A glass of the Daily Water.
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I think you’re close there, but the reality is…
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Did I mention @BrandNewFacts curates a series of Wikipedian Truth Mashups and that the author’s marginally Python walkthrough is a fine small plate presentation?
And now I need to go buy a UFS card to cache news.ycombinator content in case I say ‘well ______’ and then pause too long. No good just DuckDuckGo-ing everything.
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The first time I realized this was a phenomenon was a number of years ago: I had written a series of articles about a new library technology and was subsequently asked to give a presentation about it at a conference. At a cocktail party afterwards, whilst chit chatting with another dude, he proceeded to explain to me the real significance of said technology. I should mention I was 7 months pregnant at the time, so clearly my hormones were so out of whack that my lady brain couldn’t comprehend all the intricacies until he enlightened me.
The funny thing is, I didn’t really think about this interaction as “mansplaining” (not a term at the time or at least not a term with which I was familiar) until I shared it later with some other women and we began to compare notes. I still don’t know what bothers me more – the experience itself or the fact that I didn’t recognize it until I had it confirmed by others’ realities.
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I still don’t know what bothers me more – the experience itself or the fact that I didn’t recognize it until I had it confirmed by others’ realities.
Patriarchy is a helluva drug.
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Ain’t that the fucking truth, and I drank the spiked kool-aid without even knowing it.
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Well, actually, that gif is taken from this broadcast.
It is the goal of every meme to reproduce independently of context. I won’t let this happen.
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As far as I can work out - it’s the difference comes down to if the recipient assumes a patronising twat is a patronising twat to everyone, or if it’s because they are sexist. Which has always struck me as amusingly sexist when it’s done with no other information…
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Say what now?
The difference is that one conveys a man’s respect for the mental capacity, knowledge and/or experience of the woman with whom he’s talking, and the other doesn’t. It’s not about what a man supposedly is. It’s about what he’s doing.
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Is it?
If he’s patronising to a man (without other context), he’s patronising.
If he’s patronising to a woman (without other context [edit: not contest]), he’s a sexist mansplainer.
The only difference is that someone has decided that his reaction was sexist based on his primary sexual characteristics.
There’s a guy like it in our office. The men think he’s patronising (to everyone). The women think he mansplains. Same guy. Same actions. But one of them is sexist. shrug
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So you’re saying the whole concept of mansplaining is bullshit? And that (some?) men are the real victims here? Of, what was it, oh yes, “amusing” sexism?
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Ooh ooh! I love it when we reach the “pointing out sexism is sexist” portion of the argument!!
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Vidi horrorshow
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I always assumed that the word came from I Love Lucy, but I may be wrong.
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No, I never said mansplaining was bullshit. It’s real, and it makes me cringe every time I witness it.
I just hate the idea that a man is automatically sexist because he misjudges an audience with women in it.
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Well actually, if he patronizes everyone, equally, by consistently valuing his own opinions (probably ill-informed ones) more highly than others’ expertise I’ll go ahead and agree with you. “My half-assed opinion trumps your knowledge, which I don’t really care that you have” is the essence of all 'splaining, whichever prefix applies. But if he shows some respect for men’s knowledge – even while being a patronizing dick – that he doesn’t generally accord to women’s, he’s a mansplainer.
Because there’s being patronizing, the way I’m being patronizing right now (I think I should point this out since I’m being far too subtle for most people to notice), and there’s being condescending in that special 'splainer’s way. And I don’t think there’s much doubt that most 'splainers are men and most of the people they “enlighten” are women.
(Using sarcasm to make a point, no personal slight intended.)
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I broadly agree. Except I’ve seen the term thrown around too many times by people who either have no idea how the person behaves around men, or who ignore it.
Like the guy I mentioned in my office. He treats men and women the same but a good number of the women consider him a mansplainer.
shrug
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No idea whether the term is inspired by I Love Lucy but the mere mention of the show reminds me of the famous line:
“Luuuucy! You’ve got some ‘splainin’ to do!”
Pretty sure this is one of those famous lines that was never spoken, like “Play it again, Sam.” But this montage focused on Ricky’s accent shows he certainly pronounced “explain” that way, and it was often played for yuks.
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If you’re a man, you likely have little idea whether he really treats women the same as men. There’s condescension, and then there’s the special extra flavor of sexist condescension. Guess who’s much more experienced with the latter, and thus better at detecting it?
Hmm, maybe you shouldn’t be so skeptical about the abilities of your women colleagues…
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