My blood pressure has gone down a bit now that I’ve had a chance to sleep, but I want to address one point before I’m stuck in lab pipetting all day. Some commenters, even those who claim to generally agree with me, seem to think that I’m “irrational” and “overreact” to “little” sexist problems, which only proves I have a “chip on my shoulder.”
Let me try to explain what it’s like, in a context you may relate to better:
Imagine you have a science blog. You spend all of your time critiquing and poking fun at anti-science ideas, and your followers love those posts. But you’re also an atheist, and occasionally you blog about that too. First you make little posts about religion that have nothing to do with science – and while a couple people may get upset or use already refuted arguments, you’re able to reply to them and explain the situation patiently.
This goes on for quite some time, and more and more people start emailing you saying that while they didn’t understand in the beginning, they now totally get where you’re coming from – and some even agree with you! It’s rewarding to know that your patience paid off, especially when that patience isn’t always found at blogs explicitly devoted to atheism, which sometimes eviscerate and belittle any pro-religion argument.
But then one day you decide to write a post about the intersection of science and religion. Now many of your readers feel personally hurt. But to make matters worse, your blog post suddenly becomes very popular – now you have hundreds of people commenting on your blog, using the same old tropes that have been debated and debunked a million times before.
And since there’s just not enough time in the day to respond to every comment (you do have a job, after all), you may make a general post about how all of their arguments are the same old crap. Maybe “same old crap” isn’t the best phrase to use, because it incites them more. They start saying you just have a vendetta against religious people, and obviously have no rational responses to their arguments, otherwise you would have spent all day replying to them.
But really, you’re just human. You’re frustrated that you’ve spent years slowly educating people about a topic, but when you turn the spotlight on your own group, you realize you have so much work to do. And really, many atheist bloggers say you’re not strident enough – if people get this upset by you, what would happen if they visited an exclusively atheist blog? You have many friends – also bloggers or important people in science – saying they totally agree or sympathize with your post, but they don’t publicly say so for fear of also facing the wrath of these people. You feel alone in what you consider an important battle, facing an endlessly respawning horde.
Replace “science” with “atheism” and “atheism” with “feminism,” and you have me.
So yes. When I read comments on posts about feminism or sexism, sometimes I lose my cool – because a cause that seems very important to me now seems hopeless. Because tropes like “you’re being irrational,” “you have no sense of humor,” “you’re overreacting,” “most people didn’t have a problem with it,” “why don’t you worry about things that matter,” and “you have an agenda” have been historically used to silence women’s voices from political issues like voting and birth control, to pointing out sexism on blogs and twitter. Hearing them is like hearing someone assert “But I didn’t evolve from a monkey!” for the billionth time.
It’s hard to remind myself that many of you don’t realize that those are tropes and that they’re so triggering to a feminist. I know I need to be more patient sometimes, but I’m human. Maybe you still won’t agree with me about what I consider sexism or my views on feminism, but hopefully you’ll understand why I get so upset when I realize my uphill battle is more like scaling Mt. Everest without climbing gear.
Well, I am neither a blogger nor an important person in science but I have no problem publically saying that I support you and agree with you. I know from experience that you have a sense of humor and you don’t go looking for offense whereever you can find it. You do worry about things that matter, and your agenda is equal treatment for human beings. You have my axe.Edited to add:I have learned a lot from you, PZ Myers, and Taisha about what it means to become a better human being. I am certain that anyone willing to set aside their gut reactions and defensiveness or however you want to call it would also learn things from you.
I have read many of your posts regarding religion, atheism, atheist groups that are sexist, and so on and I have not found you to be overreacting.I am male and I think women are worthy of respect. It may surprise you to know that I do not get along with most other men for this reason alone, and a few of them actively hate me. It’s a strange reaction.I also read your take on the Assange case and you were quite reasonable there too, not jumping off the deep end. You have a scientific and rational mind, and it shows. Why anyone would see you as “irrational” and having a chip on your shoulder is beyond me. In addition, your jokes and comments regarding dating, sex, and so on are PERFECTLY in line with all of the rest of what you have said in the past.In short, I don’t get it. I guess that makes me a supporter? But it’s really just me saying I don’t understand why someone would see such a rational and scientific mind and personality, with a little bit of humor added, as irrational or reactionary.
I think the number who support you far outnumber those assholes (I know, many are generally nice, but misguided, people) Jen. Don’t let them get to you.Keep on spreading the good word(s).
I know Ian, and thank you. Sometimes blogger requires thicker skin than I have.
Thank you, Adam, you reminded me of one of the other things that drives me crazy. A lot of feminists don’t think I’m a very good feminist – that I’m “feminism lite” and don’t take it far enough, or pander to sexist people. Good lord, if I’m the gateway drug to feminism, how would these people react to reading exclusively feminist blogs?
If it helps the situation any, I read this blog for the feminism stuff, in large part because you call out Twisty for being ridiculous. (Cheers to that!) I care very little about the atheism stuff, outside of where it intersects w/ feminism.Suffice to say — you’ve got at least one reader who is here for the feminism stuff and not the atheist stuff.
a favorite generalization of mine is “all generalizations are bad.” while my daily battles are very light compared to yours, (having a subsection on reddit would be infinitely grating,) i completely feel you on the situation.trying to interject rationality, equality, critical theory and feminism into a newsroom is tantamount to heresy these days. at best i’ve worked my way up to being “that guy” in the office and just get in snarky comments and teasing when I can.i do wish there was an argument, saying, magic wand, anything, that we could just point at people and say, “go.” just to open their minds for one moment and show them the damage they’re doing to themselves and others.unfortunately, whoever, I believe it’ll be a long time before our species evolves to a point where we can truly understand each other.Like Ian said, we support you Jen, so try not to let the asshats get to you. I only have so much gas in my car allotted to ass-kicking field trips.
I almost wish you were a Quaker at this point, simply because the language I reach for to explain how I’m feeling towards you at this point is language I picked up in Quaker stuff, because we express those feelings lot. However, I don’t imagine you’d take well to an assurance that I “hold you in the light” or “want to uphold you in frustrating times”, so here goes…I know you’ve taken a lot of crap over this stuff, and I know it can be more hurtful than the people who give it out realise, even more hurtful than a sympathetic third party might guess. I applaud your attempts to get points across, and hope that you can continue as you have done. I hope you all the best, and hope that things get better, or at least that you feel better.Another way of putting it, if I knew you well enough and knew that you were that sort of person, would be to offer a hug.
Just for the record: I am a manly man of the male persuasion and I found myself nodding in agreement with pretty much everything you’ve been writing on the topic of gender inclusivity in the atheist movement.Don’t be discouraged, people who agree with you (many, I’d wager) do exist (and of both sexes – yay!) .Just goes to show, being an atheist/humanist/skeptic doesn’t preclude one from being a cloddish arsehole.
I dunno, “I wish to uphold you in frustrating times” seems like a perfectly beautiful, secular sentiment to me.
Yeah, add me to the list of people who would never think to describe you as “irrational” or “over-reactionary”.While there are many atheist blogs out there, I come to yours specifically because I find you to be one of the most level headed and insightful people when it comes to the intersection of feminism and atheism – a topic I hadn’t given much thought to prior to being directed here.
I enjoy reading your posts, even while I do consider them Feminism-Lite. That’s a great term, by the way. It doesn’t mean you’re worthless, it just means that we view things in different ways.
Even though I’m not a Quaker, I understand the sentiment. Thank you
Jen, I usually lurk, but I totally get you and don’t think you have a chip on your sholder! I’m personally terrified to go to an atheist meet up, because of the sexism I read about. But you have been giving me courage to go and stand up for myself in the face of any BS. Keep fighting, maybe it will get through someone’s thick scull some day!
Most of the terminology the Society of Friends has developed purely in itself is pretty secular, really, it’s just a bit strange to people who aren’t used to it. Upholding is a fairly obvious meaning, “holding in the light” isn’t, but it’s pretty much equivalent to the generic Christian “pray for you”, just without the implication of asking God for stuff; even Christian Quakers don’t tend to go in for “asking God for stuff” too much (or as much as other sorts of Christians) = the usual thing is more often “asking God what to do”, but I don’t use that sort of language, as a non-theist Quaker.*ahem* um, sorry about that random tangent. Thanks on behalf of RSoF for the opinion, though :)
I understand and somewhat empathize your frustration. I posted the original post on a freethinkers list and was surprised to see how many men responded badly, not even reading the entire post but just reacting. Part of my reason for posting it was the recommendations that were made about conducting a group. I hope you will repost those suggestions in a separate post as I believe they deserve to be seen on their own as well.
Jen, I’m sorry that you’ve had to deal with all of this shit. You’re right to stand your ground against the tired sexist tropes, and you’re a big person because you’re actually able to maintain composure and generally be a good sport about it all. Plenty of feminists aren’t (for very good reasons). Dealing with pushback is one of the worst aspects of any movement rooted in social justice. I just wanted chime in and let you know that I support you and admire your intersectional work with feminism and atheism, and it’s these kinds of uproars that highlight how important your work is.
I have, for the most part, tried to ignore the statements of ignorance that you remind us some of your peers exude. Not as an attempt to ignore the situation, but rather just because I do not want to give sexism any credence or credit. This post however makes me realize that you need to hear something. Not all men think sexism is just a female perspective. I try very hard to ensure gender does not affect the way I treat people or their ideas. I may not be 100% effective at it but I do try as hard as possible. I am conscious of the fact that I have a biases which I try to account and correct for. I find women who use their mind, and aren’t afraid of thinking both invigorating professionally and, in most personal contexts comforting and sexy. Being able to look me in the eye and challenge me is an important characteristic of all of those I trust. It is a requirement I impose on calling anyone (male or female) a close friend. I KNOW I AM NOT THE ONLY GUY IN THE WORLD WHO FEELS THIS WAY. Please remember not all PEOPLE are misogynistic jerks.
Hmm, the more I think about this, the more I feel I have to say about stuff like this.Firstly: I can almost feel your frustration by proxy. The whole “irrational”, “overreacting”, “chip-on-your-shoulder” thing is like one of the oldest putdowns patriachal men have used on women. It used to be called hysteria, and I’m sure if you push harder at some point some asshat is going to go to the “man-hating closet lesbian” place (if that hasn’t already happened).Now, I see myself as a fairly enlightened human; I will, however, cop to the fact that I do have sexist biases. I do occasionally treat women differently from men, and this is more likely if I find the woman attractive. But, being conscious of these biases I am capable of working against them, and using the maxim of “respect to all people” I’m actually capable of having a conversation with an attractive woman without having my eyes glued to her tits. Some would have you believe that because of “biological imperative”, men are incapable of such a feat. This argument is fundamentally lazy, and the people who employ it (mostly men) seek to justify their lecherous behaviour without realizing that they diminish us as a gender with it. “We can’t help it! We’re cavemen controlled by our penises!”, they cry. Well, I say it’s the 21st century, and the time for that bullshit is past. I am a man of the 21st century, and I truly wish my fellow penis-bearers would join me. It’s a nice place to be.
Sometimes I think newbies reading feminist blogs need a prep course – they have to tick “yes, I have read feminism101” before they’re allowed to comment… that would save the rest of us a lot of deleting and eyerolling
I’ve been reading your blog for a while, but don’t frequently comment on teh net, ’cause of all them silly people with silly opinions and broken caps locks keys. (There’s usually one. Somewhere.)But I’ll just add my voice to the chorus of support and appreciation. Oh, and I’m really, really enjoying the pop evolutionary psychology game =D As a psych student who finds all the awful nonsense about evolutionary psychology apparently supporting outdated gender roles INCREDIBLY ANNOYING, that game is a true delight!Still haven’t managed to incorporate drinking into it yet though :(
Well, I support you. And I think you are right about how some privileged people put down what makes them uncomfortable or dismisses it at an “over-reaction”.Hold your ground. I have learned to examine myself and my thoughts and words and be sensitive to how phrases I would use jokingly really have an impact on marginalized people, and that I need to respect the person who asks to be called XX, and not insist that what I was calling them is “correct”. I get to name myself, thank you….and so do you.Apologists come in all genders and colors. Sad when misogynist apologists complain about those Christian apologists without realizing that they are doing the EXACT. SAME. THING. Pot, meet kettle…So hang strong.
Hey jen. You fucking rock, your ideas kick ass and your feminist writings are fucking legit. I’m a man-nurse now and I’ve got a special place in my heart for advocating for egalitarian treatment of women in society at large and calling out inherently sexist language. (i have my own psychological hangups calling it feminism so i translate it in my brain to placate whatever shit is going on in there but at least i recognize my own bias and correct for it).So keep on keepin’ on. And check your steam account okthx.
Yours is a problem most bloggers must have. Whatever they write about, there must be an opposition group. Among that group will be newbies and/or dummies who just blather on.So! The solution (that is my naive, non blogging, uninformed solution) would be to modify the “comments” programming so that these tropes are recognized and replaced by symbols; something like {1}, {2}, etc. Each symbol would also be a link to a post with a discussion of that trope.Someday there’ll be an app for that.
I am sure a lot of the heat you get is the same anger reactions that people show when they get caught being dicks. They try to reverse the blame. Their dickish behavior may just be evidence that you are right on the money.
I would read that. Do you have a link? :)
As someone who has been on-line talking on and off on gender issues for twenty years I can say that you’re exactly wrong in characaterising feminism as having “debunked” or even debated their opponents who criticise feminism as sexist against men.For example point to even one feminist board on the web that allows critics of feminism to post their criticisms. Feminists are very censorial and never allow debate about their beliefs. They shut down discussions about gender unless they can be guaranteed that no serious criticism will take place.This effect is not limited to on-line blogging. The feminist reaction to serious authors in the men’s movement for the last four decades has been the same : exclusion, silence and a refusal to debate. Often a feminist will refuse to attend eg a TV debate if she is warned a men’s rights (ie equal rights) advocate will also attend.So please don’t try to pretend you are the one being silenced.
One way in which I think this analogy is very accurate is in the relevance of the personal ego/identity of some of the dissenters. A lot of complaints about that post seem to be to the effect of “I’m not a bad person, I’m just fine.” or “I don’t see any problem, so there must be something wrong with you for complaining.” And then even to some degree in the counter-complaints. “I’m not over-reacting. She [person on my side] is not over-reacting.”I understand people wanting to clear their names (or their friends’ names), I really do. But it turns into reaction after defensive knee-jerk reaction clogging up the tubes, without a clear division between what’s fact, what’s opinion, and whether people can be totally right about issue A and still be talking out of their asses on issue B.
It seems to me you are all of the positives of atheist, feminist, scientist without any negatives. That is, you are reasonable, as a scientist should be, even when it comes to feminism. You don’t tolerate people being overly sexist and you make sex and boob jokes. You don’t fall into the trap of being I AM WOMAN RAWR when it comes to any issue that some feminists like to take up and polarize. If that’s feminist lite then whatever. I call that being a reasonable feminist. Sounds better to me :)
I grew up at a time when a woman’s salary was very often determined by how fast she could type. In fact, when my older sister went out into the world with a Master’s degree, that was what determined her starting salary. My younger sister was a bit luckier, but not much. I was pretty clueless in my interactions with women as a young man, but it stopped when I spent an evening listening to my younger sister complain about disrespectful treatment (the term “harrassment” was not in use at the time) by her male colleagues, and I realized that I had done some of those same things myself; thankfully, not most of them, but enough to be shamed. That was my “road to Damascus” moment, if you’ll pardon the religious allusion. Heck, here’s one more –some of the comments on the guest blog had me thinking that their authors should have been raised in the church and had christenings to which the Clue Fairy was invited. Your analogy to tired creationist arguments is spot on.
I think I’ve been sheltered. My undergrad major was sociology, where everyone had to focus on social problems like sexism and misogyny. Now I’m in a grad program for library science, which is predominantly full of women and men who have read enough about sexism to accept it as a real problem because it does affect librarians (more men in director positions and faculty, better pay for similar tasks, etc.).What’s astounding to me is that I never knew about sexism in the atheist movement until I went to the SSA Conference last year, and even then it was purely hypothetical to me. I came to the conference by myself but was quickly accepted into one of the groups, and they even had a few female leaders. Now, the SSA group I’ve established at my university has all female leadership, and the other people who’ve expressed interest in joining are mostly women. The local atheist group seems to have this problem from what I read through the listserv; I’m too nervous to go because I don’t want to encounter the bizarre, sexist rhetoric.At any rate, I think your blog is a reminder that claiming to be an atheist doesn’t mean that you’re immune to taking gender roles for granted and playing into cultural stereotypes. People should apply the same skepticism they use to debunk theism to all aspects of culture, including prescribed gender roles.
Sorry for the double post; I’d like to delete this comment but am unable.
I couldn’t have said it better….I think a sense of humor is really important, and I like Jen’s…someone either makes you laugh, or they don’t….I am a bit irreverent though (duh)…..there’s always good content on Blag Hag too….what more could ya want?
The chair of the sociology department at my alma mater, an African American woman with a doctorate, refused to learn to type because she knew that it would mean she would never be able to move out of a secretarial position. It slows her down a bit now with technology, but I understand that it was worth it. I can’t imagine where she’d be now if she had learned to type then.
Or, to put it a different way, it’s sad that people are more interested in righteous indignation than hashing out the real issues. If given the option between someone who totally disagrees with me, but is totally interested in finding out what I really think, and on the other hand talking to someone who agrees with me on 99% of issues, but then is willing to ignore, caricature, stereotype, or just flat-out lie about me the moment we disagree, I’d take the latter any day.I think you’ve had a lot of patience, Jen. Good luck on weathering the blog storms.
Here is one from a well-known and “hardcore” feminist blog: http://shakespearessister.blog…this section is probably most relevant to what Jen’s been saying, to start with. http://shakespearessister.blog…
Well, Jen might not be blogging primarily on feminist issues, but she certainly doesn’t shut down debate. There is a lack of a space for men to get their introduction, to realise what it’s all about, and BlagHag is one of the few spaces where that can happen, where at least some of the community will assume good faith and give people some guidance. For me, it was getting involved in a related-to-feminism-kinda group on Usenet, getting a bit burned, and having nice people contact me off-board to help me understand what the hell happened.I don’t know that feminists refuse to engage with other points of view, but the fact is, as I see it, that most spokespeople in “men’s rights” and similar haven’t actually familiarised themselves with feminist discourse, leading to time wasted on (possibly unintentional) straw men based on misunderstood terms and arguments. Who wouldn’t want to try and avoid that. How about encouraging people on those two sides to engage privately first to work out compatible language and establish common ground?
You’re being rational. You have a fantastic sense of humor. You’re reacting completely appropriately. It’s a problem that most people didn’t have a problem with it. Thank you for worrying about things that matter. You have a cause. Good. Feminism is an important and worthy cause for a person to have.
Just because something is a “trope” does not mean it is incorrect. Unless your claim is that it is impossible you are ever irrational or hypersensitive, you need to justify the position that the charges against you are false (or ignore them, which you are not doing).
I like all aspects of your blog. Don’t let anyone coerce you into changing.
AH! Yes. I’ve recently come to the feminist movement (embarrassingly only in the past year I’ve started reading and writing on feminist topics) and found indescribable relief when I found there was an entire community of people who already had words for the ideas and feelings I’d been having since I was a young adult. I often feel like I’m a “bad feminist” as well because I don’t challenge others enough when they make sexist remarks. However I’ve found myself in situations like the one you describe above – where I am quickly overwhelmed and drowned out by meaningless old tropes. The frustration that arises from these situations is a serious deterrent to speaking up – especially when I’m the lone feminist or the only woman present.So I guess all I’m saying is thanks for continuing to speak up despite the unending frustrations and everything. It sucks – I’ve been there – I’m sure many of us have.
Well I do know and it is as I reported above. I have seen it played out literally hundreds of times over twenty years. Feminists have usually no understanding at all of sexism faced by men and react hostilely to it being mentioned. I see you put the term “men’s rights” in scare quotes there as if such a thing can’t exist.Men’s rights advocates have to be twice as well educated to get any hearing because they have to know both sides of the issue. Feminists don’t. They can just ban, censor and shut down the debate. They can pout and call out “chauvinist” or run to the bathroom and have everyone pander all over them. Men cannot.Again: show me one feminist board on the entire net that allows criticism of feminism to take place. Typically these days feminist sites will explicity say you cannot post unless you are a feminist or feminist leaning. This argument that feminists can’t be bothered to reply to “strawman” arguments is bunk. A strong ideology is one that welcomes debate and encourages criticism. Feminism does the exact opposite.Now that comment is not aimed at the contents of this blog but at the assertion made in this post that feminists have somehow answered their critics.
Maybe a better comparison would be that “You’re over-reacting.” is like the feminism equivalent of “What made you hate God?”It might actually be a valid issue to raise, but it’s more likely to be a way of dismissing the other person’s argument as being just a manifestation of an emotional disorder (a form of fundamental attribution error). A claim of irrationality or hypersensitivity should occur after a sincere attempt to understand the other person’s position, and with specific reasons, not as a bland assertion or knee-jerk reaction to seeing someone complain about something one doesn’t think important.
I’ve actually met secular or atheist Friends, and mostly their communities seem okay with it. It’s a bit startling for me, but it reminds me why I generally like Quakers.
One thing that makes it harder to have open discourse is that it’s tied up with issues of personal experience, often unpleasant experience. People share views of harassment, victimisation, a host of other unpleasant experiences. They, for sound emotional reasons, don’t want the space they have to safely discuss this to be full of people questioning whether, say, what happened to them really counts as rape.This does leave a gap for discourse, I agree, and it needs work from both ends. Feminist sites resistance to privilege-deniers is understandable, and you can’t expect one side to organise a shared space where people can feel safe discussing these difficult issues and allow intelligent discourse.- it’s a big ask.I have some feelings about men’s rights, but they aren’t things that are incompatible with feminism. We’re all victims of the patriarchy in the issues I here most (that aren’t, to me, ridiculous). Child custody – it’s a patriarchal attitude that the mother is the default carer. Similarly for parental leave.Guys moaning that women’s rights mean they can’t get a job any more are, mostly, missing a point. Yes, affirmative action can be taken too far, quotas can be damaging, etc, and most feminists I’ve met will happily discuss the different methods for promoting equality in employment at all levels, and so forth, they just want to work from the assumption that equality of opportunity is the goal, and agree that we’re not there yet.
I totally understand you, and I love your blog, even though I occasionally disagree with you. If I thought you were irrational, I wouldn’t bother reading. You are smart, funny and passionate, and your blog is a great place! I totally admire you!The truth is that you can’t get everyone to agree with you; you can’t even get all the nice/smart people to agree with you (which is sometimes more frustrating, at least for me). That’s just how it works. So just be yourself! You have a right for your emotions, you have a right to express them. It’s okay! :-)
It doesn’t tend to work with EFI-affiliated (Evangelical Friends International) meetings (or, as mosts of them call themselves, churches), but pretty much all Liberal meetings are fine with it. All that’s usually asked is that the non-theist Friends accept the Christ-centred language of the Christian Friends, and the Christian Friends will do likewise for the godless language of the non-theist Friends.Maybe I should blog about my experiences finding Quakerism and exploring the Society and all… it might save me tangenting about it here….
I’ve noticed this with myself and I think part of it is due to a pretty natural, deeply-rooted human cognitive bias.When you hear the same crap arguments repeatedly from multiple sources, your brain subconsciously associates them with each other. So, even though you’re responding to a bunch of different people, it feels like you’re having the same argument with the same person over and over. Because, frankly, you might as well be.EXCEPT when you patiently explain something and reason with someone and rationally point out the flaws in their arguments and maybe give them pause. Because, even though you’ve given them pause, there are dozens of people who are completely interchangeable with the crap-argument-spewer the person you’ve just reasoned with used to be. So when you encounter one of them, your brain’s going “what the FUCK? We JUST discussed this! I JUST explained to you what’s wrong with that fucking canard and you seemed to actually take it in! What’s fucking WRONG with you?!” and it’s not always easy, in the midst of a heated debate, to pause and go “……wait, fuck that wasn’t YOU I just explained it to. Just someone who argues EXACTLY LIKE YOU. Sorry. Here, I’ll patiently give the same fucking explanation AGAIN…”While this mistake is easy to make, it’s incumbent on us to work harder at being patient, avoiding it, and continuing to repeatedly explain the same basic common sense meets common decency concepts to the endless parade of people who pop up with the same damn tropes we’ve dealt with three dozen times this WEEK alone and not to lose our tempers in spite of the intense impression that we’re having the same conversation over and over again with a person who simply refuses to absorb what we’re saying….or, you know, people could stop mindlessly repeating crap arguments. Just…you know. Just sayin’.
And yet your comment appears to still be posted. Imagine that.
And my bow!I’m only a little baby blogger, so I’ve got nothing much to lose, but I hope I can commit half as wholeheartedly to the cause. You are one of my personal heroes, Jen, as brown-nose-y as that may sound.
This. One doesn’t have to defend themselves against a claim if it’s just thrown out there without any evidence (except in a court of law, but even then they’re likely to throw the case out before it gets that far). It’s perfectly fine to call out people for levelling the charge without having to defend yourself against it.It’s really pure arrogance to say to a woman on the topic of sexism, “you’re overreacting, prove to me (a man) that you’re not”. Instead of demanding proof by levelling an accusation, how about you take a more tactful approach. Like:“I don’t understand why {insert topic of discussion} was sexist. Could you explain to me why, if you have time?”Wow, look, treating people with respect is more likely to result in a discussion where you might actually be educated. Who would have thought?
Oh, yeah, I forgot: It gets even worse when the people you’re giving the explanations to refuse to argue in good faith and try to follow your reasoning, and instead insist on twisting your every word, demanding you explicitly fill in every conceivable blank (back to the Creationists with their “gaps in the fossil record/no transitional sequences” canard), and otherwise doing their absolute best to not understand you. The sense of outrage at the betrayal of the fundamental principles of civil (no, that word isn’t just a club to beat outraged minority positions with) discourse and intellectual honesty, and the sense of futility while you’re explaining, dramatically amplify the annoyance of having to answer the same threadbare objections over and over, and the almost invariable SMUGNESS of the fuckers who argue like this is just sickening. Dear Fuckers: “Chip on shoulder?” If you had to put up with the lot of you, you’d have gone on a shooting spree months ago.
That would be a fascinating read, I think. Do please share!
I have been a regular reader of your blog for almost a year, though I only recently started posting here after I started a blog of my own, and I have never found you to be crazy and irrational on the topic of feminism or anything else for that matter.I liked your example because I have had similar experiences in debates regarding atheism, including theists and agnostics accusing me of being “shrill” or “a jerk” for disagreeing with people, and atheists telling me I was too nice. I have found that no matter what position you hold on nearly anything controversial there will be people on either side of your position that will think you are crazy. I personally wouldn’t spend too much time worrying about it. We can’t go around having an existential crisis every time anyone disagrees with us. If it means anything I, as a man, found a whole lot of what was being said (both in the panels and in the subsequent blog implosion) to be sexist towards men as well as women.
I think that the reactions of people that you are overreacting is just one more indication of just how ingrained sexism is in our society. You are 100% correct about the sexism that exist in the atheist movement. It is very discouraging and disappointing that people who consider themselves rational and critical thinkers can’t seem to apply those skills to their own beliefs. I posted my own blog entry, http://freethinkingfordummies…., about the guest post saying how I am ashamed to be an atheist man when I hear about this sort of thing. You keep up with calling these incidents what they are, sexist and wrong. We need your voice to keep this issue of sexism in atheism front and center, otherwise it will never change.
If I posted here for a week I would be banned. Two weeks max.
We need an evo-psych drinking game! Let’s get on this!
I’ve banned a grand total of 4 people in 2 years, including one self-described feminist. Why don’t you try sticking around instead of just assuming what I’ll do?
Seeing that email produced the biggest smile I’ve had all week. Thank you so much!! How did you know that conquering the world helps me relieve stress? :)
I had no idea that the level of assholery going on was going on. This morning, I finally sat down and read some of the things said about you in the comments on the other blog.I honestly sat there stunned by the ridiculousness of it all. It completely baffles me that people who so often claim to be rational thinkers can be so completely irrational when it comes to feminism and gender equality. I fully support what you have to say on the topic on feminism, and it frustrates and angers me to see such insipid and insulting remarks made against you and what you (and many others) believe.You are not the one with the chip on your shoulder. You are absolutely right, and you have every reason to be angry. Those who think otherwise are being, for lack of a better phase, fucking idiotic. You keep doing what you’ve been doing. You’re great, Jen. Maybe when the other people aren’t so blinded by their irrationality, they’ll see that too.
There you go again dismissing men’s issues by pretending something is symmetric when it is not. Feminists ban their critics. That is not something that their critics “need to work on”. That is blaming the victim.Again you say I am a “privilege-denier” while you deny the privileges women have. This is the same circular-if-that-even “logic” you employed before. You admit that in the specific cases we examined, women are better off than men, but then you say, oh well that doesn’t matter because we all know women are worse off “generally” so that means men’s pain doesn’t count and women should be treated as worse off even when the evidence shows men are worse off.That is dogmatism. All of your explanations and protestations rely on precisely that which you wish to prove — namely that women are disadvantaged.There is no such thing as “the patriarchy” any more than there is a Worldwide Jewish Conspiracy. I find it offense that you claim there is just as a Jew would be offended. (Or rather– as anyone would be offended). You pretend a minority birth group is somehow secretly running the world to attack and put down the majority. This sort of false victimhood nonsense is very dangerous.”The patriarchy” is a way feminists attack all men and characterise men as sub-human / violent / sexist / overbearing. It is an EXTREMELY offensive and sexist trope.
Try insulting men and see what happens! Sheesh they are so sensitive.
It’s just the opposite. Feminists are so closeted and coddled by the censorship of any kind of criticism that they have often never heard before what the other person is saying and have no idea how to react except to lash out and scream and stamp their feet. Censorship makes people weak intellectually and then they have little to no ability to respond to critics which is frustrating.For example how many feminists have read even the most cautiously worded critcisms of their movement as expressed by eg. Warren Farrell? How many have even heard of Warren Farrell? Censorship breeds inteelectual sloth and disrespect.
Is this how you usually start out something on a feminist site? As I read your comment, I started to get a little angry. The way in which you’re going about saying things comes across as defensive and abrasive.
I think when you’re dealing with people who believe themselves to be “rational” they are quick to call others irrational when it’s really a matter of lack of empathy. Not to be sexist, but men are just not socialized to be empathetic and I think it’s getting worse with more men growing up with faceless communities. Online I’ve encountered some guys who spend a lot of time on games, /b/, or in chatrooms and don’t even really get that the people they interact with really are people, with feelings, and all. They don’t have the social skills to fix their mistakes so “you’re just insensitive” is the fall-back position. Take someone who is data-driven, put them on the internet, and then have their social faux-pas up on a screen for millions to see and critize, and they’re unnerved. It’s possible to get through to them though. They just have to have everything spelled out for them.
Sometime I wish my blog were popular enough to have haters. :)
The only reason I would call Jen “Feminism Lite,” personally, is because feminism is only a small part of the subject matter of this blog. Blag Hag is “Feminism Lite” the same way a sandwich is “Loaf of Bread Lite”It’s a horrible simile, but I’m sticking with it. In terms of the feminism I’ve read here, as it compares qualitatively to to feminsim I’ve read elsewhere, Jen is on the Epix level. Accessible, hard-hitting, self-aware, and rational.
I know that you don’t know me and the rarity of my use of invectives so this won’t have the same effect it has on my aquaintences but…Fuck that was sexist! “Pout or run to the bathroom and have everyone pander all over them”. WTF. (also my guess is that if you open with a phrase like that you are going to have people shut down on debating any reasonable points you make… because insulting someone as an intro to debate? Hint doesn’t work too well).Anyway there are many, many feminists on the net and off who have critisicms of some feminist groups… and many who also discuss the damaging male stereotypes as well (see Jen right here and Greta Christina for two right off the top of my head). The filters for posting on most feminist websites (not all mind you) are due to the fact that many, many assholes out there exist to troll… if you post a well-thought out, reasoned criticism that is backed up isn’t just a string of accusations, insults,victim blaming, straw-men or other logical fallacies I’m willing to bet almost anyone would have no problem with letting the comment go through… even people who heavily moderate).The fact that you don’t think that feminists welcome discussion and debate shows me that you really don’t have contact with the wider feminist population and are just cherry picking extremist examples… OR define not accepting debate as refusing to pander to you and tackle the same misunderstanding that they have heard 100 times this week for the 101st time because you haven’t researched your response (much like a creationist once again claiming the eye is irreducibly complex or some such).If you actually look for things with an open mind you will find that many, many answers have and are still being made to critics of feminism from within and without the feminist community (not to mention to the feminists that deny that male-female stereotypes also damage men).The point is also that it is not irrelevant that MOST of the societally limiting stereotypes and biases prevent women rather than men from doing things. It is entirely reasonable for feminists to want and to fight for equality in things such as pay scale or appreciation in academia or job opportunities. And the fact that they are focused on that doesn’t negate the fact that some men are also harmed by stereotypes. It isn’t an either or battle. And systematic discrimination is still a major problem (both in terms of sex and, even more keenly felt, race) and most of the problem stems from the combination of many, many small biases that add up to systematic harm… which is why it is so hard to talk about in the public forum without being yelled at for “hysteria”. For some excellent stats and a comprehensive list of areas that are proveably examples of privledge I recommend: http://amptoons.com/blog/the-m…
If you hate my blog, I’ll hate your blog!
I am going to point out that some right wing mysogynsts also ban their critics. Some creationists ban their critics. Some atheists ban their critics. Some UFOlogists ban their critics. Homeopaths ban their critics. Some scientists ban their critics. I could list ANY opinion on any spectrum (from legitimate to downright wacky) and find examples of people banning their critics. I’m not commenting here on whether it is good or bad just that it is a human reaction…. not a result of being a feminist.And most people don’t deny that women have men lack some privledges… but when you make a list of evidence/data supported claims for either side you will find it is heavily listing heavily to one side (pun not intended).
I neither dismissed things nor said that mens and womens issues were symmetric. There are feminists who don’t band their critics, and there ought to be more; there should be a space where injured people of either gender from whatever source can talk about these things in a safe atmosphere, and critically engage about them, although critical engagement is hard to do in the same place as injured people talking about problems (it’s even in my research methods and ethics material for my MA…)There are some positions in which men are better off than women, and some where women are better off than men – we agree on that, which should be a starting point for us to build from, rather than a point to conflict over. It almost feels like you got upset by my use of “patriarchy” (more on that shortly) and this distracted you from the fact that I was showing a place of common ground where we can start from.I’d prefer to be building out from initial common ground than conflicting and trying to tear down each other’s views. I do believe that women have an overall worse deal out of such matters than men, but that’s not actually a centrally important point to my views on the issue.By my understanding of the concept of “the patriarchy” (and I’m sure there are others, and no-one can say which is right), your arguments don’t make sense. I take that as an indication that we have different understandings of the term. How about I try to explain mine, and we see if we can both work with that term and that meaning when we’re talking to each other?The patriarchy isn’t an organisation or a conspiracy, it’s not something that people actively try to promote (at least, not many, that gets into murkier waters). It’s a social phenomenon named because the feature of greatest interest to those who developed the concept was that it encourages “rule by men” (well, the term literally means fathers, not men, but the idea is the same). It’s a set of societal norms that has many other features, some bad for men, some bad for women, others bad for different people depending on the context and situation. It promotes heteronormativity, women in ‘caring’ roles and men in technical roles, management roles, and so on. This is as a result of socialised views and behaviour, or possibly of gestalt phenomena depending on how you want to look at it. The important point is that the term, as I understand it (and fairly fearsom feminists explained it to me), does not connote any group of people organising anything. It just happens because that’s the way it always happened. The fact that some men have sometimes acted in a way that clearly attempts to presenrve it is unsurprising on two grounds – firstly that people tend, statistically, to promote their own benefit, so the powerful arrange things to maintain their power. That’s not unique to gender politics. Secondly, there’s always social conservatism, people (as a group) always have a tendency to cling to the status quo – even when the status quo is bad for them.As such, the idea of the patriarchy isn’t an attack on anyone, it’s an attack on behaviours and on societal norms.Now, as you find it offensive, I’d love to find some alternative term we could use. However, it would be very difficult to engage with the wider community then, and I doubt there’d be much headway changing the terms as there isn’t a huge history of deliberately abusive use of the term (unlike, say, ‘nigger’).I’ve known very few feminists who allege that “all men” (or even most) are sub-human, violent, sexist or overbearing. Although that last one isn’t too much of an accusation, really, come to think of it. I have a lot of overbearing relatives.In summary: chill, friend, we agree on more than you think, more feminists are reasonable than you think, and people didn’t, in general, mean to offend you with that term, but I’m pretty confident the offence stems in part from misunderstanding and, while the existing offence is not something anyone meant to cause and would prefer to have not caused, dialog will allow us to reduce offence in future.
I’ve skipped over most of the nonsense from the last two posts to jump in and join the enthusiastic chorus of supporters. I love your explanation (it reads like something Phil Plait could easily have written). So keep up the good work, keep keeping us guys honest.
I said name ANY feminist board that allows critics to post. It is a problem specific to ideologies that cannot defend themselves intellectually but have the power to defend themselves from ideas using force.
I didn’t mention that your blog was helpful in educating me about feminism, but you were and I’m glad for it. I’m a male atheist that leads a college club and 100% consider feminism to be part of the skeptical platform. As a consequence we have about equal parts men and women in our club and we are good allies with the pro-choice organization on campus. You make a difference, don’t listen to the haters.
Don’t worry Jen we’re with you. I don’t think there is even one point you have made feminism-wise that I have disagreed with. I am sure many people would accuse me of being feminist-lite as well……but I really, really do care about equality and am confronted with things on a regular basis being in the, until recently, male dominated field of geology. Though the last decade or so has seen major shifts and changes for the better, which is good… but in the field you definitely have to do the litany against the unconcious biases, “Yes, I am a woman. Yes, I can cut my own firewood. Yes I can make a fire in about 1 minute using a piece of tissue less than a handful of woodchips and a couple pieces of tinder. Yes, I don’t care if I have a shower every day. Yes, I can carry my own samples. Yes, I am competent. No, it isn’t that extraordinary” In summary I’m really, really glad that there are people like you who are in the public sphere (something I think I would be terrible at… I’m way too reclusive hence the loving the field jobs in the middle of nowhere) who are presenting at least the seeds (and a good chunk of the meat, too) of these ideas (particularly the small things that people do without thinking) to people who might not have thought of them before.I just wish people would stop the automatic defensive reaction of “I have done that… so she must be over-reacting!” or “I have never personally seen it affect anyone (i.e. me) so it musn’t actually affect anyone reasonable”…. and then take that as the cue to start in on the insults and revert to more bigotted responses than they would normally give (I like giving people the benefit of the doubt… it keeps me sane)… sigh… oh well.Keep on doing what you are doing and don’t let a few people who fail at being open to the idea that what they do unconsciously could affect someone adversly (particularly when lots of people are doing it), make you in any way timid to keep on sharing your thoughts! Because your (profound) thoughts rock!
That’s just it. You can never make a list because you are banned from feminist boards to make that point. It is because feminism would die as an ideology if it were exposed to truth that feminism needs censorship. Feminism has no legitimate issues. That is why there are endless discussions about how insulting calling women “female” is. Issues must be artificially fabricated to keep the hatred going and keep emotions high and keep up a sense of victimhood among members.How do you value a life? The UN does so very simply by measuring literacy or education and life expectancy. These two things are good indicators. On both these bases men are behind women.
“Publically” is apparentally not a word.
Too soon! ;p
Briefly– I asked for one feminist board where critics can post. You claim such a place exists so please say where. I have debated the topic on-line twenty years and know of none.
How about this one?My point was that people with legitimate points also ban people because very few people (regardless of beliefs) want to spend the money to host comments that they find personally offensive/stupid/abusive/irrelevant or that are just rabble rousing or trolling… So that they can listen to people lambaste them for putting their opinions out there. Very few people have the courage and thick skin required to take the lambasting that people can give… and that happens regardless of how legitimate or bizarre your ideas are. Jen is one of the amazing people out there in that she manages to put up with insults, accusations, etc. for stating her thoughts and only occasionally slips into the anger boat about it… and I have never seen her ban or delete a comment even on the basis of it being insulting or even just ridiculously and provably incorrect… from the thin skin I am sensing from your definsive posture about all of this wonder if you could say the same were you in her position… (incidently I don’t know that I could say the same in her position, I’m a fairly soft-spoken person mostly)
“It’s really pure arrogance to say to a woman on the topic of sexism, ‘you’re overreacting, prove to me (a man) that you’re not'”Not it isn’t. Further information would be required in order to make such a determination. I’m also not clear why you inserted (a man) in there. Is it more ok for a woman to question a feminist than a man?Further, one can register an appraisal without soliciting discussion or interaction of any kind. One is perfectly justified in reading a creationists column spouting off about how evolution is wrong, then critiquing it without having to first engage discussions with said person. It’s a fine idea to invite civil discourse, but it is by no means some sort of prerequisite to voicing your opinion. Lots of people no doubt read everything she had to say and the relevant Reddit thread and were entirely justified in disagreeing with her on that basis.One simply cannot say “they laughed at Galileo, so anyone who laughs at me must be wrong, too”. This is not a defense, nor attempt to rationally engage the subject matter.
Can you actually name any single issue where women in the US today are worse off than men are in the equivalent issue for men? I find that 99% of feminists I meet cannot name even one single such issue. Not even a small issue.My understanding of “the patriarchy” is as yours but I find the idea of insulting a minority birth group (ie men) to be highly offensive. I find the idea of characterizing a group of people pejoratively on the basis of how they were born to be prejudicial. It’s also a form of collective punishment as it says all men are to blame for the alleged (largely fictional) sins of the few male rulers.I reject the notion that men as a group are either powerful, or try to get power over women. On the contrary for example historically women’s rights received more support from men than it did from women. It was men who voted for the women’s right to vote not women (obviously). Men do NOT promote their own benefit over women but instead actively pander to women. In some respects men’s whole lives are based around doing things for women, just as women’s lives are based around doing things for children.For example male judges are known to be more merciful on female convicts than female judges are. That’s part of why the justice system is so incredibly sexist (worse discrimination than the racism even).The entire feminist anti-male dogma rests on this falsehood that suggests men look out for other men’s interests. In fact men are competitors with other men and attack other men but help and protect women. When men are in charge women receive extra benefits over other men (their competitors).
Our geeky intelligent male brains go semi-retarded when we meet an intelligent single woman. Sorry. It is true. It has happened to me more than once in my 50 odd years. We think this person might be the “one” who will help us be ourselves. We are attracted, frightened, intimidated and like many males, need to learn a new vocabulary and behaviour in these situations. I am not apologizing for them being jerks. These lads need to be taught how to deal with these feelings. I was lucky enough to be “tutored” in university by a smack in the head by a good friend.Trust your feelings Ms. J. You are not over reacting. You are not irrational. And your chippy shoulders are just fine. Fuxk ’em if they don’t like it.PSMy most favourite was falling in love at a clown bar while we expressed differential calculus on a red and white checkered table cloth.
I’m not entirely sure what region you are quoting this for but here is a site full of excellent statistics: http://unstats.un.org/unsd/dem…Feminism actually usually demands no censorship… a lot of people try to silence people talking about these issues… sometimes because they can’t actually see a problem… sometimes because they don’t think that women actually deserve more equality… Feminism has plenty of very legitimate and very relevant issues. If you will excuse my own anecdote, I’m in a very traditionally male dominated field (geology) and I am thankful that I arrived in it after things had already started to change… but I still am confronted with unconcious bigotry from people assuming that I can’t possibly lift something/ weild an axe properly, excel at or want to do the more rugged field work to people deciding that “girly”, or “sweetie”,are perfectly acceptable things to call a female coworker tha you barely know. (The more rugged field work, by the way is my passion, luckily I now have a miriad of excellent references attesting to the fact that I AM really good at it… mostly because I didn’t just shut up and take it when people relegated me to jobs that THEY thought I would rather do/be better at).The point is that what feminists want (in the developed world) now isn’t as “big” or easily visible as what we used to want because the gaps have closed significantly… we want the final portion of the gap to close… we want people to be aware of the negative stereotypes of and biases against both men and women, and with that awareness we want people to conciously choose to fight against them in their own heads… there is plenty of statistical evidence that there is a gap (wider in some geographical regions than others) and that the gap harms both men and women (although most of the easily measurable indicators, income, status etc. come down against women no one in this discussion is denying that some factors don’t negatively affect men (we are supporting that idea)… although you seem to think we are.). Again a thoroughly researched and well summarised list with references that has been revised as new information is brought to his attention is here… http://amptoons.com/blog/the-m… really, really good place to look for a quick summary of some of the gaps: And here is another one that highlights a lot of the detrimental effects on men as well: http://blog.shrub.com/archives…And then a link to a host of other lists for various non-gender related ones as well: http://amptoons.com/blog/2006/…These, of course, aren’t meant to be exhaustive, but are meant to be a starting point for thinking about things that we normally take for granted, or don’t even realise occur….Sorry… one more point Violet Blue, also a feminist, routinely calls out myths perpetuated by some feminists about porn and sexuality (and talks about the damage that does to both men and women)… so there is a very specific example of feminists criticising other feminists…
Who’s insulting men? Or do you think that women wanting to be treated equally is insulting to men?
I bet I have talked to more feminists and know more about the movement and its history than you do.Ampersand’s blog. I’ve known him for over ten years – or at least interacted. He used to have a blog with a girl and I was debating the gender wage gap there. When she realised that the wage gap was a big lie and that Ampersand KNEW it was a big lie all along she left the blog in disgust and it was closed and he moved to that new blog.He is good at debating and really the only feminist that does ever bother. I wonder if it is because he is male? Suffice it to say; we’ve met. Did I mention I’ve debated feminism for twenty years over hundreds of blogs (and what they had before they had blogs)?You can curse at me; I am a man and we are used to getting shit from women. No problem. Greta Christina essentially threw me off her board a while back for criticising her views on gender.The truth is if you do not make sense you’ll last longer on a feminist board than if you do. Feminists (like anyone else) like to have someone to point to as an irrational opposition. But if you bring a reasoned articulate criticism then you have to go. You undermine their ideology. You make people think.Could you please point out to me which of the arguments I have made that you have heard 100 times this week already? Or even once?You mention 3 areas where you claim women are badly off. The wage gap lie I have gone over elsewhere. I don’t know what you mean by “appreciation in academia” and as for job opportunities they are calling this recession a “mancession” because 80% of the jobs lost are to men.Feminists don’t fight for equality, they fight for their own benefit against equality. They are deeply divisive and set men and women against each other.
I don’t believe I said there were such boards – although I wouldn’t be surprised. What I think I was saying was that not all feminists want to censor people, and for that I point to Jen as evidence. I’ve mostly discussed feminism online in forums of various sorts where it’s an associated or minor issue, not the main focus.
I don’t know quite how you have come to the conclusion that feminists are censoring things? Do you have any cited examples of feminist censorship?Let alone why you think we are intellectually lazy/weak… that sounds like a rehash of the “Women don’t have the same mental capacity/intelligence/etc.” trope that has been so thoroughly debunked so many times… Feminists are often critical, intelligent, well-read, people. Anecodotally I spend at least 3 hours a week reading academic papers and technical reports and making critical (i.e. in the sense of skeptical not importance) decisions about them and based on them… Now next to none of these are about feminism (or anti-feminism) but that’s just the thing… you are accusing people of being intellectually lazy while knowing next to nothing about them… is it because they don’t agree with you?Do you think I am intellectually lazy because I am a feminist? Or lazy because you think I should have read every source that you have about anti-feminist ideas and if I haven’t that means I’m censoring them? Even if I rarely extensively read feminist sources either? (I only have so much time in the day… although today I’m doing a bit of procrastinating on creating figures for the technical report I’m writing… hence my lurking)
Just to prove my point? I don’t think so. That would put you in an emotional bind. Besides this is not a feminist board really is it? So really I was repeating a misunderstand from the commenter I was replying to which is that my comment about censorship on feminist boards would apply to this board. I get the impression you more often talk about other stuff.Science and atheism are happy to debate — LOVE to debate, because they are “right”. Feminism goes the other way. I do not want to hazard a guess as to where an atheist/science/feminism board would go.But thank you so much for the invitation. I apologise for posting a lot of long comments, some of which are straying off topic a little, but I try to respond to people who intelligently respond to me and because I am bringing a perspective many have never heard before (criticism of feminism as sexist – from a far left wing position) sometimes it gets wordy.
I don’t necessarily agree with everything you’ve said here (duh, I consider myself a feminist), but I try to make a point to emphasize that my version of feminism includes fighting for equal rights of *both* sexes, and that women aren’t necessarily immune from being sexist. But I also think feminism (or humanism, if you just don’t like the baggage of the historical word) is a rational, skeptical position to hold. But that’s fodder for many other posts, not a simple comment.
Hehe, I rarely find people who compete with my long windedness in comments. But just to make another point I occasionally criticise some feminists for taking things past the point of equality to sexism… but the point I also like to make is that mysogeny and sexism against women often ALSO hurts men… and that there are inequalities that favour women in some aspects as well. But that doesn’t negate the fact that most of the harmful gap is still leaning towards women. Also I think that you either have been trying the wrong places/groups if you haven’t found someone willing/happy to debate, let alone provide actual supporting evidence to their debate… either that or you are using arguments that they are tired of hearing and refuting or mixing things in with personal attacks…(very few people will calmly debate someone insulting them, no matter what their position)
“In some respects men’s whole lives are based around doing things for women, just as women’s lives are based around doing things for children.”Without qualifiers, this sentence is outlandishly false.
Add me to the list of supporters, Jen. I subscribed to your blog shortly after Boobquake because it was absolutely effing brilliant and I just had to read more from someone who came up with such an awesome idea! I don’t always agree with everything you say, but you always make me think and I love that. I love reading your posts about sexism and feminism because your point of view always challenges me to examine my own thinking–even when I agree with you (which is often). Thank you for doing what you do!
The problem isn’t being pro-female. The problem is with blatant falsehoods. Just like saying, females have magic superpowers and all come from Saturn, doesn’t help further gender equality, neither does lying about or mischaracterizing events to make a point. You’re not a “science” blogger, nor does your analogy work. You want an analogy? Try looking at the fallout over Andrew wakefield’s mischaracterizations. He was a respected member of his community who told non-facts and it hurt everyone. This analogy fails too, because aw’s bull kills kids.Nor are you some embattled and besieged island fighting alone. I support gender equality, so much so that while I disagree with second wave tactics and some of the philosophy, I respect others enough to use neutral technical gender identifiers lest I perpetuate the patriarchy through semantics.Manufactured controversy is good for your site stats and bad for everyone else involved. It’s sad we still have to have these discussions in 2011, but the truth will out. It’s one thing to discuss an issue, it’s another to scream and lie and call people “asshole”…
The problem isn’t being pro-female. The problem is with blatant falsehoods. Just like saying, females have magic superpowers and all come from Saturn, doesn’t help further gender equality, neither does lying about or mischaracterizing events to make a point. You’re not a “science” blogger, nor does your analogy work. You want an analogy? Try looking at the fallout over Andrew wakefield’s mischaracterizations. He was a respected member of his community who told non-facts and it hurt everyone. This analogy fails too, because aw’s bull kills kids.Nor are you some embattled and besieged island fighting alone. I support gender equality, so much so that while I disagree with second wave tactics and some of the philosophy, I respect others enough to use neutral technical gender identifiers lest I perpetuate the patriarchy through semantics.Manufactured controversy is good for your site stats and bad for everyone else involved. It’s sad we still have to have these discussions in 2011, but the truth will out. It’s one thing to discuss an issue, it’s another to scream and lie and call people “asshole”…
How about “Just because you have a dick doesn’t mean you have to be a dick”?
Actually people often host sites to hear criticism and have a debate. It is very common. People who are convinced of their beliefs and their ability to articulate them do not fear debate. Moribund ideologies ban debate because they know they can’t stand up to inspection. That is why debate is important – it sorts out the good from the bad. And therefore you can see feminism is a worthless ideology simply based on the isolationist behaviour of its adherents.I do not get the impression this board has debates on feminism. Can you point to which regular commentator is a critic of feminism?I have hosted debate boards. The problem is feminists don’t come to them (well they do but they quickly run off again).
I am not going to try and respond to ten years of Ampersand’s blog in a comment here. Pick what you think is your best shot. I did say women in the US btw not women in the third world. Why? Because neither one of us knows a damn thing about the women in the third world.Sure they have it bad but so do the men. And the UN doesn’t have divisons for looking out for men –only for women (sexist as ever). But as soon as you look in more detail you find the perspective of women as victim is just as false abroad as here. It’s just harder to do that.So please an issue for women in the US where we live.So far the only specific issue facing women I’ve been presented with is being called “female”.
I think that you might be referring to one subset of feminists there rather than feminists as a whole… ignoring the moderate voices that are quieter… and I’m sure you might know more about the history… but considering that most of my friends are moderate feminists… I’m not sure that I will agree so readily to the second point…I talk to my friends rather a lot after all… although the majority of our time is not spent discussing feminism, it’s usually more about our latest video game/book addiction or our jobs/schooling (a couple of them are currently masters studenting) or some neat science tidbit, or how awesome tea is, or in my case geology (while my non-geo friends roll their eyes and laugh at my excitement… my geo friends just join in). Incidently none of this group of (often highly opinionated women) have any hating towards the men… And while I consider myself a feminist I certainly don’t want to pit men and women against each other and for years I actually called myself an “equalist” until I met so many moderate feminists and realised that feminism was not all about going too far and discriminating against men/perpetuating harmful stereotypes against men as if that would equal the tables! I quite like men, thank you very much. I’m one of those people who scoffs at the ridiculous idea that men and women can’t be friends without wanting to “boff” one another.What I meant about academia is that despite the fact that women are finally penetrating the annuls of academia, based on their measurable achievements (papers published in credible journals, citations recieved, etc.) they are still being given less recognition for the same amount of work in terms of gaining tenure and/or gaining equal pay. It is actually one area where the wage gap is still visible… When I get home I will see if I can dig up a couple references for you… Also I do not live in the united states… so the socio-economic situation around me is likely different than the one you are living in… but out of curiousity do you know what the proportion of men to women in the workforce was prior to the recession? I would be curious to see the difference… and see the stats on how well or poor paying the jobs were that were lost… (Just because I’m weird and like stats)Anyways I’m going to guess that most places if you come in with broad generalisations, accusations and insults (often very thinly veiled) as you opened up with here… that a lot of people are going to assume that you are there to troll or just be a jerk and therefore write you off…I’m not saying that you should censor the things you say… but maybe open up with reasoned and calm arguments rather than starting with the assumption that everyone you are talking to is totally against you and everything you stand for =)You might find more people willing to debate with you that way =)(also I just prefer not to swear that often becasuse then when I do people know that I mean it… It then becomes a very good frustration reliever. I wasn’t swearing at you exactly just the insulting generalisation that you used to open your statement)
Characterising men as injust and lording it over women and seeking to lord it over women and treat women badly is both false and insulting.
Write about XMRV. I had only banned Kwok in five years, before I opened that can of worms…
I didn’t say I approved of it, but it is true.
By calling yourself a feminist you are associating yourself with some real man-haters. Many people find the term offensive so why not switch to something gender neutral? The big issues of sexism these days are facing men and the feminist movement often actively blocks solutions.
Another lurker here…I don’t think you’re overreacting about feminism. As a guy, I’d be shocked that people at an atheist gathering would come out with the misogynistic tripe mentioned. It’s totally unacceptable.I’m not good at understanding peoples feelings. It’s been suggested to me I might have some form of Aspergers, so if I think it’s unacceptable, I hate to think how more empathic people must see it.With provisos, I do think you may overreact a bit about religion (sorry). Not about the stupid unscientific hateful religious bigots saying stupid unscientific hateful bigoted things – they deserve everything they get – but some religious people just try & quietly lead good lives because thats what their scripture says. There seems to be tendency to lump all theists into the ‘hate filled irrational moron’ category.You may believe nothing of the kind, and I’ve just interpreted it that way, in which case, my bad, please ignore me.
Here’s a couple easy ones… right before I dash off so forgive the quickness: Likelihood of rapeStigma associated with enjoying sex/being open about sexual identity (although many feminists are bad for perpetuating this one)Dress Codes in many offices/restaurants (very different for men and women)Likelihood of being told that you are incapbable of being rationalLikelihood of being told that all women suck at ____ because you personally have failed at something (i.e. math, driving, etc)Just a few of many small things that can add up to make a person feel pretty small and/or angry at the end of the day.
I-Im not sensitive. Im a MAN. I have no feelings. I have thick skin. I am a Vulcan. I suppress my feelings in favor of pure logic. Stop making fun of me! You’re cute, please like me.
Actually, it’s not true. There are lots of men who don’t spend much time at all doing things for women (the extreme cases being gay and asexual men in relatively isolated social environment, or sociopaths, who don’t particularly care for spending any time doing anything for anyone). There are also women who can’t stand children and won’t have them.If what you meant was “most men” or “most women”, then the statement would at least be possibly true, if debateable.
I find what you’re saying to deeply ironic, considering that for my significant other the point in his life during which he decided that he cared about being social and charismatic toward people he didn’t know was after playing–of all things–Word of Warcraft, where his experiences running and being a member of a guild taught him, among other things, that you caught more flies with honey than you did with vinegar.
Because I’ve seen you on steam playing it a few times and lamented my inability to play against you because i’m a brokeass college grad and nursing jobs are super scarce. However, whenever I had a stressful day at clinicals I would go home drink a few beers and shoot the fuck out of zombies for a few hours and the world would be OK. I guessed you’re more the strategy over tactical type and I’ve seen you playing Civ V on steam so I figured a DLC would cheer you up :). Enjoy stomping down the Mediterranean!
Also, watch this. :-)
If women who call themselves feminists are “associating themselves” with some man-haters, then by precisely the same token a man who explicitly opposes feminism is associating himself with some woman-haters.
If you got banned, it wouldn’t be because your views are different, it’d be because you’re an obnoxious arsehole.
That may be the lamest negative comment I have ever seen on any blog, anywhere.
‘The way in which you’re going about saying things comes across as defensive and abrasive. ‘And irrational…and deluded (Did you laugh at the line about how feminism has no valid points at all? or the assertion that men are somehow being oppressed by women on the whole?). Not to mention this line : ‘Just to prove my point? I don’t think so.’ when Jen offered that he should stick around and debate. Which had me picturing a sulking teenager tossing off a hissy fit and flailing his arms about. This sort of poster, with accusatory and abrasive, and yet mostly content-free posts, are exactly the sort which nail Jen’s original point. So I suppose we should be thankful to have a case-in-point to direct people to.
Thank you, “Attendee,” for the graphic illustration of my point.
De-lurking to toss another comment into the ‘support what Jen’s doing’ pile.Jen, I don’t always agree with what you write. And I think that sometimes you’re entirely too patient with the irrational misogynists who show up to bash your ideas. I’d be one of those feminists who think you’re not strident enough. But as you stated it, you’re the ‘gateway drug’ to feminism. And I can grok that. Baby steps in the right direction, right?Please don’t let the idiots bring you down. I realize there are a lot of them, and they’re usually far more vocal than the people who support your ideas. But there are lots of us who do support you. You’re not alone, even if your allies are only silently observing.
I enjoy your brand of feminism. I enjoy your brand of religion or lack-there-of. I don’t always understand the science posts, but that’s what google is for.That being said, haters are gonna hate and trollers are gonna troll. Ignore them and worry about the misguided ones–the ones that have a chance to be educated, but I think you already know that. :3
I think you’ve single-handedly turned me into a real feminist. I’ve been arguing with morons on Reddit for a week. Thanks!
On my way home I thought more about your insistence that people couldn’t find a single issue where women are worse off then men… and it hit me! You are actually arguing (at least right here) that there are currently no injustices towards women but there are many towards men? Not just that there are injustices towards both, which is where I stand…At the same time you are accusing feminists of ignoring/denying issues detrimental to men? Are you sure you aren’t now going too far in your assertions and making the same mistake you are accusing others of making?Some men actively pander to women, some women actively pander to men… Some women promote their own interests over men and some men promote their own interests over women… Some promote their own interests regardless of gender… it isn’t the one-sided issue you are trying to make it…Gender equality benefits both sexes… and people pointing out sexism towards women do not necessarily (in fact I would go so far as to say not usually or almost never) hate men or want domination over them. And to say that when men are in charge women receive extra benefits… I don’t even know where to start… If you are suggesting they get extra benefits because of things like sex-appeal I’m going to say that there isn’t a feminist I know who wants to be recognised prefessionally because of her sex appeal rather than her actual skills…. and I don’t even know of a single case (or worked in a single case) where this is a supported claim or statistics that show that as being even marginally correlatable…Most of your statements are adding up to a picture where you seem to have a great deal of animosity towards women… I don’t know your circumstances so I don’t know why this developed or if this conclusion is even true, but are you sure you aren’t arguing from a position of emotional reaction rather than from supported data?
The entire *world* stands in opposition to feminist thoughts and ideals; by the very definition of one calling oneself ‘feminist’ one must constantly read opposition to it.I’ve never heard of Warren Farrell before but a quick Google search reveals him to be a sort of ‘men’s rights’ douchebag. Bleck.
So Jen is just throwing a hissy fit, huh?
You compare standard knee-jerk criticism of feminism (‘over-reactin’!’) to critiquing a discussion of creationism off the cuff. Saying to a feminist that she is over-reacting or that they are being irrational is *exactly* the same as a creationist claiming that a science blogger only believes in evolution because he hates god.http://finallyfeminism101.word… -get some learnin’ in ya.
“Characterising men as injust and lording it over women and seeking to lord it over women and treat women badly is both false and insulting.”But nobody has been saying that here. This is why I’m so confused. You seem to hold this position that feminists=misandrists when no one has said anything negative about men. Is this how your conversations with feminists usually go? Do you usually march in, guns blazing, and tell these women that they’re wrong without any real data or content?This isn’t any sort of debate; it’s you frankly coming across as crazy. You try to act as some elitist who knows what’s what and is hot shit because you’ve been “reporting about feminism for 20 years” but haven’t shown any sort of credentials. What kind of reporting do you even do- join a chat room about feminism?None of your arguments are anything new; they’re barely even arguments. You came in yelling about being silenced when you haven’t been here, and how men also suffer. And what’s more, countless people have agreed with you that gender inequality is bad for all genders.You’ve barely even talked to me here and I’ve grown weary of your “debate.”All you’re doing is arguing needlessly, and by the way you’ve entered and conducted yourself here, you really do come across as a misogynist.
In response to your comment below. I might not be in the third world… But I am also not living in the US… so your insistence that I take a US-centric position is a bit of a misunderstanding…(The internet is full of people who don’t live in the USA… just BTW)
“”The patriarchy” is a way feminists attack all men and characterise men as sub-human / violent / sexist / overbearing. It is an EXTREMELY offensive and sexist trope. “I’m a man, and I don’t find it offensive. I think you need to actually learn what ‘the patriarchy’ is, as a term. It doesn’t mean all men are in a grand conspiracy to oppress women (as your the worldwide jewish conspiracy comparison would mean). It refers to the systematic dominance of men over women that has existed since recorded history began.I gotta say, Mister Attendee, that for someone who has been discussing these matters for years, you seem awful ignorant of the core issues.
Everyone in this comment thread needs to read your post here.
What falsehoods are you refferring to?The analogy works perfectly for the sort of response she recieved. It wasn’t people debunking things she said… it was people saying that she “deserved it” for openly being a woman or admitting to having a sexual identity. Or that it is the way things are. Or that no woman ever has been opprossed here, how dare you suggest such a thing! Or going the I’m not sexist but… route…It was a lot of people responding defensively (regardless of the evidence) because she said something that challenged their beliefs… much like a creationist reacts defensively to an evolutionist saying something that challenges their beliefs…
I don’t live in the US, but I can name three: Equal Pay, Rights to One’s Body, The Right to Not Get Raped.
Another voice in support of you, Jen! The work you’re doing here in bringing a stronger feminist voice to the atheist movement is incredibly important, and after reading about all these dust-ups over the past few days, I’ve only become more convinced of that. The atheist and the feminist movements have a lot to learn from each other, and the more in harmony they become, the more both will benefit. Granted, there’s still a lot of prejudiced nonsense getting in the way of that, but that can be overcome. Posts like these are like lancing a boil: it gets nasty at first, but it’s better off in the long run to get this stuff out into the open where it can be disinfected.There’s a good reason why these debates are so frustrating, and it’s one that all atheists should be able to understand: the delusional people who are irrationally fixated on one belief will argue it to the death, whereas most ordinary, rational people will get fed up long before then and check out of the discussion. Therefore, if left unchecked, every thread about a controversial topic eventually ends up dominated by a handful of idiots. This is just as true for misogyny as it is for, say, creationism. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t people who get the message. I, personally, have become a lot more feminist-conscious from reading blogs like this one (though my smart feminist wife deserves her fair share of the credit as well). So don’t give up the fight! We need all the good writers and good speakers we can get, and you’re definitely one of them.
Jen, I love your blog and feel that it tends to have a consistently higher level of rationality than the other atheist blogs I follow; that being said, I’m hesitant to take sides in the controversy ignited by Sharon and Lyz’s guest post because I don’t have access to all of the facts involved. So far, the impression I’ve had is that there are people on both sides who find this to be a very triggering issue and are overreacting to what the other side is saying.You’ve admitted in the past that you have the unfortunate tendency to place your fellow atheists on a pedestal, as if not believing in deities should put one above certain behaviors – I have that problem too. Watching scenes like this unfold reminds me that we’re all susceptible to getting caught up in drama and fallacy-throwing when we have a strong enough opinion on something (the “herding cats” analogy comes to mind – there will be hissing and clawing and biting).Addendum: after reading a lot of the comments on other blogs from the “opposition” side, I do feel that they are disproportionately and unfairly attacking you for simply expressing your opinion. Aside from a few sardonic tweets, I haven’t seen much of the same from your side.
Not true! “Publicly” and “publically” are both accepted spellings. Don’t believe the second-rate spell-checker plug-ins!
I LOVE YOU!!!!!Having been at grad school all day (for history) my brain is all meltyyyyy…BUTI LOVE YOU!!!!
Why OF COURSE the little shit is all talk, no action. What else would you expect?
I’m saving this for the next time someone tells me to get the feminist chip off my shoulder and “lighten up, you could be in Saudi Arabia, ha ha ha!”Great post, you kick ass, and keep fighting. We’re with you.
I’m 46 years old, and it took me discovering atheist blogs to realize that I was totally blind to things that matter to women. Now I wonder how I could have been so dense? I’m glad that my atheism has helped me to become aware of feminist issues. I hope it has helped me to become a better person.PS: I love your blog!
Well, technically since you are both women it is implied that you already hate eachothers blogs. This also means that I hate your blogs too.CAT FIGHT!
You mean Jen stole a catch-phrase from someone else and then used it in a context that made so little sense it ended up having the opposite effect on the intended audience?lol.
Did you ever consider that maybe they didn’t stick around on your boards because they found nothing of interest there, except for someone sticking to the absolute and easily disproven position that ALL damaging sexism in the developed world is directed towards men? COmbined with strong suggestions that you think that women have all of the power in the world and use it to keep men subjugated? And keep insisting that people don’t provide you with adequete examples or won’t adress the very few examples you provide (that are accompanied mainly by assertions rather than references…)
Hi Jason! Hi Jen! Wow, so you have a lot of commenters now. It kind of makes me feel old. Just wanted to add my two cent. I used to be pretty shy about my atheism and standing up for equal rights, even though certain things people said or did to me and people I knew would make my blood boil. Since I’ve began reading your blog, meeting you and other amazing woman and men I’m definitely a much bolder individual. So I say thank you, with all my heart.
The amount of blatant sexism and pure falsehoods in this post is astounding. I’ll give a lot of credit to the other people responding to you for being very polite and actively attempting to be sympathetic and understand your viewpoint, but at some point we just have to say that you’re wrong and your arguments are groundless.”Can you actually name any single issue where women in the US today are worse off than men are in the equivalent issue for men?”There are many. One of the most obvious would be slut shaming towards women while men are praised for having multiple partners. Another is the lack of control women have in regard to sovereignty over their own bodies.You reject that men as a group are powerful and then say this?”On the contrary for example historically women’s rights received more support from men than it did from women. It was men who voted for the women’s right to vote not women (obviously).”Your argument that men aren’t powerful is that they were the only one’s with enough power to vote for women to gain the right to vote? I daresay there is an inconsistency in there. And to downplay the role that the women played in the suffrage movement(actually claiming that they played no role at all) is intellectually dishonest and ridiculous.And then we get a horribly demeaning statement about gender roles.”In some respects men’s whole lives are based around doing things for women, just as women’s lives are based around doing things for children.”What you’re saying here is that women’s role is to take care of children. And like children need women to take care of the them women need men to take care of women. What a disgusting thing to say. How can you claim that there is no inequality between the sexes and then spew this bullshit? I should hardly need to point out that it is not women’s job to take care of children and that women are more than capable of taking care of themselves.And finally we get:”In fact men are competitors with other men and attack other men but help and protect women. When men are in charge women receive extra benefits over other men (their competitors).”This is a great quote to support the concern of feminists that women are not taken seriously for their expertise and competency in the workplace. You’re saying that the reason any woman is promoted or praised is because when men are in charge they’re looking to gain favor with women against other men. Incredible. Thank you for making clear another ” issue where women in the US today are worse off than men are”
Thank you for that! I feel much better about myself now!! <3
Hey Jaki.
“Hearing them is like hearing someone assert “But I didn’t evolve from a monkey!” for the billionth time.”This is probably taking the metaphor too far, but part of the problem here may be that you view “humans and chimps share a common ancestor” and “I’m not overreacting” as equivalently, demonstrably true. They’re not. “Overreacting” is by definition a judgment call, not something that can be unambiguously proved. Mistaking opinion for fact is an easy way to get very mad, very fast, and be very, very ineffective with your anger.Now, I don’t think you do overreact to the sexism stuff, not that I’ve seen. But your metaphor made me very uncomfortable. Opinions, even very justifiable ones, and ones that I agree with, are not fact. And disagreeing with you is not the same as denying mountains of scientific evidence. You are not infallible.
Ah, I wasn’t trying to comment on the scientific nature of the statement. I was just trying to come up with a phrase that you’ve heard and responded to over and over and over again. Maybe “Atheists all hate God” would have been a better choice.
Sorry for the off-topic post but I started getting all grumpy and discouraged about all of this stuff… and then I sat down and listened to this song again (
and felt immediately better… “Scrooge Fucking McDuck” hehe… so I thought maybe some other people in this comment chain (not to mention Jen herself) could use a bit of something to make them smile too…I highly recommend a listen for people getting frustrated… The message works for so many situations, also the song is awesome and just makes me smile.Or if you want something purely geeky to get your mind off of controverial subject debates how about an awesome song about quarks… mmm… geeky science songs make everything better
Nothing says that you think they are awesome better than feeding their video game addictions. You rock Rocki!
I had some time to look over the stats and wow… look at all the political power women have in the US! Almost 17% of the parlimentary seats were occupied by women in 2010… that is only 10% away from the 28% in Afghanistan! (I am just reporting the US stats because Attendee is insistent that he is UScentric in his arguments but stats for other countries are all available at http://unstats.un.org/unsd/dem…6.0% unemployment for men and 5.4% for women (Where unemployment is defined as someone able to work, available to work, and actively looking for work… so remember people who count themselves as stay at home parents do not count as unemployed..whether they are male or female).Life expectency 78 for men, 82 for women (~ 5% difference)Interestingly literacy rates are not published for Canada or the United States (if you look through the list the literacy rates for women are almost uniformly either equal to or less than those of men.)females make up 49% enrollment in primary and secondary school (no surprise there… fairly even rate would be expected due to the laws in the states)Interesting jump in Tertiary education – enrollment is made up of 57% women. (No break down is given of degrees of study. Note that in most countries the it hovers between 40-60% usually quite close to 50%)Teachers: Primary school: 86%, Secondary School: 60%, Tertiary Education: 46%… that’s an interesting decline… Lots of probable factors contributing to that distribution… (also interesting that a lot of contries have a similar distribution…)58% of women are economically active (in the labour force i.e working or looking for work) and 72% of men are economically active… (remember the previous stat about unemployment rates…)67% of part time work is done by women. 19% of economically active women work part time. 9% of economically active men work part time.They don’t give stats for how many employers are women for the states so I’ll give you Canada’s instead: 7.1% of economically active men and 2.8% of women are employers, 12% of men work for themselves while 8.4% of women do so.43% of legislators, managers and senior officials are women.They do not provide statistics on wages for the US or Canada so I will go with the UK… Women earn 82% of mens wages in manufacturing. (Interesting note, that is one of the highest percentages… there are, however, 3 countries where women earn more including the Isle of Man…) Some of this discrepency may be accounted for by shorter hours (see part-time employment stats)There we go… some stats to while away the long winter nights (I didn’t give any analysis here and without looking at a few plots of the actual data I wouldn’t want to give any… but just a few data points to work from never hurt anyone)…I could be wrong but I don’t see a systematic trend in this data pointing towards repressing men for the benefit of women.. mostly I see fewer women in areas of increasing authority…I also notice that although Attendee was talking about the numbers of men who are unemployed vs women that he seems to have missed that how the unemployment stat is calculated is tied in with people who are not actually looking for work. The percentage of women vs. men who are not considered economically active (i.e. working or looking for work) which works out to a difference of 14%… more than adequately covers the discrepency of 0.6% unemployment rate (calculated based on the number of people who are actively seeking work rather than percentage who don’t have jobs)… so it looks like he isn’t above either distorting his presentation of statistics or just accidently misrepresenting it due to not looking into how the factors were calculated.
“you have no sense of humor,” I’m so sick of this one, it gets dragged out every time I object to a “joke” that involves something along the lines of murdering hookers (“because they’re not real people!”) or “you know you want this [obscene hip gyrations]”(because that’s original…)I need a t-shirt that says something along the lines of, “Just because I don’t think you’re funny doesn’t mean I don’t have a sense of humor.”And “you’re overreacting/irrational/hysterical” does give me the exact same facepalm as “Why do you hate God?”People are stupid. You certainly react strongly to some things, but isn’t that what blogs are for? People don’t start blogging because they have no opinions, and I certainly wouldn’t read posts by someone so bland. Keep fighting the good fight!
Let’s see: people who disagree with you are liars, feminists claim that women are massively superior to men and anyone who was offended at the lecture is either lying or “mischaracterizing” what happened, which is actually the same thing. Imply devious motives. Check.Insult Jen’s intellect and accomplishments, belittle the blog post. Check.Claim you’re actually a feminist because you use gender-neutral language. Check.Accuse Jen of manufactroversy for the sake of page hits, claim that sexism is SO 20th-century, repeat the accusation of lying, toss in “scream” for a bit of sexist icing on the turdcake. Check.Survey says . . . asshole.
I inserted “a man” in there because it is the exact thing that is the problem. Men thinking they know best and then demanding a women satisfy their desires. How hard is it to come in here and ask the question as I posited in the post above? Not very, but yet you demand answers after levelling an accusation.Feminism is not like science in that everything is purely objective. Subjectivity must be taken into account, including the subject sexism that women face on a daily basis for their entire lives.So, are you coming in here to criticise, in which case I’m sure you can get find yourself another blog to troll, or are you coming here for conversation or to learn something? Conversation is not saying “you’re overreacting, the end”, nor is it the means to make anybody want to teach you something.Now if you’re here to educate the rest of us on how feminists should act, then I stand by my “arrogance” remark and politely tell you to fuck off.
“because a cause that seems very important to me now seems hopeless.”I have no idea what you mean by this. Both in that “a cause”, feminism?, is lost because ignorant people comment on your blog? That’s just quitter speak. You’ve never going to change all the people all the time, and the more you articulate your point of view the better off you’ll be. This post is a prime example of what not to do, it will only incite the trolls.Lemmie put it this way, things that are small and not important to me is likely to be really important to someone else, and vice versa. I could drown on for days about copyright, but I know if I come right out and call myself a copyright radical the likelihood of anyone listening to me goes down. I’m not saying don’t call yourself a feminist, but when you get hung up on labels, and your commenter get hung up on labels, it distracts you from your passion. What I’m trying to say is that we can all advocate for feminism, science, atheism, copyright, whatever, but the more we label ourselves, and the more we separate ourselves from the people obsessed with labels, the more we only preach to the choir. Something tells me that’s not your intention, but *shrug*
Attendee: it’s not ‘debate’ when you assert a priori that feminism is bunk. It’s not debate when you’re abusive about the people or the terms involved. Maybe that’s why there’s a lack of real, critical engagement regarding feminism – so very few people try it.A ‘debate’ in your style seems to just end up as a circular argument, ’round and ’round, each side asserting their position and, from your example, refusing to even acknowledge any common ground. That isn’t critical debate – it’s childish bickering.
CivV FTW…(I don’t usually say things like that, but CivV rocks, and the patches keep making it better)
This is more on the side of sensitivity to others, but using the word “retarded” is like saying “that’s so gay.” I realize that you’re trying to make a point to support Jen and feminism, yet that word is offensive to a different group of people.
Hmmm. There seems to be quite a lot of fail here.You say “I reject the notion that men as a group are either powerful, or try to get power over women.”. And yet men have held almost every position of real power in human society for almost the entirety of recorded history. Right now, the vast majority of politicians and people of power are male. The vast majority of priests and other religious leaders are male. Men earn more money, and tend to have better jobs than their female counterparts.Also, you say “On the contrary for example historically women’s rights received more support from men than it did from women.” Now, if you think about it, the only people who could make a truly meaningful difference in supporting women’s rights historically were the politically enfranchised – and the politicians themselves. Before women got the vote they were politically disenfranchised, and there were no female politicians in positions of power who could support them. Add to that the fact that whilst men getting out and supporting causes of their choice was perfectly acceptable, women doing so would have been perceived in a deeply negative way by society at the time. Not exactly the kind of environment which allows women to show meaningful support for their own emancipation…You also say “In fact men are competitors with other men and attack other men but help and protect women.”. And the reason men (as you say) ‘help and protect women’? Because they have historically been regarded as weaker in every way and in need of protection and shielding from the big bad world. This is in itself an incredibly sexist statement to make.And yet, you look at the very serious problem of male violence and rape committed against women and it seems rather obvious that this helping and protecting isn’t exactly universal. In fact, a large part of what men have historically protected women from is the violence and unwanted attentions of other men.You serve principally to add yet another data point to an expanding set which indicates very strong correlation between being a ‘men’s rights activist’ and being a sexist, clueless idiot.
By acting like a sexist, insulting asshole you’re associating yourself with some real sexist, insulting assholes.
I don’t have much time (or in the case of the insulting/dismissive posts, inclination) to respond to the many comments. A lot of the stuff I already covered elsewhere. As a general reply I would point out that feminist “factoids” are often — ok almost always — false. This is one of feminisms’ conservative traits. As a movement feminism along with other conservative movements values loyalty and rigid agreement over truth and so they tell each other lots of little lies to make them feel more part of the group.A good example just recently from the conservative US government was a cable released by Wikileaks from the US representative in Cuban. This cable stated that Michael Moore’s film “Sicko” had been banned in Cuba because it would show to Cubans how their health care sucked compared to the fake hospital in the film — or some shit like that. It was all lies. Cuba actually broadcast “Sicko” on its national TV. But within the US government, loyalty and narrowly rigid agreement with right wing views about Cuba are more valuable than accuracy and truth.It is the same within the feminist movement. Feminist “factoids” are created to basically lie about men and women and make feminists feel more loyal to the movement. The biggest example is the equal pay for equal work fraud. I would guess that most feminists know that it is simply a lie to say women are paid less for the same work. Certainly many know that the figures bandied about by feminists and feminist influenced social institutions about how women earn 73 cents on the dollar — is false. A lie. A very big lie for forty years.The numbers are not a comparison of men and women working at the same jobs but they are presented as such to breed loyalty to the movement / hostility towards men.I put it to you that a genuine free thinker would reject this conservative method of spreading lies so as to gain loyalty of its membership, and instead demand the truth and call out anyone spreading falsehoods. I have seen this reaction from a feminist precisely once in twenty years. Only once have I seen a feminist who just learned that Equal Pay Day is a lie, react by getting angry. (This is the woman I referred to before who used to have a blog with Ampersand – whose new web site various people have linked to). She was angry to have been lied to and angry at Ampersand because, of course, he knew all along it was a lie. She had genuinely believed women were paid less than men for the same work!! Why? Because all her feminist friends kept telling her that.If you any of you have a real belief in equality you need to get out of that movement.
What a sexist statement – but no doubt approved of by feminists.
Yes the typical response to criticism from the left, by feminists, has been to make accusation that their critics are pedophiles or some other kind of sexual pervert.That says a lot about feminism.
Please list some of the books you have read by feminist critics.Oh? None?Please mention at least some of the names of prominent critics of feminism on the left.Oh you never heard of any?
Ok, what you’re doing now IS thread derailing, which is a bannable offense. Cut it out and stay on topic.
And I would be called an obnoxious asshole because of my views. How many feminists on this blog have you called an obnoxious asshole?
Please point to where you’ve heard the arguments I used before.
Men, not women, are the victims of violence more. Most rape in the US is rape of men.There is no stigma for women enjoying sex. Are you from the 18th century?Gay men are discriminated against more than gay women are.I don’t see your point about dress codes. But in general men’s dress is restricted far more than women’s. It is perfectly fine for a woman to wear men’s clothes but vice versa makes the man a pervert. In general men’s role is far narrower and more regimented and deviation punished more harshly.The other two seem petty in the extreme. But I would say that men are attacked far more often in popular culture than women and attacking men either physically or verbally is much more acceptable in our culture.So none of those were valid. Again a few issues facing men — real issues – so you know what a real issue looks like.Men die years before women do.Men are about 90% of workplace fatalities.Women go to college about 50% more than men do.Women almost always get custody of children upon divorce.Something like 90% of people behind bars are men – worse than the racism.A huge majority of the homeless are men.Men die of almost everything at a higher rate than women yet receive less medical attention.Men commit suicide at 4 times the rate of women.And as above men are the victims of violence (but receive less aid), men’s gender roles are narrower and more enforced, men have no advocates on their behalf whereas women have endless legions of government departments, NGOs, charities and so on fighting for them.
Fuck it, banned. I gave you a chance. You responded by repeatedly posting unfounded and uncited ridiculous lies, thread derailing, and purposefully upsetting other commenters. The reason you’re banned from feminist sites aren’t because they’re afraid of your good ideas, it’s because you don’t have any and you’re an asshole.
Were you trying for an award in straw-manning with that? I’m so glad Jen finally banned you. She has a lot more patience for obnoxious trolls than I would.
I moved this comment to the bottom of the page where he made a parting, poorly aimed pot shot, at people being dismissive and insulting him and all of us using faked statistics while he is the keeper of the “true” indicators.I’m sensing a little bit of hypocrisy here…
Okay one last thing to bring facts to the table about some of your claimed “facts” throughout this argument (although if I followed your criteria proposed above of not responding to insulting or dismissive posts I wouldn’t have debated you in the first place seeing as your first post was essentially dismissively insulting anyone who thought that women’s rights were something worth defending)…Check your stats on the rape… I am actually astonished that you can even claim that men are raped more than women seriously! Estimates are that approximately 91% of rape victims are women and that 99% of rape perpetrators are men… even accounting for the errors of reporting there is no data anywhere support the idea that more men are raped than women in the US. If there is any cue you give that you don’t actually care about the facts and only want things to fit your preconceived notion it was this statement.I cannot speak to the differing reception to gay men and women. As I have always been assumed to be, and interacted with as though I am, a straight woman (Despite being bi… that’s just what happens when you are bi and have been dating a guy for 5 years… and having little interest in non-friend relationships prior to this time). I would not be surprised if it was harder for gay men, but I am also entirely aware that it is not easy for lesbians either.There is definitely a stigma against women enjoying and seeking sex! Are you kidding? All I can say here is that you haven’t been paying attention to how women are actually treated (by other women or men) when they are known for “looseness” or being “easy”…. just saying, puritanical views are still very demonstrably dominant in todays society (just look at the USs abstinence only education). Women get told “they were asking for it” in rape cases. We are told that men are told that they have “strong urges that are difficult to control”. We are told the normal women have lower sex drives than men… We are told that women (but not men) are supposed to be more selective and are supposed to always be seeking permanent companionship rather than simply sexual relationships. We are told that normal women withold sex as a form of power in their own household. How does this add up to no stigma?You don’t see the point about the dress code because you have never had to wear women’s dress shoes for any length of time. =PAnd it is definitely true that trans behaviour from simple clothing to actual gender transmution is heavily stigmatised… Women to men are less easily visible in todays society but those that actually change do experience some of this stigma (if people know they have made the change). Also some of the best anecdotal data out there on differences between men and women can be had from trans gendered people who have reported on the differences in how people interact and treat them before and after they make their gender change.You can choose to think that the last two are petty, you’ve never had them directed towards you so I can’t expect you to understand their cumulative effect or how they drive what people grow up believing (and actually how they affect girls who are growing up and forming a personality in society).As to the issues you raise:Men do tend to live slightly shorter lives. Due to many factors that do include increased workplace accidents… but women (indeed feminists) who want more gender equality would actually like to see about even numbers of women and men in the workplace (rather than the 72% of men and 58% of women being active in the workforce. US stats). And would like it to be easier for women to enter male-dominated positions (often the dangerous ones you cite). Therefore feminism in this instance is actually fighting to eliminate the cause you cite and is your ally. There are, of course many complicated factors in lifespan that include diseases etc and a persons propensity to contract them.Women do not go to college 50% more often than men do. In the states 57% of college/university attendees are women. The difference is 7% not 50%…. You do realise that when you make up statistics like this, and make ill informed comment, such as the one about rape, you seriously hurt the credibility you try to claim by saying you argue from real data and are interested in real debate, right?Women do get custody more often, and I agree that this is not ideal at all. But it is rooted in the old steretyped gender roles that feminists are actually fighting. Feminists trying to remove the gender roles are again your allies. By removing this we would remove something that is damaging to both men and women. But yes, fewer feminists fight this statistic because it isn’t one of their special interests, however a closing of the remaining gender gap and stereotypical gender roles will result in less discrimination in custody cases.Your incarceration statistic is true. But you leave out the portion where the fastest growing demographic in prison is women. You also do not discuss the proportion of women vs men who are committing and being tried for crimes… http://law.jrank.org/pages/125… I am not going to speculate on why there are differences that is a complex question that I do not know nearly enough about to even speculate wildly on…”Most studies show that single homeless adults are more likely to be male than female. In 2007, a survey by the U.S. Conference of Mayors found that of the population surveyed 35% of the homeless people who are members of households with children are male while 65% of these people are females. However, 67.5% of the single homeless population is male, and it is this single population that makes up 76% of the homeless populations surveyed (U.S. Conference of Mayors, 2007).” Also cited are statistics saying the reasons for homelessness differ vastly between men and women: “Findings indicated women and men experienced homelessness somewhat differently. Women were more likely to become homeless because of eviction and domestic violence, whereas men were more likely to become homeless as a result of unemployment, alcohol abuse, and jail release.” (Hagan, 1987)In the United States, women have better access to healthcare, in part, because they have higher rates of health insurance. In one study of a population group in Harlem, 86% of women reported having health insurance (privatized or publicly assisted), while only 74% of men reported having any health insurance. This trend in women reporting higher rates of insurance coverage is not unique to this population and is representative of the general population of the US.Gender based perceptions of health and healthcare may help explain some of the lag of men behind women in levels of insurance coverage. Women report higher rates of illness than men, which barring the idea that women are sicker than men, indicates women are more likely to seek medical care out and are therefore more likely to possess medical insurance.Gender related disparities in access to healthcare are also related to socioeconomic factors including geographic job-market differences and differing levels of government assistance available to men and women. There are fewer job opportunities with insurance coverage available to men and women living in poorer communities, and of these opportunities, women tend to occupy more of the jobs with these benefits. Government assistance available to these individuals without job-related coverage varies between men and women, with women, especially women with children, receiving a higher percentage of available public assistance than men. Ultimately, for both men and women discrepancies in access to adequate healthcare is largely based on socioeconomic issues including income and full-time work status, with both groups of men and women with higher levels of income and full-time work receiving greater access to adequate healthcare. (Merzel, 2000).Men do commit suicide more often than women. I cann
ot speculate on the causes as I have no knowledge of the various factors contributing.The 0.6% unemployment rate between men and women in the US workforce is more than accounted for in the fact that there are 14% fewer women than men actually in the workforce to begin with. (those who are not actively employed or seeking employment are not counted as unemployed… so stay at home parents are not considered unemployed).Men do not have special interest groups fighting for them because most of the problems that predominantly affect men are not considered “special interest” problems, they are considered general problems. For example crime rates (including violent crimes which are mostly perpetrated against men) are something that is considered a general interest issue. Where there are “special interest” problems such as those that affect gay men there ARE special interest groups dedicated to advocating for their rights.Men are the dominant decision and policy makers in the US (and really, the world) meaning that problems that dominantly affect men do not generally need to be brought to the attention of these policy makers as they live with them every day.The reason men’s gender roles are societally enforced more stringently than women’s is generally because women’s gender roles are considered less important/ less desirable/ and requiring less competence (whether or not this is true). This means that someone trying to enter that role will recieve the negative pressure associated with this gender role… so even this heavy enforcement of male stereotypes has routes in imbalanced mysogenistic past weights on gender roles that are still affecting us today.I never for one instant argued that there are not problems that affect men more than women… I argued that the balance of power was actually still with men and that this balance adversely affects both men and women and we would be better off without the disparity. I also never pulled statistics out of the air without a reference to a credible source… unlike someone else we may have seen…
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&q=feminism+censors+critics“About 2,070,000 results”
Two or three at least.
Just you, so far, but I’ve called a couple of people douchebags.And I think your views contribute to you being an obnoxious arsehole, but it’s more your delivery, which is abrasive, in-your-face and excessively hostile.Oh yeah, and wrong.
I’m also glad that Jen banned you, what with your response bearing NO resemblance to my comment. I wish it were just me but, *sigh*, it’s true for all your statements.Still, I haven’t had this much fun in *weeks*.
First of all, I love L4D, and play it regularly. Also, I’m a huge fan of Jen and her posts, but isn’t saying “shoot the fuck” offensive?Nevermind that they’re zombies, but let’s keep in mind that “fucking” is a historically aggressive manner of sex that men have been perpetrating on women for centuries. The word itself embodies the most violent and … dare I say … nonconsentual penile activities in our society.Why am I the only one offended by this terminology?
Your post made me laugh, although it is a very serious matter. My aunt, working in an all-male office, had a similar caveat: NEVER. Get. The Tea.She knew that the moment she fetched anyone’s drink, she would be the tea-lady forever, and kiss promotions goodbye. Good strategy.
Hey JM? Do you think that it is all trope? All the time? Or has there been a time that claims of sexism have been overblown? Have you ever over reacted because of the personal investment?
Because thats not the only thing it means, and in the context it has fuckall to do with fucking.http://wordnetweb.princeton.ed…
Also, fucking doesn’t imply that its nonconsentual. It may be crude and vulgar and dirty but in no respect does it imply that it was not a consentual act. The word for that is rape.Edit: in retrospect these two posts could seem really consescending, and I understand how the word fucking usually implies sexual relations (though not rape to be certain) but it also serves as an informal colloquial intensifier “That fucking rope is too long” to add emphasis where desired. Its usage in my original post was in no way even tangentially related to sex or forcible sex acts by either gender onto either gender, but was utilized in order to emphasize the level of destruction delivered to the digital zombies i often come up against when i’m destressing.
Going to disagree with you there. Allow me to prove my point:”Your computer is fucked.” (Obviously someone did not consent to their computer being violated and destroyed.)”That drunk driver came out of no where and fucked up my car.” (No consent there.)
What I’m really trying to say is that “fuck” is the only curse word we have for “violated” AND it is the only curse word we use for sexual penetration.To say that “fuck” doesn’t have rape connotations is just being insensitive.
How about this – it implies non-consent in the everyday use of the word ‘imply’, as in suggest. It doesn’t imply it in the logic sense of the word, as in guarantee.There are uses of the word ‘fuck’ that have no non-consent involved (I have a bi poly female friend who uses it as her preferred word for sexual interaction of any significant sort), so it can’t be a logical implication. This difference in terminology might contribute to people’s difference of opinion here?In any case, while it does suggest non-consent, I don’t think it suggests it that strongly. It really depends on context.
Oh, and those examples are reliant on one particular vernacular meaning of ‘fuck’, that found in ‘fuck up’, rather than any sexual meaning. The fact it has multiple senses is one of the reasons it’s a problematic word, I think.That said, if there’s a widespread feeling that it has rape connotations, it should be avoided in favour of a suitable alternative, except where it is really specifically requireed – it’s just a matter of sensitivity.
Going purely by your previous examples (as I’m trying to understand where you’re coming from), I’m not sure that the meaning would generally be seen as violated, as opposed to ‘put into a bad condition’ – consider “I really fucked up that exam”. Of course, I’m not contesting that a connotation of violation might be perceived by some people.On an entirely separate matter, this made be suddenly realise… judging by TV, Americans don’t appear to consider ‘screw’ (used for the same range of meanings as ‘fuck’) to be profane. It’s odd. Not as odd as Americans using British English profanity and getting away with it, of course…
Thank you for giving me a chance to explain myself more fully and maintaining an open venue for discourse about the word.One of feminism’s greatest battles yet to be won (in the US) is “sex is violent, and violence is sexy” idea that perpetuates the rape culture we live in.To bring you up to speed, one way the rape culture is fed by using the term “rape” in other definitosn, such as “We raped the other team.” I assume the people reading this blog are sensitive enough to know not to use the term “rape” lightly. What I’m saying is that when you use a “triggering” word like “rape” incorrectly (thereby perpetuating rape culture) and it angers/hurts people, you probably recognize why it’s not a good idea to do that.However, there is a huge double standard when it comes to the word “fuck.” Fuck is a violent, angry term that is the ONLY curse word we have that relates to sexual penetration. “I’m going to fuck you up.” refers to a beating or a defeat. “I’m going to fuck you” has only two meanings (to penetrate or to be deceptive/cheat)I’m glad that you’ve given me the opportunity to explain in more detail (I was time limited before.) and I hope I’ve gotten my point across.One last important thing: I recognize that my position regarding the word “fuck” may not be very common or widespread. However, don’t use the argument from popularity here. I have explained how a reasonable person could see the word “fuck” as perpetuating rape culture/violence/sexism. If my claim is reasonable, then does it also have to be widespread to be valid?And put even more clearly: If you all (as a group) dismiss my offense at the use of the word “fuck,” and and decide to keep using the term, then how are you all (as a group) any better than the people who dismissed the women claiming that they were being marginalized?
(actually in reply to your reply to me, but the nesting limit hit)It is difficult, because ‘fuck’ does have other vernacular meanings that aren’t inherently violatory (as in my example). However, as alternatives are generally available (even if less profane), there’s little to be lost in avoiding the word.It is worth avoiding the word because discomfort in the word is not that uncommon, for a range of reasons (including those you raise – it isn’t the first time I’ve heard them). Sure, there can be a debate as to whether the discomfort is reasonable, but should one only allow for reactions that are found to be reasonable? Humans aren’t entirely reasonable beings, and claiming that atheism or scepticism implies that they should be is to ignore entirely secular evidence in social sciences, psychology/psychiatry, and more.
Nesting limit: To Jwilder204: Its an interesting position you’re taking, I do maintain however that the word fuck with its other meanings can be free of sexual connotation given the correct context, I believe my original comment on zombies to be one of them.On your “sex is violent, violence is sexy” comment I wanted to point out that some couples enjoy kink that to others would be considered violent, but the key is consent and mutual respect. Violent sex is not rape by definition, so long as there is consent its kink. Just a loose end I wanted to address.
I imagine it depends on whether you’re going to misconstrue acknowledgement that it’s happened ever as prima facie evidence that it’s happening this and every subsequent time.
I realize my question looks like a cheap trap, but it was asked honestly. I was getting the impression that there is a disconnect in what is being argued and perceived by both sides.
There are always going to be people (of any opinion) who decide to ignore evidence in favour of what they fits their story better or just causes the least amount of cognitive dissonance. So yes, there are some feminists who make false claims, but no more in proportion to the rest of the group than any other movement. Some scientists have dedicated their lives to trying to prove something that they feel must be so, even though every indication they ever get says it isn’t (from history take Kepler who was certain that the planet’s orbits must fit within the perfect geometric objects nested into one another… even though he found that the orbits were elliptical and didn’t fit into his idea he still never stopped trying to get “better” data so that he would see that his supposition was right… luckily he was also scrupulously honest and only reported what the data told him, if only we could all be at least that…)People are people wherever you are and in whatever group you are in. And sadly people are very good at putting on the blinders. Just as I think that Attendee actually believed in the validity of what he was saying (despite its demonstrable falseness) so do most people who use false facts to argue a deeply held point. It would be nice if the human brain was better at accepting and critically analysing new data/ view points… but the truth is it requires a great deal of examination both of your own cognitive processes and outside data… and even those who consider themselves reasonably skeptical hold certain “truths” in their head that they think don’t need a critical eye turned to them because, well, they are true (whether or not that is the case).
I’ve been hesitating to say this because I’m not sure how it will be received, but in the end I’ve decided to offer some advice. You certainly are the one who gets to decide whether or not to take it, but I’m worried about how you are describing how all this is affecting you.I was sexually abused as a child. I have suffered from PTSD as a result. I know about “triggers” and being “triggered” and so forth. I know how hard it is. And truly, if you are getting triggered by the things you mentioned, then I urge you to make a concentrated effort to stop being triggered, to work through being triggered. I’ve had to deal with a lot of triggers over the years, in my experience, the only time you ever stop getting triggered is when you get over being triggered, not when the world stops doing things to trigger you. Triggering is too debilitating to live with in the hopes that the triggers will go away. Counselors are a good resource to go to for help on how to stop being triggered.
I actually hear a lot about triggers and handling thereof coming out of the fanfic/fandom communities (my other half is involved and talks to me about the general points). For example, it’s certainly reasonable that one warn about content that is a clear potential trigger, but some people say you should warn about all potentially-triggering content, missing the fact that this covers almost everything… it has to be said, though, that IME the precise meaning of ‘trigger’ varies on a spectrum between a very technical meaning in the psychology/psychological therapies/psychiatry community and a much fuzzier meaning in various other communities, including some modern feminist discourse.It seems to me that the use here basically means “terms that will have (negative) loaded meanings or associations for many people hearing it that many speakers will be unaware of”. For example, in one of these threads (might even be this one) someone discussed the meanings of ‘fuck’; it’s obviously coarse language and some object to the profanity, but to them it has loaded meaning involving violation. So we see the same thing with ‘female’ in some situations. We’re all (I imagine) aware of the associations and loaded meanings associated with ‘cunt’. The term ‘nigger’ is pretty universally understood as offensive, but depending on the audience ‘black’, ‘coloured’ and even ‘of colour’ might be offensive when the speaker thinks they are the polite, politically correct terms and can be ‘triggering’ in senses I’ve seen used. On the flip side, some people (mostly men) seem to have similar reactions (related to ‘different understanding’) to the word feminism, and in all cases it is presumptuous to immediately assume that the reaction is either reasonable or unreasonable. An interesting question is why it is more acceptable to attack someone, or at the very least insist they are misunderstanding, if they have trouble with ‘feminist’ (or ‘patriarchy’) than if they have trouble with ‘fuck’ or ‘female’ (in my experience, anyway); in all cases there is likely a disconnect between the way a term is meant and the way it is received; surely in both cases the appropriate response should be to clarify the intended meaning, and explore whether it might be appropriate to use a different term. Given how widespread visceral negative reaction to ‘patriarchy’ seem to be, and how poorly the word casually reflects its meaning, I think there could be a strong argument for look alternative terms there, but the term is possibly too well-embedded now.If a word is poorly received in this way by a majority/privilege group, that is seen as far less important than such a reception by a recognised minority group. This is reasonable, but it would be so much better if we could find ways of using terms that would be clearly understood by everyone and only produce bad reactions in individual cases which can be recognised as exceptional (such as PTSD). It’s just a shame that language doesn’t work that way; meanings shift over time, usage shapes meaning, and sometimes people even encourage misunderstandings (see ‘patriarchy’ again, I guess).This largely pointless waffle has been brought to you by the condition ‘narcolepsy’ and the medication ‘modafinil’… I think different bits of my brain wake up at different speeds.
O________________________________O (Trying to reply to Attende) Site sources please?
Are you alergic to backing up your claims? Please cite your sources. IF this was true, damnit, I would WANT to know.
This…makes me weep for the future of my species.So you come in here insult people make arguments and site statistics with no sources, accuse feminists of censorship and when the owner of the blog, a self proclaimed feminists INVITES you to stay you decline,say it;s a waste of your time and say she’s not a feminist….*Long suffering sigh*
Where are these sources you speak of? Please cite them?