As promised, this blog post is focused around slut shaming / slut bashing which is a topic that I am very passionate about as I have been “slut shamed” many times before. This post is going to be a little different I guess as I have spent weeks researching, collecting information and reading many, many studies and points of views on the topic. I didn’t want this post to just be another thing I ramble on about, but instead I want to portray to you, what it is really like to be a woman who is slut shamed on a day to day basis with evidence to support my individual thoughts.
I guess the most logical way to begin this is to tell you what slut shaming actually is. In simple terms, slut shaming is the least feminist thing to do. There is such a big hype at the moment surrounding feminism, yet half the girls that claim they have these feminist views are also the same people turning around and calling their ex boyfriends new girlfriend a hoe.
I think the best and truest definition I have heard came from Larry Wilmore’s mouth on The Nightly Show where he said a slut is:
“A girl who developed faster than you both physically and emotionally; she dabbled in healthy sexual experimentation, which was intimidating; or she refused to have sex with you, which was frustrating”
Slut shaming is all about control. First of all, it enforces gendered double standards. Women are told to be sexy, but not too sexy. This makes women and girls stick to these boundaries strictly, and if they don’t, they face the social consequences. A perfect example of this is how there is a difference between a woman who has slept with 15 people, and a man who has slept with 15 people. Leora Tanenbaum, author of I Am Not a Slut: Slut Shaming in the Age of the Internet, wrote in her book, “boys will be boys, and girls will be sluts”.
Slut shaming also allows for control as it reduces a woman to her sexuality. IT IS 2016, PEOPLE HAVE TO REALISE THAT WOMEN ARE SEXUAL BEINGS AND ARE FREELY EXPRESSING THEIR SEXUALITY EVERYWHERE. Yet somehow, the idea of a woman actually admitting and claiming their sexuality and sexual experiences, is threatening and out of control. I mean, wow Jenny, how dare you freely express yourself and the activities you enjoy? Only humans with male genitals are allowed to share that kind of information!
Emily Lindin, founder of the UnSlut Project told Julie Zeilinger from Mic Network Inc, “you can’t be a slut and also a doctor and also a kind person and also a mother. You’re just a slut”. A study was completed at Cornell University where 751 students were asked to rate aspects of a woman’s character, such as whether she would be a good friend or not, based on how many people she had slept with in her early 20’s. When she had slept with 20 or more people, the rating of her character dropped significantly. This didn’t really surprise me, but what did was that even the participants judging her character who had slept with the same amount of people, still thought she was not a good person, or that she wouldn’t be someone who would make a good friend. WTF????
Slut shaming is a way to silence outspoken women. I think the classic example of this is definitely Miley Cyrus. I want to try something with my readers. I want you to think of Miley. What comes to your mind? Hannah Montana maybe, her Wrecking Ball video, the way she spiralled out of control after her break up with Liam Hemsworth, Billy Ray, her classic tongue move, the viral video of her twerking at the MTV VMA’s in 2013, her skimpy and individual outfits?
How many of you thought about her Non-profit Happy Hippie Foundation which support LGBTQ Youth Homelessness, or that her 20th birthday party was a fundraising event for a dog rescue organisation, or that she fights for gender equality and women’s rights such as the #freethenipple campaign?
This all ties back to what Emily Lindin said before, once you’re a slut, you’re always a slut.
The media and the people have been on her back ever since she split from being Hannah Montana and became herself. Miley has been very open about her sexuality, especially after she broke off her engagement. She got a lot of media attention after her Wrecking Ball film clip, and was labelled a slut.
Just to show you the extent that Miley is slut shamed to, I searched “slut” on google, and Miley was the very first image to pop up, along with Amber Rose further down the page. For some reason, when a woman is in control or has some sort of power, that gives everyone the right to brand them as a slut in order to police them.
Chelsea Dom and Alice Lancaster published the book, History of Sluts, which contains over one hundred illustrations of women from all ages. Dom stated, “Women are taught to see their bodies as objects, as something shameful. I want to show through this project that some of the most influential women in history have been called sluts”.
I definitely think the most devastating effect of slut shaming is that it turns women against one another. Girls label other girls as sluts as a protective measure. It is a way to deflect any criticism away from themselves. Kathryn Stamoulis wrote an article in Psychology Today in 2012 saying that slut shaming “Is just like the classic example of a boy calling another boy ‘gay’ in the locker room because he thinks if he shows disdain for homosexuality, there is no way anyone could possibly think he is gay”.
It is 2016, and women need to start supporting one another, AHHH. It’s so frustrating that some girls have not realised that we, as girls, need to start bonding together and build each other up, rather than bring each other down.
I hate when I go out, and I hear girls talk in the bathroom about some girl they have seen and how much of a slut she is and blah blah blah. IT’S NOT YOUR BUSINESS. I’m sure you have better things to do on a night out with friends than degrade another girl who I bet is having much more fun than you.
The easiest way a girl is labelled as a slut is through social media. We are taught to be sexy, but not slutty. Every day is like walking down a catwalk. Does our top show too much cleavage, does the length of our skirt look like we want someone to pull it up (AKA easy access), do our heels resemble stripper stilettoes too much, have I gone past the “hot” look and ventured into the “easy”? Do I look “good” slutty or “bad” slutty?
“I can circulate a certain image of myself as sexual and hot and slutty in a good way, and I can totally control it because I’m uploading stuff”. We feel as though we are in control until one day everything we have posted turns around on us and all of the digital evidence of being a “good slut” gets reshaped and we become a “bad slut”.
For example, I have posted a few pictures in bikini’s on Instagram and Facebook over the past year. Those photos are all well and good at the moment. There is no hate or shaming on those pictures at the moment. But say tomorrow someone finds out about my sexual past, maybe how many people I have slept with, and they decide I am a slut. They pass this message on, and all of a sudden the photos I have posted in the past in bikinis are PROOF that I am a slut. People start to say “oh wow, she is a slut. She has all these pictures on her Instagram in bikinis” when before it was just another picture.
It’s amazing just how much someone’s opinions can portray different messages of one’s social media pages or their lifestyle in general. Sorry to use Miley again (can you tell I’m a die hard fan), but all of her film clips and songs are seen as “slutty” because the public has given her the persona of a slut. It doesn’t matter what the song is about, or why she wrote it, it’s always going to be slutty. But let me put this to you…
Take Beyonce. She is a phenomenal woman with a beautiful voice and an even more amazing soul. Her album Yonce contains the song Partition. I adore the song, and recently watched the film clip. After it finished I was like, hang on a second. Beyonce is wearing the same amount of clothes as Miley and writing about the same things (sex), yet no one is calling her out for being a ‘slut’. If you don’t believe me, take a look at the next two videos.
One of the more controversial topics within the realm of slut shaming is female masturbation. It is something that girls keep to ourselves, or if we do talk about it, we only tell our select group of close friends, normally when we are drunk and playing “never have I ever…”. Pennsylvania State University conducted a study in 2002 which found that “women reported more communication overall than males on all topics (related to sex), except for masturbation”.
Vice.com asked five women to answer questions about what they go to when watching porn (they all decided to remain anonymous) and one girl said “I’m into things that I don’t actually do myself – like toys (I don’t have any), lesbians (I’m into men) and threesomes (not really my thing, but I have tried it)”. The fact that she could not bare the thought of putting her name to this, a simple statement about what she enjoys watching, stuns me.
Ann Friedman wrote an article in New York in 2013 where she quoted “for men, [masturbation] is not only healthy, but normal. For girls, its something bad girls do, not something every girl does”. I totally agree, I remember hearing boys talk about their “morning wank” almost every day at school! At first you were kind of like “ew” but then it just became a thing. Hardly anyone ever batted an eyelid. Reverse the roles however, and you have a completely different scenario.
Imagine if Kate rocked up to school one morning and was like “OMG, I had the best time last night. I was really horny so I watched some lesbian porn and I was fingering myself and hit my g-spot and made myself orgasm”. UMMM DISGUSTING KATE HOW DARE YOU TELL US THAT YOU MASTURBATED LAST NIGHT BUT YES JIMMY PLEASE CONTINUE ON ABOUT HOW GOOD YOUR FAP WAS THIS MORNING.
Girls need to learn that touching themselves is okay, and that it is not “slutty” or “disgusting”. It is natural!! THE WORD VAGINA IS OKAY.
I think I have done enough writing for now. I really hope that you have taken something away from this today. I am not telling you that you should now go out and sleep with 5 different boys tonight. I’m rather telling you that if you enjoy sex, and you are practising it safely, then go out and enjoy yourself. Express what you love and who you are. And for those of you who are slut shamers, and continue even after reading this post, then just take this massive FUCK OFF 🙂
Until next time,
Jords X
Tales From A Fake Blonde 