On Slapping

To slap or not to slap..Or..Quit your whining, ladies

There are a few different kinds of slaps, the “I can’t believe I gave birth to you” slap, the “you’re a dumbass” slap (commonly applied to the back of head), the “I hate your guts” slap, the venerable and always entertaining “bitch slap”, the “genital slap” (if you never saw one drop by my house on Sunday), and the most culturally acceptable of all, the “lady lover slap”…The latter is on my mind now.

The “lady lover slap” is usually delivered by a woman’s hand across a man’s face, always preceded or followed by a righteous, burning glare, choice words and either a retaliatory punch, a domestic violence charge or an ardent act of copulation. Either way, I’m gonna be a total stick and the mud, and say that it BOTHERS me. Today I watched two TV shows, Cedar Cove and Dallas (I don’t want to hear any smack, so I have bad taste in TV) lady slaps were delivered on both with the accompanying noise effects. If you watch modern day television, you know that this is completely common, can’t hardly flip through channels without seeing some poor chap get smacked across the face by a rosy palm. I consistently cringe.

What is that? Have any of my MALE readers ever been slapped? Does this still really happen anymore?

On Cedar Cove a boy tried to steal a kiss from a girl who was clearly depicted as having feelings for him, but wasn’t ready to admit it, SLAP. I felt for his face. When I see this flippant propagation of a vintage, backwards behavior from a time long gone, I am offended for both men and women. Some might see a girl slap a guy for stealing a kiss, and think it’s cute, harmless, romantic even. Some women might think it’s a deserved advantage, a concession due a woman, since historically women have been the ones on the receiving end of violence and mistreatment from men. It’s crazy stupid is what it is.

There is an evident cultural acceptance of women slapping men, but I think it’s linked in some way to the cultural expectation of men being cads to women. Let me be clear about my position, men being cads is not ok, (but that’s a whole other post) women slapping them in retaliation, also not ok. In fact, cultural acceptance and popularization of gal on guy slapping sets the feminist movement back decades. It’s not an actual advantage to accept women slapping men while unequivocally opposing men striking women. It’s a placating behavioral handicap (horse racing ref), which continues to place women on a dubious pedestal beneath men. We are weaker, we are more emotional, we are less restrained, so whilst we are flinging around our spurned phalanges, men patiently grin and bare it. To summarize:

1. A) that’s just how crazy girls are (especially when they are on their period!)
2. B) it’s not like they can do any damage
3. C) I probably did something to deserve it, small price to pay

And then we wonder why men don’t see us as equals, why we are at a disadvantage in the work place and why they can’t imagine a lady president. 

Acceptance of slapping as a behavioral norm is in a way an acceptance of the behaviors which inspire the slapping. It’s the restitution offered to women when men do wrong by them. It’s a bribe! Slapping perpetuates the idea that men victimize women in interpersonal relationships. Women cannot take care of themselves & their hearts, so they are granted this one small exemption from the “violence is bad” rule, that’s the placation I spoke of earlier. Slapping is a victim’s reaction. I’ve never felt like a victim. I never felt entitled to hitting anyone, and God knows I dated an asshole or two. If said asshole was an asshole to me, I blamed myself for making a poor choice in man and exited the relationship without degrading myself by physically assaulting said asshole. Everyone is just out there trying to get theirs, whether it’s just sex, love, or whatever the heck else. We are all responsible for our own happiness, MEN ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR OUR HAPPINESS < WE ARE. SO WHEN THEY FAIL US, IT DOESN’T ENTITLE US TO A CARD BLANCHE, whether it be one of a small act of violence or destruction of property.

The minute women stop acting like victims, stop exercising the ‘behavioral slack” extended to them by society in recompense for men’s caddish ways and accept responsibility for their unhappiness, the plight for gender equality will get a serious boost. To summarize, quit whining about every douche bag who ever broke your heart, running around with your romantic traumas like a chicken with an egg, and definitely quit slapping men & keying their cars.                                                                                   

The only way to get even is to get equal. 

In practical terms, the popularization of ladies slapping the gents is deeply irresponsible. Domestic violence experts assert that women who inflict minor acts of violence on their male partners have a higher-than-normal probability of being severely assaulted by those partners. Hmm.

Bottom line, I’d like to not see women degrade themselves on television or in life.