once escorted
May. 28th, 2009 07:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rmThe first time I worked clinic defense was the month after I turned eighteen. Now, most people stood in a particular phalanx by the clinic door, especially during the worst of the protests. The phalanx was designed to make sure protesters couldn't crawl through our legs, that there would still be a barrier if they stuck us with pins, which, yes, they did. Then, there were the people stationed inside the clinic, if it had interior doors. Sometimes women would pose as patients and lock themselves to the interior doors, blocking them. Finally, there were the people who escorted the women in and out of the clinic.
I did all three of those jobs at various times, but mostly I either guarded the inside doors of the clinics or escorted patients.
Mostly, the women didn't talk. But sometimes they did, either about nothing in particular or dark humour. It was strange, responding to them, and always being so careful not to reveal any particular sentiment to them.
"I hate this," one woman said. I couldn't but nod, because "this" could have been anything.
She kept talking. "Always being escorted, like I can't go to the doctor by myself."
"I'm sorry, sometimes the protesters pose as patients; it's for everyone's safety."
"But I feel like a child."
*
A woman's life is like that. We are always escorted: by our friends to the ladies and by our fathers down the aisle. It is what is expected of us. My debutante friends had to choose escorts -- one civilian and one military -- for the coming out ball and my high school dates always had to pick me up and drop me off at home, even as I was often older and more equipped to handle the world without such boys.
When I was engaged at 24, every professional service I talked to about the wedding planning wanted to speak to my fiance or my parents. When I called my bank today to discuss an issue they asked -- merely as a matter of security, but I know how it felt -- if there was a cosigner on an account.
There's a reason it's women and children first. It's because in the eyes of history and habit, we've long been mostly the same.
At least married you get the force of your husband's authority, if not your own.
*
Gay rights are, among other things, a feminist issue. If we did not hate and infantilize women, would we so question the masculinity and competency of gay men on the grounds that they must somehow be feminized by their romantic and sexual preference for males? If we did not hate and infantilize women, would we so condemn women who are not available to men, because they'd rather be with each other?
*
In the mid-90s, I traveled to Ireland with that man I was engaged to. Because I made all the hotel reservations, I quickly became Mrs. Maltese and he was referred to as Mr. Maltese. We learned quickly not to question this.
A vote was going on in the country then about whether to legalize divorce. The posters that supported divorce availability showed a photo of a woman and asked, "doesn't she deserve a second chance?" The posters against divorce also showed a woman and asked, "doesn't a man have the right to a family?"
The point of this is not that I was outraged. The point of this is that I am outraged now because my dominant reaction at the time, beyond anger and incredulity, was simply the quiet recognition of what I had always known as a woman: to be property is to be loved; to be married is the closest you will ever be to becoming an adult.
*
I never got married.
*
I'm 37 now. I'm not supposed to tell people that. After all, as perpetual children, women are also supposed to look perpetually young. Maybe if I looked my age I'd be more careful about it. Maybe I just don't care anymore.
I've got a lot more sense than I used to. I'm less complicated now in some ways. And way more complicated in others.
And in the great gay marriage debate, I keep coming back to this feeling that in the end this whole clusterfuck national debate on my humanity is really a secret, subconscious referendum on whether women can ever be adults, can ever be unescorted, can ever look like something that wasn't designed for the male gaze, can ever possess their own desire. It is also, it seems for many people, a referendum on whether masculinity can exist without the perpetual female child present to confirm its existence.
*
I've been an adult since I left home, because I've had to be. That was twenty years ago. Sometimes I've succeeded. Often I've failed. But I've continued on, and I've tried to do better. I don't regret much, but there was certainly some stuff I could have done without; I just didn't know it at the time.
That the world has both changed and that I'm a little bit crazy is so clear to me the more I meet people who have never felt all this, who have never had to.
That's hope.
So is the way much of this is just a pretty far gone memory to me now, like the butcher shop we got our meat at when I was a child.
*
In the late '90s I had an abortion. There were no protesters. The doorman in the fancy building on the Upper West Side smiled at me, and the man involved in the matter came with me, as was appropriate.
Which means I was once escorted.
In this particular lexicon of being, I wish I didn't know what that means.
*
Prop 8 and its ilk are not referenda on me as a gay person or as a woman, although they are the first overtly and the second covertly.
These votes and discussions and debates and decisions are referenda on what we deem an adult human to be or not be.
It really is that simple.
*
Sometimes people ask me what it's like to be bisexual or gay or whatever word we're using today. They'll ask how I knew. Or what's going on with my genderqueer stuff. Or for advice on speaking to others about these same issues. And I'm mostly happy to answer, because, let's face it, I'll run my mouth about anything if I have the time.
But I have things I want to know too: what's it like not always having to connect the dots about what people really think of you before you even walk into the bloody room?
Sometimes, people ask why I'm so public on my journal or why I want so badly to be famous and successful. There are flip answers to that, that you've surely heard me give. Oh, you know, like everyone in this business, my mother never loved me enough or No secrets, no blackmail are two of my favorites.
But there's a third answer. A truer answer. With a female body and a queer heart, my life was always going to be public anyway.
I did all three of those jobs at various times, but mostly I either guarded the inside doors of the clinics or escorted patients.
Mostly, the women didn't talk. But sometimes they did, either about nothing in particular or dark humour. It was strange, responding to them, and always being so careful not to reveal any particular sentiment to them.
"I hate this," one woman said. I couldn't but nod, because "this" could have been anything.
She kept talking. "Always being escorted, like I can't go to the doctor by myself."
"I'm sorry, sometimes the protesters pose as patients; it's for everyone's safety."
"But I feel like a child."
*
A woman's life is like that. We are always escorted: by our friends to the ladies and by our fathers down the aisle. It is what is expected of us. My debutante friends had to choose escorts -- one civilian and one military -- for the coming out ball and my high school dates always had to pick me up and drop me off at home, even as I was often older and more equipped to handle the world without such boys.
When I was engaged at 24, every professional service I talked to about the wedding planning wanted to speak to my fiance or my parents. When I called my bank today to discuss an issue they asked -- merely as a matter of security, but I know how it felt -- if there was a cosigner on an account.
There's a reason it's women and children first. It's because in the eyes of history and habit, we've long been mostly the same.
At least married you get the force of your husband's authority, if not your own.
*
Gay rights are, among other things, a feminist issue. If we did not hate and infantilize women, would we so question the masculinity and competency of gay men on the grounds that they must somehow be feminized by their romantic and sexual preference for males? If we did not hate and infantilize women, would we so condemn women who are not available to men, because they'd rather be with each other?
*
In the mid-90s, I traveled to Ireland with that man I was engaged to. Because I made all the hotel reservations, I quickly became Mrs. Maltese and he was referred to as Mr. Maltese. We learned quickly not to question this.
A vote was going on in the country then about whether to legalize divorce. The posters that supported divorce availability showed a photo of a woman and asked, "doesn't she deserve a second chance?" The posters against divorce also showed a woman and asked, "doesn't a man have the right to a family?"
The point of this is not that I was outraged. The point of this is that I am outraged now because my dominant reaction at the time, beyond anger and incredulity, was simply the quiet recognition of what I had always known as a woman: to be property is to be loved; to be married is the closest you will ever be to becoming an adult.
*
I never got married.
*
I'm 37 now. I'm not supposed to tell people that. After all, as perpetual children, women are also supposed to look perpetually young. Maybe if I looked my age I'd be more careful about it. Maybe I just don't care anymore.
I've got a lot more sense than I used to. I'm less complicated now in some ways. And way more complicated in others.
And in the great gay marriage debate, I keep coming back to this feeling that in the end this whole clusterfuck national debate on my humanity is really a secret, subconscious referendum on whether women can ever be adults, can ever be unescorted, can ever look like something that wasn't designed for the male gaze, can ever possess their own desire. It is also, it seems for many people, a referendum on whether masculinity can exist without the perpetual female child present to confirm its existence.
*
I've been an adult since I left home, because I've had to be. That was twenty years ago. Sometimes I've succeeded. Often I've failed. But I've continued on, and I've tried to do better. I don't regret much, but there was certainly some stuff I could have done without; I just didn't know it at the time.
That the world has both changed and that I'm a little bit crazy is so clear to me the more I meet people who have never felt all this, who have never had to.
That's hope.
So is the way much of this is just a pretty far gone memory to me now, like the butcher shop we got our meat at when I was a child.
*
In the late '90s I had an abortion. There were no protesters. The doorman in the fancy building on the Upper West Side smiled at me, and the man involved in the matter came with me, as was appropriate.
Which means I was once escorted.
In this particular lexicon of being, I wish I didn't know what that means.
*
Prop 8 and its ilk are not referenda on me as a gay person or as a woman, although they are the first overtly and the second covertly.
These votes and discussions and debates and decisions are referenda on what we deem an adult human to be or not be.
It really is that simple.
*
Sometimes people ask me what it's like to be bisexual or gay or whatever word we're using today. They'll ask how I knew. Or what's going on with my genderqueer stuff. Or for advice on speaking to others about these same issues. And I'm mostly happy to answer, because, let's face it, I'll run my mouth about anything if I have the time.
But I have things I want to know too: what's it like not always having to connect the dots about what people really think of you before you even walk into the bloody room?
Sometimes, people ask why I'm so public on my journal or why I want so badly to be famous and successful. There are flip answers to that, that you've surely heard me give. Oh, you know, like everyone in this business, my mother never loved me enough or No secrets, no blackmail are two of my favorites.
But there's a third answer. A truer answer. With a female body and a queer heart, my life was always going to be public anyway.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-05-30 02:16 am (UTC)I have a similar public-ness to my life, due to my disability rather than my gender/sexuality.
no subject
Date: 2009-05-30 03:13 am (UTC)I read this when you first posted it (well - just after it was boosted by
The first thing I thought about was how I'm always insisting to people that I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself, when they're telling me that I shouldn't go here, or walk there, alone... I always looked at it as a safety thing - that given my shape, size, & gender that I looked like an "easy target"...
The second thing I thought of was back in High School... how the worst thing to be called was a Lesbian... I always thought it was because the boys ran the popularity show... there were the popular boys, and you got to be a popular girl if one of the popular boys liked you... so the whole social ladder climbing thing for the girls was all about being on parade for the boys... so being a lesbian - and therefore naturally not interested in the popular boys - would be "counter culture" and therefore must be squashed...
But in both cases - you've given me cause to rethink my conclusions...
I hope you don't mind me friending you...
no subject
Date: 2009-05-30 04:47 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-05-30 04:09 am (UTC)I actually like being escorted, but I resent needing it.
I'm a very frail femme person. I am also generally allergic to the sun, and way too skittish to go out into the world alone.
I just generally prefer to be escorted by another lady. My wife and I have played at this buddy system for some time now.
It would be so nice not to need it...
I'm very dominant and into manipulating men's brains. I'm usually the substitute for having a male in the party, knowing a bit about how to hypnotize them. Femme-craft I call it.
I get high off the manipulation, but really, in the end, I really hate having to be on social guard to make sure myself, and my lover(s) are not treated poorly, given the short end of the stick or spoken down to. It can get exhausting.
You write eloquently. I sense a bit of a like mind.
no subject
Date: 2009-05-30 05:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-05-30 07:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-05-30 08:02 pm (UTC)“Uh huh. How old were you when you found out? How did you figure it out?”
no subject
Date: 2009-05-31 05:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-05-30 08:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-05-31 12:16 am (UTC)twice as X-y
Date: 2009-05-31 05:19 am (UTC)I never really thought much about being escorted- then again, when I was 18 I moved a thousand miles away from the place I'd lived since birth and felt like I'd come home- and I didn't know anyone there.
I felt like pretty early on in life I discovered it was me against the world- maybe you didn't.
There are times you can not control the way others treat you- but there are times you CAN.
Be who you want to be. THEN surround yourself with people that will help. Really help, not just commiserate.
Women aren't weak. Physically, sometimes. Mostly they are cunning and cruel, in my experience. Men tend to be more open about their adversaries.
As far as physical supremacy, I feel the gun pretty much levels that playing field.
As far as opression- it can be overcome. Obama 08.
I make it in "a man's world" by not allowing the fact that I'm not a man to be my excuse. I'm just as good as him. In fact, I'm BETTER.
Re: twice as X-y
Date: 2009-06-01 12:59 am (UTC)Your comment is really quite patronizing. It's awesome you believe in yourself, but that doesn't negate institutionalized sexism or homophobia or its effects on women, especially queer women. Please.
Re: twice as X-y
From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2009-06-01 01:55 am (UTC) - ExpandRe: twice as X-y
From:Re: twice as X-y
From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2009-06-02 11:24 pm (UTC) - ExpandRe: twice as X-y
From:Re: twice as X-y
From:Re: twice as X-y
From:no subject
Date: 2009-05-31 05:47 am (UTC)I am moderately surprised, though, that nobody has mentioned that the idea of a girl/woman being completely powerless in society was brought to popular culture in the song "Just A Girl" by No Doubt, back in 1995. The lyrics:
Take this pink ribbon off my eyes
I'm exposed
And it's no big surprise
Don't you think I know
Exactly where I stand
This world is forcing me
To hold your hand
'Cause I'm just a girl, little 'ol me
Don't let me out of your sight
I'm just a girl, all pretty and petite
So don't let me have any rights
Oh...I've had it up to here!
The moment that I step outside
So many reasons
For me to run and hide
I can't do the little things I hold so dear
'Cause it's all those little things
That I fear
'Cause I'm just a girl I'd rather not be
'Cause they won't let me drive
Late at night I'm just a girl,
Guess I'm some kind of freak
'Cause they all sit and stare
With their eyes
I'm just a girl,
Take a good look at me
Just your typical prototype
Oh...I've had it up to here!
Oh...am I making myself clear?
I'm just a girl
I'm just a girl in the world...
That's all that you'll let me be!
I'm just a girl, living in captivity
Your rule of thumb
Makes me worry some
I'm just a girl, what's my destiny?
What I've succumbed to Is making me numb
I'm just a girl, my apologies
What I've become is so burdensome
I'm just a girl, lucky me
Twiddle-dum there's no comparison
Oh...I've had it up to!
Oh...I've had it up to!!
Oh...I've had it up to here!
no subject
Date: 2009-06-01 05:12 am (UTC)Hiya hun! Hugs if you are up for them.
no subject
Date: 2009-05-31 11:10 am (UTC)Thank you very much.
I wonder if I might be able to link this? With accreditation of course:)
no subject
Date: 2009-05-31 05:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-05-31 09:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-06-04 11:41 pm (UTC)(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2009-06-02 11:56 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-06-03 05:06 pm (UTC)Thank you. Thank you.
no subject
Date: 2009-06-04 07:55 am (UTC)I moved overseas, to a developing country, with my boyfriend (on his encouragement and support every step of the way), last November. Feeling glad I could live overseas for a year the way I wanted: with my best friend, my escort.
Four months into our year overseas, he decided he didn't love me anymore, and left. Rather unexpected. Rather crushing.
The organisation I'm here with offers two pieces of conflicting advice: don't buy a car / don't go out at night on your own, especially if you are a woman. (There is no public transport at night.) Stupid me. Why did I think I would not want a car? I thought it would be fine without one; I'd just walk everywhere with my boyfriend, or stay in and have fun at home together.
I try, and I try, to get out and do as much as I can. But in the end, a lot of the time, I'm in the house, on my own, no friends nearby. I can't go out at night - even though usually I think I'd be safe, that one time, that one time, if something happened.. Everyone would point the finger at me. My fault, because my boyfriend left me, and I dared to try to go out on my own. I know it.
I love this country, and I love my job here, that's why I'm staying my contract out, but I can't fucking wait to move back to my own country, where I can buy a goddamn car and go wherever the hell I please.
Thanks for letting me share.
Once escorted
Date: 2009-06-05 08:12 am (UTC)One way that we can change this is also from within our own small universe, our families. I was the only little girl I ever knew that was raised by a single father. That I grew up with both trucks and dolls, trains and teddy bears did not make me immune to having certain ideas put into my head.My father worried himself sick when I moved out and shared a flat with friends in the big, bad city. I never encountered violence until I lived in the safe suburbs, and that was at the hands of a man who was my partner! I struggle to not be overly worried about my 12yo daughter when she does activities I never questioned allowing my son to do. Walking to the park a few houses away should not be something only her brother could do at her age, especially since it WAS her brother that got punched bloody by a bully, not so many years ago! Mass Media promotes the idea that the world is unsafe for girls, no matter how old they are. The world is really as safe or unsafe for everyone, depending on circumstance and location. I'd worry more about my husband being assaulted defending me than I do something happening to me.
I have found women to be competent in every arena men are, and vice-versa. Does this mean ALL women and ALL men? Nope. I have a husband that enjoys cooking, can sew, and cannot read a map nor stand mechanical work. He can lift lots more than I ever could. He loves that I can balance a checkbook, and follow crazy assembly directions. We balance.
We have encountered the fools who ignore my presence because I am a woman. When a deacon at our church made a very snide and sexist comment and I called him on it, he went to my husband to work things out...hubby told him he needed to talk to ME. A car salesman tried to illegally transfer MY license plate onto a car HE wanted to put into ONLY my husband's name. Sales persons always tend to look at and talk toward my husband, until it becomes obvious that I am the informed shopper and the ultimate decision is usually mine.
This whole discussion has caused me to analyze how I treat my children based upon their gender, and also helped me realize we have a long way to go.
no subject
Date: 2009-06-05 06:10 pm (UTC)i'm thinking of getting married, and there is a custom in my country that the groom's family comes to 'see' the prospective bride. it used to be a terribly humiliating ordeal though most women never seem to realize it... even now. even now, it is a rather embarrassing situation for a self-respecting woman. what's worse, society expects the prospective bride to dress in traditional attire on the day of her 'being seen', and what's still worse, my mother insists that i do so too. the groom dresses in western clothes as usual.
you were talking about eyes of history and habit. there you are.
to be a woman is to be an unsung hero. you're damned if you do, and you're damned if you don't.
Mostly a UK experience.
Date: 2009-06-06 08:05 pm (UTC)I remember when I lived in Germany I didn't like to go out into town after dark on my own, unless I could get to the place and back by public transport( ie not walking very far).
So far I've been lucky and not experienced this infantilasion too much, but I can imagine in the future if my boyfriend and I are married people might view us differently.
In terms of walking someone home (at night), I just prefer to walk with at least one person, male or female, just in case I collapse or trip and injure myself.
Here in the UAE people seem surprised that I'd take a taxi on my own. 8) but that's a whole other butterball of institunalised sexism.
So glad to be back in the UK soon where people tend not to care and I feel free.
no subject
Date: 2009-06-08 05:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-06-11 03:38 am (UTC)http://newsbean.livejournal.com/292217.html
no subject
Date: 2009-06-14 10:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-06-14 10:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-06-15 09:13 pm (UTC)Women are the Other. Men are the Default. To be Other means that apparently, people can "legitimately" own you or question your integrity or your public role or whatever. After all, the Deviant is to be held accountable, right?
Only when women and queers will become their own people, will liberation be here.
no subject
Date: 2009-06-28 11:39 am (UTC)I'm getting married next year, and everyone keeps asking me if my Dad is going to walk me down the aisle. My answer is mostly no, because I want my mom to do it (or them together) as my mom was the one who raised me (my step-dad is a good guy, but we never really saw eye to eye).
I've also considered walking down alone or walking with my fiance to symbolize our joining together as something we're doing as equals.
Then I realized how very LITTLE I CARE.
Yes, as women, we are very often escorted (dances and parties as young girls, being walked home after dates as young women, being asked if we're joint bank account holders/loan holders/etc).
However, I also noticed that my own assertiveness keeps people from looking for my companion/escort. On the phone I make it very clear that I balance the budget in this family and no one as ever challenged it. When out alone (eating, just taking in sights, etc) and people get rude enough to say "Oh, no boyfriend", I just stare at them until they're uncomfortable enough to tell them to fuck off. Because yes, I'm marrying a man, but he's NOT MY KEEPER. Nor am I his. (OK, I am b/c I'm expected to be. I know where he is at all times but that's b/c he doesn't really go anywhere but four places, haha.)
As for our very beings always being public? Yes, I agree wholeheartedly. The abortion issue is the most public scene there is. Who the fuck is any man (who can never be in this situation) to say what I can and can't do with my body? If we dress a certain way, then we are a certain type of ... person. Before anyone even ever says hello to us.
I just try to make myself something they didn't expect once they do get the balls to say hello. :D
Also, it helps once you stop giving a FUCK about what other people think. It's a lot easier to assert my own personality over their misconceptions that way.
As for being public about your life in your journal? Rock the fuck on. I wish I had those cojones. While I don't care about being judged, I do still strangely care about who knows what about me. I think it's because I feel that my emotions, my memories and my thoughts are my power and the more closely I guard that, the stronger I am.
To sum this up, you're awesome. Whether or not you're escorted. ;)
no subject
Date: 2009-10-18 07:32 pm (UTC)"A woman's life is like that. We are always escorted: by our friends to the ladies and by our fathers down the aisle. It is what is expected of us. My debutante friends had to choose escorts -- one civilian and one military -- for the coming out ball and my high school dates always had to pick me up and drop me off at home, even as I was often older and more equipped to handle the world without such boys.
When I was engaged at 24, every professional service I talked to about the wedding planning wanted to speak to my fiance or my parents. When I called my bank today to discuss an issue they asked -- merely as a matter of security, but I know how it felt -- if there was a cosigner on an account.
There's a reason it's women and children first. It's because in the eyes of history and habit, we've long been mostly the same.
At least married you get the force of your husband's authority, if not your own."
I was born in Mass and raised in Ct. I am 42 years old. I am bi, poly, and a survivor.
I can not EVER recall being escorted anywhere as a matter of course. When I dated in high school, sometimes he drove, sometimes I did - depended on who could get the folks to loan a car.
When I left home, I joined the military, and no one assumed I needed an escort to do my job.
I have walked alone through the streets of Connecticut, Massachusets, Florida - and Japan - before I was 21.
I did the same in California, Mexico, and Oklahoma .
I became a single parent, and again, I did for myself, and my child - and no one ever questioned my right to make my own decisions or asked why I walked alone at midnite to work.
Perhaps your cultural background was an impact, perhaps I just did not see the attempts to chaperone my life and thereby slipped the traces.
Or perhaps it was choice.
Not the one choice that a woman must sometimes make and listen to the world debate on - but a multitude of choices that we all make every single day.
I can't speak to your experience, but I can speak to my own truth, and that is that I am and have always been free.
I wish that you, who are younger than I, had had that freedom also.
It's not up to someone else to give you, it has always been yours for the taking.
I am reminded of the old story :
Diogenes was having lentils for supper as Aristippus, who lived comfortably by flattering the king, looked on. "If you learnt to be subservient to the king you would not live on such garbage as lentils," said Aristippus. "If you had learnt to live on lentils you would not have to flatter the king," replied Diogenes."
no subject
Date: 2010-03-16 09:56 pm (UTC)