Let's talk about sex - The body part paradox

I realized something, and I wanted to share some thoughts about it.
In the past, I was often criticized by people I had sex with that apparently, I didn't do enough with my hands/arms. To this day, this is mainly down to the awkwardness of not knowing what to do with them.

Bear in mind that so far, my sexual history is exclusively people with a penis. I do know what do to with my hands when I have access to a dick but when I don't (e.g. during penetration), my arms become just two very useless limbs, at best holding my partner, at worst lying next to me. Caressing my partner during sex is a thing I have to focus on, and we all know how hard that can be when you are having good sex. But after receiving that criticism several times, I started thinking: Why don't I know what to do with my hands? Why is that so hard?

I have a theory.
Let's have a good hard look at how we view different bodies in sexual contexts in the media. Bodies that are read as female, according to the portrayal, have a lot of parts to offer that are very sexy - boobs, a nice ass, legs, all of those are viewed as hot and portrayed as hot. The actual genitals are usually less talked about - at most, we see a vulva in media when it is currently penetrated. The visibility of vulvas is a very new concept, and people still have to discuss a lot as soon as they include vulvas in art. Now shift that look towards people read as male. The focus for body parts that are supposed to arouse us is usually on the penis. Then maybe occasionally, you get an ass or some abs.

And here is where the problem starts - the male read bodies that are portrayed as sexy in media are usually very well-trained, there are butts made of steel, overly defined eight packs etc. I don't want to tell anyone they can't be attracted to that, you are all valid, but lets be real: Those bodies are hard to find in real life because they are hard to get, hard to maintain and if you also want to click with someone on a personal basis as well, that reduces the pool of people even more. Thus, when we are sleeping with bodies read as male when they don't have the unlikely set of muscles, we might not really know where to put our hands.

Another thing where this is very visible is the topic of nudes by the way - when a female-presenting person wants to take nudes or have them taken, the focus is mostly on the chest (especially when you are actually modeling for nude art), having photos of a vulva is rare and also viewed as the lewdest option - its more likely that your crotch is hidden in pictures. For male-presenting people who are not as jacked as the image media provides, there are hardly any ways to have photos without a penis considered to be nude art.

Its the complete opposite of how different bodies are viewed in non-sexual contexts by the way, because when it comes to fashion, for example, you can't seem to do it right as a female-presenting person, and it seems to be easier for male presenting folks to find something nice that actually fits their body shape no matter what it is.

So what do we take from this? Glorify other body parts than genitals for male-presenting people. Gush the shit out of them. Gush the shit out of bodies that are not super-muscular, not super slim, that in any way don't fit into the very narrow image of an ideal male-presenting body. Especially for your partners - make the beauty you see in them and the things you think are very sexy about them visible (with their consent only, obviously). Do the same for all the unusual/underrepresented body parts of your female-presenting partners, crushes, friends. We can only win here.

The future isn't female, but the present is male

Last week, I read an article on the German blog Im Gegenteil titled "The future isn't female - a plea for more cooperation between the genders" that was, in my eyes, pretty ill-informed and not fully thought through. I decided to write an article myself, an alternative to what the other author wrote and made feminism out to be. This article was originally published on Im Gegenteil in German as well. 

Oh, when will we finally get rid of that old fairytale that feminists want to get rid of men. When will critics of feminism finally realize what feminists already know: That feminists, of course, don't want to get rid of men, because a) it's simply impossible and b) doesn't help at all?
Why do so many people still believe this nonsense? Probably because they lack the willingness to abstract. Because the thing feminism wants to get rid of is the patriarchy, the supremacy of men - and when we say "men", we mean masculinity as a social concept, not "each and every individual man has to cease to exist". Maybe that is because we are not a children's playtime club, no fancy trend that is in right now, but individuals with a political opinion - opinions, that is, which can differ a lot and can be expressed differently as well, of course. Because that is basically the main point of feminism: We are not a homogenous group. Because women are not a homogenous group. Men aren't either, by the way.

Now some may say: "When neither men nor women are a homogenous group, why do you fight against the supremacy of men, isn' t that a contradiction?"
Let's start at the very beginning, with the idea that "man" and "woman" are merely categories that we as humans use for ourselves. The failure of those begins when we are asking for definitions: What makes someone a man or a woman? A lot of people love to answer that with genitals or chromosomes. I'm sorry to disappoint you: Even from a biological view there are not only man and woman, two categories existing strictly like this. There's way more variety than XX and XY and there's a spectrum between vagina and penis. I know, all of us learned that differently in school but just because our curriculum is simplified that doesn't mean reality is as well.

So it's natural to just assume that gender is a social construct and that also means that so-called femininity and masculinity are only learned behaviours. And now we are at the roots: We live in a society that works within these exact categories. We humans just really love our labels. In the end, the aim is that each and every person can do what he or she or they or every other pronoun should be able to do whatever they want. Every person should be able to live however they want and however it makes them happy. Of course with the usual limits: My freedom ends where it limits the freedom of someone else. That goes in every direction - doing things that don't fit your socially assigned gender role, doing exactly those things, everything in between.

And yes, sure, by law we already got pretty far, but only because it already got better that doesn't mean we are already done. When I go on vacation I don't stop half-way down the road either and say "Ok, here we are, vacation time!" when I'm still in France but originally planned to go to Portugal. Sure, by law we can live our lives quite freely already. The problem is mainly the reactions of others to how we live - sure, women can have a career, but there's still always the worry that they could get pregnant the next second and go on maternity leave. Even when they can't have children. Which is not anyone's business, really. And even if they get pregnant: Why does it harm the professional life of the person giving birth so much, but not the person who impregnated them? When we always say that it takes two people to make a child (which is correct), why is only one of them taking the responsibility for it? Why isn't it more normal for both parents to equally take care of their child? We are having a structural problem here, a vicious circle that needs to be broken. And that isn't only the case here but also when the topic is the choice of profession, the gender pay gap, and many more.

The point is: Yes, theoretically, women can be and do everything they want in Germany, but it will be so much harder as soon as they want to be or do something that is viewed as masculine. The other way around as well. Ever seen the drama when a man wants to be a nurse or a kindergarten teacher?
My favourite argument is still that it is women making other women's lives miserable. And again: yes! It was never about blaming one gender. Sometimes I wish it was that easy because that would make these problems way easier to solve. The sad truth is: women are sexist. Of course they are. All of us are sexist. Simply because we live in and are socialized by a sexist society. Vicious circle, again.

So when we agree that everyone should be able to live a life in equality and well-being regardless of gender and that neither women are the only victims of the patriarchy nor men are the only ones responsible for it: Why call it feminism and not humanism? That's basically not wrong. On the German Wikipedia page about humanism you can read the following definition: "[Humanism] drafts an ideal society where the best possible personal development of every individual person should be enabled. This is linked to criticism of current circumstances which are opposing this goal from the viewpoint of humanism." So you could say in your best conscience: Feminism is always humanistic. The reason to still call it feminism is explained just as quickly: When everything that is viewed as masculine by humanity is valued more than everything that is categorized as feminine we have to bring both to an equal level. And only then we have a chance to get rid of those categories for good.
So yes, I do agree: The future isn't female. The future is diverse and great for everyone. And yes, for that to happen all of us have to work together regardless of gender. So please: Reflect on yourself, your thoughts, your behavious, talk to your friends, family and everyone you know, raise your children to be individuals and maybe, in a few generations, we can be truly humanist. Because feminism is only necessary as long as sexism exists.

#MenAreTrash - A discourse

Embroidery by Fembroidery (Instagram), please check her out and give her all the love and money!

The place is German Twitter. One of the trending hashtags is #MenAreTrash. It started with a brown feminist trying to explain that sexism is a structural problem and can't be solved by individuals only - no matter how nice and cool individual men are, men as a social group and masculinity as a social construct are a problem. We can't sustain on the few individual men that are reflecting their behaviour when they stay exceptions to a norm that stays sexist. I'd say that is a pretty simple thing to understand. Now you might say "but you haven't been called trash, you're a woman, you are not adressed by this" - true! But as a white cis woman I do get adressed when trans people call cis people trash, or when people of colour call white people trash. And I accept that. I accept that there is things going wrong between different social groups here, and that no one actually means that I am trash because of the colour of my skin or for agreeing with the gender I was assigned at birth. What they mean is: White people, cis people and, yes, men hold the privilege and the power to actually change something, and yet they don't most of the time - either they actively work against the change, or they refuse to reflect on themselves to start change from within their own behaviour, or they don't actively citicize their peers when they show problematic behaviour. And I recognize that I am by far not an exception and could do more when people tell me that cis people are trash or white people are trash for not speaking out for their fellow human beings who are not as privileged.

Now the first reaction to hashtags like #MenAreTrash are defensive ones. That is just natural - no one wants to be insulted, that's normal. The problem is that this defense very quickly turns into aggression - "I am not trash because I am a man, you deserve to be raped and killed" is a thing I have read way too often in the past few hours. Let me make one thing clear: When you're trying to proof that you are not an asshole, behaving like one and threatening others is propably not the best approach unless you really, really want to confirm the original statement. Now if that was only the reaction of very few people, that would be almost ok. Would be bearable. But it isn't. It's so so many.

Another reaction that is incredibly common is people arguing that aggressive hashtags like #MenAreTrash are a not helping the cause and only paint feminism in a bad light (and provoking reactions like the one above). That it would be the better approach to discuss peacefully and friendly. While I agree that this would be the ideal way: It doesn't really matter anymore how you talk about feminism. Ninetynine percent of the time, you won't be taken seriously anyway. You will be laughed at, belittled at best, insulted and threatened, at the worst you will actively experience physical and sexual violence or even be killed. These are all things that happen at a shockingly high rate when women speak out for equal rights, no matter how calm and friendly they are being. No matter what a fucking ray of sunshine we are being while trying to discuss this, we will get the same reactions. So why should we always take the high road? Why not yell out all the anger and frustration that sticks to our hearts all the time, each and every day, if it makes no difference anyway? To me, #MenAreTrash is an outlet for all the things we usually don't say, all the anger we bottled up over the years, everything we usually swallow in the naive hope that we could somehow be understood and be taken seriously, that we somehow could induce reconsideration and change if we just stayed calm while our counterparts give us shit. That's the thing: No one tries to police the tone of the ones we are talking to. But everyone asks us to be nice and polite while being harrassed and threatened, additionally to all the micro-aggressions we endure on a daily basis when feminism/sexism isn't even the topic. It's frustrating. And this is what is exploding right now with this hashtag. This is a telling-off.
Basically, #MenAreTrash is like when two people fight face to face and one calls the other one an asshole. Not necessarily because the other one is definitely and irreversibly an asshole, but because you are so incredibly angry about the actual reason for the fight. And when the other person just says: "Sure, you have absolutely legit criticism here with all the arguments and stuff but you called me an asshole so I won't listen to anything you just said no matter how reasonable it is!" - well, they can't be helped then.

So the overall insight of this is: Feminism is angry. Feminism is uncomfortable. Because it sometimes has to be - at least, it got people talking. Maybe, some day, they'll also start to listen. And then, only then, we can start to work on the problem all together.