Weren’t expecting a headline like that on this otherwise mundane Monday were ya! I normally scan and delete Fireside Fiction’s weekly newsletter but today’s email stopped my quasi-feminist fingers in their tracks.
You’re probably sitting there with a puzzled expression, let me explain: Fireside Fiction is a short-story magazine that began as a crowdfunded campaign in 2012 to find great stories “regardless of genre” and offer writers good pay for their words. Their bio was amended on November 8th, 2016 to proclaim their goal in “resisting the global rise of fascism and far-right populism, starting with the current occupant of the White House.”
This past week alone has lauded a gargantuan dump on the attempted discussions of women’s oppression in the past… let’s just say, since a certain wispy haired tycoon (read: buffoon) moved into power, Fireside was covering this. Obviously, women and minorities have arguably been oppressed since Adam mansplained to Eve, but let’s just focus on the past year or so when POTUS declared all pussies were up for grabbing.
Brian, the former Editor over at Fireside, piggybacked on the company’s weekly newsletter with a rant/announcement that in the same breath deprecated the Harvey Weinsteins of the world and acknowledged that men in general need to shut the fuck up sometimes.
This move comes after Brian and the current editor, Pablo, were shocked and appalled by the suspension of Rose McGowan from Twitter after she spoke out against Weinstein and his cronies /well-known actors that supported him. Or, as the lads so eloquently put it:
Rose McGowan being banned by Twitter for some bullshit which I’m not even going to bother explaining because it’s an absolute double standard and it’s shit that fucking Nazis and trolls get away with on the platform all the time but when a woman does it no no we need to stomp that unacceptable behaviour down, you see.
Brian went on to explain that he and Pablo would be pushing for #ManListeningMonday – a weekly day of social media silence, where men would commit to keeping their Twitter fingers locked and loaded only for “RT’ing and otherwise boosting women’s voices. This was especially geared towards the voices of women of colour and disabled women, along with anyone who does not identify as male — genderqueer, intersex, and all the other people on our great big gender spectrum outside of male”.
A lot of women have gone silent on Twitter today. It’s a reaction to a lot of things that have been smouldering for ages, set aflame by the past week of Harvey Weinstein revelations, emerging stories of shittiness by people in his orbit (Ben Affleck Fuck Off), and women in and out of Hollywood talking about their experiences of harassment, assault, and rape by men.
All of this is happening because women are speaking out. Whether or not they speak today, men need to listen, learn, and amplify their voices. This idea of listening is of course is not a concept I came up with, and a lot of women have been talking about this need for listening this morning.
Brian assures this stunt isn’t for “ally cookies”, and sure #ManListeningMonday is only a hashtag – but the sentiment runs so much deeper. It’s about stepping down off your town crier crate and listening to the people passing by – your peers. As a white woman fortunate enough to be living in semi-privileged Australian society, I understand that I’m nowhere near as oppressed as my sisters of colour, LGBTQIA+ and differently-abled friends. So maybe I need to zip my lips on another day of the week? What do you think, perhaps #WhiteWomenWebWalkAway could be our FIB-equivalent?
Brian, a man, laid it ever more articulately (and less shrilly, I would imagine) than I could: “listening to, believing, and valuing what women have to say is vital to fixing the bullshit they have to put up with every goddamn day” – so I think I’ll just STFU now.
