Jezebel Writers Too Smart To Be Raped

CC Staff — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 18:15:29 +0000

We talk about sex a lot on this site. That is pretty obvious to anyone who reads it. We like sex. We like being free to make our own choices about who to have sex with, how soon, how many partners and which way we are going to do it. We like to share our stories. We like to hear yours.

But what we absolutely do not want to do is send the message that sexual freedom and inhibition is a risk free lifestyle.

Recently, two writers from Jezebel – a website for women aged 25-35 – were invited onto Lizz Winstead’s show, Thinking and Drinking, to discuss their decisions to blog quite openly about their sexcapades and the message they send by writing about them (graphically) on the internet. Winstead, a former writer for The Daily Show, is a strong advocate of sexual empowerment and freedom, but argues it “can only be called a freedom if you protect yourself from rape, disease and pregnancy.”

Tracie Egan and Moe Tkacik, the Jezebel bloggers – who we have quoted and referenced many times before – showed up to the interview drunk and what they said caused quite a stir in the CollegeCandy office.

You can see the clip here:


We have no problem with the choices these women make in their personal lives, but we do have a problem with the fact that they take an issue like rape and make light of it. Pass it off like it’s funny, impossible, fictional and that they are too smart to let it happen to them.
No one is too “smart” to be raped. My friends are very smart people; some of the most intelligent, worldly and street smart people I know (Yes, I am bragging). But that didn’t mean anything when one of them went home with someone – a funny, attractive boy we knew through some friends – and found herself in an unsafe situation that she could not stop.
He was not some shady dude in the bar; she was “smart” enough to avoid that one.
It wasn’t the muscley guy buying rounds for every girl he saw; she knew not to go near that one.
It was a safe guy that she trusted and that did not make a difference.
Just as Winstead mentioned in the clip, the ladies of Jezebel have remained safe, not because they have made good choices, but because they are lucky. The same goes for me, and for a lot of the bloggers on this site. We are not doing anything different than the women who find themselves in danger; we are just really f-ing lucky.
Though we may not want to be role models, blogging comes with that responsibility. We would be jobless if it weren’t for the people who read and emulate us, so it is disgusting for these two ladies of Jezebel to ignore their responsibilities and make light of such a serious situation.
It may have been the wine talking, but what they said is embarrassing and just plain wrong. Women today are very lucky to live in a society that allows us the freedom to choose our lifestyle; we cannot take it for granted.
[Photo courtesy of Jezebel]

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Jezebel Writers Too Smart To Be Raped