profiling and unconscious bias – part 1
Many of you will be familiar with the work of The Arbourist – uncompromising feminist; sharp, witty and unrelenting master of take-downs; and forceful, commanding expert in her branch of feminism. I had approached interactions with such a fearsome blogger with some trepidation. I disagreed with some of what she said but had a strong sense of respect for her stance, and admiration for her attitude.
Why? Because I’d unconsciously profiled her.
In my head (and I’m going to brutally and embarrassingly frank here), Arb was something resembling a typically masculine lesbian campaigner who had been through the wars, who had seen discrimination, experienced the blunt end of this thing branded ‘The Patriarchy’, and whose uncompromising and fierce attitude had been generated by years of mistreatment. Not precisely that, but something like that. That was the space she occupied in my gut reaction.
This is the first time I’ve been engaged in discussion with a man under the guise of some form of feminism telling me what women need and want. And even odder, until this exchange, I’d been under the impression Arb was an unusually strong woman I respected. (Me on Roughseas)
Fast forward a couple of years to discovering in the midst of an argument about issues relating to women, that Arb is a man. In fact, it was a post that had prompted me to respond:
When I read anyone, smugly or otherwise, fighting for women to be treated equally, I rejoice.
But Arb isn’t fighting for women to be treated equally – he’s fighting for women to be placed above all other considerations, all other injustices, and for all men to scarper into the corner of evil-doing (except him). He’s fighting for women to be listened to, he’s fighting against men ‘mansplaining’ and he’s fighting to subvert the harmful patriarchal stereotypes of behaviour (except when it comes to him telling women what equality looks like). Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem with men having an opinion on what equality looks like, but I do find it ironic in the extreme when they preach from the pulpit they want to pull down.
Feminism doesn’t need to be about women. [Hold your tomatoes!] Feminism is one branch in a fight to change society so that equality of opportunity and fair representation in areas of decision-making exist for all people, regardless of their background or their appearance. Anyone who focuses exclusively on one corner of this battlefield and declares the rest to be of lesser importance has basically wriggled down a rabbit hole and lost the plot.
But, I digress. Profiling, prejudice, unconscious bias. An unavoidable part of the quick-think tribalism facility available to our brains. I like forceful women, I’m bored by forceful men. Forceful women have been there, struggled through and emerged victorious – forceful men have absorbed the entitlement handed out to them by society. Unfair stereotype? You bet.
The things one learns! The Arb, a man? Always known the good host was a woman. I think you got the wrong person VW.
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That would be an interesting twist! I hope you’re right. 🙂
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Arb is indeed a man, and i think you’re being entirely ungracious here. Principally, because you know very little else about him. Without that knowledge, how can you make a value-call on his “right” to express his views? He is astute, smart as tacks, has a vocabulary to die for, and is dangerously brilliant at the put down. Arb’s Red Pen of Justice is some of the best (and funniest) writing I’ve ever seen.
Are you just grumpy because the sun still hasn’t popped up over Hadrian’s Wall?
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I’m surprised you offered more than your requisite sandwich joke. And, in fact, I’m surprised Arb even talks to you, given your penchant for said sandwich joke. 😉
But, all that aside, yes, I agree, I’m being rather ungracious. He winds me up. But I gave him a stunningly favourable summary in my introduction, did I not? It’s a curiously personal thing. Like I said, I don’t mind being intimidated by women, but when a man has been intimidating me (not deliberately, I should add) while telling me what to think about being a woman, my hackles rise. Can you not see the utterly ridiculous irony in his stance? He believes men have been controlling/abusing women throughout history, telling them what to do, what to think, how to act, and he’s here, telling us what the problem is and how to fix it. More humility please, a change of tone, and less with telling us who can go to women’s loos. My respect for him had already plunged by the time I found out he was a man, if that’s any consolation.
On the bright side, there was a brief glimpse of almost warm sunshine the other day, and I’ll be flying over your head in a few weeks to actual proper warmth! (And 24/7 blogging)
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Well, the sandwich joke was crying to come out. Aren’t you impressed with my self-control?
You’re coming back down? What is your connection to those silly people in the south?
And I still think you’re being a terrible person to Arb. Is this Pictland-Pick-A-Fight-Friday?
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Go read the exchange on the Roughseas post linked to and see if you still feel so charitable towards him. I’m not trying to be a terrible person towards him, I’m trying to help him see clearly.
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By poking him in the eye? Is that some Highland Games thing, Hamish? 😉
Why not go pick on Inanity. She’s turned the madness up recently, it’s really quite entertaining.
Anyway, if you’re finished with your hellfire matriarchy, tell me what your connection is with those long-haired louts in the south.
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I’m married to one.
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Really? I suppose I should have figured that one out by myself, huh? I have to ask, how does the tango go with river dance?
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Groan. Salsa and didgeridoo. Have you been going to joke classes with Ark?
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Salsa? Wrong country
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Yes, riverdance too, you big nong. What’s Insanity been up to, I’m scrolling but don’t see much.
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Ahhhh, clever! OK, I’m slow. Nicely played.
She’s been higher up in the clouds than usual.
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You playing there or anywhere?
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Haven’t had time. I think I was last week on something. Can’t remember. It was Carnaval. Bit blurry.
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Oh, you lucky thing, you! Here’s a gem from one of her readers:
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Oooh, they’ve lost the plot over there.
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John, take a look at a couple of Arb’s recent feminism posts – in the past few he’s utilized a false binary and accuses those with opposing viewpoints as being liars (and deleted my comment calling him out on that one).
Makes me wonder if his religious disservice posts are aimed at undermining religion because of the patriarchal components of it, rather than the irrationality of it.
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John reads all Arb’s posts and then makes jokes about women making sandwiches over here. He’s a fickle skim reader. 😉
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I heard that
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I never thought of the Arbourist any more as a man, or a woman. Funny that. To me it is basicly inconsequential what the gender of a fellow blogist is, wether I know it or not, as long as they are not positing their opinions on their own gender. Perhaps, this is because we do not have separate he, or she pronouns at all in Finnish language for separate sexes so we do not tend to think that even as an important issue.
I tell myself to take people as what they represent themselves and nothing more. I have my doubts, like I have sometimes wondered wether if it is true, that Insanitybytes really is a woman, or was raised by atheist parents. But it is not my place to make guesses about those things, any more than it is to try to guess what religion a person represents, or what their gender is, if they have not claimed it to be something specific.
Feminism is the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes. Equal people can talk about issues on equal footing, regardless of their gender or sex. Right?
I do not think a man telling women what to think about feminism is at all ironic when he tries to awaken them to demand justice and equal treatment. That is exactly what feminism is all about. It is not just about women standing for themselves, but for any people taking a specific stand for equality. It could be ridiculous, if the man claimed, that the women must become feminists because he as a man tells them so. However, has the Arbourist made that claim? I myself have done this, in a sarcastic sense in a blog where the writer claimed that men are naturally and by the divine influece of the creator wiser than women, or something to that effect. The host of that blog claims to be a woman, and that women should be submissive to men, because men are that much smarter than women. As I recall, I got no reply from her, when I told her, that as a man I know better than she does what is best for her and in that capacity I know that women should not submit to men.
I have not read all the discussions between you and the Arbourist, so I have no idea where this disruption between you and your preconceptions about him came about. Mind you, I have my own “unconscious bias” on many issues, even towards him and it is “profiling” him as a Canadian. I have no idea where that came from, or even what that is supposed to mean to me…
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Thank you Raut, your opinion is always a gust of clarity. The irony I speak of comes from the belief in his school of feminism that men use their superior place in the patriarchy to intimidate women and tell them where they are wrong. As an intimidating ‘woman’ I found him interesting, as an intimidating man submerged in this type of thinking, I find his whole persona ironic.
That’s fascinating that you don’t profile people in your head even as far as their gender. I hear voices, see faces, think I’m sensing the whole person. A part of the argument that infuriated me with Arb was around this idea that trans women shouldn’t be allowed in public toilets. In the midst of his discussions with Clare (apart from his generally rude dismissive attitude towards her) I sensed that he felt he was speaking to a man and not a woman. I could be wrong, these things are so subtle, and you claim you don’t even consider gender in these exchanges. But I think most of us do adjust our style and tone based on the assumptions we make about someone, it’s unavoidable.
“The host of that blog claims to be a woman, and that women should be submissive to men, because men are that much smarter than women. As I recall, I got no reply from her, when I told her, that as a man I know better than she does what is best for her and in that capacity I know that women should not submit to men.” 😀
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VW, have you ever considered what it means about you and how you think that your response to a blogger talking about social justice and gender is so easily swayed by a change in the perceived gender of that writer?
The Arb has many faults (and by divine fiat it’s my job to reveal them to him!) but pointing out and explaining how patriarchy works and what effects it has is not one of them. I have learned more from the Arb as a single writer about the scope and depth of social injustices regarding gender than all other feminist writers combined. And I’ve read a lot. What he brings to the table is clarity and consistency (and yes, he’s an excellent writer) and has built a huge foundation of solid knowledge against which chauvinistic gender profiling so privileged in every facet of our society (and given ongoing influence by those so steeped in it that it is considered ‘natural’) will receive its due treatment (the famous Red Pen of Justice) regardless of the source. That’s why Claire’s ideas are fair game.
Understandably, those most privileged are men in such a society and so it is men who are least motivated to bring about a significant change in opinion. Claire demonstrates this lack of motivation to change her approach to contentious issues time and time again and is dismissive of anyone and anything that doesn’t comport to her sense of privilege for herself and demand for uncritical review. To do otherwise is most often met not by well reasoned arguments but commentary about hurt feelings, about her emotional vulnerability as if these were good reasons for her sense of assumed privilege. The knee-jerk reaction by those who have bought into this manipulative dysfunction and think themselves champions of the emotionally fragile underclass usually grant her protection and cover to maintain that mirrored sense of genderized privilege – not on behalf of men, of course, but just as as dysfunctional because it is still gender based.
Using gender as if it were a meaningful standard on its own to justify privilege is the root of exercising and engaging in gender discrimination. That said, the only way to see the subtle (and not so subtle) ways patriarchy works requires a gender based approach… in order to compare and contrast and find where gender privilege resides. Once found, it needs to be exposed if we want to do our small part to help rather than hinder serious and meaningful and non-discriminatory change to occur. That’s what the Arb does and of course it’s going to cause hurt feelings… but being a man or a woman is not germane in this undertaking.
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“VW, have you ever considered what it means about you and how you think that your response to a blogger talking about social justice and gender is so easily swayed by a change in the perceived gender of that writer?”
Yes, I kind of thought that was the point of the post.
Knowledge of gender and any other personal details can give a sense of where someone is coming from. In the same way, if you read someone critiquing Canada’s domestic problems in great detail over a period a time, you might assume they were Canadian, and then if you found out they had lived all their lives in Australia, you might rethink your assessment of their critique.
And I’m delighted that a man such as yourself can only have feminism adequately explained to them by another man.
Your ’emotionally fragile’ taunts are dismissive and lacking in real empathy. I do wonder what life is like for men like you, and how you seem to lack the ability to properly see things from another point of view. I wonder if you’ve had hardship yourself, which makes you feel that if you overcame your problems, everyone else is whining if they don’t get on with it. Or I wonder if everything just falls into your lap as the feminist religion tells me happens to Man under patriarchy. I guess I’ll never know.
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Granted, you recognized the profiling but my question had to do with the change of gears in your own thinking. You wave this away as if it were ‘natural’, namely the “unavoidable quick-think tribalism facility available to our brains.” The whole point of the Arb’s contribution I point out is first recognizing and then STOPPING ourselves from falling into this laziness because it IS avoidable.
My most prevalent criticism of my peers while at university was their propensity to avoid critical content and smothering it with context… as if the context ‘naturally’ determines the value of the content. It took years and repeated critical discoveries of tremendous value for these folk to come around to understanding what a disservice this approach of context over content did to their own overcoming of their biases, prejudices, and tribalism and how critical the actual content was to understanding others and their ideas and situations. Context alone misleads, and I find you constantly allowing yourself to be misled.
For example (and there are many you provide), your presumptions about me are factually wrong. You presume I cannot place myself in another person’s position and so I cannot appreciate this maneuver into emotional sanctity from legitimate criticism of content. You presume that if I could, I necessarily wouldn’t hold certain ideas and opinions and write as I do.
Well, VW, you are wrong; I intentionally don’t let my empathy get in the way of my understanding critical content. That focus takes disciple. I’m just not that lazy to assume such a focus is somehow a bad thing because it’s ‘unnatural’, nor am I as susceptible to breezy emotional manipulation as others you seem to prefer and are willing to defend on these grounds. Been there, done that. Learned not to give in to it’s seductive power to feel as if I were a champion of the Underdog. It’s a guaranteed approach to being not only disrespectful to the Other (because I’ve turned them into a symbol) but marked myself as a credulous fool… as anyone who has had to have dealing with addicts knows (master manipulators). And it’s a guaranteed way to produce only a facade of real empathy – one palliative clients with whom I deal so frequently find so common once their condition is known yet tedious and tiresome and bothersome and irksome to them and who tell me all the time how refreshing it is to be treated honestly and forthrightly as a real living and breathing person right here right now with real problems and difficult issues of immediate concern and not as if each of them were a representative of their fatal condition. Content, VW, trumps context. Yes, we can overcome our ‘quick-think tribalism facility’ and we are better off for it.
And so when I read the Arb’s blog and follow his links and am exposed to so many excellent writers on what a patriarchal society and culture is and how it operates and to what effect, I am not doing what you so easily and breezily presume… that I’m having feminism explained to me by a man. I am being shown over time and in hundreds of ways just how endemic patriarchy is and what kind of pernicious effects it produces… effects like presuming that allowing context to define the quality of content produces real empathy, and that a man cannot possibly be a valued guide in this journey. Au contraire, VW… and you would benefit yourself by thinking more about this comment than simply waving it aside and presuming you know better.
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I’m happy to think more about your comment. I’ve read it four times, and my honest opinion is it’s pile of patronising, pseudo-intellectual waffle. Again, probably being unnecessarily honest, I can’t help but think ‘here’s another man, talking down to me, preaching at me, yawn, and essentially saying nothing, but people are going to ‘like’ it because at a glance it looks all clever’.
But I want to understand what you’re saying. Context is misleading me – I’m making incorrect assumptions about people and basing my responses purely on emotional sob stories? Is that right?
Can you give me a couple of examples from our interactions?
And while I’m here, in the context of Arb being a man, did my Canadian/Australian example mean nothing?
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If you weren’t so bored from my waffle and talking down to you, you would already have these answers.
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@Tildeb
I’m a fan of your waffle, even when you’re wrong. 🙂
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Really? You can’t dredge up any examples? You spend four fat paragraphs accusing me of something that makes no sense, can won’t give me an example?
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And while I’m here, in the context of Arb being a man, did my Canadian/Australian example mean nothing?
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@VW
I’m not sure what prompted the hit piece, but we should look at the issues that seem to a point of contention for you.
Women, within in the bounds of a patriarchal society, will never be treated equally. The patriarchal superstructure our societies are built on pivot on the reality that their is a dominant class and an oppressed class. This fundamental imbalance, a documented historical feature, colours almost every interaction between the sexes in society.
Not recognizing this feature of society makes other ventures, like equality, essentially a non-starter because the playing field at the very start is unbalanced. Campaigning for equality in itself isn’t a bad thing, but consider the conditions – Emma Watson received threats to her person and potential explicit exposure/doxxing for making a very limited and reasonable call for equitable treatment of everyone in society.
She was not proposing anything near the tenets of radical feminism (heaven help her if she did), yet she faced threats and intimidation. Where did the backlash come from? Why were gendered insults so prominent in the threats? Concomitantly, why do women face greater risks for having the ‘audacity’ for the mere act speaking their minds online? ( Jessica Valenti, Anita Sarkeesian, Lindy West, Amanda Hess, Caroline Criado-Perez)
Is this problem (gendered insults, rape-threats, death-threats) something ‘more equality’ can fix? Please help me understand how one would go about doing so, because I cannot see how to reasonably get from A to B with equality being the primary metric of analysis.
What I can see, using the lens of radical feminist analysis, is the deep seated hatred of women for daring to subvert their roles as objects in society and taking the role of subjects and authors (the traditional male role) in society. Naming the problem, patriarchally sanctioned misogyny, would seem to at least point to a starting point in addressing the problem (men’s, sanctioned, negative attitudes toward women aka sexism and misogyny).
I’m not sure how to respond to this – offering analysis based on theoretical evidence collected by feminist women – is telling women what equality looks like? I would think that knowledge of different ways of looking at problems women and men face in society would be a beneficial action.
Feminism, ostensibly, should be about the struggle for female emancipation in society vis a vis addressing the structures in society that oppress women. When did centering females in Feminism become a contentious issue?
Conversely, if a movement is not about centering females and their needs and struggles, then should it not be called Egalitarianism?
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Do men really have authority over women in all aspects of our society? I beg to differ. There are some seriously entrenched positions that need shifted, but I’m not convinced that the majority of women suffer at the hands of male authority in a way that could truly define what we now live in as patriarchal. While I’ll argue with anyone who dares to suggest that there is no sexism in society, and that equality is there for the taking, I’m not inclined to think that women are more disadvantaged than any other non-ruling class group.
Let’s look at some of the things you’ve said that show your disregard for other groups who demonstrably suffer in current society:
This is the rabbit-hole I referred to. Why are women in your mind THE oppressed class? There are lots of groups of people who are treated unfairly, who suffer from immense levels of discrimination, and who need everyone to fight for them to be treated equally. I’m a feminist, but my support for any other disadvantaged group in society goes as far it can. No qualifications.
We’ve been through this before, I know. But I’m still shocked when I read it. Trans people ask for recognition of their deepest sense of identity. It’s not difficult, it’s the Golden Rule. Treat people as you would wish to be treated in their position. We don’t understand a pin prick of what trans people are going through, as a species we have undoubtedly hardly scratched the surface of understanding what we call gender identity. Trans people themselves can only tell us how they relate to the world. Somewhere between 40 and 50% try to kill themselves, it’s clearly not an easy road. They have been reviled and mistreated in most cultures for as long as we’ve understood they exist. Even now, some high profile trans people may be celebrated in some areas, but what’s the experience of the average trans person living a normal life from the general public around them? Confused curiosity, open ridicule and violence. Why anyone wants to fight for the right to attempt to exclude them from going to public toilets is beyond petty nonsense. Clare linked to a great article on this the other week. Please read it:
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/when-it-comes-to-transgender-rights-there-s-nothing-feminist-about-being-a-bigot-a6843811.html
In the quote above, you take pains to belittle and reject a person’s need to tell others who they are. Your use of male pronouns, your dismissive of use of *feel*. I can’t believe so many people are happy to sit by and watch rejection and disdain being piled on such a vulnerable and vilified group of people. It’s the same mindset that allowed people to believe that slaves can be no better than slaves, that women could do nothing useful with voting rights, that gay people are all sexual perverts, that Jews should be killed. Trans women aren’t women, they’re just men who *feel* like they’re women because they’re taking advantage of being the ruling class. Absurd! You’re lost in feminist naval gazing, you fail to see a group of individuals who are trying desperately to find a place in a society that didn’t even bother to relegate them to second-class citizens. You are completely denying their experience, or being deliberately blind to it.
“Concomitantly, why do women face greater risks for having the ‘audacity’ for the mere act speaking their minds online?”
Do they? Or do people threaten to violently attack anyone they disagree with online? Check out the interestingly interpreted statistics on this site.
http://www.pewinternet.org/2014/10/22/online-harassment/
This graph in particular shows there are only slight differences in harassment tactics, that basically add up to the same level of implied threat:
http://www.pewinternet.org/2014/10/22/online-harassment/pi_2014-10-22__online-harassment-03/
“I’m not sure how to respond to this – offering analysis based on theoretical evidence collected by feminist women – is telling women what equality looks like?”
Em, no, absolutely not. You’re offering *your* interpretation of a select group of feminist women who you have concluded are correct. Lots of feminist women, for example, are quite happy with trans women using toilets.
“When did centering females in Feminism become a contentious issue?”
It’s not, I never suggested it did. But when did exclusively centering on females become the only consideration of feminism? When did all women who want equality stand up and say the needs of other disadvantaged and oppressed groups are subservient, or even irrelevant? As far as I can tell, only when you’re talking about it.
[And I’m very sad that many of my good blogging friends don’t read your comments closely enough, or don’t care enough about these issues to call you out on them too]
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@VW
That was not the original question. This is what you said – [VW]: “But Arb isn’t fighting for women to be treated equally – he’s fighting for women to be placed above all other considerations, all other injustices, and for all men to scarper into the corner of evil-doing (except him).
And my response – [Arb]: “Women, within in the bounds of a patriarchal society, will never be treated equally. The patriarchal superstructure our societies are built on pivot on the reality that their is a dominant class and an oppressed class. This fundamental imbalance, a documented historical feature, colours almost every interaction between the sexes in society.
What are you trying to argue against? And really, is shifting the goalposts, like many of your religious targets, heading toward an acceptable answer?
The actual contention new becomes clear with your statement here:
Patriarchy isn’t a thing, in your opinion. Despite some 2000 years of living under the boot of men, in 2015 we have it solved, except for a few minor things – like rape culture, the lack of woman’s reproductive autonomy, the commercial rape trade, female trafficking…
Fascinatingly vivid opinion. Concordance with reality, not so much.
The physical, material reality of the situation. In almost every social hierarchy on this planet women make up the vast majority of the underclass. The less like the de facto standard, ‘white male’ the more likely you are to be marginalized, disadvantaged, and oppressed. The least educated – women, the poorest – women, land ownership – women come last. Most often killed at birth/aborted – women. Yep, no oppression to be found ’round here.
I offer Gerda Lerner words from her book, The Creation of Patriarchy:
“This cooperation is secured by a variety of means: gender indoctrination; educational deprivation; the denial to women of knowledge of their history; the dividing of women, one from the other, by defining respectability‟ and „deviance‟ according to women‟s sexual activities; by restraints and outright coercion; by discrimination in access to economic resources and political power; and by awarding class privileges to conforming women.”
Patriarchy exists and it still central to the continuing oppression of the class of human being we call female.
So this isn’t about feminism, or patriarchy or feminist theory. This is about how *you think* others should think and feel about a particular topic. Dissenting opinion, we certainly cannot have any of that. Do I get to say that your trans-activist rhetoric is like your religion too or is dogmatic thought a label reserved only for your opponents?
Are there any other topics where differing opinions are off the table? Because this all-encompassing push for equality seems to becoming much more delimited as time passes.
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I notice you do not address the trans issue here at all.
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You claim we live in a patriarchal society. I’m not shifting the goalposts, I’m responding to your suggestion that we live in a society where men have authority over women. If that’s not your definition, what is? Is this one okay? “A patriarchal society consists of a male-dominated power structure throughout organized society and in individual relationships.” Maybe it’s down to where we live and the community we’re based in, but that’s not the case anywhere I’ve ever lived. The majority of women around me are not under the authority of men, certainly in individual relationships, and in their daily lives, not even throughout organised society. The bigger, wider power structure, certainly, is currently dominated by men, but that too has changed immensely in the last couple of decades. (And bear in mind I’ve lived in various locations around the world, I’m not basing this solely on Scotland.) I feel like it’s easy to fall into the trap of blaming this nebulous concept of the Patriarchy for everything, and lose track of how much things have changed, and how much of a desire there is for further change in society. I like having people like you in feminism shouting out the worst case scenario like it’s endemic, it’s useful, but I don’t like it when you try to drag down everyone (anyone who wasn’t born with a vagina) with you.
I’ve never ever said that. I see gender inequality everywhere. But I see it for other people too. I see generations of underclass left to rot with little opportunity to improve their lives and discrimination against them on a huge scale by the rest of society; I see men struggling under unhealthy pressures to conform to models that don’t make sense for them, and caving; I see a privileged rich culture in large swathes of the world with all the opportunity and freedom life can give in front of them moaning because they make £1000 less or more than another gender; I see millions of people locked into warn-torn or poverty stricken countries denied entry to safer, richer countries because we fear change, and place our own wealth above the lives of others. Humans will never ‘solve’ everything. Life and society are way too complex. It’s good that people choose their battles with passion, and fight for change, but not to the exclusion of others.
Isn’t that what every argument is about? I think you should think what I think!? I’m not sure what point you’re making.
Dissenting opinion is welcome, obviously, here you are. Apparently you’re the one who banned Jason for daring to question one of your posts – is that right?? Did I say anything was off the table?
Since when is saying that women should be able to use women’s toilets ‘trans-activist rhetoric’, that’s kind of creepy.
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Mmm. SIx likes for “The Arbourist”. .
I am away for the weekend, with wise people expressing Love. How to live Love in the world. Three wonderful encounters so far, several other wonderful people glimpsed, more to get to know, more beauty, more wonder.
Sometimes the game we play here just makes me feel ill.
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Indeed, six likes, most I’ve ever seen here. And he waffled essentially nothing of any value. It’s just like an empty speech of soundbites that gets a crowd in a frenzy. It’s not what you say, it’s how you phrase it – it’s an art. We should put a rousing anthem behind it and he could take over the world.
I get the ill thing, that’s what my last break was driven by. Enjoy your weekend.
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@VW
I have rallies too. Paper hats, plates, and cake – the whole nine yards. 🙂
I’ve always been fond of ‘Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries’. I think it would be fitting.
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I loved what Stephen Fry said. He gives short shrift to theists, but I’ve heard people shriek their secularism in such a way as to make me want instantly to become an evangelical Christian.
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Yes, if you read his twitter feed you’d understand what he means… and it’s not to be found here in this comment thread or any of the commentators.
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Not even you? I have started following Sirius!!
I assure you, I understand perfectly what he means.
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How interesting! I missed that completely. I never understood why anyone liked Twitter in the first place. I don’t understand what you are tildeb are saying to each other though – so much goes over my head, sigh.
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Claire seems to be alluding to the fact that Fry’s leaving the room of Twitter, so to speak, because of so much directed bile – from both the religious ‘community’ and the anti-theist ‘community’ – is similar to the kind of reasoned criticism on offer by the commentators here directed towards such snowflakes as Claire. That’s why she says she understands ‘perfectly’ what he (Fry) means when he explains why he’s leaving.
But Fry isn’t taking a break from Twitter because his feelings have been hurt or because some of his ideas have been criticized fairly or unfairly by theist and anti-theists (he was a very good friend of the Hitch, for crying out loud, and they often appeared on panels together and Fry certainly never thought the Hitch was out of line with his rather strongly worded anti-theism that puts the Arb’s Red Pen of Justice to shame), so what is ‘it’ that Claire understands perfectly? She’s trying to make a false equivalency that the death threats and bile spewed at Fry are somehow similar to the criticisms she has received here. And that demonstrates the degree to which Claire will misrepresent her never-ending victimhood in order to smear those who dare to even criticize her opinions or disagree with her demand for respect like the Arb has done.
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Oh Tildeb, so much nasty sarcasm. I’m at a loss to try and explain to you about empathy, respect and the useful exchange of opinions and ideas on various topics, given that I’ve already thrown several thousand words your way to no avail.
But anyway, here’s another angle to chew on.
Try criticising Clare’s religious beliefs. She’ll engage you in discussion, at some stage she might get snarky and annoyed but she’s unlikely to ask you to empathise with her. Try disagreeing with her political opinions. She’ll engage you in discussion, at some stage she might get snarky and annoyed, but she’s unlikely to ask you to empathise with her. Tell Clare that her understanding of herself is somehow flawed, she’s lesser than other humans because of it, try and undermine her sense of identity, which like many trans people of this generation has been traumatic journey, she’ll engage you in discussion, at some stage she might get snarky and annoyed, and obviously, obviously, she’ll wonder why on earth you can’t empathise with her. Jump on the bandwagon of someone else’s attempt to do this, then proceed to mock her pain with this ‘sensitive snowflake’ crap, and I’m wondering why no-one else who lurks round here doesn’t have the decency to chip in and tell you you’re being horrible, unfair and completely blind. Really, can you see yourself?
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Of course you do, Claire. That’s why you make this false equivalency without a care in the world… to suggest these commentators like the Arb here are the same as the death threatening kinds that have gone after Fry on twitter. Yeah, you understand perfectly.
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True understanding is empathy, not argument.
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Oh, I see… one cannot truly understand if one dares to criticize or challenge a bad idea or poor reasoning by that individual because then it’s not empathetic enough. Obviously, someone cannot understand you unless they empathize with you and they can’t empathize with you if they argue with you. How very convenient… for you. Got it.
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Why this desperate need to “get it”?
I understand that you imagine you have eluded your operant conditioning, and think rationally. You don’t “get” anything at all.
There are human beings with feelings. One subgroup exults in trans women killing ourselves and feels under imminent threat unless every single other person agrees no trans woman should ever enter a woman’s loo or changing room. One or more men, with male privilege, in a lordly manner tells me what is “my place”. I find the way I can be most authentically me, and follow it. Many women see that I am mostly harmless, and don’t “get” the excluders’ need to exclude me and drone on endlessly about my kind on the internet. And you imagine you have eluded operant conditioning, and yet pick a side which you rationalise.
You do not believe yourself, that is your problem. Or you would just say once that Sirius was wrong to delete any of your comments, without the thousands of words purporting to justify yourself.
Were I a snowflake, I would be melted by now.
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Waffle and try to divert as much as you want, Claire. Play the emotional card repeatedly. Try to avoid using reasoned argument in response to the Arb. That’s fine.
No matter what you do, however, the fact remains quite clear that the Arb is not like those death-threat utterers that hounded Frey. Pretending he is, pretending that you are the same kind of victim suffering the same kind of hounding here on this thread, is ridiculous but hardly an atypical maneuver on your part. I’m just pointing out your standard operating procedure which indicates the quality of reasoned thought upon which many of your opinions try to stand… namely, only by the allowances and sympathy of those who buy into your emotional manipulations to feel like they have to champion many of your poor ideas in order to show proper respect to you as a person. You’ve intentionally smeared the Arb in this typical underhanded and mean-spirited way (and try to do the same with me and my ludicrous banning by SB) and now that I call you out on it, you thrash about to try to avoid taking responsibility for what you’ve done.
Grow up, Claire, and let your opinions stand on their own merit. That would improve the value of your contributions for every reader – me included… presuming you don’t get too bored, of course – because you can offer compelling insights and observations that do have merit. But what detracts more and more from their merit is all this emotional manipulative bullshit and childish defensive attacks on others you try to attach to them.
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“Compelling insights and observations that do have merit.” Thank you for that.
This is a game to me. Much of the time I am laughing. But also, what we discuss is my life.
One option is the view that XY=”male”, therefore me dressing female and using female names- Clare and my real name- is ridiculous, and me going into women’s loos is threatening and offensive. There you go. There is your clear, simple, straightforward rational answer.
The trouble is, I would rather die than go back to presenting male. Most people who know me IRL humour me. Transition was what I wanted more than anything else in the world.
If you hear the anger of the Excluders, they have a similar emotional investment. One said, “if a man feels so entitled to having society validate his fetishes and misogyny that he’d kill himself if he isn’t catered to, then his suicide would be a relief to others.”
The answer is not going to be reached by reductive rational argument. It is going to be achieved by negotiation, empathy and, yes, emotional manipulation.
“The Arbourist” does not get to tell me what to do. The Excluders do not need him to defend them from me, and there are better feminist battles for them all to give their energy to: prostitution and pornography, reproductive rights, whatever. A few thousand eccentrics are no threat at all, and if no-one transitioned the trans sex offenders would still be sex offenders. Though I have far more respect for the excluders than for “The Arbourist”, as they actually have a personal interest. I will listen to them, and engage with them; but to him I quote Germaine Greer: “Piss off, you’re a man”.
What appears to be “rational argument” without taking the feelings of my tiny minority into account erases me. It is a human thing. It is emotional as much as rational.
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I see you took what I said in my last comment to you completely on board.
Let’s look at some facts here – where has Clare ‘smeared’ Arb?
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the fact remains quite clear that the Arb is not like those death-threat utterers that hounded Frey. Pretending he is, pretending that you are the same kind of victim suffering the same kind of hounding here on this thread, is ridiculous
Suggesting the Arb is like those who hounded Fry is a smear. For such an empath as yourself, I’m surprised you missed this connection. Or do you think the false equivalency Claire links between the Arb and Fry’s detractors – those who threaten to kill others – should be taken by the Arb as a compliment to his character?
Look, the fact is that the Arb is a powerful advocate for feminism. Claire derails this fact in her quest to vilify him… for reasons she thinks are important.
In a nutshell, this the problem sweeping the Left’s ranks: we’re so busy trying to implement rules and regulations about specific correct behaviours and specific correct opinions and specific correct language that we then vilify those in our own ranks who we <i.feel step beyond what many of us consider the correct version of what’s acceptable, what’s tolerant, what’s respectful, that we eat our young and cast our strongest allies as the worst villains. Meanwhile, there are very strong enemies who really do call for the death of people like Claire in real life who carry on promoting real intolerance, real misogyny, real paternalistic values, real violence, demand real submission, advocate for real laws that criminalize such people and so on.
Guess what? These folk are the real enemies of those of us who support individual autonomy and equality in law. They are the ones who really do utter real death threats. They really are a problem in need of sustained an united criticism. Miscasting the Arb to be someone in such ranks is beyond lunacy, beyond false witnessing, beyond anything resembling reasoned debate of legitimate but tiny differences in opinions.
Those in the left who blow these tiny differences up into major shit-storms for entirely selfish and manipulative reasons, who then call for banning and censuring and dis-inviting and so on have become fascists – the natural sympathizers of intolerance who have all but capitulated their own esteemed tolerance and respect for others in favour of feeling they are exercising correct form. They’re not. They are aiding and abetting enemies of the enlightenment values upon which our freedoms and rights stand by eroding their support by real acts of intolerance against their natural allies, real acts of disrespect towards their natural allies, carrying out real acts of censure and banning and dis-invitations of their natural allies. These are the folk who are fast becoming the greatest danger all of us must face… starting with ourselves.
By all means argue with the Arb about bathrooms but for crying out loud, don’t escalate this tiny difference nestled somewhere in a massive amount of overall support to equate with those who threaten to kill people for their opinions.
Stop being so busy defending the feelings of others – feelings that you project onto them and assume are of supreme concern – that you vilify natural allies. That’s the crime going on with the Arb here and that’s why so many people rally to his defense against this quibble you have elevated to heights of stupid vilification.
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Where does she say he is? I took her to mean she understood the kind of sickened feeling about it all – can’t be bothered with the nastiness. And I doubt Arb is anything like the worst she’s faced online. Please show me where she says this, before you take your little story of patronising snide any further. I think you may simply have taken it upon yourself to project your irritated thoughts onto Clare (that’s Clare without the ‘i’, once more …)
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In your reply to Violetwisp, below-
It is not a “quibble”. I have been trying to think of analogies- it is as if he advocated pulling niqabs from women’s faces. Arguably the niqab is an instrument of oppression, but stripping the woman of it is wrong.
It is not just me. Other people, hearing he thinks I should be excluded from all women’s space, are revolted. Yes, we can agree about a lot; but my exclusion matters.
I am not blowing something minor up. It is my whole life. The ones “vilifying those in our own ranks” are the trans-excluders.
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‘Profiling, prejudice, unconscious bias. An unavoidable part of the quick-think tribalism facility available to our brains’
This is very true Violet. It is formidably hard for us to fight against this natural tendency. I gather that we naturally stereotype as a way of saving brain energy as it is an effort to think.
I learnt at work that our CEO’s reaction to a suggestion was more dependant upon who made the suggestion then its underlying merit.
I am not meaning to demonise the CEO, but rather using this as an example.
This unconscious bias is demonstrated in any judged event when it is not possible to screen the participants.
What I wonder is whether it is possible to educate to overcome this bias? My gut feeling is that education only goes so far and unless handled sensitively sometimes can result in an unconscious fight back as we all tend to resent being lectured to.
What to do? That is the question.
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What I wonder is whether it is possible to educate to overcome this bias?
Yes, through conditioning.
The method to do so often is called critical (and creative) thinking. What is difficult is to apply it… especially when our emotions have been activated (and our stress hormones active the amygdala and produce cortical stimulants and all that jazz) and we then use our higher cognitive functioning to rationalization our feelings rather than examine for truth value the issue or encounter that started this process.
We undergo operant conditioning very early and quickly develop a neural response to stimuli that activates a cortical response. Another name for this is emotional manipulation. We receive it and learn to employ it. When we receive it – including self induced – we chemically respond. This response has the benefit of increasing all kinds of various performances but it tends to use lower brain functioning pathways and it is here where we find uncritical and simple pathways… fight or flight, right or wrong, Oogity Boogity! or something else, and so on. This is where we find basic biases.. like the rustle in the grass is presumed to be a threat and we act on that presumption immediately, that noise in the night is a threat, so we’ll assume the cause is malignant and hostile and act accordingly. We presume our allies are those most like us, and when we encounter differences we tend to push our automatic trust downward. This is where tribalism and xenophobia lives. (Donald Trump and his guru Ann Coulter make their homes here).
To move away from these kinds of presumptions – because we know they are almost always incorrect (but still favoured by evolution) – we have to alter our brain’s response away from this simple default and into our higher cognitive functioning pathways. This is where we ‘learn’, where we ‘think’, where we make meaning, and this is where we create pathways that we know do produce reliable and consistent descriptions of our environment and do produce our successful interactions with it (also favoured by evolution).
Overcoming bias and prejudice and stereotyping is a brain activity that requires us to change gears, so to speak, and intentionally stop ourselves from acting on these emotionally charged responses. We have to engage the brain intentionally and this is where critical thinking and its methodology plays a central role. And this stops us from jumping to rationalized conclusions and gives us a chance to actually think and consider and weigh and judge accordingly. This is how bias and prejudice and stereotyping (and belief in Oogity Boogity) is put aside in favour of reason leading to vastly improved social functioning.
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“What to do? That is the question.”
I think being aware it exists is a good starting point. Get people to agree to measures that combat it – blind evaluations where possible, quotas in areas where equal representation should be mandatory e.g. media, government.
I first became aware of it as an undergraduate in tutorials with a dinosaur academic, who greeted everything the male students said with enthusiasm and interest, and everything female students said with complete disinterest. I initially assumed that the girls weren’t up to it, when it dawned on me that when the guys spouted inaccurate, vacuous nonsense, he’d look for something of worth in it, whereas anything girls said was cut short. I’ll never forget that, I was really shocked. Sounds similar to your experience with the CEO – it’s not what people say, it’s who says it.
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