"If patriarchy hurts men too, then how is patriarchy even real?"
Patriarchy doesn't mean that all men benefit while all women are marginalized; rather, it means that a society is structured to favor a stereotyped masculine ideal that is the default perspective and position, and is expected of all men, with an idealized feminine ideal expected of women, but still defined in relation to the preferred masculine concept.
In practice this means men who do not inherently conform to the masculine ideal are marginalized, although unlike women, being still men (or perceived as such) means they have the opportunity to attempt to conform or fake their conformity. Being men, particularly men who have internalized these masculine norms and do meet them at least partially, they are still favored by a society that perceives them as men (with all the social assumptions that go along with that perception), at least until their perceived masculinity is "removed" (such as having too many stereotypical "feminine" interests, including being attracted to men, failing to meet expected "masculine" standards and presentation, such as clothing and personality).
These men have two main options, attempt to conform to the ideal (or try to expand the ideal to include them), or reject the ideal. Since most people in a society have so internalized their community's norms, they never question them, and try to conform when they notice discomfort (ie: shame or embarrassment).
My Little Pony fans.
My Little Pony has always had a large fanbase of children and adults that was predominantly female; this is how it has continued to exist for 30 years. Although they were a minority, there were male fans even from the beginning. The current series, Friendship is Magic, expanded that fanbase to include more boys and young men. However, rather than integrate with the large, preexisting, majority-female fanbase, they created their own "masculine" fanbase, with a masculine name, Bro-nies, and masculine interests like drawing the characters as "sexy" or making outright porn of it, rejecting the stereotypical feminine elements of the series as less important, and even going so far as to claim the action elements are proof that the series is really for boys, for them, not for girls: that it is masculine, and that being "masculine" makes it superior to the perceived "feminine" previous generations, ignoring the similarities in fantasy and action.
These Bronies are men who, by having a "feminine" interest, fall outside of the male ideal that they have internalized. Patriarchy has hurt them. They feel the discomfort, the judgmental social expectations, the embarrassment over their interest. Many in the past chose to hide their interest from others, or even from themselves, but Bronies embrace their interest. Unfortunately, this leaves them to deal with the cognitive dissonance. They like something "feminine" but have not rejected the masculine ideal that they have internalized as part of their male identity; it's so foundational to their worldview that they may not even know they hold it. And so rather than question the validity of masculine expectations, they reinterpret their interest, reject the feminine parts, emphasize or outright create the masculine parts, push away female fans with their displays of hyper-masculinity and sexuality, all framed as perfectly normal and natural, as that default masculine ideal makes it seem, in turn reinforcing the illusion that yes, FiM must be for boys because mostly boys are here, as well as reinforcing the illusion of how to "properly" be a male fan.
This wasn't the only option though. There were male fans before. Male fans who felt the embarrassment of liking something "for girls" and dealt with harassment and disapproval from not just society, but close family and friends, who were still working out of the patriarchal mindset and judging and hurting these early male fans for it. Yet some refused to reject their interest and instead rejected the masculine ideal, or at least parts of it. This wasn't the easy option of course; there weren't enough of them to make a change in perceptions. They may have still hid their interests from most people, but they joined online fan groups with mostly female fans, and had private collections, and went to pony meets to spent time with other (mostly female) fans. And within the larger fan community, "the boys" had private, safe spaces for only them. Because patriarchy hurts men too.
Bronies had the chance to change perceptions. There were enough of them willing to come out and embrace and defend their non-traditional interests. But they chose not to question and reject the flawed foundation of their masculine identity and fear of the inferior feminine, but instead reshaped themselves and their interests to conform to those expectations and fears. In doing so, they only reinforced the patriarchal concept of maleness, masculinity, and it's superiority to the patriarchal concept female and femininity, setting up the next group of non-traditional males to struggle with the same cognitive dissonance.
I'll address female Bronies/Pegasisters and women who don't conform to patriarchal femininity, as well as the harm of conforming, in other posts.
Wednesday, May 21, 2014
Tuesday, May 20, 2014
Those obnoxious relatives
Do conservatives worry about holiday gatherings where they'll be surrounded by obnoxious, insensitive liberal relatives who are going to spend the time complaining about politics with no regard for anyone else present's views or feeling? Do they get ready to go to these family get-togethers by mentally preparing themselves to either argue or hide their feelings to keep the peace, and go home afterwards needing a vacation from their emotionally draining relatives? Do they wish they could avoid them or convince everyone to talk about other topics as a way to respect the diversity of opinions during what should be a happy time, but go and try to be as silent as they can because they still feel an obligation to their families? Do they write blogs and complain to their friends about how hard their family makes enjoying their company and how alienated it makes them feel around the very people who are expected to care about them most?
Or does that stereotype only exist in reverse?
Or does that stereotype only exist in reverse?
Thursday, May 15, 2014
Not seeing privilege and thinking you're oppressed
MRAs claiming it's sexism against men to focus on women's issues. Christians claiming discrimination and intolerance means society not supporting and promoting only their views. White people claiming it's racist to question if a white person might be racist. Cis-gender people claiming it's cis-phobic to call them "cis," or anything at all.
Privileged people are appropriating the language of oppression and social justice for themselves.
I suppose this is to be expected in a way. One of the defining traits of privilege is that society tends to be build in support of your worldview while marginalized views are perceived as unreliable accounts. So of course oppression and social justice concepts are just as susceptible to being reinterpreted through a privileged lens as any other cultural element. One's own privilege is very hard to see when it's the assumed backdrop of everything around you, yet it does still hurt to be accused of things you don't believe are true about yourself. If you don't see the inequality in the system you're commenting on, it certainly looks like those "other" people are simply complaining because they don't like something you, their "other" does, so why can't you do the same when you feel hurt by them too, right?
I think the important thing right now is how do we help people see the power imbalance and inequality that their group identity benefits from and contributes to when they claim oppression for themselves? How do we communicate the understanding that something hurting or being different from what you like does not by itself put you on the marginalized side of the privilege/oppression dynamic? That you can be privileged in some area because of some aspect of your identity, and still have things not go your way as an individual? That they're subconsciously devaluing other people's experiences and elevating the value of their own when the hostilely accuse the others having a secret agenda, by arguing against a simplistic strawman? That the study that has gone into these issues is real, and they're not as simplistic as they appear on the surface? That promoting and supporting minority/oppressed/marginalized identities and issues over privileged ones is not promoting inequality in the opposite direction, but is trying to right the balance of inequality and priority that already exists? How do we get people to see that inequality still exists and is still in their favor and is the very reason they can dismiss everyone else's views so easily, if even if doesn't feel like it? How do we show someone the very thing that's preventing them from seeing?
People can and do have paradigm shifts in their fundamental understanding of themselves and their relation to the world. That shift to a more complete picture and aware understanding of other people's experience is what we're asking, and there's no denying it's asking a lot. How do we do it?
Privileged people are appropriating the language of oppression and social justice for themselves.
I suppose this is to be expected in a way. One of the defining traits of privilege is that society tends to be build in support of your worldview while marginalized views are perceived as unreliable accounts. So of course oppression and social justice concepts are just as susceptible to being reinterpreted through a privileged lens as any other cultural element. One's own privilege is very hard to see when it's the assumed backdrop of everything around you, yet it does still hurt to be accused of things you don't believe are true about yourself. If you don't see the inequality in the system you're commenting on, it certainly looks like those "other" people are simply complaining because they don't like something you, their "other" does, so why can't you do the same when you feel hurt by them too, right?
I think the important thing right now is how do we help people see the power imbalance and inequality that their group identity benefits from and contributes to when they claim oppression for themselves? How do we communicate the understanding that something hurting or being different from what you like does not by itself put you on the marginalized side of the privilege/oppression dynamic? That you can be privileged in some area because of some aspect of your identity, and still have things not go your way as an individual? That they're subconsciously devaluing other people's experiences and elevating the value of their own when the hostilely accuse the others having a secret agenda, by arguing against a simplistic strawman? That the study that has gone into these issues is real, and they're not as simplistic as they appear on the surface? That promoting and supporting minority/oppressed/marginalized identities and issues over privileged ones is not promoting inequality in the opposite direction, but is trying to right the balance of inequality and priority that already exists? How do we get people to see that inequality still exists and is still in their favor and is the very reason they can dismiss everyone else's views so easily, if even if doesn't feel like it? How do we show someone the very thing that's preventing them from seeing?
People can and do have paradigm shifts in their fundamental understanding of themselves and their relation to the world. That shift to a more complete picture and aware understanding of other people's experience is what we're asking, and there's no denying it's asking a lot. How do we do it?
Guns, tools, and responsibility
I've written previously about my thoughts on guns and gun control, and my views on "good" and "bad" people in regards to gun use and ownership. I want to follow that up with my thoughts on calling guns "just another tool" and why that perspective concerns me.
Tools are objects that we use to serve a certain purpose, to aid us in completing a task, to do things we would not be able to do with just out bodies. Tools are designed for a specific purpose or multiple purposes, but can often also be used for actions and activities they weren't initially intended for. A spoon is a tool used for scooping and stirring food or other liquids, gels, and granular materials. Because it is designed for scooping, it can be used for digging or scraping if you don't have a shovel. If a tool designed specifically for prying is not available, it can be used for that purpose as well, depending on the material and design. A spoon can be made into art. Under certain circumstances, it can be used to injure or kill someone. But it is designed for scooping and stirring, and learning to use a spoon means learning to use it to scoop and stir effectively and without hurting yourself or others.
A knife is a tool used for cutting. Even moreso than with a spoon, there are many utilitarian uses of knives, and knives and small blades are often designed for specialized uses: kitchen knives, scissors, pocket knives, scalpels, filet knives, rolling blades. Each of these have an intended use that they are best for, but each can be used for other things if necessary. Including hurting or killing someone. Thus, learning to use a knife typically means learning how to use it to cut without getting hurt or hurting others.
So, if a gun is "just a tool," then what is its purpose? It's purpose is to hurt and kill. It is not "just a tool," it is a weapon, with no utilitarian use. Now, of course, similar to tools, training with weapons in intended to also decrease accidental injury and death, but with the intent of getting better at only causing wanted injury and death. This is the opposite of tools, where improved use means not causing harm. The better you get at using a gun (or knife designed for fighting/killing, or certain explosives), they better you get at hitting a "target," the better you're intended to get at hitting a living person or animal. If guns (and other weapons) are "just tools," then they are tools with a dangerous purpose that gives the wielder a "responsibility" no one deserves: the "responsibility" to decide who lives and dies.
Now, of course, people will make the case that self defense is necessary when someone else decides to take on that "responsibility" and uses it to kill others. But the more invested the "self-defense" advocate is in "needing" a gun for this purpose, the more they insist guns are the most reasonable form of self defense and not an absolute last resort, wanting to take it everywhere as if day-to-day life in most of American is that dangerous, the more they minimize the actual ethical and "responsibility" implications of using a weapon by using it for "fun" or calling it "just a tool," as if killing a person or animal is just as utilitarian a purpose as and equitable to cutting a piece of fabric, the less I trust them to understand the "responsibility" they claim gun ownership teaches; the less I trust them to not become the person who makes a decision to kill another. They already have decided that it's OK as long as that person is the "other," and I don't trust how they're going to define the threat from this "other" when they talk and behave as though their personal safety is constantly a risk even when it's not.
As I've said previously, I don't trust people who think causing injury or death is not simply sometimes necessary, but reasonable, who think "every man for himself" is an effective way to maintain order when we are social beings living in a society that should be able to provide structure to minimize violence without using a threat of more violence. Otherwise, what's the point of living in a society?
Tools are objects that we use to serve a certain purpose, to aid us in completing a task, to do things we would not be able to do with just out bodies. Tools are designed for a specific purpose or multiple purposes, but can often also be used for actions and activities they weren't initially intended for. A spoon is a tool used for scooping and stirring food or other liquids, gels, and granular materials. Because it is designed for scooping, it can be used for digging or scraping if you don't have a shovel. If a tool designed specifically for prying is not available, it can be used for that purpose as well, depending on the material and design. A spoon can be made into art. Under certain circumstances, it can be used to injure or kill someone. But it is designed for scooping and stirring, and learning to use a spoon means learning to use it to scoop and stir effectively and without hurting yourself or others.
A knife is a tool used for cutting. Even moreso than with a spoon, there are many utilitarian uses of knives, and knives and small blades are often designed for specialized uses: kitchen knives, scissors, pocket knives, scalpels, filet knives, rolling blades. Each of these have an intended use that they are best for, but each can be used for other things if necessary. Including hurting or killing someone. Thus, learning to use a knife typically means learning how to use it to cut without getting hurt or hurting others.
So, if a gun is "just a tool," then what is its purpose? It's purpose is to hurt and kill. It is not "just a tool," it is a weapon, with no utilitarian use. Now, of course, similar to tools, training with weapons in intended to also decrease accidental injury and death, but with the intent of getting better at only causing wanted injury and death. This is the opposite of tools, where improved use means not causing harm. The better you get at using a gun (or knife designed for fighting/killing, or certain explosives), they better you get at hitting a "target," the better you're intended to get at hitting a living person or animal. If guns (and other weapons) are "just tools," then they are tools with a dangerous purpose that gives the wielder a "responsibility" no one deserves: the "responsibility" to decide who lives and dies.
Now, of course, people will make the case that self defense is necessary when someone else decides to take on that "responsibility" and uses it to kill others. But the more invested the "self-defense" advocate is in "needing" a gun for this purpose, the more they insist guns are the most reasonable form of self defense and not an absolute last resort, wanting to take it everywhere as if day-to-day life in most of American is that dangerous, the more they minimize the actual ethical and "responsibility" implications of using a weapon by using it for "fun" or calling it "just a tool," as if killing a person or animal is just as utilitarian a purpose as and equitable to cutting a piece of fabric, the less I trust them to understand the "responsibility" they claim gun ownership teaches; the less I trust them to not become the person who makes a decision to kill another. They already have decided that it's OK as long as that person is the "other," and I don't trust how they're going to define the threat from this "other" when they talk and behave as though their personal safety is constantly a risk even when it's not.
As I've said previously, I don't trust people who think causing injury or death is not simply sometimes necessary, but reasonable, who think "every man for himself" is an effective way to maintain order when we are social beings living in a society that should be able to provide structure to minimize violence without using a threat of more violence. Otherwise, what's the point of living in a society?
Why is talking about spanking so divisive?
Why can it be so difficult to talk with people who were spanked as children about the fact that spanking has been found to be harmful and not actually effective at teaching children good behavior? Why is even suggesting this might be true met with hostility and defensiveness (never mind outright stating it)? If people want what's best for children, and I don't doubt people in these conversations do, then why does the disagreement reach such high levels of angry opposition to even considering alternatives to spanking?
Of course, many people who were spanked will claim that it worked out fine for them, taught they "respect" and "consequences," so the risks must be overblown or completely untrue. This is an illogical conclusion since a few anecdotes are never enough to completely overturn a measurable trend, never mind that they may simply be unaware of the harmful effects it had on them personally, but I question just why are they holding on to irrational conclusions? What is the motivation to try to justify this conclusion?
I think the answer is in their justifications. They don't typically argue that hitting children is OK, and will even sometimes go so far as to try to claim that "spanking," or whatever other term they choose to use, is somehow not "hitting." So they know using violence against children is wrong; they simply refuse to see spanking as violent, and they look to their own upbringing for justification.
This, I think, is the key to their defense of spanking. They're not simply defending their own parenting abilities - many of these people are not even parents themselves. Instead, they are defending their own parents.
People who love their parents and had a happy childhood with them are going to usually reject the idea that anything their parents did could be interpreted as abusive. Abuse is something "bad" people do, people who don't love or care about their children. Real harm is done on purpose, not by accident, by loving parents who didn't know better. Loving parents aren't ignorant of how to raise their kids!
This positive view of one's own parents seems normal, but add the stated goals of spanking - respect (for parental authority) and consequences (for challenging parental authority) - and it becomes even more difficult to think critically about one's own parents! Respecting parents in this mindset means trusting that they know best, not challenging parents, enforced through painful "consequences" that are framed as logical, natural outcomes of not "respecting" "authority."
Of course in this environment, where spanking is used to reinforce this kind of unquestioning "authority" of parents, breaking out of the mindset that respect and love means supporting and obeying parents and instead recognizing that it's OK to question and doubt your parents, even to say that they're wrong, is going to be a difficult challenge. The more spanking was taught at the way to raise children to love their parents, the more difficult it's going to be to convince someone who does love their parents that spanking isn't likely the reason they do.
Of course, many people who were spanked will claim that it worked out fine for them, taught they "respect" and "consequences," so the risks must be overblown or completely untrue. This is an illogical conclusion since a few anecdotes are never enough to completely overturn a measurable trend, never mind that they may simply be unaware of the harmful effects it had on them personally, but I question just why are they holding on to irrational conclusions? What is the motivation to try to justify this conclusion?
I think the answer is in their justifications. They don't typically argue that hitting children is OK, and will even sometimes go so far as to try to claim that "spanking," or whatever other term they choose to use, is somehow not "hitting." So they know using violence against children is wrong; they simply refuse to see spanking as violent, and they look to their own upbringing for justification.
This, I think, is the key to their defense of spanking. They're not simply defending their own parenting abilities - many of these people are not even parents themselves. Instead, they are defending their own parents.
People who love their parents and had a happy childhood with them are going to usually reject the idea that anything their parents did could be interpreted as abusive. Abuse is something "bad" people do, people who don't love or care about their children. Real harm is done on purpose, not by accident, by loving parents who didn't know better. Loving parents aren't ignorant of how to raise their kids!
This positive view of one's own parents seems normal, but add the stated goals of spanking - respect (for parental authority) and consequences (for challenging parental authority) - and it becomes even more difficult to think critically about one's own parents! Respecting parents in this mindset means trusting that they know best, not challenging parents, enforced through painful "consequences" that are framed as logical, natural outcomes of not "respecting" "authority."
Of course in this environment, where spanking is used to reinforce this kind of unquestioning "authority" of parents, breaking out of the mindset that respect and love means supporting and obeying parents and instead recognizing that it's OK to question and doubt your parents, even to say that they're wrong, is going to be a difficult challenge. The more spanking was taught at the way to raise children to love their parents, the more difficult it's going to be to convince someone who does love their parents that spanking isn't likely the reason they do.
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