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Oh Noez! What about Teh Menz? -Patriarchy isn't a dude's friend EITHER!

Started by Pope Pixie Pickle, August 07, 2012, 11:33:24 AM

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Salty

Quote from: Dear Departed Uncle Nigel on August 15, 2012, 11:17:30 PM
Garbo; I am pretty sure I understand what you meant by "cis man tears". I think you were trying to express the tragedy of the oppressor, when the oppressor expresses that it will cause them pain to alter their behavior so that it ceases to oppress others. However, it's as counterproductive a term as "white man's burden". Yes, it describes something really specific, but it also falls into the trap of negatively generalizing and dismissing a group of people. It would probably be best to just say it was a poor choice of phrasing, and abandon it forever as a derogatory term.

This was what I was trying to say, more or less.

Albeit, with a little *cough* more subtly.
The world is a car and you're the crash test dummy.

Juana

"I dispose of obsolete meat machines.  Not because I hate them (I do) and not because they deserve it (they do), but because they are in the way and those older ones don't meet emissions codes.  They emit too much.  You don't like them and I don't like them, so spare me the hysteria."

Mesozoic Mister Nigel

I think that we're also struggling with the word "understand", because there is sympathetic understanding, and empathetic understanding. Sympathetic understanding is a cognitive process, whereas empathetic understanding is an emotional process; in sympathetic understanding, you are tapping into what they are expressing and giving them support, whereas in empathetic understanding you actually feel what they feel because you have had that, or a very similar, experience.

Most men can't have empathetic understanding for what women experience in our culture, nor can most women have empathetic understanding of what men experience in our culture. They can, however, have sympathetic understanding, which is why listening to each other is so important.
"I'm guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk," Charles Wick said. "It was very complicated."



Mesozoic Mister Nigel

Quote from: Alty on August 15, 2012, 11:19:10 PM
Quote from: Dear Departed Uncle Nigel on August 15, 2012, 11:17:30 PM
Garbo; I am pretty sure I understand what you meant by "cis man tears". I think you were trying to express the tragedy of the oppressor, when the oppressor expresses that it will cause them pain to alter their behavior so that it ceases to oppress others. However, it's as counterproductive a term as "white man's burden". Yes, it describes something really specific, but it also falls into the trap of negatively generalizing and dismissing a group of people. It would probably be best to just say it was a poor choice of phrasing, and abandon it forever as a derogatory term.

This was what I was trying to say, more or less.

Albeit, with a little *cough* more subtly.

:lulz:
"I'm guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk," Charles Wick said. "It was very complicated."


Mesozoic Mister Nigel

"I'm guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk," Charles Wick said. "It was very complicated."


Juana

Me either.

Quote from: Dear Departed Uncle Nigel on August 15, 2012, 11:23:18 PM
I think that we're also struggling with the word "understand", because there is sympathetic understanding, and empathetic understanding. Sympathetic understanding is a cognitive process, whereas empathetic understanding is an emotional process; in sympathetic understanding, you are tapping into what they are expressing and giving them support, whereas in empathetic understanding you actually feel what they feel because you have had that, or a very similar, experience.

Most men can't have empathetic understanding for what women experience in our culture, nor can most women have empathetic understanding of what men experience in our culture. They can, however, have sympathetic understanding, which is why listening to each other is so important.
This. Said much, much better than I did.
"I dispose of obsolete meat machines.  Not because I hate them (I do) and not because they deserve it (they do), but because they are in the way and those older ones don't meet emissions codes.  They emit too much.  You don't like them and I don't like them, so spare me the hysteria."

Mesozoic Mister Nigel

And on that note, I'm off to write a term paper and make a shitty short movie about prejudice. :lol: See you later, spags!
"I'm guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk," Charles Wick said. "It was very complicated."


Juana

Quote from: Alty on August 15, 2012, 08:34:53 PM
So, it can be said that identifying someone as a cis male is as accurate as saying, "that guy, no the black one."

That black guy who...what? Depends. Depends on what that guy is doing.

Is oppressed
Kills his own citizens
Works with homeless people
Lives a life much like any other
Doubles the number of predator drones

Theres only so much use you get from those kind of descriptions. Only when you have preconceived notions of that description does that differ.
Again, no disagreement.

Quote from: Dear Departed Uncle Nigel on August 15, 2012, 11:17:30 PM
Garbo; I am pretty sure I understand what you meant by "cis man tears". I think you were trying to express the tragedy of the oppressor, when the oppressor expresses that it will cause them pain to alter their behavior so that it ceases to oppress others. However, it's as counterproductive a term as "white man's burden". Yes, it describes something really specific, but it also falls into the trap of negatively generalizing and dismissing a group of people. It would probably be best to just say it was a poor choice of phrasing, and abandon it forever as a derogatory term.
Probably. All it did was drag the discussion into the mud, anyway.
"I dispose of obsolete meat machines.  Not because I hate them (I do) and not because they deserve it (they do), but because they are in the way and those older ones don't meet emissions codes.  They emit too much.  You don't like them and I don't like them, so spare me the hysteria."

P3nT4gR4m

Quote from: Dear Departed Uncle Nigel on August 15, 2012, 11:23:18 PM
I think that we're also struggling with the word "understand", because there is sympathetic understanding, and empathetic understanding. Sympathetic understanding is a cognitive process, whereas empathetic understanding is an emotional process; in sympathetic understanding, you are tapping into what they are expressing and giving them support, whereas in empathetic understanding you actually feel what they feel because you have had that, or a very similar, experience.

Most men can't have empathetic understanding for what women experience in our culture, nor can most women have empathetic understanding of what men experience in our culture. They can, however, have sympathetic understanding, which is why listening to each other is so important.

Yes! Now this is where I think I'm of a different opinion. What's similar? Analogous? I have spent the best part of 24 hours, locked up in a room with the windows boarded up, battered and bruised, wondering if I was going to make it out of there alive. Did I get raped? No. Do I understand how a woman can be beaten up, powerless and fearful for her life? Do I understand how you get a bit agoraphobic for a while after an experience like that? Do I understand how your self preservation manifests itself as ultra-paranoia and you are suspicious, not just of strangers you meet but of long time acquaintances and even family members, just because they say something that reminds you of some stupid little detail that happened during that time? Do I understand enough about being abducted and raped that the fact I wasn't subjected to uninvited sex becomes virtually irrelevant?

I'm up to my arse in Brexit Numpties, but I want more.  Target-rich environments are the new sexy.
Not actually a meat product.
Ass-Kicking & Foot-Stomping Ancient Master of SHIT FUCK FUCK FUCK
Awful and Bent Behemothic Results of Last Night's Painful Squat.
High Altitude Haggis-Filled Sex Bucket From Beyond Time and Space.
Internet Monkey Person of Filthy and Immoral Pygmy-Porn Wart Contagion
Octomom Auxillary Heat Exchanger Repairman
walking the fine line line between genius and batshit fucking crazy

"computation is a pattern in the spacetime arrangement of particles, and it's not the particles but the pattern that really matters! Matter doesn't matter." -- Max Tegmark

Bebek Sincap Ratatosk

Though I think this discussion actually highlights one of the ways "Patriarchy isn't a dude's friend EITHER". If you are a dude, living in a society where the stereotype for dudes is "potential rapist, doesn't understand women, is intentionally or unintentionally misogynistic" then no matter what your personal behavior is, you're getting dumped in with the worst members of your sex's example in your society.

Aside from that, on the drive home I was thinking of LMNO's Common Walls essay. I think what feels missing here is that some of the comments from the feminist side appear to ignore the common walls. Debate can be handled in many ways. You can take your position and fight for the win. Alternatively, you can find common ground to use as a basis for convincing the other side of  the value of your position. The first one works with some people, the second works with more people (usually). "I'm right, but you can't possibly understand" seems like the worst option to win someone over. I think some of the feminist comments here come across as the third... I think some of the guy comments are trying to aim for the second.

I was never a woman, so I can't understand what its like to be raped by your boyfriend. Yet, I was once raped by someone I trusted. I don't know what its like to be abused because I'm a girl. Yet, I do know what its like to be abused growing up as a poor, skinny, nerdy member of a weird cult. I know what its like to be held down on the playground while a girl kicked me repeatedly in the balls. I know what its like to get jumped by a group of guys and have my head beaten with a chunk of concrete. I know what its like to have my face torn open by a Doberman at age 7 because some homeowner decided that I deserved it when I walked up the stairs to their house in my little suit and tie to offer them a Watchtower.

It's not the same wall... but I think there are some commonalities that might help with understanding... and Understanding.
- I don't see race. I just see cars going around in a circle.

"Back in my day, crazy meant something. Now everyone is crazy" - Charlie Manson

Anna Mae Bollocks

#626
Quote from: Dear Departed Uncle Nigel on August 15, 2012, 11:08:11 PM
Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on August 15, 2012, 10:49:16 PM
Quote from: Dear Departed Uncle Nigel on August 15, 2012, 10:46:19 PM
Quote from: Signora Paesior on August 15, 2012, 09:39:10 PM
Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on August 15, 2012, 04:15:24 PM
I am a "CIS male".  This is utterly irrelevant as to whether or not I am an elgatarian.  And I don't see any "feminist space".  I see people who want to be recognized as people and/or who recognize other people as people.  There is no "space" here to enter.  There is no territory upon which to infringe.  You are, or you aren't.  Nothing else matters.

That's fine. But Roger, there are feminist spaces. Whether there should be or not is a different argument, but they exist. There are feminist collectives and feminist blogs and feminist communities and feminist events, and they are spearheaded as such. They're a thing. And when men come along and want to turn the whole things into a discussion about "what about meeeeee", that's when we get frustrated.

One thing that is especially frustrating about it is that there is no reason men can't have those spaces, but it's up to them to make them. It's a bit silly for men to ask women to make them a space for feminist men. The world is wide open for spaces like that, if people want them.

My problem is that I still don't recognize these spaces.

There's humanity, in it's entirety.  Other than that, there is a cold, empty universe that wants us all dead.  There's nothing else, discounting religion, which isn't the topic here.

Well, yes, and no. There is humanity, and there are subgroups within humanity that all have an interplay with one another, and there are virtual (and literal) "spaces" that are all-female or all-male. There are some groups, for example the molestation and rape recovery groups I attended as a young woman, which are female-only, because their members do not yet feel safe expressing themselves freely or being vulnerable in the presence of men, and similar groups for men who don't yet feel safe expressing themselves or being vulnerable in the presence of women. In my work with foster kids, often we have requests for only a female team or only a male team, because some of these kids have been abused, some very badly, and are scared of one sex.

So, sometimes certain types of groups are needed in order to create a "safe space" for people who are still too scared to open up and discuss ideas that make them feel vulnerable, whether they're men or women. Men are particularly conditioned to fear vulnerability, and most intensely to fear vulnerability in front of women. I see "safe space" groups like that as intermediate steps that are sometimes necessary on the road to fully interacting as equal human beings.

"Safe spaces" are necessary. But what I've been seeing with a lot of "feminist collectives and feminist blogs and feminist communities and feminist events" for a good chunk of my life is just plain old man-bashing. Back to the fish and bicycles.

When people are oppressed or whatever, they have different ways of dealing with it. One way seeks to elevate everybodyand create an even playing field. I've never been denied entrance or treated badly at a black enclave, whether it was a church or a club or a neighborhood. I'd have understood if I had been, because that's EXACTLY what white people did for hundreds of years, and some still do. It just never happened.

Or you have the other way, where people seek to BECOME the oppressor. "My turn", so to speak. A lot of these "feminist spaces" come off as "white only".
Scantily-Clad Inspector of Gigantic and Unnecessary Cashews, Texas Division

Juana

Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on August 15, 2012, 11:36:33 PM
Quote from: Dear Departed Uncle Nigel on August 15, 2012, 11:23:18 PM
I think that we're also struggling with the word "understand", because there is sympathetic understanding, and empathetic understanding. Sympathetic understanding is a cognitive process, whereas empathetic understanding is an emotional process; in sympathetic understanding, you are tapping into what they are expressing and giving them support, whereas in empathetic understanding you actually feel what they feel because you have had that, or a very similar, experience.

Most men can't have empathetic understanding for what women experience in our culture, nor can most women have empathetic understanding of what men experience in our culture. They can, however, have sympathetic understanding, which is why listening to each other is so important.

Yes! Now this is where I think I'm of a different opinion. What's similar? Analogous? I have spent the best part of 24 hours, locked up in a room with the windows boarded up, battered and bruised, wondering if I was going to make it out of there alive. Did I get raped? No. Do I understand how a woman can be beaten up, powerless and fearful for her life? Do I understand how you get a bit agoraphobic for a while after an experience like that? Do I understand how your self preservation manifests itself as ultra-paranoia and you are suspicious, not just of strangers you meet but of long time acquaintances and even family members, just because they say something that reminds you of some stupid little detail that happened during that time? Do I understand enough about being abducted and raped that the fact I wasn't subjected to uninvited sex becomes virtually irrelevant?
Analogous, yes. As far as the last sentence, no, I don't think so. Women in that situation have another hundred pounds of fear to that, since it's far more likely that she'll be raped than you. Rape is an intense violation of personal autonomy in ways I don't think the rest of it quite adds up to (this is not at all an attempt to deligitimize what you went through. I probably would be useless for a good hour before being able to deal with anything).
But, as I have never experience either of those situations, I am not going to say for certain.

Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on August 15, 2012, 07:45:01 PM
Quote from: Alty on August 15, 2012, 07:29:28 PM
Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on August 15, 2012, 07:24:54 PM
Quote from: Alty on August 15, 2012, 07:22:30 PM
What I like most about this thread is how I often feel like I'm barely keeping my fingertips above the waterline. And I need to read a lot more.

It's also fun to watch the horrible, congealed, toxic slug-like creature that is PD (that's how I always picture it) react to these ideas.

What I like most about this thread is that I presented an idea, and was told that what I REALLY meant was something else.  And then everyone came along to agree vehemently with what an ass I am for the belief I didn't have.  So I clarified my position, and it was totally ignored.

I'm fuming fucking mad, and I have been since this morning.

Hm, I've been on the run so I haven't read the whole thread.
I have this feeling about this word Cis, though. A though actually. And it's a bit rambly but essentially boils down to:

Yeah no.

Labels are inherently devisive.  I don't refer to Robert Jackson at work as "my Black coworker."  I don't refer to Anthony as "My Gay friend."  I don't refer to my doctor as "my male doctor/my female doctor".  The only time labels are important is when the label itself is relevant to the conversation, and FUCK ANYONE who says I don't get an opinion on elgatarianism unless I'm female or Gay, or that my opinion is of less value for that reason.


Your opinion is not worth less than mine when it comes to issues women/females deal with. We both have memes we need to pick out of our teeth to deal with them. The only time my opinion is superior is when I'm telling you what women directly experience. A man's observations are valid and important and you might see something I'm missing, but you can't tell me what it's like. That is, let me emphasize, the one and only time my opinion trumps yours.
I like labels, to some extent, because they are words I can use to describe things more concisely than, "here, here's an idea I have about myself or other things, which entails x, y, g, and v."
Although yes, they can be divisive if you're not careful.

Quote from: Bebek Sincap Ratatosk on August 15, 2012, 11:38:27 PM
Though I think this discussion actually highlights one of the ways "Patriarchy isn't a dude's friend EITHER". If you are a dude, living in a society where the stereotype for dudes is "potential rapist, doesn't understand women, is intentionally or unintentionally misogynistic" then no matter what your personal behavior is, you're getting dumped in with the worst members of your sex's example in your society.

Aside from that, on the drive home I was thinking of LMNO's Common Walls essay. I think what feels missing here is that some of the comments from the feminist side appear to ignore the common walls. Debate can be handled in many ways. You can take your position and fight for the win. Alternatively, you can find common ground to use as a basis for convincing the other side of  the value of your position. The first one works with some people, the second works with more people (usually). "I'm right, but you can't possibly understand" seems like the worst option to win someone over. I think some of the feminist comments here come across as the third... I think some of the guy comments are trying to aim for the second.

I was never a woman, so I can't understand what its like to be raped by your boyfriend. Yet, I was once raped by someone I trusted. I don't know what its like to be abused because I'm a girl. Yet, I do know what its like to be abused growing up as a poor, skinny, nerdy member of a weird cult. I know what its like to be held down on the playground while a girl kicked me repeatedly in the balls. I know what its like to get jumped by a group of guys and have my head beaten with a chunk of concrete. I know what its like to have my face torn open by a Doberman at age 7 because some homeowner decided that I deserved it when I walked up the stairs to their house in my little suit and tie to offer them a Watchtower.

It's not the same wall... but I think there are some commonalities that might help with understanding... and Understanding.
I admit to falling into the "debate to win" trap a little bit here (frustration => I will steam roll you and use you as a crepe).
"I dispose of obsolete meat machines.  Not because I hate them (I do) and not because they deserve it (they do), but because they are in the way and those older ones don't meet emissions codes.  They emit too much.  You don't like them and I don't like them, so spare me the hysteria."

Juana

After wading through the thread, I think it's mostly unknotted? My dumbass choice of words (yeah, not a phrase I would normally have used, but 10+ pages of frustration + ass o'clock posting = poor phrasing) dragged what was otherwise an interesting thread into a mire of assumptions and confusion and generally fucking up a good thread.
"I dispose of obsolete meat machines.  Not because I hate them (I do) and not because they deserve it (they do), but because they are in the way and those older ones don't meet emissions codes.  They emit too much.  You don't like them and I don't like them, so spare me the hysteria."

Salty

Quote from: Secret Agent GARBO on August 15, 2012, 11:52:35 PM
After wading through the thread, I think it's mostly unknotted? My dumbass choice of words (yeah, not a phrase I would normally have used, but 10+ pages of frustration + ass o'clock posting = poor phrasing) dragged what was otherwise an interesting thread into a mire of assumptions and confusion and generally fucking up a good thread.

I don't think so. For the desired equality to happen we have to wade through these issues. I feel the primary goal is to raise awareness, to educate. And that OUGHT to be hard or it's just a circlejerk. It should require smacking your brain into a brick wall until understanding happens.

The world is a car and you're the crash test dummy.