Posts by Danielle
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Hard News: Cultures and violence, in reply to Emma Hart,
But it does happen. Sometimes.
Yes. But aren't we currently talking about what happens *here*? That's what I don't get about why this conversation is... turning out less well than I had hoped.
PS "Male brain" alert: I am really good at reading maps.
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Hard News: Cultures and violence, in reply to Keir Leslie,
I am completely nonplussed, because really, seriously, I am not trying to offend Russell. I am actually trying to have a non-angry discussion. Pinky swear.
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Hard News: Cultures and violence, in reply to Russell Brown,
This is hyperbole.
Yes. I couldn't resist the alliteration or the imagery. :) The rest of my post isn't, however, and you appear to... not want to engage with that.
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I tried half a dozen responses to that and the best that I could come up with was that I’d be sure to let you know when I’d stopped beating my wife.
It was a slightly snippy question, but it actually was an honest one. (And frankly, your answer does contain a few elements of “feminists are so mean”. Doesn’t it?)
part of the problem for men discussing gender is that it will almost always be a discussion framed by women, and by women who have the benefit of a particular academic background, and will use a particular related vocabulary.
I am hard-pressed to think of a similar area of expertise on PAS which causes these sorts of objections. When Ben talks hardcore philosophy, or when the computer-expert types talk about security holes, I am going to tell you right now: I have no fucking idea what any of it means (sorry Ben. :) ) Now, it may be that people are more invested in this topic – we are, after all, wrestling with ideas about gender every day – but shouldn’t that mean you would be pretty happy about having someone who *thinks about this for a living* involved in the discussion? (I, incidentally, am not that person: I last took a postgraduate class in Women’s Studies in 2001, so I am hardly on the bleeding edge of academic theory at this point. I get many of my recent ideas from blogs. That’s probably where I learned about performativity, as it happens.)
even though that’s an uncontroversial fact anywhere outside the humanities
It’s actually a pretty accepted fact within the humanities too, but the point is that no one really understands to what extent those biological differences create behavioural differences – and, as Stephen said above, what good does it do in these discussions to keep saying that over and over if it can’t shape a reasonable response anyway? (Also, everything else he said.)
It’s really only safe to talk about gender as a social construct, and that can seem suffocating. The risk of being deemed an asshole in such a discussion is also considerably higher if you’re male. You can’t fall back on privilege arguments.
Honestly, do you really think of us as a bunch of hatchet-raised harpies, Russell, poised to come down on you like a tonne of bricks? Because that’s the impression you’re giving me right now.
a discussion that’s structurally difficult for men to have on their own terms
I don’t quite understand what this means. Are you saying that because women created the terminology, men can’t use it to discuss things? Or…?
I have had plenty of discussions about gender with men which haven’t turned into the shitfight you’re describing. We can rebuild it! We have the technology! (I make that reference knowing full well that anyone under 35 won’t get it. Sigh.)
ETA Stephen, you probably are taller than me. EVERYONE is taller than me. Except Snooki.
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Hard News: Cultures and violence, in reply to Keir Leslie,
It isn’t the critical one that gender studies supplies, but it is one.
I think perhaps you and I are using "analysis" differently.
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Hard News: Cultures and violence, in reply to Bart Janssen,
Crossed wires: Keir was talking about the culture at large and I was talking about this particular thread.
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Hard News: Cultures and violence, in reply to Russell Brown,
Keir, I thought you were talking about THIS discussion, not the discussion in the culture at large.
men don’t talk about the construction of gender is pretty insupportable
Performing gender is not the same as analysing why it's performed in that particular way.
In part that’s because it can feel really quite perilous to do so.
Because... feminists are so mean?
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Hard News: Cultures and violence, in reply to Keir Leslie,
It also interesting to what extent this is a conversation about (supposedly) disempowered young men initiated and dominated by women; there’s a who’s-speaking-for-who problem here.
That can be almost entirely attributed to another problem, which is that the construction of gender roles is a topic “marked” as a chick thing. A *feminist* chick thing. When in actuality it could be so much more than that. So men end up not having any practice in talking about their own gender as a category.
(I rather take issue with “dominated”: that word shows the extent to which “several women speaking in a non-women’s-only-area on the internet” is… unexpected.)
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Hard News: Cultures and violence, in reply to Russell Brown,
I'm kidding, I'm kidding. But I *am* a sometime historian. That appropriate attribution shit runs deep with us, yo. :)
non-marked social group
Speaking of marked social groups, I meant to say, I really liked THAT article linked way back in answer to my question by... David, I think?... in Salon.
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Hard News: Cultures and violence, in reply to Russell Brown,
I tried to say so two pages ago.
Yes, I saw that, but since you were so busy accusing me of making shit up it got a bit lost in translation. ;)