It also happens to be about sex. Because, you know, only stupid girls get raped. I’m pretty floored by this one; check out Jezebelism, and then see how college blogs are reacting (“Jezebel Writers Too Smart To Be Raped”) to seeing two Jezebel bloggers go on Lizz Winstead’s show, get drunk and joke about how they don’t get raped because they’re smarter than you.
There is no sexy picture to go with this post.
The retired chancellor of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and co-discoverer of DNA James Watson recently made the abhorrent comment that Africans were genetically inferior in regards to intelligence. He later apologized for this statement. Not only was James Watson completely wrong in his thinking but also cruel and irresponsible. He is regarded as a role model in the field of molecular biology and he is socially responsible for the comments he made. Another example is the comments on gender and academia made by the former president of Harvard University, Larry Summers.
Yet I have a tough time placing these 2 idiotic Jezebel bloggers in the same camp. They made reprehensible statements in a drunkard state. Nobody made them the torch bearers or the gold standard of viewpoints in regards to inhumanity committed against women. They are 2 bit bloggers on a 2 bit website. I feel sorry for those impressionable individuals who fail to distinguish between the honest, compassionate and mature bloggers (eg. Violet blue) and those who dish out crap (eg. the Jezebellers). There will be good and bad bloggers. It is therefore the reader and not the blogger who bear the responsibility. If you the adult reader regard individuals whose verbage largely consists of “like” before any statement or whose infantile comments end with “blah, blah, blah” as role models to emulate then I seriously wonder whether you regard Tila Tequila to be an icon fighting for the rights of lesbians and bisexuals. I hope you don’t believe the excrement dished out by Fox News.
I’ve read a lot about this incident on various blogs and my feeling is, yes, it was a somewhat unfortunate incident and probably regrettable on the part of the two bloggers (and I’m not going to comment on the rape discussion b/c I don’t feel that I can truly understand how painful that must be for rape survivors) but I’m also struck by the observation that whenever a couple of women behave badly or even semi-badly, or disagree publicly, or fail to live up to the “perfect example of womanhood/feminism/journalist/mother/CEO/whatever,” it’s an indictment on the whole group and not just an individual foilable…which just goes to show how we have some more work to do on the whole equality front. I’m more outraged at the shit that women still have to put up with from the culture at large than I am about two girls who maybe had a lapse of common sense and said some things that I’m very sure they would like to take back or restate.
@Sunshine Steve:
“Jezebel is like women’s MAXIM only with more sex and gossip. How can you honestly care what they think?”
Oh, I don’t know. Because MAXIM has influenced an entire generation of men? Because there are impressionable people that believe what they see on the internet? Because the dialogue about rape and victimization is still taboo, hush-hush, and generally dismissive? Because what was said was blatantly lacking in any sense of humor, restraint, or consideration? Because it’s good to be outraged over things like this? Because there was justification for being upset about someone’s ignorant and uncalled for comments? Because making jokes about rape inherently justifies it? Because people that are victimized already feel it’s their fault, and don’t need some stupid loud bitch telling them they’re right when the rest of the world does that enough?
Gee…why would anyone be upset about that?
Amazingly stupid can best describe their attitudes.
Makes me wonder what the color of the sky is in their world.
I’m betting they never watched a close friend die from AIDS.
This whole thing is a pretty nice piece of character assassination on Liz’s part. You invite some girls over to your show that you know you disagree with, then you feed them a half dozen drinks and bring up a subject that requires a clear mind to discuss unoffensively. You bully them, and then you post the video on the internet.
I’m sorry, I really don’t see how anything they said was relevant to anything. I mean, have you actually read Jezebel? The idea that they have some sort of blogger responsibility is shit. Boing Boing has a responsibility because they have a sort of political will and aspirations of high-mindedness. This video represented Jezebel poorly, but it didn’t misrepresent them. Jezebel is like women’s MAXIM only with more sex and gossip. How can you honestly care what they think? Jesus Christ, two drunk bloggers are largely ignorant about gender politics! How dare they!
They are professional bloggers because they’re damn good snarky writers, not because they know shit about anything. Their drunken irresponsibility is part of how they made it in the first place, it’s their whole schtick, it’s what their readership wants, it’s something they can relate to. I mean, if they’d had the presence of mind to say the exact same irresponsible shit in a witty only-mildly-offensive fashion, we’d all have happily gone on ignoring them. So what are you even mad about? Yeah, the world’s unfair. Yup, and they accidentally pushed your hot button. So what you really ought to do is get up in arms and make a stink about this example of irresponsible journalists promoting terrible values to young women. What’s it to you? I’m sorry, I know there was that whole scandal last week that I didn’t care at all about, and now there’s this whole new scandal this week that I don’t care at all about, and the whole thing is so incredibly pointless. Oh shit! Someone did something naughty! This is something I can easily form an opinion about because it doesn’t actually require serious thought or research! Let’s talk about it like forever on every blog everywhere!
What we’ve got here is an attempt to culturally regulate behavior. No! No! Bad slut! Bad! No joking about what I don’t find funny! And use some goddamn protection, you filthy whore! God, I only hope that someday I can make a faux pas that makes a big stink. But me, I’m just so goddamn likable and RIGHT all the time, I don’t think it’ll ever happen.
Pardon me, I hear someone is wrong on the internet…
I’ve been raped. I spent the better part of my childhood in fear of my father after watching him rape his girlfriend when I was all of 5. Three of my best friends have been raped. And quite frankly, my crew has a lot more street smarts, people smarts, and book smarts than Tracie clearly possesses.
I can’t even describe how offensive this is to me. Because having witnessed this, I can’t think of more irresponsible, arrogant, and flat out inexcusable commentary. The fact that Tracie was trying to “use humor” to discuss RAPE is astounding to me. What’s next? Getting drunk and proclaiming, “Only stupid Jews get massacred. They should have had more education.” I don’t even see her as trying to be funny. It’s clear that she’s not and this is a lame attempt at covering it up. And really, being drunk is no excuse.
And now this is out there, where the thousands of young girls who are looking for something to get through the hell that is being abused can find some stupid bitch telling them “Well if you were smart like me, then it wouldn’t have happened.”
I’ve been thinking a lot about blogger responsibility lately due to the BB-drama, but really–I can think of NOTHING more irresponsible than Tracie’s comments. Jesus.
In Tracie’s blog, she says she was attempting humor by saying things about how only unintuitive girls are at risk for rape, etc., and that it fell flat because she was drunk. At the very least, I think this is overwhelming proof that being drunk for a video interview is a bad idea. And Tracie may be a writer, but she’s NOT a comedian. So her drunk attempt at humor not only fell flat, it came off as very smug and ignorant.
I agree with Liz, that Tracie’s lucky she’s never been raped. I’m lucky in that respect too, but I know it, and am thankful for it. I know that no matter how smart or intuitive you are, it cannot always save you from being victimized. I was beaten by adults as a little girl. My intelligence and intuition couldn’t save me. I know people who think the Kung Fu I now study & love is “icky” because it’s violent. I just tell myself they’re lucky that they have the luxury to feel that way.
I can’t believe anyone actually *reads* Jezebel anyway. I read one or two articles, and after the one where they wrote about how much condoms sucked and sex without condoms was awesome I stopped. I thought it was completely irresponsible, and to be blunt, I find most of the writers and a good chunk of the readers to be dumb bitches. Only dumb bitches say things like “I’m like, too smart to be raped.”