This is something I’ve been thinking about for a while, but the whole “Free Monty” thing over the past few days really brought it home. I found it fascinating how my post about the comparison of the purchase of a puppy from a responsible breeder to slavery being offensive morphed into a far more general discussion of pet ownership, animal status and why Jessica should have to answer for every little thing she does just because she’s a big feminist blogger.
It kind of blew up bigger, and more unexpectedly, than I thought it would. I guess I’ve been away from Feministe for too long, and I’ve forgotten the megaphone aspect of it. Also, people’s reluctance to talk about race.
That megaphone thing, incidentally, is why I’m posting this here and not on Feministe. I really don’t want another damn blogwar, or a rehash of inter-feminist disputes over old issues, or god forbid, more attention from Carol Lloyd. Here, the traffic is low enough that a productive discussion can take place (if anyone comments at all), and nobody that I’m going to name later on has to feel that I’m using the big stick rather than just trying to work out some issues and areas of difference.
So, onward. I’m here to talk about ownership, but not ownership of animals. Ownership of high-traffic bloggers and other figures of some reknown.
One of the themes that went through the Monty posts before I stuck my nose in was that multiple people felt entitled to scold Jessica and demand that she answer their questions, right now, about where she got her puppy. The reason for the demand was, frequently, that Jessica has an obligation as a feminist to justify her choices on feminist grounds, and if she’s going to post something on a feminist website, she damn well better be prepared to have people asking her questions about it, because she put it out there. And when Jessica, who was traveling, didn’t answer those questions right away, the demands got more and more scolding, and more and more, well, demanding.
Some other commenters responded by saying either that where Jessica got her puppy is not a feminist issue, or even if it is, are we not entitled to have fun or joy without subjecting it to feminist analysis?
That’s not to say that there aren’t legitimate questions to be raised, and there were, in fact, legitimate questions raised. But there were also accusations hurled, there was scolding, there was hectoring. And there was an undercurrent of ownership, as well: Jessica’s influential and famous and authoritative and a lot of people read her blog, so she HAS to answer. She’s putting herself out there, so she can’t expect to be able to cut off discussion by saying something’s personal, or that she doesn’t want to discuss it. She. Owes. Us.
And here’s what I have to say: being a high-traffic blogger does not make anyone public property. And as much as people raise “the personal is political” as a reason for high-traffic bloggers to have to justify their personal choices, that’s rather a corruption of Carol Hanish’s original argument, which was that discussions of women’s oppression were not mere navel-gazing or matters for women to solve individually, but discussions about a political problem that required a political solution:
They could sometimes admit that women were oppressed (but only by “the system”) and said that we should have equal pay for equal work, and some other “rights.” But they belittled us no end for trying to bring our so-called “personal problems” into the public arena - especially “all those body issues” like sex, appearance, and abortion. Our demands that men share the housework and childcare were likewise deemed a personal problem between a woman and her individual man. The opposition claimed if women would just “stand up for themselves” and take more responsibility for their own lives, they wouldn’t need to have an independent movement for women’s liberation. What personal initiative wouldn’t solve, they said, “the revolution” would take care of if we would just shut up and do our part. Heaven forbid that we should point out that men benefit from oppressing women.
In other words, “the personal is political” was never meant as a club to beat individual women with for not living up to some kind of feminist ideal in their individual lives, but as a call for putting “women’s issues” onto the same political footing as men’s issues.
High-traffic bloggers are still people, and aren’t exactly making a ton of money from blogging. I’ve never seen a dime from Feministe, for instance, and I know that Jill puts the ad money back into the site. Everyone who posts at Feministing has other jobs, as do the bloggers at Pandagon (that some of them have parlayed their success in attracting an audience into paying work does not change the fact that they’re not making a living from blogging). In fact, I can’t post under my real name because I don’t want to lose the job that pays the bills (if you knew my real name, you could find out easily where I work, because attorneys are listed in a number of directories). So for all the talk of fame and authority and influence, there’s not a whole lot of reward attached to it, and at least in my case, a considerable amount of risk. And in any event, that fame is fame on the internet, which doesn’t really count for much in the wider world.
But there are an awful lot of people who, just because they read you and just because a lot of other people read you, think that you have to act a certain way or be a certain way or write about certain things and no others. And they think they have a right to demand that you act, be or write about what they want you to act, be or write about. Or they think they have a right to attack you personally for how you act, who you are, or what you write if it doesn’t fit in with some kind of Platonic ideal of a feminist blogger.
Every now and again, Atrios will post a reminder that he doesn’t owe his readers anything, that he doesn’t have to pay attention to your pet cause, that he doesn’t have to write what you demand he writes. I used to think that was over the top and unduly harsh, but then the whole “Fun Feminist” blowup happened. Short summary: Jill wrote a “quote of the day” post quoting Twisty about how the reason that so many women hang onto the trappings of femininity is that doing so is not a sign of empowerment, but a survival skill in the patriarchy. A debate ensued in the comments about how much of a duty women have to examine their motivations for dressing up in feminine trappings (which kind of missed Twisty’s original point). In a subsequent post, Jill decided to examine her own interest in feminine trappings while being quite aware that they were somewhat problematic in the larger scope of her feminism.
Things got rather interesting.
Both in comments, and in at least one blog posting, people started attacking Jill personally for her choices, and questioning her commitment to feminism. She’d already examined her shit quite thoroughly and publicly, but somehow, this wasn’t enough. She had to show that she felt really bad about it, or something (those demanding that she feel bad never really got around to saying what they wanted her to do, beyond feel shitty). She no longer deserved to be listened to. She no longer had any place in the movement — even though the people castigating her for her impurity were hardly without stain themselves.
But the creepiest aspect of all was the number of people who asserted ownership over Jill because they’d decided that she was a feminist role model, and felt entitled to demand explanations from her. I think Ron Sullivan summed up what was happening quite well in this comment:
Not to spoil the fun, but for the sake of a few commenters who seem to have missed it: The big stinky pile in the punchbowl isn’t grooming (for values of “grooming” broad enough to include stuff I’d never subject myself to) but the weird 20th-century idea of the “role model” that has somehow grown to include the sub-idea th[at] one can declare someone else a role model and therefore feel entitled to give that person orders.
What the fuck? What the fuckin fuck? As my little sister (not that one) would say.
As Ilyka said on her blog:
I am not a role model: You’d think people would have wrapped their heads around this back when Charles Barkley first said it, but no. Some people still think that if your audience is large enough, you’re a role model regardless of your own wishes in that regard, and you’d better behave in accordance with the bylaws of Rolemodelville, population You.
And as I said:
Molly, Jill’s not your little monkey. She doesn’t have to dance for you just because you put her on a pedestal.
And really, that’s what we’re seeing with Jessica and Monty. Because a lot of people read Jessica, and have decided that she’s a feminist role model, that means that they feel that they can give Jessica orders, and Jessica has to respond. It meant that Molly could declare Jill a role model and declare that because she waxes, she’s not worth listening to because she’s failed as a role model, a job which she never agreed to take on:
At the risk of sounding like Britney Spears, I’m gonna go ahead and throw it out there: I am not a role model.
I am, however, a feminist. And you can try and take away my membership card, but I’m still going to claim it.
I’m a 23-year-old kid trying to get through law school, get a job, and make it through my daily life. I also blog sometimes. Blogging is not my job. I don’t get paid for it, and while it’s important to me, I don’t construct my identity around it.
Aside from the whole ownership aspect, there’s the idea that, just because someone posts something on the internet, it’s up for any and all discussion and the person who posted it has no expectation of being able to claim privacy. I think that’s utter bullshit, it’s dehumanizing, and akin to “she asked for it.” It didn’t fly when the AutoAdmit assholes were swiping Jill’s picture for use in their wankfest, and it doesn’t fly here.
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