Wow

[catsittingstill]

Powerful, powerful piece on reproductive violence (probably not triggery) here at Tiger Beatdown.

Check out the comments too--very interesting stuff, including the perspective from some women in Europe. 

I may have to start reading this site more regularly.

Comments

[lil-shepherd.livejournal.com]

I knew that it was bad in the States, and I knew about the way Congress is trying to subvert Roe vs Wade, but that site really brings it home.

Yet here the argument is mainly about whether kids of 14 should have the pill without consulting their parents...

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I wish I lived in a sane country. Unfortunately a lot of the Puritans who left Europe settled here.

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

Come on over! Ah,if only it was so easy (

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

Good grief. I knew the USA was weird in some ways, especially about not treating health care as a basic human right, but that's ridiculous!

Nice to see an intelligently written article followed by intelligent comments, anyway.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I was very struck by the article and comments (which was why I posted a link to it) myself.

It really brought home to me how many women and girls have been heavily socialized to think that birth control is not something they are entitled to as a matter of course, but some sort of special privilege they must beg for and earn.

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

I knew (well, expected) that was the case in third-world countries and those under misogynistic religious rule. It hadn't previously occured to me that that included the USA.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

:-( The Republicans count as misogynistic religious rule, I'm afraid. And some of the Democrats buy into it.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

Very triggery for me, actually, despite the fact that I've never had to have an abortion, take Plan B, or do any coaxing to get a man to wear a condom. That writer's life is still the stuff of nightmares, as far as I'm concerned. But you're definitely right about it being powerful. And I've been on the receiving end of enough of the "normalized sexual or reproductive violence" that she was talking about to understand perfectly, even if it wasn't the same kinds she experienced.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry that I misjudged how triggery it was.

I was thinking of rape when I wrote that, and to me it was eye-opening to see how many things that fall short of that are still trampling on a woman's right to believe that she is a human being, who deserves to be safe and to have only lovers who care that she is safe and happy.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

I'm glad your experience leaves you still able to be surprised by stuff like that, Cat. *hug*

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

In terms of sexual partners I was pretty lucky--partly I think because I just hit puberty so late myself, so by the time I had a boyfriend I was nearly eighteen and some of this abusive stuff just couldn't take root.

But still, let's say some of this stuff was less surprising than others. And some of what was surprised me as I was reading the piece was not the stuff that happened to them or to me in the past, but the way I find I feel about it now, looking back.

Like "of course I deserve to be safe and comfortable and happy and anyone who loves me wants that for me, so why did I put up with some of that shit?"

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I understand that. I spent ten years convincing myself that my marriage couldn't really be abusive, because I only actually got hit a few times and he didn't try to stop me from going places or seeing people. I look at some of what did happen and go, "I was a reasonably well-educated, feminist-raised woman, near 30 when I married, and I STILL managed to make myself believe this s---?!?"