So as soon as I hit save on that last post I started thinking that there was much more I should say. See, April is "Sexual Violence Awareness Month." Last night, there was a Take Back The Night rally on campus. All over the country, similar events are taking place to acknowledge the sexual violence in our lives and recommit ourselves to fighting against it. Sexual violence, the majority of it against women and children, continues to be a literal monster in the lives of so many people, all over the world. The horror cannot be overestimated.
And here I sit, writing about the connection between sex and violence on a television show. A show that, I realize more and more the farther into it I get, has sex and violence as one of its primary foci. In a way that is not always critical. The interplay between sex and violence is, if I am honest, one of the most intriguing elements of the show for me. So how do those things balance? My commitment, as a feminist, as a woman, as a human being, to the eradication of sexual violence, and my fascination with the fictional portrayal of it? How do they balance for any of the millions (?) of women who watched with baited breath while Spike and Buffy fought and fucked until the house fell down around them, squirmed when they saw the beaten and shirtless Angel? For the smaller but still significant number of women who have interacted with this show (and other examples of similar) not just as viewers, but as writers, as critics, as scholars, as fans? How do we acknowledge the dark sexuality of our own natures without minimizing our commitment to standing up against the violence, the rape and abuse, that has been plaguing us for centuries?
How does it all fit in?