Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Dear Anonymous

Ok, I know that Molly is perfectly capable of responding eloquently to this, but as the other name on the title of this blog, I feel the need to chime in about her post, and to the many responses from an anonymous reader. Also as her friend I think Molly needs to put some cucumbers on her eyeballs and chill out for the rest of the night. No blood vessels bursting on my watch, please sweetie!

So, Anonymous. I tried to reply in the comments, but I've got too much to say here and Blogger won't let me fit it all in the little comment form. So you get a full post in response. Congratulations.

First, thank you for saying that the shirt is bad. I'm glad we can at least agree on that point.

Now I'm going to start with the easiest point of yours to refute: that this shirt is supposedly not "OSU gear." Actually, Molly acknowledged in her post that it wasn't officially licensed by Ohio State, we all know that it isn't officially OSU gear. However, if you do a quick web search (here you go) you'll find that quite a few people seem to think it is, or are at least happy to jump on the Buckeye-bashing bandwagon as a result of it. So this shirt represents us, and official or not, we're being put in the position of defending ourselves as a result. 


And as any Ohioan knows, though the team colors may be scarlet and grey (as you pointed out - as if we don't know), white is often substituted for grey in our fan gear. It just shows up better than grey, let's face it. Even the team's uniforms use white! And the shirt mentions the Wolverines - duh. Who's a bigger rival to the Michigan Wolverines than OSU? Perhaps Michigan State, as you say, but their colors are green and white. So no, pretty sure this shirt is all Buckeye. But if you really want to argue that point, you may be interested to know that this isn't only happening here in the Buckeye state, but also in Michigan, Alabama and Louisiana State (again, try a Google search.) Probably in the time I've taken to type this, half a dozen more have popped up. There's even an Urban Dictionary term for it now. So no, it isn't specifically OSU gear, sadly it's actually much worse than that.

Now, your "women women women, men are bad! bullshit" comment. First of all, yes, you're being an obvious troll here. I might even venture to say that you sound like a complete asshole when you say things like that, and quoting Voltaire just makes you then sound like a very full of himself asshole. And this blog isn't the US government, we are free to censor you all we want - keep up crap like that and we will happily do so. Go start your own blog if you want to exercise your freedom of assholery, that's your right.

Second, it IS misogyny that marginalizes the importance of rape, because rape usually happens to women and girls. Not all the time, and not in this specific instance, but one in four college women are victims of sexual assault. Four. That's me, Molly, and each of our daughters. That makes it our issue. If you begin any way of thinking from the standpoint of valuing one group of people less than another, it follows that crimes done to that group of people will be seen as less horrific than if they were done to the group that is seen as superior. Ask an African American or two or thousand about their experience if you don't think this is true. And don't even get me started on a certain Republican's ridiculous remarks about rape and abortion, or the kind of fights that rape victims have to endure in our country's legal system. Rape is not taken as seriously as it should be because it happens to women. Prove to us that that isn't true - take it seriously. Spend your time fighting the one in four statistic instead of arguing these points with women. As a woman and a feminist (who never said men are bad, who is married to a lovely man, who works with lovely men including Molly's lovely husband), I would love to see this become an issue that isn't deeply tied to misogyny. I would love to see it become an issue that doesn't exist at all, because rape doesn't exist. But too few men are interested in making that happen, and that's why it's especially important to us "women women women."

Finally, to your free speech comment: I think this is really the most valid point to be made here. I agree with you - whoever made this shirt should be free to do so. I think it's wrong, and I think they should stop, but I don't think I have a right to make them stop, and neither does OSU as an institution. I agree that it's a slippery slope when we start trying to shut people up, no matter what nonsense they may say. However, what we all CAN do is exercise our own freedom of speech by expressing our outrage about this. And Ohio State can certainly publicly condemn these shirts, and make it clear that they are not only not producing nor profiting from them, but that they find them offensive on behalf of the Penn State victims and Ohio State fans. They can encourage other schools to do the same. They can call on all college sports fans to begin the season with a little more class, simple as that. A message like that could very powerful coming from OSU President E. Gordon Gee or Coach Meyer, much more than our little blog or even Molly's petition could be (though kudos Molly for starting it!)

Actually, I have one more thing to say. Are you just one person, Anonymous? If so, can you please keep your comments to one post or two instead of flooding our blog with reply after reply? That's a little rude, and again, we can delete them. You're coming to our party, we can kick you out. If you're different people with a similar sentiment, fine, please read the above message too. Thanks.

~ Lynne

7 comments:

  1. Lynne, just when I think I can't love you any more, WHOA. This is pretty much a perfect response to the ridiculousness that Anonymous started. I can't add much more except thank you, and I love you. And also? You are probably the best writer I've ever known.

    ReplyDelete
  2. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hey Anonymous, stop hiding and show yourself if you are so impressed with yourself and your comments. Keep kicking ass girls, I am proud of you both!

    ReplyDelete
  4. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Thanks Genji! Your words are very much appreciated. :)

    ReplyDelete