Journal the Tenth and the Final…?: What I’ve Learnt & 2 General Themes

There have been two major themes found in almost all of the readings this semester that are difficult to ignore. I think that they are intimately linked, and also say a lot about the politics of sexuality today.

I have learnt first and foremost that sex (the act itself) sculpts identity. This might seem obvious in the context of the identity politics movements in the sixties and seventies, which hewed out new subject positions such as gay, lesbian, bisexual, and s/m. But it has become more and more evident to me that sex produces and reproduces identities and self-images supposed unrelated to sexuality. Some immediate examples would be helpful. The Halperin article describes how in antiquity, sex did not decipher sexual-orientations, but rather the positions of active or passive subjects, which then effected and maintained rights of that subject. In effect, the sexual act was producing identities of citizenship and society. Lisa Duggan discusses how the rape of trans- man Brandon Teena essentially reified the identities of his attackers as white males with privilege, despite their disadvantaged class positions. For Catherine MacKinnon, the identities of male and female, supposedly established by biology, are laid out in sex. For sex-positive writers like Califia and Duncan, the identity of ‘feminist’ or ‘activist’ can be constructed in the bedroom as well. All of these examples produce identities through sexual acts.

It should also be noted that this happens through negative definition vis-à-vis the other party (parties?) to that act. Self-definition through Othering is not uncommon, nor is it exclusive to within the domain of sex, but I believe that the physical actions that sex includes are perhaps the most direct and conducive to Selfing and Othering, to identity formation. It involves blurring boundaries, mixing fluids. Points wherein one is completely aware of their alterity to their partner, and points when this divide is not so obvious any longer. Sex creates crisis and demands self-identification*. Forgive my generous references to de Beauvoir, but this is the exact reason she encourages active sexuality and sexual knowledge in women: because of its possibilities for transcendence! Indeed, these characteristics of sexual encounters might open up an empowering space of self-knowledge for women, but it does not always lead to freedom…

After identities have been hewn, they seem to congeal, often in communities and movements. Despite the individual nature of some self-definition through sex, society and identity politics are not ready or nuanced enough to allow for overlaps. My second major theme is the notion of ‘betraying your minority’, which I have already discussed extensively. Especially when sexual identities (LGBTQ, BDSM etc.) are concerned, they are thought of as ‘recessive’ identities and because of their invisibility should come after loyalties to race, nation, class and gender. This silencing of liminal identification leads to real and palpable oppression, often for women whose bodies are marked with burdens of maintaining certain identities already.

It seems immanent to acknowledge sex’s possibilities for sculpting identification, while simultaneously recognizing the limits to some of these identifications. To me, this link is just why sex seems to be about everything but sex, why sexuality is such a politically laden notion, and why we instill it with so much value, crisis and anxiety.

*Here I am borrowing heavily on the ideas of philosophers Kristeva, Levinas & de Beauvoir.

Journal the Ninth: Audre Lorde and Holistic Sensuality

Lorde’s piece, Uses of the Erotic, is a description of how women should harness this ‘passion’ that they posses and that has been muted, undermined, and simplified by oppression.  While ‘the erotic’ may have a certain definition in our vernacular, Lorde desires to expand this definition as well as expanding the uses of the erotic, infusing it into all parts of life, allowing for self-fulfillment and joy and satisfaction that is not just felt from the genitals, but in everyday life where it is applied.

Still, Lorde’s notion of ‘the erotic’ reminds me of past definitions of women’s sensuality, and orgasm.  In particular, Simone de Beauvoir’s chapter on virginity in The Second Sex comes to mind.  She emphasizes the unique, imprecise, diffused and “peculiarly psychosomatic” nature of woman’s sexual pleasure and desire.  She sees it as much different from that of the man, as it does not linger in solely the erogenous zones, but is “conditioned by the total situation” (396).  This seems to allow women a unique middle ground in which their sexuality can exist healthily without direct physical pleasure. Their enjoyment of intercourse can be curtailed by the “cold premeditation” of when and with whom (wedding night; spouse) one might lose their virginity, removing the aspect of spontaneity that adds to the ‘magic spell’ of the female erotic experience.  De Beauvoir’s paints a poetic, phenomenological portrait of female pleasure.

In class, this definition was called a “more maternalistic, essentialist” description of female sexuality which was “not what Lorde was going for.”  I would beg to differ.  I find de Beauvoir’s description to be a pretty cool, and potentially liberating notion of women’s sensuality.  Like Lorde’s notion, this diffuse and holistic description has been taken away from us by the images of what we are supposed to act like, look like, feel and think about when we are having sex.  By de Beauvoir’s definition, there is much more to take into account than the visual or even the tactile (which Sarah Chin discusses), it takes into account the situation and the mentality of the woman as well.  Lorde’s passages about synesthetic experiences found in Chin’s article fit easily with de Beauvoir’s theorizing.

I don’t think it should be looked upon as an ‘essentialist’ thing to be discussing ways women experience and have sex, especially if these discussions, like Beauvoir and Lorde’s, leave ample space for further diversity and satisfaction in experiences.

Journal the Eighth: The Potential of the Radicals

This week’s readings were like a timeline of different feminisms, their different time periods, and their varying beliefs on the act itself.  Moving through writings by radical feminists, s/m dykes, and one that is critical of the real difference between the two, we notice that common threads through all the readings, notably on infusing sex acts with political consciousness in different ways.

Catherine MacKinnon wants to display the construction of oppression via normative sex acts.  In her version of social construction theory, sexuality is not simply a product of male dominance, but is also a constitutive force in the making of oppression.  This is simultaneous and almost identical to the construction of gender  “All the social requirements for male sexual arousal and satisfaction are identical to the gender definition of ‘female.’ …each element of the female gender role, the standard that women are held to, not emerges as specifically sexual” (41).  She believes that it is the inequality in a relationship that makes it sexy for men. She also touches on the rape-continuum, critiquing ideas of “rape as violence” which maintain sex as innocent of violence by definition.  Rather, “force is sex, not just sexualized; force is the desire dynamic” (38).  Most notoriously, MacKinnon posits a relative helplessness of women to the ever-present patriarchy, and the existence of ‘false-consciousness’ amongst women who claim to enjoy and take agency in their sexual lives.

It was important that the readings for this week were assigned together.  Reading MacKinnon’s article on its own would undoubtedly inflame opinions.  It seems that she is telling us something that we already know, and possibly something that we have overcome. But recalling the time of its publishing, and the fundamentality of radical feminism to our field of study, there is definitely worth in a piece like Pleasure Under Patriarchy.  I am always excited to read MacKinnon, Dworkin or Daly since being radical, being anti-sex and exposing the deep-seated presence of patriarchy takes eloquence and guts.  I think Pleasure Under Patriarchy is well argued, well written and has (and has had) an amazing potential for moving people.  This is what I think is the biggest success of radical feminism, especially regarding the ‘sex wars’.

I don’t want to say that pro-sex feminisms, or the s/m dykes of the Duncan reading, are just reacting to MacKinnon, since that implies opposition and disagreement.  I think Glick’s article is invaluable for its ability to syncopate the theories, and align their supposed ‘differences’.  In fact, they are attempting to retain the deep and well thought out theories of MacKinnon, the production and reproduction of power relations by the state of sex at the time and the politics of inequality that are implicated, while simultaneously infusing them with new attempts at resistance.  It could be argued that they are inherently rejecting the original “false consciousness” theory by falling victim to those very processes.  This is doubtful, since MacKinnon herself argues for the constitutive power of sex acts, and how they individually and collectively produce oppression.  Therefore a sex-positive approach where sex acts are the sites of resistance is logical under her theory.  On a less theoretical level though, I personally don’t believe one can fall helplessly victim to something they know, and in 1989 MacKinnon made sure the world knew about the machinations of patriarchy in sexuality so that we would be able to resist it in whatever ways made sense.  The readings of Califia and Duncan are now making that sense.

Journal the 7th – Classism, Ageism and Degeneracy in Dominant Historical Discourse

Kathy Peiss’ article on “Charity Girls” of the early 20th century was a breath of fresh historiography. It painted a new, fun, and ultimately more realistic picture of a time past that seemed nothing but repressive and prude regarding women’s sexuality. That our generation views these eras in such a manner demonstrates the dominance of middle-class history over that of working class, as well as its ageism.  Peiss’ article opens up our understanding of different periods and their ‘sexual codes’ and explodes them. I wonder what a working-class analysis of an even more repressive era, let’s say the peak of the cult of domesticity in the 50s and 60s, would reveal.

Peiss’ article discusses the behaviours, trends and social codes of working women of the era in a certain age group, around their 20s. In particular the trend of ‘treating’ is focused upon. Treating is described as a mechanism by which working class women, dealing with drastically different wages and jobs, wouldn’t have to sacrifice their leisure time and social activities on account of not being able to afford them.  Women traded sexual favours for nights out, dinners paid for and dates at the dance hall.  In a subculture where “popularity was [a] goal to be pursued… where familiarity and intermingling among strangers, not decorum, defines normal public behaviour between the sexes… [and which] placed a high premium on allure and personality,” (58-61) this was deemed an absolute necessity. They were classic recessionistas! These ‘charity girls’ were defined in a grey area between the usual poles of chastity and whoredom and produced a “fluid definition of sexual respectability” (67). This young group of girls were not ‘fallen’ for their actions, but were still not models of decorum. Some quotes regarding these women’s actions by their contemporaries mirrors almost identical social panic today about young people’s sexual habits and the degeneracy of the times.

A recent media uproar surrounds the supposedly pervasive teen trend of ‘sexting’. It is exactly what it sounds like: sexually explicit text messages involving simple dirty talk to photos and videos that today’s technology provides for. The sexting crisis seems to be of the brand as ‘rainbow parties’ and vodka-soaked tampons (check out THIS hilarious clip of uncomfortable talk-show doctors trying to talk sense into the nation’s youth). These ‘trends,’ in reality are breaching on urban legend status. Nonetheless, the infamous Tyra Banks Show manages to squeeze a whole show out of it. Trends like ‘sexting’ are inflammatory because they seem ‘new’ and seem to indicate a further degeneracy through modernization, through technology and in increasingly younger people. Yet, the bases of objection against these ‘trends’ are always the same, which exposes a pervasive discourse that wishes to police youth sexuality, young female sexuality, and in particular, purity. Commenter Beets.Go.On summed it up nicely in response to the Tyra ‘exposé’: “What is everyone up in arms about? I totally did this with chat when it first came out and paper notes before the technology caught up. THIS IS NOT A NEW TREND. Teenage girls have been and always will be horny.” Peiss and working class history agrees! “[W]orking-class daughters socialized on street corners, rendezvoused in cafes and courted on trolley cars” (63).

This intergenerational resistance of women and girls against ideals of ‘respectability’ has not made substantial changes to the dominant discourse of premarital female purity. How could it have survived so tenaciously with whole classes and age groups transgressing its limits over time? This ultimately implicates history as classist and ageist as well. Peiss constantly reminds us that the trends she presents us with are not those of the middle-class. Often in the same breath she must position her research in the reality that relatively little data or history exists about these trends. I have no doubt in my mind that these two caveats to her work are related.

Journal the Sixth – “Differentability”

Whenever we discuss topics of disability in my WGS classes, I find myself eager to believe in ideas such as “differently-abled” or “super-abled” bodies for those we would generally label as disabled and “crippled”.  Still, part of me cannot completely invest in these ideas, because they seem superficial or simply a foil for the same mix of pity, curiosity and misfortune many feel for disabled people.  This doesn’t exclude us in ‘equity’ studies programs, as our mixed answers to Ms. Odette’s questionnaire made clear to us.

This week, however, I stumbled upon this video of athlete Aimee Mullins speaking at TED (the Technology, Entertainment, Design conference).

Aimee is best known for her work in the advancement of prosthetics, and in particular, for her sprinting legs based on the hind legs of a cheetah. Her talk at TED gave me a new understanding and created new meaning for the concepts of “differently” or “super-abled” individuals.  The creative power that such a space (no longer a LACK) permits is real and amazing, not just a foil or a coping mechanism.  I love what she says about beauty: that for prosthetics to offer empowerment, we must “stop compartmentalizing form, function and aesthetic and assigning them different values,” and picture a more wholistic model.  Additionally, I love the idea of “mov[ing] away from the need to replicate humanness as the only aesthetic ideal.”  I think this was what really made “differently-abled” work in my mind.  It comes with the idea that a person with a disability doesn’t necessarily need to strive to do just what the rest of the world are doing with their bodies, but might make themselves pieces of art, works of fashion, or might bend the imagination into the world of fantasy.

These possibilities are not open to able-bodied individuals because (ready for it?) they are limited by normal, everyday bodies that don’t inherently question the world around them, and don’t seek to move in different ways.  This limitation is proven by Aimee’s friend at a dinner party.  Noticing that Aimee had somehow grown six inches, she question her about her height.  Aimee was wearing her ‘tall legs’ that day: prosthetics with elongated calves as well as high heels attached to her Barbie-like feet.  Her friend’s one reaction was “But that’s not fair!”

Considering the oppression and the invisibility that disabled folk have endured throughout history, I think that for an able-bodied woman to be jealous of the possibilities of art, utility and play that new imaginings of the disabled body can produce is a really powerful place to be at.

I would also like to make some comments on the in-class movie that was watched, “Want”.  The movie was short but I think it accomplished a lot regarding ‘the gaze’.  The Rosemarie Garland Thompson piece mentions that disabled people are “not the object of the appropriating gaze but of the stare” (285).  This stare is inherently prying and scrutinizing and curious.  This movie into the erotic life of one disabled, queer, woman exploded that stare.  We are no longer able to sit in the safety of sideways glances that we think no one notices, but are rather confronted full-frontally with it, and I think that is a libratory act by the filmmaker.  In a way, I think the film also gave into the curiosity behind physical disability, everyday functions (including sex).  I found myself less concerned with the fact that there was blatant erotica being played in my classroom, than I was interested in the way this woman was able to take part in sex.  Linking to my above comments on “differently-abled’, each person can go about their sexuality in any positions that make it possible and make it feel good.  As Garland Thompson comments, “disability confounds any notion of [the] generalizable” (283).

Journal the Fifth- Betraying your Minority

The following journal covers linkages between readings from Feb 10th to March 3rd, concerning themes of colonialism, race, nation and sexuality.   The main take-home messages in all of the readings were very similar: that Blacks have been cast, since colonization, as possessing uncontrollable heterosexual desire because they are most like animals and driven by their instincts. This amounts to the stereotype of black promiscuity. Many antiracist women’s movements have attempted to reverse the stereotype by promoting the “culture of dissemblance”: a public silence of sexuality amongst black women, projecting the “super moral” black woman.

The Hill-Collins and hooks articles add the intersectional level of sexual orientation into the discussion of race, racism and sexuality. The purported hyper-heterosexuality of black people also leads to the impossibility of LGBT blacks individuals. It is interesting how this binary feeds in to other larger ones, in particular, modernity:backwardsness::West:East or White:nonwhite. Again, all these binaries take part in the eventual task of defining the normal subject, that is, whiteness. Similar binaries have been deconstructed in readings I’ve had for other classes: Uma Narayan’s chapter “Westernization”: Respect for Cultures and Third-World Feminists and in Jasbir Kuar Puar’s article Transnational Configurations of Desire: The Nation and its White Closets. Each piece takes on the exclusivity of “backwards” peoples (visible minorities, Third world women, immigrants) from alternative identities, feminist and LGBT respectively. In all three articles, identifying as queer or feminist is seen as a betrayal of one’s “primary” identity and loyalty to the nation. The discourse of nation is very prevalent as it controls, catalogues and genders what is deemed part of the nation or not (Puri). The negative reactions from one’s own race or nation can be rooted in simultaneous skepticism of whiteness and Westernization. Bigger social anxieties are taken out on these subaltern bodies and, in so doing, the nation of origin is complicit with the receiving state in ignoring or rendering invisible the interests of the subaltern group.

Many colonized-versus-colonizer movements may embrace, even more tenaciously, essentialist and ultimately colonial ‘characteristics’ and ‘traditions’ of their nation to define themselves in opposition to the colonizer. The complete opposite of conformity, one cannot hail this as a much better solution. In much the same way, since a homogeneous tradition is being upheld, heterogeneity in identification from what is ‘nationalized.’

In a similar situation, a different minority may exercise another approach. In the previous post I displayed, as Hill-Collins does, just how complicit Black groups such as churches and anti-racist movements really are in the ‘disappearing act’ of black queers and black female sexual agency. When gaining legitimacy against the ‘colonizer’ by overturning the black promiscuity stereotype through the culture of dissemblance, any sexual identity or agency is crosscutting and could potentially delegitimize them once again. It would stir up old stereotypes and, what’s more, their movement is vulnerable to begin with. This approach is a fascinating attempt at conformity. It begs the question: Why would such a subjugated group desire and attempt to be so much like its oppressor? As Prof. Durish said, “respectability is one of the master’s tools.” By perpetuating the stereotype of the promiscuous black female, it seems that controlling and muting their sexuality is exactly what the dominant ideology is trying to do.

This conformity has an interesting link to another minority group that is supposed to be exclusive of black membership: the queer community. This ‘culture of dissemblance’ reminds be EXACTLY of the idea of ‘normalizing the queer.’ In attempts at being legitimized and given full civil liberties, certain factions of the queer community have touted the “just like you” argument to the point where they seem to be just “well behaved gay couples.” When the right for rights is so political, how can the fight for gay marriage be anything radical when framed in an attempt to be just the same? This is definitely where the Hammonds piece comes in: in search for a better genealogy and expression that is neither essentialized, nor conforming.

Nonetheless, both approaches at resistance display their limits: a tendency of ‘Judas-ing’ intersecting political identities happens in countless other minority movements: Nestel describes the alienation of women fighting against racism in Ontario midwifery; Chicana women’s feminism was frequently muted in Mexican-American movements; resistant symbolism of the veil by Muslim women has been co-opted by their patriarchy. Black communities dissociating their queer individuals are moved by the same power relations and intersections of race, nation and identity as the above.

Journal the 4th- The Black Church and popular representation of Black Sexuality

The “black churches”, as Patricia Hill-Collins names them, have “incorporated dominant ideas about the dangers of promiscuity and homosexuality within its beliefs and practices” (107).  They have bought in to both the “culture of dissemblance” of their women and the binary thinking that causes homosexuality to be impossible in their culture.  I present you with two interesting links that demonstrate both these strands of thinking still highly predominant in these communities today.

First is a blatant example of the creation of the super moral black woman in the church setting.  This strange and pretty hilarious video is of a black woman spiritual leader who, while preaching, breaks into the recent Beyonce hit “Single Ladies”.  In particular she calls on all the “single ladies” of the congregation to stand, sing and clap along with her.  But she changes the lyrics!  She implores all the single ladies (not to dance around in booty shorts like Beyonce in her video, but) to ‘Wait.’  I thought I had heard it wrong at first, but what a more clear cut example of the culture of dissemblance than this?  Sex is never explicitly mentioned, maintaining ‘the silence’, and yet the reference is still poignant.

Second is this page on the website for the predominantly black youth movement Passion 4 Christ.  They have been selling an “Ex” t-shirt series which has taken the internet by storm.  Their video testimonies add to the appeal for believers and scoffers alike.  While the group sells “ex-masturbator”, “ex-hypocrite” and “ex-fornicator” shirts, the most controversial is definitely the “Ex-homosexual” iteration.  I feel that the ‘choice’ versus ‘biological’ debate over homosexual identity is still ongoing, and many people have had homosexual experiences and still consider themselves hetero, or have embraced a bisexual or alternative identity.  Still, the religious drive of this reversion to heterosexuality carries with it all the weight that Hill-Collins speaks about in her discussion of the black church and its “hate the sin, not the sinner” mentality.

Mother Wisdom’s remix of “Single Ladies” and the P4C shirts are both manifestations of the tensions and interactions of varied layers of marginalization and display a group trying to make the best of the situation for their own.  Still, buying into dominant perceptions, silences and ‘normalcies’ is niether effective nor inclusive to all members of their identity.

Journal the Third (02.01.09)

I love when articles can materialize a theory for me.  The Trials of Alice Mitchell ended up being an excellent example of some of what I discussed last week.  Lesbian women were able to mold the definition of their burgeoning identity because they were marked by it.  In being so marked, actions would reflect ‘realities’ of all sharing that ‘identity’.  This did not have to be a negative thing, as it could draw in others with similar stories.  While most lesbians do not kill their estranged lovers, it could be the knowledge that girl-girl love could run that deep that was the more identifying characteristic.  Duggan encourages us to read the story of Alice Mitchell ‘against the grain” to see the characteristics of the modern ‘lesbian’ experience (desire for permanency, mixing gender roles, isolation from other women etc.) that was not included in its scientific definition.  They were not included because science did not need to know that.  Self-representation had to fill those gaps, and allegories of actual women’s actions and experiences were able to do so.

Journal the Second (01.27.09)

An intro to social constructionism regarding sexuality practically requires a reference to Foucault’s famous example of the ‘creation of the homosexual’.  There is a realization in this branch of theory that sexual practices are now shaping subjects and defining individuals.  There are sexual identities now.  Jeffrey Weeks’ describes the creation of such identities as a cycle between the self and society.  To me, this branches off into two other interesting themes: identity politics and resistance.

Regarding the former, I felt the contradiction almost immediately.  Identity politics, how I’ve been taught to understand it, seems to be at least strategically essentialist, citing specific differences as the bases of identification, belonging and organization.  These ‘inherent’ differences seem the antithesis of supposedly socially constructed identities and groups such as ‘homosexual’, ‘lesbian’, ‘fetishist’ etc.  Yet Weeks’ account reconciles the two.

I feel that the room left by Foucault for resistance is important for that very reason.  Identities cannot be created by abstract concepts or general social trends.  It is actual occurrences, be they repressive legislation or social organizing, moral condemnation or ‘sexual’ migration, which hold that productive power.  Those who may have been defined top-down still embody that identity and are thus able to alternatively shape its definition by their actions.  Therefore, while science and society can create the ‘homosexual’ the ‘invert’ or the ‘gay man or woman’ for their own usages, homosexuals can also create these categories defined it their own terms for resistance: the identity politics of the gay rights movements.  These simultaneous definitions have undoubtedly changed what ‘homosexual’ connotes today.  Through resistance it is identity politics that can do the subject-making, and not simply fall out of definitions from others.  It can socially construct on its own.

Journal the First (01.19.09)

On Gayle Rubin’s Thinking Sex: Notes for a Radical Theory of the Politics of Sexuality…

The article presented a comprehensive description of the forces and forms of sexual stratification that challenges those part of erotic minorities.  Her brave discussion of such taboo sexualities as S/M and inter-generational sex is a rational and reasonable analysis of the practices while ignoring the strong ‘ick’ reactions that society has imparted upon them. The larger argument therein (a secondary one in her thesis) is the issue of consent.  It is a concept often taken for granted in our society, yet it is both elevated and denied by the law and other informal forces.  While we are always taught that consent is absolutely necessary in sexuality, there exist those who are ‘incapable,’ ‘not allowed’ or ‘impossible’ to consent.   In fact this censure of active consent seems to redundantly erase the possibility of coerced sex in these circumstances (since apparently all of that sex is coerced, or, ‘they were asking for it anyways’.)  While such a claim might be a bit extreme, I feel it is safe to say that sex laws nullifying consent within subjugated sexualities by at least blurring a very necessary line for those who partake in the practices.  They do this on top of vilifying those practices by enforcing sex laws and other informal sanctions against them.

With consent in mind, I present some current events.  I stumbled upon this article about a 20-year-old anti-abortion activist who posed as a 13-year-old who had been impregnated by her 31-year-old boyfriend.  She then entered, with an accomplice and a hidden video camera, a Planned Parenthood “in search” of abortion options.   In Indiana, the state she has done this twice in already, statutory reporting laws exist wherein anyone who comes to the knowledge that someone under 14 is having sex with an adult must report it to the police.  This law negates doctor-patient and other confidentiality clauses. The Mona Lisa Project which the films have been called, are available to watch on their website.

The films clearly wish to smear Planned Parenthood with a different type of “crime” which has little or nothing to do with the abortion debate, yet can be and is effective.  The PP counselors are clearly aware of the rock and the hard place that the law has put them between, as they plead not to know the age of the “boyfriend” once realizing the age of the “13-year-old”.  For those not impressed by the films’ messages, it demonstrates the realities of everyday people negotiating the law.  This, for me, makes clear the law’s oppressive qualities. Watching these counselors toe the line of what the law says was not the child’s choice (an older boyfriend) and what they believe is the child’s choice (terminating an undesired pregnancy) only serves to strengthen this fact for me.

The counselors who were filmed ignoring (i.e. not reporting) the filmmaker’s situation were both fired.  To me, the whole process mocks girls who are actually in the circumstances that the filmmakers are simulating.  How they are manipulating such an already invasive consent law make these girls’ difficult situations one level more difficult.  They might never receive the help and healthcare they need from counselors and clinicians who do their job first.