words...

BIRDCAGE
just watched this car commercial that was engaging and funny. it was about this guy in the backseat who wouldn't shut up and was going off about conspiracy theories, and the woman in the front turned up the stereo, which was so awesome and a great reason to buy the car. What does this have to do with anything? For me it says a lot about critique, and the birdcage idea from an earlier reading. yes, the audio in that car looked awesome. yes, it was successful in muting the irritating guy in the backseat, BUT: if you didn't buy a car at all, then you wouldn't be trapped with this guy to begin with, and you could buy sweet headphones and listen to that song on your own time, on your bike.

it's always important for us to back up back up back up, and intentionally examine the cage, the wires, the bird, and ourselves as audiences.

LANGUAGE
I said I would write about this and I’m a little behind. Jordana’s presentation, to me, is pure genius. It’s a powerful, intellectual analysis of the way we create our worlds and paradigms through language. I love the part about language being our most prevalent form of symbology. And the part we saw reflected in Tough Guise tonight about forgetting the dominant groups (ecology is plants and animals, etc).

This topic has interested me for some time. Long ago I removed “that’s gay” from my language, shortly after I also removed “that’s retarded” and finally, “b*tch.”

B*tch was a tough one because I had felt very empowered in saying for a long time. It wasn’t until several of my male allies confronted me that I realized the implications of the term. I support womyn who use it, and I strongly support Bitch magazine and their critiques of popular culture (by the way if you’ve never read Bitch Magazine it’s in the Prescott College Library – check it out!), however I no longer can use it myself because I have come to regard it as disrespectful, violent, and oppressive. To me, it’s the equivalent of F*g and N****r. Looking at the word it’s quickly apparent that it’s a euphemism for a female dog. This holds some importance for two reasons: it equates womyn with animals, the most highly abused creatures on the planet, the second reason is taking this one step further and realizing that the female dog takes a sexually subordinate position. This is pretty far out, but it’s powerful to consider.

Speaking of other animals, animal rights activists are also proponents of change around language. Think about the implications of the following phrases/terms:
Bullshit
Horseshit
Sweating like a pig
Kill two birds with one stone

Interestingly gender and animal rights have a strong intersection in oppressive contorted language and imagery.
He’s a dog
She’s a tramp
Sex kitten

This extends to the sexualization of animals. Rabbits are highly sexualized. Cats are (sexualized and) gendered to be female, dogs – male. Riding a horse is often likened to riding a man…




Actually in my home town a police officer who watched the crosswalk at our upper elementary school was put in jail for raping a baby cow. I’m not kidding. This strange hypersexuality and degradation through language is physically threatening to all oppressed groups.

In class I also mentioned other interesting sexuality vernacular:
I’m turned on
I’m turned off
Two things on this.
1. This form of expression implies that the power is external, that someone is DOING this TO you, without your control or participation. This form of expression lacks personal responsibility.
2. It implies that arousal is a binary. Black or white, male or female, turned on or turned off – like a radio or something!
I do not care if people use these phrases at all, I use them, and I also think deeply considering the implications and meaning of our words is accessible and important.

I’m turned on vs. I’m attracted to you

LANGUAGE AND PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY
Consideration to this subject is entrenched in my studies as a psychology student, and for now I’d like to share two ideas from this field.

The first is around the word “self”
Myself
Himself
Herself


My self
His self
Her self

What is the difference here? I have some thoughts but I’d love to hear from you all on this. How do they strike you as different if at all?
Self is an important word in English, it’s everywhere.
I have to take better care of myself
I love myself
I’ve gotta do it myself
Self-actualizing
Self destruction
Self mutilation
Self discovery
Selfish
You’re kidding yourself
Do it yourself
Self sufficient
Who can think of some more??

I’m not making a heavy point on this one, I’m still figuring out what this all means to me. What does the prevalence of “self” mean in our culture? With the focus on self, are we more caring toward our selves/ourselves because of it? Less caring? Etc.

Something I do have strong feelings about in regards to language and personal responsibility are the words “make” and “made.”

“That makes me happy.”
“That makes me sad”
“When I heard that, it really made me think about this.”
“She makes me so fucking angry when she does that stuff.”
“It made me really uncomfortable.”
“How does that make you feel?”
Think about these phrases. Where is the power and control? The answer is that the power and control in all of these phrases, lies outside the individual speaking. This implies that we are powerless, choiceless creatures whose emotional, psychological, and cognitive responses are dictated by outside forces. And this simply isn’t true. We do have choices. We are the ultimate decision-makers on our attitudes and emotions. Even when I am deeply triggered by something or some words, I have the power to decide how I feel about it, whether I am going to react or respond (which are very different), what attitude I will have for the rest of the day, how I’m going feel about the person or the words, etc.

The bottom line is that outside of physical interactions, nothing and no one can MAKE us anything. This comes back to I statements. I statements are powerful translations of sentences where we formerly said “make/made”:

“I feel happy.”
“I feel sad.”
“When I heard that, I really thought about this.”
“When she does that stuff I feel so fucking angry.”
“I feel really uncomfortable.”
“How are you feeling?”

What does this have to do with feminism? To me, it has absolutely everything to do with feminism and social change. By changing the way we express our responses to the world, we have the opportunity to take true accountability for ourselves and our feelings. We acknowledge the beauty of choice, and the power we hold as people. We actively shape our reality in a more honest way. We remove the power from the external force, and reclaim it as our own empowerment.

Will we still have strong reactions to things? Yes. When sexist pigs make violent comments I still feel that they have MADE an unsafe space, but I know that the strongest way to combat this psychologically and dialogically is to remember my power of choice is not the think “I hate her, that made me so uncomfortable and mad,” but rather to come to think “I HATE what she just said, I feel so uncomfortable and mad…” Instead of falling victim to the oppressor, I am able to use those moments as opportunities to recognize my own strength as a survivor in an oppressive situation, and I am better able to take honest, accountable action based on feelings that are MINE.

This is a concise/brief version of my long thoughts and opinions on “make” and “made” and it’s funny because probably no one would ever notice that I don’t use these words (in these contexts) but now you know! And I hope you think about it. Our language is a powerful tool in the construction of our worlds.

Keep your eyes out for a post about Spitboy soon.
Your friend,
addie

aka baddie.