The opening of the title story from "Fighting Words: notes for a future we won't have"

sharing the whole book, which can be downloaded as an epub here: https://www.hellyeahimafeminist.com/wp-content/EBOOKS/Fighting Words - Peg Tittle.epub

Fighting Words

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?

[contd] ...