First, let's agree that the word "slut" has a variety of definitions. Salon writer Tracy Clark Flory wrote that the word's subjective nature-- some women think it's a turn on, others feel it's a demeaning label, some high school and college girls use it as a term of endearment -- is exactly why it wields such power.
On my blog, I've discussed the complexity in how we can educate our daughters about slut-shaming. Do we allow them to embrace the word so that it gives them confidence around their sexuality? Or do we teach them that it's a bullying tactic. The problem is the word's fine line of a culture looking to take it back and those who use it to attack.
More recently, studies have shown that slut-shaming is more than just the "nuclear bomb of teenage insults" (as Jezebel writer Erin Gloria Ryan put it), it's public finger-wagging towards any kind of defiance -- i.e., you're not acting how you're "supposed" to act -- and not necessarily narrowed down to sexual activity.
But who is better to school us on slut-shaming than a teenager?
Thirteen-year-old, Astrorice, via Feministe, eloquently discusses slut-shaming in a YouTube video with a bundle of charm and wild intelligence.
Here's some of what she says:
Slut-shaming is the unfortunate phenomenon in which people degrade or mock a woman because she dresses in tight, revealing clothing, enjoys sex, has sex a lot, or may just be rumored to participate in sexual activity. The message that slut-shaming sends to women is that sex is bad, having sex with more than one person is horrible, and everyone will hate you for having sex at all.
Can some one give this girl's parents an award? Then book the girl for a speaking tour?