Alternatives International

Sisterhood of the Sluts

Anna Lekas Miller — 2011-08-02T17:08:22Z

On January 24th, 2011, Constable Michael Sanguinetti, spoke at a crime prevention conference at a Toronto law school. He dared to say, “…women should avoid dressing like sluts to avoid being victimized.”

He did not know it at the time, but he had just single-handedly given birth to the next modern feminist movement: the SlutWalk.

SlutWalks appeared first in Toronto as a group of women and men who were outraged by Constable Sanguinetti's statement and took to the streets. They protested the idiocy of the idea that women can be divided into “sluts” and “non sluts” and that one group is more at fault for being raped than the other. By being advertised and mobilized by the Old Girls' Club 2.0 of social media and the feminist blogosphere, SlutWalks have taken place in seventy-six different cities on four different continents and across several different cultures. “Sluts” and their allies alike rallied, organized, and marched in cities ranging from San Francisco and Montreal to Morelia, Mexico and Bishek, Kyrgyztan.

Inspired by Constable Sanguinetti's statement, SlutWalk protestors seek to re-appropriate the word “slut” in the same way that queer, dyke, butch, and geek have been reclaimed as positive identities. Just as Kathleen Hanna famously scrawled the “s” word across her stomach at the height of the Riot Grrrl movement, many SlutWalkers wish to redefine “slut” and remove its negative connotation as an apparent qualifier of who does and who does not deserve to be raped. In their eyes, “slut” should become a sex-positive term, used to describe a liberated, sexually free woman who dictates her own promiscuity free of social judgment or repercussions.

Some of the women (and men) who march wear lingerie or other traditionally “slutty” clothing. Many others wear jeans or sweatpants and a T-shirt, a school uniform, or the clothing that they themselves were wearing when they were assaulted. Their attire powerfully states that anyone –regardless of respective sluttiness or non-sluttiness—is vulnerable to assault.

The movement clearly did not spread because of Constable Sanguinetti's statement alone. It spread because his statement is indicative of a larger, omnipotent, and cross-cultural, trend that rape happens because of the victim, the “slut,” and not the rapist. Rape is the victim's own doing. Rape happens because the victim should not have walked home alone. Rape happens because the victim should not have been that drunk. Rape happens because the woman should not have been partying, flirting, or talking about sex. Rape happens because the woman should not have been dressed like a slut.

No. Rape happens because of rapists.

Though wildly successful, the SlutWalk movement is not without its criticisms. For one, it has been accused of only catering or applying to white, western feminists. Globally, most women are in no position to re-appropriate the word “slut” in the way that the name, or many of the movements' spokeswomen, suggest. Though western women are able to flirt with, and even experience, a modern sexuality without the traditional helping of social stigma, many other women live in a cultural reality of honor killings, corrective rape, and unspeakable shame. “Sex positivism” is literally an alien concept in most parts of the world, and is rendered even more irrelevant in many cultures by the institutionalized levels of patriarchy and ignored violence against women.

Additionally, within western cultures white women are at an advantage in this movement, as they have the privilege of being disassociated from their sexuality enough to present themselves as either “women” or “sluts.” That is, as a majority race in western cultures, white women are not as easy to stereotype sexually. Many women of other races do not feel that they have this privilege. Some women are stereotypically cast as hoes, irresponsible young mothers, or sexually “loose” women. Others are promiscuous, sexy, and “unrapeable,” since they are “always ready.” In other words, female sexuality is stigmatized by race in a way that denies women the privilege of presenting themselves as either women or sluts. They are put enormously at risk of upholding caustic stereotypes if they self-identify as the latter.

It is no secret to feminists that there is no universal sisterhood. Each problem, policy, and movement inevitably applies to some women more than others. This inadvertently slices through the glorified ideals of universal feminism and elucidates the privileges of some women over others based on race or class.

How then has this phenomenon, Slutwalking, captivated and spoken to women from New York City to Bishek?

Re-appropriating “slut” into a sex positive term is more important to some niches of women than others. Some women are eager to call themselves sluts to intensionally blur the line between Constable Sanguinetti's fictional and rapeable “sluts” versus unrapeable “everyone else.” Yet many women are still not comfortable putting their sexuality on the line.

However, the second element of re-appropriation taken on by this movement is that of the blame, redirected from the victim to the perpetrator. Though one could argue that some women are likely to be blamed more than others, most would agree that around the world, societies universally teach, “Don't get raped!” rather than the obvious, “Don't rape.”

But that is not to say that re-appropriating the “slut” in “SlutWalks” is not critical to the movement . As feminist activist Jessica Valenti stated in an interview, “Do you think I would be sitting here if they were called Empowerment Walks?”

Photo: Man Alive! (flickr)

Anna Lekas Miller is a freelance writer and activist, currently
interning at The Nation Magazine.

Moroccan Monarchy in the Arab Spring

Anna Lekas Miller — 2011-07-01T14:57:53Z

Like many Arab revolutionaries before him, including Mohammad Bouazizi of Sidi Bouzid, Tunisia, Oussama Khlefi is young, highly educated, and unable to find work. He has a dual degree in information technology and business management, credentials that could earn him a lavish salary if he lived in Europe or even the United States, but currently lives with his parents in Salé (a small town outside of Rabat, Morocco), while picking up odd jobs in a vain attempt to earn and save money.

This is what pushed him and many others into the streets on February 20.

Like the many other uprisings across the Arab World, Morocco's February 20th movement began as a response to the lethal combination of widespread government corruption and economic despair. Thousands of young people in Oussama's position—young and educated recent graduates—are quickly realizing that their university degrees are meaningless in a desolate and corrupt economy.

Most of the country's economic wealth is concentrated in the hands of King Mohammad VI and the royal family. Needless to say, it is hardly able to “trickle down,” and the few Moroccans who do have jobs making use of an advanced degree are most likely employed through a personal connection or blatant bribery. It is nearly impossible to enter the job market based on merit alone.

The bottom ninety-nine percent, those who are not connected to royalty or have extraneous money in their personal budget for bribes, remain chronically unemployed. They are like Oussama Khelfi: picking up odd jobs, living with their parents and unable to imagine a future of their own.

Idleness defines the Arab youth. Idleness becomes restlessness, restlessness becomes unrest and unrest becomes uprisings and possibilities for revolution.

Inspired by the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt and uprisings across the entire world, Morocco set a date—February 20th—and organized protests across all of Morocco's major cities. The demonstrations began with few basic demands, mostly revolving around limiting the executive powers of the king. Moroccans wanted a representative government that was elected, rather than selected, and for the king to be a ceremonial rather than politically authoritative figure. As the protests began to generate momentum, these demands expanded to include the complete dissolution of the current parliament and government, the release of all political prisoners, and long overdue judicial proceedings to investigate well known, but never addressed cases of human rights violations and corruption.

In the words of Oussama Khlefi, “we want to be citizens, not subjects.”

Morocco is technically a constitutional monarchy, but shares many of the same characteristics of the sultanistic dictatorships of Tunisia and Egypt. Though power is allegedly balanced between King Mohammad VI and parliament, in practice it is highly concentrated in the hands of the king. He controls all legislative, judicial and religious decisions and hoards the lion's share of the economy as the rest of the country falls into economic disrepair. The King has promised constitutional reforms and referendums a number of times, but previous empty promises make it difficult to believe that his proposed concessions of power will be fulfilled or generate changes in any meaningful way.

Despite the illusion of stability and a balance of powers, King Mohammad VI's twelve year “ceremonial” rule has produced the same toxic effects as Ben Ali and Mubaraks' kleptocratic dictatorships. Moroccans face the same soaring rates of unemployment, illiteracy and rural and urban poverty. Education and healthcare, though on paper free and accessible to all, often require similar personal connections and bribes as employment. Decades of these inescapable social hardships render descriptions like “pluralism” and “constitutional monarchy” meaningless.

Many Moroccans celebrated on Friday, June 17 when King Mohammad VI announced that he would reform his government to be elected, rather than royally selected and make the prime minister, rather than the king, the political authority of the government. They drove through the streets of Tangier, Fez, Rabat, and Casablanca honking horns, cheering and waving the Moroccan flag. Most international media seems to have latched onto the celebratory images as a victory of the Arab Spring, but is it?

On that Friday, King Mohammad VI announced a new constitution that “enshrines a citizenship-based monarchy.” The prime minister, rather than the king, will now be the “president of the government” and able to appoint officials and dissolve parliament. He will be democratically elected, rather than royally appointed, and preside over a parliament that oversees all legislative decisions. Still, the king will remain the ultimate religious authority, and be the ultimate power broker of military and security issues. There is no guarantee that corruption within the royal family will be examined or mitigated, making it quite possible that the economic conditions that pushed Moroccans to protest in the first place will remain stagnant.

Moroccans will be back in the streets.

Photo: Frankdouwes, Magharebia