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The Open Source Boob Project and subsequent stoning
This morning I find myself asked in email both what my take on the OSBP is and (in a separate message) whether or not someone can quote a comment I made on it elsewhere. People are welcome to quote me, and in fact here I will quote myself.
I am really sorry that at least one track of the widespread online discussion of this project was headlined with mean disdain and an association of it with the thousands of creepy, unsanctioned gropes and feels that many women have suffered over the years, especially at conventions. The way the people who started it have been attacked for the pure pleasure they found in opening themselves to this idea and in thinking that their thoughts and feelings about it could be shared with a larger group is nothing less than horrible. Clearly it isn't for everybody, but they never *said* it was for everybody. They also didn't claim it was without flaws, and obviously one issue with it is that people may have chosen to participate due to perceived peer pressure, and/or without understanding that the little buttons meant "I may say no" just as much as they meant "you may ask."
I also think the name of the project is not quite right, since "Open Source" traditionally means no barriers, anyone can play, and while anyone could join this project, it was about permissions and consensual contact, not about making your body a public resource or about taking away your right to control access. As I said above, it was rather the opposite.
And I think it was a good thing, and I admire my friends who started it, and I stand by them, and I am not ashamed that I was pleased to take part.
To me this was really about gender-nonspecific personal connection and permission-granting (or not granting), not women caving to the male power or notions of body-rightness.
A lot of people are concluding it was a "You had to be there" kind of thing, but it's frustrating that people clearly don't understand.
Society has been telling us women all our lives that our breasts are not our own to make decisions about--that they are inherently only for certain approved purposes and we must otherwise cover them and protect them from detailed touch or inspection with things like bras and clothing and moats and lions and tigers, if necessary, because the only person who is allowed to see and touch them is YOUR MAN and you aren't allowed to assert a non-standard set of access permissions yourself.
This project stood that on its head. It was in fact a fine case of feminist rebellion, combined with general rebellion against socially defined rules and toward opt-in interpersonal intimacy and appreciation.
I am really sorry that at least one track of the widespread online discussion of this project was headlined with mean disdain and an association of it with the thousands of creepy, unsanctioned gropes and feels that many women have suffered over the years, especially at conventions. The way the people who started it have been attacked for the pure pleasure they found in opening themselves to this idea and in thinking that their thoughts and feelings about it could be shared with a larger group is nothing less than horrible. Clearly it isn't for everybody, but they never *said* it was for everybody. They also didn't claim it was without flaws, and obviously one issue with it is that people may have chosen to participate due to perceived peer pressure, and/or without understanding that the little buttons meant "I may say no" just as much as they meant "you may ask."
I also think the name of the project is not quite right, since "Open Source" traditionally means no barriers, anyone can play, and while anyone could join this project, it was about permissions and consensual contact, not about making your body a public resource or about taking away your right to control access. As I said above, it was rather the opposite.
And I think it was a good thing, and I admire my friends who started it, and I stand by them, and I am not ashamed that I was pleased to take part.
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I am sure as hell not down with this, and expressing my viewpoint - that this is upsetting, and threatening, and is pissing me off - doesn't make me a bitch or a prude. And honestly, calling opinionated women bitches is getting old - these ones mostly aren't bitching to bitch, they're bitching because they feel threatened and/or angry at the rampant male privilege they're seeing and/or upset for another reason. I suggest that you try reading other people's posts, and not just the comments before going off half-cocked about how LJ is full of bitches.
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I'm not going to try to reexplain what I said, as it's written there just fine. But I am going to tell you several things I did not say:
I did not call anyone a bitch or a prude. No derivative of the word 'bitch' in my comment made reference to a human being, nor was any of my language gendered.
I did not say that LJ was 'full of bitches'.
I did not say that people shouldn't be upset.
I did not say that I supported the 'project'.
I did not mention what I read or didn't read.
I did not say anything about you.
If you actually wish to discuss what I said with me, I'd be okay with that. I cannot respond to the comment that you just wrote, sorry.
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Sorry, I conflated 'snark communities' with 'LJ'. I'm also sorry for the rage you got in the second paragraph - I'm a blunt person at the best of times, and I was not in a friendly, cuddly mood. I'm not sorry for the rage itself, mind, but I'm sorry that you were on the end of it.
I do still disagree that the crux of the problem is people being upset at being touched by strangers. What upsets me about this project, other than the being touched fairly intimately by strangers:
1. The breaking of protective social boundaries. There is a reason we as society do not condone strangers going to up to people and asking to touch their bodies. That's sexual harassment. That really sucks. It happens anyway but it shouldn't be encouraged or be socially acceptable.
2. The rampant privilege in the inital post itself.
3. There was other stuff, but it's early in the morning and I haven't had my coffee, so I'm going to stop here.
I submit that it's way more complicated than just 'don't touch me!', and that reducing it to that attitude is incorrect.
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Your point here is valid, and as a result I should clarify as I was being pretty general -- sorry about that.
I totally don't think that the crux of the problem is people being upset at being touched by strangers. I don't want to address the crux of the problem.
There are a LOT of problems here, obviously: the tone of
What I was kind of addressing was the poisonous level of vitriol that the threads ultimately came to. When I talk about a "DO NOT TOUCH ME" attitude, I don't mean "I am skeeved by the idea of a stranger touching my breasts".
I'm more thinking about the people who said that after reading the original posts, they would surely never go to a con. I mean the name-callers. I mean the people who seemed to be more interested in calling other people out than in getting their point across -- the severe sort of behavior that I figured
Threads where the above sort of rhetoric gets thrown around virtually never result in anyone changing their viewpoint. Nobody goes "Oh my goodness, I really kind of screwed up, didn't I? I had it wrong!" All that happens is that insults and criticisms become more and more clarified and people become more and more angry, and the people who were hoping to actually get a point across drop out.
I see a lot of the same style of 'discussion' on LJ communities where negativity or opposing something seems to be the main thrust. I believe that a similar principle that governs those communities is in effect here.
I guess that's what I'm trying to say.
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Hmm, so you think the haters caught wind of the, uh, somewhat heated discussion and all piled on? Definite possibility. This was linked all over the place. I'd never even heard of this guy before, and I ended up here.
I think the post also hit a lot of instant "HELL NO" buttons (fear, shame, somewhat violent rage...), and that definitely contributed to the level of viciousness, especially since
It's probably a mix of the two, I guess.
* The thing about the "DO NOT TOUCH ME" attitude is that I think it's a legitimate position; if you don't want to be touched, well, it's your body and you shouldn't be touched. (I was like this for awhile, for a couple of reasons, and then I went to a school where people climbed on each other as a regular thing and I was socialized out of it.) I don't think this attitude necessarily makes someone incapable of contributing in a meaningful way to this discussion.
** I also think that if this is someone's first exposure to con culture that it could genuinely act as a deterrent to getting involved with cons. I've never been to a con; it's unlikely that I'd attend a con in the near future; this made me very uncomfortable, and for me it's a moot point. If someone was kind of thinking about going to a con, and this came up and hit all the "HELL NO" buttons, well, I can understand re-thinking the con thing, even if it seems extreme from the position of someone who has actually attended a con or two.
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