sasha_feather (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sasha_feather) wrote2011-05-11 06:12 pm
sasha_feather) wrote2011-05-11 06:12 pm
Random Guy at Work: let me tell you why you are WRONG
Or, spirit of the staircase!
I participated today in a free screening for oral and throat cancers. It took 5 minutes and I was feeling uncharacteristically talkative to the people running it. For example I told the woman taking the forms: "You should have check boxes for male, female, and other." (I doubt she took me seriously.)
So after I finished having the screening (the doc looks in your mouth with a flashlight), I was talking a man who was passing out the flyers. He was a friendly middle-aged guy that was sort of easy to talk to. He told me the risk factors for these cancers are tobacco use, alcohol use, and HPV (human pappilloma viruses).
"Well," I said, "Hopefully that will go down because now there is a vaccine." (Gardasil.)
"Or, teens could just have regular sex!" he joked, and laughed. He was referring to the fact that oral sex, ie blow jobs, are a risk factor for HPV causing cancers of the mouth and throat.
"Well, that's not going to happen, they just need to get vaccinated!" I said at the time.
What I wished I had done is either gotten scarily calm, or scarily angry, and scared him into NEVER SAYING THAT AGAIN. It was totally inappropriate for a number of reasons.
1. "Regular sex" is a figment of the imagination that exists in a subset of straight people's minds, and is centered around penis-in-vagina hetero sex. It erases queer sex, oral sex, manual sex, kinky sex, etc etc etc.
2. His so-called "regular sex" still transmits HPV-- to women, who can then get cervical cancer.
3. There was more than a strong whiff of victim-blaming to what he said-- if people get cancer from HPV, it's their fault.
People are such assholes! This guy told me he used to be a study coordinator!
ETA I just occurred to me that this man could have been attempting to flirt with me by making a risque joke about blowjobs. Such a lesbian am I-- I was totally oblivious.
I participated today in a free screening for oral and throat cancers. It took 5 minutes and I was feeling uncharacteristically talkative to the people running it. For example I told the woman taking the forms: "You should have check boxes for male, female, and other." (I doubt she took me seriously.)
So after I finished having the screening (the doc looks in your mouth with a flashlight), I was talking a man who was passing out the flyers. He was a friendly middle-aged guy that was sort of easy to talk to. He told me the risk factors for these cancers are tobacco use, alcohol use, and HPV (human pappilloma viruses).
"Well," I said, "Hopefully that will go down because now there is a vaccine." (Gardasil.)
"Or, teens could just have regular sex!" he joked, and laughed. He was referring to the fact that oral sex, ie blow jobs, are a risk factor for HPV causing cancers of the mouth and throat.
"Well, that's not going to happen, they just need to get vaccinated!" I said at the time.
What I wished I had done is either gotten scarily calm, or scarily angry, and scared him into NEVER SAYING THAT AGAIN. It was totally inappropriate for a number of reasons.
1. "Regular sex" is a figment of the imagination that exists in a subset of straight people's minds, and is centered around penis-in-vagina hetero sex. It erases queer sex, oral sex, manual sex, kinky sex, etc etc etc.
2. His so-called "regular sex" still transmits HPV-- to women, who can then get cervical cancer.
3. There was more than a strong whiff of victim-blaming to what he said-- if people get cancer from HPV, it's their fault.
People are such assholes! This guy told me he used to be a study coordinator!
ETA I just occurred to me that this man could have been attempting to flirt with me by making a risque joke about blowjobs. Such a lesbian am I-- I was totally oblivious.