Why is "douche" an acceptable slur?

This last night, I was on the Twitters. And as I scrolled down my feed, about two-thirds of the tweets sported the hashtag #palpabledouchery.

Almost all of the tweets were directed at either Woody Allen (because of his denials of Dylan Farrow's claims of sexual abuse) or Stephen King (from their content, it seems as though he tweeted something in support or defense of Allen, although I am not 100% sure, as I did not seek out King's original tweets/comments).

Anyway, this post is not in anyway meant to critique the critiques of Allen or King. What Allen is accused of is sickening. And people who reflexively defend him play into a longstanding dynamic where survivors of sexual abuse are shamed and put on trial while their perpetrators remain above the fray.

No, this post is not about the Allen/Farrow/King news story or controversy. This post is about the hashtag: #palpabledouchery.



The use of the word "douche" as a slur has existed decades now. I very clearly remember the first time I heard it. I was probably about fourteen at the time, playing video/arcade games with boys from my neighborhood. I forget exactly what happened, but in the context of the game, I did something, and my video-game-opponent responded, "you douchebag!" I was unfamiliar with the term, so I asked, "What's a douchebag?" He laughed, mocking of my naievity. And our mutual friends laughed along until I continued to assert my naievity/curiousity: "No seriously, what is a douchebag?" My acquaintance didn't know what it meant either, so my friends began to laugh at him for pretending to know more than he actually he did.

But despite all of our collective naievity, we all knew *why* the word "douchebag" was funny, why it was a slur. It had something to do with girls.

Fast forward to now. Feminism has made many important inroads. If a person makes blatantly anti-female remarks, they will be branded as a sexist. But if they engage in derogatory commentary about things associated with women, or things associated with femininity, then they will often be let off the hook.

Even before this whole #palpabledouchery meme took off, I was startled to find how many self-described feminists I know who would hurl the word "douche" as a slur. When I questioned them about this, they almost always responded with a rote reply, something to the effect of "Well, douching is a fucked up patriarchal practice that is unhealthy for women to engage in."

Well, first off, some women may medically need to douche. Personally, as a post-op trans woman, I need to douche on a semi-regular basis (I cannot speak for other trans women, or trans men, or other gender-variant folks, but that is my experience).

But of course, this isn't a trans thing. If only trans people douched, such products surely wouldn't be given so much counterspace in pharmacies and supermarkets. The fact that these products are so ubiquitous means that someone is buying them. And presumably the vast majority of people who douche are cis women.

And this brings us back to the whole "women shouldn't douche" or "douching is bad for vaginas" arguments that are invariably invoked to justify using the word douche as a slur. Like I said, all vaginas are different. I know douching can be useful for some trans women, so perhaps there are some instances where it is legitimately necessary for other people to douche. But even if douching turns out to *always* bad for cis women, it nevertheless remains a practice that is *associated* with women. And the negative force the word has as an insult clearly comes from this association. As with other misogynistic slurs (e.g., bitch, slut, pussy, sissy), it shames the person in question by feminizing them, by associating them with the lowly status that femaleness/femininity have in our male/masculine-centric society. Regardless of what you think of the practice of douching, the word douche (as a slur) has misogynistic overtones.

As I said, feel free to critique Allen and King and whoever as you see fit. All I ask is that you think for a minute about whether accusing them of "douchery" is the best way to go about it.

(*note: the next to last paragraph was edited for clarity on 2-4-13)

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