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June 21, 2012 | 24 notes

The confrontation in Michigan confirms what Ensler makes clear: this is not about a sex organ, or about obscenity. The vagina isn’t outrageous when it is under someone else’s control, but it immediately becomes outrageous when a woman decides to control its meanings, define the morality and hermeneutics of its experiences – as Brown was doing – and determine its deployment, for herself. This fight beautifully illustrates what is so magical, disruptive and potent about the word “vagina” and vaginal politics. Brown’s was an act of appropriation. When “fags” became “queer” (as in the slogan, “we are here; we are queer”), they became more powerful, claiming that epithet and refusing the stigma and shame society had previously attached to it. Brown did the same thing. I am not surprised that Brown’s flag-waving is unleashing a torrent of female solidarity. This seems to be the year of the vagina; from virginity exams by the Egyptian military of female protesters in Tahrir Square, to the brutal introduction of the punitive transvaginal sonogram, women are being targeted in this age-old way. But what is new is that women are claiming the word, loud and clear. They have stopped running from the slut-shaming that so closely follows it; they have had enough of this kind of control and assault. Vagina: say it loud, Lisa Brown | Naomi Wolf | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk