Saturday, March 14, 2009

Ooh, I'll play along!

Sometimes I feel so good, it feels strange to be grouchy. Today was so beautiful; the sun was glorious, the earth smelled fresh, the seeds on my windowsill are sprouting, work flew by and I had a song on my lips all day. (Well, a Marylin Manson song. Still counts.)

But grouchiness is its own reward and also one of the major themes of this blog, so I present my answers to Twisty Faster's Snarky Little Survey. (It's long and repetitive so there's some skipping.)

On special occasions, or when he’s seeking your approval, does your boyfriend or husband dance provocatively in lacy satin lingerie and a pair of Christian Louboutin pumps, the price of which would shock you?
No. Then again, neither do I, for chrissakes. But sometimes I dance filthily in sexy clothes just for the fun of it, and so do a lot of guys I like.

In school, were most of the assigned books written by poor women of color?
Most? I spose we should've had more (although frankly some of the high-school writing by disenfranchised authors didn't have much else to recommend it as literature and was clearly thrown in for that reason alone), but most doesn't even make sense.

When you go deer hunting, does your boyfriend or husband visit the spa for an herbal wrap, a facial, and a pedi?
No, but for shit's sake, neither does the reverse happen. I'm not Carrie Fucking Bradshaw, and you know what? Neither are most women. I don't understand why this feminist blog is assuming that most women are shallow enough--or privileged enough--to actually do this stereotypical nonsense.

Is your boyfriend, husband, or father afraid to walk alone at night?
Unarmed? In this neighborhood? Yeah.

Would your boyfriend or husband continue to raise your kids and keep house for you if you stopped putting out?
Yeah, it's called marriage.

[joke removed for being beneath even me, but too funny to actually remove]

After the presidential inauguration, when your boyfriend, husband, or father had a light lunch with the girls, did the subject of Michelle Obama’s outfit come up?
Jesus, Twisty, where did you get your fucking image of women from? The last time I had a light lunch with the girls, we were talking about hiking, guns, Medicaid, and heavy metal. We're people, yanno, Twisty.

Does your boyfriend, husband, or father take steps to eliminate his “feminine odor”?
No, that would be silly. But they do have to take some serious steps about that masculine odor.

Does your boyfriend, husband, or father ever try to appease you by tilting his head and giggling?
Come on, Twist, do you seriously fucking think women do this? Have you ever met a woman?

Is your boyfriend, husband, or father expected to wear makeup and heels to work?
Hangon, lemme unzip my hi-viz bomber jacket and kick off my steel-toes and I'll answer this.

Does your boyfriend, husband, or father carry a can of pepper spray in his purse?
Nah, just a Glock 19.

When your boyfriend or husband buys a cute new bag, is he crestfallen when you fail to notice?
Hmm, maybe she doesn't think we're all Carrie Bradshaw, maybe Twisty just thinks all women except her (and some "short-sighted privileged exceptions assuming the whole world is like them," amiright?) are fourteen fucking years old.

Are you OK with it if your boyfriend or husband gains a little weight, because curvy men turn you on?
Yep. :)

Does your boyfriend, husband, or father clean the toilets with harsh chemicals?
Oh noes, not "harsh chemicals"! After the Femynist Revylution, rose water and happy thoughts will be sufficient to remove caked-on bacteria-covered grime!

Is your boyfriend, husband, or father a primary school teacher, a nanny, a maid, or a stay-at-home mom because he finds it so gratifying to make personal sacrifices for others that he doesn’t mind the low or non-existent pay?
Yeah, fuck teachers and caregivers, freakin' suckers don't know what's good for 'em.

Do you send your boyfriend, husband, or father email forwards describing rape avoidance techniques?
Well, sometimes, if they're funny.

Does lipstick scientifically formulated with ginkgo biloba, licorice, and tea tree oil give your boyfriend’s or husband’s lips a fuller, plumper, more kissable look?
Yes. I have pictures.



The main point of this doofy-ass "survey" seems to be that women (because of the Patriarchy!) are all silly little hens that flutter about preening and clucking. That's very feminist.

17 comments:

  1. Wow... I would LOVE to see Twisty square off against Marko Kloos...

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  2. You know, I actually AM a man AND a child care worker. The pay is better than my last job, and I have fun (most days) taking care of the kids. Take that, Twisty!

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  3. I am a curvy male schoolteacher who carries a bag and cleans his toilet with harsh chemicals (if you think the chemicals are harsh, wait'll you see what MRSA looks like.)

    It's the smallest special-interest victim group EVER.

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  4. Strings - Hm. I hadn't heard of Marko Kloos, but from a glance at his blog it appears he's fairly grounded in reality. So yes.

    M. Derosier and Don Gwinn - I've read enough of this shit that I can anticipate the response: "Yes, but as a man you're doing it by choice and thinking you're so special for doing it, not like women for whom it's just an expectation!"

    Yeah, I realize I didn't base that on any information other than your gender, but really, what else could I possibly need to know?

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  5. The thing that gets me about Twisty (and a lot of "feminists" like her) is that their assumptions about women who aren't members of their club are at least as sexist as the crap you hear from MRA.

    I'm a woman. I work in housekeeping because it was that or retail and the idea of working in retail is enough to make me want to slit my wrists. I don't bat my eyes, giggle, or wear expensive lingerie. My husband owns more clothing than I do, I don't have a clue what Michelle Obama wore to the inauguration, and I haven't worn makeup since Halloween.

    I also don't have to delude myself that any of the above makes me a warrior on the front lines of feminism. It's sad that Twisty does.

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  6. Aebhel - Exactly. When I talk about wearing men's clothes, talking about things besides fashion, being on equal footing with boyfriends, I don't think that makes me special. Girls all around me are doing the same thing and not giving themself Femynist Warriyr Medyls of Honyr.

    I also see a lot of classism in Twisty's attitude-- you can't expect a mere housekeeper to understand her own oppression, the poor dear.

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  7. Heh. I at one point had a long argument with a guy who had gotten his gf some dippy lingerie and wanted her to wear it, and was deeply nonplussed by her response of, "What's in it for me?" He was all, 'But women like lingerie, right?! What's wrong with her?' I think I managed to beat through his skull eventually that just because a kink (like lingerie) is socially normal, that doesn't make it not a kink.

    As for the wacky sitcom privilege women, when I see Twisty pulling that sort of shit I just remember that she lives on inherited money on a ranch, which means that her notion of what ordinary people are like may be a bit lacking. It's always nice when the elites come slumming, eh wot?

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  8. Another reason why I firmly believe the vast majority of feminists are really women of means who don't give a good Goddamn about working folks, male or female.

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  9. I also see a lot of classism in Twisty's attitude-- you can't expect a mere housekeeper to understand her own oppression, the poor dear.

    Freaking seriously. That always gets on my nerves, because it's like they don't fully comprehend that it's a job. I actually get paid to be there; I'm not just doing it for the warm fuzzies. And yes, I do prefer it to customer service, but that's probably because unlike Twisty I don't find manual labor inherently demeaning.

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  10. Bruno - The funny part is that when we had our big kerfluffle, her followers repeatedly accused me of being "blind to your own privilege."

    However, I don't want to play the "who's more miserably poor and oppressed" game, because that's not really the point; there's nothing wrong with being rich and I'd love to do it myself someday. I just wouldn't be a condescending dipshit about it.

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  11. Congratulations on snarking this. I don't think I could have. I would have just been sitting there wondering what color the sky was on her planet.

    I just, what? Stingray would divorce me if I acted like she apparently thinks is expected of women.

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  12. You shouldn't take Twisty's questionnaire literally, but in the deeply ironic sense in which it was intended. Obviously, she meant it to address the gazillion women inoculated with the feminine construct that the media bombards us with, relentlessly so. The fact that it's inconceivable to turn it around--that it somehow seems ridiculous to ask these questions of men but not of women--is the lesson to take home. Jeez, it's not a real questionnaire!
    (Came here via Figleaf, but won't be returning.)

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  13. Anon - My point is that it's equally ridiculous to ask these questions of women. "When he goes deer hunting, do you visit the spa for an herbal wrap, a facial, and a pedi?" is not pointing out something real women really fall prey to, it's merely some crazy-ass stereotype in Twisty's head.

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  14. I'm sort of amused that dear anony-leaving-now there missed the raving sexism of asking those questions of women, but hey, well, whatever.

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  15. Oh but Dw3t, don't you get it, it's irony, which Dear Beloved Twisty invented just last week and no one else could possibly be engaging in.

    Anyway I think the intended effect is for me to slap my forehead and go "oh, what a fool I've been, getting these pedicures while the menfolk handled the important things in life," and... yeah. (Or more likely, to go "oh, what fools those less enlightened women than me are, getting pedicures etc.") If that's not hilariously retro-sexist, I just don't know what is.

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  16. On my livejournal I have an icon tagged 'Martian anthropologist' for all those moments when I feel like a total space alien dealing with other people. It's fairly rare for me to run into people who I'm convinced are the ones who are from a different planet.

    I mean, I just wind up thinking stuff like, "I'm pretty sure the only thing I've appeased with head-tilting recently was a screaming conure in the pet shop, and that's because head-tilting is how you say 'Hi there!' in parrot, and it was freaking out because it couldn't see anything else that spoke parrot. :P"

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  17. Does your boyfriend, husband, or father clean the toilets with harsh chemicals?

    Fuck yes I do! What's the fun of cleaning if you can't use chemicals with unpronouncable names and power tools?

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