The Internet's 'Misogyny Problem' - real or imagined?

[Evie]

Perhaps we should focus discussion on some element other than the opinions of a user who is in no position to participate in the thread anymore?

 

[Manfred Belheim]

Because he never said anything that acknowledged that anything other than his own definition was accepted, widely or otherwise, at all. Nor did he preface anything with "I think", or "as I understand it". Add to that the incredibly hostile tone that showed little to no tolerance for any dissent with his proclamations and voila... I think you're reading a whole level of tolerance, reasonableness and logic into his posts that was actually entirely absent from them.

But as I said to him before the thread got locked, instead of getting sidetracked into a pointless semantics debate, why not just state what definitions you find acceptable, and what terms you would find acceptable to be applied to the concept or principle that the other person is describing, then you can both reach an agreement and get on with debating the actual issue. After all, ultimately labels are just labels. But you have to first be willing to reach an agreement on what labels you're using and what they mean in order to have a debate. Cheezy demonstrated no willingness to do that.

 

[luiz]

He just thinks these definitions, though common and widely accepted, are actually wrong, which is a valid claim.

My problem is exactly in the claim to be able to decide what definition is right and what is wrong. You can certainly argue for more useful definitions, I have no problem with that and have done it myself. But not that the widely accepted definition is wrong.

 

[Flying Pig]

That's a bit of a philosophical question to say the least!

 

[Senethro]

I'm not responding to the particular example in question, but I think it's worth remembering that not being a misogynist doesn't necessarily mean never, ever being sarcastic to, or disagreeing with, a woman.

If you're not going to respond to me can you not quote me or say things that don't need to be said. Thanks.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

If you're not going to respond to me can you not quote me or say things that don't need to be said. Thanks.

I responded to the sentence of yours that I quoted. Like I am doing now. What I wasn't responding to was the quote you were responding to.

 

[aelf]

Because he never said anything that acknowledged that anything other than his own definition was accepted, widely or otherwise, at all. Nor did he preface anything with "I think", or "as I understand it". Add to that the incredibly hostile tone that showed little to no tolerance for any dissent with his proclamations and voila... I think you're reading a whole level of tolerance, reasonableness and logic into his posts that was actually entirely absent from them.

But as I said to him before the thread got locked, instead of getting sidetracked into a pointless semantics debate, why not just state what definitions you find acceptable, and what terms you would find acceptable to be applied to the concept or principle that the other person is describing, then you can both reach an agreement and get on with debating the actual issue. After all, ultimately labels are just labels. But you have to first be willing to reach an agreement on what labels you're using and what they mean in order to have a debate. Cheezy demonstrated no willingness to do that.

All this changes nothing. He never denied that the definition was not widely accepted. If someone did not deny that a piece of fact (maybe a somewhat debatable one, but I doubt anyone is actually interested in debating that here) is true, it's best not to assume that he did.

My problem is exactly in the claim to be able to decide what definition is right and what is wrong. You can certainly argue for more useful definitions, I have no problem with that and have done it myself. But not that the widely accepted definition is wrong.

So you have a problem with people thinking that things are right or wrong? That would be extremely rich, to say the least.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

All this changes nothing. He never denied that the definition was not widely accepted. If someone did not deny that a piece of fact (maybe a somewhat debatable one, but I doubt anyone is actually interested in debating that here) is true, it's best not to assume that he did.

Perhaps it does change nothing. It certainly doesn't change my opinion that it was a very, very generous reading of his posts.

 

[Senethro]

I responded to the sentence of yours that I quoted. Like I am doing now. What I wasn't responding to was the quote you were responding to.

What you did was respond to a thing I wrote out of its context and attempt to inform me that not all sarcasm is misogyny. It reads as hugely patronising and attempting to one-man-up me while being too lazy to actually read the context in which my post was made.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

This site s far too dominated by males that it is hard for women to get their voices heard over all the arguing.

I've found this to be true in a lot of threads on this site.

I'm beginning to believe that current day online feminism, or ********sm as I prefer to call it is just an organised movement of misandry.

Just because someone is a feminist, that doesn't mean that person hates men, period. I don't hate men. I just really dislike willfully stupid or arrogant men (and women, too; I have dealt with both in the past and unfortunately have to continue dealing with them).

Yes, we need more anecdotes.

A man sarcastically dismisses a woman and women's points of view in a thread about misogyny.

Thank you for illustrating exactly why most of the female members of CFC prefer not to come to OT.

Brennan, thank you for the disrespect you have shown by your "creative" spelling of my username. Copy/paste is a useful feature to use when you don't want to use multi-quote, yet quote someone. And as always, you are free to refrain from reading the posts of any forum member who displeases you.

Yeah, normally anecdotes aren't exactly sought after, but they could at the very least serve as a jumping off point for some other discussion in this thread.

Feminism and misogyny are not abstract things to me. I deal with them every day of my life. Therefore, I choose not to express my views in abstract ways here. From what I've gathered over the years from various threads that range from scholarly to the "Dear Abby, how do I get a girlfriend without bothering with the 'friend' part?" there are/have been some people on this forum who are absolutely clueless about women as unique individuals. Some of the things that have been mentioned by me or others regarding misogyny either have happened or are happening to your wives, girlfriends, mothers, daughters, sisters, or friends.

The point of my anecdotes is to share part of my experiences with the other posters here and to explain what effects those experiences have had. Hopefully that will lead to a realization that yes, some of these things you talk about in the abstract are not abstract at all, when they happen to someone you know.

I commend downtown for his understanding of the challenges his female co-workers face on a daily basis.

By and large you could say the same thing about non-whites. Or at least there never seems to be much first-hand experience of racism brought into the debates (or at least when it does it's usually denounced as being physically impossible).

Any kind of racism is physically possible. All it takes is two people, at least one of whom has a problem with the other one, for a reason that may range from reasonable to irrational.

But this thread isn't about racism.

 

[luiz]

A
So you have a problem with people thinking that things are right or wrong? That would be extremely rich, to say the least.

I have a problem with people assuming that their non-mainstream definition is the only right one and anyone using a different one is wrong. Big problem.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

What you did was respond to a thing I wrote out of its context and attempt to inform me that not all sarcasm is misogyny. It reads as hugely patronising and attempting to one-man-up me while being too lazy to actually read the context in which my post was made.

Untrue. While you made your comment in response to things that two other people said, the comment itself was actually quite a general one that didn't refer to anything specific that either of those parties said, and actually just looked to be pushing the general idea that a man disagreeing with a woman in a thread about misogyny was automatically a bad or ironic thing. I was responding to that notion itself, not commenting on the original exchange that made you say it (which I think is a perfectly valid thing to do), and so I stated that I wasn't expressing an opinion on the original exchange just to make that clear that by disagreeing with your sentiment, I wasn't actually expressing an opinion on that particular exchange. It was in no way meant to de-contextualise your comment at all which was, after all, only a few posts before.

I also wasn't informing that not all sarcasm is misogyny, I was just stating that disagreeing with a woman, even in a thread about misogyny, isn't necessarily inherently misogynistic itself. Given that, to my reading at least, your statement seemed to imply that it was, this seemed like a fair thing to do.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

But this thread isn't about racism.

I know, that's exactly what I was trying to say earlier. I think these feminism/sexism/misogyny threads have more than enough to say on their own merits, and all sides have more than enough that they want to discuss (or at least proclaim) that there's really no benefit to clouding the issue. And yet every time someone will very quickly use racism as an analogy and before you know it we're all talking about racism as well. It's like starting a thread about how best to eliminate world poverty, and then curing cancer gets thrown into the mix as well. Some topics are kind of big enough on their own.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Untrue. While you made your comment in response to things that two other people said, the comment itself was actually quite a general one that didn't refer to anything specific that either of those parties said, and actually just looked to be pushing the general idea that a man disagreeing with a woman in a thread about misogyny was automatically a bad or ironic thing. I was responding to that notion itself, not commenting on the original exchange that made you say it (which I think is a perfectly valid thing to do), and so I stated that I wasn't expressing an opinion on the original exchange just to make that clear that by disagreeing with your sentiment, I wasn't actually expressing an opinion on that particular exchange. It was in no way meant to de-contextualise your comment at all which was, after all, only a few posts before.

I also wasn't informing that not all sarcasm is misogyny, I was just stating that disagreeing with a woman, even in a thread about misogyny, isn't necessarily inherently misogynistic itself. Given that, to my reading at least, your statement seemed to imply that it was, this seemed like a fair thing to do.

As the woman who was specifically quoted in the first place, here's my take: It's often more a matter of how something is said that raises the misogyny flag than the bare words themselves. And context does matter.

I felt the crack about anecdotes was disrespectful.

 

[Farm Boy]

It's how it read to me on first pass though, if that's of any worth. It seemed to have an insinuation that if one had anecdotes one would also not have data.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

As the woman who was specifically quoted in the first place, here's my take: It's often more a matter of how something is said that raises the misogyny flag than the bare words themselves. And context does matter.

I felt the crack about anecdotes was disrespectful.

I wasn't saying the context or the original exchange between you and Brennan (I think) didn't matter, I was saying that I didn't think it was particularly relevant to Senethro's comment. Even though he obviously said it in response to that exchange, he didn't make any specific reference to it but instead made a more general observation. As such it seemed a perfectly reasonable thing to do to quote his comment "out of context".

As I've said, I was making no comment on your exchange at all, and I'm still not doing. The anecdotes comment has nothing to do with me as I've not expressed an opinion on it either way.

 

[Senethro]

I wasn't saying the context or the original exchange between you and Brennan (I think) didn't matter, I was saying that I didn't think it was particularly relevant to Senethro's comment. Even though he obviously said it in response to that exchange, he didn't make any specific reference to it but instead made a more general observation. As such it seemed a perfectly reasonable thing to do to quote his comment "out of context".

As I've said, I was making no comment on your exchange at all, and I'm still not doing. The anecdotes comment has nothing to do with me as I've not expressed an opinion on it either way.

Oh my god just shoosh. Please take it as understood that I do not and have not thought disagreeing with a woman in any context is necessarily misogynistic. I just thought brennan being sarcastic was worth highlighting as an example of a dude getting it completely wrong! Thats all! Nothing more!

 

[Valka D'Ur]

It's how it read to me on first pass though, if that's of any worth. It seemed to have an insinuation that if one had anecdotes one would also not have data.

As I said, it's not an abstract or intellectual issue for me. It's what has had a major effect on my life from childhood, right up to present day and it has had an effect on how and why I present myself here as I do. Sorry for not presenting it as a study written up in some journal, but as I see it, what is data but a set of observations - and who better to communicate observations about how an issue has affected a person's life than the person him/herself?

Oh my god just shoosh. Please take it as understood that I do not and have not thought disagreeing with a woman in any context is necessarily misogynistic. I just thought brennan being sarcastic was worth highlighting as an example of a dude getting it completely wrong! Thats all! Nothing more!

I don't assume misogyny if someone disagrees with me about something as long as the disagreement is made respectfully, without belittling my position because I'm female.

It is sometimes a challenge to decipher when a put-down is because the other person has something against me personally, or because they just don't want to be bothered with a woman's opinion, period.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

Oh my god just shoosh. Please take it as understood that I do not and have not thought disagreeing with a woman in any context is necessarily misogynistic. I just thought brennan being sarcastic was worth highlighting as an example of a dude getting it completely wrong! Thats all! Nothing more!

Okay, well why not just say that in the first place instead of claiming that I'm being all lazy and unfair and trying to one-up you etc etc. I misinterpreted you, you've cleared up the misunderstanding, case closed.

I don't think telling me to "shoosh" just because I took the time to explain my words after you took such umbrage with them does you much favour though. If you don't want me to even talk to you then don't say something about me that I'm quite obviously very likely to respond to.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

I don't assume misogyny if someone disagrees with me about something as long as the disagreement is made respectfully, without belittling my position because I'm female.

But do you assume misogyny if they are disrespectful and belittle your position just because they disagree?

My own anecdote. I was part of a twelve member team, of which ten were male and two were female. An opportunity came up for a team leader position on another team (standard practice in this company was to fill such openings from outside the team under some theory that elevating someone to supervise people they had been shoulder to shoulder with the day before was a bad idea) and many people on our team were qualified. Our own team leader's recommendation would be expected to carry a lot of weight, and the guy who was recommended did get the job.

Four other guys, who I thought were probably better qualified did not get the recommendation. We all agreed that the guy who did was qualified though, and even though we thought he only got the nod because he was a shameless butt kisser the four guys settled back in and we got on with our own team's work. One woman, who might also have been a little better qualified, filed a discrimination suit.

The point being that when the butt kisser got the recommendation it was because he was a butt kisser, not because he wasn't a woman...but she took some sort of special offense to it that the men in the exact same situation did not take.