I am now declaring the next week celebration of female desire week.

Don't like it? Too bad. This is my blog, and I can declare whatever I damn well please.

So I've been doing some lurking recently, and visited some new-to-me blogs, and I've noticed a few trends that irk me. And what's the point of having a blog if you can't use it to vent? So, ventage coming right up...

I'm seeing a lot of woman-as-passive, man-as-active talk about sex, and I don't like it. I don't like it a bit. And what REALLY irks me is that a lot of it is coming from women who identify as feminists.

See, here's the problem. I'm a dom. I don't do passive. Well, I do SOMEWHAT passive by my standards (which are not the same as most people's) on occasion, when I happen to be in the mood, but as a general rule? No.

According to a lot of people I apparently do not exist. You can see how this might be vexing.

Now when I see this from ye olde mainstream culture I'm not too surprised. I still don't like it, but it's not surprising. I think that the fact that most cultures encourage this view is extremely damaging to women, and to men too in the long run if only most of them had the intelligence to realise it. Who would you expect to be at the forefront of fighting this view? I would say feminists. But such is often not the case.

For the record, I think that the idea that women are sexually passive, which is inextricable tied up with the concept of womanhood as representing purity, is one of the worst things that has ever happened to women. It's been used to shut us up, to keep us secluded, to bar us from participation in public life. All in all not a good thing. It's also been used to justify rape, because if women naturally don't want sex anyway but can be persuaded to do it if they really love the guy, or if they feel obligated...

So when I see invocations of womanhood as some kind of mystically cleansing force, as a counterweight to the supposed beastliness of men, my bullshit detector starts ringing. And ringing and ringing and ringing.

And the worst thing is that that idea is EVERYWHERE. It's in every major religion, it's in every culture that I know of. In some religions and in many cultures it somehow coexists with the idea of women as dirty and base, as tied to nature in unseemly ways, which for me only proves once more that religion's primary purpose is to melt people's brains so thoroughly that any capacity for logical thought is extinguished.

As illogical as it may seem to position women as both pure and debased, in reality I think both ideas come from the same basis. They come from the idea that the body and the soul are fundamentally separate, and that one is better than the other. It's dualism - mind versus body. flesh versus spirit. And I don't buy it.

People are flesh. We're animals. Animals with big brains and nifty opposable thumbs, yes, but animals nonetheless.

This is not a man thing (note, my radfem friends, it really isn't). It's not a woman thing either. It's a people thing.

What's so terrible about admitting that we're flesh? About dumping the whole idea of purity versus corruption altogether?

It's not just feminists who do this, or just conservatives, it's EVERYONE. And I'm sick of it.
There is no idea in the history of the human race that has done more harm to women than this one. Wherever women are positioned on the scale of purity versus corruption, the one thing that never changes is the fact that it's used to hurt us.

This is why it vexes me when I see the idea of women are pure, morally upright creatures (as opposed to those nasty brutish men) being used as a reason why feminism is justified. It's playing right into the hands of people who want to hurt us. It's not some brilliant new idea that someone came up with in the sixties, no matter what the more hippie-inclined might think. It's a very, very old idea. And it's a very, very bad one.

Lust is not a male thing. It's an animal thing. And women are animals, just as much as men are. When we deny that, we deny a part of our humanity. Why the hell does anyone think that's a good idea?

The justification for feminism shouldn't be that we're better or purer than men. It should be that we're people. No more, no less.

And as for the men who cling like limpets to this idea, that you're the ones who hold all the cards and women have no libidos of their own, that they are the choosers but not the doers...sorry, but no. You think we're not looking at you and assessing you just the same way you are doing to us? Guess again, sunshine. I could make you a list right now of every man I know, and each and every one has a little mental check or cross next to their name indicating fuckable or unfuckable. I may never act on it, but it's there. And the more you cling to the idea of women as passive receptacles the more likely you are to end up in the unfuckable column, because really, who wants to fuck someone who thinks of them as a passive receptacle with no needs of their own? Are you getting that, all you "oh pity the poor shy men who just don't get laid, why do women keep rejecting us, boo hoo" guys? Maybe if you tried approaching them as people rather than as machines that will automatically dole out sex if you just figure out the correct code to enter...

Remember the old feminist adage about the personal being political? Truth starts at home, yes? Well, sex is a big part of the personal for most of us. Yes, ye of the "asexuality is the best way for a feminist to be and all this talk about sex is so trivial and yet we still can't shut up about it" sisterhood, sorry to break it to you, but the vast majority of people are not asexual, and yes that includes women. You want to be that way yourselves? No problem. I'll even go to bat for your right to be that way. But if you could stop attempting to passive-aggressively IMPOSE that way of being on the rest of us and then sneering at anyone who doesn't fit the mold it would be much appreciated. Be a pal and quit with the slut shaming, OK?
(Side note - given that about 90% of the population is heterosexual for most people "political lesbianism" IS in effect asking someone to commit themself to a life of asexuality. Since when is being a feminist like joining a monastic order? As someone who does sleep with women I hate to break it to you, but the real reason to do it is for the muff diving.)

And now I'm off to go wake up Mr Cassandra, who went to bed far too early, the lazy bum. I'm wide awake and horny, time for him to do his job...

Think that makes me a bad feminist? Or a horrible brazen hussy for those of you of the simplistically woman-hating variety?

Kiss my ass.


(PS There will be some actual celebrating later, after I get done with my own personal celebration)