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queencallipygos
2008-04-23 12:45 am UTC (link)

At the risk of painting a big bulls-eye on my butt....

I actually have read a lot of other things written by this guy, and I must dissent with the notion that he is skeevy. More like possessing-of-an-aging-hippie's-utopian-sense-of-sexuality. But that, in and of itself, isn't skeevy. Unconventional, yeah, but...not skeevy.

I'm a bit sad that for many, this is the first they've heard of him; he's actually written some wonderful things. He's actually very good.

As for his views on things sexual? I hung out on an adult themed bbs for years, and it sounds more like he'd fit in with that kind of crowd; a relaxed attitude towards it all. Some people wanted to go further than others, but usually all it took was "sorry, I dont' want to do that" to set them straight. The people who pushed it got their asses handed to them.

Pretty much the only thing I can fault him for in this is in talking about it outside the context of those like-minded folks who want to engage. Yeah, my crowd went to a strip club every week, and maybe had some daisy-chaining hook-ups going on, but we...didn't talk about it too much with people outside the group, because that wasn't their bag, really. But if any of us had a blog, we may talk about it a little. Maybe under a filter, but we may talk about it.

All he did was just forget to restrict this to a closed audience, and I don't think this makes him skeevy, just...optimistic. And I can't fault him for that.

Not that I'm saying that those who don't go in for this kind of thing are prudes, either. It just ain't your thing; great. Slash ain't my thing, I can respect the "this isn't my thing" thing.

So -- my contribution to the discussion is that it looks like he just got caught up in something, forgot to restrict the audience, and it bit him in the ass. And no, I don't feel that makes him skeevy, misogynistic, creepy, horny, desperate, or anything like that. Just...someone who forgot how many people he was talking to when he got all excited about something. I can forgive that.

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hallidae
2008-04-23 12:55 am UTC (link)

::notches an arrow:: I'm sorry, but in what possible context could "let's make boobs into non-sexual, non-fetish objects by getting women to let us grope them," be construed as anything but perverted? There is no non-objectification here, except his own mind trying to justify the fact that, for all his lofty ideals, he and like-minded people just want to touch women's boobs. Now, if it had been mutual, like the one person in Scalzi's blog who suggested that if women allowed their chests to be fondled, men had to allow the same for a sexualized part of their own body, then maybe I could understand the "non-objectification" claim. But the fact of the matter is, men wearing buttons that say you can touch their chests has nowhere near the same effect as women doing it, and people trying to claim that it's equal are just trying and failing to cover their asses. Aside from Florida, no one gives a shit about seeing or touching male nipples, for all romance novel covers would like you to believe otherwise.

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	pyratejenni 2008-04-23 01:15 am UTC (link)
	If they really wanted to make it mutual, fondling men's crotches should have been allowed and encouraged. But that won't happen, because OMG TEH GAYZ MIGHT TOUCH ME! (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)