Jessica Jones, Sex Robots for Jesus, and the Love/Respect Binary

I. SEX ROBOTS FOR JESUS

What causes someone to voluntarily become a sex robot for Jesus?

I once listened in horror to a podcast subtitled A Good Woman's View of Sex on the Love and Respect Podcast that appeared to answer just this question. 

She doesn't need your respect. Photo via collider.com

If you're not familiar with Love and Respect, it is a popular Christian marriage book written by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs. The book purports to rescue and redeem marriages through the universal application of a simple gender binary: 

Women need love; Men need respect ("desperately"—his word, not mine). It's all based on this verse:

However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. (Ephesians 5:33)

Although Eggerichs repeatedly says in the book and throughout the "Love and Respect" franchise that both men and women need both love and respect, his application of these two concepts proves otherwise.

Essentially, he places any need or desire women have for respect and puts it under the heading "love." He places any need or desire men have for love and puts it under the heading "respect." A woman's core need is love. A man's core need is respect. If you put a gun to a man's head and asked him to choose, he would choose respect; if you put a gun to a woman's head and...you get the idea. If I just keep saying this over and over again, you'll eventually buy into it, right?

The truly "revolutionary" concept in "Love and Respect" is not the idea that husbands should love their wives (which as Eggerichs points out, is old hat by this point), but the idea the wives should unconditionally respect their husbands (109). 

Yeah, you heard that right. Husbands deserve unconditional respect, especially when they are undeserving. 

It's important to emphasize here that in this context respect has everything to do with power. The key to respect is for the wife to consistently demonstrate by word, deed, and tone of voice (or even better, silence) that her husband is in a hierarchically superior position within the marriage. 

A man's power is his God-given right. A woman's power lies in respecting her husband—she gives power away (unconditionally) in order to get it back. Make sense? I didn't think so. 

Now, back to A Good Woman's View of Sex, which is, now that I think of it, demonstrably the worst possible title for this podcast. 

In the podcast, a good woman writes in (we'll call her "Martha") to describe a painful marriage. Martha believed that in order to honor God and be a good Christian wife, she needed to make every effort to meet her husband's sexual needs.

Therefore, she went from "never saying no to sex," because that would be sinful, to initiating sex with her husband every third day, without fail, although he continued to treat her poorly. Basically, he came to expect regular sex. He refused to ever initiate, but would subtly punish her if she didn't offer herself up to him every third day.

In her letter, Martha describes weeping uncontrollably in the shower, knowing that sex would be expected of her that day—knowing that if she did not initiate as expected, her husband would treat her with even more coldness and contempt than usual.

This story is upsetting—this wasn't just a woman submitting to unwanted sex with a selfish and emotionally distant husband because "that's what Jesus would want," but a woman who took it a step further and became the only person in the marriage to initiate sex—emotionally (possibly physically) painful sex that she did not want, but believed God required of her.

In essence, she became a sex slave within her own marriage.

Okay, now we get to the good part. How do Eggerichs and his son Jonathan Eggerichs respond to this letter? Do they mention the concept of self-respect? Do they tell Martha that no, Jesus does not require her to die emotionally every third day in order to meet her husband's sexual needs? Do they perhaps suggest that Martha's husband might want to be married to and have sex with a fully realized, equal human being with thoughts, feelings, inclinations, or a will of her own? And if that doesn't interest him, she should think about getting out of what sounds like an abusive marriage?

No. No, they do not.

Instead, Emerson Eggerichs says stuff like, "I honor you for your obedience to Christ" and "If you worship Christ in the sexually intimate area, [. . .] you are touching Christ's heart" and "this is a good-hearted woman" (refer back to the title of the podcast). At one point, he calls a wife like Martha a "goldmine" for sexually starved husbands everywhere. Most husbands would kill for such regular sexual activity. Who cares that she has to shut down every other aspect of her humanity?

"Love and Respect" the book devotes an entire chapter to "Sexuality—Appreciate His Desire for Sexual Intimacy." Because everything in this book is drawn along a gender binary, men have sexual needs and women have emotional needs. For men, "sex is symbolic of his deeper need—respect" (250). Eggerichs equates respect with sex, and let us not forget the oft-repeated phrase "unconditional respect."

Although Martha's story might seem like an outlier, it's hard not to see it instead as the logical conclusion of "unconditional respect": unconditional sex, or "Sex Robots for Jesus."

Now, let's talk about Jessica Jones.

Watching the new Netflix series was as bracing as the Atlantic ocean in December. I've never seen the issue of abuse tackled like this before—somehow it takes a woman with superhuman powers to show the effects of mental, emotional, physical, and sexual abuse. Jessica is nobody's fool, but even her superhuman abilities and dour wit don't save her from the harrowing trauma of an abusive relationship.

What the show makes plain is that mental and emotional coercion can be just as powerful as the threat of actual physical violence.

Kilgrave abuses Jessica through the use of mind control. He wines and dines her as his perfect, ideal woman, going on and on about how much he "loves" her even as he turns her into his sex slave. As the show demonstrates, the worst kind of emotional and mental abuse eventually destroys a person's will. It breaks down their humanity. Over time, they have no willpower left to resist the abuse, no ability to say, "No."

Christian marriage advice, on the other hand, uses spiritual coercion to guilt women into unwanted sex. It's essentially a form of mind control—the woman submits her will to the "will of God," losing some of her own humanity in the process.

If you tell a devout Christian woman, "This is what God requires," you don't need to put a knife to her throat.

So when you encourage a woman to treat herself as less than human—when you praise her for making herself into a sex robot whose only purpose is to "respect" her husband by meeting his sexual needs—when you tell her that Jesus is pleased—then yes, you are encouraging and enabling abuse.

II. RESPECTING YOUR ABUSER

Ending an abusive relationship (that I initially didn't recognize as abusive) has caused me to more carefully examine words like "love" and "respect."

I've learned that if someone does not respect you as a human being, they cannot love you. Lack of respect, not lack of affection or care (often confused with love) is the cause of abuse. And as bell hooks puts it, "Love and abuse cannot coexist."

In "Love and Respect," Eggerichs addresses the question of whether his conception of "respect" will cause abuse:

Will the concept of biblical hierarchy lead to abuse? [...] Yes, this is possible, but because it is possible does not mean a woman should refuse to allow her husband to be the head. If a husband is evil-willed, the abuse will happen anyway, no matter what the family structure is. Any hierarchical role given to him has nothing to do with the abuse. The evil-willed man always treats those around him abusively (207).

I absolutely disagree. Shrugging and saying "Evil be evil" or "Abusers gonna abuse" is both misleading and f***ing irresponsible. 

Eggerichs fails to admit that he is putting powerful, ready-made, "biblical" (his word) tools into the hands of the abuser. Will reading "Love and Respect" turn an ordinary man into an abusive jerk? Doubtful. But an abusive man would have a field day with the concepts presented, and could easily use them to further control and manipulate his wife or girlfriend.

Here's why:

The words "love" and "respect" are deliberate. They are words favored by abusers.

I can't stop hearing Kilgrave's voice in my head:

"Jessica! Jessica! I love you!"

Nightmares for days

My abuser said the same thing (minus the Jessica part). He told me, "I still love you." And then he indirectly threatened me (but only because he was trying to help me and he didn't want to see me suffer!)

Hearing "I love you" from an abuser creates a huge amount of cognitive dissonance: "But he told me he loved me! Over and over again with tears in his eyes!"

Only when I began to see that the "love" itself was abuse did the fog start to lift.

And then there's that other word: respect. I've written about how another abusive man in my life used to repeatedly say, "You don't respect me!" By "respect" he meant exactly what Eggerichs means in "Love and Respect". He meant, "You don't submit your will to me. You don't treat me as being above you. You won't give in to me."

You see, respect as Eggerichs conceives of it—that is, the respect men "desperately need"—is always a hierarchical value. Men need this kind of respect in order to feel like men. It's an odd setup, where men are the more powerful entities (by God's design), but without a woman following them around all the time telling them how much they respect them, men collapse emotionally, spiritually, and probably sexually (Eggerichs writes that "respect beats a dose of Viagra any day!"). It's a spiritual variation on a common theme: men need women to prop up their fragile egos.

I can still remember the time I told my ex-boyfriend that I respected him. He lit up like a Christmas tree. I don't even know why I said it—maybe the love/respect doctrine had trickled down to me somehow. I had just confronted him with some things that he had said and done that troubled me—so perhaps this was my way of restoring equilibrium in the relationship.

I wonder whether I used "respect" like Trish Walker does with Kilgrave in "Jessica Jones"—to prevent him from turning, and tearing me to pieces. Now, this is a type of respect that I can relate to—the kind of respect that I pretend with men so that they will stop hating me, stop abusing me, stop treating me with contempt, or just simply leave me alone. Did my "respect" keep my ex-boyfriend from treating me abusively later on? No. It didn't.

Joy Eggerichs, the daughter of Emerson and Sarah Eggerichs, talks candidly on her website (billed as "Love and Respect" for the current generation) about being in an abusive dating relationship where the guy would tell her she was being disrespectful in order to manipulate her. By her own account, she went to her parents and asked them if she was really being disrespectful.

Luckily, she got out of that relationship. But here's my question: Why would Joy (as an adult, presumably) need the outside validation of her parents to confirm that she was being manipulated? Why would the progeny of the love/respect dynasty fall prey to a common tactic of abusive men?

Perhaps because the only guidance that "Love and Respect" gives about abuse is that we need to somehow discern between "good-willed" people and evil people, without giving any real guidance on how to tell the difference.

III. LOVE AND RESPECT AND ABUSE

Eggerichs grants that at times, women might need to submit to God instead of to their husbands, for example, in cases of physical abuse.

Later on, however, he relates the story of one woman who went back to her previously abusive husband (he repented), but was still struggling to show him respect. She writes:

My heart's desire is to win my husband to the Lord through my respectful behavior. I must admit I have to "mull over" some of your teaching, but it IS biblically based, and the Holy Spirit keeps revealing my rebellion, contempt, disobedience, etc. I keep asking the Lord for strength to implement your suggestions, and He is so faithful!

This letter creeps me out.

Basically, the husband abused his wife, but she is the one who needs to work on her rebellion, contempt, and disobedience. This reeks of Stockholm syndrome. Any time a thought arises within this woman's mind that even hints at self-respect, anger, or, I don't know, boundaries around being abused, she beats it down as a sign of rebellion—against God!

And this is not the first abused wife in the book jonesing for more ways to unconditionally respect her husband. In another story, a woman emails Eggerichs wanting more resources and guidance about respect, but fails to mention how her husband once threw a dish at her, cutting her face.

Eggerichs' response to her selective account of her marriage: "What a woman!"

I'm not kidding. Her husband threw a plate at her face and she needed to learn more about how to respect him (he apparently repented while sitting in jail).

The connection between "Love and Respect" and abuse is not a coincidence. The false binary between love and respect is textbook spiritual abuse—"scriptural" mind control.

IV. CONTEMPT IS FOR WOMEN

Eggerichs deliberately uses the word "contempt" only in the context of a wife having or showing contempt for her husband—as if contempt, the opposite of respect, were a gendered phenomenon.

Women treat men with "contempt" (the word or its variations appears a total of 48 times in the book, always gendered female), while men are "harsh" (20 times, gendered male). Notice that women are described as contemptuous more than twice as often as men are described as harsh.

Men are never described as having or showing contempt for their wives. Why is that? My theory: It is impossible to show contempt for someone who is already beneath you, see also the phrase "beneath contempt." Eggerichs encodes his own misogynistic attitudes into his use of language.

It goes further: women are overwhelmingly portrayed as the ones responsible for marital problems and strife. I believe this is also deliberately gendered: women are the ones expected to buy the marriage books. They are the ones who should shoulder the emotional burden of improving a troubled marriage—see the previous two stories from women who were abused. 

Eggerichs' overwhelmingly gendered use of the word "contempt" sends women a clear message: It's your fault; it's your responsibility.

On the Love and Respect Now blog, writer and former missionary Alece Ronzino writes about her husband at the time literally throwing the book "Love and Respect" at her and saying, "Maybe this will teach you how to respect me like you should instead of accusing me of having an affair."

What do you know. He was having an affair.

Mindblowingly, Alece concludes this story by affirming her own ongoing struggle to respect her ex-husband despite his manipulation, abuse, and infidelity.

Yes. The moral of the story is: How do I continue to show respect to a man who has betrayed me and treated me with overwhelming contempt?

In a way, I appreciate the incredible effort Joy and Alece make to shoehorn even this traumatic story into the love/respect binary.

But on the other hand, someone throwing a book titled "Love and Respect" at you is the equivalent of a gigantic, neon, glowing sign that reads, "GET THE F*** OUT OF THIS ABUSIVE RELATIONSHIP", not a gentle suggestion that maybe you need to learn some respect.

Trying to demonstrate unconditional respect to a person who is only interested in manipulating and abusing you is, needless to say, a very, very bad idea. Telling an abuser or a controlling person, "I respect you," doesn't tend to make them less abusive or controlling. Instead, as I found in my own personal experience, they are more likely to escalate the abuse.

If you are in an abusive relationship, the last question on your mind should be, "How do I respect my abuser?" That's hyperbolically equivalent to asking during an attempted murder, "How do I show my murderer that I genuinely admire his skill with a knife? Perhaps a mid-stab compliment is in order."

Notice that I used the "C" word to describe how a man treated a woman. I think my use is perfectly valid, and anyone who tries to convince you that it is impossible for a man to have or show contempt for a woman is either delusional or has a deeper agenda at stake.

Going back to Martha's story, I can't imagine a greater expression of contempt for another human being than to use her body but reject everything else about her.

What Eggerichs and Eggerichs fail to acknowledge in their podcast is that this woman's supposedly godly and praiseworthy behavior only caused her husband to treat her even more like a sexual object and less like a human being.

V. SEX ROBOTS AGAIN

As far as I can tell from reading Joy's comment on Alece's post, women can potentially save "disobedient" men by showing them respect. But it doesn't always work. Sometimes people are just evil (there's that helpful advice again).

Wives saving their disobedient husbands through unconditional respect is a huge theme in "Love and Respect," based on these verses:

In the same way, you wives, be submissive to your own husbands so that even if any of them are disobedient to the word, they may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives, as they observe your chaste and respectful behavior. (NASB, 1 Peter 3:1-2)

Which Eggerichs shortens to:

The apostle Peter reveals that husbands who "are disobedient to the word" (meaning they are undeserving of respect) "may be won . . . by . . . respectful behavior."

Notice that the burden is on the wife to save her husband. And how does one save a husband? By having sex with him as often as possible—um, I mean, by respecting him.

Eggerichs' comments in the "Good Woman" podcast make so much more sense now—Martha is literally worshipping God by having sex with her husband. She may be dying on the inside, but all that matters is that her vagina is winning him to the Lord.

Eggerichs claims that it's not like she's being "tortured" or "crucified" or anything. I feel like the fact that he even uses these words implies the opposite. She is crucifying her own will. She is crucifying her emotions. She is crucifying her body. She is emotionally tortured every three days over a two year period.

And to be consistent here, isn't that what women are supposed to do? Be Jesus for their husbands? Die a little more each day so that he might "live"?*

Sex Robot = Sex Martyr

VI. LOVE AND RESPECT AND JESUS

I have yet to read a single story in the entire love/respect canon that describes a woman standing up for herself and saying, "No." No, I will not abused. No, I will not stay in a situation that puts my life at risk. No, I will not stay in a marriage in which I am emotionally and sexually degraded.

Women are being counseled to trust the love/respect doctrine over their own self-preservation instincts—and I'm not just talking about life-threatening situations, though of course those exist.

I'm talking about preserving your life—your emotional, spiritual, rational self—precisely the self that abuse seeks to destroy. Precisely the self that, according to Christianity, Jesus died to save.

And that's probably the primary reason that "Love and Respect" the franchise makes me so f***ing angry, and what makes it so spiritually abusive at its core:

"Love and Respect" uses the gospel of Christianity to keep women enslaved in hierarchical, if not abusive, relationships, where they are told to subjugate their anger, their intuition, their analytical abilities, their desire for meaningful work and a career, their sexuality, their bodies, their voices, and their facial expressions* to the overriding goal of "respecting" their husbands.

So I'm going to call "Love and Respect" what it is: a false doctrine. Idolatry. A dangerous, misogynistic, and abusive ideology masquerading as the biblical, magic pill solution to all male/female relationships.

VII. LOVE WITHOUT RESPECT IS ABUSE

It feels ironic to read a book about how much men need respect when I've been writing about how disrespected I've felt in relationships with Christian men.

Usually, love or romantic feelings are used to justify or gloss over disrespectful behavior—so that the men who have treated me the most abusively or disrespectfully are also the ones who have expressed the most love, affection, and attraction.

When a man tells me that he "respects" me, it's usually after he has treated me in an incredibly disrespectful way—this seems to indicate that men understand how manipulative the words "I respect you" can be.

I've struggled with how to characterize this lack of respect for women in the Christian world. It's more than a simple lack of respect. It's not even contempt, because "contempt" implies that you actually see the other person.

I think it really comes down to the idea that women are less human or not fully human. This is the only way I can explain the abuse, especially as it coexists with "love." It's the only way I can describe a man who violates my boundaries even as he sheds crocodile tears over the depth of his love for me.

"Jessica Jones" captures just how terrifying it is to have such a man tell you he loves you.

Give me respect any day.









*Eggerichs makes a huge meal out of the fact that men are willing to die for their wives. He uses this willingness to die to justify a man's inherently superior station in the marital hierarchy. I once watched a baffling video clip of him telling women something like, "Remember that your husband would die for you. He may never open up to you emotionally, but he would die for you" as if this were somehow sufficient consolation for having an emotionally distant husband. I just picture lonely women rocking themselves to sleep every night saying over and over again, "He would die for me, he would die for me, he would die for me..."

Given the statistical probability of a man ever having to die for his wife, what about the slow death of living in an abusive or unloving relationship? What was that saying again: "Death by 1,000 Cuts."

*"A simple application is that a wife is to display a respectful facial expression and tone when he fails to be the man she wants" (43)

*"Right or wrong, men interpret their world through the respect grid, and a wife's softened tone and facial expressions can do more for her marriage than she can imagine."

*"Love and Respect" includes two letters from wives who have learned how to control their facial expressions (191, 302) and the glowing effect it has had on their marriages.

All pages numbers are from the Kindle edition of "Love and Respect."

Three Reasons Christians Make Dating Weird

We had been dating for a few months when he brought up the question of whether we were "boyfriend and girlfriend."

Does this mean we get to hold hands now? [Photo by Brett Sayer]

This was soon followed by, "So should we call my parents? Book a flight back home so you can meet them?"

I was confused—it felt like something we might do if we were engaged, not just officially exclusive.

We had gone on two dates (different guy, because I really get around) when he tried to shove his tongue down my throat when we hugged goodbye.

I was confused—we had seen each other in person exactly three times. Was there some memo about making out on the third meeting that I hadn't received because of a glitch in the Christian worldwide dating protocol server?

Christians. They make dating weird.

It feels like I'm stating the obvious, but dating while Christian can feel like swimming in a pool full of jello, snapping turtles and dynamite—except that getting out with all your extremities is the least of your problems.

From side hugs to guys who won't date you but will let you wash their socks as they pour out their hopes and dreams, Christian dating is just weird.

Why? Here are three reasons:

1. Traditional gender roles

I have heard so many Christian women say some version of either, "No one asks me out" or "I want to be pursued" (including me). Unfortunately, this can extend to every phase of dating—if no one asks you out, then you don't date.

Ever.

Even expressing interest in a guy is suspect—because isn't he supposed to pursue you, as God meant for male/female relationships to play out, from the Garden of Eden on? Adam didn't have to pursue Eve, and look what happened to them.

In this construct, Christian women have to come up with extremely roundabout and sneaky ways to communicate interest in a guy—signals that the guy is somehow supposed to pick up on.

"Would you like to, um, go to Bible study together on Thursday?"
or
"I would love to get your exegetical take on 1 Corinthians 13."

This is all very confusing and great for angsty, 2AM conversations with friends. Not so great for actual dating.

2. Sex

I don't know if I can really explore here all the ways that sex makes Christian dating weird.

There's this idea floating around that if you hold out for marriage, you will have (amazing) sex. No wonder Christians are marriage-obsessed.

Awesome married sex is predicated on how much I save my body for my future husband or wife. If I hold hands with you and we don't get married, does that mean I'm cheating on my future spouse? What if we kiss? Every act of physical intimacy is potentially cheating.

On the flip side, I've encountered guys who grab me and try to kiss me when I've given no indication of interest. At best, it's awkward. At worst, I feel like my boundaries are invisible or irrelevant. The guy has no interest in my comfort level or what I want.

3. Marriage

The threat of marriage hangs over every, "Will you go to coffee with me?", every tentative flirtation, every first, second, 20th date.

Marriage plus gender stereotypes mean that every girl is gunning for a dress, a cake, and a husband in that order and every guy is too scared to actually ask anyone out.

Because marriage is everything, we ask the wrong questions at the wrong time.

At the beginning of a relationship, instead of asking, "Do I like him?", "Do I enjoy her sense of humor?", "Do we have fun together?"—

We ask, "Could I marry her?", "Do we want the same number of kids?", "I wonder what he thinks about living on a farm in New Zealand and raising llamas?", "Do I like her laugh or will it drive me insane after 45+ years?", "OH MY GOD WHAT IF I HAVE TO SPEND THE REST OF MY LIFE CRINGING EVERY TIME WE WATCH THE OFFICE GET ME OUT OF HERE I CAN'T BREATHE."

Ahem.

It's enough to make any sane, commitment-phobic girl bolt.

How do we make Christian dating less weird? I feel like that is fodder for a different post.

More about dating:

Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - Anger

10 Reasons You Should Think Twice About Dating Someone Who Goes to Your Church

Women, Men & Mixed Messages

Photo by John Wiley 

So, I came across this quote on a guy's online dating profile. Although there was no attribution, I instantly knew where it came from: the infamous "Sexodus" article that inspired this response.

This same gentleman states in his profile: "I believe in gender equality, feminists need not apply"--which is hilarious in its own right. 

But I am not here to make fun of some random guy on the internet (okay, maybe just a little bit). I am here to dissect this passage of text, because I was an English major and that's what you do.

Besides, I'm fascinated by what provoked a guy to quote it at length on his online dating profile.

Surely, there must be something here--something compelling that resembles an actual thought. Because at first glance, I'm feeling a bit dubious. 

Here's the quote, presented completely out of context because that is how I found it: 

"Women have been sending men mixed messages for the last few decades, leaving boys utterly confused about what they are supposed to represent to women, which perhaps explains the strong language some of them use when describing their situation. As the role of breadwinner has been taken away from them by women who earn more and do better in school, men are left to intuit what to do, trying to find a virtuous mean between what women say they want and what they actually pursue, which can be very different things."

"Women" - Who are these women? Do women represent some monolithic entity that speaks and acts as one, has a unified message and point of view, perhaps holds secret, underground meetings about the mixed messages they plan on sending men to keep them confused and under gynocentric control? [If you are part of this underground society, please email me. I bet you guys have awesome snacks.]

"Men" - Also presumably a monolithic entity representing all male humans.

"Mixed messages" - I'm so intrigued. What are these mixed messages and how can I start sending them. Seriously feeling out of the loop here. Was it that time I contradicted myself and said I like Coke better than Pepsi? Sorry about that.

"The last few decades" - I feel like the timeline here is a bit vague: So...starting in roughly the year 1985, women started sending men mixed messages:

Man: What do you want to eat?
Woman: Italian. No, Chinese. No, Korean BBQ. No...I take that back, Italian.
Man: God, Woman, make up your mind!!!

I could see how this would be frustrating, but unless there is a memo out there from "All Women" to "All Men," I'm not sure how the author can prove this multi-decade mixed-message sending conspiracy. I've been alive for at least some of this time period, I think, so I'm also wondering at what point I began sending mixed messages to men. I doubt it was when I was born, though I suppose my birth could have been sending out some kind of message.

Just trying to assess my role in the damage here--especially since, as a feminist, this is probably all my fault.

[Side note: If a guy texts me "Sup" and I answer "Not much" is that considered a mixed message? Asking for a friend.]

"...leaving boys utterly confused..." - Wait a minute--I thought we were talking about men here, but now we've somehow reverted to boys--who I am sure spend at least 80% of their waking hours thinking about those insidious mixed messages women seem to be sending them. You're right, this does seem wrong.

"...about what they are supposed to represent to women" - Now, I don't mean to be insulting, but I spend exactly zero seconds of my time thinking about what I am supposed to represent to men. In fact, I spend the same amount of time thinking about what I am supposed to represent to anyone.

Huh. I'm starting to see why women have all the power. If boys/men are spending that much time contemplating what they are supposed to represent to women (A partner? A sperm bank? A guy on the street? A father? A brother?), then maybe men are ultimately subservient to women.

"Strong language" - I think you mean misogynistic language.

Those mixed messages I've been sending make it totally okay for boys/men to call me a "castrating bitch." I get you. Is it the fact that I made more money than you last year? Please don't hate me.

"Role of breadwinner" - Men don't automatically inherit this role because they are men. Yeah, I guess that could be confusing.

"...taken away from them" - Wow, those feminist assholes. How dare they earn more than men do. I think women should earn less by default, then maybe those poor boys will stop being so confused by the mixed messages.

"...by women who earn more and do better in school" - Since these are the only two metrics of comparison that matter, I can see why men would be upset. Someone is better than you at something, and that someone is a woman. Unacceptable!

"Men..." - Oh. We're back to men now. What happened to the boys?

"...are left to intuit what to do" - Intuition is hard. I guess before this shift in power relations the men's monolith simply issued a manual on how to be a man, and things like shifting gender dynamics and evil mixed messages were a thing of the future. Times really have changed.

"...trying to find a virtuous mean..." - Shoutout to Aristotle! I like it.

"...between what women say they want..." - There I go again--missing the semiannual gathering of all women during which we discuss what we want and then tweet about it to the male masses.

"...and what they actually pursue..." - I'm a little bit lost here as to how all women pursue the exact same things. I mean, I could be wrong here, but it seems like not every woman has the exact same goal in every situation. I mean, have you talked to any women lately? No? That's what I thought.

"...which can be very different things." - Women! They're contradictory! Unlike men who always say and do the exact same thing. None of those confusing mixed messages.

Damn. That was disappointing. I thought I would learn something about how people I disagree with think thoughts, but instead I feel like I was hit over the head with a frying pan. There's less than a thought here. There are -18 thoughts.

And yet someone, somewhere is nodding their head vigorously in agreement about women and their mixed messages.

So here's an anti-mixed-message:

That quote was stupid as ****.

If the above message was too mixed for you, please contact me and I will endeavor to make it less mixed, perhaps by doing some skywriting.

Have a good one.

Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Misogynist

[For an introduction to this series, go here.]

There's nothing subtle about misogyny. The word literally means, "the hatred of women."

To me, if a guy is a misogynist, it makes him undateable. Harsh, I know. But a girl's gotta have her standards. If a man hates women and wants to date me, I consider it a conflict of interest. Because I am a woman. Sorry. It's not something that I chose. You could say it chose me.

Recently, I checked out this book from the library and had it sitting relatively inconspicuously in my apartment. Three different women came over in one evening, each arriving at a different time. All three immediately noticed the book and had a strong reaction to it:

Christian Men Who Hate Women

Despite the cheesy title and vaguely 80s slasher flick cover, the book reads as just as relevant and resonant (Mark Driscoll) now as it did when it was published 24 years ago. From the book:

"Christian men who hate women are in some ways even more dangerous than their non-Christian counterparts. Non-Christian misogynists do not have the additional arsenal of church doctrines, God-talk, and the "sanctioning" of male authority, which comes in a Christian marriage. Their wives are not taught from childhood to 'submit' to men 'no matter what' because it is 'God's will.' Thus Christian relationships based on misogyny are much more complicated due to the theological, cultural, and traditional influences that tend to reinforce the misogynist's prejudice against his wife." (Dr. Margaret J. Rinck, Christian Men Who Hate Women)

This leads to an important question as someone who dates and has dated Christian men: How do you tell if a Christian guy is a misogynist? If he doesn't walk around with a T-shirt that reads 1 Cor. 14:34 or ask you about how much you like to cook and clean on the first date, how will you know?

In addition, should we draw a clear distinction between the dude who makes tasteless and unfunny jokes about women (we all know this dude) from a man who uses or abuses women?

The misogynist is probably always sexist, but is the sexist always a misogynist?

Good question. There is probably no foolproof detection method, but I do know that a guy I dated turned out to be both (it was an unpleasant surprise to say the least).

It started with banal, oft-repeated (by men in general) sexist comments and stereotypes and turned into full-blown hatred, emotional manipulation, and abuse.

So on that fun note, here are some things that might be true of the misogynistic Christian guy:

He believes in rigid, non-negotiable gender roles

I'm not talking having complementarian leanings, I'm talking:

"A woman's primary role is to stay home and take care of the children and the household."

"Women should never hold a leadership role in church."

"If a man isn't the sole provider for his family, then he's not a real man,"

I've definitely met guys who say they would prefer for their wife or future wife to stay at home with the kids--but when confronted with specifics, they actually have no hard-and-fast rules, and that's key. 

He refers to his ex-girlfriend(s) as "a bitch," "crazy," "gold digger," "slut," "overly emotional," etc.

This one seems like common sense, but if your date starts talking about how crazy, deceptive, and destructive his ex was, you might think, "Wow, I'm so much better than his last girlfriend" instead of "I wonder if he's going to talk about me that way too."

Of course, a guy may have been treated very poorly in past relationships. This doesn't excuse talking about another human being with a lack of respect, and there's something about gender-inflected stereotypes and insults that is especially telling--of his character, not hers. 

He uses one tone of voice and type of language around his "bros," and another around you.

He may use sexist humor or the degradation of women and femininity to establish or build rapport with other men. He is one way with his buddies and another way around you.

He often uses hierarchical language to describe himself or other men.

He refers to men as either "alphas" or "betas." He's preoccupied with power differences, particularly between himself and other men his age. He's concerned with appearing "weak" or feminine in front of other guys and looks for their approval in subtle ways.

He's racist, sexist, homophobic and/or speaks about "the Other" with disgust

How does he talk about and treat those he sees as "Other"?  Does he talk about UCLA fans as if they are less than human? Use derogatory language to describe muslims or those of other faiths? Make cruel jokes about those he considers unattractive?

He generally blames other people or things for his problems.

This is a larger character defect obviously not limited to men. But if a man tends to blame others for his actions, failures, mistakes, or shortcomings, this will also apply to his closest relationships. He will be able to justify any abusive words or actions, because they will never, ever be his fault. In fact, they will probably be yours.

He becomes defensive or hurt or attacks you if you confront him about his misogyny or sexism.

Defensiveness is a corollary of the last point. Men who do not take responsibility for their actions are by nature extremely defensive. They have built-in defense mechanisms against anything that might threaten their own views about themselves (as caring, loving, rational, good, etc.).

If you find yourself defending your own actions after confronting his, that is a bad sign. If you let him, he will turn the scrutiny onto you and your perceived faults.

He puts you on a pedestal.

"[T]he greater the idealization, the greater the devaluation when it finally occurs."
- Dr. John Townsend in Hiding From Love

You know what you put on pedestals? Things. Idealization is simply another form of objectification, and has far more to do with his needs than your perfection.

He might treat you like an extremely valuable, fragile glass vase at the beginning of the relationship--striving to meet your every need, handling you with care. Unfortunately, objects are made to be used, and when they no longer serve their (his) purpose, or when they cease to be useful, they are made to be destroyed.

How do you distinguish between the man who treats you with love and respect and the man who idealizes you as an object he can worship?

Is he secure or is he anxious? Does he respect your boundaries? Does he hear what you say or what he wants to hear?

He abuses you physically, mentally, emotionally, or spiritually

I started writing about misogyny, and here I am writing about abuse. I think this because abuse is the end game of misogyny. If you find yourself in a relationship with a misogynistic man, it's only a matter of time before he turns this hatred on you.

Questions:
Is he hurting you?
Is he destroying what you love?
Are you living in fear of "the next time"?
Are you constantly in "fight or flight"?
Are you caught up in a cycle that seems impossible to break?

Please check out more resources about this topic at the end of the post.

I'm not saying that any one of these traits is necessarily indicative of misogyny (with the exception of abuse), but a cluster of them could be a pretty big red flag.

Abusers rarely batter you (physically or verbally) on the first date. In fact, at the beginning of the relationship, an abuser will pour on the love, idealization, empathy, etc., so that when he starts the abuse, you are already "hooked."

The point of this post is simply to point out some of the warning signs of misogyny--so hopefully you can leave before it ever gets to that point.

He eats peanut butter Cap'n Crunch for breakfast

Just kidding about this last one. Peanut butter Cap'n Crunch is my favorite.

Resources:
Christian Men Who Hate Women
Why Does He Do That?
The Verbally Abusive Relationship
Power and Control Wheel
Should I stay or should I go?
The National Domestic Violence Hotline

A Story Worth Fighting For

I never imagined it would be this much of a struggle to be the hero of my own story, the lead in my high school play, the center of my own narrative.

No one and nothing prepared me for this. Not college. Not courses in feminist, post-modern, post-colonial, or Marxist theory. Not reading Doestoyevsky, the Bronte sisters, Donne, Shakespeare, or George Eliot. Not all the papers I wrote about hybridity, syntax or laughter. Not being good at school or good at my job. Not praise from teachers, employers or peers. 

Nothing. 

Part of being the hero means you get to have layers. So, for example, one of the most jarring things about inhabiting my identity is the baffling (to me) denial that I have a past. That things have happened to me. Not only that things have happened to me, but that I've been affected by these things that have happened to me.

At every fresh encounter with a new person, I'm assumed to be (supposed to be) a blank slate. 

As if you were the first stranger to tell me to, "Smile." 

The first white guy to call me "exotic." 

The first person to ask, "So, where are you from?"

The first man to speak to me in a condescending tone of voice about something technical. 

I'm told that I'm "cynical." That I have a bad attitude. That I "hate white people."

I feel like part of being human is learning from the past, taking in experiences that repeat themselves over and over again, making sense of these experiences and even molding them into a narrative. 

Like any three-dimensional character, don't I deserve a back story too? 

Like Marx said, history repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce. But sometimes it seems like even laughter is not allowed to me. Because to laugh is to have a distinct point of view that sees the cracks, the contradictions, the absurdities of the status quo. 

I think I can say that I've paid a price for not aquiecsing to the dominant narrative. And as I fight for my story, I can't help but feel like I'm fighting for my life. That if I don't have this, I have nothing. That if I don't fight for my story, no one else will. 

"But I don't have any power" or Why "privilege" is a dirty word

The more I'm not supposed to talk about something, the more I want to talk about it, so:

Privilege. Privilege. Privilege. PRIVILEGE!!!

The other day, some guy called my friend a "slut."

Now, it was all in good fun. [Not in good taste, perhaps, but certainly in good fun.]

Not to get into the semantics of it all, but my friend is not a "slut."

Guess what. He was using the term ironically.

I know. I KNOW. So freaking clever. I cannot even.

So--back to my story:

He called her a slut. [As is his God-given right.]

She objected to the term. [As is her God-given right. Assuming God grants rights for these sorts of things.]

"It was a joke."

[There's nothing worse than a girl who won't take a joke--especially if it concerns her sexual honor.]

As jokes go, I guess it was passable if a bit too easy [ha ha].

But besides being politically incorrect, what's wrong with playfully calling someone a slut?

Power.

That's right. You are implying that you (a man) have the power to make a value judgement (slut) about me (a woman) based on [the number of people I've slept with, the clothes I'm wearing, the way I carry myself, how I choose to interact with you, etc.]

Playful? Yes. Affectionate? Perhaps. Power play? Absolutely.

"But I don't have any power."

To determine if you have any power, ask yourself:

If the tables were turned and a woman called me a slut (in jest), would the word carry the same negative connotations [mean the same thing]?

The icky, uncomfortable truth:

Women, historically, have been shamed for their sexuality in ways that men never have. Words like "slut" have been used and are used to shame and control women and their sexuality.

[Notice that this is not about what you actually believe. Maybe you think women should never be shamed for their sexuality, or maybe this is all part of your plan to subtly shame even women who fit within your narrow definitions of "not a slut," in which case, bravo.]

I realize this is not your fault.

But realize that you have the power in this situation.

It's not fair. It's not right. It's not your fault. I get it.  You're poor and have no health insurance. You take the bus everyday because you don't have a car. You're uncomfortable with the idea of power. You voted for the other guy. You've worked hard for every break you ever got. You have a lot of black friends. You don't go through your day thinking, "I wonder what's on Netflix, AND OH BY THE WAY, who can I oppress next?"

It's uncomfortable. It's unfortunate. It's unfair.

But I'm not sorry for pointing it out. I'm not sorry at all.



More on privilege:

White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack

The Male Privilege Checklist

Femininity & The Blank Slate or Why I'm Not Flattered When a Stranger Tells Me I'm Pretty

This has bothered me for a while. 

Every time (yes, generalizing) a girl/woman tells a story about unwanted male attention (catcalling, harassment on the street, being asked out by a stranger, having her personal space invaded,  getting a sexually explicit fb message), someone chimes in with the equivalent of: 

"Jeez, he was just trying to pay you a compliment / be friendly / make a personal connection / ask you on a date." 

In every other situation I encounter in life, I'm supposed to be an adult, which means I have thoughts, I have values, I have past experiences, I have a modicum of practical sense, etc. 

But in this one specific scenario, I'm supposed to be a complete blank, approaching every fresh encounter with a new man as if I had just stepped off planet xx and this was the first time someone had ever told me to "Smile, Beautiful!"

And instead of thanking him or smiling sweetly, I flip him off.

And when I tell the story, someone I know (male) defends that guy on the street (or on the social network). 

"Why can't you give him the benefit of the doubt?" 

So...it's okay for him to objectify me and reduce me to an adjective [My name isn't "Beautiful," you asshat. Oh wait, it is. Nevermind.]

But I must ascribe to him thoughts, feelings, a deep and meaningful history of respect for all women, and, especially, that "he's not like all other guys."

He gets to be an individual with a unique background, history and cultural context, and how dare I treat him as anything less than a unique and special human being. I get to be "a pretty little thing."

"You're being so judgmental."

I mean, right. Maybe he's a really nice guy. Maybe he wouldn't hurt a flying cockroach if it landed in his beef bourguignon. Maybe he loves children, candy necklaces and riding escalators at the mall.

Well, welcome to my world, where making snap judgments about strangers based on past experiences and not making snap judgments about strangers based on past experiences can mean the difference between life and lying dead in ditch somewhere, to put it subtly.

Have you not watched a single episode of Law & Order: SVU? Evolutionarily-speaking, it's better to assume the worst.

This is what doesn't make sense to me. It's okay for me to follow my instincts EXCEPT when I don't respond favorably to a man's romantic overtures, or at least act a little bit flattered that, gee whiz, someone thinks I'm pretty!

"You should be flattered that someone finds you attractive."

The opinion of a total stranger > My safety, sanity and desire to appear in a public place without being harassed.

There's also the not-so-subtle threat: 

Someday you won't be attractive anymore and no one will think you're pretty or make obscene gestures at you from the safety of their motor vehicles AND THEN WHERE WILL YOU BE, HUH?? AT LEAST SOMEONE WANTS TO HAVE SEX WITH YOU, CAN'T YOU SHOW A LITTLE GRATITUDE!!!

Yet another reminder that my primary value as a woman lies in how attractive I am to the opposite sex.

And how to explain the anger some men seem to feel when a woman resists objectification or even--how dare she--complains about it.

I mean, a woman who finds her value within herself without any reference to outside male validation--

How unappealing.

The 7 Deadly Sins of Being a Woman

So, church today got me thinking about the ways that we gender things like sin, sex, shame, anger, evangelism, and emotional needs. It got me wondering--do churches split men and women into gender specific groups so we can talk about the differing sins that plague each gender? How do we tend to gender certain sins?

Lust

Sex, as we all know, is for men, and thus only men struggle with lust. Women never struggle with their sexual desires. They just want to be loved unconditionally, like that movie "The Vow" (or was it "Pretty Woman"?) No further comment needed here. Moving on.

Gluttony

I don't know about you, but I feel like Los Angeles has this weird relationship to food, eating, diet, and exercise. As a city, we're probably bulimic, anorexic, and addicted to exercise. On a good day. Now, far be it from me to look down upon healthy eating (not my fav) and exercise (not my fav either). But I feel like extreme dieting and exercising are like gluttony's prettier, skinnier cousin. In our culture, things like weight loss and being skinny are heavily geared toward women. There's a lot of shame involved. See also, envy.

Greed

Ah, the gold-digging stereotype--it lives on, it thrives even. Though I suppose now that many women are making more money than their spouses, men will start being objectified only for their good looks and hot bodies. On another level, it seems like women are constantly accused of having unreasonable expectations--of men, of marriage, of sharing housework, of having it all. It's not so much the injunction to "settle" as it is anger that women might have these kinds of expectations in the first place.

Sloth

If anything, Sloth is a guy. A guy who plays XBox all night and works at Dairy Queen. Women are really falling behind on this one. They're going to have to work super hard to even think of achieving parity.

Wrath

Recently, I read an article on Relevant Magazine entitled "When I'm Bad at Being a Woman." The article didn't seem to be about being a woman at all--but rather about anger, disappointment, getting credit for your work, and basing your value in God. As I tried to suggest in the comments, the title betrays the underlying assumption that getting angry makes you a bad woman (Hey kids! Close reading--it's not just for English majors!) I think with women and getting angry, there's always the fear of being the shrew--the B-word. But anger, man oh man is that a real emotion, and if anything, I wish I expressed it (rather than holding it in) more than I do. Because anger is so much better than resentment and bitterness.

Envy

Lions and tigers and bears, oh my! Women are notorious for constantly comparing themselves to other women, favorably or unfavorably. Of course, our culture doesn't contribute to this at all. Of course, I'm being sarcastic. Here's the thing about women, especially women at church--they are the nicest, most accepting people EVER. But that envy stuff is real.

The only gender-specificity I can really see here is that men are not under the same pressure to compare their appearance to that of other men. I could be wrong.

Pride

I sometimes think that one of the worst things a woman can be is arrogant (to those that think she's arrogant). I'm not saying men get a free pass on this one, either. There's just this desire to take her down a peg or two. I should know.

I don't think having an ego is all bad--instead, women pretend that they are not competitive, ambitious, or confident in themselves and their abilities. Or women are confident, they just don't express themselves confidently, in fear it will come off as arrogance.

I worry about gender stereotypes in the context of church. Mostly, I worry that women or girls who don't fit into the dominant gender stereotypes (emotional vs. analytical, for example) will feel alienated and as if they are "bad at being a woman."

Dear Sort of Sexist Guy,

Hey there. How's it going? It's me. Yeah. We went to college together. We work together. I think I had a crush on you back in the 8th grade.

You were the one who told me in high school that most guys think that men are better than women--they just don't say it out loud. But you--you were above that kind of cowardice. "Think about it," you said, "Why are the best chefs in the world men?" I still can't argue with your unshakeable logic.

I feel a bit bad for you, Sort of Sexist Guy--the way political correctness has driven your kind underground, for the most part. You can't even post sexy pics of underage girls on facebook anymore without getting some kind of feminist flak. I mean, where's the harm in a little objectification? The sooner girls realize that they are primarily valued for their looks, the better.

I really have to admire your panache, Sort of Sexist Guy. You could be rocking a unibrow and a beer gut, but that doesn't stop you from making condescending comments about a woman's weight or how she's "let herself go."

Of course you "loooooove women." And yeah, you're sort of an a-hole, but in a good way. Cause you're a guy. And guys are a-holes.

At least you're not like Sort of Racist Guy or Sort of Misogynistic Guy. I'm never going to catch you ranting about how feminism has ruined the American dream or how the REAL reason you're such a jerk is that this one girl broke your heart this one time in the second grade...

You're just a little bit of a chauvinist. I get that. Now that I think about it, you're not half bad, Sort of Sexist Guy. Maybe we can hang out some time and you can tell me all about how if I only lost some weight and started reading challenging books, I could really make something of myself.

Well, it's been real. I sort of gotta go do some laundry.

Yours (sort of),
MT

The Burden of Shame

Wow, I've been writing about shame a lot lately. And really, all of these burdens seem to be about shame in one way or another, see also, the burden of secrecy. But this time, I'm gonna get a little bit more specific. Hopefully. We'll see.

Have you ever heard the (Christian) cliche that women need love and men need respect? There are whole books, websites, ministries, etc. devoted to this idea. These books, websites, and ministries list hundreds of ways women can work on showing respect for men--you know, shoulder that burden, that burden of shame.

It's not hard to see that shame and respect are two sides to the same coin, or to hone in a little more exactly on the meaning, shame and ego. The message is clear in this and other contexts: Men aren't stepping up at church. Well, then women must step down. Men aren't stepping up to lead their families. Again, women must step down, respecting and honoring the divine hierarchy of male headship. It only makes sense that women must become less so that men can...become. Women must diminish. They need love, not respect, and so this diminishment, this restraint, can only be easy for them.

Even in secular contexts, it's clear that one harsh word from a woman can easily destroy a man, no matter how powerful he is. Therefore, women must wield this awesome power with care. A man's ego is a fragile, fragile thing--much like a tiny, speckled robin's egg. A woman's job, in marriage and career, is to faithfully guard that little egg with her very soul throughout the great obstacle race of life. If the egg drops and the man's ego is crushed--it's her fault.

Men must be protected from their own shame. Perhaps if a woman feels shame, she's just being her normal, insecure female self. Shame looks good on her. But if a man feels shame, it's a crisis of masculinity.

I don't deny that both love and respect are important in a marriage. However, if a man or woman has not worked out the problem of shame for themselves--it's doubtful that all the respect or love in the world will make them feel whole.

I suspect this often plays out in abusive relationships. And I wonder if shame often looks a whole lot like rage. If only she didn't "make" him angry. If only she didn't set him off with her careless remarks. I've mentioned before that I was once in an emotionally manipulative relationship, and he would often say, "You don't respect me," when I failed to do what he wanted me to do. And he would rage.

Now I know that someone's else's shame, their anger, is not my responsibility, just as my shame, my ego is no one's responsibility but my own. And if you think that persons of the female gender don't struggle with ego--Hi, my name's M. Nice to meet you.

And you know, I wonder. I wonder at what age we start teaching girls that the shame of others is their burden to carry.

I read this article on the Love And Respect Now website (Yes, it's Love And Respect for the younger crowd. Eep.) about daughters engaging their emotionally distant fathers in a respectful way. The article has some pretty good advice. Part of growing up is forgiving your parents and engaging with them as real people with real flaws.

But part of me feels deeply saddened. Here's an excerpt:

"It’s also important to note that while a man can talk about relationships and marriage, it may not be as energizing to him as it is to you because he feels like he might be a failure to you in this area. Men often feel that “questions,” no matter your motive, are calling them into question because they believe women want them to change, resulting in them feeling not liked by you."

[So, men just wanna be liked, just like everyone else? I dunno. These fathers don't seem to like their daughters very much anyway (not talking to them, ignoring them to watch TV...) There may be little to lose.]

Well, the writing is depressingly clunky, but that's not what I'm talking about. Ouch. Just ouch. Any question is suspect. If you know me, you know I'm screwed. I might not be cut out for this whole love and respect thing.

It distresses me that the daughter is, emotionally speaking, the only adult in this exchange, ever careful of her father's delicate masculine feelings. There is no suggestion that pain and hurt can be honestly and frankly expressed. Real emotion is way, way too threatening in this context. Men can't handle the anger of women, unless it's couched in "respect." And I know we're talking (presumably) about grown daughters here, but at what age do daughters start bearing the emotional burdens of their fathers? The day they stop being daddy's little girl and start asking real questions? When is dad's emotional withdrawal first conceived of as "my fault"?

To conclude, as a woman, have you ever felt compelled to bear the burden of shame and if so how, why? As a man, have you ever expected a woman to bear the burden of shame for you and if so how, why?

And forgive the disrespect. It was not intended.

Sex, Text and My Other Body

I'm sure there's a literary/sociological/psychological theory* that addresses this, but I've been thinking about something I can best describe as "my other body."

This is not my actual, physical body, but my symbolic one--not how I experience the world as flesh and blood, but how the world chooses to experience me. Perhaps I can explain.

I might see someone I don't know and based on his appearance alone conclude that he is smart, dumb, nerdy, a douchebag, etc.

Another person might see me and based on appearance alone conclude that I am not American and must be from a different country.

Or a person might view my body as a sexual object, no matter that I am not (an object).

I'll put aside for the moment the question of whether our bodies do have any inherent value, worth, or beauty. Let it suffice for this blog that there are in fact two very different bodies in play. [I imagine someone who saw the two bodies as one and the same would have some kind of body dysmorphia.]

I find this concept extremely helpful as a writer. From the earliest days of literature, writers have identified their works with their own bodies--often as mother or father to an errant child. Anne Bradstreet famously wrote a poem titled "The Author to Her Book" in which she chides the "ill-formed offspring of my feeble brain." In this conception, the work is both intimately associated with the writer's body (as child) and dissociated and excused for its flaws and imperfections (the text as orphan).

Another Renaissance writer wrote of having undergone "pressing" to produce his book (don't you just love a good suggestive pun?). Both of these metaphors indicate the vulnerability (to criticism, etc.) of not only the author, but the author's body.

I'm sure every writer can relate to this in one way or another. You write something. You put a little (or a lot) of yourself into it, then the editor/publisher changes a word here, a phrase there and completely changes what you wished to say.

[I used to metaphorically hit the ceiling every time the school paper came out and the editors had once again marred my flawless copy with one or more grammatical, typographical, or idiomatic errors. Did I mention I was a joy to work with?]

Or someone reads something you've written and takes it completely out of context, interpreting it to mean something it doesn't mean or imputing to you a belief you hate.

And for whatever reason, women's symbolic bodies have always been more vulnerable then the symbolic bodies of men: witness online (or in print) attacks on a woman's looks or sexual history or anatomy, all because she wrote about, I dunno, anything. I can understand why authors like Charlotte Bronte wrote under a male pseudonym. Protection. Safety. No one drawing attention to the vulnerability of your body as female.

I feel this vulnerability--as much as I have tried to protect this other body so intimately associated with my own. I've tried to protect it in the way that I dress (that doesn't really work, by the way). I've stopped writing because a man read my words and thought that he knew me, thought that he could read me, thought that he could take liberties because hadn't I put myself (my body) out there for everyone to read?

I've despaired to think that in the career path I wish to pursue, my male coworkers will see me primarily as the cute girl (with "deep, dark, and soulful eyes," direct quote from one confessional email) and not as competent, smart, or talented.

I know I've been stressing the disconnect between my actual, physical body and this other body, but truthfully, they're not always so disconnected. It's this other body, I think, that causes men to casually touch my leg, my waist, my butt (without, as one friend so memorably put it, even bothering to buy me a happy meal first). It can't be me, right?

I don't know what it's like to be white, male, and heterosexual (a girl can dream), but I imagine there's less of a gap between the way other people perceive you and the way you perceive yourself. I imagine there are fewer moments of disconnect. I could try to primarily see myself as a sexual object, but I think that would get in the way of my writing.


[Based on this, one of the major feats that women in our culture are expected to achieve to become adults is internalizing the male gaze, or viewing themselves as primarily sexually attractive or not. Thus, being sexy is a culturally conditioned behavior that requires seeing a reverse image of yourself (as sexy) and then projecting it back to the world.]


*This might be Lacan and the mirror stage. Or Marx and alienation (alienated from work, from your body, from other people's bodies which then become instruments of production?). Or feminism and the male gaze.

Are you experienced? : Excellence, Exclusion, and the Hollywoodization of Church

“Well, we’re really looking for someone with experience.”

My heart sank. These were the words I dreaded with all the dread of a combined $30,000 in student loan debt. Experience was exactly what I did not have as a recent grad.

What I did have were Hollywood dreams, a resume replete with low-level production jobs, and a working knowledge of literary theory.

Now, here I was, rejected from a volunteer, assistant position on a film that would never make money. I reacted the way most mature adults do when faced with rejection. I raged. I sulked. I griped to my friends. I half-heartedly contemplated quitting my dreams.

But most of all, that word “experience” hit me like a punch to the gut. I thought I was over it. I had mentally shrugged it off as no big deal.

I had tried once, unsuccessfully, to volunteer at a church I was attending. I wanted to get involved. I chose production arts because it seemed like the best fit for a wannabe filmmaker who happens to be an introvert and doesn’t particularly like directing cars or working with children.

I was emailing back and forth with a church staff member. He asked me what I wanted to do. I said I wanted to work behind-the-scenes. He asked about my experience. I described my involvement in making movies. Radio silence on his end.

I finally approached him at church and introduced myself.

“Oh. I had confused you with another girl named ‘M___’ who is definitely not qualified to volunteer for the production arts team.”

In the next 30 seconds, he must have used the word “experience” at least five times: everyone who volunteers for production arts needs to have experience, all the people who’ve signed up during the volunteer drive are supposed to have experience, the other girl doesn’t have experience, etc.

I froze. I dug around in the back of my mind. How could someone be so completely unqualified to run PowerPoint slides or wrangle microphones? I quickly surmised that she must have been born without thumbs. How tragic.

Everything hit me at once—my name in the emails (announcing my gender, my non-white racial status), my perceived lack of knowledge, my dubious credentials, and my strange kinship with this girl with missing digits. I felt naked and exposed, as if the letters of my name had shouted from the rooftops the deep unworthiness I had tried so hard to hide.

How had he perceived the truth about me? How had my name betrayed me so brutally?

I did what all writers do under these circumstances. I wrote what I knew was a reasoned, well-thought-out email explaining why what he said had bothered me. I was handling this in a grownup, rational fashion. I joked to myself, “Well, at least he didn’t tell me to go volunteer for the children’s ministry or the welcome team instead.” But at night my mind wouldn’t let go of that girl, that other girl, the one without thumbs. I kept thinking about her. I felt bad for her.

I knew it was nothing personal. What is church after all, amateur hour? You can’t just let anyone push buttons or run PowerPoint slides. These things take finesse, experience, maybe even some degree of talent.

God forbid a bad sound mix or a missed slide distract the churchgoer from the message of the gospel. It’s about excellence. And experience is the necessary precursor.

Excellence is hard to define, but I think we all know mediocrity when we see it. Rachel Held Evans calls out painfully amateur special music as one hallmark of the awkward church. As Christians, mediocrity embarrasses us. If it’s not good enough for the world, it shouldn’t be good enough for Sunday service. Mediocrity hurts us and makes us cringe, like watching your friend perform bad standup at a club with no guest list and a two drink minimum.

And so we are urged to give God our best: Quality. Excellence. Good production values. I don’t believe that God has a problem with any of these things. I don’t think your worship is any more pleasing to God because you have a crappy sound system or sing Keith Green songs off key.

Similarly, just because a movie has positive Christian values, spells out the gospel, or is produced by a mega church does not make it good. Au contraire says every “Left Behind” movie ever made.

I currently go to church on Hollywood Boulevard. We get our share of the homeless, the strung-out, and the downright crazy. Last Sunday, a relatively normal looking man rushed the stage in an attempt to join in as a backup singer for the worship team. He never made it that far. Security escorted him out, his hands still outstretched for a microphone.

I feel like I’m that guy sometimes—the grossly unqualified gatecrasher violating the sacred order of the liturgy with my flaws, my brokenness. It’s not that I’m not experienced. It’s that I know that no matter how much experience I have at living this life I will never be perfect.

If only you could see my heart—the hatred, the bitterness, the jealousy, and the pride—you would rightfully conclude that I should be forcibly removed as well. In the face of perfection, I am unworthy. We all are. We are all missing a few fingers, or in my case, probably a major limb.

To weave the connection between church and Hollywood a little bit tighter, consider this Hollywood value: The product is more important than the people.

If it is the quality of the end product that matters, the church too can justify exclusion on the basis of excellence. Are you experienced? Are you worthy? Will you make us look bad?

In the midst of my disappointment at my rejection from the film job I didn’t have the experience for, what hurt the most was realizing that a church was ready to reject me for the same reason—this ethic of excellence that expels and excludes.

Ironically, I HAD the right experience. But my name, my face, my body told a different story.

The church is not transforming Hollywood. Hollywood is transforming the church and making it after its own image.

The Heresy of a Woman with Ambition

[Excerpted and expanded from an email to a friend]

Let me preface this by saying that I will probably have kids someday. But I worry. I worry that having a family will conflict with following my dreams.

A friend once told me that part of his dream for his life was to get married and have a family. So, in other words, to him, having a family and living his dreams wasn't a conflict. I think this is how it should be, ideally speaking.

Of course, for men, having a career and having a family isn't usually seen as a potential conflict. This rests on the assumption that the wife will do most of the child rearing. I don't think that's terribly fair. But then there are plenty of women who want most of all to be wives and mothers, which I find completely valid. I'm just not one of them.

But why, when I bring up my desire to have a career and a family, does a guy my own age feel comfortable telling me, "Well, you probably won't feel that way after you have kids," as if motherhood miraculously transforms all women into selfless beings with no ambitions of their own.

I can remember bringing up in a women's Bible study once that I didn't want to JUST have a family. I was quickly reassured that I didn't have to have a family, I could always not get married or have kids--you know, focus on my career.

But I didn't mean it as an either/or proposition.

So to return to my original point, two things: One, I think that having kids should be part of life, but not life itself. While I agree that parents should love their children self-sacrificially, I also believe that there's more to life than raising kids.

Two, in my ideal world, the husband would be just as involved in raising and nurturing children as the wife. This might not mean that he ends up doing the actual physical work of raising kids--it's more about having the mindset that it is just as much his responsibility as his wife's.

I originally asked: If men have the responsibility to support their families financially by themselves, does this mean that they should pursue careers that will enable them to do so? Or to put it another way, should this goal trump following their dreams/passions/interests etc.?

I think that this either/or mindset--either I follow my dreams or I work to support a family--can cause guys to put off getting married and starting a family--mainly because they do not wish to sacrifice their dreams. (I don't know, but it seems like in Hollywood at least, following your dreams usually means being pretty broke.)

I can relate to that sentiment, but why can't following your dreams coincide with getting married and having kids? The burden on men to be the sole providers seems to contribute to both this unnecessary dichotomy and the unnecessary extension of adolescence (Again, extended adolescence seems more prevalent in LA where the cost of living often necessitates living a college-student-esque existence long after graduating.)

Honestly, what I've seen the most here in LA (and my sample size is pretty limited) is wives making financial sacrifices for their husband's dreams. So, the wife works as a nurse/teacher/accountant/other-paying-profession and the husband writes or works part-time, generally making less money. I wish I could think of examples where the genders were reversed.

I wish this didn't bother me so much. I think the core of it is that whether the wife is working to support her husband financially or taking care of the kids, she always seems to be in service to his dream, his purpose, his aspirations. I get the same feeling when I read that a woman with amazing talent and a successful career "would throw it all out the window tomorrow" if the right guy came along.

Of course, this is reductive, and in many cases simply not true. There are many people who aspire to be teachers, nurses, and accountants, and it has nothing to do with supporting the dreams of another person.

I think our culture tends to both over-romanticize (for lack of a better word) motherhood and the self-sacrificial role that mothers play, while simultaneously denigrating all things seen as "women's work." We undervalue the work of mothers even as we heap on the sentimentality.

But to say that as a woman you value having a career just as much as you value getting married and having a family. Heresy. Flat out.

Don't believe me? Watch how almost every single romantic comedy ever made punishes women for caring about their careers. And the number one punishment? Being single, alone, and unhappy.