"She looks like a right tramp"

[Moranne]

On our local FB group (I know!) somebody has shared a video of a couple dealing drugs outside his front garden. She appears to be weighing out a quantity.
There's been a lot of discussion about logging it with the police, how they're a well-known problem around the area etc. And then somebody has just said, ""She looks like a right tramp".

I'm so frustrated with this comment, the subtext and the message it sends. I want to respond calmly, I don't want to let it go unaddressed, but I can't find the words.

How do you think I should respond?

@BaronEssoStation

Sorry, but MLM?

Multilevel marketing. Direct sales. Social network marketing.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/legal_money_matters/3981533-MLM-Bot-watch-62-MLMs-taking-advantage-of-CoronaV-and-other-scams?pg=1&messages=100

@Moranne

So you believe that when he says "slut" it's not a comment on her sexual behaviour but her slovenly house-keeping standards?

In a way, yes - though I'd say he probably means what my posh grandmother would have tended to describe as someone who is clearly low brow or low class who is trying to appear not to be. She's think it would include housekeeping habits, personal habits, sexual habits, taste in clothes, etc.

It's in many ways an unfair and snobbish judgement of a person who is as much as a person as any one, at the same time it can be quite nastily accurate too. IMO that's where some of the discomfort with that sort of judgement comes from, realising you recognise that type of behaviour/person they are describing despite thinking it's an unfair/classist judgement.

But it's interesting to me on a personal level that this guy is essentially making the same observation as my snobby posh grandmother, but in a working class voice and language.

Sorry but what's the connection with multilevel marketing? I'm so confused.

I could be on my last penny and I still wouldn't think to exploit and abuse my friends and family via MLM so I do expect better of people in that regard.

But it's interesting to me on a personal level that this guy is essentially making the same observation as my snobby posh grandmother, but in a working class voice and language.

I agree that both 'tramp' and 'slut' can be taken in an old fashioned way and not relate to sexual behaviour of a woman. However, the fact that they were only applied to the female, and not the male, makes me conclude that they are both being used in the modern, far more common, way of referring to women's sexual behaviour.

It's in many ways an unfair and snobbish judgement of a person who is as much as a person as any one, at the same time it can be quite nastily accurate too.

Can you clarify what "sexual habits" would make someone a slut or a tramp?

Re MLM. I have no knowledge of the business structure of the drug dealing.

@Moranne

But it's interesting to me on a personal level that this guy is essentially making the same observation as my snobby posh grandmother, but in a working class voice and language.

I agree that both 'tramp' and 'slut' can be taken in an old fashioned way and not relate to sexual behaviour of a woman. However, the fact that they were only applied to the female, and not the male, makes me conclude that they are both being used in the modern, far more common, way of referring to women's sexual behaviour.

It's in many ways an unfair and snobbish judgement of a person who is as much as a person as any one, at the same time it can be quite nastily accurate too.

Can you clarify what "sexual habits" would make someone a slut or a tramp?

I think in the context we're talking about people would probably mean anything from actual prostitution to loose sexual habits, however they perceived that. Trading sex for drugs might be an example that would apply. I suspect though if you were talking about someone who was clearly well off, knew how to dress, had a "respectable" job, wasn't likely to be having sex for drugs, you'd see different language used, or it would be applied differently.

I'm finding the discussion quite frustrating. Why are you motivated to attempt to excuse the male poster's misogyny? Mental gymnastics indeed, given that the slurs were made solely against the woman.

She's dealing drugs. That's the problematic behaviour. Not how a woman dresses or whether the man on FB found her sexually attractive and not how he likes to fantasise about her sexual choices (or lack of choices).

How do the rest of us women in the community have to behave so that we are also not called sluts or tramps? At what point does it become acceptable and normal for it to be ok for men to get away with calling us these names?

Probably when our net curtains need a wash.

I would have read that as she looks homeless. That’s how that term is used where I live.

@Moranne

Probably when our net curtains need a wash.

Priceless!

Oh for goodness sake!

Homeless my arse.

Sorry @BaronEssoStation, my exasperation was at @LizzieBlackwell

Yeah I could tell.

@WellIWasInTheNeighbourhoo

Tramp is also a synonym for homeless or vagrant, it may not have been meant sexually.

This is the term I would know too.

@Moranne

Oh for goodness sake!

It is! I say it to my dh - your not going out like that you look like a tramp! When I was growing up ‘I’m not having that coat it’s trampy’

Yes I’ve heard women being called tramps before but that’s mainly by older people and women who have said it ( I’m in my 40s) However where I live and grown up it’s generally used as some one who is scruffy and homeless. 🤷‍♀️

I guess the thing is, there are slurs that people use against men in these situations too. Why this guy didn't in this situation is difficult to say.

Typically there isn't the same sense of their being a sexual element, unless it's something like saying he looks like a pimp, which you do hear and which isn't complimentary. But is that sexist - it could be that it's simply reflective of the fact that women involved in the drug trade very often are sexually exploited too whereas to a large extent, men aren't, or are themselves the exploiters. Rent boys would be the exception, I guess, though it might be thought a sexual slur to be told you look like a rent-boy.

'Tramp' to mean 'slut' isn't modern or commonplace, it's similar to 'floozy': old fashioned and at odds with a younger person using it on FB.

[quote Notredamn ]'Tramp' to mean 'slut' isn't modern or commonplace, it's similar to 'floozy': old fashioned and at odds with a younger person using it on FB. [/quote]
Yes I agree. Not heard floozy in years - reminds me of Lilo Lil in Bread

People are always that bit more shocked when women and girls transgress behavioural norms. We are held to higher standards. There is a much larger set of derogatory terms to describe female transgressors, many with sexual slurs neatly packaged in them.

We still have a way to go!

I guess some posters have never heard of the derogatory term 'tramp stamp'. Perhaps they think it is something referring to homeless people too.

I'm sorry but there's going to be muscle strain what with all the reaching going on here. It was a misogynist comment the OP picked up on. She challenged him and he confirmed he was being misogynist. So what the hell are you all going on about?

Have you never heard of a "tramp stamp"? It's not what Big Issue sellers wear for ID.

No, 'tramp stamp' is a well known term, it's supposed to be funny and clever because it rhymes. Most people my age have heard of it, but I can't think of one who would use 'tramp' alone. They would say 'slag' or 'slut' generally as like I said, misogynists usually have no problems saying what they really mean.

@Antibles

I guess some posters have never heard of the derogatory term 'tramp stamp'. Perhaps they think it is something referring to homeless people too.

Ha, cross posted! :)