My brief thoughts on the Open Source Boob Project

[novapsyche]

At a private room party at this year's PenguiCon, I overheard someone talking in very general terms about the Open Source Boob Project, and I exclaimed that I would totally do something like that. The woman who had been talking brought out the "YES, you may" pin and the "I participated, for Science" ribbon, which pleased me because I'd only garnered three ribbons by then. Before she turned back to her group of folks, she asked if she could touch my breasts, and considering that I'd just said I would and had donned the pin, I said yes. She did, complimented me, and that was that.

No one else felt me up. This was a bit to be expected, as I didn't get the pin until around 3 a.m. Saturday night, and my ride and I packed up and left just after noon Sunday.

I do have to say, however, that if I'd read theferrett's post about OSBP before someone offered me the pin, I would have turned it down, and perhaps gone into feminist reasons why I was declining. His post was extremely heterosexist, and I was dismayed that he got defensive to the point of not listening to others who pointed this out to him. I have to say that I didn't feel honored to be part of the group once my body had been reduced to "gropes". Sorry, but word choice matters.

And for him and a few others to proclaim, without qualifier, that "no one felt any peer pressure to participate" is disingenuous at best. I can say that even I felt a bit of peer pressure to do it once I had "opted in" (in theferrett's terminology)--no one explained to me that I had the option to turn away those who'd requested. Besides, how would it look if I let one person do it and then, when their friends asked, to climb up on my high horse and reject them? I mean, really, the whole thing smacks of social peer pressure, and I say that again as someone who is not modest about her body.

theferrett's post might have been excusable but for a few choice phrases and paragraphs, which really soured me to the entire enterprise.

So, no more OSBP for me.

Other posts about OSBP: The Ferrett clarifies his earlier post
scalzi writes about OSBP in his blog Whatever
James Nicoll lists his opinion (thanks, supergee)
pleonastic's take
springheel_jack adds commentary, including a very apt description of how privilege turns into -isms
pnkrokhockeymom has something to say
netmouse speaks
ojouchan breaks things down
coffeeandink has quite a bit to say
delux_vivens digs a little deeper

Comments

[atdt1991.livejournal.com]

That friendly woman seems fairly devastated by this whole aftermath (having created the buttons herself, and having been the first one to start on this project). What you heard described on Saturday night was what we experienced at the time, and it seems a real shame that it has soured so, long after it was done.

[vylar-kaftan.livejournal.com]

Thanks for posting this. I think you should unlock it because this would be a valuable post for many people to see. Unlike most people expressing their opinions, you were actually there.

[novapsyche.livejournal.com]

I'm not saying that it didn't start out in an innocent way and progressed in a fairly non-heterosexist fashion. However, theferrett had to have known that his blog had a very wide readership, and that most of those readers would have only his words to go on as far as understanding what occurred. So, IMO, that woman should be most upset at him for his extremely poor choice of words.

[novapsyche.livejournal.com]

I'd locked it because it seemed that most people (especially those on my FL) were doing so. But I think you make a good point.

[atdt1991.livejournal.com]

Maybe so. As it is, though, she's having a hard time not taking the sometimes-vicious response to his post as a personal attack. For her, it has clearly ruined the experience.

If I had people throwing around abusive language in order to "teach me" how wrong I was in allowing it in the first place, I think it'd be pretty ruined for me, too. This threadlet is all I can think of, and I'm sorry, no one deserves that.

I'll be spending my day circling the wagons and trying to convince my friend that, no, she really shouldn't stop going to con, and no, she really shouldn't let someone else's opinion ruin her weekend in retrospect.

I look at it in retrospect and think that the mistake was either A) in talking about it afterward, publicly, or B) allowing other people to be involved. If it had remained within the confines of the 10 or so people who knew about it before Con, no one would be talking about pressure and coercion. *shudder*

I really wish you hadn't taken the pin, as I don't think anyone who felt the compulsion to allow people to touch them out of fairness should be put in that position, nor anyone who (and I mean absolutely no offense by this, nor am I trying to exaggerate) feels uncomfortable/peer pressure by the request itself.

[novapsyche.livejournal.com]

But my point remains that I didn't know all the ramifications of pin-taking. It wasn't explained in detail--it was overheard party talk and I said I would participate in something like that. The woman who handed me the pin (and I can't be sure that this is the same person you're talking about) just gave it to me--she didn't tell me that the pin only meant that others had the right to ask and that I retained the right to turn them down. My point is, there was no discussion of the boundaries at all. I thought, and continued to think until I got home and read the comments in that post, that the pin meant "you may touch," not "you may ask."

I mean, in the confines of the party (which was a lingerie party, where social barriers about bodies are already relaxed), I didn't feel like I was throwing my consent out the window. In the context of that party, I didn't have a problem with the pin being what I thought it was, because if I didn't want that physical boundary broached, I could just leave. But if the people originally involved were in fact doing this in common spaces like the hallways (which theferrett admits to doing), I think that changes the dynamics quite a bit.

[vrax.livejournal.com]

I'm curious as to how one person's post would sour you on the idea, if your experience was pleasant?

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not defending Ferrett here, he'scapable of dealing with his own fallout or whathaveyou. I'm just curious about your reaction.

[atdt1991.livejournal.com]

The woman who handed you the pin is the only person handing out pins, as she created them.

It is a shame she didn't mention the "rules" as we discussed them, because the issue of whether it meant "touch" or "ask" came up frequently, and it was always "ask only", at that party or anywhere else.

The 'groping in the hallway' was immediately after the lingerie party, in the 3rd floor hallway just outside, at one in the morning Saturday night, by a guy dressed as Frank N Furter who had been whipped in the hallway just a minute prior. It seems to me that scenario has similar social barriers, though I admit that's my own perspective, not certain to be standard.

For what it is worth, I would have been surprised to see the pin on you, if I had, as I would not have thought you would be comfortable with it in the first place, and I'm surprised you were, at the time, comfortable with it having meant "yes you may do" vs "yes you may ask".

Personally, I do not grab my friend's boobs without explicit immediate permission, no matter how close we are, and would not have participated if I thought the pin meant "you may touch me, no matter who you are, without asking." Even amongst those who started the pins, they still asked each time, as a courtesy.

It was an experimental concept intended to make people feel good about their bodies and feel good about asking to touch other people - it wasn't something intended to be done on the street, around children, in public, in someone's home, or otherwise away from this one weekend.

It was clearly a mistake, despite the fact that no one who was there complained or expressed any negative comment about it until you. I am absolutely certain that it will not be happening again.

I just think it's a shame that people are insisting that those who decided it was a fun idea, asked for a pin, and participated were not in control of their bodies or their decisions, and were thus abused by the patriarchy. I can't think of a better way to insult someone than to tell them they have no right to feel the way they do, or that someone else controls their behavior. Poor them.

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

It's fascinating to see how something conceived abstractly and innocently, in terms of an ideal egalitarianism and hedonism, breaks down between theory and practice because of heterosexism and misogyny. It may have been intended and proposed in the most innocent (non-exploitative) frame of mind, but was poisoned because sexism pervades every corner of society, even those corners where we attempt to create a temporary haven or zone of interference.

Also, it sounds like this illustrates quite well a principle i have been struggling to articulate, about how ideas and movements can be born when a few people share a moment of synergetic (and perhaps "numinous") awareness, and then attempt to express that experience to others; and in so doing, seek to find out what it was that characterized that experience so as to force it to become repeatable. Many such moments... simply aren't. But that doesn't stop people from trying to bottle it and peddle it to others anyway.

[vylar-kaftan.livejournal.com]

Well put.

[novapsyche.livejournal.com]

I want to say that I wouldn't have even posted about it (it was such a minor experience, compressed in such a short time frame) if it hadn't taken off like wildfire online (especially on LJ).

I want to be clear that the experience itself was a positive one. Again, the party I attended had quite a relaxed atmosphere where we knew that normal social boundaries were going to be left by the wayside.

For what it is worth, I would have been surprised to see the pin on you, if I had, as I would not have thought you would be comfortable with it in the first place, and I'm surprised you were, at the time, comfortable with it having meant "yes you may do" vs "yes you may ask".

Perhaps I have changed more since college than I would like to admit. ;)

I just think it's a shame that people are insisting that those who decided it was a fun idea, asked for a pin, and participated were not in control of their bodies or their decisions, and were thus abused by the patriarchy.

I'm not saying that it wasn't fun for those who participated, nor am I positing that those who did weren't in control of their bodies. However, I think it's instructive to deconstruct what happened after the fact.

Someone else in the comments of the original post noted that if the touching had been a non-standard sexualized part of the body, then it wouldn't have raised so many red flags. I think it would have been even more interesting and intimate if the buttons referred to kissing another person's inner wrist, for example.

[novapsyche.livejournal.com]

I'm curious as to how one person's post would sour you on the idea, if your experience was pleasant?

Because I had had one idea of what the Project may have been, and then I read an account from an insider of what it was from his perspective. His very recollection degraded the Project, because his account is being seen as definitive.

Encountering theferrett's language, his attitude showed through, and it altered my understanding of what this was all about.

[atdt1991.livejournal.com]

We discussed what it would have been like if it had been kissing, and that was a no-go. Many of us found that a far less comfortable idea. It is a shame it was called "boob", but "Open Source Secondary Sexual Characteristic Project" just doesn't have that 'ring' to it.

Open Source Butt Project would have been fun. Sounds a bit unintentionally anal, though.

[vrax.livejournal.com]

I don't think I'm expressing my question very well. I mean yeah, I see what might turn you off about it in the future, but I don't see the point in letting his attitude (or anyone's) color the experience you already did have. Does that make sense?

[atdt1991.livejournal.com]

The rest of us who were involved have no control over the fact that he is a reasonably accomplished writer, and by far the most popular livejournal amongst us. That it is the definitive definition is, I think, directly attributable to its incendiary nature, which has called everyone and their mother out to that post.

On my journal's flist, there are six posts about OSBP from people who directly experienced it, and none of them are anything like that. Oh well, that's the internet for you.

[novapsyche.livejournal.com]

It is the fact that he is a reasonably accomplished writer that I am so surprised that he wrote it the way he did and then was taken aback that people responded to his words. He claimed at one point that considering the activity, it wouldn't matter how anyone described it, that it wouldn't matter what words were used.

He also has claimed that he didn't feel he could write from women's perspectives because he's not a woman. Come on. Fiction writers write from other genders' perspectives all the time. It's called being able to put yourself in someone else's shoes. The fact that he could not find it in himself to see that his word choices and the overall tone of his post affected how others would view what he described is just incredible.

[novapsyche.livejournal.com]

I understand your question. The individual experience, as I have it in my head, is still positive on the whole. But the situation is as any other act: the person's intent determines how an outsider views the deed. theferrett didn't touch my breast, so the individual experience isn't changed. But my view of the overall project (as he was there from its inception and these were his underlying feelings and thoughts)? Yes, knowing how he approached the act changes things for me.

[vrax.livejournal.com]

Ok, that makes good sense. Thanks for clarifying. That's exactly what I had meant, too.

[david-de-beer.livejournal.com]

I'm here via Vylar Kaftan's link and want to thank you all for your thoughts. re:

>A) in talking about it afterward, publicly, or B) allowing other people to be involved

it's the public speaking, I think, that gets to everyone. For myself, I see no harm in this so long as:

it's done among like-minded people on safe ground. This seems to have been the original intent, yes?

unfortunately, it seems to have gone well beyond those barriers, and affected a far larger group of people than was intended. Affected the public as it were, and that's where the problem comes in.

Within a specified locale, among a small group of people, I personally see no problem here, but taken to the public and publicly flaunted (which is what the ferret did) it's not an idea I can personally get behind. Too many ramifications and negativity.

The way the ferret makes it sound is...well, let's just leave it there.

Sorry about your friend. I realize people are generalizing in their attacks, but to be sure, the ferret is the means by which everyone has been informed of this event and its purpose, and the attacks are aimed and in response to that and him.
I hope she doesn't take it too much to heart, although I suppose that's not possible right now.

This is the first I've ever heard of ferret and sorry to say, it's not a good first impression I'm forming of him.
Talking about it in public would have been ok, I think, if it had been handled differently. As it is, most of us have only a certain perspective of the mindset of the people who participated.
What does anger most of the women on my flist, is the idea that it was taken public. Within confines, people respect privacy and let it be. Outside confines, it becomes everyones's business and impacts on a much larger world.
I'm rather repeating myself, so will stop now:)
but thanks for sharing this post and comments.

[dionysus1999.livejournal.com]

Elitism! I wasn't invited to the lingerie party because of my hardware. ;)

[bustylis.livejournal.com]

But that doesn't stop people from trying to bottle it and peddle it to others anyway.

Another incredibly spot-on criticism.

(I followed here from a rather delightfully comprehensive post about BoobPrivilege '08 on JournalFen.)

[coffeeandink.livejournal.com]

Thank you for making this public.

[rydra_wong]

Here via coffeeandink, and I also wanted to thank you for posting this.

[alias_sqbr]

As a random stranger who finds this discussion really interesting, I just want to say thanks for posting, it's really good to get a different "insider" perspective (and see that the rules were not always as explicit and universally acknowledged as they have been claimed to have been)

[rbradakis.livejournal.com]

She is very upset with him for his extremely poor choice of words.