I respect that some of you are anti-vaccines–or just anti-Gardasil—but I hope that some Girl with Pen readers will join me in cheering what I consider a better-late-than-never decision by the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices. It has officially recommended that boys and men ages 13-to-21 be vaccinated against the sexually transmitted disease HPV (human papillomavirus) to protect from anal and throat cancers.

There are many reasons this makes good sense. As I wrote in the Winter 2010 issue of Ms., there’s overwhelming evidence that HPV can lead to deadly oral, anal and penile cancers–all of which affect men and all of which are collectively responsible for twice as many deaths in the U.S. each year as cervical cancer. However, vaccines are a touchy topic, and I want to be clear that I’m not advocating in favor of or against anyone’s decision to get an HPV vaccination. I do strongly advocate for boys and girls, men and women, to have equal access to Gardasil and any other FDA-approved vaccine. Private insurers are required to cover HPV vaccines for girls and young women with no co-pay under the 2010 health reform legislation, and with this decision, that coverage requirement will extend to boys and young men, effective one year after the date of the recommendation. And, whether or not you or your loved ones get vaccinated against HPV, we will all benefit from more vaccinations, considering the extent of this sexually transmitted epidemic/pandemic, which affects as many as 75 percent of adult Americans and can be spread by skin-to-skin genital or oral contact (yes, that includes “French kissing”).

However, the media coverage of the recommendation includes a line of reasoning that I, as a sexual health educator and researcher, find offensive, ignorant, and inaccurate. The New York Times wrote: “Many of the cancers in men result from homosexual sex.” Really? What counts as “homosexual sex”? Most public health experts and HIV/AIDS researchers view “homosexuality” primarily as a sexual orientation, sometimes as a social or political identity, but not as a type of intercourse. Anyone who studies U.S. sexual norms knows that oral sex and anal sex–the behaviors cited as increasing risks of HPV-related oral and anal cancers–are not restricted to men who have sex with men. In fact, the NYT article itself asserts, “A growing body of evidence suggests that HPV also causes throat cancers in men and women as a result of oral sex” –so you don’t have to identify as a “homosexual” man to be at risk; you don’t even have to be a man.

Nevertheless, the New York Times goes on to muse that “vaccinating homosexual boys would be far more cost effective than vaccinating all boys, since the burden of disease is far higher in homosexuals.” Thankfully, the author also thought to check this idea with a member of the CDC committee, who seemed to grasp the ethical and practical challenges of making a recommendation based on a boy’s or man’s “homosexuality.” Kristen R. Ehresmann, Minnesota Department of Health and ACIP member, is quoted as cautioning, “But it’s not necessarily effective or perhaps even appropriate to be making those determinations at the 11- to 12-year-old age.”

Still stuck on the question of sexual orientation, that NYT author seeks to console potentially “uncomfortable” parents of boys by reassuring them that “vaccinating boys will also benefit female partners since cervical cancer in women results mostly from vaginal sex with infected males.” So, is the message, if you don’t want to imagine your son having oral or anal sex with a male partner, then you can focus on the public health service you are providing for girls and women who have male partners?

Instead of contributing to a homophobic panic, I thought it might be helpful to field a few frequently-asked-questions:

Q: Do you have to have a cervix to benefit from the “cervical cancer” vaccine? A: No. Despite its early branding, Gardasil has always been an HPV vaccine. Physiologically speaking, boys and men could have been benefiting from the vaccine since its initial FDA approval.

Q: Why are they recommending vaccinations for girls and boys as young as 11? A: Vaccines only work if given before contact with the virus. Reliable data on age of first “French” kiss is not available, but recent surveys show that about 25 percent of girls and boys in the U.S. have had penile-vaginal intercourse before their 15th birthdays.

Q: Are you too old to benefit? A: If you have not yet been exposed to all four of the HPV strains covered by Gardasil, then you can still gain protection. The more challenging question is: How would you know? The only ways to test for HPV (and then HPV type) is by tissue samples being sent to a lab. Most HPV infections are asymptomatic.

Q: What’s the risk of not getting vaccinated? A: We know that U.S. cervical cancer rates have dramatically decreased in recent decades due to improvements in screening, such as the Pap smear, and better treatment options. However, rates of HPV-related oral and anal cancers are reported to be increasing–and our screening options for these types of cancers are not as effective, affordable or accessible as those for cervical cancer.

Q: So, what can an unvaccinated person do to protect him/herself from a cancer-causing strain of HPV? A: Abstain from behaviors that can transmit the virus, such as deep/open-mouthed kissing, and use barrier methods when engaging in vaginal, anal or oral sex.

If this last answer strikes you as unreasonable, then mobilize your political energies to advocate for increased funding for HPV research. We need and deserve better ways to be tested and treated for the types of HPV that have been linked to serious and potentially fatal cancers. And, as my own research has shown, we have to get rid of the harmful stigma surrounding HPV and other sexually transmitted infections. We need to stop linking STDs to immorality. You can help by making sure your community supports medically accurate, age-appropriate sexuality education. And if you or a loved one wants more information about sexual health, then check out these free online resources.

(Originally posted on Ms. blog, cross-posted at AdinaNack.com)

This week, a drug company called Sequenom has made their prenatal blood test, MaterniT21, available in select markets.  This is the test I made reference to in a post or two over the summer:  it’s the test that can examine fetal DNA from a maternal blood sample.  What this means is that it can provide the information that, until now, could only be gotten from amniocentesis or CVS, and these are tests that carry a risk of miscarriage.

Well, I say it can provide the information that an amnio or CVS provides.  These are tests that examine fetal genetics for a wide range of things.  MaterniT21 looks for one thing, and one thing only:  Down syndrome.

Amber Cantrell and I have interviewed quite a few women as part of an extended research project. Those who’ve chosen not to have an amnio or a cvs have said this was because of the risk of miscarriage.  A maternal blood test carries no risk of miscarriage, and it can be done quite a bit earlier in the pregnancy than an amniocentesis.  Earlier in the pregnancy matters because 90% of people who discover through testing that their fetus has Down syndrome decide to terminate the pregnancy.  If you can learn that your fetus has Down syndrome earlier in the pregnancy, abortion is safer and easier.

As you all know, I am a big advocate of reproductive rights, so this isn’t a post saying that folks shouldn’t have abortions.  It’s a post saying that I’m interested in seeing how this new technology affects our conversations about parenthood and disability.  We’re a culture that often lets technology–rather than thoughtful ethical conversations, for instance–take the lead.  So where will this technology lead us?  What will it mean for the decision-making processes of women who are pregnant?  What will it mean for people, like my daughter, who have Down syndrome?

Cross-posted at Baxter Sez.

AVORY:

When Kyla suggested that we do a post on non-normative bodies for Love Your Body Day, I was enthusiastic.  The more I thought about it, though, the more difficulty I had defining a non-normative body.  Non-normative with reference to what norm?  This is an important question for determining body-related policy goals, because a body might appear “normal” but be strongly mismatched with a person’s identity.  If we want to encourage feminists to include non-normative bodies in body-positive messaging and policy, we need to be aware that people relate to their bodies in different ways.

The feminist goal of body positivity and acceptance is a good one, and I don’t support policies that encourage body shame and negativity.  But rather than spreading an unqualified “Love Your Body” message, it is important to pay some attention to how people define their own normal.

For example, I support health at every size (HAES) policies in public health, which avoid shaming fat bodies that don’t meet an unrealistic thin “normal.” I am opposed to policies that exclude transgender bodies that don’t meet the standard some call normative for transgender bodies–a standard that requires genital surgery and/or hormone treatment, and little ambiguity in one’s gender presentation.

On the other hand, I am aware that by most standards, my body is extremely normative.  My genderqueer identity is invisible, so most people aren’t aware that my body doesn’t “match” my gender (there’s no match for my identity, in fact).  So I am sensitive to feminist messaging that unequivocally encourages body love.  For example, in a room full of people who seem to be women, it is dangerous to spread an essentialist message focusing on feminine wisdom that comes from menstruation and the ability to make babies.  Are you sure that everyone in the room feels comfortable with “feminine?”  Are you sure that everyone in the room menstruates, or can make babies?

KYLA:

Yes, oh my lord, yes!  The annual Love Your Body Day is always a tricky one for me on a personal and political level.  While I think it is essential that we create more and more space for people to live in their bodies, express themselves through their bodies, and feel comfortable navigating this world in their body, I recognize that this is no easy task in our body-negative society.  Also, “loving your body” means different things to different people depending on their relationship between their body, their identity, and how society perceives them.  My concern is that often the rhetoric of “love your body” doesn’t go deep enough or reach enough people. Who is being left out of the conversation?  I think that often fat people, trans people, and people with disabilities, for example, are not included.

As a fat, tall woman, it is a daily struggle to inhabit my body.  I have worked to love my body as soon as I discovered that it was an option to do so.  My college admissions essay was about frumpy sweater day—a day I invented in high school to deal with the constant judgment I faced.  Whenever I got sick of people commenting (with words or just looks) on my body, I donned this frumpy sweater that used to my father’s.  It was my shield.  I knew I looked ridiculous; that was the point.  I was daring peope to judge me on what I was wearing rather than what I said.  If they couldn’t get past the superficial, then it said more about them than me.  It was my way of saying, “I give up. I no longer care. On to more important things.”

Even though this coping mechanism made it easier for me to navigate the tumultuous hallways of a preppy high school, it did nothing to help me find strength in my body.  In fact, it may have alienated me further.  I figured that loving your body didn’t apply to me.  If the cute girl with perfectly coiffed hair sitting next to me hated her body, how could I be expected to love mine?

Our society is so saturated with body hatred that saying “love your body” to cisgender, able-bodied, non-queer, thin (the list goes on) people is a radical act.  But surely you don’t mean that a fat woman should love her body, right?  Or that people with disabilities should find power in their differently abled bodies?  Or that transgender and genderqueer people should find pleasure in their bodies that defy assumptions?

But I think that’s exactly where we need to go to counteract pervasive body negativity.  On this Love Your Body Day, I want to explore how we create space for people with so-called non-normative bodies (for lack of a better term) to truly love their bodies and how that inclusion will alter the conversation. I’m not going to even pretend that I have the answers.  Instead, I’d like to highlight some fantastic work already being done on this front:

Nolose.org

A community for fat dykes/lesbians, bisexual women, transgender folks, and our allies seeking to end fat oppression!

Eli Clare

White, disabled, and genderqueer, Eli Clare happily lives in the Green Mountains of Vermont where he writes and proudly claims a penchant for rabble-rousing. He has written a book of essays Exile and Pride: Disability, Queerness, and Liberation (South End Press, 1999, 2009) and a collection of poetry The Marrow‘s Telling: Words in Motion (Homofactus Press, 2007) and has been published in many periodicals and anthologies. Eli speaks, teaches, and facilitates all over the United States and Canada at conferences, community events, and colleges about disability, queer and trans identities, and social justice. Among other pursuits, he has walked across the United States for peace, coordinated a rape prevention program, and helped organize the first ever Queerness and Disability Conference. When he’s not writing or on the road, you can find him reading, hiking, camping, riding his recumbent trike, or otherwise having fun adventures.

Dylan Vade and Sondra Solovay. 2009. Shared Struggles in Fat and Transgender Law. In The Fat Studies Reader, ed. Sondra Solovay and Esther Rothblum.

What if our laws and courts assumed this: Every person is different. We move differently, work differently, dress differently, express gender differently? What if difference were the given? And, what if bodies were a given? We all have bodies. Our bodies come in different sizes, styles and shapes.

We need to recognize there is no bright line dividing man from woman, fat from thin. Let’s stop visualizing a continuum, with man at one end and woman at the other, or thin at one end and fat at the other. Dividing lines and continuum-style lines lead to the law of norms and make it far too easy for courts to threaten those who fall outside the norm with loss of children, employment, and opportunity — unless, or course, they support the norm, pray to the norm, and reinforce the norm.

“Why I’m Fat Positive” from You’re Welcome, blog about the impact of public policy on marginalized communities

I’m fat positive because I identify as queer, a category designed to upset essentialist thinking about sexuality and gender. There are tidy lines of thought that prescribe that male = man = masculine = straight, and female = woman = feminine = straight. Fatphobia is one of many things that props all that up. By regulating what our bodies can and can’t look like (in a very gender-specific way), fatphobia perpetuates normative gender and sexuality in a way that keeps all of us trapped.

Can a Fat Woman Call Herself Disabled? Disability & Society, Volume 12 Number 1 February 1997 pp. 31-41

As an ostensibly able-bodied fat woman I discuss my experimental usage of ‘disabled’ to self-define, asserting that this is a problematic label. I criticise some of the mutual misconceptions fat and disabled people share, especially the rle of medicalisation, and I explore some similarities and differences in our respective struggles for civil rights. I suggest that identifying as disabled is political in origin, and that disability politics offer and important precedent for fat people.

The Adipositivity Project aims to promote size acceptance, not by listing the merits of big people, or detailing examples of excellence (these things are easily seen all around us), but rather, through a visual display of fat physicality. The sort that’s normally unseen.

Tasha Fierce, “Sex and the Fat Girl” column at Bitch Magazine.

Tasha Fierce is a 31-year-old sex-positive feminist of color, queer high femme, unabashed fat chick, cupcake lover and Los Angeles native. She’s written about body image, fat acceptance, queer issues, race politics and sexuality for various independent publications online and offline since 1996.

Shooting Beauty

Shooting Beauty tells the inspirational story of an aspiring fashion photographer named Courtney Bent whose career takes an unexpected turn when she discovers a hidden world of beauty at a center for people living with significant disabilities. Shot over the span of a decade, this film puts you in Courtney’s shoes as she overcomes her own unspoken prejudices and begins inventing cameras accessible to her new friends. Courtney’s efforts snowball into an award-winning photography program called “Picture This”—and become the backdrop for this eye-opening story about romance, loss and laughter that will change what you thought you knew about living with a disability—and without one.

Adios Barbie (blog)

We say “adios” to narrow beauty and identity standards. We say “hello” to frank talk about race, class, age, ability, gender, sexual orientation, size and how our multiple identities shape the way we feel in our bodies–and in the world. (Yeah, it’s a mouthful. But it’s also real.) We’re committed to creating a world where everyone is safe, powerful and at home with who they are.

Dances with Fat (blog)

Regan Chastain is 5’4, 284 pound dancer and choreographer who blogs not only about fat acceptance and fat positivity, but about using a fat body to do glorious, creative things.  She challenges the stereotype of a thin dancer and in general helps to break down barriers around a narrow concept of what a dancer looks like, encouraging readers to use their bodies and criticizing those who equate “fat” with unable to move.

Jacyln Friedman, What You Really Really Want (Seal Press 2011)

This manual to reclaiming your sexuality, using an enthusiastic consent model, includes body love exercises that don’t have any particular requirements about body type–the book is inclusive of fat women, trans women, genderqueer people, people with disabilities, etc. and acknowledges the difficulties in body-love, particularly for survivors of sexual assault.

Genderfork is a website that offers examples of different gender expression that aren’t often available elsewhere, from photos to quotes to profiles of those who identify as gender variant in some way.  Genderfork focuses on genderqueer, gender variant, gender fluid, and other non-binary genders, but also includes transgender contributors and cis people with non-normative gender expressions. 

This post is part of the 2011 Love Your Body Day blog carnival

There are many reasons why women are underrepresented in science & engineering. Some are specific to certain areas and some are systemic. When I was an undergraduate in science, as I tell my students, many moons ago, the advice I received from older women was to wait until tenure to start having kids. In the late 1990s that meant waiting until about your mid-late 30s. That did NOT sound like a good plan. Nowadays I see more graduate students and post-docs starting families. I know not an ideal time, but it coincides better with fertility.

That is why I practically screamed in my office when I read that the White House was announcing some new initiatives at the National Science Foundation to assist in this family versus career battle:

• Allow postponement of grants for child birth/adoption – Grant recipients can defer their awards for up to one year to care for their newborn or newly adopted children.
• Allow grant suspension for parental leave – Grant recipients who wish to suspend their grants to take parental leave can extend those grants by a comparable duration at no cost.
• Provide supplements to cover research technicians – Principal investigators can apply for stipends to pay research technicians or equivalent staff to maintain labs while PIs are on family leave.
• Publicize the availability of family friendly opportunities – NSF will issue announcements and revise current program solicitations to expressly promote these opportunities to eligible awardees.
• Promote family friendliness for panel reviewers – STEM researchers who review the grant proposals of their peers will have greater opportunities to conduct virtual reviews rather than travel to a central location, increasing flexibility and reducing dependent-care needs.
• Support research and evaluation – NSF will continue to encourage the submission of proposals for research that would asses the effectiveness of policies aimed at keeping women in the STEM pipeline.
• Leverage and Expand Partnerships — NSF will leverage existing relationships with academic institutions to encourage the extension of the tenure clock and allow for dual hiring opportunities.

These are some serious changes folks!

For one, as the Sylvia comic points out, women, from my own sampling, do want to use their awesomeness to help the world. What some young women struggle with is seeing how their fab science and math skills translate into working with people to solve the world’s problems. I know, I know…for some of us it is obvious. For some of us it takes time to learn how imperative it is to have empathetic and caring people in science and engineering. Not that only women are those things, but girls are raised to value emotions and relationships. But even when they can see how much of the world they can impact with their civil engineering skills, many have plans to be mothers one day.

I do not believe women are leaving science & engineering because they want to be mothers, but it may be influencing how easy it can be for them to decide to leave when they hit other challenges and roadblocks.

The no cost extension benefit will be tricky. Most, if not all, scientists and engineers have others working for them off these grants. From graduate students and post-docs to supporting department administrators (like the accounting office), all that would also be on hold.

My cynical side needs to be reminded that these are just the beginning. Hopefully if the National Science Foundation is sending this strong and clear message that women in science & engineering are valuable enough to enact these changes, that other institutions like universities will follow. Perhaps bridge funding for the graduate students who need to keep working on their experiments while the faculty member is bonding with a newborn? More on campus child care centers to allow parents to stay on campus (and in the lab) longer each day, instead of dashing out at 5 pm to make the 6 pm pick up.

These changes are a start. Not a small start either, but still a start. And a huge signal to the next generation of scientists and engineers that their human lives will be valued as much as their lives in the lab.

In “Mad, Bad Romance” an article published in The Sydney Morning Herald, a large Australian paper, Christopher Scanlon explores the popularity of male characters that have the markers of “compensated psychopaths.” While Scanlon admits that mad, bad male characters have long populated literature and film, he argues there is a new twist to the male baddie – he is now framed specifically as “boyfriend material.”

While Scanlon’s article focuses on Edward Cullen (and kindly quotes my take on Twilight), the compensated psychopath Cullen represents is widespread in popular television dramas as well.

The article describes compensated psychopaths as people who have a “limited emotional repertoire,” are “incapable of feeling compassion or remorse,” are “socially withdrawn,” “controlling,” and “psychologically immature,” and, perhaps most dangerously, are “able to ‘pass’ as normal.” Don Draper of Mad Men,  Damon and Stefan in The Vampire Diaries, Sam and Dean of Supernatural, Eric and Bill of True Blood, Dr. House of House, Dexter Morgan of Dexter, heck, even Simon Cowell of The X Factor all accord with many of these descriptors of  a compensated psychopath. (Granted, The X Factor is not a drama in the traditional sense, but there is plenty of drama on the show that has, thus far, pitted the male judges against the female ones. Cowell has lately been trying to “play the nice guy” and frame Abdul as the baddie, presumably to hide his compensated psychopath attributes that have been readily apparent for many seasons of American Idol).

In addition to the fact the psycho males in television drama are framed as mate material, these characters (and reality show celebrities) are becoming MORE bad while simultaneously being more often framed as romantic, desirable, and sexy.

The bad-boy Byronic hero (which has been particularly associated with Edward Cullen) is by no means new.* However, in older iterations this type was undoubtedly “mad, bad and dangerous to know,” (as famously described by Caroline Lamb, one of Lord Byron’s lovers), but he was also punished rather than rewarded for his badness. Edward Rochester is blinded (a metaphorical emasculation) in Jane Eyre. Heatchliff did not get the girl.

Yet, today’s dramatic bad boys don’t suffer much literal let alone psychological punishment. Moreover, though they may not be familiar with open communication or able to articulate their open relationship desires (hello Don Draper!), and though they lie, commit extreme acts of violence, and largely treat females as pawns (Eric, Bill, Damon), they are generally represented as oh-so-hot. This being the case, the mock personal ad that opens Scanlon’s article:  “PSYCHOLOGICALLY immature and nihilistic M. incapable of love with barely restrained urge to murder seeks F. for fun times and possible romantic relationship” seems particularly apt.

A few of these “bad boys” are, though frequent killers, less “bad” in other ways. For example, Dexter, a serial killer, is more “nice” than many current bad boys. Sure, he has murderous compulsions, but he is a good brother to Deborah, a caring father, and a committed partner. As a bonus, he has a zero tolerance policy for rapists and pedophiles. Sure, this zero tolerance translates into murder, but the underlying message is Dexter is “punishing” those the law fails to.Sam and Dean  also have good intentions — they are trying to make the world demon-free with their badness. And they do feel remorse and display psychological and emotional maturity. Simon Cowell? Not so much.

However, even these “likeable” compensated psychopaths are hardly uber-positive models of masculinity. Where, in today’s television drama, is a good partner, BFF, or good brother/father/son material? (Please share your “good guy” characters in comments!)

Thankfully, there are a few good men out there in TV-land. It’s just that most of them reside in comedy and sitcom, not drama. I would gladly invite Cam, Mitchell and Phil of Modern Family over to dinner. Sure, they have their hang ups, but controlling women and lacking compassion are not among them. And I would love to have Kurt, Finn or Arty of Glee as male voices in my women’s studies classes.

The new fall line-up isn’t looking too promising so far in terms of positive  male characters in dramas goes – at least not in shows such as The Playboy Club, Pan Am, Terra Nova, and Charlie’s Angels. Pan Am has the (so far) fairly likeable Dean, but my gut-reading tells me his co-pilot will turn out to be a compensated psycho. In Terra Nova, the “paradise” of the past that is supposed to represent hope for an entirely fresh start, militaristic white dudes still call the shots. This poster says it all, with Jim Shannon in a hyper-masculine stance and Commander Nathaniel Taylor standing on an armored vehicle wielding an automatic weapon. Jim’s family? They’re in the background.

Scanlon asks in his article, seemingly only partially joking, “Should the Twilight books and films come with a health warning?” Admittedly, not all males in media are mad and bad, but many are – more problematically, these baddies are now framed as THE good boyfriends, good fathers, and good leaders – as the heroes rather than the rakes.

Scanlon closes the piece noting that “as the father of a two-year-old girl I would prefer that her future media diet isn’t saturated by men whose emotional lives resemble those of the undead.” I echo his sentiment, hoping that all of our television diets can be made more palatable via the inclusion of positive male characters – not only for our daughters, but also for our sons.

Heck, reshaping norms of masculinity to be less violent, or less psychopathic, would be beneficial to society as a whole. And yes, before someone chimes in saying “it’s just entertainment,” let me pre-empt – nothing is ever just entertainment – as the sociologist quoted in Scanlon’s article eloquently puts it – “The media play an important pedagogical role in the socialization of young people” – and, I would add, in the socialization of all of us.

***

*For more on this line of argument, see “Rewriting the Byronic Hero,” by  Jessica Groper in Theorizing Twilight.

The Council on Contemporary Families co-chair Josh Coleman sent the following note about the CCF’s awesome, highly affordable media workshops they are giving online. I gave the first one last Thursday (you can listen to the podcast for free). I’m biased, but it is a super-practical and efficient series! If you feel moved, share the info about the series with colleagues.

From Josh–

Here’s what people are saying so far:

CCF’s Teleseminars on Working with the Media are a must for anyone interested in spreading the word about their research. I attended the first event featuring Virginia Rutter and she gave targeted tips for media planning in a very accessible and engaging manner. The advice on how to figure out what you want from the media, how to tap resources to help support these goals and how to develop a timeline and get the work done was particularly beneficial to someone new to working with the media. I expect more excellent advice from the remaining seminars!

–Sarah Damaske, Author of For the Family? How Class and Gender Shape Women’s Work

I had no idea I’d come away from the Teleseminar on Making a Personal Media Plan with so many specific, practical suggestions – plus some sound advice about how to communicate nuanced ideas to the general public and enlist journalists to the cause. I am looking forward to the rest of the series.

–Ashton Applewhite, Writer

I learned so much from the first webinar in the CCF media series: Virginia Rutter demystified the process of working with the media, by giving us tangible steps, concrete examples of success and insights into how best to collaborative with journalists. The workshop was accessible and extremely useful, both for media “novices” and those with considerable media exposure. It reinforced my belief that the best people to teach researchers about how to interface with the media are other academics who have done the same! I will definitely be signing up for the remaining workshops in this series!

–Amy Schalet, author of Not Under My Roof: Parents, Teens and the Culture of Sex

Go here for more information or to register.

Josh Coleman and Stephanie Coontz
Co-Chairs, Council on Contemporary Families

–Virginia Rutter

GWP welcomes Sarah Damaske, an assistant professor of Labor Studies and Employment Relations and Sociology at the Pennsylvania State University and author of For the Family? How Class and Gender Shape Women’s Work (Oxford University Press, October 3, 2011). Her remarkable new study of moms and work, described in detail in her new book and below, goes far in separating myth from fact.

A judge presides over the case of Kate Reddy, a working-mother. Her crimes: not knowing her daughter’s preference for broccoli and indulging her children with expensive Christmas presents. This poignant nightmare from Allison Pearson’s I Don’t Know How She Does It, now a major motion picture starring Sarah Jessica Parker, deftly portrays Kate’s fears that she will be considered a bad mother.

A hedge-fund manager, devoted wife of an architect and mother of two, Kate works at a high-stress and high demanding job. Before her youngest turns two, she has left the firm and moved to the country where her husband will be the sole breadwinner. Kate’s story is a commonly told one about middle-class women’s choice to “opt-out” of the workplace due to the pressures of combining work and family.

But this story does not accurately portray the average working-mother who leaves work.

In my research with eighty women living in New York City in 2006-2007, I discovered that it is working-class mothers who are more likely to interrupt their careers and often face prolonged periods out of work, as they move into and out of the labor market in search of a good position. Working-class moms have a harder time cobbling together childcare so working outside the home has to be worth the effort—meaning jobs that provide benefits, the promise of promotion, a fair wage, and the respect of employers (characteristics often lacking in the service sector jobs these women most often found themselves in).

Turns out that most middle-class mothers are “doing it”—weaving work and motherhood. In fact, the movie version of the book has changed the story to show Kate staying at work in the end. Women with higher education and higher-status jobs benefit from more than just their larger incomes, they typically have more “social capital,” including an insider’s understanding of the ways that the workplace functions and connections to people who can help them find jobs. These resources make it easier for middle-class women to stay in the labor market when faced with a bad job because they are connected to networks that can help secure better employment. Rather than opting-out of the workforce, per the fictional Kate, many of the middle-class moms that I met switched jobs (sometimes multiple times) in an attempt to balance home and work.

All of the mothers who participated in my study, whether or not they worked, shared Kate’s fear that someone would sit as judge and jury to their crimes of imperfect motherhood. This pressure to be good mothers did not lead women to leave work—in fact the majority of women in my study, like the majority of mothers nationwide, work. But it has led to a common response when women are asked to justify their decisions about work.

Whether the decision is to stay home or go to work, the majority of women justify their work decisions as being made for their families. Women who work explain that labor market participation fulfills their families’ needs. Cynthia, a working-mom married to a husband earning six figures, explained that she stayed at work, “so I could make all the extras and everything for [my kids].”  Those who leave work explain that they, too, make their decision for their family. Virginia, a stay-at-home mom whose husband is unemployed, said she left work to “be home for the kids,” although she only left work when a new boss reduced her job flexibility and publicly belittled her. These responses allow women to emphasize behavior they believe is acceptable, such as decisions made to care for family and to minimize behavior that might be seen in a negative light, such as taking advantage of a job opportunity or finding disappointment at work.

Cultural expectations about selfless motherhood lead women to say they make work decisions for their family and continue to drive the public discourse about women’s work. Ultimately, the talk of middle-class women’s choice or working-class mothers’ financial need to work constrains our public consciousness, pigeonholing women’s work as selfishly chosen or unrewardingly forced. Instead, my research suggests that women examine the possibilities that lie before them and make decisions that they believe best for themselves and their families.

The woman who “chooses” to leave work because her financial resources allow it is a red herring. She draws attention away from the real issues that all women, even fictional Kate, face in the workplace: a lack of workplace flexibility, few childcare options, few sick days, and little parental leave. All women would benefit from policies that addressed these concerns, but we also need to focus our attention on creating better work environments for working class women so that these women, too, can find the respect and fair wages that will lead them to stay at work. Creating better work environments will mean more women will stay at work and that stability will be better for mothers, families and the economy in the long run.

–Sarah Damaske

For this month’s column, I spoke with Patricia A. Adler, Professor of Sociology at the University of Colorado, Boulder. She and her husband Peter Adler, Professor of Sociology at the University of Denver, co-authored a new book that offers an ethnographic perspective on a controversial health topic. The Tender Cut: Inside the Hidden World of Self-Injury (NYU Press) invites readers to go beyond predominant medical and psychological perspectives by offering a nuanced analysis of self-injury as a sociological phenomenon.

Their book is the culmination of 135 in-depth, life-history interviews conducted over ten years with self-injurers from across the world, as well as analysis of tens of thousands of emails and Internet messages. Their participants were engaging in self-injury, the intentional non-suicidal harm of one’s own body, including but not limited to include cutting, branding, burning, branding, and scratching. 

AN: In your book, you describe a broad range of motivations for self-injury. Can you explain the most typical reasons?

PA: Most of the people we interviewed saw it as a way to cope, to function when they were facing tough times. Many started in their teens when they were trying to cope with negative life circumstances.

AN: Did you find that sex and gender made a difference – did the self-injury types or reasons differ between men and women?

PA: Yes, men and women differed in the ways that they self-injured and their motivations. Men were injuring their bodies because of feelings of rage and anger and were more likely to use dull or rusted instruments to make bigger injuries on parts of their body that would be easily visible. If a man did small self-injuries and tried to hide them, then other guys would be likely to ridicule him. Women were more likely to use sharp, small blades on parts of their body that they could easily conceal because society judges women’s bodies, and they wanted to be able to hide it. They tended to self-injure because of negative feelings about themselves.

AN: It’s fascinating that sex and gender factors into others’ reactions to the self-injurers: that those who acted in ways that matched their gender norms – who were seen as being appropriately masculine or feminine – received less ridicule. Do you think mental health and medical practitioners understand self-injury as a gendered phenomenon?

PA: I think that mental health practitioners probably regard self-injury as they do eating disorders, as a generally female behavior. They may see a guy here and there, but I doubt that any practitioner sees enough to recognize this pattern. And some of the books I’ve read from the clinic people who do see larger numbers have presented cases of men who injure in ‘feminine’ ways. So I don’t think they’re attuned to this gendered pattern.

AN: Most media coverage of self-injury approaches it as a psychological problem, often as a physically dangerous type of addiction. Can you explain the sociological perspective you present on self-injury?

PA: It is common for self-injurers to be told that they have a mental disorder and that it is an addictive practice. We looked at a range of people who self-injure and found that their motivations did not necessarily reflect mental illness. A lot of regular teenagers and adults who were structurally disadvantaged were using it to find relief. Then there are those who have severe mental disorders before they start self-injuring. Some of the people we interviewed were mentally ill, but our research suggests that many of them are not. We intentionally chose the word “tender” in the book’s title because cutting may be a coping mechanism that makes some people feel empowered with a sense of control over their pain. The self-injury gave some people relief from emotional pain that they needed to get through challenging times. Our book is nonjudgmental, providing a “voice” for the experiences of a broad population of self-injurers: comprising people who have genuine mental disorders, as well as those who just have temporary situational life troubles, and everything in between.

AN: From the medical and psychological perspectives, a key focus in on how to help self-injurers stop “dangerous” behaviors. So, what did you learn about the ways and reasons why self-injurers stop?

PA: Many self-injurers stop when they are able to escape from the circumstance that caused them to initially start. So, transitioning from high school to college can be a time when young people stop. For others, it takes getting a good job, finding a partner who will not tolerate it, or becoming a parent and not wanting their children to see them self-injuring.

AN: In other published interviews, you’ve made the somewhat controversial point that not every self-injurer will need to invest in professional medical and mental health treatment in order to quit. What are some of the other ways that those you interviewed found to be helpful when they decided they wanted to stop self-injuring?

PA: Solutions from the medical-psychological community include everything from specialized clinics, which can be very expensive, to outpatient therapy, and drugs. Those who found therapy to be effective were those whose therapists addressed the reasons the person began self-injuring in the first place, rather than those who focused on self-injuring as the problem to be treated. Most of the people who self-injure are not trying to self-destruct; they’re trying to self-soothe. And, we also found many turning to free online support groups to connect with people like themselves who had either stopped self-injuring or could give advice on how to better manage the negative aspects of self-injury. In addition, some people just stopped on their own or with the encouragement and support of friends.

AN: As experts on deviant subcultures, would you say that the Internet has helped to create communities of self-injurers?

PA: Yes, the Internet has helped to build a kind of self-help community for self-injurers. Peer support groups have emerged organically, and people are sharing their experiences with each other in cyber-communities. These online relationships help them manage stress so that they function better in their daily lives.

AN: What role do you think the media played in transforming self-injury into a sociological phenomenon?

PA: It was initially shocking but not necessarily more shocking that the many other ways the people try to relieve their pain. The stories often showed that self-injury was not a suicide attempt and wasn’t necessarily because the person had serious psychological problems. Once the media started to cover self-injury stories of celebrities, then it became more acceptable because young people could relate to these people. Now, it’s so common in high schools that teens are more willing to disclose their self-injuries to their friends, and their friends often see it as “that thing that people do” if they’re unhappy, as a temporary coping mechanism. We see this behavior as highly “socially contagious”—the media, along with word of mouth, has contributed to its spread.

In The Tender Cut, we describe how media coverage of celebrities who self-injured, the accessibility of the Internet, and shifts in cultural norms made it possible for loner deviants to join Internet self-injury subcultures. These subcultures represent a range of levels of acceptance of self-injury and often help people to realize that their behaviors do not necessarily mean that they are mentally ill or bad people. This helps them manage the stigma of society judging people negatively for relieving emotional pain by inflicting physical pain on themselves. Our longitudinal data shows that many who began self-injuring as teenagers eventually outgrow it and lead functional lives.

From the UCLA Center for the Study of Women:

Thinking Gender is a public conference highlighting graduate student research on women, gender and/or sexuality across all disciplines and historical periods. We invite submissions for individual papers or pre-constituted panels on any topic pertaining to women, gender, and/or sexuality. This year, we especially welcome feminist research on: gender roles in relation to marriage, parenting, or being single; critiques of biosciences and biotechnology as they pertain to fertility, sanitation, and/or medical experimentation at a local, national or global level; mobility as duress or success–for example, in relation to migration, immigration, or upward or downward economic mobility; life stage issues, such as aging and girlsʼ studies; and feminist storytelling or research in modes such as oral histories, graphic novels, theater, comedy or other inventive expressions.

CSW accepts submissions for both individual papers and pre-constituted panels from all active graduate students. In order to give everyone an opportunity to present, we do not accept submissions from people who presented at Thinking Gender in the previous year. Also no previously published material is eligible.

Students proposing individual papers are to submit a cover page (provided on our website), an abstract (250 words), a CV (2 pages maximum), and a brief bibliography (3-5 sources), for consideration. All components are to be delivered in one document and labeled according to the submission guidelines found on the CSW website. For panels, a 250-word description of the panel topic is required, in addition to the materials that must be provided for individual paper submissions. For a more detailed description of submission guidelines, please visit:
http://www.csw.ucla.edu/conferences/thinking-gender/thinking-gender-2012.

Send submissions to: thinkinggender@women.ucla.edu

Deadline for Submissions: Monday, October 17th, 2011 at 12 noon

Conference to be held on Friday, February 3, 2012
UCLA Faculty Center

Event is free and open to the public, but please be aware that there will be a $30 registration fee for presenters, to cover the cost of conference materials and lunch at the Faculty Center.