Brutal Language

"Why lie...The brutal language of being in my life"
My Ruin, “Cold Hands Warm Heart,” The Brutal Language, Rovena Recordings, 2005

I thought for my second entry, I would explain the meaning of my blog's title, Brutal Language. While the inspiration for the title comes from a song by one of my favorite bands, My Ruin, it was arrived at only after spending a considerable amount of time trying to come up with a title that would fit the future content of my blog.

The significance of the title Brutal Language comes from my intention to write openly and frankly regarding patriarchal society's rampant misogyny. It is my contention that one of the main problems in society today is that people are so concerned with being “politically correct” that true honesty has become a rarity; this in turn leads to latent frustrations. I do not have that problem. I give no quarters and I call bullshit when I see it.

Thus, I will be dispensing with much of the euphemistic language which is used to legitimize inequalities between women and men. I will also be discussing ways brutally honest language can be used to draw attention to and fight against power differentials. For instance, I plan on spending a fair amount of time exploring the intersectionality between pornography, the prostitution of women, and rape as a triad of male controlled political violence against women. In so doing, I will not be referring to the prostitution of women with the common euphemism of “sex work,” for various reasons which I will go into at a later date. However, at this time I will say that the prostitution of women is not sex and it is not work. Sex is an intimate sharing between equal partners, while work is a productive activity which adds something of value to society; neither of these elements are inherent in “sex work.” Suffice it to say that I have a huge problem with the mainstreaming of pornography, the prostitution of women, and the ways in which a culture of rape is normalized in present day patriarchal societies.

While I am getting the preliminaries out of the way, I would like to make a few additional points regarding my blog perfectly clear. First of all, I am writing this for myself; my primary purpose is to continue developing my own feminist theory and to hone my writing skills. It would, however, be nice to have thousands of readers. And it would be wonderful if those readers could perhaps learn a little about the world in which they live, as reaching the point in my life where I am wishing to share my thoughts has certainly been a process of learning and discovery.

Secondly, I do not allow comments on my blog. I have learned from experience and from what others have told me that there are some people who make a habit of leaving nasty comments whenever they read something they do not agree with, or which is beyond their level of comprehension. Such people seem to be particularly vile concerning anything even remotely related to feminist issues. And, quite frankly, I really do not care to read someone else's unqualified opinions. If you do not like my blog, no one is forcing you to read it. Unless you are a professional reviewer of blogs; then I hope you are having a wonderful time here. :)

Now that that's out of the way, we can let the fun begin!