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Zephro posted:I don't see why it has to matter, though. Surely the ethical core of feminism shouldn't be "women and men are exactly the same" or any similar notion, it should be "don't be a dick to sentient creatures / don't cause unnecessary suffering" which handily covers other oppressed groups like trans people, as well as even more infrequent cases like people who self-identify as androgynous, or have hermaphroditic characteristics, who exist as brains in vats, or who are sentient computer programs or aliens from a species with three sexes or whatever exotic scenario anyone can concoct. the core of feminism was and is fighting for the rights of women, whether votes, equal pay, the right to be treated properly by the police, not to be sexually harassed, to be free from sexual violence, to take domestic violence seriously, to have equal opportunity to career paths, to have their voices taken seriously in whatever field. men have and still do marginalise and shut down women - many of these issues are still far from being solved to any satisfactory degree, even if things were better than in the past. my understanding of where some feminist academics take exception is having someone who spent their life as a man, who may still have a penis - which is in and of itself a tool of violence and subjugation - consider themselves to be women and shut down feminists who may not quite agree on that point. It's like if I as a white british person went to the black ghettos in america and patronisingly told them our experiences are the same because I am now an immigrant in their country, a minority and suffer oppression because I am not an american citizen. They'd probably tell me to jog the gently caress on.
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Jan 29, 2016 16:31
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JFairfax posted:It's like if I as a white british person went to the black ghettos in america and patronisingly told them our experiences are the same because I am now an immigrant in their country, a minority and suffer oppression because I am not an american citizen. They'd probably tell me to jog the gently caress on.
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Jan 29, 2016 16:36
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JFairfax posted:the core of feminism was and is fighting for the rights of women, whether votes, equal pay, the right to be treated properly by the police, not to be sexually harassed, to be free from sexual violence, to take domestic violence seriously, to have equal opportunity to career paths, to have their voices taken seriously in whatever field. Party Boat posted:Seems like a pretty ignorant way to describe the experiences of trans women tbh
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Jan 29, 2016 16:37
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trans people represent a massive headache to many gender theory people, both practical and theoretical - on one hand, they manifest a kind of fluidity that essentialists cannot accept, and on another, taking transsexuality seriously means that one has to accept that there is a certain level of essential overlap re: gender and sex. both of these challenges are massively inconvenient on a theoretical level, as you suddenly have to accept that "ok maybe women are inherently like X" based on the behaviour and preferences of trans people, which will necessarily sit poorly with someone who has spent their life working on the assumption (relatively well-supported among cis women) that "inherently" feminine behaviour is a meaningless term in practice then on the practical level you have an element of who one ought to accept as female for female-only spaces (say a rape survivor group) &c - a trans woman who has not undergone transition, for instance, might very well make many of the women in the space uncomfortable, and opens the possibility of some idiot lad going in on a bit of a laugh and just loving the whole thing off it's one of those issues that makes me very happy i'm not seriously invested in theoretical feminism, because it's so complicated, delicate & contradictory
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Jan 29, 2016 16:37
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It seems to me like half the problem here is a surfeit of "theory" based entirely on handwaving (because we do not understand the biology of gender/sex in any comprehensive way and we know the very next thing to nothing about embryonic brain development). All this armchair theorising gets in the way of the fundamental imperative to not be dicks to other people.
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Jan 29, 2016 16:39
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What God-like powers do you get if you're a Maoist?
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Jan 29, 2016 16:40
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Zephro posted:It seems to me like half the problem here is a surfeit of "theory" based entirely on handwaving (because we do not understand the biology of gender/sex in any comprehensive way and we know the very next thing to nothing about embryonic brain development). All this armchair theorising gets in the way of the fundamental imperative to not be dicks to other people. or cunts to other people
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Jan 29, 2016 16:41
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I mean if the entire ethical framework underlying your liberation struggle would be demolished by the discovery of a CNS-related gene that was expressed in XX blastocysts but not XY blastocysts then maybe your ethical framework is bad?
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Jan 29, 2016 16:43
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Zephro posted:It seems to me like half the problem here is a surfeit of "theory" based entirely on handwaving (because we do not understand the biology of gender/sex in any comprehensive way and we know the very next thing to nothing about embryonic brain development). All this armchair theorising gets in the way of the fundamental imperative to not be dicks to other people. theory is very important - de Beauvoir's statement that one is not born, but rather made a woman, for instance, is profoundly theoretical and was a huge rallying cry in the struggle for equal rights and representation for women - and that's just one point of it. if one neglects theory like this in favour of "not being dicks" one might end up with a terribly condescending, paternalistic society where women just aren't clever enough to do serious work, the poor dears
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Jan 29, 2016 16:44
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Zephro posted:I don't see why it has to matter, though. Surely the ethical core of feminism shouldn't be "women and men are exactly the same" or any similar notion, it should be "don't be a dick to sentient creatures / don't cause unnecessary suffering" which handily covers other oppressed groups like trans people That's just ethics, it's not feminism. The opponents of feminism have always used biological differences as an argument to justify different treatment of men and women (treatment they frequently insist is for the benefit of all); they will use any claimed differences in this way. Feminists have to be prepared to counter such arguments, and their usual reply has been 'your claim about innate sex differences has no good scientific basis'. I don't think they should abandon that one until a good scientific basis is found.
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Jan 29, 2016 16:44
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Guavanaut posted:What God-like powers do you get if you're a Maoist? Killing an average of ten million people a year for three years by being bad at farming is a pretty god-like power. Maybe he was just starting out with an allotment.
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Jan 29, 2016 16:46
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Oh dear me posted:The opponents of feminism have always used biological differences as an argument to justify different treatment of men and women (treatment they frequently insist is for the benefit of all); they will use any claimed differences in this way. Feminists have to be prepared to counter such arguments, and their usual reply has been 'your claim about innate sex differences has no good scientific basis'. I don't think they should abandon that one until a good scientific basis is found. Feminism shouldn't respond to lovely arguments with lovely arguments of its own that accept the underlying premise that the details of protein synthesis are relevant to your worth as a sentient being.
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Jan 29, 2016 16:49
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Guavanaut posted:What God-like powers do you get if you're a Maoist? A body odor so powerful it can only be described as otherworldly.
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Jan 29, 2016 16:50
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Rigged Death Trap posted:A body odor so powerful it can only be described as otherworldly. guess I've been Combating Liberalism my whole life
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Jan 29, 2016 16:54
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Zephro posted:I mean if the entire ethical framework underlying your liberation struggle would be demolished by the discovery of a CNS-related gene that was expressed in XX blastocysts but not XY blastocysts then maybe your ethical framework is bad? the feminist argument on this point is a little more sophisticated than you're giving it credit for - it's not (apart from some radicals) that these differences don't exist at all - they manifestly do, for a large part - but that they are a priori impossible to isolate and verify, because all that makes a woman a woman is biology filtered through culture, and the effects of the two cannot be meaningfully separated, at least not before one has entirely abolished patriarchy, which is itself a very fuzzy goal. then, suddenly, these people start going around changing gender based on some "inherent" urge, and start to behave in certain ways - can they, then, be used to elucidate the "inherent femininity" or "inherent masculinity", giving them effective definitional power over these terms, and making those terms themselves valid? I'd say no, but it's easy to see why people are uneasy over it and, again, another issue is that many formerly unifying experiences of women - being biologically, manifestly womanly attributes - such as giving birth, are suddenly much more problematic with the existence of trans people. this was a major debate that raged in sweden a while ago because someone said just that - "giving birth is a womanly experience" - and was absolutely pilloried for it. thus, building a common identity on the traditional markers becomes much more difficult, and arguably the central goal of modern feminism is/was to build a new definition of femininity on women's own terms. complications as to just who counts as a woman when obviously makes such an effort even more monumentally difficult than it was already all this said, i do think it's possible to rationalise many kinds of feminism to accommodate trans people without too many contortions, but for people who are too invested in versions which preclude them (often entirely without malice - germaine greer, for instance, will likely never have even aware that trans people are an actual Thing before relatively recently) it becomes a problem. add in the level of touchiness that identitary debates almost inevitably involve, and you get a recipe for some very deep ideological trenches
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Jan 29, 2016 16:56
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Zephro posted:Actually if it leads them to oppress and mistreat trans people then I think maybe they should. Especially since it isn't necessary, involves fighting on your opponent's ground, and is counterproductive because it's a huge hostage to fortune if anyone does find an unambiguous developmental difference between the nervous systems of XX and XY embryos, regardless of how insignificant it is. I don't think feminists are necessarily oppressing or mistreating trans people, just saying that you're not automatically a woman if you remove your penis.
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Jan 29, 2016 16:56
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JFairfax posted:I don't think feminists are necessarily oppressing or mistreating trans people, just saying that you're not automatically a woman if you remove your penis. this seems a little flippant
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Jan 29, 2016 16:57
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also, if my previous post seemed inconsistent, it's because it was - i was following the outline of two different families of feminism, and they are often contradict each other theoretically, based on their analytical focus and ideological bent
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Jan 29, 2016 17:00
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V. Illych L. posted:this seems a little flippant https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8273HGqxEc
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Jan 29, 2016 17:00
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JFairfax posted:a penis - which is in and of itself a tool of violence and subjugation And this is where I stopped reading, as I mostly use mine to wee while standing up, and not for subjugating anyone
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Jan 29, 2016 17:05
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JFairfax posted:I don't think feminists are necessarily oppressing or mistreating trans people, just saying that you're not automatically a woman if you remove your penis. Cathy Brennan.
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Jan 29, 2016 17:06
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Renfield posted:And this is where I stopped reading, as I mostly use mine to wee while standing up, and not for subjugating anyone It's a real thing: Women's bodies have become part of the terrain of conflict, according to a new report by Amnesty International. Rape and sexual abuse are not just a by-product of war but are used as a deliberate military strategy, it says. The opportunistic rape and pillage of previous centuries has been replaced in modern conflict by rape used as an orchestrated combat tool. And while Amnesty cites ongoing conflicts in Colombia, Iraq, Sudan, Chechnya, Nepal and Afghanistan, the use of rape as a weapon of war goes back much further. Spoils of war? From the systematic rape of women in Bosnia, to an estimated 200,000 women raped during the battle for Bangladeshi independence in 1971, to Japanese rapes during the 1937 occupation of Nanking - the past century offers too many examples. So what motivates armed forces, whether state-backed troops or irregular militia, to attack civilian women and children? Gita Sahgal, of Amnesty International, told the BBC News website it was a mistake to think such assaults were primarily about the age-old "spoils of war", or sexual gratification. Rape is often used in ethnic conflicts as a way for attackers to perpetuate their social control and redraw ethnic boundaries, she said. "Women are seen as the reproducers and carers of the community," she said. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/4078677.stm
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Jan 29, 2016 17:09
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And closer to home: (CNN)A new survey of college students, one of the largest ever focusing on sexual assault and sexual misconduct, has reignited the debate over just how big a problem sexual assault on campus really is. Among female college students, 23% said they experienced some form of unwanted sexual contact -- ranging from kissing to touching to rape, carried out by force or threat of force, or while they were incapacitated because of alcohol and drugs, according to the new survey by the Association of American Universities (AAU). Nearly 11% said the unwanted contact included penetration or oral sex. http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/22/health/campus-sexual-assault-new-large-survey/ so yeah, quite a few men do use their penises to subjugate, oppress and assault women.
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Jan 29, 2016 17:11
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Zephro posted:I don't see why it has to matter, though. Surely the ethical core of feminism shouldn't be "women and men are exactly the same" or any similar notion, it should be "don't be a dick to sentient creatures / don't cause unnecessary suffering" which handily covers other oppressed groups like trans people, as well as even more infrequent cases like people who self-identify as androgynous, or have hermaphroditic characteristics, who exist as brains in vats, or who are sentient computer programs or aliens from a species with three sexes or whatever exotic scenario anyone can concoct. Or people who self-identify as a cat. Prince John fucked around with this message at 17:18 on Jan 29, 2016 |
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Jan 29, 2016 17:12
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JFairfax posted:And closer to home: quote:quite a few men do use their penises to subjugate, oppress and assault women quote:a penis - which is in and of itself a tool of violence and subjugation
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Jan 29, 2016 17:24
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All penises are weapons of the patriarchy.
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Jan 29, 2016 17:28
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penises are like guns, tools which can be used for either good or evil
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Jan 29, 2016 17:28
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Dildos exist and are popular with feminists and lesbians
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Jan 29, 2016 17:31
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JFairfax posted:penises are like guns, tools which can be used for either good or evil Their mushroom shaped head is a spade for scooping out the semen of rivals, so it is fairly obviously designed to be a tool of oppression.
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Jan 29, 2016 17:34
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JFairfax posted:penises are like guns, tools which can be used for either good or evil The gun is good, the Penis is evil.
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Jan 29, 2016 17:36
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and so, the discussion of feminism ends in a bunch of dudes talking about penises i feel as though this is somehow instructive
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Jan 29, 2016 17:43
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Gonzo McFee posted:The gun is good, the Penis is evil. If I was in charge I would have started with lasers, eight o'clock day one.
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Jan 29, 2016 17:44
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V. Illych L. posted:and so, the discussion of feminism ends in a bunch of dudes talking about penises it's why germane greer has a point
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Jan 29, 2016 17:48
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That explains why HorseLord hasn't been around much of late, busy with that trial.
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Jan 29, 2016 17:48
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I thought he was a Stalinist?
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Jan 29, 2016 17:51
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Guavanaut posted:I thought he was a Stalinist? Yeah, he is, but I don't think we have any open Maoists at present? At some point Tankies & Third Worldists are both insane so I'm happy to confuse them. Actually, is General China a Maoist? I forget how he identifies.
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Jan 29, 2016 17:53
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V. Illych L. posted:and so, the discussion of feminism ends in a bunch of dudes talking about penises If it had ended with a bunch of dudes (which are almost all you have to work with itt or on the forums generally) prognosticating on the female experience I'm sure somebody would have been just as quick to jump in with accusations of "mansplaining" on something they don't and couldn't possibly understand.
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Jan 29, 2016 17:54
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I don't like to talk about my dick
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Jan 29, 2016 17:59
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Me neither, they can buy my book about it if they really want to know.
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Jan 29, 2016 18:03
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JFairfax posted:it's why germane greer has a point
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Jan 29, 2016 18:04
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