Fighting Words (a story)

She was so tired of it. They all were. Every day, as they walked from one classroom to the next, or to the cafeteria, or to the gym, “Hey, ho!” “Gonna do me?” “C’mere, I got somethin’ for you!”

Then from school to the bus stop. “Y’all jus’ bitches, you know that, right?” “She’s a slut!” “No, she’s a slut!” Laughter. Always laughter.

And as they wandered through the mall. “Hey, look, a bunch of cunts!” “Yo, slag, c’mere!” This last, with a British accent.

Of course, they’d all tried to respond in kind. Problem was, there was no ‘in kind’. ‘Asshole’, ‘dick’, and ‘prick’ just meant idiot. ‘Stud’ was a compliment. There was no word—

Then one Saturday afternoon, when she and her friends were standing in line to see a movie, one of the older boys they knew called out to a guy, “Oh, look at the little puss-in-boots!” The guy was a young man, actually, not someone from their school. And he completely lost it.

Someone called 9-1-1. Everyone got it on their cell phones. Mall security managed to stop the fight and hold onto the two of them until the police arrived. Shortly after, the paramedics wheeled them both away, and they read all about it in the following weeks.

There had been a number of nasty punches, resulting in one very broken nose and one seriously bruised kidney.

The boy charged the young man with assault.

The young man responded with the ‘fighting words’ defence.

And won.

They looked up from their smartphones. He won? The same eureka-moment flickered on each of their faces. They started googling, as they settled into more comfortable positions in Teague’s room.

Women had tried suing men for defamation. After all, surely relentless sexual insult ‘causes injury and damage to the woman’s character’.

“It fucking dismisses her character,” Teague muttered when they start read the definition.

“Maybe the courts didn’t see it as making false statements,” Sophe suggested as she continued to read the rest of the definition.

Teague and Em stared at her. Fuck. She could be right.

“It also says,” Sophe read aloud, “‘The statement must have been made with reckless disregard for the truth, meaning the person questioned the truthfulness but said it anyway.’”

“Right,” Teague said with disgust. “How often do men question the truthfulness of anything they say?”

Em nodded.

“They’ve been bullshitting so long,” she added, “they believe their own bullshit.”

“But,” Em pointed out, reading, “damages include ‘pain and suffering’, which covers ‘personal emotional reactions such as shame, humiliation, and anxiety’.” She looked at them.

Yeah.

“And,” she continued, “‘being ostracized from a social group’.”

“That certainly applies,” Teague said, angrily. “Every time a woman is called a cow or a cunt, she’s ostracized from humanity.”

“So,” Em said thoughtfully, “wouldn’t sexual insult be cause for a class action suit?”

“You’d think so,” Sophe murmured, tapping away, “but the charge seems to stick only when lost income is at issue. Figures.” She looked up at them. “Money. Business. The world.”

In any case, they discovered that defamation was considered damaging only when the statement was public; one-to-one didn’t count.

“Maybe it’s just as well,” Sophe said, leaning back, “because do we really want to limit freedom of speech? I mean, remember that article we read in class? ‘Freedom to Offend’? The way to deal with something you don’t agree with is to make a counterargument.”

“But when they call us sluts, they’re not making an argument,” Em pointed out. “So there’s no—

“True, but—”

“And remember Stoltenberg’s comment,” Teague added. “Exceptions to freedom of speech exist because some speech causes harm that cannot be redressed or undone by more speech. That’s why defamation is illegal.”

They turned back to their phones.

Women had also sought remedy on the basis of ‘intentional infliction of emotional distress’.

“Also called ‘outrage’,” Sophe announced happily, looking at her screen. “‘This cause of action may be available for cases that involve just words or in cases that involve both words and acts’,” she continued with optimism, then deflated: “‘In order to be actionable, the defendant’s conduct must be extreme, meaning that it exceeds all bounds of decent behavior.’”

She sighed and leaned back.

“And that’s the problem,” she said. “This sort of thing has become normalized.”

“Yeah. Wonder how that happened,” Teague said bitterly.

Because they knew the answer. The internet had made porn easily available, and therefore (therefore?) widely viewed. And it had become, almost all of it, so completely degrading: women were invariably presented as subservient, doing, willingly or not, whatever disgusting thing the men wanted them to do. And apparently boys, and even men, were unable to distinguish reality from fantasy: they came to believe that women actually existed to please men, sexually; they came to believe that they were entitled to women’s bodies. And so boys, and even men, routinely reached out and touched women’s bodies. Grabbed women’s bodies. Not only their behinds, but also their breasts. Thus routinely proclaiming that girls, and women, were sexually available to them. Hey ho.

“Hang on,” Em had a thought. “Schools already have rules about bullying …” She started tapping at her phone again.

Sophe nodded and joined the effort. “Here we go. ‘Bullying can be defined as repetitive, aggressive conduct growing out of an advantage in power and a desire to control. Said conduct can include the repeated infliction of verbal abuse such as the use of derogatory remarks, insults, and epithets.’”

“Perfect,” Teague said.

“‘While the techniques of bullies vary,’” Sophe continued, “‘their object almost always is to gain control over the victim by engendering shame, anguish, fear, and/or humiliation.’”

“Our entire sexist society bullies,” Teague said. “It’s designed to enable bullying. By men. Of women.”

Em nodded.

Sophe continued. “‘Most victims of bullying experience guilt, shame, fear, embarrassment, and diminished self-worth. These effects can lead to anxiety disorders, depression, and insomnia. The targets have an increased risk of suicide and other forms of self-harm.’”

They looked at each other. Anorexia. Cutting. Two girls killed themselves last term.

Not to mention the self-fulfillment prophecy. Call a girl a whore often enough …

They found dozens of articles in law journals about bullying. But not one presented a gendered analysis of the phenomenon. Not one specifically addressed males bullying females.

And bullying in itself was not a crime.

Go figure.

“Why can’t we just charge them with hate speech?” Em asked, then turned back to her phone.

“‘A hate crime’” Em read, “‘is a criminal offence committed against a person or property that is based solely upon the victim’s race, religion, nationality, ethnic origin, sexual orientation, or disability.’”

There was a moment of silence. Then Sophe pointed at the elephant in the room. “Sex isn’t on the list.”

“How can that be?” Em was aghast. She looked it up again. And again.

Five definitions later, she echoed Sophe. “Sex isn’t on the list.”

“Which explains why Reddit banned GenderCritical as hate speech,” Teague grimaced, “but continues to allow AntiFeminists and StruggleFucking. Previously called RapingWomen,” she added with a grimace.

“Wait,” Em was catching up, “how was GenderCritical hate speech? Gender isn’t on the list either.”

They looked at each other. Blankly.

“So,” Teague concluded a long moment later, coming full circle, back to their starting point, “‘fighting words’ it is.”

Em nodded. “If ‘puss-in-boots’ is considered an instance of ‘fighting words’, surely ‘cunt’, ‘slut’, ‘ho’—”

“Not necessarily,” Sophe interrupted.

“What? Why?” Em asked.

“They’ll consider the context. For a man to be called a woman is more insulting than for a woman to be called a cunt.”

Sophe was right. And they both knew it.

“A lot of men genuinely believe that,” Teague added anyway.

“So a judge might decide that calling a woman a cunt is … okay,” Em said, with disbelief, “because it’s just …”

“Fact.” Teague’s voice was hard. “Women are sexual. They are to be fucked. They are to be incubators. End of story.”

Geezus. How the hell did they get here?

“Even ‘girls’ is used as an insult,” Sophie said. “And ‘ladies’. When they say it … The way they say it. You know what I mean.”

They did. Bottom line, it was insulting just to be called female. What do you do when what you are is an insult?

“Regardless,” Em said, “it’s a defence, right? ‘Fighting words’? So we have to be hit first?” She wasn’t keen on that part.

Sophe started tapping again. “‘Fighting words alone are not considered assault,’” she read, “‘but may be folded into an assault charge,’” she emphasized the word, “if accompanied by threatening acts, for example, raised fists—’”

“A grabbed crotch?” Teague suggested.

“What about a smirk?” Em asked. “A facial expression is an act, right?”

Sophe sighed again. “That would probably be hard to prove.” And she wasn’t sure what ‘folded into’ meant, exactly.

“Wait a minute,” Teague said, “I thought I saw … Here it is. ‘Fighting words are words intentionally directed toward another person which are so venomous and full of malice as to incite him/her to immediately retaliate physically. … The offensive language is such that the person temporarily loses control of their actions.’”

“And that’s exactly why women are at a disadvantage,” Sophe said with frustration, leaning back again. “We’re more mature than they are. We have greater self-control.”

Em nodded.

“Which is truly ironic,” she added, “given the laws against contraception and abortion, which deny us self-control …”

“Well, we’ll just have to change,” Teague announced. “The critical factor isn’t the retaliation per se, it’s that the resulting fight is a breach of peace.” She’d continued reading. “We just have to make a fuss. We have to breach the peace.”

“And,” Sophe was thinking it through, “we just have to do it often enough to convince the courts that it may happen.”

“Exactly.” Teague consulted her phone again. “‘Provocative words may be justification for an assault, provided the person uttering the words understood or should have understood that physical retaliation would be attempted. The words must be ‘fighting’ words.’”

“And,” Sophe was getting on board, “since the court uses the reasonable person standard …”

“What difference does that make?” Em asked. “I mean, it’s not always reasonable to retaliate—”

“Because the ‘reasonable person’ in courts of law has always been assumed to be the ‘reasonable man’.”

“Ah.” A reasonable man would retaliate.

“That’s interesting,” Teague said. “Maybe we’ve been unreasonable not to retaliate. By ignoring it all these years, we’ve been doormats. We’ve let them insult us.”

“And so stayed alive,” Em protested. “Atwood.”

Yeah. Men are afraid women will laugh at them. Women are afraid men will kill them.

“Hang on,” Sophe said, backing up. “Isn’t it the case that if escape is possible, assault isn’t justified?” She started tapping away again. Teague and Em, as well.

“Here it is,” Em said. “‘According to the Castle Doctrine, victims threatened with physical aggression are required to retreat if they can safely do so, before responding with force. If the victim were to respond with physical force when she could safely retreat, she would be charged with a crime concomitant with the amount of force used and the harm done to the aggressor.’”

“Oh, sure, in that case they identify the person as ‘she’!” Teague said with disgust.

“But it’s everywhere now,” Em said, thinking about retreat. “Where are we supposed to go?”

Teague agreed. “Some days I feel like I’m spending all my time trying to avoid these assholes.”

“Wait,” Sophe said, still reading. “It’s changed. The Castle Doctrine has given way to the Stand Your Ground Doctrine. ‘In the last ten years, most states have extended the Castle doctrine to both public and private places. In these jurisdictions, everywhere a person stands is his or her castle. That is, most states have jettisoned the duty to retreat.’” She looked up at them, a smile creeping onto her face, then continued.

“‘The major justification for Stand Your Ground laws is summarized most succinctly by the Supreme Court of New Jersey in State v. Abbott’, which says ‘The law should not denounce conduct as criminal when it accords with the behavior of reasonable men’” —she grinned at Teague— “‘The manly thing is to hold one’s ground, and hence society should not demand what smacks of cowardice. It is obvious that the interests to be protected by stand your ground laws are dignity and pride.’”

Sophe looked up to see both Em and Teague smiling, then finished the paragraph. “‘So, if pride is a protectable interest … why should the law not protect other emotional and psychological interests …?’”

“Yes!” Teague almost shouted. “Why shouldn’t we be able to defend our dignity and pride and everything else required for our emotional and psychological well-being? Especially since defending one’s physical well-being is allowed!”

“Wait—” Sophe sounded discouraged again. “‘Although the law is currently without protections for those who use physical force in defense of their emotional and psychological well-being,’” she glanced up, then resumed, “‘jurisprudence’—that’s the lawyers and judges—’has always vindicated the idea of physical force when certain non-physical interests of the victim are at stake.’”

“Aha!” Teague raised her fist.

They organized it on social media. On one of the ‘by invitation only’ sites.

“I don’t know,” ChatCat posted. “I’ve never hit anyone in my life.”

“I’ll do it,” NotYrPrincess posted. She was a boxer.

“Me too,” HockeyStick posted.

“Keep in mind that we don’t have to really fight,” Teague posted. “We just have to retaliate in a way that causes a fuss. The point, if we understand it correctly, is that the insult disturbs the peace or whatever.”

“And if you don’t feel comfortable with the physical part of it,” Sophe added, “that’s okay. You can be one of the people at the edge getting it all on your phone. We need people to post the incidents online.”

“We also need someone to call 9-1-1,” Em chipped in. “You can be that person.” She was going to be that person.

“And we need people who can write about it,” Sophe said. “So everyone who blogs, tweets, spins …”

“We have to be prepared,” Ruby49 cautioned. “The backlash will be vicious.”

“Agreed. Hell hath no fury like a man one-upped by a woman.” Sportster described an incident wherein she was playing basketball in a mixed league. She’d set up such a perfect pick, the guy ran right into her. Hadn’t seen it coming at all. He was understandably embarrassed. But so embarrassed, so humiliated, by a woman, that he actually came at her and proceeded to plow her right off the court. No foul was called. Duh. She withdrew from the league.

“And that’s how they do it,” ButListen remarked. “They don’t even have to pass any laws, to keep us offside ….”

“Yeah,” Sportster replied, “but it wasn’t fun anymore. As it was, the guys hardly ever passed the ball to me.”

“A metaphor if there ever was one,” said ButListen. And everyone heard the sigh.

The first reported incident was textbook perfect. If there’d been a textbook about this sort of thing.

“Hey ho!”

She glanced at her friend to make sure she was recording it.

“What did you call me?”

“A ho!” he laughed.

She started to walk toward him. Three other young women walked with her.

“Take it back!” one of them said.

“No!” he laughed again.

So she shoved him. So hard, he fell down.

Then, as predicted, all hell broke loose. His rage!

Someone called 9-1-1. The young man’s broken nose was tended to. The young woman’s black eye was tended to. They were both wheeled away for various x-rays.

And they were both charged with disorderly conduct and assault.

The young woman’s lawyer argued that ‘fighting words’ had been uttered. Six different videos proved it.

Within an hour, said videos had been posted. Everywhere.

Accompanied by commentary that placed the blame, the responsibility, clearly on the young man. None of this ‘A woman was raped’ shit. No, it was ‘A man, with malicious intent, provoked an assault, with complete disregard for women’s moral right to be free of sexualized insult …’

Even so, the young woman lost the case.

But the idea spread like wildfire.

Early on, someone suggested organizing ‘Take Back the Day’ marches, reminiscent of the ‘Take Back the Night’ marches of the ’70s. Someone else suggested that ‘Take Back the Public Space’ was more accurate. But it was ‘Take It Back!’ that caught on.

“But we don’t want them to say it in the first place,” Sophe had lamented.

No matter. ‘Take It Back!’ got its own hashtag.

Social media exploded with videos and reports … ‘Men triggered five fights today …’ Then ten. Then twenty.

It was hard, though. Women had to overcome a lifetime of ‘Don’t hit,’ ‘Don’t hurt’…

“And that’s how they’ve kept us subordinate all these centuries,” ButListen posted.

And so the women who’d already broken through helped the others.

“Aim for their knees,” JustDoIt7 posted. “Once a man’s down, their upper body strength isn’t as much an advantage!”

“Men have a weak spot,” FightFire posted, “front and center, that we have not taken advantage of. It’s time. Surely, it’s time.”

Schools had to hire extra security personnel. They’d already had to hire guards to oversee metal detectors at the entrances because so many young men came to school with weapons. Now they had to have personnel walk the halls all day.

Malls had to do the same. They too had already put guards at the entrances to watch for ‘trouble-makers’. Now they had to have circulating guards.

Every day, the police lay more and more charges. Breach of the peace, disorderly conduct, causing a disturbance … and, always, assault.

Apparently, men couldn’t help themselves. They kept up the insults, and once they were shoved, they could notjust walk away. Let alone take it back. As requested. Said request seemed, universally, to elicit a ‘Fuck you!’ Which didn’t help matters.

When was society going to get fed up with their young men? (‘Young’ as in ‘under forty’. That seemed to be the age at which misogyny— Well, no, it didn’t disappear, it never disappeared, it just … went underground. Still.) When would they be shamed for their immaturity?

“I get it,” a prominent black man posted. “I’ve been called a nigger my whole life.”

“Thank god for the SNCC, right?” a prominent black woman responded.

“You know it, sister!” He attached a smiley face.

“You do realize,” the prominent black woman then posted, “that Stokely Carmichael said the only position for women in the SNCC was prone? Stokely Carmichael, the civil rights leader? What does that tell you?”

Apparently the prominent black man had logged out. No doubt, he had something important to attend to.

“I get it,” a prominent gay man posted. “I’ve been called a faggot more times than I can count.”

“All in one day?” a woman asked.

“And when it happens,” another woman asked, “do they reach out and grab your penis when they say it?”

Apparently he too had logged out.

And, as predicted, the men upped their game. First, by outnumbering the women. No insult was made unless there were ten of them present. They were used to acting as a gang.

Women responded in kind. No retaliation was made unless there were twenty present.

“No fair!” The beaten men cried.

“No fair?” One blogger responded. “But gang rape—gang rape—that’s fair?”

Then the men made sure they were armed. Baseball bats were too obvious, knives and guns could be discovered, and would most definitely lead to more serious charges, so they started putting palm-sized stones in their pockets.

Women responded in kind. And discovered it was relatively easy to swing a purse full of marbles.

Even so, fearing cracked skulls, those who already had pepper spray started using it.

Men started wearing face shields. And using acid.

And then, in a long-awaited landmark case, a judge was convinced that the young man before him should have expected retaliation. He should have known that a scuffle (yes, ‘a scuffle’) would ensue when he called the young woman in question ‘a fucking cunt’.

The young woman in question won her case.

Sexual insults were considered fighting words. No question now.

And then, much to women’s surprise, and delight, several of the lawyers who had been involved in pushing the ‘fighting words’ defence, pushed for sex to be added to hate speech legislation. Pushed to make the insults themselves an offence.

They succeeded.

Sexual insults were considered hate speech. No expectation of retaliation required.

And then, surprisingly, wonderfully, years later, when men no longer routinely called women sluts and hos, when they no longer heard other men routinely call women sluts and hos, they just … stopped thinking of them in that way.

But not after many, too many, young women had died from their injuries. They were appropriately remembered as martyrs to the cause. One headline that made mainstream news said it all: “Young woman dies defending our humanity”.

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