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

[JollyRoger]

Some that post on the internet try to be the digital equivalent of Ray Rice on an elevator.

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[cardgame]

Sexism can be all but eliminated on the institutional/societal level but still be exist, or even be common on an individual scale.

Case in point: Apparently United States Senators think its ok to tell a female Senator not to slim down too much because he likes “my girls chubby.”

Since when have congressmen been anything but terrible people?

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Ah,. yes, and my 'attitude' in rejecting the validity of arguments from personal experience is typical of people who say 'women don't play computer games' is it?

Let's face it, while you have called me 'typical' the alleged offence has nothing whatsoever in common with any of the above.

1) It's a simple thing called 'trying really hard to be offended'. 2) Some irony - or possibly hypocrisy - in the little dig about my ability to spell there.

At least one poster on this thread has capitalised the B in Brennan. How offended am I?

It's your choice of whether or not to be offended if someone capitalizes the B in Brennan (I see you did it yourself above, so I assume you're not that offended). I will capitalize it if I use your name at the beginning of a sentence. The rest of the time I will endeavor to respect the formal spelling you chose upon registration at this site. All I ask is that you accord me that same respect and spell my name right. As I've said repeatedly, this isn't a misogyny issue; there have been instances on this forum of same-gender negative interactions regarding the spelling of usernames.

I'll admit to being a bit sarky, but 'rude and dismissive' is a clear exaggeration and both hypocritical and hilarious coming as it does from someone with red font all over their posts.

Huh? How is using red font in my sig 'rude and dismissive'? My sig deals with a writing competition in a different subforum on this site. It has absolutely nothing to do with any of my posts in this thread.

 

[brennan]

Finally you got it, though in a crude form. Took you long enough.

I have to say I am still baffled as to how you took my rejection of the validity of your analogy to indicate that I didn't understand what an analogy was. I am further baffled as to how adding plain sarcasm has brought you to the belated realisation that I do in fact understand analagies, but either way i'm glad you've caught up.

first hand experience is valuable and i'd like to hear it

I have first hand experience of suffering from sexism. Would you acept that as an argument that men are systematically victimised in my society? No you wouldn't. Personal experience is a highly suspect form of evidence, usually rife with selection bias.

baseless except for what you wrote

Now there's a meaningless statement.

this is silly and you know its silly

Your stance that any gender gap shows sexism is indeed demonstrably silly. I am glad we agree.

gender gap is convincing to me because i have a bunch of base assumptions regarding women

Like what?

an amazing claim, if you know this to be true why are you asking me for the evidence and not presenting your own

To clarify: by 'institutionalised' I specifically mean within UK law. Feel free to prove me wrong by finding a sexist law in the UK - other than the ones that discriminate against men..

i really dislike biological explanations as theres always some evo-psych justifications from an undergrad behind them

just dismiss the actual science coming from actual scientists. They are all just undergrads.

out of interest can you point to a developed/near developed nation in which institutional sexism unambiguously occurs

Of course: Abortion laws in the USA. Pretty much anywhere in the Middle East. I believe there is a clearly discriminatory property law in Spain, but I can't remember the details off hand. It's easy to find examples, but note that they are far, far, fewer then they would have been mere decades ago, which is kind of my point, sexism is fast disappearing, not 'normalised' as per the accusations of 'everyday sexism'.

Note again, that i'm not saying 'there is absolutely no sexism', but that sexism is no longer a dominant, institutionalised social force. It is an undercurrent at best or should that be worst?) and is still in retreat.

Sexism can be all but eliminated on the institutional/societal level but still be exist, or even be common on an individual scale.

I agree. But since both genders get the same treatment in different ways it's hard to see how this makes any clear cut case about misogyny. Often misogyny is concluded purely by looking at the female experience, but if you take the exact same standards and apply them to the male population you find that the claim that 'society is misogynist' can only seriously be made if you simultaneously claim that 'society is misandrist'. Which seems to me to indicate an unsatisfactory definition of hate towards a gender group somewhere. A society can't hate all its members, surely?

When you look at example such as that which you cite, note the reception it gets - which is almost universal condemnation and ridicule. That is not the reception sexism would get if there was a widespread problem of 'misogyny'.

Assuming that statement was sarcastic, it's rather at odds with your stance on anecdotal evidence isn't it?

I'm not really seeing how. The claim has been made that the subject of online misogyny is 'abstract and removed' for most people. Given that we are actively discussing it, that the subject matter gets into the national news, that many of us here have debated some of the allegedly most egregious examples of it both here and elsewhere and that because this is the internet we can all see and read the offending material I find that a slightly odd claim to make.

We may have no personal, direct experience of being slagged off on twitter (or we may have), but I don't see how that makes it some sort of incomprehensible 'abstract' notion when I can just click a link and read exactly what was said. It isn't as though I am blissfully unaware of what it is like to have someone be rude to me, nor to be discriminated against. This seems to me an attempt to quibble over the value of personal experience and one I don't see as having any validity, it isn't about anecdotes at all.

Huh? How is using red font in my sig 'rude and dismissive'? My sig deals with a writing competition in a different subforum on this site. It has absolutely nothing to do with any of my posts in this thread.

Ahem:

I and others here pointed out that you are being rude and dismissive about my posts. Senethro stated that you, a man, are being dismissive of a woman's posts

I hope that clarifies what I said.

To all: can we agree to draw a line over all the silly bickering and try to stay on topic please?

 

[Senethro]

Ignoring the sarcasm, you've again dodged saying what kind of evidence you'd accept.

Edit: also that claim that women are apparently the cause of few women MPs etc

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I'm not really seeing how. The claim has been made that the subject of online misogyny is 'abstract and removed' for most people. Given that we are actively discussing it, that the subject matter gets into the national news, that many of us here have debated some of the allegedly most egregious examples of it both here and elsewhere and that because this is the internet we can all see and read the offending material I find that a slightly odd claim to make.

We may have no personal, direct experience of being slagged off on twitter (or we may have), but I don't see how that makes it some sort of incomprehensible 'abstract' notion when I can just click a link and read exactly what was said. It isn't as though I am blissfully unaware of what it is like to have someone be rude to me, nor to be discriminated against. This seems to me an attempt to quibble over the value of personal experience and one I don't see as having any validity, it isn't about anecdotes at all.

There are all kinds of things I can click on and read exactly what was said. That doesn't mean the subject matter isn't an abstract thing for me. For example, there are certain portions of the male anatomy and medical issues associated with them. If I read about them, it doesn't make it any less abstract for me, since I haven't experienced those issues, will never experience those issues, and have no male relatives experiencing those issues.

Ahem:

I hope that clarifies what I said.

I have no idea what Senethro's original post said or what color font he used. As for the content of the post that is in red font, Senethro didn't write that. Neither did I.

 

[brennan]

Ignoring the sarcasm, you've again dodged saying what kind of evidence you'd accept.

I've responded to several points, but you are going to refuse to move on until i've dealt with everything? Honest engagement ftw.

I have in fact intimated what sort of evidence i'd accept - different (clearly discriminatory) legislation; patterns of behaviour in the press and online that indicate a tolerance of sexism. You on the other hand have not said what it would take to get you to rethink your position.

You haven't told me what your 'base assumptions' are about women that cause you to accept any gender gap as indicative of sexism. By your standards this means you are 'dodging' the question.

Edit: also that claim that women are apparently the cause of few women MPs etc

That's an odd way of putting it, I suggested that some jobs seem unpopular with women, not that they've 'caused few women MPs'. By the way I find it really tiresome to be asked for citations on things that, so far as I am aware, are common knowledge. Here's a report that states that men (in the USA) are twice as likely as women to report having often thought about running for office and twice as likely to say that they definitely wanted to run for office.

it doesn't make it any less abstract for me, since I haven't experienced those issues, will never experience those issues, and have no male relatives experiencing those issues.

You will never experience it isn't the same as 'abstract'. And here we a talking about a form of verbal/written abuse/harassment or bullying. Who hasn't experienced that?

I have no idea what Senethro's original post said or what color font he used. As for the content of the post that is in red font, Senethro didn't write that. Neither did I.

That's kind of the point.

i'm not saying 'there is absolutely no sexism', but that sexism is no longer a dominant, institutionalised social force. It is an undercurrent at best or should that be worst?) and is still in retreat.

Anyone actually disagree with this? And if so, why?

 

[Manfred Belheim]

We may have no personal, direct experience of being slagged off on twitter (or we may have), but I don't see how that makes it some sort of incomprehensible 'abstract' notion when I can just click a link and read exactly what was said. It isn't as though I am blissfully unaware of what it is like to have someone be rude to me, nor to be discriminated against. This seems to me an attempt to quibble over the value of personal experience and one I don't see as having any validity, it isn't about anecdotes at all.

What do you see as the difference between someone's personal experience and that person's anecdote? Are you saying that it's because you can click a link and see it for yourself, thus making it "personal" for you as well? Does this then mean that your main problem with anecdotes is that you consider that the person might be lying?

 

[aelf]

I have to say I am still baffled as to how you took my rejection of the validity of your analogy to indicate that I didn't understand what an analogy was. I am further baffled as to how adding plain sarcasm has brought you to the belated realisation that I do in fact understand analagies, but either way i'm glad you've caught up.

You are baffled because you don't understand my explanation of why your rebuttal makes no sense because you don't understand how an analogy works.

 

[Old Hippy]

That's an odd way of putting it, I suggested that some jobs seem unpopular with women, not that they've 'caused few women MPs'. By the way I find it really tiresome to be asked for citations on things that, so far as I am aware, are common knowledge. Here's a report that states that men (in the USA) are twice as likely as women to report having often thought about running for office and twice as likely to say that they definitely wanted to run for office.

yes but in the UK experience only 23% of the house of lords are women, an appointed postion...

it might change as in an all male meeting behind closed doors the church of England is thinking of allowing women bishops into the house of lords

Spoiler :

Women bishops could be fast-tracked into the House of Lords under plans backed by the Church of England’s current all-male episcopate.


The Church’s ruling General Synod is widely expected to give final approval for a historic change in church law, allowing women to become bishops and archbishops, when it gathers in York in July.


If the legislation is passed and receives Royal Assent, the first women bishops could be chosen by the end of this year or early 2015.


Nevertheless, under the rules, that could still mean a wait of several years before any women bishops take their places in the House of Lords.


But in a meeting behind closed doors, the current bishops agreed to open talks with political parties at Westminster to relax the rules to allow the first women bishops to join the Lords more quickly.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/10844909/Women-bishops-to-be-fast-tracked-into-House-of-Lords.html

so by the time it is done and someone dies they could get another one in say 10 years time ....

a sign of changing values maybe or maybe not

Spoiler :

It follows calls from some quarters, in the wake of the defeat of previous women bishops legislation in November 2012, for bishops to be denied the right to sit in the Lords until there were women among their number

 

[brennan]

What do you see as the difference between someone's personal experience and that person's anecdote? Are you saying that it's because you can click a link and see it for yourself, thus making it "personal" for you as well? Does this then mean that your main problem with anecdotes is that you consider that the person might be lying?

As I said, I don't see how the lack of personal experience makes any specific experience an abstract one. I've never seen Venezuela, i'm never likely to see Venezuela, but I don't see any reason to regard Venezuela as an abstract concept.

Not only that but I could pose as a woman on an internet forum and directly experience some of the misogyny that is alleged to occur. With considerably less difficulty than it would take to visit Venezuela.

Edit: sorry, I didn't respond to that second point. No, my problem with anecdotes is that reliance upon them is problematical. Personal accounts are clouded by emotion and demonstrate selection bias. You need a representative sample in order to make an objective judgement, not a queue of people with a chip on their shoulder.

yes but in the UK experience only 23% of the house of lords are women, an appointed postion...

it might change as in an all male meeting behind closed doors the church of England is thinking of allowing women bishops into the house of lords

Bishops are a tiny minority in the lords - only about 3% IIRC. So not really.

I can see why you'd think the appointment of Lords is relevant, but Lords are generally recruited from the ranks of prominent individuals in business, political and artistic fields. All those fields already contain gender gaps so that gap wouldn't disappear via the appointment process.

a sign of changing values maybe or maybe not

As i've intimated already. I think it is beyond question that values are changing/have changed.

Within my lifetime homosexuality was decriminalised and men have been granted legally recognised marriage. My mother was taught how to use a mangle at school and only allowed to take a single A-Level, because she was a girl, in my cohort there were 4 women on my degree course - other courses are taken mostly by women.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

I owe a few people in here an apology. Valka, Manfried, brennan, and some others I'm sure I missed; you got lumped in with some other people as the thread went paroxysmal, and it was unfair of me to include you in that.

So there are at least two senses of the word, and the descriptive sense denotes diversity. Hardly "two distinct things", as you put it

...

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

That's a very, very generous reading of Cheezy's posts in this thread.

Nonetheless, it is a correct one.

There's been a rush in this thread, as there often is in related threads on this topic, to interpret my position as far more extreme and nonsensical than it is. This may admittedly be due in part to my abrasiveness on this issue (to be honest, as I'm sure you realize, it is one that I find far more offensive to reason than many other issues such as, for example, nationalism), but nonetheless, the point stands as it is made.

Just to clarify, let's reiterate:

While individual discrimination may be based upon race, I do not think that is racism. It's discriminatory, yes, and hostile, yes, but the key aspect is that, while unpleasant and certainly potentially dangerous, its existence and manifestation in that social event does not reinforce, nor is it based at all upon, the structural/institutional disenfranchisement of the White race. In some circumstances it may be; South Africa, for example, has the potential to become that.* Because of this, it should not be treated as anywhere near "equal" to racial discrimination which does do those things. Racism is a concept which extends far beyond the individual actions and opinions of people**, and ultimately, in capitalist society, one which is rooted in the power structures which are centered around property accumulation and possession. Because of this, it is important to perceive individual interactions in the context of larger, social dynamics, and not as isolated incidents of "one race member performing an action wrt to the race membership of another person" and leaving it at that.


*Although I think even in SA or in Zimbabwe, where the white minority are the descendants of settlers and formerly ruled in a racist society (in other words, former Apartheids) that the concept of "racism" is open to interpretation, and that discriminatory or race-based actions should not be interpreted in the same fashion as racist parallels in the USA, where white cops beat down Black men or laws discriminate against Blacks or other POCs.

**Structural/institutional racism, such as I have cited previously in this thread, extends beyond simple interactions to include laws, customs, language, and policies which either purposefully or incidentally reinforce the power and opportunity divides between races and communities, which can include everything from red-lining (a purposeful practice directed against POC communities) to performance-based college enrollment (an incidental one, since POC are disadvantaged from the start in relation to white applicants, due to the generally sub-par nature of schools in POC communities; something which is itself a form of incidental structural racism, because schools are funded through local taxation, which causes affluent districts to have increasingly better schools while poorer districts circle the drain and perpetuate the problem) as opposed to Affirmative Action. It is rooted in the base of society but reproduced in its superstructure; this is why simply policing individual interactions cannot solve the problem any more than a taxation scheme can solve the problem of wealth distribution.

 

[Gori the Grey]

There [is] no sexism against men..

While individual discrimination may be based upon race, I do not think that is racism.

Well nigh half the discussion in this thread was prompted not by the second claim, which is defensible, but by the first phrasing, which is objectionable.

 

[cardgame]

This seems highly relevant. Also good writing.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

Cardgame, do you know the term concern trolling? Because that's what the author of that article is doing. He's pretending to "be concerned" about the "validity" of the movement's arguments, and so advocates gutting those arguments in order for them to be more palatable to his own tone-policing sensibilities.

This is not a practice in which people outside of the group in question should be engaging. If there's a weakness, even a fatal one, in the message or tactics of the groups formed for and by the groups seeking liberation, then that is their problem and their duty to fix, and ultimately their responsibility if it causes their efforts to fail. For people outside that group to try and correct them on this is faulty, especially if they are from the group which oppresses them. Ostensibly, such an ally would be rejecting that identity in order to forward the cause of the oppressed, but for them to correct their liberative tactics would be to revert to precisely the social relationship they are supposedly fighting against: that of dictating to the oppressed group how to carry out their own affairs.

In other words, his rant is itself a form of privilege and an imposition. If he realized that, then he would not hold the position that he does in the first place.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

I think I speak for all straight white men when I say that sounds really bad and if I was doing it I’m sorry and will try to avoid ever doing it again. Problem solved, right? Can’t believe that took us however many centuries to sort out.

A sinking feeling tells me it probably isn’t that easy.

It is sort of hard to imagine an apology is sincere when it is directly followed by 'since there's no way that is going to work let me get right back to what I was doing before without even pausing for breath'.

 

[cardgame]

yeah, I don't like point 1 at all, but 2-4 all work. Specifically the motte-and-bailey tactic and point 3,

Why can’t social justice terms apply to oppressed groups?

If you go by the inoffensive definition of privilege (also not a fan of how he defines that, so for clarity, "Privilege is when you think something is not a problem because it's not a problem to you personally." In other words, the invalidation of the experiences of others based on your own, as they would apply to your social group or category (as it is not an individual thing).

 

[Timsup2nothin]

yeah, I don't like point 1 at all, but 2-4 all work.

The problem with the article is that the four points at the start are a quote, and are only quoted for the purpose of refuting them...which in fact requires completely disregarding them in the first place. The idea that three out of the four work for you would seem to support the idea that the guy would have been best served to quote them, apologize for having ignored them, and then just shut up. If his intent was just to refute them (which it pretty clearly was) the insincere apology and pretense he was giving them any consideration could have just been skipped.

 

[cardgame]

I have the feeling we're not on the same page at all.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

I have the feeling we're not on the same page at all.

So it seems. I will bail.