gemmaem
1yr ago
And in a world where all women are queens by political fiat, all women are born into power, thus – all will be absolutely corrupted and not amenable to persuasion.
Queens of what? Ourselves? The question of whether we are going to gestate an entire baby with all the physical and mental changes that implies?
Well, if you think that you should have control over that, then I think it's pretty clear which of us is the one with unreasonable dictatorial aspirations.
gemmaem
1yr ago
Well, since you can't even explain what power it is that women have that you're complaining about, I suppose there is no substance here for me to argue with. You've made one vague gesture towards @2rafa's list of admirably gender-neutral constraints while simultaneously declaring it, understandably, "too hardcore."
You can't even really articulate the premise on which your misogyny rests, let alone substantiate it.
gemmaem
1yr ago
I do, in fact, generally respect exhaustion in my argumentative partners, you're not wrong about that. Unfortunately, in this case, you've made any number of statements that require answers. You accuse me of sneering, but you've been sneering at me this whole time, and suggesting taking away rights far more fundamental than a right to single-sex spaces. As for catty sniping, you're full of catty sniping! "I love the indignation here," you write. "And thanks for another illustration," you continue. It's true that I'm not spelling out my own object level ideas; I'm asking you to spell yours out because you keep leveling accusations at women that honestly seem far more true of you. Perhaps if you were better at engaging with women in good faith, you'd get more good faith in return.
gemmaem
1yr ago
Gosh, people are writing pop songs that are power fantasies! Sometimes they even write them about women. What is the world coming to?
Come on, there's no substance here.
gemmaem
1yr ago
Be honest, you know you being a woman has nothing to do with how he is engaging in this conversation
Dase has made his opinion of women very clear, on multiple occasions. He thinks we are liars. He thinks we are mean. He thinks we habitually act in bad faith.
The style of sneering at female commenters personally that he is employing in this thread is very obviously coloured by his broader opinions.
Do you seriously think "has women franchisement gone too far" is too spicy relative to the other things the motte discusses?
I'm not arguing that it shouldn't be allowed. I decided not to let it -- and the sneering alongside it -- go unchallenged.
So why add in that little snide at all if not for shaming purposes?
I meant it, sincerely. Good faith works best as a two way street. That's just a fact of human interaction.
I've been on the Motte since it was the Culture War Thread. I'm one of the left-most people here. I've never flamed out. I've garnered two mod notes over six years; never a ban. I stay for the charity, when I can get it; I stay to be challenged and to see views I wouldn't otherwise see. Sometimes, I admit, I stay for the fight. But I always argue in good faith, even when it leaves me vulnerable. If you can't access that side of me, you're not trying very hard.
gemmaem
1yr ago
Male power fantasies in fiction are still very common, I think you'll find. There's an entire section of literary criticism in which the ur-narrative is The Hero's Journey. Being the Son of Heaven or some other kind of Chosen One comes standard.
Reality is, ultimately, its own check on these things, I think. Most women know they aren't actually queen of very much. Time comes for us all, and most of us grow. Some of us still like to imagine being Batman now and then while we're at it, and that's okay.
I think it might actually be harder to mock women for not being powerful just because, unlike men, we're not failing in our gender role by lacking power. Which isn't fair to men, that they should be mocked for not aligning with a gender role, but I think some of the difference that you are seeing actually comes from there.
gemmaem
1yr ago
Being violently attacked should not be "the consequences" of making unpopular policy, or of being the family of someone who has made policies that some people do not like. If you're worried about being smeared as supporting this kind of violent attack, then don't talk as if the attack was justified.
gemmaem
8mo ago
I know I’m being an SJW, but I don’t think you should use African-American dialect pejoratively like this. I don’t think these are black people to begin with, and this wouldn’t be a good way to respond even if they were.
gemmaem
1yr ago
I loved Ancillary Justice. It did not deserve to get dragged through the mud just because some people were mean to Larry Correia on the internet. It certainly starts out quite opaque, but it rewards attentive reading.
Given the publicity surrounding its use of feminine pronouns for every character, you could be forgiven for thinking that this is a book about gender. In fact, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that this is really a book that is not about gender. The Imperial Radch is a deeply flawed society with a great deal of systemic injustice -- and it doesn't have gender (as we understand it) and it doesn't have race (as we understand it). So it's a book about systemic injustice that has very carefully excised the main two identity markers that we usually associate with that sort of thing. It takes away the compass that the average social justice advocate would use, and asks readers to learn to navigate anew.
I thought the body horror aspects were excellently handled, creeping up on the reader precisely because they are so normal to the narrator. I also found Anaander Mianaai's troubles with herself to be predictable in the manner of a successful Chekhov's gun -- the sort of thing where you ask "but what if..." partway through the book and then learn later (to great readerly satisfaction) that, indeed, if. On the whole, there is a general theme of throwing the reader into the deep end of some massive cultural and technological differences. If you enjoy subtle clues and tricky empathy leaps, it's a really good book.
gemmaem
1yr ago
As I understand it, the claim is that women are so powerful that they have turned into little dictators who go around making unreasonable demands. This requires substantiation. What kind of unreasonable demands? So far I've been given "shut down any political project they don't like." That's a strong claim. There are, in fact, many existing political projects that women are more against than in favour of that have not been shut down.
You've given me a second claim, that "criticizing women as a group is so verboten that any and all of it is taken with utmost offense." It is true that claims about women are policed more strongly than claims about men. However, women are not unique in this regard. Claims about black people are policed more strongly than claims about white people, for example. So it does not make sense to attribute this to women's overwhelming manipulative dictatorial power. It has more to do with the fact that there is a historical pattern of unfair mischaracterisation of women that was bad enough that it gave rise to a movement dedicated to correcting it.
None of what I have been given substantiates the claim that I was initially criticizing -- namely, that women are "queens by political fiat" in any real sense of social or political power. We are not. It is obvious that we are not.
gemmaem
1yr ago
I think there are many, many people in the world who think they deserve more than they have, certainly. It's fair to say that those people's self-evaluation is frequently questionable. I don't think this tendency is confined to women, though, nor do I think it is more out of control in women than in men. There are some areas where it is more tolerated in men (especially if those men are already high status), and others where it is more tolerated in women (especially if those women are already high status).
gemmaem
8mo ago
Like @raggedy_anthem, I do not believe you intended to sound Black. Because AAVE is an alternate dialect with different pronunciations and rules of grammar, and because it is primarily spoken by members of a socially disadvantaged class, the stereotypical “idiot” pronunciation has sometimes shifted towards that (actually fairly complicated and internal-rule-abiding) dialect. This isn’t on me or on you. It’s on the pre-existing history of seeing Black Americans as social inferiors.
Given the surrounding social environment here, I don’t expect to gain points for wokeness. I do think that it’s useful to avoid normalising racial caricature, even unintentionally.
gemmaem
1yr ago
Well, I certainly support sympathy for men and policy measures designed to help men in areas where they are disproportionately struggling, and I am open to the idea of trimming back the power of the state over some facets of our lives. So although I don't believe we actually live in a "gynocentric society," we might well be able to come to an agreement on some individual changes!
gemmaem
1yr ago
Here's the BBC on the subject.
When Diddy asked him again to stop [selling 'white lives matter' shirts], West replied: "Ima use you as an example to show the Jewish people that told you to call me that no one can threaten or influence me."
...
He followed up with a message saying: "I'm a bit sleepy tonight but when I wake up I'm going death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE The funny thing is I actually can't be Anti Semitic because black people are actually Jew also.
"You guys have toyed with me and tried to black ball anyone whoever opposes your agenda," he added.
It's classic anti-Semitism, not disguised and not any sort of edge case.
gemmaem
1yr ago
I have, indeed, been strictly informed that it is not that women ought to be stripped of the right to vote but that it should not have been given to them in the first place in the way that it was. Reluctant pragmatic acceptance of my rights is obviously not as reassuring as actual support for them would be, but that is where that conversation stands.
gemmaem
1yr ago
Concealing material information from parents is pedagogical malpractice.
... If a child is confused about sex or sexuality, that is not the government's business to decide how to address that. By making it the government's business, Democrats are actively grooming children.
Don't be ridiculous. You're seriously trying to say that it's "grooming" if someone believes that a teacher doesn't have to tell a kid's homophobic parents that their kid is gay? You want to call keeping a secret from someone who will hurt their kid if they know the same as deliberately trying to make it easier for someone to sexually abuse a kid? That is absurd.
gemmaem
1yr ago
To respond to your edits (which I think you ought to have marked as such, out of courtesy, given that I had already replied):
Does "unfortunately it's illegal because teachers and kids sharing porn would be a Powerful tool for social justice" count? Or "porn is good for kids, but only if it's Queer and Addresses Gender Inequities"?
Like, I just want you to acknowledge here that these "social justice in porn studies" academics only have a problem with kids being given porn if they think it's the wrong kind of cisnormative porn.
First of all, I would appreciate knowing what this quote is from. You've said nothing about where you found it, or who said it.
Second of all, it is still not clear to me that it is saying what you say it is saying. "Porn can be helpful in these ways and harmful in these other ways" is very far from an unqualified endorsement. The fact that the person who wrote this (whoever they are) reaches first for a social justice critique of porn is not actually evidence that they think porn is always good for children when it doesn't have those issues, or that children should be given it when they are not choosing to access it on their own.
In particular, I think there may be something important being said here:
This interrogation would not rule out explicit critiques of misogynistic, homophobic or racist tropes within pornography, but might also offer the capacity to open up critically productive conversations about the boundaries between adult sexual knowledge and young people’s sexual learning; and the ways popular and institutional discourses define particular forms of sexuality, sexual identity, and sex/gender expression as ‘legitimate’ (or ‘illegitimate’) know-ledge for young people.
It's not clear from your quote what "productive conversations" would consist of, but I can see two potentially sympathetic things being alluded to here. One of these -- from my second bolded section -- is the lack of access children might have to non-pornographic information about LGBTQ topics. Children sometimes turn to porn because they don't have alternate sources of information, and this can be particularly true when topics like homosexuality and trans identities are deemed off limits for them. Rather than castigating them for turning to porn for information in that situation, it might indeed be helpful to leave room for a productive conversation about what information they are looking for.
The second sympathetic thing that I might be detecting here -- although I would need more context to be sure -- is this reference to "the boundaries between adult sexual knowledge and young people’s sexual learning." I do wonder if this is trying to say that adult pornographic content is not necessarily a good source of sexual learning, and that it's useful to have a boundary here.
gemmaem
1yr ago
I, by contrast, often find that men who sneer at "I feel..." statements and "So what I hear you saying..." acknowledgements are often the first to appreciate genuine listening to their actual feelings, and validation of their emotions as socially understandable. Respecting other people's feelings is an important bit of social glue.
Indeed, in contexts like The Motte, thinking about people's underlying emotions rather than taking their statements solely at face value is a valuable part of my skill set. Often, acknowledging people's feelings can actually be a really useful aid to getting them to step away from their statements and examine them factually without feeling like those underlying emotions themselves are about to be crushed underfoot.
I do not doubt that emotionally respectful conversation can be done badly. I do not doubt that it can be enforced in unproductive ways. But if you think that enforcement of detached manly emotionlessness is the solution then you are very wrong.
gemmaem
1yr ago
Citation needed. The usual requirement for child diagnosis of gender dysphoria is that the claim to be the other gender is "insistent, consistent and persistent." Your claim that merely saying the words "I am a girl" is taken to imply a stable and permanent identity is contrary to the facts. You are straw-manning your outgroup here.
gemmaem
7mo ago
There's no need to escalate this to "requiring explicit consent for any type of physical social interaction." I'm sure a congratulatory pat on the back would have been fine. Even a hug.
gemmaem
1yr ago
Thank you so much!
This makes me pretty unimpressed with OP. For one thing, this isn't a post "explaining the rules of the subreddit," as OP claims. It's an opinion from an ordinary user. It's also preceded by several important caveats that make it less inflammatory than if it had started from the place where OP begins their quote. Also, it's from nine years ago -- how far did they have to dig in order to find something they could quote out of context in order to make it sound suitably threatening?
@KingKong, I don't think you posted this in good faith. You omitted important context. You didn't provide a link so people could check. And you lied about what the post actually was.
You should be ashamed. The culture war is hot enough without misrepresenting things deliberately in order to cause drama.
gemmaem
1yr ago
Sex education has been controversial for years. Calling it "grooming" is new, and this form of demonization didn't get used before it was specifically the LGBT content that people were angry about. I think it's reasonable to suspect that this tenuous claim of sex/sexuality/gender-related education leading to pedophilia did not just happen to occur when the controversy was about LGBT topics instead of about sex education more generally.
Still a bit light on the details. Are you too afraid of my mean-girl power to explain which men's rights women are taking away, or would you be willing to elaborate?
As for "casting women in an unflattering light," well, your premise that women are too mean and irrational to be allowed to participate in politics certainly does that! And I suppose you will claim that any counterargument that I make is merely an appeal to "women are wonderful." But I think my conduct speaks for itself, to any reasonable observer. Your accusation of habitual bad-faith argumentation on my part is unfounded.
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