FEMME&Foe

CW: misogynoir, violent femmephobia, violent homophobia, censorship

quit the fucking racism ppl. i'm on team azealia banks.

first up, check ur misogynoir framing of what happen *to* banks on that flight. *she* was *physically attacked* by two white men and that *led* her to fight back in whichever way she cud (cause and effect! get ur sequence of events and context right i.e. do some intellectual labour!). a black woman vs two white men...fuck u. she has no power in that situation, who cares if she took a cheap shot, what else was she supposed to do? stand there and let the physical abuse continue? framing it all like 'omg, azealia banks called a flight attendant what???!' is cynical, manipulative, racist, sexist bs.

on her follow up tweets e.g. "the lgbt community are like the gay, white KKK"...she's right (tho it is an exaggeration, in that the lgbt community are more guilty of out-of-control violence and rape, rather than violence, rape and murder. great). i'm part of the lgbtqiap community and it's rotting. i've said it over and over again. the white men dominate – economically, spatially, culturally and in terms of being recognised by society at large - and they treat the rest of us like shit. try going out on the scene if u are femme and u have to *assume* u will be physically attacked, threatened, assaulted and verbally abused as par for the course, with ppl just standing by and condoning it. wtf??? how can our scene be so deranged that it is *normalised* for these men to terrorize the rest of us?

when u speak up to ur community u are derided, degraded, bullied and censored. ive been blocked and banned by ‪#‎Gegen‬, one of the biggest 'queer' nights in berlin for writing openly on their timeline abt exactly this; the rampant violence at their events. the shit storm that came back at me - framing me as the aggressor and trouble-maker - went on and on. i was bullied so badly, both by #Gegen and their vile supporters. any wonder their gathering is like it is? there used to be a tradition of protesting #Gegen’s misogyny and transphobia but after that little display, no-one dares say anything anymore.

the queer media is useless. reality is censored away into nothing while they bore on about the latest borefest kink bore harness bore yawn. so irrelevant and niche while we’re under perpetual attack and censorship! or crapping themselves over some analogue act straight out of the 70s (looking at u, ‪#‎PansyParker‬ et al), some cis-guy capitalizing on bitch face like that isnt totally inappropriate and exploitative in a scene where there are so few visible women, just a shit load of cis-men and their €€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€, lapping that shit up. seriously, fuck u so much.

i have tried to speak to ‪#‎Siegessäule‬ and ‪#‎LMAG‬ year after year abt our violent, racist, sexist, classist, ableist, transphobic and everything-that-is-shit scene. i speak to them in person and at festivals, i send messages. every time they ignore me, even tho they damn well kno who i am by now. but it wud kill them to hear, let alone, support intelligent, critical, femme voices.

the rest of the scene is either invisible, alienated and sicked by our depraved mess of a community or just slinks around, intellectually colonised, dead behind the eyes, imitating everything our damn overlords do and deign acceptable.

[German version below] The sanctimonious sculpture, 'Anything to Say', which was unveiled by activists and members of Germany's Green party on Labor Day in Berlin last week, is a piece of hypocritical, censorious transmisogyny.

It features life-size, bronze statues of Julian Assange (who is wanted by police over counts of unlawful coercion, sexual molestation and rape), Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden. Manning, who is trans* and identifies as a woman, is depicted in the 'artwork' as a man. The texts accompanying the piece credit her as 'Bradley Chelsea Manning' and misgender her as 'he'.

Manning officially changed her name from Bradley to Chelsea in 2014. In her press release accompanying the name change she stated:

"I’ve often been asked, “Why are you changing your name?” The answer couldn’t be simpler: because it’s a far better, richer, and more honest reflection of who I am and always have been –a woman named Chelsea."

By depicting her image as that of a man, the artist of this sculpture and its supporters silence Manning's authority on her own mind and body. This is a typical act of ‘daddy knows best’ male supremacy and is in gross conflict with the artist's promotion of his work as a reminder of “how important it is to know the truth and have the courage to know the truth.”

Patriarchal people, media, press, politicians, power centres, activists and ‘artists’ resist a transwoman as an idol and leader. So they erase her, restoring ‘normality’ by replacing her image, White Christ style, and re-enforcing their distorted reality. This is a transmisogynist act of violence and censors yet another woman from our history books.

End transmisogyny. End femmephobia. End invisibility.

 [Video depicts two activists in princess masks in front of the sculpture. One activist glues a long, blond wig onto the head of the Manning figure. The second activist sprays in red the transfeminist symbol onto the wall behind the sculpture. The activist then holds up a sign reading, ‘FUCK TRANSMISOGYNY FUCK FEMMEPHOBIA FUCK INVISIBILTY,’ followed by a second sign reading, ‘CHLESEA MANNING IS AND ALWAYS WAS A WOMAN.’]

 Die scheinheilige Skulptur „Anything to Say“, die letzte Woche am Tag der Arbeit von Aktivisten_Aktivistinnen und Mitgliedern der B’90/Grünen in Berlin enthüllt wurde, ist ein Werk heuchlerischer, zensierender Transmysogynie.

Sie zeigt drei lebensgroße Bronzestatuen von Julian Assange (der wegen sexueller Nötigung, sexueller Belästigung und Vergewaltigung von der Polizei gesucht wird), Chelsea Manning und Edward Snowden. Manning, die trans* ist und sich als Frau identifiziert, wird im „Kunstwerk“ als Mann dargestellt. Im begleitenden Text wird sie als „Bradley Chelsea Manning“ angeführt und mit falschen Geschlechtspronomen benannt.

Manning hat 2014 ihren Namen offiziell von Bradley zu Chelsea geändert. In der Presseerklärung schrieb sie:

„Ich wurde oft gefragt: ‚Warum änderst du deinen Namen?‘ Die Antwort könnte nicht einfacher sein: weil er eine viel bessere, reichhaltigere und ehrlichere Reflektion dessen ist, wer ich bin und immer gewesen bin - eine Frau namens Chelsea.“

Ihre Statue als die eines Mannes abzubilden bedeutet, dass der Künstler der Skulptur und ihre Unterstützer Mannings Autorität über ihren eigenen Verstand und Körper zensieren. Es ist eine charakteristische Handlung männlicher Überlegenheit („Papa weiß es besser“) und in schwerwiegendem Konflikt mit der Darstellung des Werks als Mahnmal für „die Wichtigkeit, die Wahrheit zu wissen, und den Mut zu haben, die Wahrheit zu wissen.“

Personen, Medien, Presse, Politiker_innen, Aktivisten_Aktivistinnen und „Künstler_innen“ einer Patriarchie wehren sich gegen eine Transfrau als Idol und Führungskraft. Folglich wird sie ausradiert und ihr Bildnis gegen eine gewünschte „Normalität" ausgetauscht, das eine verzerrte Realität reproduziert. Dies ist ein transmysogyner Akt der Gewalt und zensiert eine weitere Frau aus unseren Geschichtsbüchern.

“i guess part of the reason i wish i could wear my sexual preferences on my sleeve is because i just hate being harassed by men

i fucking hate this smug, pseudo bullshit so much!! oh thank u, u gender queer master for appearing to give when u actually take take take. and taking that one thing, that one thing that matters more than anything. THE FACT THAT I AM AN AUTONOMOUS *HUMAN BEING* JUST LIKE U. JUST. LIKE. U. MY EQUALITY IN STANDING. MY HUMANITY. REMEMBER THEM??? urgh, check out 4:48 if u wanna vom. what’s the point of this crap? it’s like some sections are ok (3:55, ‘thank u for side swiping stereotypes’) but, just when u let ur guard down, we’re back to the usual crap. um...some situation where ure parading around, clock some randoms and start tripping cos u got the girl? and that makes u the big something. really? so, let’s step back a min. we’re animals, crawling a rock in space. u spot some animals u figure dont respect u. u dont respect them. and yet u still see fit to trip out on some status war, with hottie on ur arm acting as some magic tree air freshener, hanging around to remove the smell of ur shit. reality check: no-one wins with these insecurity-motivated hierarchy games. u fuck urself and the ‘other’ and most of all, u fuck the femme, relegated from thinker, soul and human reality to accessory to ur playground bs.

from wiki: ‘ Coyote does not believe in the gender binary.’ clearly. just some morphed version of it. facepalm!

aaaannd...here we go again. as is so often the case, femmephobia is veneered in gay pride and feminism.  a white gay boy manages to find some naive lesbians willing to bash working class femmes. platforms like gawker fucking love it and the whole thing gets passed around like some kinda gay pride, feminist victory. ‘real’ lesbians....’fake’ lesbians. excuse me? right, cos poverty stricken eastern europeans cant possibly be queer! cos queer is advanced and advanced is middle-class and affluent. or something. note the usual body policing. ‘lesbians dont have long nails’. read: the lesbians i am willing to see and acknowledge dont have long nails. this is an example of the weird invisibility/objectification combo femmes are subjected to. quite how that particular combination is even possible is fascinating. femmes are ignored, invisible and censored. except when daddy needs some kinda vestibule to discuss the evils of the world. then, hello femme! gather round peeps, let’s trip out on some bubble politics and chat about how this vacuum bitch is getting everything wrong. 

TWs: queer scene harassment and policing

“For me, taking feminine social signifiers and playing with and subverting their meaning is a way of taking back the idea of femininity as performed in relation to masculinity and as inherently unthreatening to masculinity, and making it something that is my own and is both of those things.

TWs: sexism, femmephobia

TWs: physical harassment, humiliation, sexism, homophobia 

“hallo! ok, last minute. Maybe its to much or less details, maybe the violence is not clear enough, i mean it is vague. hope it can become useful for you anyway feel free to edit! And great work you're doing!

Standing in the cue for toilettes, at [club name]. I stood there for a while, and the next booth that becomes free is mine. A guy, stands behind me, talking loud, making jokes with his friends, nothing wrong with taking up space, i guess i just thought he was a bit annoying. Until he uses my body as something to lean on, he puts his arm on one of my shoulders, and leans relaxed in while continuing to talk talk to his friends who's standing all around me. I put away his arm. Tell him that i don't want him to touch me. he ask me why i am so angry. aren't we on a party? and yes we are on a party, and we standing in a cue of course I dont care about bodies touching, i just feel that if he need to lean on something, use a wall or some of your own friends. He roles his eyes.

I turn back and stair at the toilettes, for maybe 20 seconds. then I feel a mouth around one of my ears and it hurts and I realize that this idiot is blowing really hard into my ear. It was very confusing form of harassment. I felt a bit unsure of how to handle that someone blew my ear? and what that even was? well, It did hurt, and I was pissed, and embarrassed, so I pushed him back, two hands at his chest. Screaming 'what the fuck are you doing?' he laughs. I try to deal with the laugh. 'it was a joke' he tells to calm me down, he and his friends are still laughing. They laugh until my friend, (male) tells him to back down. Then they turn to him, asks him 'Why are she so aggressive?? Why didn't she get that it was a joke?' He didn't mean anything. He tells my male friend that He Is Sorry. We are all standing 20 centimetres from each other.

I tell him that its me he should say that he is sorry to. He doesn't even look at me. All mesmerized by my male friend.

I go and pee.

For me the violent thing is not so much what was happening with my ear, It could have been whatever. For me its about someone doing whatever they feel like for the moment with me. And then they are totally immune to the consequences. So they can never fail - and I can never win. And it was so extremely saddening that it doesn't matter how good I think I am in taking care of business, my self and an never ending stream of douche bags. Because they don't care about my reaction. They can stand an laugh until a guy comes in and tell them that it not cool. Its like my words needs to be translated through a male representing body to be heard. And that for me is the scary part, the threats and the violence - even if its much more on a psychological level.”

Blog editor’s reply: hey, thank u so much for this testimony. i'm sorry u had to experience that (along with a million other examples, i'm sure) but it's really important to have these events documented.

"For me the violent thing is not so much what was happening with my ear, It could have been whatever. For me its about someone doing whatever they feel like for the moment with me."

and

"Its like my words needs to be translated through a male representing body to be heard. And that for me is the scary part, the threats and the violence - even if its much more on a psychological level."

i think u are articulating exactly what this is... normalised exploitation and the reinforcement of the fact that a certain group of people are pushed into a low position in the social hierarchy. so...it's not one weird guy in a toilet, which wud be bad enough. it's the confused/embarrassed/dismissive reactions of those u tell. it's the relief u feel when someone believes ur version, it's the need to assume people will not. that's what that guy was exploiting: u have less value than me. ur reaction to this event has no meaning, ur voice holds no weight. i have the power and now feel that.

fucking gross. not ok.

but our experiences are not in vain. fuck this femmephobic shit!

Original in German below.

TWs: sexist harassment, homophobia, xenophobia, rape culture language, undermining of Holocaust

Femmephobia: Recently in Olfe, at the Tuesday ‘Mädchendisco’ [ed: thanks for the sexist name, Olfel!]. 

“As always, the place is packed. I’m sitting at the bar, a friend comes back from the toilet and is pushed slightly by the crowd and can’t help falling back into some guy. He totally loses it (I don’t know if he was on speed. Either way, he was highly aggressive). I’m sitting a little way along and can’t hear everything because the bar is loud and full. I hear him shout, “You shouldn’t be here, you shouldn’t be here, you fucking lesbian!” I go up and interrupt and say, “Hey, what’s wrong with you?” He keeps freaking out and his two friends had to hold him back, “It’s not your business, fucking lesbians, fucking assholes. You shouldn’t be here!” I say to him, “Hey, if someone shouldn’t be here, it’s you! It’s Tuesday, it’s ladies night, so shut up and leave us alone!” He completely freaks out and shouts at everyone, “Nazi! Nazi! You fucking lesbians! You Nazi lesbians! Fuck you fuck you fuck you!!!” His friends seem embarrassed by the whole thing, one looks at me apologetically as they push him to another part of the room. We go back to the bar, he and I make eye contact and I pull a face like, “Wtf was that, jeez…” He starts losing it again, gives me the finger carries on tripping out. He should have been grateful that I didn’t do anything to his bag, which he’d forgotten on the stool next to mine. When he noticed he didn’t have it, he stormed back over, snatched the bag and made a big play of turning his back to us. A week later I was back. He was too. He looks straight thru me as if I wasn’t there. When I tell a friend what happened, she says, “Oh, I know him. He’s one of that super pc clique.”

 Femmephobia: Neulich im Olfe, Dienstag, „Mädchendisco“. 

FEMME EXPERIENCE WITHIN THE LEFT

TWs: sexist harassment, invisibility

“i met k in person at a planned, political intervention against a supremacist event. k told me about her activism in berlin’s queer scene. it was clear she was a fairly high-profile, radical left activist and she had a strong online presence.

we spoke and i gave her anecdotes about feminists who question my ethics and values when learning i work for a modelling agency (as if diversity, representation and objectification issues exist in fashion alone). k had been arguing online, rightly, that the event we were intervening was racist and sexist. she also identified my encounter with the anti-modelling feminists as femmephobia. this indicated to me that she was sufficiently educated on intersectional feminist theories. but, from the start of the meeting and throughout, she would:

-constantly take my hand or touch me without any encouragement or consent from my side

-call me „sweetheart“ and „darling“, also unreciprocated

-interrogate me publicly and in detail. for example, 15 minutes into our meeting, she asked me if i was queer and, when i affirmed, asked if i had ever slept with a woman. she defended her intrusiveness by explaining she "needed to know where i was coming from” in order to properly read me.

during our „planning“, i expressed a specific concern several times and was ignored until two hours later, when it prompted k to claim she didn’t understand my „sudden change of heart“. k stalled the intervention by continuing to publicly interrogate me. none of the other activists intervened at any point.

k was worried about the possibility of the police showing up. i’m everything but a fan of the police, however, over several years of going through shitloads of bullshit with officials/clerks/civil servants as an asian woman (and girl), i’ve learned how to talk to them effectively. when i told k this and that i could be helpful in this way, she answered “that only works for you because you’re pretty.“

throughout the evening, she kept commenting on my appearance, saying things like: „too bad you’re not my type, i think we would be compatible“ and „you’re a bit thin for my taste, i prefer something more sturdy.” all without any encouragement from my side.

a second femme, j, arrived, also meeting k for the first time. k instantly started calling her „honey“ and touching her. k asked j if she preferred speaking english or german. after getting the response that german was fine, k ignored this and even began translating german into english ‘for’ j. j criticised k’s behaviour; first by demanding to not be called pet names or touched, later by asking k not to refer to women as „girls“ or use gender terms at all when unnecessary. k’s reactions were to complain that j took away all of „her“ words. even though criticism never got personal and the tone remained constructive, k started crying, complaining that nobody valued her efforts to organise the intervention and asking us to leave our gender politics aside so we could tackle the racism problem first.

MEME BS

urgh, ppl, including ‘allies’*;  keep sharing the shit out of this on my fb. this smug, sanctimonious, blink and u miss it NewSexist™ crap has been pissing me off for weeks.  i guess we can be amused by the irony. how i can tell if i i i…excuse me? *u* need to educate *me* on, like, whether i’m being objectified? hahahaha...perspective check much? how can i tell? here’s a quick tip: how about I TELL U AND U STFU AND LISTEN they just dont get it, do they? daddy’s tripping tripping tripping on some hierarchical horseshit.

*re ‘ally’ lol check out the auto-crowners. “i’m an ally”. kool, when do u start? my dry cleaning needs picking up, get me a latte on ur way back. i once met a person at a party who said he “used to be a rock-star”. i shuda hung around. he coulda referred to himself as a genius and an entrepreneur before the night was out and i coulda played some kinda bingo drinking game in my head.

yep, femmephobia, femmebashing and femme invisibility are misogynist and usually hypocritical. and, yep, ‘queer’ (*cough* appropriated label hell) scenes and lefty scenes are rife with it.