Feminism and Gender

[Rairun]

Uh, sweetie, patriarchy hurts gay men immensely. But seeing as gay men aren't really men, I can see how that comment is completely appropriate in overlooking us.

I don't see how my post overlooks gay men at all. In fact, it specifically addresses a subset of men which includes them (ie. non-heteronormative men). Gay men are less privileged than straight men, but that doesn't change the fact that in many ways they still have male privilege.

I'm not going to engage in oppression olympics here - I'm not interested in knowing who's more oppressed, straight women or gay men - but gay men still reap benefits from the patriarchy, even if they are also hurt by it in several ways. Their maleness isn't normative, but it's still male.

 

[Tsukasa Buddha]

I don't see how my post overlooks gay men at all. In fact, it specifically addresses a subset of men which includes them (ie. non-heteronormative men). Gay men are less privileged than straight men, but that doesn't change the fact that in many ways they still have male privilege.

I'm not going to engage in oppression olympics here - I'm not interested in knowing who's more oppressed, straight women or gay men - but gay men still reap benefits from the patriarchy, even if they are also hurt by it in several ways. Their maleness isn't normative, but it's still male.

But I think this type of argument just begs for oppression/privilege olympics, especially since activists using the language are so wont to discuss male privilege and never mention female privilege, cisgender privilege, male oppression, the dependency on context, etc. in their analyses. That's why I prefer talking about coercion, social pressure and limits.

I feel the terminology that people "have" a privilege, that it has somehow imbued them, is a misnomer and a real turn off to people. It is a product of social interaction, not a spectre.

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

I don't see how my post overlooks gay men at all. In fact, it specifically addresses a subset of men which includes them (ie. non-heteronormative men). Gay men are less privileged than straight men, but that doesn't change the fact that in many ways they still have male privilege.

I'm not going to engage in oppression olympics here - I'm not interested in knowing who's more oppressed, straight women or gay men - but gay men still reap benefits from the patriarchy, even if they are also hurt by it in several ways. Their maleness isn't normative, but it's still male.

I'm sorry, but it's a rule here that you can be assumed to hold every stupid belief in the universe except those that you have explicitly denied within the short-term memory of the dumbest poster present. If you're lucky.

 

[Rairun]

But I think this type of argument just begs for oppression/privilege olympics, especially since activists using the language are so wont to discuss male privilege and never mention female privilege, cisgender privilege, male oppression, the dependency on context, etc. in their analyses. That's why I prefer talking about coercion, social pressure and limits.

I feel the terminology that people "have" a privilege, that it has somehow imbued them, is a misnomer and a real turn off to people. It is a product of social interaction, not a spectre.

I agree that "privilege" is a complicated word. My main problem with it is that it's ill-defined. Some use the word as if it meant "anything X has and Y doesn't". Others think it means "anything X stops Y from having". Others think it means "anything X has due to the fact Y doesn't". For example, I've seen people claim that being able to walk is an able-bodied privilege. Then other people came in and argued that no, that's not a privilege - able-bodied people are privileged because they don't have to deal with all the prejudice related to disabilities. And I'm yet to come across anyone who says that able-bodied people gain anything from marginalizing disabled people.

But when it comes to gender, men as a class most certainly gain advantages from marginalizing women as a class. When it comes to race, white people benefit from marginalizing people of color. It doesn't matter whether you yourself are sexist or racist. If you are a white man, you are going to have better opportunities than a black man, a white woman or a black woman. You're going to be taken more seriously when you speak. You're going to have more and better job opportunities - because less privileged people are not.

I find that many feminists agree that men have it worse in certain aspects of social life. But focusing on those aspects and pretending there is some sort of balance here is ridiculous. Sure, it's horrible that people act as if men were sexual predators who can't be trusted around young children (it's particularly bad for gay men), but women have several other disadvantages AND an economic one, from which men benefit directly. In short, I'm not saying the bad things that happen to men are unimportant because women have it worse - I'm saying that we shouldn't pretend men don't benefit economically from the subordination of women, because they do.

 

[AvalonXQ]

And I'm yet to come across anyone who says that able-bodied people gain anything from marginalizing disabled people.

I'll make that argument.

The disabled require special accomodations. Wheelchair ramps, braille, closed captioning. These things cost time to plan and resources to implement. A society that marginalizes the disabled doesn't have to be concerned about providing these things.

There; how's that?

 

[Rairun]

I'll make that argument.

The disabled require special accomodations. Wheelchair ramps, braille, closed captioning. These things cost time to plan and resources to implement. A society that marginalizes the disabled doesn't have to be concerned about providing these things.

There; how's that?

As far as I can tell, it's true too. I think the main difference between this and gender is that the number of disabled people is nowhere near 50% of the population. We'd have to spend more money, but that's pretty much it. If disabled people were suddenly able to compete on equal terms in the job market, it wouldn't make that much of a difference. On the other hand, if women were able to enter male dominated fields on equal terms, things would become considerably harder for men.

 

[Belz...]

In some areas, that may well be the case. College applicants, for example. Although we still don't have equal numbers of men and women in the hard sciences.

Maybe women are simply not as interested in them as men. I'm sure there are areas where this is reversed. Seems fine to me.

 

[luchog]

My score then, as now, is -11, which puts me in the "nearly masculine" category.

I scored a +1; which is pretty much what I expected, as I always tend to score well into the androgynous part of the spectrum on any sort of gender assessment tests.

One thing that struck me, that I never noticed before, is that these sorts of tests are geared toward the neurotypical. I wonder how something like, for example, ASDs would skew the results? I know several women who would score well into the "masculine" side due to Aspergers Syndrome.

 

[Fishstick]

I'll make that argument.

The disabled require special accomodations. Wheelchair ramps, braille, closed captioning. These things cost time to plan and resources to implement. A society that marginalizes the disabled doesn't have to be concerned about providing these things.

There; how's that?

The disabled are however still properly capable of contributing to society in meaningful ways, so there are still benefits to gain in planning for their wellbeing and social integration.

 

[slingblade]

Maybe women are simply not as interested in them as men. I'm sure there are areas where this is reversed. Seems fine to me.

That could easily be part of it. I am not trying to argue against this idea.

I went to college in middle-age. I am interested in the sciences, but I knew I did not have the math skills or ability to do well in science as a course of study. I went with an English concentration and an Education minor.

This is, or it seems to be and I could be mistaken, another "gender difference" that appears to have been more imposed than assumed. By that, I mean that women don't tell themselves they are bad at math, so much as they are told they are bad at math, by teachers and parents. (Those are generalizations on my part, and are not intended to be 100% accurate.)

The topic has been studied, however. When I was in public school, in the '60s and '70s, studies done showed that girls were steered away from maths, essentially made to feel math was a "guy thing." Remember the 1992 talking Barbie that said, "Math class is tough!"?

Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison say that gender inequality is the cause of the “math gap” between boys and girls—not just girls sucking at math.

The study looked at countries in the World Economic Forum’s Gender Gap Index and found that girls score better at math in countries where there is more freedom, better education and financial opportunities for females. For example, girls in Iran, that beacon of women’s rights, scored low in the International Mathematical Olympiad—but in the U.S., girls are taking high school calculus at the same rate as boys. But don’t burn your “math is hard!” Barbie in a flaming pyre just yet. In American schools, boys are still considered to be more “mathematically gifted” than girls, meaning that your little sisters and nieces are still being discouraged at schools. From Fox News:

“There’s a gender stereotype that boys are better at math than girls are, and stereotypes die very hard,” [University of Wisconsin-Madison psychology professor Janet] Hyde told LiveScience. “Teachers and parents still believe that boys are better at math than girls are.”

The blog post was written by a woman, and her final comment regards the D+ she got in college math, and she muses she didn't know her bad grade was a result of gender stereotypes. She sounds...unconvinced, and a tad sarcastic. http://www.thefrisky.com/2009-06-04/barbie-says-math-is-hard-researchers-say-girls-can-handle-it/

But as mentioned, this is hardly a new idea. I've been hearing about it since the '70s, myself, and it could be even older than that.

While in college, I despaired a bit, because I knew I'd have to take a year of math, including the dreaded algebra I failed so miserably at in 7th grade and never tried again.

But in college, I took a 101 Logic class, in which it quickly dawned on me that logic is algebra, but using words instead of numeric equations. After passing that course with an A, I went on to pass my algebra and College Mathematics courses with a B in each.

It disturbs me a bit to consider I might have gone a different direction, had I this opportunity while I was still in public school.

 

[TragicMonkey]

And the "math and science are for boys" goes along with the "English is for girls". There were never more than two or three other boys in any of my honors English classes, and teachers sometimes suspected me of cheating in writing assignments because I wrote well. Real boys don't have large vocabularies, are incapable of expressing themselves, and certainly don't do creative writing. Or anything creative, for that matter. Real boys take shop and talk about sports, they don't have imaginations and make anything outside of shop class.

 

[luchog]

You know, you can't say you've ever really lived until you've been forced to your knees by your husband, and beaten in the head with a bible while he screams at you to "Submit, submit!"

Try as I might, I can't find that anywhere in there anywhere in any of the versions I have access to. could you point me to the specific verse that mandates husbands beating their wives into submission, and what translation it's in?

 

[Rairun]

And the "math and science are for boys" goes along with the "English is for girls". There were never more than two or three other boys in any of my honors English classes, and teachers sometimes suspected me of cheating in writing assignments because I wrote well. Real boys don't have large vocabularies, are incapable of expressing themselves, and certainly don't do creative writing. Or anything creative, for that matter. Real boys take shop and talk about sports, they don't have imaginations and make anything outside of shop class.

I completely agree. This is a problem. It's important for girls to feel they can do maths and science, and for boys to feel that English is for them too. From a personal, "I want to do whatever makes me happy" point of view, this is equally damaging to both genders.

But then an unhappy girl graduates as an English major, and an unhappy boy graduates as an engineer. They are both unhappy, but financially their situations are very different. It also doesn't help that even in a supposedly female dominated field like literature, male writers are still more acclaimed.

 

[slingblade]

Try as I might, I can't find that anywhere in there anywhere in any of the versions I have access to. could you point me to the specific verse that mandates husbands beating their wives into submission, and what translation it's in?

I never said it was.

 

[luchog]

But then an unhappy girl graduates as an English major, and an unhappy boy graduates as an engineer. They are both unhappy, but financially their situations are very different. It also doesn't help that even in a supposedly female dominated field like literature, male writers are still more acclaimed.

That's in large part a holdover from the Victorian period, when women were considered incapable of any sort of intellectual activity. The "language is for women, math is for men" is a very recent invention; as previously in Anglo-derived cultures, both were the province of men (oration and rhetoric were still common school subjects). Those women who did write, typically did so under "male" pseudonyms.

 

[Mark6]

I scored a +1; which is pretty much what I expected, as I always tend to score well into the androgynous part of the spectrum on any sort of gender assessment tests.

One thing that struck me, that I never noticed before, is that these sorts of tests are geared toward the neurotypical. I wonder how something like, for example, ASDs would skew the results? I know several women who would score well into the "masculine" side due to Aspergers Syndrome.

If you buy the argument that AS/autism is "extreme manifestation of male brain", then it makes perfect sense.

 

[luchog]

I never said it was.

The context clearly implied that the abuse you described was justified by scripture.

 

[Mark6]

That's in large part a holdover from the Victorian period, when women were considered incapable of any sort of intellectual activity. The "language is for women, math is for men" is a very recent invention; as previously in Anglo-derived cultures, both were the province of men (oration and rhetoric were still common school subjects). Those women who did write, typically did so under "male" pseudonyms.

And routine math was not considered an "intellectual activity" -- so things like calculating artillery tables (lots and lots of repetitive boring arithmetic) were done by women. Right up until 1940's, when these women were finally replaced by computers. Nowadays it is a strangely forgotten piece of history.

 

[slingblade]

The context clearly implied that the abuse you described was justified by scripture.

The context did no such thing. You read it wrong.

 

[bookitty]

I don't believe I challenged you at all. Indeed, I try to avoid engaging with you, because you can get aggressively ideological around gender issues. That said, wtf are you on about? I quoted Bumble saying the law is an ass if it imagines a man is responsible for his wife's opinions and actions, and you took exception to that. And now here you are telling me who bumble is and I'm struggling to make sense of what you think you're trying to say or prove or demonstrate - except that you like a fight with those who don't share your ideology, because you know the casual observer will side with the woman (oh the oppression!). For the record, we're on the interwebs, and it aint even live. I could look up enough information to 'challenge the liberal book dealer' if that was what I wanted to do. Why add 'liberal', by the way? They're the only party who ever got a vote from me. Or should I hand in my party card because I don't agree with one element of what you have decided defines liberalism? I expected to get treated as a nazi for not being a feminist, to be fair - that's how it works - but really, as I've said, I'm not here for entrenched warfare, it's dull and counter-productive.

I said liberal because Dickens was progressive for his time. He's also one of my personal heroes.

In order to make a point that women have always had power you quoted a character who is so stupid, petty and cruel that the narrative demands he descend into a hellish existence. And not even for redemption but as destiny.

I asked if that was a joke and you tried to say that Charles Dickens would use the voice of one of his most contemptible characters to make a point about women in general. It's like saying the quote below is Dickens making the case for vegetarianism.

'Meat, ma'am, meat,' replied Bumble, with stern emphasis. 'You've over-fed him, ma'am. You've raised a artificial soul and spirit in him, ma'am unbecoming a person of his condition: as the board, Mrs. Sowerberry, who are practical philosophers, will tell you. What have paupers to do with soul or spirit? It's quite enough that we let 'em have live bodies. If you had kept the boy on gruel, ma'am, this would never have happened.'