Good Reads: Feminism, Sexuality, Relationships

You may already have seen the post on HuffPo on which this is based, since it went viral. This is her husband's side of the story. It's about honesty and feelings and love and woundedness, and it is very much worth reading.

• "My Wife Told Me She Wants To Cheat: Here's How I Feel" (Nige Atkinson, Good Men Project)

I had no idea that it's completely legal to fire people for what they do privately in their sex lives. But apparently it is:

• "Can You Really Be Fired For Being Kinky? Absolutely." (Jillian Keenan, Slate Outward)

Probably seen this one:

• "The Problem With That Catcalling Video" (Hanna Rosin, Slate XX) 

(No, I won't link to the video itself.) But maybe not this one:

• "What My Wife Taught Me About Street Harrassment" (Damon Young, Good Men Project)

There's other good discussion about that out there, but I forgot to keep the links!
 

Ta-Nehisi Coates on White Supremacy and a Life of Struggle

We shouldn't just focus on folks like Frederick Douglass who actually did live to see the end of [slavery]. Many, many more people did not live to see the end of slavery. And yet they resisted and they fought, and they struggled. And so my responsibility, regardless of what my conclusions are, or regardless of what I think is going to happen tomorrow, my responsibility is to resist and is to struggle and is to keep on going. And it doesn’t require, as far as I’m concerned, [me] to believe in ultimate victory. It just requires some amount of loyalty and fealty, frankly, to my ancestors. To people who came before me and struggled.

It would be absolutely just, like, the highest sort of wrong, a moral betrayal, to retreat to a corner and curl up in a fetal position. Even if I believed there was no hope at all. Resistance, in and of itself—struggle, in and of itself—is rewarding. So that really is it. It just—it opened me up to other possibilities, and I think it just made me fuller as a human being.

At The Root.

Women on the Internet, Part 2

Bunch more articles on this sad story.

• "The Trolling Epidemic, Quantified" (Jessica Goldstein, Think Progress)
• "Online Misogyny Levels Up as Gamergate Targets Gawker" (Amanda Marcotte, Slate XX)
• "On the Internet, Men Are Called Names. Women Are Stalked and Sexually Harassed" (Amanda Hess, Slate XX)
• "Anita Sarkeesian, GamerGate, and the Self-Dehumanization of a Generation" (Matthew Rosza, Good Men Project)
• "Gamergate and the Basement Generation" (Matthew Rosza, Good Men Project)

Two Reflections on PGR from Mitchell Aboulafia

Over at Up@Night:

• "Leiter Posts Response to Criticism of Rankings—A Response to the Response" (here)
• "The Dog Ate My (Philosophical Gourmet) Report" (here)
• "Ten Excuses For Not Filling Out the PGR Survey" (here, and just humor)

I personally hope lots of people will simply decline to fill out the report, whether they signed the September Statement or not. That is the best way to delegitimize what has become an embarrassment to the profession.

Also, Leigh M. Johnson has produced a nice timeline of recent events here.

A Wonderful, Sad Story About the Shame of Masturbation

From Julia Boriss, at XOJane:

When I was eight years old, I stacked two layers of pillows across my bed to keep myself from masturbating. I figured that sleeping atop a pillow fortress would force me to sleep on my back, which would keep my fingers from wandering to my nether regions, which would prevent the soul-crushing shame that befell me every time I gave myself an orgasm.

I suspect (as she more or less goes on to say) that this affects women more than men. But, having been raised Catholic and in a very sex-negative household, I remember those feelings, too.

High School Popularity Rankings

A bit of satire from Jonathan Jenkins Ichikawa. Since rankings are such a good idea, you know.

At Least Philosophy Isn't Like This

From Feministing.

Not that it's a lot to cheer about.