Annoying abbreviations

Unnecessary, 2 syllable abbreviations, such as WaPo (Washington Post), WaMu (Washington Mutual - now their actual name *gag*), MoCo (Montgomery County), etc. Is it that hard to write out the whole word? They're not clever, or cute, or anything, and they're potentially confusing especially if they're uncommon.

Feminism and sex rant

In part in response to this post on feministing.

First of all, the number of negative responses surprised me.  Especially the few about how society would better if people didn't do BDSM. Which, to not beat around the bush, is anti-sex. Along with the people who oppose pornography and sex work (to be distinguished from people who oppose certain practices/traits common in those industries, without being opposed to them in general), as there are and always will be people who freely chose to get involved in those. But such people are anti-sex. They might not be as extreme as the religious right, and they might not want their opinions put into law, but they're still anti-sex and they're still harmful to others.

Then there are the well-meaning people who are interested in cultural critiques of why people are into BDSM (or other sexual practices). Which can be an interesting question, but raising such issues has to be worded very carefully, to make it clear that you're interested in cultural trends, and not the reasons behind a specific person's inclinations. Because questioning the basis behind another person's sexuality gets to be a very touchy subject.

There are also the people who appear to be very interested in introspection. Which is fine, but you have to realize that you're strange and quirky, and like thinking about the motives behind your actions/desires/etc, and not suggest that everyone else should do so. Because there's no reason they should. As long as it's not harming themselves or others, then it doesn't matter what the reason behind it is, if there even is one. If another person wants to, they can, but there's no reason they should.

Furthermore, there's the oddity of people trying to reconcile their sexuality with feminism, or pondering whether certain sexual practices are feminist or not. Sexuality and sexual practices cannot be non-feminist or feminist. They just can't. They're separate things. If people feel pressured to regarding sexuality because of society, that might be a feminist issue. Perhaps this is more clear to me, because I'm a queer woman who is predominantly involved with other women, so I know that gender has nothing to do with whether I'm submissive, or prefer some sex position over another, or such. Maybe if I were dating someone of a different gender, so that gender could be an issue more often, I'd be more inclined to question whether parts of my sexuality were "feminist" or not. But I don't; I see them as almost completely separate things. As long as it's consensual, and people are aware of what there doing, then it's ok.

I wonder if the concern over whether or not something is "feminist" (which isn't limited to sexuality) is because the term exists. There isn't (and wasn't, as far as I'm aware) an English word for anti-racist, or pro-LGBT/anti-heterosexist, etc. So one can't sit around pondering whether something is LGBTist; one can only consider whether something is heterosexist/homophobic. But one can ponder whether something is "feminist" without considering that it's sexist/patriarchial, because those mean different things. And so it can go downhill from there.