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| Painting by Thomas Saliot |
After a night-out , at 4 in the morning I end up at a friend's house for more drinks. Drowsiness ( or tipsy-ness) catches up. I yawn and am ready to crash.
' I have a spare toothbrush If you need one' he says,
' Oh that's alright. I have my own ' I say and pull one out of my bag.
' You have a toothbrush with you?! That means you're a slut '
' A What?!?!'
' A slut. Means you were going to crash somewhere' he says.
Hmmmmmmmm.
So now I'm a slut just for carrying my toothbrush around on a pre-planned night-out that all my friends knew of.
Now that I ponder on it, I am in fact , as deemed , a 'slut'. I go where I like, I dress rather provocatively whenever I head out. My hair is an unnatural shade of red. I once had my eyebrow , tongue and navel pierced. Controversial personal choices decodes for 'slut' or 'hooker' by itself.
I gossip with my girlfriends about who's hot , who's cute , who's doable and who's not , and all sorts of stereotypical depraved behaviour.
If a woman has a sexual appetite or lives the lifestyle equivalent to that of a 'player' , she's a slut by default. If she's an older woman , she's a cougar. If she is wearing a fitted leopard print dress then that translate as kinkiness that could make a man's teenage wet dreams come true.
Ironically , the guy with the spare toothbrush , who might have been mostly or even half expecting sex is not labelled anything. But I'm a slut. I'm a slut for choosing to wear red lipstick and smoldering kohl during the day. I'm desperate if I desire a male body to sleep beside me tonight.
Sadly , I have no shame, I'm not at all bothered by old-dusted-off-to-look-new title that I recently acquired. Foolishly I thought now that I'm an adult , all this would stop and prior to this there hadn't been an echo of it either.
Henceforth I shall proudly put on my proclaimed 'SLUT ' sash and crown, smoke a cigarette as I would on a normal day and ash on your misogyny-crafted shoes.
خُدا حافِظ
*Disclaimer: This post is purely satirical however the catalyst incident was true to life. The post was written to highlight how hurtful it is to call a girl a 'slut' and is not a matter that can be joked about or a word to throw around casually.
