(no subject)

[serene]

So I followed a link in a locked post to the Open-source Boob Project, and here's how my thinking went:

1) Wonder if I should post to my friendslist "Yes, you may".

2) Well, but should I friends-lock it?

3) Well, but then I should really remove anyone from my friendslist that I don't want touching my boobs.

4) Well, no, because I can say no to them. But wouldn't it be funny to just post an open post saying "If I drop you from my friendslist in the next day or so, it's because I don't want you touching my boobs"?

Anyway, Yes, you can. Ask, that is. I'm likely to say "You can touch my boobs; it's no big deal."

Comments

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[sistercoyote.livejournal.com]

"But that doesn't mean it's the only way to be, or that it's always healthy."

Um, yes. (And I know you're not agreeing with him.) It is a fact that one's body is always one's own to choose how to handle. Or who to allow to handle.

Serene, I know you know this isn't in any way directed at you. I still have your *smooch* on my wall.

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[serenejournal.livejournal.com]

Not to worry. I'm enjoying the discussion. And if I'm being creepy, I want my friends to tell me. :-)

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[sistercoyote.livejournal.com]

You'd really have to go a long way for me to suddenly find you creepy.

Just thought I should clear that up. ;)

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[serenejournal.livejournal.com]

Well, then, let me touch your boobs!

(Kidding, kidding, I swear!)

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[hel]

I'm really curious where in that you see him saying one's body is NOT always one's own to choose how to handle. Cos I don't see that. The closest to that I see, is him suggesting that in SOME cases, how people choose to handle their bodies might be less healthy for them than other choices available to them. But, just cos someone says 'X isn't always as healthy as Y' doesn't mean suddenly everyone has to choose Y.
Is your problem with his statement that he's saying some choices aren't always unhealthy? Cos, some really aren't. I mean, when judging as an outside party if a choice is healthy, one has to consider the person, the circumstances, etc, but, still, some choices just aren't healthy. Doesn't mean people can't make them, but the fact that people choose to make them doesn't mean other people can't say 'that's not healthy'.
I mean, take that exact phrase, and shift it from 'who you allow to touch you' to 'who and how many people you get romantically involved with'. I've heard the exact words "But that doesn't mean it's the only way to be, or that it's always healthy." said about being mono any great number of times. Doesn't mean the person saying it is saying people can't be mono.

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[sistercoyote.livejournal.com]

I read his response as him saying: Keeping one's body to one's self, if that is one's proclivity, is not as healthy as freeing it up for other people.

Keeping in mind that he was responding to someone who basically disagreed with his open-source premise, not speaking of healthy vs. unhealthy in general (or even in particular). In context, he seemed to be saying "you just don't know any better and your reticence is unhealthy" to someone who unequivocally said: "This is Not For Me."

Out of that context, I would have been less disturbed by his response and might have felt freer to recontextualize it as you did in your last paragraph.

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[hel]

*nod* I can understand that. I just see it differently, since he says 'That's fine. But it's not the only way to be.' So, it doesn't read to me as 'you don't know any better', but rather, 'ok, you make your choices and I'll make mine'. I generally take people at their word, and when they seem to me to be saying 'you make your choices and I'll make mine', I think they mean it, since I mean it when I say it.

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[sistercoyote.livejournal.com]

Yes - I don't think you and I inherently disagree on most of this; I just took the context differently.

IDIC, right?

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[hel]

*nod*

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[emmycantbemeeko.livejournal.com]

Speaking as the person to whom that comment was originally addressed, as someone who found in extremely upsetting, and as someone who has spent an unfortunate amount of mental energy contemplating it and trying to find a more positive reading than what I'm actually getting, grammatically (because I used to consider Ferrett a friend, and would like to still, but am struggling)- what he SAID, literally was:

"The attitude that your body is a vested space... is fine... but it is not always healthy."

Please bear in mind also that Ferrett said this to me, someone he knows to have a generally healthy happy sex life and body image, in response to my position on his project, so we are not talking here about him referencing some extreme of social isolation or psychological trauma or speaking in hypotheticals. He's talking to me about how I feel. As the non-hypothetical addressee of the comment, I found it really disturbing and not at all fine.


He ALSO said, earlier in the same comment to me, that my saying "My body is something so special to me that only people I have firmly vetted and talked to and invested in should be allowed to touch those areas" was REALLY a way for me to say that I didn't want people I didn't find attractive/nice to want me. Which is funny, because as myself I can assure him, and everyone else, that when I say that that only people I have firmly vetted and talked to and invested in should be allowed to touch those areas, that is in fact EXACTLY WHAT I MEAN.

Although I don't say that phrase exactly, because those are his words and frankly they are dripping with all sorts of judgements about how women make decisions on who can touch them and they creep me out more every time I read them.

Basically, I've spent quite a bit of time turning those words around, and honestly, they DON'T say what you're reading. He may have meant to say what he literally said, but what he said was not "Allowing people access to your body is sometimes healthy". What he actually, literally said was "Considering your body yours to control is not always healthy." I can't seem to put a positive spin on that, no matter how hard I try.

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[emmycantbemeeko.livejournal.com]

Rereading my comment, I need to edit for grammar/clarity: "He may not have meant to say what he literally said, but what he said was not "Allowing people access to your body is sometimes healthy". What actually said, the literal meaning of his actual word choice, was "considering your body yours to control is not always healthy". I can't seem to put a positive spin on that, no matter how hard I try.

As, I dunno, formal and tacky as this sounds

[sistercoyote.livejournal.com]

Thank you for providing your insight as one who was involved. It's helpful.

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[vito-excalibur.livejournal.com]

Exactly. That is EXACTLY what he wrote, and I am so tired of people making excuses for guys and saying, oh he didn't mean that, he meant this other much more reasonable thing; and you're like, but he did! He said that! I can point to it! What the hell ass balls do you get out of flat refusing to see what is in front of you?!

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[rikibeth.livejournal.com]

THANK YOU for putting your finger on what was bothering me about that phrasing.

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[badgerbag.livejournal.com]

I read a quoted bit of his comment - the same bit quoted above with extra - and my own wall of judgement against him came down because that is one of the damned sleaziest, most underhanded, horrible arguments to make to a person -- he was saying that HE understands better than YOU do what would be healthy for you to do with your body, and that that healthy thing would be for you to let him touch your boobs. "Considering your body yours to control is not always healthy" is still putting too nice of a spin on it. I read it very much as what rushthatspeaks pointed out: (http://the-red-shoes.livejournal.com/1263869.html?thread=12469245#t12469245)"The way he is using 'oh, people who do not see awesome in this are uptight and unhealthy' as a shaming statement really gets my goat.

Because I don't think it's unhealthy in the slightest not to buy into his juvenile 'utopian sexual vision', but. Even if it were?

He is using 'uptight and unhealthy' to mean 'not worthy of being listened to'. Because of course people who are 'uptight and unhealthy' have forfeited their place in the public discourse."

So it is a multi-layered ATTACK on your agency and on all women's agency.

daddy knows best!

[faithhopetricks.livejournal.com]

he was saying that HE understands better than YOU do what would be healthy for you to do with your body

YEAH, and he's pulled that before, repeatedly -- he likes to set himself up as some kind of guru. This is partly just a really big manifestation of that, I think.

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[faithhopetricks.livejournal.com]

Wow, thank you for clarifying. I had thought that particular remark of his was horribly condescending and sleazy, but now it's just even worse....

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[rivka.livejournal.com]

We don't know each other, but I just wanted to say how much I appreciated your comments over there.

Re: the Open-source Boob Project

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

Your interpretation of his statement is the same as mine, and I also "generally take people at their word."