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Thanks! My wife has a Masters in Philosophy, taught Logic and Critical Thinking, always answers my naive questions in detail, and absolutely wonât stand for sloppy thinking or poor assumptions. Iâd like to think Iâm slightly more emphaticempathetic than the average computer-dude which makes it easier to see another personâs point of view, but really, itâs all her. Sheâd probably tell me to stuff it and let the women defend themselves for a change, but I couldnât walk away from waethermanâs comment. (Edit: A word)
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What a concept â sincerely listening to those who have less privilege than oneself.
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Better yet, realizing that it is your privilege to listen.
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My favorite sentence from Laurie Pennyâs piece:
This is why Silicon Valley is fucked up. Because itâs built and run by some of the most privileged people in the world who are convinced that they are among the least.
But I think we also need to consider the metaphor in the title. Weâre all servants of the Empire, whether we want to be or not. And if you get to rebelling â well, thereâs an astonishing amount of room for disagreement on how, most effectively, to rebel. Which, come to think of it, is the sort of disagreement in which the arguments about the nature of privilege are most likely to come up: when weâre trying to figure out how to fight, and how we can get more people to join us.
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We are certainly all participants. Servants may be too strong a word.
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It would be better to use terms that are more accurate. We do not live in a patriarchy strictly speaking. Women can own property, businesses, are CEOs, and in the government, perhaps be president soon enough. Do we live in a society that the balance of power favors men, yes. Do women have disadvantages compared with men, absolutely.
Rape Culture is also intellectually dishonest. If you accuse somebody who an employer in Silicon Valley of creating or promoting a rape culture, I donât think youâre going to have any sort of meaningful conversation.
Basically, the point Iâm trying to make is that, if we want to affect change in society, it would be best to strive for real conversation instead of using code words and phrases that signify a lack of desire to engage in a meaningful dialogue.
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It seems highly unlikely that you knew 230 other people in high school well enough to know what they were all actually like and how they felt and what they experienced, especially if you are introverted. It also seems statistically improbable that out of 230 high school teenagers, only 1 would consider themselves nerdy, a loner, or starved for affection. Just because you wouldnât perceive others among the 230 as filling that âroleâ doesnât mean they didnât experience things differently than you perceived.
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People who are either ignorantly or willfully blind to an issue usually arenât interested in engaging in a meaningful dialogue, regardless of what lexicon youâre using.
Patriarchy and rape culture are shorthand for large, complicated concepts and the definitions of these terms will vary depending on who you speak to. For those who have been discussing these issues for decades, itâs likely difficult to step back and have to explain them to a person who may not even be willing to accept the idea of their existence.
If youâre interested in discussing these issues, you need to do some research and catch up with the conversation instead of demanding the cliffs notes version.
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Yes, you will have a meaningful conversation. And the likelyhood of the hiring manager or exec listening is very high.
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I donât think arguing that everyone needs to use your terminology or else they arenât really for equality makes a lot of sense. When you accuse somebody of promoting rape culture, that immediately puts them on the defensive. Itâs a really bad way to try to get someone to come around to your point of view. You canât just stamp your foot and expect people to âcatch up with the conversationâ. If youâre more interested in preaching to the choir, by all means, carry onâŚ
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Exclusionary weighted words are certainly a problem. It is the reason far more white people were sympathetic to MLK than Malcom X. However, the choice of language used today doesnât really undercut the argument, it is just a poorly thought out choice if you want white men to join your cause instead of getting defensive.
I doubt many of us wouldnât argue that the System (as opposed to the Patriarchy) generally favors men over women or that women have a raw deal in what Society expects of them.
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Itâs funny that you bring this up like youâre making a very valid and original point, but weâre way ahead of you: See âOppression Olympicsâ and âintersectionality.â People who understand social justice have had that discussion already, and the consensus is already that it gets us nowhere.
The point of this article isnât to play Oppression Olympics, but to highlight the obvious endlessness of engaging in a game of âwhat about my suffering?â Systemic problems are systemic, and that fact doesnât change no matter how much one individual suffers. Even certain systemic problems are simply lenses that magnify larger systemic problems. A lot of ânerdâ culture was a result of boys coming in to a lower caste of masculinity. The problem of defining masculinity, is of course, part of the larger systemic problem of patriarchy.
So when white male nerds complain about their suffering as nerds, in and of itself, thatâs not a problem. When they cast themselves as antagonists of women who (in this fiction) never had to suffer, itâs just dishonest.
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That might be a valid criticism if it were my terminology that I were selfishly insisting people adopt. Itâs not. Iâm saying people should do research if they want to understand other peopleâs perspectives, as I had to do when I was curious exactly what people meant by patriarchy and rape culture. I still donât understand it all and Iâll continue to do research to learn more. But I donât expect people who have been discussing it for decades to hand me a simplified explanation of complex concepts so that they can get the supposed âprivilegeâ of my participation in their topic of interest and activism.
This suggestion of doing research prior to participation is valid regardless of the topic.
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I never said I was the first person under the sun to make this argument. Nor would I say that any other argument on this page is original - weâre all falling in to retreads, cliches, false logic and ad hominem attacks. Just like we always do.
I think the point of her article is to point out that as a woman nerd, she suffered the same circumstances and more. And reading the original article I can find no place where Scott casts himself as an antagonist of women who never had to suffer. There, see, you rounded the discussion out with a nice strawman argument. How original.
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Very well said.
I suspect you either misunderstand what ârape cultureâ refers to, or youâre very naive about what goes on in Silicon Valley. Most likely, the former.
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People who use the term SJW donât generally engage outsiders in meaningful discussion.
Like this?
THOSE PESKY CODE WORDS AND PHRASES! I DO NOT LIKE THEM SAM I AM, NOW LEAVE ME BE!
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I read Pennyâs piece, and made a statement about it. See the 1st paragraph of my post. Then I started talking about Brustâs piece and the points he made. Cory linked both, so itâs on topic.
Agreed and acknowledged. But if Ms. Penny thinks she understands what the other half has gone through as well as someone who has actually gone through it, thatâs just shopping the same old mistakes under a different banner. I have great sympathy for her position and her own travails (and would be happy to introduce her to some very nice guys here on the East Coast*) but her post is discrediting anotherâs testimony and breaking solidarity. And thatâs what Steven Brust and Emma Bull are talking about.
Again, I agree. But have I really dismissed any otherâs struggles? I donât mean to. Has Brust or Bull? Penny came pretty close at a few points, but she didnât really say that any problems faced by white male nerds arenât worth anyone elseâs acknowledgement. I give her full points for that, and I wish everyone here was as generous as she.**
I lost friends to suicide and murder in 2013, and I donât want to talk about their race or gender, because I donât think race or gender creates any meaningful difference in the final quality of suffering and despair that leads one to a horrific, avoidable death. Isnât that the top end, when someone reaches that point? Does it matter where they started from? Only identical twins start from the same place. It grieves me that people think thereâs some scale or gauge of suffering that accumulates pluses and minuses, and that they can denigrate and discard anyoneâs pain as long as they can show someone else might possibly have suffered more overall. I donât want to dismiss anyoneâs struggles. Not anyoneâs.
Step 2 toward solidarity:*** Accept that of the millions of ways that people are screwed by the system, no one person experiences them all, and that focusing on tabulating injustice to the point where youâre actually alienating and dividing people is self-defeating. We have to find a way out of this blame spiral if we are going to move forward together.
You will never hear me say that I deserve to be treated better than someone else because I was born into a broken system.**** Any better treatment I receive would have to be earned by my own actions for me to defend it. Everyone thatâs been harmed or mistreated under this broken system has my sincere apologies for their lack of any advantage I have received from existing in it.
Let me repeat that with more emphasis. I sincerely regret that others have not enjoyed all the advantages and opportunities that I have had given to me through no effort or merit of my own. I deeply regret every injustice that others have suffered due to this broken system, regardless of whether I have also suffered or even benefited from their suffering. I will do everything within my power, regardless of cost, to help prevent others from suffering such injustices henceforth.
Iâve made such apologies and acknowledgments many times before, in several different phrasings, and I will again when I think itâs appropriate, but itâs never helped anyone that I can see. I wish someone could show me some real measurable good coming of it. And hereâs the thing: As a child of the middle-class suburbs, as the only male progeny of two people who came from less privileged backgrounds and worked hard to improve their lot, I have been conditioned to value solving problems. Not just acknowledging injustices or just making others acknowledge them. Ending them. Acknowledgement of any particular wrong is not the end of the journey for me. Iâm not Mrs. Parkinson. And when people say that moving on to talk of repairing our broken system is a dismissal of othersâ suffering, or insist that we must endlessly beat our breasts over any specific groupâs privileges or lack thereof, I canât get behind that. I agree with Brust and Bull**** in seeing that as just another way to derail, divide and disarm us all.
Change wonât happen while the focus remains endlessly locked on exactly why someone elseâs suffering is more important than yours or mine. We have to be more generous with each other. We have to stop yelling at potential allies. We have to acknowledge and understand real hurts and move on if we donât want to perpetuate the system that inflicted them. Stopping at the problem analysis stage is as bad or worse than skipping it entirely.
I wish my prose was less prolix. I envy the pithy. I guess I should shut up now.
* Totally not kidding.
** Not referring to my own problems here. I donât want or need anyoneâs pity.
*** Apologies for taking you out of context here. But I really like your step 1.
**** People like to claim that Iâm saying that, but the poison is in their ears and not my mouth.
***** I hope they donât show up here to tell me Iâve misunderstood and misrepresented them.
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