Loading ...
We talk about sex a lot on this site. That is pretty obvious to anyone who reads it. We like sex. We like being free to make our own choices about who to have sex with, how soon, how many partners and which way we are going to do it. We like to share our stories. We like to hear yours.
But what we absolutely do not want to do is send the message that sexual freedom and inhibition is a risk free lifestyle.
Recently, two writers from Jezebel – a website for women aged 25-35 – were invited onto Lizz Winstead’s show, Thinking and Drinking, to discuss their decisions to blog quite openly about their sexcapades and the message they send by writing about them (graphically) on the internet. Winstead, a former writer for The Daily Show, is a strong advocate of sexual empowerment and freedom, but argues it “can only be called a freedom if you protect yourself from rape, disease and pregnancy.”
Tracie Egan and Moe Tkacik, the Jezebel bloggers - who we have quoted and referenced many times before – showed up to the interview drunk and what they said caused quite a stir in the CollegeCandy office.
We have no problem with the choices these women make in their personal lives, but we do have a problem with the fact that they take an issue like rape and make light of it. Pass it off like it’s funny, impossible, fictional and that they are too smart to let it happen to them. No one is too “smart” to be raped. My friends are very smart people; some of the most intelligent, worldly and street smart people I know (Yes, I am bragging). But that didn’t mean anything when one of them went home with someone – a funny, attractive boy we knew through some friends – and found herself in an unsafe situation that she could not stop. He was not some shady dude in the bar; she was “smart” enough to avoid that one. Just as Winstead mentioned in the clip, the ladies of Jezebel have remained safe, not because they have made good choices, but because they are lucky. The same goes for me, and for a lot of the bloggers on this site. We are not doing anything different than the women who find themselves in danger; we are just really f-ing lucky. Though we may not want to be role models, blogging comes with that responsibility. We would be jobless if it weren’t for the people who read and emulate us, so it is disgusting for these two ladies of Jezebel to ignore their responsibilities and make light of such a serious situation. It may have been the wine talking, but what they said is embarrassing and just plain wrong. Women today are very lucky to live in a society that allows us the freedom to choose our lifestyle; we cannot take it for granted. [Photo courtesy of Jezebel]
It wasn’t the muscley guy buying rounds for every girl he saw; she knew not to go near that one.
It was a safe guy that she trusted and that did not make a difference.
20 Comments
it was ever-so professional of them to show up smashed to an interview. that’s the kind of thing that makes me think they’re respectable and intelligent women. they obviously are not taking this issue seriously what so ever.
i agree with mary… they shouldn’t have showed up drunk in the first place.
that being said, the interview just made them seem very ignorant. hopefully they never will get raped, but if they did, it would probably make them reconsider all their statements during this interview.
at least they were lucky enough to really not know better. if only everyone could be that lucky.
Let me first say that, yes, Moe and Tracie behaved horribly on the show. They were totally drunk, didn’t even try to present themselves intelligently and worst of all, they completely undermined Jezebel’s credibility in the blogosphere.
That being said, I don’t see the need for Tracie to put a “Kids don’t try this at home” disclaimer on her blog. Give me a break, it’s not as if people that read One D at a Time or even Jezebel have like, gosh, never heard of pregnacy, disease or rape before. She’s a blogger who writes about her own personal experiences, not, as she put it, “Captian Save-A-Ho.” Same goes for Moe’s work.
Yes they were disgustingly drunk and dumb and said some really ill-conceived things about rape. However as a Jezebel reader what bothers me is the way they misrepresented themselves, Jezebel.com, and by extension, it’s readership. Do they need to take responsibilty as role models and start issuing sexual violence PSAs? Bish plz.
The Jezebel girls can’t represent all of us (it’s not fair to ask them to), but Lauren, I agree with your comment — what hurts me the most is that I think they completely misrepresented what Jezebel stands for, and what sexual liberation stands for.
They shouldn’t apologize for their personal actions and how the represent themselves. That’s their own business. But when you represent a pretty big website, a website that is doing so much good when it comes to worldly women, it’s so important to realize the power you have in your words, both written and spoken.
FYI, Tracie Egan’s blog is onedatatime.com, not slutmachine.blogspost.com.
@J-NYU: Well put. I can’t stand women’s magazines and Sassy folded just a little before my time, so I was delighted when I discovered Jezebel about 6 months ago. The mix of politics, fashion, snark, insightfulness and irreverence offered at Jezebel is a often a god-send to me in my otherwise female culture deprived world. Of course it isn’t perfect, but I haven’t found anything else like it.
I just hope this doesn’t tarnish the blog’s rep too much, I would hate to see it associated in people’s minds with dumb drunk girls. And while I’m pissed at Tracie and Moe, I’m also annoyed that Lizz Winstead felt it necessary to turn this crap interview into a hit piece on Huffington Post. No doubt she was really disappointed with them, me too, but does it have to be made into some dire warning about the state of new wave feminism? OMG OUTRAGE look at what these writers are telling IMPRESSIONABLE YOUNG WOMEN! Ugh, self-serving bullshit, if you ask me.
I really don’t know where to start after watching this clip.
Yes, the girls shouldn’t have been that drunk (or drunk at all for that matter) when trying to discuss such hot button topics that (I’m assuming) they’re passionate about. Tracie can’t seem to find the words she needs to articulate her position (which I really and truly hope was the case, and that she didn’t mean that she was too smart to be raped). Moe continued guzzling throughout the whole interview but it’s not like she was given the chance to complete a sentence anyways with Winstead interrupting her every 30 seconds (I’m with Lauren on the self serving bullshit).
But they were wrong to dismiss the role they play as, um, role models. Granted, Slut Machine does not make me want to go out and explore my promiscuous side, but Tracie and Moe are both women that I DEEPLY admire as writers. While their lifestyle isn’t something I necessarily try to emulate (with the exception of pot psychology), their wit, intelligence and f*cking awesome writing style is a talent I hope(d?) to achieve someday. So, no, little girls everywhere are not reading Jezebel hoping they grow up to booze it up and sleep around. But little bloggers like me are reading Jezebel and other well respected, extremely popular sites searching for and cultivating their own personal writing style based on what they see.
So yeah, I know Santa isn’t real now and what not, but this interview completely undermines what Jezebel stands for.
Sexual liberation and female empowerment are things we’ve fought (and continue to fight for), but a woman’s intelligence, in no way, can be held accountable for her rape. Sorry to get all Lifetime on everyone’s ass, but as an intelligent woman (who was f*cking lucky for a very very long time and knew how to avoid situations they teach you about in Sex-ed), my lucky streak ended when I was raped. And I definitely thought I was too smart for that to ever happen to me.
Lizzy Winstead has the right to do what she did. You can’t deny that young teenage girls will be impressed by these two slutbags since everything has been demoralized. Also, I do have strong feelings about rape. You should always report it. But I can’t help NOT feeling sorry when promiscuous girls get raped. I just can’t. They want sex well they got it in a way that they didn’t like. Too bad.
laura: wow. just, wow. i was appalled by SM and Moe’s ridiculous display on the show. that said, please don’t represent yourself as a jezebel. you don’t feel sorry when a promiscuous girl gets raped?
perhaps you could clarify your overwhelming ignorance: is it okay when a girl gets raped, if she’s naked and fooling around with a guy? is it NOT okay if she’s simply walking home from work and someone jumps her from behind? what if she’s not promiscuous, but the drunk guy perceives her in that manner? is that okay? or is this a question of odds for you? promiscuous = more opportunities to get raped? by that logic, does that mean women who live in more populous cities should just accept that they might be raped, and deal with it? you know, if it’s a question of odds: a woman who lives in a town of 300 people is a lot less likely to run into a potential rapist on any given night than a woman living in a city of 2 million. i’m just wondering. as you can see, i’m hopelessly confused by your logic.
how can you even purport to be upset by SM’s statements (which implicitly blamed the victim for being “too stupid”) and make that kind of assertion? please explain.
no, actually, don’t explain. just fuck off.
oh, and FYI: i’m not promiscuous. i just have this pesky personality trait where blatant idiocy and ignorance infuriate me.
@Laura: Oh, good lord! I really hope your comment is sarcasm gone horribly wrong. If you are serious… well, jeez… I don’t even know how to address that! Do you just have a problem with promiscuous women who have sex with many people or would you also have a problem with monogamous people who have a lot of sex with each other? I’m guessing the latter doesn’t offend your delicate sensibilities. NO ONE deserves to get raped. NO ONE. It is not the victim’s fault if they are raped. It is the fault of the person who took it upon themselves to violate the body of someone else, forever making that assault a part of who they are. Nobody is “asking for it” no matter how short her skirt may be or how many people she has had CONSENSUAL sex with in the past. I agree with noxiousbeast… please do fuck off.
@Laura- Fuck you.
if theres such a thing as being to smart to be raped, these bitches aren’t it.
@Lauren no thank you, please, I don’t want herpes or whatever stds you have. ^_________________^
FYI Laura, CollegeCandy in its entirety has every STD imaginable. Just by visiting our site you’re probably being infected. Just something to consider… if you are capable of intelligent thought (methinks not!)
And for those who practice cognitive thought/reading & writing skills/ non-ignorant dumbassedness, Tracie gives her take on the whole debacle here
*wouldn’t let me post it. It’s the newest entry on One D at a Time . com
these women are idiots.. but i bet their blog has gotten a mountain of hots because of this interview and that was probably their agenda.
these women are idiots.. but i bet their blog has gotten a mountain of hits because of this interview and that was probably their agenda.
Moe mentioned being raped. She made light of it, but it’s her experience, she can make jokes all she wants if that’s how she’s able to deal with it.
Those girls were hammered. Are you really all up in arms over what they said? I mean, come on. Liz could have recognized that these girls were piss-drunk and had a good time cracking jokes, but she took it personally, and ran them down on the show, and then ran them down on the internet. I mean really, who asks drunk people about rape? You talk about a subject that touchy for that many women with two girls you disagree with after you feed them alcohol for two hours in the green room? No, this is character assassination, and they walked right into her trap!
She also mentioned that ‘you can’t rape the willing’ as Tracie talked about having never been raped. Well yeah! You CAN be too smart to get raped if you’re a total slut. Just avoid being alone with guys you wouldn’t be willing to fuck, which is easy if you’d fuck just about anyone any time. Be really into whatever porn move your suitor wants to pull, and generally willing to try absolutely anything. Yes, you too can never be raped! All you have to be is compliant and enthusiastic and preferably drunk. It’s easy, and so can you!
I think Liz really did take advantage of the situation. Not to mention the fact that she used every blame-the-victim tactic in the book. I don’t know why the girls chose to show up drunk, but they clearly thought they were walking into a lighthearted interview and were ambushed when they could not intelligently defend their positions.
Post a Comment