Here are (and I’m sure you’ve been awaiting it anxiously) my thoughts on the Open-Source Boob Project (OSBP). I’m loath to link directly to someone so clearly looking for Internet Fame, but if you want to go to the source and read it, I’m sure Google can help you.
For those of you unfamiliar with the OSBP, basically, a guy and his group of friends went around to a couple of conventions and asked women if they could feel their breasts; it’s indicated that this was mostly done in a circle of friends, though some strangers were asked; at a future con, they devised a system wherein women would wear green or red buttons signifying that “Yes, you may ask to touch my breasts” or “No, you may not ask to touch my breasts”, respectively, stressing that this program was ‘opt-in’ and those not wearing buttons would ‘never be asked’, and that women wearing green buttons could always refuse. (How are you going to recruit more women to your party, one might wonder, without asking non-button-bedecked women to opt-in?) In his posts, the author also indicated that the group approached women who were ‘dressed to impress’…so I guess it’s opt-in unless you’re just too goddamn hot or dressed like a whore and therefore ‘asking for it’.
Here is why I think this whole thing is dangerous. I have no problem with a group of people who want to get together and grab each other’s boobs. Cthulhu knows that Laura and I had a field day at Dragon*Con in the room party judging the ‘best ass contest’, so I’d like to make it clear that I’m not intending to come off as a hypocritical prude. Have fun. Go nuts. Grab nuts.
I have a problem with taking an experiment done mostly with friends, and extolling its virtues in a large con environment where results are likely to be MUCH different. Many people are far more comfortable around their friends than they are around strangers, and so with friends, you can push comfort boundaries a bit and people are less likely to end up hurt, offended, terrified, or worse.
If you were a single woman ‘dressed to impress’ via cosplay or simply a nice outfit, and you were approached by a group of strange men who asked you straight out for a favor that was sexual in nature, how would you feel? Even in a con environment, with hundreds or thousands of people milling around nearby, there is still a huge power shift in favor of the group of males, who could, in all fairness, quite easily drag you off. If you give them what they want, will they go away? Or will they ask for more? If you deny them, what will happen? Is it more or less dangerous for you to acquiesce?
I don’t disagree that men can be sexually assaulted and even raped, and that the double-standard shouldn’t exist (just look at the difference between the way that males have to treat female strippers versus how females treat male strippers–men can look but not touch, while women practically ATTACK the men). However, in this instance, I don’t think it’s unfair to discount attacks on men from the equation entirely, for the following reasons: When a group of men approach a woman and ask her for a sexual favor, men are most decidedly the aggressors, and furthermore, there is no reciprocity in the OSBP. Oh, sure, some men offered to allow women to feel their chests or grab their bum, but there is no direct male equivalent for breasts. Penis-touching was disallowed because it was ‘too sexual’ in nature, whereas boob-fondling….is not? There we have it, folks: This is merely a guy’s elaborate excuse to get his hands on some titties, and if you refuse him, you’re the one with the problem, so bound are you by social mores!
Furthermore, this is a direct quote: “Unfortunately, I can’t decry the process of “asking repeatedly,” mainly because it’s the only stimuli a lot of women respond to. Frankly, I think any woman who has to be begged fifteen times before she eventually accepts should be drug into the back alleyways and beaten, because her rampant need for a string of pleadings trains the wrong sort of men that no doesn’t mean no. And then we should go beat up the men for good measure.” (edit: This is a quote from 2005 and was not stated in reference to the OSBP. I apologize for the error, though I still believe it is an important insight into his character and demeanor towards sexuality.)
Yes, there exists a subset of women who want you to PROVE how much you want them before they give in, and I’ll further agree that the women who do that train men that if they ask repeatedly, a future answer is more likely to be ‘yes’. HOWEVER, not decrying it within the scope of the OSBP is tantamount to saying that everything he said earlier about the project being opt-in is a load of freshly-shoveled manure, since he does not truly believe that no means no. So at conventions, does the red button on one’s chest mean NO, or in this guy’s mind, does it mean ‘No until you ask me often enough’? Far from teaching that subset of women anything, I believe that it further reinforces the idea to MEN that it’s ok to ask ad nauseum as it improves your chances, with the originator of the project’s blessing.
The greatest evil from this madness, unfortunately, is that even though the author has posted and NOW suggested that people not try to recreate his experiment, is that you can’t put the cat back into the bag. Even if this schmo doesn’t attend any convention in my area, there are plenty of people who read what he had to say, buy into the idea that second base is totally ‘freeing’ and ‘healing’, and want to grab some titties themselves. How many people are going to ask to touch your boobs at San Diego Comic-Con? At PAX? At Dragon*Con? At GenCon? Will they be more or less respectful than the originators of the idea? Is this something you should *have* to be concerned with when all you wanted to do was drool over Jamie Bamber a little bit, and maybe run up to Kevin Sorbo clapping your hands and squealing ‘Hercu-LES! Hercu-LES! Hercu-LES!’?
You want to grab some titties? Fine. Just keep it to your rooms. Do you really want to give attractive women another reason not to attend conventions?
I agree with you pretty much 100%.
There is often an extension of what counts as “my friends” in a convention situation where “people who should be comfortable with me” extends to “everyone at the same convention as I am”. I think this phenomenon compounds the problem with people who claim that this is acceptable. Pressuring someone else, regardless of the genders of either party, into sexual activity is clown shoes of the highest order.
Theoretically, people attending the same convention should have at least similar interests, so there *is* an arguable basis for at least the potential for friendship…but friendship potential isn’t enough to make this idea work.
The whole thing just screamed “Creepy Nice Guy” so much that I still haven’t gotten that icky feeling off of me from the “Lo, and her breasts were magnificent” sentence of that post.
Even the apology came off that way. “I’m sorry that you are too repressed to understand this.” DKjkjkJKJIJIweMEWKMEKLWL
Oh, I don’t get ‘nice guy’ from him at all. Just ‘Creep’. I blame myself for reading his LJ userinfo and seeing that one of his memorable entries was when he tried to pick up a homeless woman for sex and felt like a victim because she’d been abused before, so he didn’t get any tail. Poor, poor victim.
Ah, see, I took it as “Poor me, I never got anything. Can you plz offer your boobies to me to ease my high school trauma?”
And what you mentioned definitely made me go D:! when I read that.
I scanned through that essay. It gets worse, instead of a nerdy HS kid who didn’t get any, he came to realize that he was an aging, fat and balding guy who wasn’t getting any.
Sooooo…yeah, the plan is by the time you are fat, balding and aging, you should have the self-worth and confidence instilled enough to not pick up on teenage homeless chicks.
Jesus. Why did I have to even type that.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m mega-skeezed by that whole post, but part of me finds it hilarious that the answer to getting his then-girlfriend to sleep with him wasn’t to simply ‘free himself’ and ask to touch her breasts.
Also, omg, this made me go look at his memories. OMG. Now I do think he’s a creepy entitled asshole who wouldn’t know privilege if it bit him in the ass (and I actually rarely use the word “privilege”), whereas before I just thought he made some incredibly poor writing choices.
The “lo” line totally got to me to. Although the part that I thought was creepiest was where the woman was coming up to them asking if her breasts were “good enough” to be touched. And they totally said the boobs were! And she was JUSTIFIED IN LIFE after that.
That line made me want to shudder and weep simultaneously. Yes! Your boobs are ‘good enough’! EVERYONE’S BOOBS ARE GOOD ENOUGH! They are you! And no one else is you! And YOU. ARE. PERFECT.
I agree with you, but as a counterpoint, I’ll offer that in any public area (of Dragon*Con, at least), a loud “No, you may not touch my breasts, leave me the hell alone!” is going to be quickly followed by either an apologetic leave-taking or someone getting a serious beatdown (probably involving at least one Klingon) and a dragging off to Security.
I can’t tell you how much I’d love to witness a cosplayer rumble. The klingons really have to start shouting about honor in the middle of it, though.
The klingons really have to start shouting in Klingon in the middle of it.
Well, ultimately, they’ll start shouting in Klingon about honor in the middle of it, but I suppose I can’t be too picky.
Also…OMG. It’s that hot guy from the videos! :swoon:
I’m afraid that’s not going to get old for a while.
Reason #2 why Sean does not attend any of these conventions. I would just end up punching everyone.
What’s reason #1?
I’m not a fan of most things Cons are held for. Anime, star trek, sci-fi in general…
That’ll do’er!
I thought there was a con for everything these days. 🙂
Well, yeah. They just go by different names, like “Shareholder’s meetings,” “Branson, Missori,” or “the Apple Store,”
Apple Store is a tent revival, not a convention.
I was going to go with ‘compound-less cult’.
I nearly went with “cult”, but I didn’t want to overplay my hand; I’ve only ever been in one location.
I have no problem with vastly overstating my case; I engage in it regularly!
“…overplay my hand…”
And the masturbation euphemism list grows yet again.
Are you maintaining a masturbation euphemism list wiki? Because you totally should.
I shall call it a wanki.
OH GOD YOU GOT ME AGAIN.
I believe I’ll call you the PUNisher.
people i don’t know trying to touch my breasts? they get nutted, HARD. then the rabid justin takes over.
dammit. now i have to change my “to-do” list.
XD
I’ve been fondled at cons before, always through a crush of people. It’s like there’s always an opportunist waiting around. If I could’ve identified the perpetrator, I would’ve broken his fingers. Each and every one.
Someone asking first isn’t likely to make me feel less skeezed about it; I think breast-touching in general is intimate and as such should be reserved for people I intend to be intimate with.
accidental contact i glare at.
‘pretend’ accidental contact i hunt you down.
asking me to do it intentionally i attempt to break your nose.
intentional contact earns a death wish (and the above mentioned instantaneous punishments).
I can’t wait until I get laser eye implants. Technology isn’t moving NEARLY fast enough for me!
ooo, i’ll take one too!
I’m glad I’m not the only one with those reactions. Sometimes I wonder if I’m just a bitch.
if you are, it’s okay, because i am too (or so i am told).
being stuck in the middle of no where are cons are limited to a really small scifi con when I was 12 and 13 and Anime Fest which is run and attended mostly by people I loath, and not at all worth the entry fee. But that doesn’t mean I’ve avoided this BS, don’t even get me started on the ren faire crowd, they’re probably all going nuts over this right now. *shudder*…. what was my point?
oh yeah, at the Suicide Girls Burlesque show I went to in Oklahoma City i was wearing big platforms and a mini skirt and if I’d known the number of guys crouching to look up my skirt a lot more would have walked out with at least a limp. I stepped on the one guy I noticed pretty hard, but the random ass grabbers never got there just deserts. I get that in crowded bars pretty often as well. Like the “I’m touching your shoulder so you don’t walk into me while I pass” thing, but with my ass.
Seriously, who DOES that?
Seriously, who DOES that?
People who want to lose a hand. No wonder you’re dating Mr. Big N’ Burly! 😉
When you’re king, can I have pointy robot teeth? you know, for bitting.
Absolutely! Unless you intend to use them to bite me, in which case, I have to veto.
It’s always rude to invite yourself over.
I look at this whole little E-Controversy with an disinterested sneer and a condescending eye-roll.
If I see one more LJ post pontificating about it like it’s some kind of issue, it’s going to earn an exasperated sigh. But that’s as far as I’m going with it.
It’s just common knowledge: Don’t fondle the goods unless you’ve been invited to do so. One slut and a couple depraved, sex-starved, stereotypical con-going fratboy rejects doesn’t change this.
Re: It’s always rude to invite yourself over.
See, but the thing is, as a guy, you can afford to roll your eyes about it because it doesn’t affect you a whit. If random con girls (and remember, not booth babes, but your average con girl or maybe less attractive than average con girl; perhaps one with bad skin in a sailor moon costume) were asking to grab your junk, would you feel differently?
Sexual harrassment *is* a problem for women at conventions. And this is taking it to a new level; swirl in the internet, and you’ve got maybe 100 or potentially many more loser con-going fratboy rejects with the SAME awful idea.
I mean, when I, far from being the most attractive girl on the block, have had problems with random dudes groping me at conventions when I’m dressed in a t-shirt and jeans, THIS.IS.AN.ISSUE. And if some outrage at an even MORE stupid idea brings awareness to the original problem and how people treat and perceive women who walk about in public, then I think people pontificating on the subject can only be a positive thing.
Re: It’s always rude to invite yourself over.
Well, if some girl came up to me and asked to grab my junk in public, I’d probably say no, and question her upbringing. If she suggested taking the touchy-feely back to her hotel room, I might react a little differently.
But it’s always my right to say “No” just like it’s any woman’s right to say “No.” And it’s not my fault if other dudes think it’s okay to sidestep that rule, just like it’s not your fault if some girls decide to hand out free base runs. If someone’s expectations are flawed because of how someone else acts, that’s not my problem.
Besides, come on; these are CONVENTION PEOPLE. What do you EXPECT? Depraved, sweaty basement dwellers are as common at cons as pot at a Tom Petty concert. Look at the industries that Cons typically support: There’s stereotypes and sexualization of female characters and fantasy and occasionally getting it on while wearing animal suits. None of this should be particularly surprising.
At assorted cons, I’ve: been hit on by a short little gay starfleet vulcan, molested by a borg, witnessed drunken klingon karaoke-filking, shared an elevator ride with a very nice dominatrix and her gimp, and staved off the urge to strangle countless anime morons gibbering in pidgin Japanese. If these people weren’t freakjars, they wouldn’t BE there. Which is why I don’t go to cons anymore. People are gonna pee in the pool — if you don’t like it, don’t go swimming.
And if people keep giving this PARTICULAR dipshit attention, you’re going to see more and more people trying the same stupid idea. I wouldn’t have even HEARD of the OSBP (Oh Look, it has a fucking acronym now) if it hadn’t been for all the outraged people complaining about it on their blogs.
It’s a stupid idea, only stupid people will subscribe to it, and stupid people will get kicked out of cons for it. If they’re smart, they’ll move their private groping parties to their hotel rooms, where it usually happens anyways. And people on crowded trains and at concerts will still grope people. There’s not a lot of blogging that will change any of that. 😛
Re: It’s always rude to invite yourself over.
“And people on crowded trains and at concerts will still grope people.”
And what makes that acceptable? What makes it unworthy of outcry? Because the perpetrators are faceless? Because *someone* has to be treated like a piece of meat?
Re: It's always rude to invite yourself over.
It’s not that it’s acceptable so much as it’s inevitable. Some people are just like that, and even though it’s technically illegal, good luck stopping it.
…But the morally reprehensible and invasive things people feel they can get away with under the guise of anonymity is a whole other can of worms.
Re: It’s always rude to invite yourself over.
Now I disagree, I think we can stop it just fine…
…We’ll just remove one groping finger at a time, until there are none left. 😀
Re: It’s always rude to invite yourself over.
As long as they are not replaced with stronger-gripping prosthetic robot fingers, I am fine with this idea!
Re: It’s always rude to invite yourself over.
That would be a DISASTER!
from brunch this weekend: ‘slitting someone’s throat is also assault, but i don’t see people wearing red buttons for that.’
Maybe they should. Otherwise, how will you know not to do it?
When the day comes to raise the black flag of anarchy and begin slitting throats, they’ll be first against the wall.
You might like this entry, if you haven’t seen it…
That is awesomesauce!
I feel that reading the original post even with its attendant feelings of ookiness was worth it, just to read that response.
I See What She Did There, but there is backfire potential as some men would be into that.
That reminds me, I need to contact that guy from Federal Way who wanted to be my slave. I’ll let you know what he thinks about ball-kicking.
The whole “looking for Internet fame” thing was why I stopped reading his journal some years ago, despite tons of people telling me how great he was. To borrow a quote from Top Gun, “Son, your ego is writing checks your body can’t cash.”
Besides, the guy can’t even spell “ferret” right.
cheers,
Phil
What I don’t get is WHY people think he’s great; I suppose he’s better at manipulating (certain kinds of) people than I first surmised.
The first time I saw this, and the link to the post, I thought it was just something he wrote about. Was it really *his* idea? WTF? I never really drank this guy’s koolaid, but I honestly thought he was smarter than this.
I’m the first guy to tell you whining hippies to shut the fuck up and quit expecting the rest of us to treat you like beautiful flowers, but this thing is just flatout fucking retarded.
And, speaking as a dude, if I wanna touch your boobs, I god damn well want it to be a sexual thing. I’m not curious, I know what tits look like, I’m horny. Other than in a sexual way, breasts don’t really interest me at all. Ok, those triple F cup monstrosities are interesting in a freakish kind of way, like 5 foot fingernails. But other than that, when I think of boobs, I think of sex. Trying to act as if it’s in the name of science is just creepy insecurity.
DINGDINGDING!
As a woman (not speaking for all women, of course), when I allow someone to touch my boobs, I *also* want it to be a sexual thing. I’m not interested in being compared like produce in the grocery store, or being part of some sort of vaguely Heinleinian social experiment.
That’s the thing though, there’s no “comparing like produce in the grocery”. They’re trying to pass off a cheap thrill as some sort of rebellion against social hangups and say “omg look at how progressively cool I am”. Except anyone who’s not bullshitting themselves knows it’s still just a cheap thrill.
Not that cheap. They had to pay to get into the con. Buttons cost money too.
For some of them, it might’ve been cheaper to travel to BC and go to No. 5 Orange and grab a bunch of stripper tittay.
If there was ever a more appropriate time for the Internet King icon, I missed it. Pathetic.
Lace! The Final Brassiere.
DISCLAIMER: The person in question is a colleague and friend, and thus I’ve chosen to remove myself from all discussions on this topic. My comments below concern only the facts of the case.
The quote you provided, although it is attributed correctly, has nothing to do with the Open Source Boob Project. I Googled it, and it’s from an unrelated post from 2005.
It’s still unfortunately phrased–as he in fact admitted in a subsequent post, also revealed by my Google search–but my point isn’t that that quote is or isn’t defensible, misogynistic, problematic, whatever. It’s that it has to do only tangentially with the topic at hand, its been taken out of its context as a footnote to a larger point, and he’s said himself that he could’ve said it better.
Now, I’m guessing you didn’t know any of that, and that you found the quote out of context in the first place. It looks as though it’s being dredged up all over the place in relation on the current controversy, and that bothers me.
If you’re going to fry him for the OSBP, there’s plenty of oil in the pan already.
I was not aware of that, and I’ll certainly make note of it; I don’t want to perpetuate mistruths. I appreciate the restraint you’ve decided to show in this situation.
I don’t know you very well, and I think you’re pretty nifty. I don’t necessarily want to badmouth one of your friends, whom I don’t know at all, besides how he chooses to present himself online.
However, even though the quote is *not* in reference to the OSBP, I think it is an important insight into his character. The problem with anyone who strives to be an e-celebrity is that everything they’ve said, whether they’re being mean, spiteful, or just plain stupid, is a mere Google index search away, and, as evidenced here, can easily be used against them. In this way, I think that e-celebrity is even harsher and more dangerous than actual celebrity status. Is it necessarily fair? No. But I’m fairly sure he knew full well what he was getting into when he posted it.
You’re quite right about e-celebrity. It’s like show business but with a shorter attention span and a longer memory.
And I agree that that quote–and the rest of the post to which it’s a footnote, and any number of other posts he’s made about women and sex over the years–might be relevant to establishing a long-term pattern of behavior, if that’s what you’re trying to do. It just bugs me that because it includes the phrase “repeatedly asking” and seems like it could be talking about the OSBP, it’s being quoted widely and without context. My several semesters of training in history would send up a red flag there even if my acquaintance with him didn’t.
Again, let me stress, I’m not laying the blame for that at your feet–it’s being quoted enough that right now the original post isn’t even on the first page of Google results. You saw it and picked it up, and while that’s poor research methodology, it doesn’t make you a bad person.
I don’t, however, agree that he knew what he was getting into, either with the OSBP, the post in 2005, or internet fame in general. He’s quite intelligent and sometimes shrewd, but he’s got blind spots you could drive an LJ-wide controversy through.
Unfortunately, there’s not much more I can do to correct this than I’ve already done; strike it out of my post and explain when it’s from, that it’s not connected to OSBP, and that I do think it’s part of a pattern of behavior. I feel that this course of action is better than just removing the quote entirely, though I’m open to suggestion. I don’t consider myself to be a journalist, but having been screwed over by one, I don’t want to make the same mistakes, and do hold myself accountable for the things I say and quote. In that vein, you’re correct. I’d seen that attributed to him, checked his post to make certain that I could quote him directly as opposed to someone’s paraphrase, and neglected to see the date.
As far as him knowing what he was getting into, perhaps he didn’t know the particular shitstorm he was starting here, but based on his rather calculating posts regarding how he’s been going about seeking fame and collecting friends and comments, I can’t help but think that this is him getting exactly what he wanted. It struck me that even in his follow-up posts, he was more concerned with how many comments they were generating as opposed to the highly-charged nature of the controversy at hand.
Some people just thrive on attention and don’t really care where that attention is coming from.
I apologize if I sounded at all peevish, and I didn’t actually scroll up and see that you’d made the correction. Striking it out and explaining is a great course of action. I’m also impressed that you actually tracked down the original post, even if you didn’t note the date. On a subject as heated as this one, honestly, I don’t expect anyone to be half as reasonable as you’ve been. People are upset about this, and with reason.
I’m acquainted with his statements on accumulating friends and comments, yeah. He wants to win at internet… but having known him for a while, I strongly disagree that this gets him what he wants. What he wanted, I firmly believe, was for everyone to say that this was a great idea and for it to go on to become a Big Thing at conventions and for him to be remembered as The Guy What Started That Open Source Boob Thing.
He takes controversial stances on things, sure, and he certainly likes arguing, but in the end he wants to win people over. I know, even without having discussed it with him directly, that he is genuinely mortified and bewildered over what happened here. Remember: He froze comments on his post. If he just wanted the attention, there’d be no reason for him to do that.
Anyway, I’m a little deeper into this than I meant to get. You can choose to either believe me or not when I say that he’s definitely not enjoying this. Either way, I said my piece, and you changed your post when presented with new information. Under the circumstances, this counts as win / win.
No worries! I didn’t mean to drag you into a debate that you didn’t want to have!
As far as being reasonable goes, being unfair to someone or misleading about someone is hardly the way I’d like to go about making points or winning arguments.
I think that the most/best we can hope for out of this is that everyone learns at least something. Most people are realizing that sexual revolutions are neither started nor won overnight, and I’ve learned to check my sources. 🙂
Are you coming to the next Phoriday?
I’ve definitely learned something, which is to *think* about this stuff. When I read the original post, I mentally blinked and thought, “Huh.” Only after the controversy erupted did it really occur to me that wait, yah, that’s a problem.
Phoriday is a good question. There is a certain… Battlestar… that demands my attention–specifically, Battlestar Galactica. I don’t have TV, and the group of my friends that’s watching this season together refuses to use DVR because we know that “watch any time” will radioactively decay into “never actually get around to it” with an astonishingly short half-life.
Phoriday usually convenes at what, 7? I might make it. Stay tuned.
How do I love thee, Battlestar Galactica? Let me count the ways…
I don’t have TV either, but since I don’t watch it with friends, the internet has proven to be my friend this season.
I believe Phoriday is a 7/7:30 thing–not this week but next.
Just because outrageous sexual mores are overexposed in our culture and encouraged by the artificial anonymity of the Internet to the point that anyone with healthy boundaries is considered an irritating roadblock to this group’s immediate, meaningless sexual thrills doesn’t mean that women don’t have a right to their personal privacy…or that these OSBP douches aren’t irritating loooosers.
There’s something more sinister going on here to which the “beating women in the back alleyways” comment alludes. It begs the question: who are the “wrong sort of men”?
OSBP dorks… look in the mirror. You’re a painful rejection away from the back alley.
As always, the ‘wrong sort of person’ is your polar opposite, regardless of where you yourself stand.