Joey

After I graduated from college and left my dorm room, I moved back in with my parents for a while. At the end of next week, I'll finally get to move into an apartment of my very own. Well, almost my very own: I'll be sharing it with a good friend. This good friend happens to be male, and ever since we have shared our plans to move in together with our friends and family, we have been subjected to a never-ending stream of jokes and assumptions regarding our gender roles.

My parents have expressed happiness at my having a 'man in the house': Apparently, thanks to my roommate, there'll be no need for me to carry water bottles up to our 7th floor apartment, fix things that break around the house, put up pictures, put together my furniture after I move in, talk to the landlord about anything, ever, or worry about my safety.

"At the time, it was better to be a man than to be a woman, because women were on the same level as animals" explains Pashe Keqi in a recent article in La Stampa about an old Albanian custom (original article on page 17 of La Stampa from June 29th, 2008). What Pashe means is the history of the "sworn virgins", woman who vowed to essentially become men. The tradition first started about 500 years ago, and today there are still 40 women living who went through their whole lives with all the rights and duties of a man.

In a country rife with conflicts and wars, families were often left without a male to fend for them. But since the women had no rights and thus could not take on the jobs needed to sustain a family, a man was needed as the head of family.

A couple of weeks ago, a young woman was sexually assaulted and killed while walking home from a bar at four in the morning. This happened in Milan, only a few feet away from my old high school. She was chatted up by a man she'd seen collecting bottles at the bar she'd been to, and she assumed that he worked there and was thus 'safe'. He wasn't.

That was the second such attack within a short period of time, and sparked renewed discussion on women's safety. One of those discussions took place in the 'opinion' section of Milan's Metro newspaper, where a female reader shared her experience of sexual abuse and whose letter had been entitled "Men are Monsters" (and while I can't swear to this, I am fairly certain it's the paper who titles the letters, not the readers). This prompted several replies by enraged men who felt misjudged and misunderstood. One particularly appalling letter was from a man who felt that women use the word 'abuse' to easily and that, at least within marriage, it is a woman's duty to pleasure her man. Another writer complained that women are too ungrateful and do not know how good they have it. This exchange took place over the course of a week, and every time I read the letters, I had to remind myself that this is indeed the 21st century.

When I am in the US or talking to Americans, I am often told how lucky I am to be living in Europe where people aren't all prudes and where sex is not a taboo topic. I always end up wondering where that myth comes from, as there are so many ways in which it is not true.

I was reminded of this again yesterday, when I stumbled across a study on contraception use among teenagers in Italy. An article on the study (found in yesterday's edition of the Milan Metro paper) stated that 30% of youths do not use any method of birth control at all and 20% use the 'withdrawal method'. Also prevalent amongst teens are urban myths about ways to prevent pregnancy, such as having sex standing up or washing out the vagina with coca cola afterwards. Too, 8 out of 100 women of all age groups do not use any birth control at all, and according to the organization of Gynecologists in Italy, the main reason women give for not using the pill is a fear of gaining weight.

Today is national Blog for Choice Day.

I did not sign up because I was not sure whether I'd have the time, but I think it's really pretty important to get the word out anyway. The topic this time around is: Why is it important to vote pro-choice?

Here's why I think voting pro-choice is important: We're all going to be faced with tough choices at some point in our lives, and with a lot of those choices, we can never know how we'll react until it happens to us. It's easy to judge, and it's easy to rationalize and theorize, but ultimately all of that means very little when the situation arises. And when we're in those situations, it's always best to have as many options as possible, and to have information about all of them, and to then be able to make the decision that is best for us at the time.

I keep meaning to write an article about the election and my opinion on Sen. Clinton. I will get around to it, too. In the meantime, there's this:

Grave of Pregnant Marine Found

The North Carolina police found what they believe to be the body of a female marine that had gone missing in Deccember - shortly after reporting that she had been raped by a fellow Marine. Who is now, to the surprise of no one, the prime suspect for her murder.

What I found even more disgusting (and what, curiously, isn't discussed in the article) is that, after reporting the rape, Marines scratched up her car, called her names, and one even punched her in the face. Got that from the CNN news on TV just now.

No single news item has dominated the German media landscape over the past few months like the case of Marco W. The 17-year-old was detained in Turkey in April on the charge of statuatory rape. The charges had been brought force by the mother of the 13-year-old Britisn girl, Charlotte, who had apparently spent a night with Marco.

The story didn't make the news until around June, but then it hit with a vengeance. Though Marco was at that point charged with statuatory rape, it didn't come across that way on the news and in the papers. The reason for that is the relative ignorance of Germans regarding the concept of Age of Consent. Though we do have them, legally, few if any teens are aware of them and they are rarely enforced. Consequently, it soon became public opinion that Marco was charged with sexual abuse and attempted rape.

"Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplacable spark. In the hopeless swamps of the not quite, the not yet, and the not at all, do not let the hero in your soul perish and leave only frustration for the life you deserved, but never have been able to reach. The world you desire can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it is yours."
-Ayn Rand.

Out of interest, curiosity and just a plain old need for money, I briefly returned to modeling last week. From the 15th to the 23rd, I worked as a hostess for a company exhibiting at the IAA in Frankfurt (an automobile fair, sort of like the Auto Show in Detroit). My job description sounded fairly innocuous: Show up on time, wear the prescribed outfit (consisting of a short, black skirt, high-heeled boots and a shirt with the company logo) and be friendly to the customers at all times. The reality was that I spent 10 hours out of every day standing around on those obscenly high heels, smiling politely at everyone and observing the people walking past.

Today, as I was walking across the parking lot to the mall, a man who was cruising for a parking spot looked out of the window of his car and followed me with his eyes. I noticed and grinned at him. When the car had passed us I turned and said to my mother, "This is one of those things I sometimes miss when I'm in Germany. No one ever stares at me". She asked, "Why only sometimes?" and I told her, "There are times when it crossed the border from somewhat cute to downright offensive".

I don't know if it is really a cultural difference and if yes, what the reasons for it are, but while I turn heads almost everywhere I go when I am in Italy, hardly anyone gives me second glance in Germany. It was literally the first thing I noticed when we moved to Italy: we were standing in line to cross the Swiss-Italian border at Como-Chiasso and a car full of (male) Italian soccer fans in their 20s kept passing us. Every time they came level with us, they hooted and honked and winked at me. During the half hour we stood in that line, I went from feeling surprised and incredulous to feeling flattered to feeling mildly annoyed.

The other day I read an article about a beach in Italy, in Riccione, that is for women only. There were pictures of women sitting happily together, wearing skimpy bikinis and expensive sunglasses, sipping colourful drinks and reading glossy magazines. The tone of the article suggested that the women of that region had demanded a beach of their own, where they could spend time enjoying the sun away from the lustful gazes of males.

The article went on to list the services the beach offered: you can get massages and facials and manicures; you can even get your hair done for the night on the town to follow the day at the beach. All these services were provided by women, even the bar was run by women. No men allowed.

After that enthusiastic last paragraph of my previous post, I feel more than a little annoyed to report that the empowered feeling lasted less than 24 hours.

In an older book, Alice Schwarzer described her dream of a utopian society: one where a woman can walk by herself after dark and not shudder at every noise. I hear her on that one. We're very far away from that.

I visited friends on Saturday afternoon and took the train back at 10pm. By the time I was on my train, it was dark, and my compartment was nearly empty. I hoped it would stay that way, but was disappointed: with about 45 minutes left to go, two obviously drunk young men got on the train and sat down close to me. Their conversation was loud and though I tried to concentrate on my book, I couldn't help but listen.

About a year ago, when I first signed up with the AGA, I left a blank where I was asked to list my feminist heros. Now that I've spent some time actively participating in the feminist community, there are a few names I'd feel comfortable putting in that blank. One of them is that of Alice Schwarzer. Earlier tonight, I went to see her read from her new book, 'Die Antwort' (The Answer).

The first thing that I noticed when I got there was the demographics. I admit it, I expected a lot of dreadlocks, earth tones and Birkenstocks. Instead, the average audience member was in their 50s and sporting conservative dress. My age group was the minority, rivaling for most under-represented only with males. But if I felt a bit alien, the feeling was lifted as soon as the lights went out and a representative from the bookstore came on stage.

I've been meaning to post some of my poetry here. I don't exactly have any poems that deal directly with feminist issues, but I do have quite a few that deal with my struggle to work through the abuse I've suffered, and I suppose those are relevant to the AGA.

The first one (though not one of my faves) is a good metaphor of the way my past makes me feel at times. The second one is an imaginary conversation with an abuser that was sparked by a therapy session.

1. Haunted House
Walk on into this splendid mansion,
barefoot on plush carpets
in spacious rooms,
and rest on silken sheets.

Last night I had the pleasure of listening to a guest lecture by Professor Naomi Goldernberg from the University of Ottawa on the topic of "A Feminist, Psychoanalytic Reflection on 'The Cat in the Hat Comes Back: Exploring the Male Claim to the Ownership of Sacred Texts".

The three main themes of the lecture where the function of language in the story, the religioius themes and the gender issues. While the first two were equally interersting, I am going to focus on the third theme, as it's most relevant to Feminism.