‘Slutwalk’, the controversial feminist movement in which women dress provocatively in response to social criticism that labels women who have been raped while being dressed “immodestly” were “asking for it” is coming to Israel. While I agree with Varda Bachrach that the term slut is derogatory and otherwise detrimental to female empowerment, I find the message of ‘Slutwalk’ to be witty and oddly effective. I’ve previously blogged about the complex relationship between Jewish women and clothing; we’re expected to cover up, as if men’s sexual predilections were somehow our fault. Slutwalk flips that expectation on its head.
Are we supposed to make apologies for men who just couldn’t control themselves at the sight of a woman in a halter top? If the instinct to rape is there, it will manifest itself regardless of a woman’s dress. If there were to be an outbreak of female rapists, would soccer players be told to stop taking off their shirts? Would men be told to be careful, to not look or act a certain way in a certain area, for their own safety? The entire premise of rape being in any way connected to the way in which a woman conducts herself is utterly absurd – a woman may be as abrasive or sexualized as she wishes, and it still doesn’t give anyone the right to tear her clothes off. Yes, the sexualization of women in modern media is at times derogatory and patriarchal, but in reaction are women supposed to deny or surpress their sexuality? ‘Slutwalk’ is a way in which women can reclaim their sexuality by telling the world that how covered up a woman is has no correlation with how seriously you should take her. Let’s separate sex and power for one second, and admit that in a 21st Century world, telling women that what they wear somehow impedes their message is antiquated. We ought to move forward in a world where a woman can dress how she would like and not be told she’s “asking for it”, not be told she’s not “serious” because her manner of dress doesn’t conform to so predetermined, archaic norm prescribed by men in order to control their impulses. The desire to rape is a psychological urge primarily experienced by men that they must deal with. Leave women out of it.
