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  • MONDAY APRIL 10 2006 4:37 AM

Feminist Author Says Piercings and Tattoos Are Mutilation, Blames Gay Self-Hatred

Submitted by NoThanks

Edited by NoThanks

Think your tattoos or piercings are harmless fun, simply cool or pretty? Nuh uh, says Sheila Jeffreys. The British feminist and author who teaches at the University of Melbourne in Australia is claiming nipple piercing, tattoos, breast implants, cutting and amputee fetishes are all expressions of the same pathological impulse, one triggered by an abusive, male-dominated society. It’s self-mutilation, whether you do it yourself or pay someone else to perform the act for you.

The cutting up that girls do secretly in their bedrooms, the nipple piercing that is performed in high street studios, breast implant surgery, sex reassignment surgery, are connected. They are all forms of self-mutilation, and increasingly the cutting is carried out by proxies for a profit. They are responses to low social status, sexual and physical abuse or severe emotional distress created by a male dominant society which does not accept women’s varied body shapes or condemns homosexuality.


Apparently this trend entered the mainstream due to the influence of self-hating homosexual men.

The forms of injury provided by these studios and independent operators ranged from bellybutton piercings to the extremes of spearing straight through the torso as carried out by the Californian ex-advertising executive Fakir Musafar. The practices stemmed from two main sources, punk fashion and gay male sadomasochism.
Gay male fashion designers placed pierced models on their catwalks, and helped to inscribe a practice that had symbolised gayness, onto the bodies of conventional young women and some young men.

The practices of mutilation that are being carried out on the bodies of women, girls and vulnerable categories of men in the early 21st Century are savage and increasing in their brutality. Underlying the demand for these practices is the despair of those with low social status, particularly women and gay men. The harms of misogyny, sexual and physical abuse and gay-hating, create the ability of those who self-mutilate to disassociate emotionally from their bodies, and to blame their bodies for their distress.


Jeffreys, who became a lesbian in 1973 not because she wanted to fuck women but instead to show her commitment to feminist revolution, also claims 10 to 15 percent of piercings become infected, breast implants were invented to make Asian women sexually attractive to westerners during the post-WW2 occupation of Japan and that heterosexuality is more oppressive than apartheid. At least one of her critics seems to think she blames lesbians who enjoy make-up and pornography for derailing feminist revolution.

Someone should hook her up with a complementary SuicideGirls membership. It'd give her enough source material to generate books and papers and proclamations for the next hundred years, if her brain didn't explode on first contact.

 

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Comments
JeslynJames

JeslynJames

Scottsdale, AZ
January 2005

APR 11, 2006 08:47 PM

I'm a secret cutter.

Shhhhh.

MC_Dove

MC_Dove

Cincinnati, OH
November 2004

APR 11, 2006 08:51 PM

the thing that i hate about these types of feminists is that they oppress women just as much as they think society does. we can't like men, we can't get tattoos or piercings, we can't be a house wife. guess what? i do all those things because i WANT to. not because i'm being forced, not because it's expected, not because i was abused. feminism should be about allowing women to make their own choices based on their own wants and needs, not about telling women what they should and should not do based on someone else's principles.

Doxie

Doxie

SUICIDEGIRL

Oregon, USA

APR 12, 2006 01:09 AM

Oh my.

Ohelde

Ohelde

HOPEFUL

Harrison Township, MI

APR 12, 2006 09:39 AM

what people do to their bodies is no ones business.

LokisChild

LokisChild

USA
March 2005

APR 12, 2006 12:31 PM

"heterosexuality is as oppresive as apartheid"

surreal what?
and may i ask how the human race was supposed to reproduce then? i'm pretty sure women don't have semen. or a penis.
EL SUICIDO LOCO
p.s. and if they do, then they're not really a woman, and therefore belong in the work camp, with all the rest of the men!! skull

Cherry_Vanilla

Cherry_Vanilla

United Kingdom
January 2006

APR 15, 2006 08:42 AM

kimberleyfantasy said:
Well thank goodness she doesn't speak for all feminists. Unfortunately the more radical they are the more they are heard and then people get silly ideas like ^^^ represents all feminists.



Yup, agree completely, It's this kind of thing that gets picked up by the media and taken as what ALL feminists believe, when in fact it's only a tiny tiny proportion
whatever

ASSH0LE

ASSH0LE

Las Vegas, NV
June 2003

APR 16, 2006 03:50 AM

kimberleyfantasy said:
Well thank goodness she doesn't speak for all feminists. Unfortunately the more radical they are the more they are heard and then people get silly ideas like ^^^ represents all feminists.



+72.351

dek_ker

dek_ker

Canada
January 2008

JAN 11, 2008 10:24 PM

i wonder if she has her ears pierced...or has worn deodorant...or painted her nails!?

<shrug>

PantherNesmith

PantherNesmith

Gloucester, VA
June 2006

JAN 11, 2008 11:21 PM

I will admit that I enjoyed my nipple piercings because they made me look and feel erotic. And that I think my ink makes me sexy. In fact, I just finished guaging up all my piercings, because I like the way the larger plugs look.

But none of this is done because I'm being oppressed. While the pain may have been enjoyable, it is temporary. If I only sought the punishment of these actions, I would cut, or play pierce. But what I want is the work of art these actions leave behind, be it in steel and stone, or ink.

And putting all of those things in one category is ridiculous!

Nixon

Nixon

SUICIDEGIRL

California, USA

JAN 12, 2008 10:20 AM

Oh, dear. I feel a little bad for her. I imagine she was anally raped by zoo workers in a pile of elephant dung when she was nine. Thats about what it would take to get that pissed at everything.

Or, maybe she's just jealous of the not-crazy hot chicks.

Ferretbite

Ferretbite

Mexico
September 2006

JAN 12, 2008 10:50 AM

I wonder if this diagnosis applies to the women in Thailand with the rings around their necks. Or is it just women of western civilization & cultures that have been brainwashed & perverted like that.

strangebeastie

strangebeastie

Oceanside, CA
September 2004

JAN 12, 2008 11:16 AM

Fatality said:

blackhalo said:
She's not saying that body-mods make you gay, but that the allure of them is due to an culturally dictated male-dominated regime. That fact that tattoos and piercings have been around so long does not disprove this theory, as you can look at the people practicing it and see that they are male-dominated societies.

The theory is not that people are looking to harm themselves per se, but that the psychological allure and draw of these practices stems from oppression. You may like the particular design and aesthetic value of the particular tattoo, but it has roots elsewhere as well.

Again, I'm not saying I agree 100% with what she is saying, but the responses on this are missing much of the point and the people posting them are failing to read what's above.



I know. People seem to be superficially understanding and jumping to conclusions much like they accused her of doing.



But that's what we do on the internet.

loll1pop

loll1pop

Dominican Republic
November 2007

JAN 12, 2008 12:52 PM

what a nutjob

tatz

tatz

USA
July 2007

JAN 12, 2008 04:23 PM

yeah, i pierced my nipples because society told me to...

...waitaminute...

...i'm considered a lunatic by most of society because of my body art.

someone needs a better hobby...

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