Writing the political

Pank Magazine's Roxane Gay writes in The Rumpus about the language of sexual violence and how it has defined society's treatment of rape and assault. "We live in a culture that is very permissive where rape is concerned," she writes. "We live in a strange and terrible time for women." Last month, Gay wrote about what it means to be a woman and a writer today, and how each action she takes, each word she writes, is political, whether she intends it to be or not. I think this is something that is true regardless of gender, though gender affects the way writing is treated and perceived. If a writer chooses to write about a particular issue it's seen as political, and if a writer chooses not to write about a certain issue, that, too, is seen as political, regardless of the medium. The personal is still political. And as a woman, it certainly seems that that is intensified. The question, then, seems to be, what can writers do to change the way sexual violence is perceived? Because I think it's time for those steps to be taken.