I have caught him in a gross error. He notices that MRA Paul Elam detests faux feminist Christina Hoff Sommers, and makes an erroneous generalization.
I turns out that Elam is one of the very few carbon-based life forms in this sector of the galaxy to actually believe that Sommers, who’s devoted most of her career to bashing feminists, actually is the feminist she pretends to be.
This is incorrect. A great many carbon-based life forms actually enthusiastically present Sommers as the very model of a modern feminist, and are disingenuously dumbfounded if you explain to them that she’s actually an anti-feminist. Unfortunately, that list of carbon-based life forms includes surprisingly many high-profile atheists, including Steven Pinker and Richard Dawkins.
I think criticizing Futrelle instantly qualifies me for an official MRA membership card, doesn’t it?
Your evil tactic worked on me. Well done, sir.
Uh oh. Flashbacks to “Darwin Was Wrong” magazine covers…
You got the fainting-couch outrage right, but I think you have to be doing it at the same time as criticising someone else’s outrage to really qualify as an MRA.
Brian Moon @ 1:
Worked on me as well. :applause:
But she says she as a feminist, which means that she must be, just like creationists say they are scientifically literate, which means they must…..uh……
Dreaming of an Atheist Newtopia 5:
Exactly. Sara Palin says she’s a feminist too, therefore she is. Why, it’s almost as if the word “feminist” works exactly like the word “liberal” does! Magic!
By numbers, most carbon-based life forms don’t care about ‘feminism’, because they are from species that lack two sexes (or often, sexual reproduction at all). (Your pedantry for the day.)
But Elam may be one of the few people who is willing to group Sommers with ‘those evil feminists’, since most of the people calling Sommers a feminist are doing it to contrast it with ‘what is wrong with feminism these days’.
I suppose that’s the same book of magical incantations that brought us “I’m not racist/homophobic/islamophobic/transphobic/etc.”
You may have done him a disservice there – and yourself. If the MRAs apply their usual rigour in research, they will soon be claiming that even evil atheist feminist bossman PZ Myers himself, otherwise a sworn enemy to The Cause, agrees that Futrelle is wrong about Everything.
Then again, given the wide berth these people give facts, my post might do the same.
It’s about ethics in quote mining.
komarov: if someone you don’t like is going to treat you exactly the same way no matter what you do, why not just do what’s easiest?
I don’t find CHS to be an anti-feminist. Perhaps anti certain new feminist ideas, but not anti-feminist in general.
Certainly I have not read all of her work, or heard all of her talks, however from what I have read and heard, one thing I do agree with her is when she cautions against inflating statistics and misrepresenting the issues, because it can get in the way of real solutions.
Would anyone who feels she is anti-feminist write a short blog highlighting a few examples of her anti-feminism? What she has said or done that you consider anti-feminist?
Thanks,
–TAPP
Gee, the misogynist faction heard from. Calling any evidence of harassment or complaining about known sexual predator behavior as anything but evidence of a problem isn’t feminism, it is victim blaming. The problem of rape/sexual harassment is with the predators, not the victims. You need to shut the fuck up and listen to women, not tell them what they should believe, and stop saying antifemists have a point, unless you will back it up with third party evidence. Which is MIA.
I don’t see why we would care whether or not you find her anti-feminist, given that your position that “Feminism Stifles Female Achievement at the Highest Levels” puts you in direct agreement with her.
I quote Sommers here:
If you can’t see instantly that all three of her points are complete flaming bullshit, there’s no help for you.
As a long-time lurker and occasional commenter, I can only second Futrelle: I look forward to seeing both sides in this fight lose.
Warren Zevon, “Finishing Touches.”
Bodhisattvas, we come back. You know, around and around, again and again. Carnivals or something.
Thanks PZ,.
Good place to start, because this is where we are at a difference.
I agree with at least two of those points you quoted. I would love provide examples why. Still not sure if discussion ever happens here, or if everyone just hurls insults at people who disagree, but I would be interested in hearing viewpoints, not insults (sorry, but they really don’t hurt my feelings).
1. Today’s movement taking a dim view of men – Agreed:
I don’t know if it is different than in the past, but it seems to me that today there is a lot of generalizing of men, and the narrative that Men as a group need to be corrected. Requiring mandatory sexual consent classes does nothing to reduce the incidents of sexual assault and violence, because they do not happen due to ignorance. It does however raise the stigma that every guy could be a rapist, and we need to make sure we re-educate them all.
2. Wildly overstates the victim status of American Women – Agreed:
As a scientist PZ I would have expected you would be a little more off put by the blatant misrepresentation of the wage gap being 77%, and the incompetently managed “survey” from which the 1 in 5 women is a victim of sexual assault. I believe that no one is well served when incomplete or downright invalid statistics and facts are used to promote any point of view. The actual facts are still enough to demand action and improve the system. And don’t think I don’t know that CHS isn’t also guilty of this. I am not a cheerleader for her, I just agree with her on this point, and think she could practice more of what she preaches as well.
3. Is dogmatically attached to the view that men and women are essentially the same. Agreed I think?
I do not believe that men are women are necessarily the same. I don’t know that modern day feminists think they are the same either though.
I don’t think we should expect to find that all things being equal, men and women would make the same choices. Why would we expect to see that? As a biologist, do you not think that it is possible that through our own evolution that at this point in the process we could be at a place where men and women in general have different interests?
Is it not possible certain traits may have developed and been selected for amongst men and women over thousands of generations to the point where today we might find for example, men tend to be more interested in risk taking or women tend to be more interested in art? (or other examples that are better than that?)
Those are my thoughts on those points. Looking forward to any repsonses.
Thanks for the reply,
–TAPP
+Vivec Thanks for the comment
If you read my post about “Why Feminism Needs More Climbers” I would love to hear your thoughts.
+Nerd of Redhead
You are contributing nothing to the conversation. What are you afraid of? Try to use your words like I have done instead of just calling me names.
Thanks,
–TAPP
1. Bullshit. When feminists turn the stereotypical response to rape around, and state that the blame for rape resides in the rapists, not the women who are attacked, that gets turned into a general statement about men by oversensitive, privileged guys. Men are not all rapists, but almost all rapes are by men.
2. The pay gap is real. What apologists love to do is claim that the fact that more women do part-time paid labor justifies their lower net earnings. Unfortunately, they never stop to wonder about why women get less full time work. They also love to point out that they get paid less because they’re doing work that is less valued…again never considering why that would be.
3. The one argument you claim you might agree with feminists isa accompanied by the statement that you don’t know much about what feminists think. I certainly agree that you don’t know much . Too bad you don’t recognize all of your ignorance on this subject.
Also…go read the wiki before you arrogantly parade your ignorance around here again.
theamateurphilosophysicist
PZ has given you advice.
Heed it.
—
and stop whinging
thanks
@TAPP
I told you why you were called the name. That isn’t an ad hominem. You need to be shaken out your ignorance and privilege to look at the situation with clear intellect, not pontificate about it, which is mansplainin’ at the politest. Show me you understand the arguments, and you will get a response back. Especially if you provide evidence to back up your claims. Which are still MIA.
@17
It’s bullshit.
/Review
Couldn’t they be? Why is it not the case that men, as a class, are possible rapists? I can imagine a few sorts of people, in very specific circumstances, for whom it would actually be impossible, like if they were paralyzed or comatose for instance. Otherwise, as a general matter, what do you think is supposed to be false here?
I don’t think we should expect that all things are equal, if in fact they’re not. When was anyone ever supposed to have observed this counterfactual situation, in which the entire categories of men and women were in equal circumstances, and have formed expectations about it? And what the hell would it imply about the factual situation?
Who cares whether this is merely possible? It’s possible that ancient aliens crawled out of your ass and taught you this bullshit. I’m not saying it was aliens, but it was aliens.
Where did anyone say any of this is impossible anyway? Notice that “essentially the same” doesn’t mean “necessarily the same.” Essentialism is a different and very old concept, having to do with essences, as you might guess if you just read the words. The idea that men and women do have different essences, for any old reason you want to dream up, is also not a claim that they must (necessarily and logically) be different, since you could just as well mean that it’s a contingent fact about human evolution (or whatever else) that simply happened to produce that result rather than something that couldn’t have been otherwise.
But again, who cares? What actual evidence do you have that anything like this is the case? An argument that it’s possible is a poor fucking substitute for what you seem to believe is a fucking fact, which (as you almost recognize, yet assume PZ et al will have a problem with it anyway) isn’t even something (once you straighten out the logical twists and turns, to say something else that at least could make some fucking sense) that is being disputed by feminists.
@TAPP
Even if that’s true, such mandatory courses (if done right) could improve people’s intimate relationships by offering them a good model to emulate.
Yet there’s evidence that many rapists do not even believe that what they’ve done was rape.
Another point on the subject that I’ve seen feminists make is that sometimes the victims, or people the victims tell, don’t believe that what happened really counts as “rape”, and this causes more problems that education could help to fix.
Last time I checked, that statistic seemed close to being accurate:
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss6308a1.htm?s_cid=ss6308a1_e#Table1
Know something about it that I don’t?
Bullshit. It’s not only about assaults and violence.
As I complained several times in this blog, if I had access to better information on how to manage relationships I would have spared too many women and myself a lot of damage.
Also the point of rape culture is that men are not responsible of their own action. If this is not outright insulting to men, I don’t know what it is, so you know where you can cram your “dim view”.
(Society has a *duty* of making people aware of their privilege. To this extent, I feel society failed me. Regardless, I take full responsibility for my actions.)
It’s great to see someone arguing from such a solid basis in evidence.
@25 F.O.
I’m always amussed when people complain that feminists have a dim view of men, when in fact there is nothing more mysandric than an anti-feminist. If you want a dim view of men, go check any MRA site, for example…
Feminism offers me, as a man, a far superior prospect.
That’s an interesting assertion, since it contradicts the results of practically every study I’ve ever seen that attempts to investigate either aspect (the effects of education around consent, or the role of ignorance in sexual assault). Do you have any kind of evidence-based source for this position, or are you simply assuming it to be true?
Allow me to do my best impression of Theamateurphilosophysicist.
Highly doubt theamateurphilosophysicist is genuinely curious.
Here is their response to this post from Stephanie Zvan on Milo and CHS:
After reading that whole post, that was their conclusion on CHS. Yeah, doesn’t sound sexist at all. Pretty sure they’re a dudebro type of the JAQing off variety.
@28 That would be misandric…¬¬
I think I’m gonna play my gender vs. race word substitution game and see what things sound like afterwards:
…nah, seems fine to me! This speaker’s as racially neutral as they come.
/eyeroll
@amateursomethingProfessionalidiot
1) a) By your arguments burglars are not responsible for burglary and murderers are not responsible for murder. Try that in court sometime.
b) One widely criticised and very flawed study said that education had no effect on outcomes of male/female interactions.
2) Pay gap may not be as big as thought if people ignore all the associated problems with coming to the conclusion you put forward; otherwise known as the “La-la-la-la-la, I can’t hear you defense,”
3) Men and women are not the same. So women are not human? So females do not have a brain functionally identical to the male? So you deny the fact that women are physically and mentally capable of doing the same jobs as men?
Oh, yeah! women do not have that oh-so-important piece of flesh between their legs.
Intalglio,
Some women do.
#31 nails it for me. theamateurphilosophysicist is an ignorant troll. Banned.
So, maybe someone can explain to me this: Why is the idea that any man could be a rapist and it’s not possible to know if they are or not (i.e. Schrodinger’s rapist) worse than the idea that a woman better dress modestly, refrain from drinking and know self-defense because all men are uncontrollable rape beasts (i.e. every anti-feminist’s alternate suggestion)? Why is the former “anti-male” while the latter is just fine? As a man, I know which I’m more offended by, and it isn’t the feminist idea.
ck, the Irate Lump, @37:
There’s a tendency I’ve noticed in a lot of discussions, especially with privileged young men, whereby they expect everybody to automatically assume the best of them, and get terribly irate with anybody who doesn’t. They don’t get offended by the idea that women need to prevent rape by modest dress etc, because (to them) that’s not based on the assumption that all men are “uncontrollable rape beasts”, just that some men are – specifically, men who are Not Them. They tend to have a very simplistic moral schema, in which the world is divided into Good People and Bad People – they are obviously Good People, and woe betide anybody who suggests otherwise, whereas Bad People are just Bad People and there’s nothing you can do about it. They can’t deal with the idea that other people can’t tell whether they are Good People or Bad People (or even that other people might see the world in more complex ways) because they have trouble with the idea that other people don’t see the world in exactly the same way that they do.
This explains a number of other things besides the point you raise. For example, there’s no point in consent education or learning about privilege, because Bad People do Bad Things simply because they are Bad People, and the condition of being Bad People is innate and unalterable. They expect society to trust them with guns, because they’re Good People, and they’ll get ever bit as irate when you point out that there’s no way for the rest of us to know that as they do when you try to explain Schrodinger’s rapist to them. This also explains the whole shtick about how “the only thing that can stop a Bad Guy with a gun is a Good Guy with a gun”, which is otherwise obviously ridiculous.
They believe the world is divided into White Hats and Black Hats, and that everybody else can see they’re wearing a White Hat. They seem to have trouble with the idea that other people don’t have access to their self-perceptions and internal mental states, or that they have internal lives of their own.
Dunc, #38
I never thought about it that way, but it certainly does make sense and explains all those things. Generations upon generations of being the privileged group would lead members of that group to be blinded to these things since they never have to think about it. It’s like the Lamarckian use and disuse concept.
Dunc, @38,
Yes, I think many don’t want to be educated on consent because they don’t want to be asked to do something. Somehow that makes it seem like they are blamed or suspected. It’s not their responsibility to do anything if they are “Good People.” I believe this is also the reason nearly all white Americans are supposedly anti-racism until being anti-racist might interfere with their lives or require them to take action.
Just a thought here… Perhaps consent eduction would be better received if we were to frame as “how to have better sex” rather than “how not to be a rapist”? Even the terminology of “consent” is arguably a little iffy – I “consent” to medical procedures, but I don’t enjoy them. We need to move away from a framing of “what your partner is willing to agree to” towards “what your partner wants“. Sure, that’s the intent of affirmative consent, but I’m not sure that the words really have the right connotations (especially for a general audience), and I think that might be important.
Of course, that would require getting over a whole mess of fucked-up ideas around having sex for pleasure, and especially teaching “kids” (scare quotes because that’s how opponents will frame it, even if you’re talking about young adults) to have sex for pleasure, but that’s something we kinda need to do anyway.