Most folk have heard of SlutWalk, the “movement” sweeping North America in response to a Toronto policeman’s misogynist comment at Osgoode Hall Law School that women could avoid sexual assault by not dressing like sluts. In response, Sonia Barnett, art school graduate and erotic arts purveyor, Heather Jarvis, Jeanette Janzen, Erika Jane Scholz and Alyssa Teekah – allegedly tired of “being oppressed by slut shaming (and) … judged by their sexuality and feeling unsafe as a result” (or something) – organized SlutWalk, to show that “no one should equate enjoying sex with attracting sexual assault.” Oh, and sell merch.
Huh?
The naughty marketing genius of “SlutWalk” and the images of scantily clad females strolling through seemingly safe neighborhoods have attracted scads of attention – including male attention. Males love SlutWalk, with an 18-year-old anarchist formerly of the Formspring handle “Molester” taking credit for organizing Baltimore SlutWalk. Heralded as the “first event in years to energize the women’s rights movement,” September’s SlutWalk attracted hundreds of marchers from the Inner Harbor to City Hall to fight victim blaming and slut shaming.
Or something.
Many of us cannot discern what SlutWalk seeks to achieve and how it seeks to achieve it. Baltimore has a rich feminist tradition – located in the social justice, domestic violence, peace, rape prevention, lesbian and choice communities – but none of those communities’ organizations endorsed (with the exception of the “sex positive” GLCCB). Further, the International Socialist Organization – which mostly appears at protests organized by others – acted a key promoter of SlutWalk, despite having no apparent ties to the broader feminist community. Hollaback Baltimore – another organizer of the SlutWalk – is part of a movement to combat street harassment, noting, “(m)ovements require trust, and trust is earned. … (W)e promise you honesty and transparency.” Hollaback’s Shawna Potter advised that Pennsylvania-based National Sexual Violence Resource Center (“NSVRC”), Sticky Buns Burlesque and the adult swingers website Love Voodoo also endorsed SlutWalk. When I called NSVRC to confirm, Karen Baker, the director of the Center, denied that NSVRC endorsed or sponsored SlutWalk, and stated that a staff member participated as an individual.
So, what do an 18-year-old man who publicly opposes “calling the police if it can be helped,” a socialist organization that usually appears as a “me too” player at demonstrations, and a nascent anti-street harassment organization do to fight victim blaming and slut shaming?
They march from the Inner Harbor and down the Block, mocking the lives of females reduced to “sex work” not as a career choice, but due to life circumstances that would cause many of the bourgeois SlutWalkers carrying signs proclaiming “I am greater than the contents of my bra” to crumble. They rally in front of a majority white audience with mostly white speakers – in a majority black city – to talk about how women aren’t to blame for rape at the same time SlutWalk celebrates porn culture.
Hey you guys! Women aren’t to blame for rape! Oh, also, sluts are sexy!
And SlutWalk counts as the first event in years to energize the women’s rights movement?
Are you kidding? Is this a joke?
SlutWalkers, I appreciate that you want to stop victim blaming and slut shaming, even if only to make females more comfortable buying your porn. But your movement – particularly in Baltimore – ignores the talents of people who have labored for years to name the problem – male violence against females – and combat it. Your movement doesn’t speak to the concerns of African-American women, many of whom have noticed the lack of diversity in SlutWalk’s vision and execution. Your movement doesn’t speak to lesbians, who – like all females – are assaulted and raped by males, but who are invisibilized from the whole conversation of dressing “like a slut” and the heteronormativity of “wanting” appropriate male attention (i.e., not rape).
Here’s a tip, if your “movement” is authentic. Get an authentic message. How about this message: males – stop raping us. You already know your audience – men (and the women who love them). The more you can get “the menz” to recognize that objectifying and raping females is bad, the better. But for the love of Andrea Dworkin, do not insult us with this ahistorical “energize the women’s rights movement” spin. And, given that Baltimore’s founding organizer has publicly stated his opposition to “calling the police,” tell us how Baltimore SlutWalk proposes to punish males who rape females. Wandering bands of SlutWalkers with machetes? Think of the merch!
Until you figure out who you are, SlutWalk primarily offers men the right to say the word “slut” without consequence and women the “right” to enjoy porn without fear of being called a slut (or something). SlutWalk all you like, but don’t expect us to ignore that you have substituted porn for progress.
Friday, 07 October 2011
You think I just don't understand, but I don't believe you. 
For the record, I love a majority of what you write, and I’ve learned more from your website than I have in the several women’s studies classes I’ve taken in university so far. Admittedly I’m just a 19 year old girl, a sophomore in college, and I don’t know nearly as much about the world as I’d like to, but I have to say that I thoroughly enjoy slutwalks. I’ve been to two, and helped organize one and I know they aren’t perfect but I think your critique of them is far too harsh. When done correctly, and explained correctly I think the slutwalk is helping a lot of girls my age realize that the term “slut” is a figment of the imagination which is muddled with misogyny, just as the term “prude” or “tease” is. Until the slutwalk I know a lot of my friends never realized how vilified women were regardless of whether they say “yes” or say “no”, either way they’re not being sexual enough or being too sexual. I myself am a lesbian and have become more than aware of the atmosphere I’m surrounded by. One full of obligation and guilt put on women by the men they’re surrounded by. I think slutwalk empowers victims of rape, it tells women something they don’t hear often enough; it’s not their fault, they did nothing wrong, they aren’t to blame.
I think you made a lot of valid points, particularly the lack of visibility beyond white, heterosexual females. Like I said, sluwalks are far from perfect, but I do believe that there’s something to be said for young women rallying together to send out a message that is overall a good one, a powerful one. I learned a lot from the slutwalk and I know a lot of my friends did as well.
I am also 19 and I’m in my third year of college. While I believe the general intention of SlutWalk is good, everything else is rotten. Why call it Slut Walk? Why call it slut-shaming? Why call a supposedly woman-centered thing “Slutty”? I don’t want to be called a slut, I don’t want to endorse anything that gets women called sluts. Why go topless or scantily clad? This is what males want to see, this isn’t revolutionary. Why call ourselves sluts? We’re not sluts. I think SlutWalk is very immature. A more mature movement, from what I heard about (I’m not from the US, I’m latin-american) would be Take Back the Night. I imagine a walk with women of all types marching against rape, not focusing on “slut-shaming” (I hate that term).
The problem is, I think, that for every woman that discovers how ostracized we are and starts fighting for feminism, 100 people understand that feminism is about looking sexy, young, fresh, perfect, big-boobed, slutty, having lots and lots of sex with lots of men. This is what happens in my country. Before SlutWalks, a feminist was probably a hairy-legged lesbian. Now a feminist is blonde, willing to have sex and wanting to live a life of hedonism and pleasure (with lots of men). This is what men want to see.
I believe the positive points you talked about, Rachel, would happen to every pro-woman anti-rape rally, not only Slutwalk, but only Slutwalk types tell the people feminism is all about… being a “slut”, wanting to be called a slut and loving it. Slutwalk makes it seem that misogynist slurs are empowering and all we fought against is empowering. This brings choice into the issue, another problem of liberal feminism. For example, before we’d say a female character on TV was oversexualized and tokenized if she wears high heels full makeup scant clothing and that deciption hurts women, now she’s “empowered” and “an individual” and “feminist”. This really seems like a reversal now that I think about it.
[…] Radical feminists are familiar with the male-dominated and male-catering SlutWalk phenomenon. To catch up, we recommend analyses by Black Women’s BluePrint and Radical Hub, as well as others. […]
[…] Radical feminists are familiar with the male-dominated and male-catering SlutWalk phenomenon. To catch up, we recommend analyses by Black Women’s BluePrint and Radical Hub, as well as others. […]