Talent, Skill, Popularity, and Misogyny: A Feminist Critique

[seasons]

I read this post several times and each sentence expresses a complete idea but together I don't understand what purpose they're working towards, so I'll just unpack this sentence by sentence. And I'm trying not to be pedantic jerk in the process. But only you can decide if I am or not.

Equality is a great thing. It's something I agree with wholeheartedly.

No argument there!

Causes are great too. They give you meaning and purpose, even when they're making claims of -isms to rouse support.

What kind of causes do you mean? What "claims" are you referring to? I don't know if I believe the second sentence here; your feelings about "-isms" was made clear in other posts.

The problem, however, is that a fair number of people get wrapped up in causes to the point where they polarize.

I suppose this happens a lot. Are you saying that it's happening in this thread? And if a cause "polarizes," does that make it a bad thing?

For example, the US civil rights movement of the 1960s was certainly a polarizing movement. Do you think that leaders went about it all in the wrong way because they offended too many white people who supported segregation?

That might sound like an extreme example but if you're not referring to a cause like that, or one as relatively small and humble as what this thread is about -- essentially, getting people on the forum here and at other anime/AMV-related spaces to be more conscious of the sort of language they use -- then what kind of causes should people avoid getting "wrapped up" in?

You are either a crusader that must attack the problem or you are part of the problem - there is no middle ground.

Could you give an example of this that's applicable to the issue at hand here? Is Kionon saying this to us? If so, where?

These people don't want equality, they want preferential treatment and special deference for years/decades/centuries of mistreatment by others.

When you say "these people," who do you mean? What "preferential treatment" do they want? I can tell that you've taken offense to something in this thread and you're trying to talk about it but this is very general and without any specifics, we can't talk about it much, let alone identify whether or not there's any merit to it.

That is not okay, because that is not equality.

What isn't quality? "Preferential treatment"? Perhaps it isn't, but who's asking for something like that? Kionon? Girls on the Org? "Feminists"? "Radical" feminists?

Fairly or not, that's how a lot of modern feminist groups are perceived.

Your first sentence is absolutely correct. That is how a lot of modern feminist groups are perceived.

That is how they are understood by people who do not take the time to try to understand what they are about or what their goals are. A lot of modern feminist groups are perceived that way... by people who completely misunderstand them. One can perceive something without actually coming to a real understanding of it that approaches the truth. Perception is influenced as much by the "seer" as it is by the subject. But anyway...

In previous sentences you've made the accusation that certain unnamed groups are demanding preferential treatment. Here, you connect the dots to feminism. Is modern feminism guilty of demanding preferential treatment, or does it suffer from an image problem that makes people think that's what it's all about?

I think it's important to understand that and address it.

That might be important to understand and address, but I don't know which side of the line you're on. It's clear that you think that the phenomena of minority groups demanding special treatment is out of control and a big crisis in modern society. But then you focus on the problem of the "perception" the minority groups, which is a different matter altogether.

Who needs to "address it"? Feminists? Do they need to change all their goals/strategies/expectations just because certain people don't perceive them correctly? Is it more important for them to change than it is for the rest of society?

I just don't understand what the main idea of this post is and I feel like it's built on a set of assumptions that make a lot of people unnecessarily hostile towards a set of totally reasonable demands. I'd say "requests" instead of "demands" just to sound more friendly, but screw it, it's sort of silly that society has to have an argument about most of this stuff at all in 2013.

btw I'm not picking on you, I just think we should try harder to understand each other.

[Kionon]

I wanted to leave this this topic alone for a few days in order to allow people to come in and post personal experiences. I've carefully watched traffic patterns, so I know there have been numerous people viewing the forums so that even if only a small portion had posted, we would have had a few if not several really great posts.

This hasn't happened.

This presents four distinct and disturbing possibilities:

A) Misogyny does not exist as a pervasive problem and feminist theory is wrong.
B) Misogyny does exist as a pervasive problem, but not in AMV communities.
C) Misogyny is pervasive enough that editors with personal experiences feel that they will be made uncomfortable, or mocked, or hounded if they choose to post.
D) Misogyny is so pervasive that it has been internalised so heavily by everyone that very few of us even notice it is an issue, even when it is directly directed at us.

D is certainly plausible in some communities, but we're a pretty well educated group, so I have a hard time believing we're unable to spot misogyny when we see it. B is possible, but I'd really like evidence that these many situations I've seen, heard about, or personally experienced, are actually isolated. And even if they are isolated, that seems to me to suggest that certain women are being targeted with misogynistic comments whereas perhaps not all women are, and if that's going on, it's still a problem. A is right out. The evidence that patriarchal attitudes continue to be everywhere is really easy to demonstrate. Feminist Frequency's series on women characters in video games is a great example which limits itself to exploring one single form of media/entertainment. I could find similar analysis on almost anything we could possibly think of to put forward as a topic of discussion. So, if I was a betting woman, I'd go with C as my theory. It not only fits descriptions in conversations which I have had with others, it also fits complaints I have received.

The conceptualisation of C also plays directly into the "humorless bitch" trope which I have seen and experienced. This is the idea that if a woman (or a man!) finds a particularly gendered joke, comment, or behavior problematic, she (or he) is derided as lacking an appropriate sense of humor, not having a sense of humor, or being too uptight. Such a response is extremely problematic. This tells the offended party her (or his) toleration of such comments is required in order to maintain social harmony and continue to be included in the group. It is a silencing tactic and it means that even if the offended party is wrong, no exploration or critical thinking has taken place. Social currency is produced and inclusion maintained when silence is the watchword. It creates an atmosphere of intimidation where some voices, perhaps many voices, specifically those of women, are not heard on an issue that affects their every day lives. Therefore I am sure (and in fact know because of comments I have received in PMs to this effect) that there are editors who have issues, but end up not talking about them.

I'd like to offer my PM box as a safe space for comments to be included in this thread anonymously. I'll post the quotes here. Even moderators cannot read private messages. Short or long, specific or general, please share with me if you believe that openly declaring your issues will cause you undue, unwanted grief. That said, like in earlier posts, I would like you to avoid naming names for incidents long past. The plan here is to emphasise the idea that this is a real issue which needs to be addressed.

All that understood, I want to propose a view which usually isn't discussed as much, even in feminist discourse. I believe it is just as valuable to explore why a comment isn't problematic as it is to explore why a comment is problematic if someone calls it out. Indeed some comments may have double meaning, and both the intention and the perception are worth considering.

To demonstrate this, I'll use a comment from my own history. A few years ago, when a specific woman editor was having issues with unwanted male attention, I alluded to, and then specifically mentioned, her issues in two jokes I made in a topic "why are you here in the hobby?" I said I was only in the hobby to hit on women editors, and I then proceeded to "hit" on this specific editor in a very obvious (to me) over the top way. While I only discovered this comment of mine in doing research into the history of questionable comments here on the forums, and I don't actually remember writing these jokes, I am pretty certain I know what my intent was: to mock the creepy and inappropriate attention and to call attention to it as a serious problem. Neither I nor the woman editor I joked about appeared in that topic again. I have no idea how she perceived it. Even if she recognised my intent, she may have felt it was not my place to turn her oppression into a joke, even one that obeys the rule, "never joke about the victim, always joke about the perpetrator." She may have been able to rationally accept it was a good joke with a strong message, but she may just have been really tired of hearing about it entirely. I'm fairly certain I would not choose to make such a joke now, and if I did, I would not name any editor. I would just name the problem.

I also want to say I didn't have to wait long before a subtly problematic and unintentionally misogynistic comment came up which I felt I had to explore under my own issued challenge:

I'm in the middle of a women conversation...is it dangerous?

Now, I know (and I knew) that FarmXD is a great guy, a great friend to many, and definitely not a misogynist. Not even remotely. Not even in the same universe. But is the comment still problematic? You bet it is.

"But wait, Kio," you say, "haven't you said there are women-oriented discussions?" Yes, yes I have. This is a woman-oriented discussion. There have been other recent attempts at women-oriented discussions. However, "oriented" here does not mean "only." This discussion specifically is about misogyny as an aspect of patriarchy and how it affects attitudes and behavior subtly in the treatment of women editors. However, patriarchy also hurts men. It's fair, as a side bar, to bring this up. I encourage it. And heck, I think that the other women-oriented conversations were absolutely open to men as well. So if there are conversations which are women-oriented, why would FarmXD's comment be problematic? Excellent question.

In this case, a number of women (but not only women) were discussing weight and height and what a healthy weight looks like for each of us. This is an issue which absolutely affects men, but FarmXD's comment implies that it this conversation is either women-oriented or just for women. Given the extreme messages about women's bodies which are refreshed every day, it subtly supports the notion that women need be concerned with their bodies, in minute detail, whereas guys do not or should not be as concerned. Yet FarmXD himself was one of the men in the conversation. His very presence negated his own assertion. There's also a hint of perhaps internalised patriarchal feelings, as FarmXD seems to be questioning whether he is doing something wrong, or even dangerous, by participating in this conversation as a man. Short, subtle, and packed with semiotic intertextual meaning.

I want to thank FarmXD for allowing me to call him out in the thread in question and to discuss the problematic nature of the comment elsewhere. His apology and his gratitude for the conversation proves he's one of the good guys. He has set a model for exactly how we all should react when our comments, attitudes, or behaviors are challenged. Myself included, if I deserve it, and as I say, sometimes with ableism, I most certainly do.



SERIOUS PART OVER, RELEVANT, THOUGHT PROVOKING, OVER THE TOP COMICS TO FOLLOW!

And now some appropriate (and to some degree over the top) comics!

*

*Just kidding Pt. 2: I don't actually think I am or any woman for that matter is a bitch, feminist or not.

While this comic from Gabby Schulz is clearly exaggerated to some degree (it is, after all, a comic in a distinct cartoon style) and has some issues with the idea of monolithic opinion amongst both women and men (which we've clearly debunked here, with aesling disagreeing with me, and seasons taking up the feminist position as his own), the last page of the comic is pretty much how I feel about both this thread and DJ Ultima's menses thread in General Discussion (not about sexism, in that thread's case, but about "woman-type stuff" as Gabby calls it):






Thank you all for continuing to engage with this topic.

[Sephiroth]

First what you are doing to your male students is segregating them from the girls your claim of males dominating academia is contrary to actual facts.
http://www.williamdraves.com/works/boys.htm
I don't expect you to read the whole thing the main point i wish to make with it is that less males are graduating in comparison with females and that numbers only going to get higher. Your attitude towards your male students is questionable in light of these things. You are the majority and that includes in success in the collage sphere at the moment. You had admitted to actively working against your male student by clamping down on their success drive, i would not surprise me if some of your male student feel resentful of your attitudes towards them give you are engaged in active segregation.

To hammer my point home about how your particular i'm going to change only a couple words keep your statement exactly the same in order to emphasis a point about how your language comes off

"I had a class where there were about 30 students. A rough count revealed more Whites than Blacks. What proceeded to happen is that about 10 black, the majority of the blacks (perhaps there were two or three others who were not so active) who were very energetic. Always speaking out, always raising hands, always volunteering for everything first, and showing a lot of initiative. These are great traits in an English class, and I know that the blacks were not attempting to be inconsiderate. They simply weren't thinking about the whites or being situationally aware. Regardless of intent, the environment was a hostile one for the whites.

At one point about halfway through the lesson, I simply had to put my foot down and cut the blacks off. It didn't always work, and I spent a lot of energy and focus to create a space where the whites could participate and their voices were not marginalised. It was exhausting, and although I did not actually keep track, I feel like I devoted more time to the whites and yet was unable to get their participation up to blacks levels because I often had to deals with the blacks' somewhat sullen resentment. They simply did not understand that they were doing anything wrong. If the whites wanted to participate, they ought to fight for it, or so that seemed to be the shared idea. Since I had already been thinking about this due to this thread, I was hyper-sensitive to this racial byplay. "

Based on what you have stated it would appear that it's is not your male students who are failing, it is you who are failing them. In this case as you have stated they are a minority in your class. I have also proved factually that they are a minority overall in the kind of institution you are in. Logically what you are doing is actively working against a minority in the professional space you occupy. Now you have a perception that they are dominating, as was argued about claimed perception of feminism (facts are needed to establish what the actual mainstream perception of feminism is, even what form) that it is just that a perception. I would argue that there is a good change that the behavior you saw them exhibit confirmed your own particular belief systems about how males and females operate in that particular space.

If that's the case i'm not going to hold that against you as it is very easy to fall into what we want to believe due to most people wanting their world view validated. The term is confirmation Bias i believe that would be a decent description of what i'm talking about. I would suggest you look at success wise how they are actually doing, likewise if you can see how well the males compared to females are doing throughout your school.

2nd a rebuttal to your authority who i would suggest you read her thesis paper also if you want to look into the view and opinions of the authority your linking and see if they really match up with yours. I do not like talking about Anita at all given that the subject has been exploited into a emotional divide on many web pages instead of being a topic of rational logical discussion. In part because of Anita's argumentative technique which i would put into the same level that people argue in relation to a Glen Beck or Michael Moore, a person who uses particular fallacies in order to conform to the lowest common denominator of a group in order to achieve financial benefit by championing said groups. However as you have brought her into your arguments a rebuttal is in order.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6gLmcS3-NI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LpFk5F-S_hI

Goes into her reasonably well id also suggest looking over her thesis which is cited and available for download in the links on those videos. Anita from what i've seen is not a thinker she is a mouthpiece for other feminist writers she has read in college.

Oh and this is not just a female orientated discussion due to heavy involvement of males in the topics of contention. Your statement that amvs are male dominated for instance implicitly bring men into the fold. Now a more acrate description would be This in in relation to how women are treated by men primarily. Id agrue this also from just the examples you've given very few of them cite women's behaviors, rather its how males are behaving and its relation to the female. To call it entirely female centric is rather stretching it. Even the way that you have defined and used Misogyny involved men since everyone has attitudes towards genders and sex outside of the handicap of being dead.

You claims of a desire ofsafe space does come off as a desire to silence opposing viewpoints, after feminism safe from what? It feel great to say safe. We want to keep people safe, what that entitles is questionable.

Well i'm going to post a major authority talking point about the important of others speech. And do understand i hold this both ways. I have a right to say unpopular views and so do you, id argue that what often is banned or swept aside sometimes are the most important things in any group.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2nyBOucJcc
"Be It Resolved: Freedom of Speech Includes the Freedom to Hate."

[Kionon]

Sephiroth,

I'm not going to take the time to address your arguments, but not because I don't value open discourse. There are a couple of reasons for this:

1) I find your posts, especially your long ones, to be extremely hard to follow. If you're going to write a text wall (as I have done several times already) you need to create a more coherent flow within clearly segmented portions of your views.

2) I keep telling you this is not about numbers, and you say you understand that, but your attitude and choice of citations does not suggest you believe it.

3) You seem to be implying, if not explicitly stating, that male privilege doesn't exist. If that's the case, any further discussion is moot.

4) Your comparison of male and female speech patterns in educational environments with racial dynamics in educational environments is not only a false analogy, it's probably pretty offensive. Gender and race cannot be directly compared.

Primarily, however:

5) You are not reading. You try to address points I never made, and a few of your arguments are actually against the opposite position from mine. I have repeatedly had to tell you to reread, and it seems that is still the case.

I cannot have any actual discourse with you; you won't let me. However, I want to make this very clear; I am not out to create a space that is overly politically correct and therefore hostile to critical thinking. I welcome objections and I have thanked others for objections. However, those objections need to be to positions I've actually taken. I see no problem with a safe space where objections are welcomed. And specifically, I certainly have no anti-male/anti-man agenda or bias.

[Sephiroth]

Sephiroth,

I'm not going to take the time to address your arguments, but not because I don't value open discourse. There are a couple of reasons for this:

1) I find your posts, especially your long ones, to be extremely hard to follow. If you're going to write a text wall (as I have done several times already) you need to create a more coherent flow within clearly segmented portions of your views.

You are also hard to fallow and all over the map so the feelings are mutual.

2) I keep telling you this is not about numbers, and you say you understand that, but your attitude and choice of citations does not suggest you believe it.

So your logic is even if 80 percent of college graduates are female i believe its around 73 percent at the moment isn't a sign of dominance? Males are a minority in success in college period. College is now dominated by the achievements of a female majority. Your gender is dominating wither you believe it or not. You bases for this is that the males in your class are more eager to try to answer questions and succeed. You see no problem with this?

3) You seem to be implying, if not explicitly stating, that male privilege doesn't exist. If that's the case, any further discussion is moot.

You have not supplied any evidence that it exists, if it does you must then look into the privileges females have compare and then consider which options fit the scenario best. You claim there is male privilege, prove it. Not just because your perceive it as being so. I hear nothing but anecdotal evidence from you. An appeal to the authority of Feminism doesn't mean it exists. And if you do you must also take an equal look at the privileges of females before you make any conclusions. Your a feminist, it says it exists.

4) Your comparison of male and female speech patterns in educational environments with racial dynamics in educational environments is not only a false analogy, it's probably pretty offensive. Gender and race cannot be directly compared.

The language you are using has a negative bias against the male gender based on no hard evidence. You are advocating curtailing the success of proactive students based on their gender.

Primarily, however:

5) You are not reading. You try to address points I never made, and a few of your arguments are actually against the opposite position from mine. I have repeatedly had to tell you to reread, and it seems that is still the case.

I am covering ground in other areas, by that logic you should never have brought up video games because that has nothing to do with editing amvs outside of ripping footage.

I cannot have any actual discourse with you; you won't let me. However, I want to make this very clear; I am not out to create a space that is overly politically correct and therefore hostile to critical thinking. I welcome objections and I have thanked others for objections. However, those objections need to be to positions I've actually taken. I see no problem with a safe space where objections are welcomed. And specifically, I certainly have no anti-male/anti-man agenda or bias.

Whatever your arguing, prove it with facts, not appeals to emotions. I will make my opinions known i will also back up as much as i can with facts. What exactly does a safe space mean then? The presumption with that statement is that there's something out there that's a danger too it that you don't want in.

There really is no discourse because you don't present much in the way of evidence, so all we get is opinion. Your working from a presumption that feminist theory is true. I won't without proper evidence. Not believing in it obviously is not comparable with your belief system. As you have said since i do not believe in male privilege because a group of people claim there is, there is no point in going further because i do not prescribe to that presumption. I will be going.

[Fall_Child42]

ohhhh I get this joke now! It's clever!

It's portraying a woman making a feminist joke about sexist jokes. Which in and of itself IS a sexist joke!

Comedy!

[Kionon]

It's portraying a woman making a feminist joke about sexist jokes. Which in and of itself IS a sexist joke!

Comedy!

Todd... It's not actually a joke at all. There is a humor value in it, but that humor resides from the fact that it is accurate to the artists' feelings towards sexist jokes.

It is not a sexist joke itself, and I don't see where you're getting that from.

[Fall_Child42]

It's portraying a woman making a feminist joke about sexist jokes. Which in and of itself IS a sexist joke!

Comedy!

Todd... It's not actually a joke at all. There is a humor value in it, but that humor resides from the fact that it is accurate to the artists' feelings towards sexist jokes.

It is not a sexist joke itself, and I don't see where you're getting that from.

Humourous observations about one's perceptions and experiences are totally not jokes.
I learned this today.

What is the deal with airplane food?

[Kionon]

Humourous observations about one's perceptions and experiences are totally not jokes.
I learned this today.

What is the deal with airplane food?

I appreciate that you took the time to read the thread and interface with some of the ideas, and images, presented. As to your claim above, however, that's not what I said, and I really feel like you knew that already. Of course I believe they certainly can be, although in this case, humor is derived from the fact that the artist isn't joking, but rather is completely serious about challenging sexist jokes which are both unfunny and deeply problematic.

Please don't derail this thread, although you are welcome to contribute to it in a positive manner.

Thank you.

[outlawed]

I'll try to get y'all back on topic.

So how does this video clip make you feel?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kORINpVUEtE

Good luck.