Over at revgals Songbird has drawn together an importnat post as a response to the Slut Walk phenomena that is sweeping across the worlds (mostly western) cities. She began by quoting Carol Howard Merritt who said:
"The SlutWalk came to D.C. Unfortunately I missed it. If I didn't have a conflict, I would have been there, not in a short skirt or highheels, but in my clergy collar.
Why? Because the Slutwalk is a protest against a rape culture. Women are speaking out against the understanding with which many of us live -- if you've been raped, molested, abused, or betrayed then you must have done something to deserve it." More here
Howard Merritt goes on to say that religion, particularly Christianity with it's oft held focus on "female sin" needs to own up to the way that it has coluded with the culture to make rape and abuse almost always the womans fault, she says:
"Even ten years after youth group, when I was in seminary, I was taught that I needed to wear a collar under my big black academic robe as I preached, or else men would not think about the sermon, they would imagine what was under my massive garb. The robe looks like something you would wear at your high school graduation. I basically wear a tent to preach. But that wasn't enough, because somehow, I should be responsible for the thoughts that someone might have when they see four inches of my neck.
It's time for our religious communities to acknowledge the ways in which we have contributed to a rape culture -- the ways in which we blame women as we proclaim our narratives, ask our questions, and teach our teenagers. And it's time for us to stand with women who have had enough."
I agree with Howard Merritt that yes the church should put it's hands up and own it's culpability in this, but I am not sure that I would have joined the slut walk even in my clerical collar. And here is why, I find myself agreeing with hassopheret who blogged this over at Inscription:
"I was immediately put off by the phenomenon (of sl*t walks) and it took me some time to figure out why.
Finally it came to me: slut is not a word I chose to claim for myself or other women. I am not a slut. I am not a bitch. I am not a c*nt. I realized my response to the Slut Walk phenomenon was the same as my response to one of the Vagina Monologues monologues. Some words cannot be redeemed for me. I am not a n!gger. I am not a whore. I am not a 'ho. I am not a slut.
I am a woman created in the image of God. I am beautiful and brilliant in every sense of each word. And no one has the right to touch me without my permission. Not my hair. Not my skin. Not my body. And there is nothing I could ever do - or have ever done that would justify anyone breaking into my body."
And there is the answer, I am a woman created in the image of God- I am fearfully and wonderfully made! And because I am fearfully and wonderfully made I need to respect myself and for me that includes caring about what I wear.
I do not want to put my breasts or even part of my breasts on display in a provocative manner, I do not want to expose even the tiniest bit of my bottom, I have good legs but that does not mean that everyone needs to see them when I walk down the High Street. Now don't get me wrong, I am not a prude, I don't wear a Victorian style costume when I go swimming, I simply believe that appropriate clothing should be worn at appropriate times, and not in order that men won't be tempted, in order that I am respectng myself!
I need to respect myself, and I need to be comfortable with myself as a whole person and that includes the sexual part of me, for me that part is precious and not to be flaunted, it is shared with the man I love and nobody else. and that is my choice.
Add to that the fact that women are abused no matter what they wear as hassopheret points out eloquently for us:
What Raped Women Wear...
Grandmothers in housecoats and slippers
Critically ill women in adult diapers in hospital beds
Mentally ill and developmentally disabled women and girls in jumpers and jeans
Infant girls in onesies
Little girls in their Sunday best
Muslim women in hijab
Nuns in their habits
Businesswomen in business suits
Students in jeans and skirts
Girls and women in their pajamas, nightgowns and skin in their own homes, in their own showers, in their own beds
Prostitutes and strippers in their uniforms
Police women and soldiers in their uniforms
Any woman or girl anywhere, wearing anything
this is what raped women wear.
Abuse as reported here is not about what we wear or even on most ocassions who we are, it is because we are women, and that is a crime that will not be solved by Slut Walks!
