Feminist Theory & "Women's Issues" Discussion Thread: All Gender Identities Are Encouraged To Participate

just observing the thread, just want to echo WCC, peta's gender politics are wretched and set back animal rights as a srs political issue to boot

I guess I was aware of their "veganism = sexy naked babes" angle before but this just seems next level with the whole sexualized violence thing.

point 1 - thanks people who talked about libidousness and "the feminine", i was posing my questions from a position of genuine ignorance and like so much else on this thread i feel like a world of reading/ideas has just been flagged out for me :)

point 2 - in my opinion the repressive narratives of an org like PETA are reproduced by plenty of "progressive" communities eg Green movements on class and race - this is the point of the idea of kyriarchy, surely i.e. "friendly" power structures still riddled with inequality etc

ENBB, the idea that "what it feels like to be a woman is emphatically NOT something that all women share and relate to, that being a woman is NOT a monolithic entity" is something that's pretty central to most (at least) Third Wave Feminism.

I can understand how, if you walk into a thread where a group of women have had a specific set of negative experiences are talking about them, and you say something like "well, I've never had those experiences (and can't really understand or relate to them)" that could be a pretty alienating experience. For *both* sides. But I do think there's been quite an effort on "the ILX gurl community" (through Jenny's (I think?)) manifesto (which may have got lost on the Sandbox) saying something like "it's valid for women to have these experiences and express them, it's valid for women to not have those experiences and express that, neither invalidates the experiences of the other." I'm sorry if you feel condescended to by that, but I'm not sure what else you want?

I watched the ad without sound (I'm at work obv).

but, wha?

isn't whether one has had certain experiences oneself actually...not relevant? what's important is the recognition that in other circumstances they could easily have happened to you.

i was never bullied at school for being gay, i've never been beaten up for being gay, i've never experienced homophobia in the workplace, marriage is something that i personally can take or leave, but those are all crucial to any discussion of gay rights and i recognise that. i certainly don't feel alienated when people talk about issues i haven't experienced. alter my circumstances or character slightly and it could easily have been me. i mean, all of that is why i'm in a thread about women's issues (along with several other dudes) even though we *can't* have experienced the things described here.

I haven't watched the PETA video partly because, no bandwidth, partly because I know it's something that will upset and offend me and I don't want to expose myself to that when I already know what PETA's tactics can be like.

But that idea behind kierarchy? kyriarchy? (that word seems to be spelled about half a dozen different ways over the blogosphere - it's from the same Greek as Kyrie as Kyrie Eleison (sp?) that some of us sung in church choirs meaning lord or master, but in a more gender neutral way than "patriarch.")

So many progressive movements have been riddled with both inequality and a kind of refusal to admit or acknowledge oppressions other than the one they have come together to fight. It is ironic that late 19th C First Wave Feminism (at least in the States) was partially born out of dissatisfaction with the amount of outright sexism in the Anti-Slavery movement. (And likewise Second Wave feminism being born out of sexism in the 60s Anti-War and Civil Liberty movements.) Only for the Feminist Movement(s) itself to fall prey to huge amounts of endemic racism and classism.

I'm still trying to get my head around kyriarchy. It seems like this way of trying to acknowledge that oppressions don't cancel each other out, they intersect - often in multiplying or exponential ways, rather than merely additive - and often come from the same root, no matter what the expression. That the privileging of male over female, white over black, light-skinned over dark-skinned, straight over gay, cis over trans, middle class over working class, upper class over all - that all of these things, rather than being separate systems are part of the same interlocking system designed with the idea of keeping the same few kinds of people bobbing up to the top every time. So that no, switching the straight white dude at the top with Margaret Thatcher OR Barack Obama, although symbolically powerful, does not make THAT much of a structural difference, UNLESS you start to dismantle the entire systemic structure of privilege that props it up. (Which, clearly Thatcher did not do, and Obama, the jury is still out on.)

It's hard, because there are some systems of privilege I instinctively grok, and others that I don't, that I have to try to imagine or project or extrapolate based on the experiences of others (and the Othered.) But one of the first steps is acknowledging that the experiences of others are real, are meaningful, even when they don't align with your own. Still working on that one. Trying, at least.

isn't whether one has had certain experiences oneself actually...not relevant? what's important is the recognition that in other circumstances they could easily have happened to you.

I think that bolded bit is important.

Anything I say that follows, it would be very easy to interpret as having a go at ENBB - it genuinely is not. I don't know ENBB that well, I can't say whether this applies to her or not. Any attempt to say that would be projection, and that *would* be condescending.

This is a thing, that I have seen many times, in women I do know well:

1) Women who do conform to their culture's expectations of "femininity" (and indeed women who can) - either through nature (they are just naturally pretty and chipper and people-pleasing!) or through carefully controlling their appearance and behaviour - these women often get an easier or simpler or less complicated ride through society. Conform to The Rules, you don't feel Patriarchy's teeth quite so hard. This is the way it works, this is why it's so effective.

(This also doesn't go into the hidden cost to some of these women - as we talked about on the Girl Thread, that maintaining ~nice-face~ can come at the emotional cost of suppressing one's true emotions and reactions, which *hurts*, and also that maintaining the right physical appearance leads to huge costs in terms of self esteem, image problems, body dysmorphic disorder. Some women are naturally thin, pretty and smiley. Some maintain this pose at huge costs to themselves.)

2) Some of these women draw conclusions from their experiences that either a) all women surely get this easier ride, and anyone who doesn't is moaning or making it up, or, somewhat worse b) that women who don't or *can't* conform to society's expectations of femininity are bringing it on themselves, whether that's harassment, bullying, rape or not just getting the promotion because someone mistook your assertiveness for being a bitch.

It is very hard for me, personally, as a non-conforming woman not to do the automatic cringe - when I encounter a woman who seems to be like paragraph 1, I expect paragraph 2 to be in the post, shortly behind. I'm sure that is unfair, because not all paragraph 1 women go on to paragraph 2, many of them are able to recognise there but for the grace of god go I when they see me get shit. But enough of them don't, that it's a natural defensiveness to expect 2 to follow 1.

I don't know if this applies to the women that feel alienated from these discussions. But that is what goes through my head, so if that's what's reading as being condescending or dismissive, I'm sorry it comes across that way. But it's bad enough going through negative experiences without it being implied it's your own fault for being yourself, and not like someone else.

ENBB, the idea that "what it feels like to be a woman is emphatically NOT something that all women share and relate to, that being a woman is NOT a monolithic entity" is something that's pretty central to most (at least) Third Wave Feminism.

Yes, I know that. I know quite more than you'd probably expect about feminism in general and particularly Third Wave Feminism. I was saying that it often *feels* that way on ILX discussions though. That said, I don't feel like you were really having a go at me but thanks anyway for the disclaimer.

You raised some really interesting points and I think that you've definitely hit the nail on the head in some respects and not so much in others but I need to get my ass in gear and get ready as I'm already late. Will respond later from work or tonight once I've had time to think about it some.

I am also sorry if I come across as preachy or 'splainy - I didnt go to school for this stuff, it was pieced together thru experience and research so I never know what's common knowledge and what's obscure to the point of requiring explanation.

I also get that the nature of ILX is such that the same experience can feel different ways to participants in the same thread. Like when I said on the blog thread that I *felt* like ppl were trying to tell me that my emotions were invalid - and in the process of ppl trying to say "but we didn't *mean* it like that!" some bloke came along and did *exactly* what I was afeared of, thus totally justifying the feeling.

Feelings and intentions don't always align; we need to recognise both. (this is a note to self as much as anything else.)

hey folks. a few things:

1) the first sexual revolution: lust and liberty in the 18th century souns v. interesting, so thanks, LL, for the tip

2) peta r vile

3) while i'd love to further discuss the impact biological gender has (and/or doesn't have) on human behavior, it seems that this probably isn't the best place for it. aok.

there's been a lot of talk on the thread about men being unable to escape their own privilege, or being unable in most cases to really understand what certain experiences are like for a woman.

I feel like both of these stances, while almost always true, are more counterproductive because they smuggle in through the backdoor exactly the kind of thinking I'd want to avoid. there's nothing theoretically impossible about someone gendered as a man understanding someone gendered as a woman's experience. there's nothing necessary in either experience. again, i dont think there's any such thing as a gender identity, and i neither do i think anyone has a transparent relationship to their privilege OR their oppression. it's not as if there's a group of privileged people on one side and oppressed on the other.

now is it almost always true? again, yes. but i feel like there's something at stake in making this (very fine) distinction.

I could very well be wrong about this, so I'd love to be schooled on it.

I don't really see the point of saying in 3000 different ways that not all men have benefited equally from privilege and not all women suffered equally from the lack of it. If we couldn't talk about THE EXISTENCE of the phenomenon just because it wasn't applied equally to every person ON THE FUCKING EARTH, we couldn't talk about it at all, ever. So what is your point?

acutally i'll revise a bit. what I'm worried about above is an essentialist "Men = priviledged, Women/Other = oppressed" dichotomy that basically repeats the gender binary that I'd want to avoid in a Utopia.

maybe NOT being in utopia means that dichotomy has some pragmatic value in certain circumstances, though not all.

I think it's important to realize that men stand on privilege at every turn whether they are nasty, unfeeling, or power-hungry or not. Even ones who are allied with women, working to help women, etc. Like if you can't get that then you will always be having the wrong discussion.

― Melissa W, Monday, February 13, 2012 2:39 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

certain circumstances = basically all of the circumstances you're likely to experience throughout the rest of your life, yes.

saying men have privilege in a patriarchal society is not essentialist.

i think the discussion you want to have, ryan, about ensuring that men still try to understand these things, is not blocked, but rather facilitated by acknowledging the workings of privilege

no of course. i wasn't try to get rid of the idea of privilege! i apologize if that came across. and trying to see your OWN privilege is always a hard and constant task i think. and yes of course being humble and shutting up sometimes and hearing others is often the best way.

if i rephrase it as a question, i asked: is making this distinction worthwhile? Thread (sensibly) answers no.

i'm not sure if i understand your post. i admit to being a little dissatisfied with discussions of privilege, too; it doesn't seem a full enough rendering of *inequality in the world* or whatever you want to call it. i think it's understood to be shorthand, though, and it's better than anything i can come up with. sometimes discussions about privilege do seem counterproductive to me, but that usually seems to stem from people not understanding what it is and thinking the point of these conversations is that privileged people should stay out of them/stop thinking about economic inequality/racism/sexism.

xp Not in the context of this thread or things we're likely to discuss here, I would venture to say. Because give butthurt dudes on the internet an inch and they'll take over your whole thread tbrr.

haha Laurel that's true. i apologize if i did that in any way.

i don't think there's anything wrong with saying 'i suffered/experienced this (x) too – or one of its analogues - and i want to engage in a substantive discussion about it' that reduces or flattens the experience of the OP or initial topic, even if it is about a gendered experience.

I think it's best for the thread to drop this discussion, but i remembered the essay that got me thinking about this. It's called "The Unquiet Judge" by Barbara Herrnstein Smith. therein she talks about the uses of "Objectivism" for both privileged and oppressed groups.

i've been thinking abt the kyriarchical approach to power relationships discussed upthread. though it arises from feminist thought, approach seems intended to shift the focus from any one specific power imbalance (such as male vs. female) onto a complex system of interconnected power relationship in which most people are simultaneously "the privileged" and "the oppressed".

privileged positions = white, male, heterosexual, cisgender, wealthy, upper or middle class, able-bodied, "attractive"/thin, lots of other positions relative to local culture (think hutu v tutsi).

oppressed positions = nonwhite, female, non-heterosexual, transgender, poor, lower or working class, disabled, "ugly"/fat, old, other positions relative to local culture.

this approach makes good sense to me, and i like the term, but what do we see as the primary implications of this approach?

WCC - I'm not going to respond as in-depth to what you said earlier as I'd like to becasue I feel like I could really only do so on a personal level and don't want to take this in that direction. That said, while I understand why you might think the way you do about the people you've described, it sounds like you're operating under of a lot unfair assumptions about the experiences of what you see as "paragraph 1" women and their "easier or simpler or less complicated" rides through society. I just think it's really important to bear in mind that no woman has it easy in regards to this stuff and just because their experiences in life may not mirror your own it doesn't mean for a second that they've necessarily been any less trying.

Just reading everything itt, and w/r/t WCC's categories:

Those categories you listed are exactly why I am too intimidated to weigh in here. It's like the thread is being constantly weighed and vetted for correctness of thought, and there's no room to just *try* to understand, *try* to discuss, because if you're not on point with terminology references & the "right" experience, you're dismissed, or categorized.

I dunno. It just grated on me. I'm not trying to start something. Just trying to speak as one of the "meek", idk

3) while i'd love to further discuss the impact biological gender has (and/or doesn't have) on human behavior, it seems that this probably isn't the best place for it. aok.

― Little GTFO (contenderizer), Wednesday, 15 February 2012 15:37 (4 hours ago)

If you start a thread on this I will join in with it.

you're operating under of a lot unfair assumptions about the experiences of what you see as "paragraph 1" women and their "easier or simpler or less complicated" rides through society. I just think it's really important to bear in mind that no woman has it easy in regards to this stuff and just because their experiences in life may not mirror your own it doesn't mean for a second that they've necessarily been any less trying.

I'm pretty sure no one wants to do this, but there have definitely been posts by...some people that have taken the tack "I've never experienced misogyny/etc in this way so I don't think the philosophy/theory/substantiated thing you're talking about is true or I don't like how you're talking about it."

That's def putting lived experience over ideas that are an accepted and solid part of the general discourse. If you want to know what the terms, ideas, etc are about, either listen in or ask questions or google things or read up. I'm completely stupid on theory, I don't know shit about shit on transgender ish or anything, but I do notice when logical fallacies are being all flounced around about.

If you start a thread on this I will join in with it.

been thinking about it, tbh. expect it'll just be on gender in general, though (to honor the pattern of gradual widening that's been going on in these threads over the last week or so).

Hey, I am trying to describe my experiences, and why I have emotionally loaded reactions to certain patterns of behaviour. Of course because it is so subjective, it may read as judgemental. I have no right to draw any judgemental conclusions about Paragraph 1, but when it gets into Paragraph 2, those women are *vetting me* for correctness of presentation which is very unpleasant - I'm already feeling how you're describing and my judgement is a reaction against feeling vetted and found wanting.

I'm really being throw by this use of the term "biological gender."

Because my understanding is that the ~biological~ stuff is sex. Like, it's obvious that biological sex has some bearing on gender, but saying "biological gender" is like saying "biological personality." Of course all mental functions are ultimately reducible to biology bcuz we are just chemical bonebags. But it's such a reductive way of looking at what we think of as ~personality~ as to be almost useless.

If you can find some hard science on how biological sex interfaces with gender - by all means, talk about it - that's why I lent you a whole book full of it, Z. I'm just not interested in any more not-backed-up opinions on why "men are the adjective gender because: testosterone."

http://cache2.artprintimages.com/lrg/30/3005/P9GBF00Z.jpg

xpost

Yes WCC, I really appreciate the book loan. I'm through the intro and the 1st chapter and it's completely fascinating. Also I'm really enjoying it because it supports my own most cherished beliefs about the need to sweep away all forms of assumption w/r/t gender whilst at the same time somewhat frightened by the apparent extent of our malleability.

I would love a thread where I can just chew over the topics in that book with people, and hopefully some more books like it, and I think Con's thread will serve nicely?

lol Latham that's an amazing photo what is it!

its Zoe from Dr Who!

I'd love to do a reading group on that book (and also Pink Brain Blue Brain) involving ground up rebuilding from Evidence Based stuff!

ah - my Dr. Who knowledge doesn't go back that far

I would love a thread where I can just chew over the topics in that book with people, and hopefully some more books like it, and I think Con's thread will serve nicely?

― Also unknown as Zora (Surfing At Work), Wednesday, February 15, 2012 12:21 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

as it turns out, i think there's already an appropriate thread for this kind of discussion. i posted in it here. it's a generic "gender" thread, max started it a year ago, and it starts off discussing determinism (in a rather lolzy way, but whatever). open invite to anyone who's interested in talking abt that or any other gender-related stuff there.

I apologize for thread derail to Dr WHo companions

I'm pretty sure no one wants to do this, but there have definitely been posts by...some people that have taken the tack "I've never experienced misogyny/etc in this way so I don't think the philosophy/theory/substantiated thing you're talking about is true or I don't like how you're talking about it."

I think that because these are sensitive topics, posts sometimes get read incorrectly. I know that I am definitely guilty of this myself. I don't know if the ". . . some people" was meant to mean me but if it was then I once again apologize for having done this in the past. Also, if I've said that I haven't experienced misogyny in the way that someone on board was describing, I didn't mean to invalidate their experience but do understand how it can often feel that way. My not sharing a particular experience, however, doesn’t mean that I haven’t battled related issues of my own including harassment, domestic violence, and rape. I mention these things, which I generally don't talk about very much, to emphasize my point earlier about the importance of not making assumptions about people, esp ones that conclude they've had easier rides.

That's def putting lived experience over ideas that are an accepted and solid part of the general discourse

Isn't lived experience pretty damn important when it comes to these discussions? Theory is great and necessary but I'm way more interested in hearing people's actual stories/experiences than listening to people rehash things they've read in a book or learned in a lecture hall. Not that those are crucial or don't have their place, mind. It's just that they're just way less interesting to me than people's actual experiences esp in the context of a thread on a discussion-based message board.

So that other thread is gonna be "I can't be bothered to read thd book but do I ever have PINIONS about what it all means" which is p much my gender theory nightmare.

This is why I don't discuss gender with men any more. Failed experiment, tears before bedtime.

I'm gonna try and make them read the book and if they don't I'm gonna tie them to a chair and feed them the book one piece at a time. Until I get tired. I get that you've been round this course too many times but I haven't - outside of the sociology of gaming at least - and I'm excited about it, at least for now.

I'm not doing this any more. I'm going back to threads about trees and coastline and Cornish grammar and Radiohead records. :-(

idk u got sniffy w me for quoting monique wittig. its like also there is not one single syllabus for doing womens studies. there are feminisms.

I must've missed it: what book are we talking about?

"The 100 Greatest Action Films of All Time"

LOL

I like that this and that are the two threads I have posted on today.

Thom Yorke's hair is really kinda attractive in a so wrong it's right way.

LOLOL.

There's more than one pertinent book but I'm starting with "Delusions of Gender".

<3 Thom Yorke's hair