Creeps pretending to be feminists

boing
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There is a difference between happening to find a woman aesthetically unappealing, and making that judgement because they are a woman. It’s often quite easy to find out if double-standards are being applied from context or questions. I was in some online chats last year where people were complaining about Hillary Clinton’s perceived lack of sex appeal, as if that was a smug and obvious thing to do. When I asked them why they found Trumpelstiltskin more sexually appealing it caught them off guard, and they explained it away as a non-question. Which highlighted the double-standard being employed.

It can cut the other way as well. A relative a years ago who resented that her father found Sarah Palin physically attractive, and she ranted to me about how Palin’s appearance isn’t “all that”, rather than criticise her political positions or ability to communicate them. She had cognitive dissonance and raged at my explanation that wherever a person is placed on an aesthetic appeal spectrum is still a superficial way to evaluate their competance.

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I’m going to post this as a general reply, not as a reply to specific posts because it’s been made clear that particular individuals do not want to discuss the topic with people unlike them, so…

And to put everything out in the open, I’m not commenting on feminism, because I’m a dude. I’m not going to comment on LBGTQ issues because I’m straight. One discussion that I do feel entitled to engage in is F-ing racism, being somewhat tannish brown with slanty eyes, and not living in an Asian country, I’ve been on the receiving end of a fair amount of it in my 4+ decades on this planet.

You know who I want to engage in discussion? You know who I want chiming in and sitting down at the table? Everyone. Especially white people (not that Asian on Asian racism isn’t as bad if not worse in some respects). Regardless of whether or not they occupy a position of privilege, the “opposition” are actually the ones that need to be at the table the most. Yeah, it makes it way more difficult if the people you’re discussing things with occupy the position of power, but you know what? I’d much rather have someone who doesn’t really understand my position, but is earnestly trying to understand, at the table than someone who completely understands where I’m coming from. That’s the difference between a discussion that has the potential to actually change something (hopefully by passing some message or understanding to “the opposition” who can start to change the “other side” from within), and a comfortable but pointless echo chamber.

I want to sit down with tRump and his ilk to discuss racism. If you segregate the problem part of the population from the discussion/solution, you’re really just “othering” yourself. I get that there are certain situations where the discussion can’t happen in the presence of the “other” (like abuse victims and their abusers etc…), but in the greater social situation if you can’t sit down and include the enemy at the table, then your victory (if it happens) is likely to be a false and/or transient one. You win by getting your enemy to willingly change their views, not by excluding them and forcing a solution on them.

I’ll say it again, we’re all in this together. And regardless of whether or not you want to believe it, we all have skin in every game. Yeah, we’re disproportionately impacted by each different “game”. So like I noted in another post, if you have advantage/privilege do you not have an obligation to use it to make things a bit better. And yeah, I may realize that I may not have a clue how to do that for things where I am in a privileged position, but hey, that’s what shutting up, listening, and learning is for eh?. Hard to do that if you’re not even allowed at the table…

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Just to be clear on my part, I too am all for having the empowered at the proverbial table. To listen, as I gather you’re saying. Trouble is, they’re rarely any good at that.

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Oh no, he got labeled. The poor man.

Often I think the difference between being judged to be a shitty person, rather than a normal person who did a shitty thing, is having the ability to acknowledge the fault and then try to do better. So jumping in at the first comment to defend the guy from some perceived crucifixion seems like an unhelpful thing to do.

A long-time friend of mine is, or has, whatever, higher functioning autism. We lived together for several years and during that time he was charged for indecent assault. And he’s still my friend and I drove him to court every day but to be honest with you I only have so much sympathy. His condition didn’t give him a right to be creepy. I gave him a lot of leeway for a lot of social missteps over the years but ultimately other people have to live in the world with you so if you want to be an independent adult then you have certain responsibilities in how you behave, and if you can’t meet them you should seek support.

They might have a name for your problem, but it’s still your problem. It’s not nice but it’s true.

Yeah, pretty much… The range of topics where people don’t seem to mind my contribution is vast, the range where I should shut up a bit is narrow and I ought to be able to see it coming but sometimes I miss the warning signs because I’m talking too loudly. I also do what I guess you’d call active listening, when people explain things to me I repeat them back in my own words to show I understand and so they can correct me if I don’t. I find it super helpful but sometimes it’s not well received.

Don’t ask me to explain male creepiness though. Ugh. For all that women get a bad rap for being hormonal and irrational, the self-awareness some men possess and the relationship they have with their own bodies and their own sexuality are just fucking abysmal.

Wow, are you still at it? As far as I can see the discussion here is about calling out behaviour, not vilifying people. We’re not naming an enemy, we don’t even know his name to begin with.

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But if they’re the source of the problem it is about them. The issue is whether they approach it with excuses and hairsplitting and “Look at me, I’m not racist/sexist/homophobic, I’m one of the good guys!” Or as “Tell me what I can be doing differently to help.”

Cishet white men have a lot of power in our society; telling them to shut up and mind their own business because it’s not their fight is eschewing a potentially valuable tool. They can make themselves heard by people who would reflexively dismiss anything said by one of “those people.”

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Fox or squirrel? Or are you going for a colour-clash look?

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Who here told them to mind their own business?

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The implied second clause of “It’s not about you” is “so shut up already.”

Obviously not every BLM meeting or Women’s March planning committee wants or needs a white dude offering his perspective, and there do seem to be a hell of a lot of white dudes that don’t grok that. There are more productive and less productive ways of conveying the limited scope within which those (hopefully genuinely well-meaning but clue-deficient) men can be more helpful.

But this is all drifting way off the topic of sleazy PUA fauxminists.

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In fairness, I don’t think anyone ever confused them for feminists and/or decent human beings while they were wearing them.

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As a woman who is very tired of men telling women that we’re doing feminism wrong, I’d say the desired second clause is more accurately “so stop talking and start listening.”

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Apologies for quoting myself but

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You were making a comparison above when you typed that.

If a man asks that question, he best be prepared to listen to the answer instead of interrupting the speaker to offer up his own ideas of what he can do differently. Sweet FSM, does that happen a lot.

To be clear, I’m not directing these criticisms at you, personally. I’m speaking in general terms.

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KISH-et?
SISH-et?
CISS-et?
KISS-et?

Or does the accent go on the other syllable?
ki-SHET?
si-SHET?
sis-SET?

Oh, I know! kis-SET! I have devices that can play those at home.

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Yeah. I’m glad that there is a word to describe cis (as opposed to not having a word because it’s invisible). I’m glad more people are having their awareness raised about their cis-ness.

I just wish, as a lover of language, that it wasn’t such a cringy phoneme(s) as “cis”. No matter what the attempted pronunciation, it sounds awful.

“Trans”, though, is quite pleasant to the ear.

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I’d offer consolation, but since I didn’t write it, that’s someone else’s opportunity.

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How about interpret it as, “The experiences you’ve had aren’t so god damned important that the whole discussion has to be about them”?

Here’s an example of a conversation that isn’t happening:

“As a very privileged person (white, male, cis, het, able-bodied) I often struggle to see how I can fit myself into working for progressive change. When I read this story it makes me feel defensive because I imagine myself making a mistake and negating anything positive I have to add.”

If someone posted that, I would probably post something like:

"I think a lot of men feel that way. In this specific instance, you can walk away realizing that you should just plain never talk negatively about the appearance of a woman publicly - there just isn’t any circumstance where it is useful or called for. But more generally, we all have the potential to say something very offensive or upsetting without knowing why. The thing is, it isn’t that bad. If it happens just listen to people telling you you did something wrong, say you were ignorant and now you know and you won’t do it again. "

That is describing your experience and having someone choose not to negate it.

But instead the posts are:

“This is wrong! Men need to be listened to!”

And the arguing goes back and forth for 20 posts, drowning out any other discussion. I do have empathy for that. People feel hurt, sublimate that into anger and then rationalize that anger and take it out on other people around them, taking anything other than pure validation as confirmation of a victimized worldview. That’s a terrible way to feel. I have empathy for that experience without giving two fucks about the “argument” they are making, since the argument is a facade built to externalize their hurt.

You want you experiences validated, talk about your experiences. You want to be venomous so that other people can feel the pain you’re feeling, then go to your room until you can calm your body down.

I’ve taken to sə-SHAY.

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Sis-het. Rhymes with MOSFET. Sort of.

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Dudes, I feel your pain. I was also lost and confused that feminism wasn’t about me! (Because I transitioned and things changed, but anyway…)

Don’t worry, this is what you do:

  1. Listen to women
  2. Before you offer ‘the male perspective’ consider: have they heard this before? (Spoiler: yes, they have)
  3. Amplify the voices of women. Online, this might look like a retweet or a like. Offline, if somebody is ignoring a good point made by Sally, repeat what she just said with attribution. Make sure Sally gets credit.
  4. Are you talking too much? Do some maths: how much should you be talking? Don’t take up more than your share of space, especially if you’re just agreeing with other men.
  5. If you have a pertinent point, is it something maybe you heard from a woman? Give her credit.
  6. Do your own research. Find or ask for resources and figure stuff out on your own time, without expecting a reward or hand-holding.
  7. Don’t participate in events that exclude women. (If you go to conferences, check out who’s on the panels ahead of time. Take the pledge.)
  8. Pay women for their work. (Especially relevant if you’re trying to organise an event or do some ‘diversity’ outreach.)

Pursuant to point 5, these aren’t my ideas.
Pursuant to point 6, try googling ‘how to be a feminist ally’.

Many of these points apply to being an ally of any community to which you do not belong. As Trumpism is putting many different groups of people at risk, working together in solidarity is more important now than ever.

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This is hilarious, and sort of on topic. :frowning:

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Yeah, totally. I thought that the sentence I wrote after what you quoted conveyed exactly that, but it seems like you didn’t, so maybe I was unclear.

Are you talking about other comments, or is that how I’m coming across? Because if so I have fucked up.

What I meant to express was that it is men who need to have empathy. Or in other contexts white people, first-world people, cis-het people, etc. The point was that rather than simply keeping quiet or staying out as a way of appearing to be sensitive to the situation of marginalized and oppressed people, folks with privilege should take the next step and actually seek to empathize with those situations. Because their participation can be helpful, but it’s often harmful when it lacks careful consideration, critique, and actual empathy.

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