For feminist activists, the danger of being misinterpreted, being taken out of context, or having your words used to support an argument that is the exact opposite of your own, looms large. Because of this, some feminists, like blogger Melissa McEwan, flat-out refuse to do interviews. There is an entire program dedicated to training progressive women on how to get out their message heard in a constructive, accurate way.
This week, sex-positivity and anti-rape activist Jaclyn Friedman felt the sting of having her own words taken out of context to suggest that she supports a position with which she actively disagrees. The culprit is CNN, which interviewed her about the myth of the "new bad girls" -- the notion that young women are engaging in unprecedented dangerous behavior which makes them vulnerable to sexual assault. On Monday, CNN correspondent Cathy Costello considered Kick-Ass' profanity-loving Hit Girl and pop star Ke$ha and then asked if bad girls are a "dangerous trend." In the segment, Costello features clips of Jaclyn, who she cites as a feminist expert.
Friedman went on the show with a specific agenda: to debunk the claim that girls' drinking is more dangerous than boys'. But Friedman was selectively quoted in a way that made it seem that she was warning girls that drinking could lead to sexual assault and that the "destructive behavior" was "scary." After the piece aired, she complained on Twitter, "That piece is the opposite of all the work I do!" Yesterday, Friedman published a response piece at CNN.com making clear her opinion that we should "stop wringing our hands about 'bad girls' and put the focus where it belongs: on the men who put them in danger."
The whole episode highlights a major problem: How do we fight the persistent message that young women should avoid having fun because fun is dangerous? It's a stubborn and repetitive form of victim-blaming that seems to appear every year around spring break, as if young people are now getting drunk for the first time ever. The blatant misconstruing of Friedman's position raises questions of journalistic ethics, but what are we to do about it? There are plenty of commentators who are willing to blame victims of sexual assault outright and don't need their words misused to do so.
I find it disheartening that episodes like this one might make Friedman and others like her reluctant to do such interviews in the future. But can you blame her?
--Silvana Naguib
