I’ve been reading this book, We Can Save Us All, that I started knowing only that it was loosely about superheroes and was surprised to find is also kind of, sort of, about the aftermath of a campus rape. I won’t get too spoilery or anything here, but I will say that I’m maybe 90% of the way through and I am still holding my breath trying to figure out if I like it because, well —
There is a part of me that feels weird reading a book where a campus rape is a significant plot point is written by someone who, as far as I can tell, is a straight dude, and yet to be honest, there’s nothing super objectionable (to me at least) about how the rape is discussed? The survivor gets to be complicated, she gets to feel weird, she gets to be traumatized and human and be loved even as she is also punished for the sin of… being assaulted. There’s a heavy dose of Male Feminism™️ of the 2010s variety (the book came out in 2018), and it feels like the author gets it, you know?
Well, mostly. Because at the same time, there is also a fair amount of crude objectification of women in the book. Multiple female characters — maybe all the significant ones? — get their breasts described in detail that is not afforded to their male counterparts’ cocks, even as there are — minor spoiler — multiple orgy scenes in the book. It’s this bit that has me unclear on whether or not I like the book, I think I’m still waiting to see if the author understands that some of this is, well, a little gross, a little male gazey, a little alienating to his female readership.
It’s a bit weird, as a bi woman, to bear witness to men and especially straight men objectifying women. You’re expected to be able to bond with men over your shared love of tits and pussy, except men never seem to understand that the way that you, a bi woman, appreciate tits and pussy might be qualitatively different than the way that they do. Or even if it isn’t: talking to men about women as a bi woman is a bit like being a pig watching some savor a nice plate of bacon. Yes, it might be something you’d consume yourself*, and yet you cannot escape the knowledge that you, yourself, could just as easily be served up on that plate.
I don’t know if it is quite the same for lesbians given that lesbians by definition do not want to cavort with men; and I don’t know if it is the same for bi men, because the power differential is simply different enough that talking about admiring men with a straight woman just doesn’t seem equivalent to talking about women’s bodies with straight men.
But what I know is that while a younger me liked to play the role of the “guy’s girl,” the Cool Girl™️, who could play along with the boys as they objectified both her and her female friends, I simply do not have the taste for it anymore. I love women, I sexualize women, I even objectify women (of course!). But the way I do it will simply never be the same as the way someone who has never experienced the cut of the male gaze. It simply can’t be.
*I had to look this up but it is indeed true that pigs will eat pork
Leave a Reply