Hi, Sexist readers. Welcome to a new daily item, in which I link to the sex-and-gender pieces of note from around the Internets. I'd love to link to what you're reading, as well; file your suggestions here!

* After writing a diatribe against rape victims that begins "I agree with Alex Knepper," romance novel reviewer Rachel Potter has resigned from her spot at All About Romance. Potter claimed that a "reading funk" inspired her resignation; romance fans suspect that it actually has more to do with her claims that slutty women cause rapes against chaste women by "teasing men into a frenzied rage," forcing these men to "vent that rage on a bystander."

* Amanda at the Undomestic Goddess has launched a great reguler feature on SAFER Campus called "Beyond the Campus," which rounds up the week's reporting on issues of sexual assault.

* Amanda Marcotte adds another layer to the discussion of feminine performance-as-labor. In order to conform to the cultural script, women aren't only required to perform femininity and make that performance appear effortless. They must also take no joy in it:

That fashion is pleasurable for many women is why it’s considered “frivolous”, due to the long-standing cultural belief that if a woman is feeling pleasure, something must have gone wrong.  So I look to the cultural pressure to look good to explain why women are stuck in this catch-22, where they’re supposed to shop and pull themselves together, but they’re shamed if they enjoy it. . . . That women insist on taking pleasure in clothes shopping while being shamed over it is admirable.  It’s not like the world’s greatest act of bravery to continue applying lipstick after a man snits at you that he prefers “natural” beauty, but it does take self-assurance.  (Or, if you want to move up a level of bitch, echo Dolly Parton in “Steel Magnolias”: “There is no such thing as natural beauty.") I admire the courage of women who say no to beauty standards, but I also admire the women who decide to take audacious pleasure in femininity.  Both are rejections of the restraints of femininity, one of the standards themselves, and one of the taboos against women showing their work or taking too much pleasure in it.

I wonder how this keys into the expectation that women smile for men—are we meant to appear to enjoy performing femininity, but internally take no pleasure in it?

* Alyssa Rosenberg on the emotional space between the music of Madonna and Lady Gaga:

I've always thought of Madonna as kind of the Belle Watling of pop, the woman who despite the fact that she's gotten around a bit, and in fact because of it, understands the euphoria of true love and sexual chemistry.  I hope to dance to "Cherish" at my wedding.  But while I find a lot of resonance in certain shards of Lady Gaga's lyrics, she's working in an emotional photo-negative of a lot of Madonna's best songs, exploring loneliness, aloneness, heartbreak.

* David Mitchell on the liberal use of the word "empowering":

Having stumbled upon the word "empowering", which can be deployed under so many circumstances—I use it about charging my phone—they've let it trick them into thinking that they've framed an argument.

Photo via Zawezome, Creative Commons Attribution License 2.0

Meet the hottest new women's fiction subgenre: the Amish romance novel. Seeing as "the church has traditionally viewed fiction as distracting and deceitful," the Wall Street Journal reports, Amish romances are largely written by non-Amish women, for non-Amish women. These so-called "bonnet books," essentially, are romance novels for modern women who want to live vicariously through an Amish character's modest romantic transgression against her religious community. So while the books routinely defy Amish sensibilities in plot—they generally involve "an Amish character who falls for an outsider"—they remain extremely sexually conservative.  In one popular book, Cindy Woodsmall's "When the Heart Cries," the forbidden couple "actually kiss a couple of times in 326 pages."

Woodsmall's peculiar writing technique reveals just how strange the world of non-Amish Amish fiction can be. Woodsmall researches her books with the Flauds, a family of Pennsylvania Amish farmers. Woodsmall visits the family twice yearly to generate story ideas and ask the Flauds for plot advice. Woodsmall then "mails her manuscripts to Mrs. Flaud, who, as a favor, checks them for mistakes." Mrs. Flaud's contributions to the books range from fact-checking—"characters riding bicycles" when "most Pennsylvania Amish ride scooters"—to suggestions for "adding or rewriting scenes." Because Woodsmall's books are about breaking Amish tradition from a non-Amish perspective, the Flauds aren't always helpful:

During a recent visit, Ms. Woodsmall sat on a swing outside the Flauds' 133-year-old farmhouse and peppered them with questions for her sequel to "The Hope of Refuge."

"This is one of those questions I hate to ask," said Ms. Woodsmall. One of her characters, a schoolteacher, wants to modernize some aspects of Amish education. "What are some things she might want to change?" Ms. Woodsmall asked.

The Flauds' 13-year-old daughter, Amanda, piped up. "The bathrooms," she said, explaining that many students at her school wanted to replace outhouses with indoor plumbing.

Some of her inquiries drew a blank. The Flauds couldn't come up with Amish expressions for the word "quirky" or the phrase "women's rights."

Though the books are mainly read by "Englishers"—the non-Amish outsiders who become embroiled in the book's forbidden love affairs—some Amish women have taken to devouring the books "under the covers." Others, apparently, read them for informational purposes. Beth Graybill, director of the Lancaster Mennonite Historical Society, keeps up on bonnet books enough to debunk their inaccurate plot lines. "Outside authors exaggerate the wild activities during Rumspringa, the period when Amish teenagers experiment with technology and worldly distractions, from about the age of 16 until they decide to join the church or leave the community, Ms. Graybill said. Buggy accidents, and romances between Amish youngsters and outsiders, are also far less common than the books suggest, she said."

I can understand why an Amish woman might be interested to read about a woman, like her, who catches  a couple of hot smooching sessions with an exotic hunk one fateful summer. Why 250 non-Amish people recently gathered in Pennsylvania Amish country to "[snap] Ms. Woodsmall's photo with cellphone cameras," however, escapes me. I suppose I just don't get hot reading a romanticized account of a community where women's rights don't exist. Beyond the genre's unsettling conservative bent, the Amish romance novel strikes me as a more offensive version of the Regency romance. They both rely on sentimental ideals of antiquated societies, except that the Amish are still alive, kicking—and on-hand to inform the novelists that their buggies aren't crash-prone and their youth actually choose to remain within the community most of the time. Plus, I'm pretty sure that Woodsmall is taking advantage of Mrs. Flaud for her free Amish editing services. Wise up, Mrs. Flaud. You could be the first Amish Amish romance writer. Think about it.

Want a taste of the Amish romance novel's stolen kisses, tousled curls, and baby-making hotness? Here are some excerpts from novels by Woodsmall and another New York Times-bestselling Amish romance writer, Beverly Lewis.

Beverly Lewis' "A Cousin's Promise":

Wayne gave Loraine's fingers a gentle squeeze. "This will be our last chance for an outing with our single friends before we become an old married couple, so we'd better enjoy every moment," he whispered in her ear.

He looked at her so sweetly she wanted to tousle his thick auburn curls, the way she sometimes did when they were alone.

In just a little over a month, she and Wayne would get married, and then she could tousle his hair to her heart's content. By this time next year, they might even have a baby, and their lives would take a new direction — one that wouldn't include weekend trips to amusement parks. A baby would mean changing dirty diapers, getting up in the middle of the night for feedings, and so many new, exciting things. Loraine could hardly wait to make a home and raise a family with Wayne. It would be a dream come true.

She leaned her head against Wayne's shoulder and let her eyelids close. She felt safe and secure when she was with Wayne — enjoying his company and happy to know she'd soon be his wife.

Cindy Woodsmall's "When the Heart Cries":

Some days the desire to break from her family’s confinements sneaked up on her. There was a life out there—one that had elbowroom—and it called to her. She took another long look at her homestead before traipsing onward. Paul would be at the end of her one-mile jaunt. Joy quickened her pace. Her journey passed rapidly as she listened to birds singing their morning songs and counted fence posts.

As she topped the hill, a baritone voice sang an unfamiliar tune. The melody was coming from the barn. She headed for the cattle gate at the back of the pastureland that was lined by the dirt road. Beyond the barn sat Paul’s grandmother’s house, and past that was the paved road used by the English in their cars.

Paul used the cars of the English. Hannah’s lips curved into a smile. More accurately, he drove a rattletrap of an old truck. Even though his order of Mennonites was very conservative, much more so than many of the other Mennonite groups, they didn’t hesitate to use electricity and vehicles. Still, his sect believed in cape dresses and prayer Kapps for the women. Surely there was nothing wrong with her caring for Paul since the Amish didn’t consider his order as being an Englischer or fancy.

As Hannah opened the cattle gate, Paul appeared in the double-wide doorway to the barn. His head was hatless, a condition frowned upon by her bishop, revealing hair the color of ripe hay glistening under the sun. His blue eyes showed up in Hannah’s dreams regularly.

Cindy Woodsmall's "When the Morning Comes":

Hannah gripped the railing as the train squealed and moaned, coming to a halt. Her body ached from the absence of the life she’d carried inside her only days ago. When the conductor opened the door to the outside, a cold blast of night air stole her breath. He stepped off the train with her bag in hand and turned to help her onto the platform.

“It’s bad out here tonight.” The man glanced across the empty parking lot, then passed her the traveling bag. It weighed little in spite of carrying all she owned–all she’d begin this new life with. “You got somebody meeting you, young lady?”

Wishing she had a decent answer to that question, Hannah studied her surroundings. The old depot was dark and deserted. Not one sign of life anywhere, except on the train that was about to depart. She glanced the length of the train in both directions. There wasn’t another soul getting off.

The conductor’s face wrinkled with concern. “The building stays locked 24/7. It’s no longer an operating depot, but we drop people off here anyway. When somebody lands in Alliance, they better have made plans.”

A few hundred feet to her right stood a small blue sign with a white outline of a phone on it. “I’ve got plans,” she whispered, hoping he wouldn’t ask any other questions.

BONUS: the covers are adorned with the faces of "Amish" babes:

And "Amish" hunks:

…

Welcome back to Sexist Beatdown, the erotic weekly chat wherein Sady of Tiger Beatdown and I discuss our innermost desire to be raped, forcibly married, and impregnated by a handsome and affable doctor of our parent's choosing.

Shit, no, no—that's the subject of our $39.99 Pay-Per-View edition of Sexist Beatdown (check local listings). This Sexist Beatdown is actually about how a handsome and affable doctor who rapes, forcibly marries, and impregnates a young woman is a totally awful and fucked up hero to write into your romance novel!

Or is he?

Are rape fantasies—and the Romance Novelists who love them—any more disturbing than all the other strange sexual fantasies being parsed out there in pages upon pages of awkward prose? Before you answer that: You should know that some of these strange sexual fantasies involve sexy role-playing as "Friends" character Chandler Bing.

SADY: hi there! i'm glad we're taking on something tasteful and uncontroversial this week. such as RAPE FANTASIES!

AMANDA: Yes, and furthermore, I believe that in order to fully haze Sotomayor this week, I think it's time we create the New Litmus Test. The New Litmus Test is: Rape fantasies? Eh?

SADY: Well, I have to tell you that I really loved your take on the whole matter. And this is tied to a personal anecdote about the first romance novel I ever owned. May I tell you my personal anecdote?

AMANDA: please.

SADY: All right. So I had these two cousins, who were in their teens when I was about eleven. And they felt I needed to get a boyfriend, and gave me many romance novels in order to further my boyfriend-related education.

AMANDA: cool.

SADY: One of the romance novels they gave me had the following plot: a young woman is betrothed to a wealthy family friend, whom she has never met. She wanders around the city to process this, with a high fever, and stumbles into a BORDELLO, where she is given LAUDANUM. in this drugged state, a doctor comes, looking for a prostitute! he is sent into the drugged young lady's room, due to an entirely understandable error, and they end up fucking like two wildcats, or, more accurately, one wildcat and one seriously drugged and basically unconscious young woman. then in the morning she wakes up, remembers none of it, and goes home to meet her fiance. can you guess who he is?

AMANDA: the doctor?

SADY: YES! AND THEY GET MARRIED!

AMANDA: but ... she's been sullied!

SADY: and she is like, "i don't know who you are, Dr. Rapington, but for some reason I feel totally uncomfortable having sex with you." but eventually she learns to love him and his prostitute-raping ways and also she gets pregnant and has his baby.

AMANDA: i see. and so, did you finally land a boyfriend?

SADY: um, i was never able to land enough laudanum, as a middle-schooler, to really make the scenario work. i had to try other methods, such as consensual makeouts.

AMANDA: do you remember, did a lady write that book?

SADY: well, yes, the name on the cover was a lady name.

AMANDA: sounds progressive then. So: i have a rape fantasy lit story as well!

SADY: hurrah!

AMANDA: in college, i worked for this "women's fiction / erotica" literary agent. my job was to read the unsolicited manuscripts, which were not just any unsolicited manuscripts, but unsolicited manuscripts for erotic romance novels targeted at women.

SADY: oh, lord. you had the best job in the world, it appears!

AMANDA: i grew up fast that summer.

SADY: hahaha

AMANDA: anyway, a lot of the people who liked to target their erotic romance novels at women were dudes. i remember one dude's fantasy, err, novel, in particular: aman and a woman meet at a Chinese restaurant. they're acquainted in some way – maybe they work together. anyway, they eat some lo mein or whatever and one thing leads to another, and all of a sudden some old mystical Chinese woman is beckoning them into the back room, of course.

SADY: right, as you do

AMANDA: where they eat this magical Chinese herb, okay, and then the woman falls into some sexy trance.

SADY: this sounds totally realistic. i'm compelled to learn more!

AMANDA: so—paraphrasing here—he ends up with his penis inside her, and then his penis magically expands, until it's this really long magical penis that goes through her vagina, up past her entire body and then pokes out of her mouth. thus raping her in two orifices, at once! and i thought, i wonder if this guy thought i would actually pass this on to a literary agent to consider it for publication? or did he just want the intern to read his bizarre one-dude double penetration rape fantasy? and i realized: it was probably both.

SADY: Yowza. I mean: leaving aside this dude's one (RESTAURANT-SPECIFIC) rape fantasy, I get that people's fantasies, in general, are weird. I knew a girl who worked at a phone sex operation and one guy would call her up, constantly, to discuss his fantasies about the cast of "Friends." She would play Rachel, and sometimes maybe Phoebe; he would be Chandler.

AMANDA: wow. this guy fantasized about being chandler! chandler would make some hilarious ironic comment about this, were he here.

SADY: but, in your article about romance-novel rapings, you do touch on the fact that some women have rape fantasies. and they totally do! because people's fantasies are weird! but what worries me is when the raping just (a) isn't addressed as such, or (b) is in EVERY SINGLE ROMANCE NOVEL, which – it was a major part of the romance novels I read as a pre-teen, I'll tell you that.

AMANDA: yeah, i think the world of the romance novel is an interesting space for discussion of the rape fantasy, because it's a space that is a) largely written by and for women, and b) embracing (probably too much) of what is a very taboo fantasy for women to have. But at the same time, these novels are also c) EXTREMELY derivative and conformist, and one wonders what exactly they are conforming to.

SADY: right. like, at one point, i just did a study of romance novels, because they're one of the only "acceptable" outlets (or were, for a while) of porn for ladies. and they follow a very recognizable script. like, the heroine is never "classically beautiful," and she's often though not always working-class, and they always have to hate each other at first, and etc. and when the rape thing crops up so often (along with all of the stuff about "taking" and "possessing" and etc.) it just seems like part of the script is that women aren't sexual and men are and men have to "break them in," as it were, so that they can enjoy sex. which is remarkably similar to many rationales of actual real-live rapists! what with the "she wanted it" and "she said no but didn't mean it" business we all know and fear.

AMANDA: and yet ... people, like, read these books. and supposedly identify with them. women-people.

SADY: yeah... that's totally true. and i think we can talk about rape as a real-live thing that is unconscionably evil, and also own up to the fact that a rape FANTASY (which is pretty much within your control, seeing as it exists only in your head) is not the same thing.again: dude porn is almost always based on some kind of sense of transgression. so lady porn might be the same way, for similar reasons. maybe ladies enjoy this stuff because it's one of the most extreme taboos in existence, if you are a lady-person.

AMANDA: yeah. ive always thought that "rape fantasy" was a bit of a misnomer, though i guess calling it "actively desiring someone to have sex with you while pretending as if you don't actively desire it fantasy" takes some of the punch out of it

SADY: yeah, exactly. i mean, "rape fantasy" is such a contradiction in terms. but i think a lot of people's sex fantasies are about (a) feeling that what you're doing is "dirty" and (b) pushing past the feelings of "dirtiness." and having a fantasy that is about losing control is a really easy way of just not feeling "dirty" or "guilty" in a way that inhibits your enjoyment.

AMANDA: and if the guilt extends all the way from your vagina, through your organs, and out your mouth: bonus.

SADY: well, you know: i suspect that dude is not someone you'd want to be trapped in an elevator with. i do give him credit, however, for not including matthew perry.

Photo via flickr user anoldent

Romance writer Moriah Jovan notes a disturbing new trend among the youngsters in "Romancelandia" (that would be the realm of romance novel fan-dom). Women "who love romance novels" are mocking older romance novels for their fantastically retro covers, dated cultural references—and rapist love interests. Not fair!

Writes Jovan:

In the 1970s and 1980s, there was a host of “rape romances” that are routinely sneered at by younger romance readers and/or people young to romance reading. The device is that the hero is cruel, arrogant, and (as I saw in a comment about my favorite one, written in 1974) he “rapes her until she loves him.” Sounds harsh now, right?

Yes. Raping a woman "until she loves him"—shit, that could take forever!—does sound pretty harsh. Kids today, with their expectations that the idealized coupling presented by the romance novel not involve incessant raping! Jovan?

Let me put this in some context. [Great -ed.] In the early 1970s, a lady named Nancy Friday interviewed women on the subject of their sexual fantasies and published them in a couple of books: My Secret Garden (1973) and Forbidden Flowers (1975), just at the cusp of the “rape romance.” Without taking Friday’s scholarship into account, I find it interesting that many women’s fantasies at that time featured rape prominently. I also find it fascinating that these books were published nearly simultaneously with the early rape romances and thus, probably didn’t inform each other.

Mind, this definition of “rape” is not a legal one; it’s a highly stylized one in which it allows the female to retain her Good Girl status while still A) having sex and B) enjoying it because the hero is a different kind of rapist: One who is attractive, who is uncontrollably attracted to the heroine, and who gets her off after he’s made it possible for her to have an out, i.e., “I was raped.”

Why did she need an out? Because, at the time, a woman’s enjoyment of sex (especially outside of marriage) was still taboo.

Jovan's insight into why women were attracted to "a different kind of rapist" isn't invalid. And the idea that women might turn to fantasies of sexual control in order to satisfy their own desires while wiggling out of societal constraints didn't expire in the 1970's.

But if young fans of mainstream romance novels now find this idea silly, outdated, and ripe for mockery, why not respect their own idea of what's romantic? Shouldn't we focus on the positives—girls feeling comfortable expressing their desire for consensual sex—instead of attempting to force young women to appreciate rape in context? Remember: The great sin these women are committing is nothing more than gentle mockery—putting concerns like "I can't believe that guy is so rapey!" on the same level as "I can't believe they printed that ridiculous stallion on the cover!" or "I can't believe they're listening to Fleetwood Mac!"

Still, Jovan tries to convince young readers to appreciate the "zeitgeist" of the romance novel—even though they've expressed a clear "unwillingness to go along with [it]":

I’m not sure why there’s this unwillingness to go along with the zeitgeist of the time in which the book was written, but instead to apply today’s standards of fashion or technology or pop culture as markers of timelessness. We don’t expect that of our historical novels, so why do we expect it of “contemporary” romances that cease to be “contemporary” the moment the galleys are finalized?

I'm not a fan of romance novels myself, but I do think these vintage genre works can prove relevant to modern women—just not in the way Jovan suggests. Young readers don't just find the fashions and soundtracks of 70's romance novels ridiculous—they find the very romantic ideals they're based on offensive. To me, that's a sign that the role of women in sex and relationships is flexible, socially informed, and changing fast—even in the relatively mainstream world of romantic paperbacks. That doesn't mean we throw out vintage romance entirely—Jezebel's Sadie Stein, for example, has done some great work discussing the trappings of dated romance novels from a modern context—but if we're not allowed to mock, why would we even read the old stuff?

After all, romance novels are written to indulge women's sexual and romantic fantasies. If the fantasies in the book—like, you know, rapist boyfriends—aren't getting the job done anymore, what's left to appreciate?