Those last two posts are why I have a pretty different perspective on the concept of male entitlement than a lot of other women seem to.
[Epistemic status: tentative, but approaching something quantifiable.]
Most entitlements are invisible. They only really stand out as entitlements when we think the person in question is acting *unduly* entitled. For example, we don’t think of a person who wants to walk their dog without being hit by a drunk driver as “acting entitled”, because our social contract considers that something we *are* entitled to. When we decry someone as exhibiting entitlement, there’s an unspoken “unjustified” hovering there. This makes sense: calling someone “entitled” for, say, wanting to be able to vote is technically not inaccurate, but since the law and the broader culture consider it a *legitimate* entitlement, it becomes an example of Scott’s “worst argument in the world”.
When we say men are acting entitled, we’re saying they’re demanding access to things they aren’t *actually* entitled to. We lack a similar concept for women. I think this is because the things many women act entitled to are things most of society *actually does believe* they deserve. It’s not obvious to the world at large. To most people, these women are merely acting within conventional female scripts. To the people on the receiving end of that entitlement, though, it reads very differently.
Many women believe, or behave as though they believe, that they are entitled to a certain degree of intimacy from other women. Unlike entitlement to specifically *sexual* intimacy, this is mostly not coded as threatening. It is considered part of normal womanhood, to the point where we don’t actually recognize it as an entitlement. It’s just part and parcel of Sisterhood.
This phenomenon includes but is not limited to:
- The normalization of trauma as a casual conversation topic
- Physically fixing another person’s clothes or hair without asking (tucking in tags, etc.)
- Commiserating over body issues, periods, etc.
- Casual discussion of weight and calories
- The near-ubiquity of hugs as greetings
All of these are things to which many women are socialized to feel entitled. Remember that I’m not calling entitlement an inherently bad thing. Food and shelter are entitlements! I do not want to belittle the importance of these particular feminine norms for those who find them enriching. What I am saying is that this constant white noise of emotional (and sometimes physical) intimacy that women are expected to share is more damaging to some women than the expectation of male sexual intimacy. This is very, very rarely acknowledged in a feminist context.
Predictably, the women for whom this is especially difficult tend to be neurodivergent. Autistic women who can’t be touched, eating disordered women who can’t handle calorie talk, women with PTSD who don’t feel safe in a space where assault is constantly discussed. Even women who are “just” private, or gender-nonconforming, or, hell, even just kind of weird can find these norms burdensome. But they are so integral not only to large groups of women but to the structure of feminist activism that it’s no wonder so many of us feel alienated.
And the thing about entitlement is that it’s invisible. Many men who act entitled to women’s sexual attention do not realize there is any other way. It’s simply the nature of things. If you call them entitled, they honestly won’t understand what you’re talking about. It’s the same for many of the women mentioned above. They don’t see how their expectations of entitlement might be burdensome or unfair, because that’s just what being a woman is all about. It’s a blind spot they don’t even seem to realize they have.
While this is true, it’s also the responsibility of a person who does have different requirements to say so. And comparing an expectation of hugging to an expectation of providing sex is kinda…we’re in two very different ballparks here.
I have a friend who hates to be touched so much that he has a phobia of it. Result: He told me and I have never once touched him without first asking permission and checking that it was OK.
I had a friend who had a specific trigger based on their past. They didn’t have to tell me, I knew them well enough to pick it up. Result: I’d warn them every time I knew it would come up in media and if it came up unexpectedly I would provide an excuse for them to escape the situation.
I have issues with an acquaintance who has placed continued and repeated sexual demands on me despite my stated refusal. Having mentioned this to my friend, he now places himself between me and said person when there is no escape.
In other words, you need to communicate. Obviously some people use power held over you to force you to conform to their expectations and that is never OK but in a social situation where you feel like people who expect a hug from you are encroaching on your boundaries….try maybe saying so?
And comparing an expectation of hugging to an expectation of providing sex is kinda…we’re in two very different ballparks here.
This is a matter of degree, I think. Sex is obviously (for most people) a more intense and involved experience than hugging, but many more people will expect hugs from you throughout your day than will expect sex. Think of it like a physical microaggression – an admittedly imperfect analogy, but a pretty clear illustration of how little things can add up and wear you down.
“If you want different norms, then say so” is good advice, and I frequently take it. But I also want people to be mindful of what it’s like to always have to be the one to make that request. Having no spaces in which to set your own norms from the get-go is a wearying experience.
And how often bringing up odd boundaries will result in accusations of “entitlement”.
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