Suggestions, please!
Open Suggestion Thread
Please add suggestions for questions that have not yet been addressed, hopefully with links to articles that address those questions, in the comments to this post.
Note: Comments left here are to suggest further posts rather than begin a debate. If you wish to generate a discussion, then your question might be more appropriate on the Ask A Question thread.
What sort of suggestions could you make?
Firstly, links that cover basic material for the benefit of the genuinely curious.
Secondly, links that debunk common anti-feminist myths and address common arguments from trolls.
The model for all efforts of this kind to emulate is the marvellous Index to Creationist Claims associated with USENet newsgroup talk.origins. The wonderful zuzu, who has kindly seen fit to widely promote this project, nails it:
Got a troll asking you disingenuous or stupid questions and don’t know where to tell them to go (other than hell, of course)? Drop on by the open suggestion thread and make a suggestion for a post to which you can later refer trolls (or the genuinely clueless). With a sweet smile and a suggestion to come back once they’ve covered the first-year course material.
As a general rule I’d prefer people to nominate other people’s articles rather than their own in this thread, but it’s fine to link to your own writing in other threads.
If you have an article you’d like to suggest as a link to be added to an existing FAQ post, please add it in the comments to that post. That way the comments thread becomes a user-generated “More Reading” list even if I decide against adding the link to the body of the post.
Thanks in advance for contributing to this feminist resource.
OK, Unless and Until I work out how to import individual comments from Haloscan, here’s the link to the comments to the original thread over at blogger. There are 50 suggestions so far.
I’ve distilled the latest suggestions from the previous version of the blog down into this comment, to jumpstart the thread here. I’ve taken out the suggestions I’ve already covered and left just these, which I’ve yet to address fully in FAQs although some of them have been tangentially mentioned. Any suggestions for good articles on any of the following Qs would be gratefully received.
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From E. Fulton: Gendered language - “What’s the big deal about using ‘mankind’ and ‘fireman’ and stuff?” - mental framing as “other” by use of words - resulting policy decisions based on masculine standarding (permalink)
From tekanji: - the accusation that feminists are too one-sided and don’t acknowledge the pain that men go through - Who’s responsible for facilitating discussion on men’s issues? is an article that tekanji wrote about when/how it’s appropriate to bring up men’s discussions. (permalink)
From Betty: - something addressing “Why Feminists Won’t Let Me Call Women Sluts/Whores, Not Even That Slut, Paris Hilton.” (permalink)
From Tigs: Can you post something on the ’sex class’ and all its different meanings? I feel like sometimes the feminist blogosphere means different things when they talk about the sex class, and I just want to make sure I understand what the community ‘usually’ means. (permalink)
from tekanji: Two suggestions based on this conversation:
1. A FAQ post debunking the idea that we can and need to divorce ourselves from the “militant extremist” image, possibly coupling it with the argument that we need to present ourselves as less offensive in order to be taken seriously.
2. A post that specifically addresses the myth that feminism is about “reversing roles” and giving women the upper hand. (permalink)
Here’s a nice piece on the subject of ‘Why don’t feminists defend men’s rights’
http://www.thefword.org.uk/features/2003/09/feminists_are_sexist?skin=print
…. but it’s FUNNY!
A FAQ section about humour. Topics include
Inclusive vs Exclusive humour
Laughing with vs laughing at
Why those inside a group get a bonus on the ‘laughing with’ scale, and those not part of a group are disadvantaged in that department
… no offence meant
How this is not a free pass to say anything you want
Why ‘can’t you take a joke’ adds insult to injury
Why ‘It’s just a joke’, ‘no offence meant’, and their kin all sound the same to the target
Damn. I knew I forgot something.
Additional topic to the humour faq section: How humour is often used as a means of separating groups - including certain people, and excluding others.
How sexual humour has been used since (at least) the Victorian era (in Victorian-descended cultures, and possibly in other cultures) as a way of putting women in their place, and/or barring women from certain places.
Episode 3: In which Jenn learns that she really ought to draft out these suggestions fully before she makes them.
Also, a section on getting out of trouble gracefully when you realise your attempt at humour was inappropriate and/or has fallen flat.
Obviously ‘it’s just a joke’ or ‘can’t you take a joke’ don’t work, so what can you do? (My ideas: apologise, admit that you intended a joke, admit that it was inappropriate, promise to keep that in mind in the future, then let it drop.)
Nice links and ideas, Jenn. A lot of your humour ideas tie into aspects of generic privilege (surprise surprise) so I wonder whether there’s some really good article out there already on this stuff just waiting for us to find it.
I hope there is, but if there is, I don’t know where. If I find one, I’ll put it in the comments here.
A piece on harassment: http://dwellonit.blogspot.com/2007/05/harassment.html
A piece on rape:
http://danadocus.livejournal.com/1881.html
I just realised I wanted to find something that explained the sexual double standard, the madonna/whore or virgin/whore dichotomy, and why ’stud’ is a compliment but ’slut’ an insult.
So some piece on all of that would be very useful.
You’re not the first person to mention that, Jenn. I’m heading back into an FAQ headspace, I think. It seems to come and go. I’ll try and get a few completed this week.
More of a suggestion for a question I would frequently like to ask, but am afraid to - what are the “waves” of feminism? How do I tell the difference between first, second, and third-wave feminism?
I’ve got a brief description of the three waves in the Jargon File, Chet.
The three waves refer to the strongest emphasis of feminist activists mostly, although there are theoretical differences as well. Tiptoe through the links from the Jargon File and you’ll probably find more than you need.
Hey, sports provides many opportunities for feminist analysis. Gender equity in prizes in tennis and golf, for instance. Or women competing in men’s leagues. Just a thought.
What is your position on female genital mutilation?
Also, what is your position on laws in many countries where women get stoned for committing adultery (often the “adultery” means they were raped)?
The practises you describe oppress women. Western feminists have been working with feminist activists within the countries where such oppressions exist to help end such practises for decades.
If you want to dicuss this further, please take it to the Ask A Question thread.
Hi tigtog,
I come from a similar place to Jennifer Vesperman: geek communities. There are a bunch of issues that might be FAQ worthy:
1. Why is calling women ’sexy’ problematic?[1]
2. Why can’t she just take my comments on her as a sexual being as they were meant, as a compliment?
3. Isn’t it a public/moral good to say whatever the hell I want and challenge the mainstream politically correct dogma?
4. Isn’t it better for sexual liberty if I make sexual possibilities explicit where ever possible?
5. Aren’t you just trying to cut down on all the fun bits of our circle and make us behave like stuffy business people?
Of course, all of these are used disingenuously a lot, so sometimes I wonder how seriously it’s worth taking them.
[1] “We need more women in our gaming/coding/business circle, because they’re sexy!”
Mary, I think your FAQs 1 and 2 often very earnestly asked. Many (most?) people are so used to viewing women’s primary purpose in life as ornamentation and titillation that they genuinely start to believe that “sexy” is the best compliment they can pay a woman.
Tigtog has a link in the sexual-objectification section that might be useful:
“But Don’t You Like To Be Objectified Sometimes?”
I feel like there should be a page somewhere in the links below, but I can’t think of just one easy to understand subject heading to put them under:
Debunking the Myth of Frivolity
Speaking of Twisting Feminist Arguments
And here’s some that look at the myth of the “hive vagina” (or that “feminists are the borg”):
By the Numbers
Chorus Member
There are some more good ones for the “not the borg” argument, but I’ll have to look them up when I have more time.
A certain professional wrestler I liked recently murdered his wife, then his child, the committed suicide. Certain people are talking about “roid rage,” but in light of recent other murders by men of their spouses/exes/girlfriends, I wondered out loud about the role of misogyny in murder/intimate partner abuse, and why the finger would never once be directed there in MSM and only at the crazy roid rage sensationalism. Certain people cannot get that violence against women (and children as a result) is misogyny. It is hatred of women. They claim that hatred of that ONE women does not constitute hatred of ALL women. This is making my head explode. Could you maybe do a FAQ post on misogyny in general or the correlation to relationship violence? To me, it seems so DUH, but it’s hard for me to break it down as to why.
There’s a few posts around regarding the response to recent spousal homicides by men, especially the interesection of racism and misogyny in judging Jessie Davis. It’s hard to distill down to FAQ length, although I’ll add it to the list.
Pandagon
Feministe
Violet Socks at the Reclusive Leftist probably has closest to an overview of the general intimate murder phenomenon, again sparked by commentary about the murder of Jessie Davis.
I suggest that you provide a link to a feminist blog that permits comments that all of the other feminist blogs seem to consider unutterable heresy, if any. I say this because there is actually no place that feminists congregate online where their basic assumptions can be challenged and destroyed.
Otherwise, I will continue to presume that feminism cannot withstand even elementary criticism.
The basic assumption of feminism is that women are entitled to full social equality with men, both de jure and de facto.
From that basic principle other ideological positions have been derived, all of which can and have been criticised by others both within and without the feminist movement. If you haven’t found such critical discussions, then you haven’t been trying.
If you do actually want to debate the basic assumption bolded in the first sentence above, then of course you’re not going to get any takers: you don’t want an actual debate, you just want the opportunity to abuse feminists.
“If you do actually want to debate the basic assumption bolded in the first sentence above, then of course you’re not going to get any takers: you don’t want an actual debate, you just want the opportunity to abuse feminists.”
Well, I suppose that would be the rub, tigtog – and of course, the devil, as they say, “is in the details.” What you and other feminists seem to be advocating is not equality as between differently oriented and situated groups, but gender or sex symmetry, viz, the notion that equal is only equal when and if everything that men are in the habit of doing women are also in the habit of doing in the same proportion, or if a male-identified occupation, in proportions equal or greater. It is my belief that the rhetorical rabbit of “equality” gets slipped into the hat quite regularly to be produced on demand. Simply repeating “women are equal” (where equal means symmetrical) does not make it so, and, just as importantly, does not compel others to agree or be adjudged irredeemably evil and unworthy of discourse.
I first began along this line of questioning – really asking for a comprehensive Apologia from a feminist representing the feminist worldview which begins with some self-evident principle, ethical tradition, etc. from which the broad “rights” claims arise, and which does not permit of similar claims in favor of, for example, an unborn fetus/baby/nascent demon. I have as yet been left wanting. I fail to see why simply asking for this most basic thing, which all feminists ought to be able to recite at will, is “abuse,” putting aside the issue of whether or not I accept the notion itself. Such a deflection tracks more closely to the behavior of the religious dogmatist than the clear-headed and dispassionate thinker of feminist self-perception.
After all, does not so much of feminism require the same of others, and most often dismiss their answers as founded in some religious tradition, cultural tradition, or Natural Law theory closely associated with religion, and therefore able to be dismissed without debate or comment?
Considering the capabilities of both men and women across a wide variety of tasks/interests, I see no reason that even traditionally genderised crafts/trades/professions shouldn’t be constituted at least 40/60 by the non-traditional gender (at all levels of the hierarchy in those crafts/trades/professions). Once we actually reach that level then we can examine further aspects of hypothetical total gender parity, eh?
No person has the right to demand the use of another person’s body.
[Moderator note: I've copied Alec's comment over to the thread "What do Feminists want?" because this debate is off-topic for this thread]
i know you said to not self-promote, but i wrote this one post and i’d really, really like to see the topic in general covered more… i have checked other posts and i haven’t seen this anywhere, or seen a thread i could put this into seamlessly…
i made an FAQ of the Mary Koss rape survey, because a lot of trolls hear the ‘1 in 8′ statistic and go ‘NOOOOO!!! THAT’S WRONG!!!11111′ and they have no way to back that up. but they don’t listen to you and they refuse to go to a library and request the article and claim that YOU can’t back it up. so i made a breakdown of the article so that the concepts are more clear. it covers the methodology and the percentages and other things.
here’s the post: The Mary Koss Survey — I Read It So You Don’t Have To!
Thanks for soliciting suggestions. What a great resource you’re building!
I don’t see tags for “lesbian” or “sexual orientation”. It’d be nice to have some FAQs about lesbianism and how it relates to feminism.
There are the straw questions, “Don’t all feminists hate men?” or “Aren’t all feminists lesbians?” But there are also questions like, “Why is the word “dyke” used by some men to insult women? Why does that insult work?”
Lorelei, that’s a great summary/FAQ of the survey. It’s worth adding to comments in the What’s wrong with suggesting women take precautions to prevent being raped? FAQ as a tangent to the current thread, particularly as it is tangentially relevant to SarahMC’s comment replying to Chuck pointing out that rape is rarely stranger rape: most of these women students knew their attackers after all.
AstroDyke, what a great idea. I have a very brief mention of lesbian feminism in the Feminisms FAQ, and will have to create a ‘Sexual Orientation’ tag under the broad Sexuality/Health category. Not having a specific FAQ is a definite lack. Got any favourite posts on the issues to recommend?
Got any favourite posts on the issues to recommend?
I will stoke my thinking-engine.
How about a heading along the lines of “But everyone knows feminism is dead”? I swear I’ve read the FID catch phrase three or four times just in the past week, but a post with some estimates of the sheer number of websites, organizations, events, authors and blogs should whack it on the head pretty effectively.
What Orlando says. I often hear something along the lines of ‘But feminism’s all over: we’re all equal now and the work’s been done’. I’ve heard this quite a bit from my younger students or just from people not necessarily hostile to feminism, just not aware of ongoing struggles. Would be nice to direct them to a post about why it’s not ‘all over’.
Thank you tigtog and tekanji, for this wonderful resource.
Some of that sort of material is covered in the “Does Feminism Matter?” FAQ, but it’s not laid out in a way that specifically addressess the FID catchphrase.
Yep, should probably work something up. If you know any good links rebutting the FID card, please add them in comments for that FAQ.
How about a bit on the invalid quality of “reverse sexism.”
Perhaps as defined in the Livejournal Feminist community guidlines:
http://community.livejournal.com/feminist/profile
rowmy