this post is pleasingly meta

[helenic]

I've got a massive text file here of various links and thoughts that I've been wanting to post to this tag, but the epic thread a couple of weeks ago wore me out a bit. I've been slowly working up to returning to it, but my text file runneth over, so I've should probably start somewhere.

One thing I've been thinking about is the two opposing responses I've seen to inequality. One is to articulate it: to talk about it, to rant about it, to ask questions, to have debates, to try to convince others that it's happening and it shoudn't be. The other attitude is to accept that stuff is unfair and get on with living as fair and just a life as you can, with a strong spirit, fighting unequality with action rather than word.

I've been called a "shouty" or "angry" feminist by people who fit into the latter camp. Which made me blink a bit. I mean I didn't talk about this stuff at all until recently, and even now I am I'm trying very hard not to shout. I want to express my hurt and anger when I'm hurt and angry, and I want to talk clearly and powerfully about stuff that seems to make sense to me, but I don't want to shout, because that makes me too easy a target for people to tell me to shut up.

Shouty vs quiet activism? I think both are invaluable in different contexts, at different times and to achieve different ends.

The reason I'm writing about this at all is because I'm still learning. A lot of my thinking about these questions is still pretty unsophisticated. I'm airing my experiences and ideas in the hope of inviting engagement from those who have more education or experience in gender studies than I do. Educating me isn't their responsibility, of course, but if I make it clear I'm willing to learn and read for myself and listen, hopefully some of them will chime in occasionally and help me develop my interpretation or my approach. In fact this hope has been more than realised. The response I've got from people who are further along than me has been overwhelmingly encouraging and reassuring.

I could get that from writing in a feminist safe space, though. And I'm not. Talking about it publically is a deliberate action on my part. The thing is that I'm becoming increasingly aware (as I read more widely and as I gradually grow up, gather more evidence, and become more circumspect) of the extent to which misogyny is still alive and flourishing in the society I live in. At the same time, I've become aware of how many people in my privileged, protected social group (and I include myself unreservedly in that category) disagree with that observation. I don't have time to fight battles every time I want to talk about something that's bothered me, so this project - of writing about this publically - is a finite one. Its aim is twofold: to sound out my friends and find out who still thinks change is needed and who doesn't (which I've already done, to some extent), and to give the people who are reserving judgment something to chew on.

To be perfectly honest, the person I'm really doing this for is my beloved dennyd. I hope he'll forgive me using him to explain :) Denny is sympathetic to my point of view, but he admits that he doesn't really know enough to be sure whether he agrees with me. He's aware of the concept of male privilege - he knows in theory that he benefits indirectly from misogyny through no fault or action of his own, and he knows in theory that because he isn't a woman he doesn't experience the world as a woman does, and therefore doesn't have the right to tell a woman her experience of the world is incorrect simply because it doesn't match his. He knows this in theory. But he struggles to see the misogyny that's still eating away at our society because he's never learned to look for it. He admits I might conceivably be right that there's lots of stuff going on he doesn't or can't see, but he still hasn't observed it for himself. He wants to understand in a more visceral way than that. He wants to learn to look for it. Several of my male friends have said the same sort of thing. They sympathise, but in a vague way. They don't get it.

So I'm not trying to convince chauvinists or misogynists of anything, here. All I can do is wait for them and their attitude to die. And I'm not interested in engaging with anyone who's never studied gender studies and yet has a brilliant theory about how none of this has anything to do with gender, because you're not going to change my mind and I don't have time to go over this kind of thing every time I post. I'm writing this for the benefit of the people who want to get it.

The reason I'm not writing this in a feminist blog, for a supportive and sympathetic audience who already gets it, is that that won't help me. I know that lots of people in out there agree with me, and when I need pepping up or reassuring I'll go and read some of the many, many eloquent and powerful things they've written. What will make a huge, tangible difference to my quality of life is to increase the number of real life friends I have who get it, so I'm not restricted to the internet when I want to talk about this stuff. Talking to the people who already get it won't help with that. I don't really want to ditch all my non-feminist friends either: you're brilliant, funny, smart, cool people, and I love your company, which is why I'm friends with you. Some of you I have political differences with and I can respect that. But a lot of my friends don't get it not because they've thought about it and done the research and have come to a different conclusion - but because they've never engaged with the issues. They've never had to. (Another consequence of privilege. I don't know much about race politics, because I'm white: I've never had to. I try to be aware of that when listening to people who are very invested in it, or when I join in conversations about it.)

Anyway, that's why I started talking about it. And to be honest, I don't know enough and I'm not eloquent enough and I don't have time to educate you all by myself. But I want to start writing about how this affects me in a more public way. Yeah, the debates are exhausting, but I'm not the type to keep quiet when something's on my mind. And this is on my mind a lot at the minute. So you get to hear about it.

The other reason is this: that the older I get, the more people are talking about this. This movement has gotten bigger and louder and more secure even in the short time I've been watching it, and I think that's amazing. I fully support the general principle of talking about this shit, even in front of people who might not agree with you. I support the principle of challenging misogyny or any hateful attitude when I see it, whether or not I stand a chance of convincing the person I'm challenging. I won't be silenced by fear of people telling me they see things a different way.

That doesn't mean I'll have the energy or time to answer every disagreement (and on general principle, the more sensitive and civil your response, the more likely I am to engage with it). But I see little point in saying any of this if only the people who agree with me can hear me.

__

The other thing I've been thinking about is the tag itself: "Sexism: every little helps."

Several people pointed out that my usage of the word "sexism" in my first post was inappropriate. I don't, on balance, have any interest in a conversation that's defined as being about things that only happen to women. The world is full of exceptions and I do not want my interpretation to be derailed by someone piping up with one. And of course men suffer from gendered abuse and harassment as well.

So my subject matter is, I guess, the way in which gendered abuse and harassment directed at women by men is part of a wider pattern that makes the conversation different from how it would be if the genders were reversed. And the statistical slew of various sorts of rudeness, invasions of privacy, harassment, abuse, violence, inconvenience and disadvantages. When picking out examples from that pattern, whether it's a man or a woman being treated badly because of their gender or sex, I would call it sexism. I've been told this isn't the term other people would use. There's "misogyny", which I'm considering, but is there no gender-neutral word or phrase that can be used in the same way? This is a serious question, because there's no point setting myself up have my language torn apart every time I start talking. What word should I use?

I don't mind calling myself a feminist because I think feminism hasn't finished its very necessary work yet, but in general I prefer the term kyriarchy to patriarchy, and actually the term I'm happiest to describe myself is "gender activist". "Gender egalitarian" is another useful phrase, but I don't just think we need to equalise the genders, like some sort of binary balancing act on a pair of analogue scales, I think we need to break down the whole structure of gender and all the assumptions and restrictions and expectations attached to it.

So that's fine, but is there a better word for what I'm objecting to? Words are important: a lot of people (myself included) find it difficult to think clearly about something until they have the vocabulary to do so; and I certainly find that expanding my vocabulary helps me think more clearly and powerfully. Denny felt that I should avoid jargon when writing about this, because he finds the academese of a lot of feminism off-putting; he found my first post to be so convincing precisely because it took the talk back to the streets, back to day to day experiences, and away from abstract discussion of sociopolitical trends and invisible concepts like patriarchy and privilege. It made it visible. (Personally I think the visible stuff is only noticable once you contextualise it in the more conceptual stuff, but still, I see his point, especially given my intended audience.)

What word should I use, if not sexism, for gender-based incidents which reflect a more widespread and historically-rooted oppression? Bonus points for suggestions that fit into a catchy tag.

Comments

[original-hell.livejournal.com]

*applauds*
*watches*

[thene]

I'm very wary of calling what you're doing 'shouty activism' - that sounds like a tone argument, and it sounds like the usual weak excuse that misogynists provide - "She's so ANGRY, she's just not RATIONAL, so of COURSE I'm right and I'm not really acting like an entitled asshole." Women are considered to be 'angry' at far lower emotional thresholds than men are, simply because women are 'supposed' to be meek and mild and whatnot.

Whether you're shouting or angry doesn't ultimately matter to the points you make in any case. You'll be called angry just for having those opinions, so you may as well enjoy it.

[flats.livejournal.com]

"gender-based incidents which reflect a more widespread and historically-rooted oppression"? Of course it's bloody sexism! It's discrimination, so -ism, and it's on the grounds of perceived 'biological' sex, so sex-. Risky to call it something else in my opinion - too placatory towards the folks blind to their own privilege who think we live in a flat world of glorious equality. If you think there's a problem, why shy away from the language that affirms that? While there is a place for jargon (specialist blogs; academic journals), in outreach-type writing such as this it's best (imho) to use terms people will recognise; if you explain what sexism means, the next time (non-feminist) people see the word they might not be turned-off by it, but actually pay a bit of sympathetic attention...

[libellum.livejournal.com]

Someone posted a fantastic comment (http://naath.livejournal.com/391994.html?thread=2106426#t2106426) about this on naath's journal recently:

"you should think clearly rather than emotionally

And yet, in many many situations, thinking emotionally is the clearest thinking of all. It is the thinking related to how one feels, how one can function optimally. Thinking without feeling is reducing the human experience to that of pure calculation. And while that in itself can be very useful for abstract concepts, it is not the best method to use when dealing with the human experience.

Think of this scene in the form of an XKCD cartoon: Chap and girl walking along. Girl trips over and falls flat on face and hurts self. Girl cries out in pain. Chap does nothing. Girl wails 'please help me up!'. Chap says well if you stop being emotional about it and try to sound reasonable, maybe I'll help you up. Girl checks emotions and rationally says 'Oh dear, I seem to have fallen, would you be so kind as to reach down and lend my your hand'. He then helps. Or sometimes, even worse, he could say 'well you don't seem very distressed, you seem to be making a fuss about nothing. I'm sure you can get up by yourself'."

[sharp-blue.livejournal.com]

There's "misogyny", which I'm considering, but is there no gender-neutral word or phrase that can be used in the same way?

The only word that I can think of that doesn't sound like jargon is "incivility", but I don't think that's congruent with the concept you're expressing for several reasons. Firstly, it presupposes some notion of civic virtue which historically might have been a very different set of values to that which you or I might prefer. Secondly it doesn't suggest gender-based behaviour in particular, or even that underlying the behaviour is a widespread and longstanding oppression.

(However, it seems to me that there might be two parts to the problem: many people's lack of empathy for and disrespectful and insensitive attitude towards others; and the differing ways these things are expressed when dealing with other people of the same or different genders. The differing modes of expression are clearly channeled and guided by wider cultural biases. "Incivility" might describe part of this tangle, with "sexism" describing other parts.)

[vectorious.livejournal.com]

XKCD defn: How to explain things to geeks

[biascut.livejournal.com]

Maybe sexism is the best term for what your purposes? It seems to me that it probably isn't possible to do justice to the complexity of the gender system and the sophistication of gender theory, and avoid jargon and reach a general audience.

Like any specialised language, it isn't there because it's fun, it's there because you need it to express complex ideas and make fine distinctions. But communicating with people who don't identify as feminists and don't want to read feminist theory is still a laudable goal, and if jargon is a barrier to communication in that situation, it'd be daft to use it. Why not work on the assumption that you're developing two registers simultaneously: the specialised language that you use when talking to other feminist-theory-literate people, and the one you use when you're trying to raise awareness? Sexism is a perfectly good word until you come up against a situation where it becomes indequate, and there's nothing wrong with using it in the situations where it works well.

[biascut.livejournal.com]

Wow, that sounded super-bossy! Sorry. It started as a ramble and then I condensed it down, but it got very terse and bossy in the condensing!

[woodavens.livejournal.com]

The obvious one is probably still, alas, male chauvinism.

I don't quite see the "shouty activism" tag, either. In my universe there's a continuum all the way from non-violent direct action (or perhaps the other side of that, even) to simply living one's life as if feminism mattered, and on any one day I might be at any one point along the whole stretch of it. Some stages of one's life may be more conducive to one end than to the other, but we need all of them.

[friend-of-tofu.livejournal.com]

I've been called a "shouty" or "angry" feminist by people who fit into the latter camp.

*boggles*

I just find that so unlike my image of you! OK, I don't know you very well (yet?), but I don't read you as shouty or angry at all. Me, yes, I'm definitely shouty.

I also prefer 'kyriarchy', because it's more useful in illustrating why eg having one woman reach a position of power != feminism having achieved its goals.

[yvesilena.livejournal.com]

I just wanted to pop up and say that I'm interested in and impressed by these posts of yours. I have a great deal of catching up to do on the subject of feminism because I've only recently started to think of myself as a woman, and of my sexist encounters as normal sexism, rather than 'these people don't understand that I'm really a fairytale prince!' So I feel like as much of a learner in relation to you as you do in relation to others, which is why I'm being a bit quiet, but please keep posting these things - it's really making me think. *love*

[yiskah.livejournal.com]

I'm with biascut - I'd stick with sexism, if I were you, especially as it's a term that makes sense to you. While I think that kyriarchy is an interesting and useful term in itself, you are very much discussing gender privilege (and the lack of it), and I am wary of any terminology that disguises that.

[unwillinggal.livejournal.com]

Drattit, I've been trying to find that Jacky Fleming cartoon. The text of it (roughtly, from memory: "Man: 'You're so *emotional*!' Woman: 'An obvious shortcoming in a human being'" At teh risk of being sidetracked, I get ticked off when people guffaw and say 'oh, hormones, that's what's upset her'. Well, yes and no - what exactly do the guffawers think is influencing *their* moods?

See, now I sound angry and strident. ;-)

[unwillinggal.livejournal.com]

The thing that makes me more likely to call myself a feminist than not is that I caught myself thinking 'Wow, I'm lucky to have been born here and raised in the culture I was'. It struck me that this is an *appalling* thing to think in this day and age, why should I have to thank my luck simply because of an accident of birthplace and biology? So now, yeah, I'm absolutely a feminist because no person should be picked on or beaten or raped or trafficked or killed simply because of the sex of their body. (I hope I don't have to say that none of those things are alright in any case)

So yeah, there is casual sexism (used here roughly as 'the tendency to treat one sex as sex objects first and people second') in most levels of UK life and there are issues around privilege etc. but we have come a long way and a lot further than some.

P.S.

[unwillinggal.livejournal.com]

I find it interesting that you make the assumption that feminist fora and blogs would automatically be safe spaces for other women. In what way do you mean 'safe' here?

[supermouse.livejournal.com]

I heard of you via TLL and what you have written on feminism is awesome and the pictures you produce are wonderful. Especially the elephant in acrylics on canvas. May I friend you?