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MORE T!

I'm asserting no such thing. I recognize there is pressure on men to conform to a narrow definition of "masculinity", but I stand by my claim that that is largely perpetuated by other men.

And when I said "the rest of the universe of possibilities is masculine", I meant expressly non-feminine behavior. Swishing your hips dramatically while you walk is a specifically feminine trait. The guy wasn't being berated by Mr. T just for walking. He was walking a certain way -- an expressly feminine way. And I was complaining because I *don't* agree that men shouldn't act "feminine" -- they ought to have any kind of mannerism that comes naturally to them, or that they prefer, as far as I'm concerned.

What I meant by the "universe of possibilities" comment is that areas of "expertise" -- any area of expertise -- are always purported to be the domain of men, and that is what I disagree with. I think a lot of competitive areas are dominated by men not because they are any better at what they do than women who are skilled in a field, but because the men are more aggressive and more ready to psych out the competition, and men -- who were the sole gender allowed to participate in many arenas until relatively recently, such as academia, and consequently have an ongoing tradition of conspicuous advantage -- are always looking out for other men.

I've seen this firsthand. I myself had at least one professor who comes to mind (and I'm sure there are more but I really don't feel like rehashing every instance of favoritism) who always conspicuously favored the male students over the female ones, even when (or especially when) there was only a lone female (myself) (or someone other than me whom I knew well) in the class.

It's not just personal anecdotal evidence...people are biased against the competency of women. People love to doubt the competency of women. It's a totally bigoted mentality. Like Kerry Howley has suggested, if you are a woman, you can be competent or likeable, but not both* -- because competency (which spans the entire universe of possibilities that a human is capable of achieving) is mysteriously and inexplicably defined as a "male" quality...which frankly blows my mind. Because I've seen some hella incompetent, stupid men.

*according to stupid people.

Well, that does have a lot to do with gender roles. Women weren't even allowed to learn back in Ancient Greece...that was specifically the realm of men. Even in later times, women were browbeaten into doing housework instead of participating in intellectual forums and academia. Even now women in some cultures are discouraged from intellectual pursuits and encouraged to learn more "practical" (read mindless and unskilled) skills like housekeeping, crafts, and other "hobbies". I really believe, personally speaking, that a lot of it has to do with constant belittlement and relegation to the tasks that no sane person would do in lieu of doing something more thoughtful and creative. My 2 cents.

What?!? Bigotry??? What bigotry? I hate to break this to you, but discussing gay men in terms of femininity isn't the most outrageous notion in terms of psychology or of homosexual relationship roles.

Again: What?!?! I happen to *like* Ayn Rand, so you can stop lumping me in with my "gender" collective, Mr. Free-Thinking Objectivist.

Well, I'm glad you cleared all that up with impartial objectivity and an appeal to so-called common sense. EDIT: talk about bigotry and bias!

You really are too much.

I wouldn't include Rand in the pantheon of great philosophers, and I seriously doubt that's either because of my uber-chauvinism or my honorary membership in the right-on sisterhood. I remember groaning while reading some epistemological musings of hers, I've long since forgotten what it was, and I was a Rand fan at the time or at least wanted to be. I don't think academic philosophers have treated her unfairly. Then again, philosophy is (unfortunately) very trendy. Take Nietzsche, for example, whom no self-respecting (and career concerned) philosopher at the schools I attended took seriously in my day. Now he's all the fashion. Perhaps Rand's day in the academic sunshine, such as it is, has simply yet to come.

In any case, whatever reluctance there has been historically to credit women of genius, and I don't deny there has been quite a bit, the fact is that philosophy has as often been a mere advocation for many of its greatest contributors. There really aren't any "barriers to entry" beyond literacy and access to what others have written. And Rand certainly proves at least that.

Yes, he was more right than you were. You were contorting yourself to make a point that was self-serving.

No, they don't. Stereotypical portrayals of gay men might have something in common with some "more feminine" females, but there are regular ol' beer drinkin' gays out there who don't act like women. The fact that you read into the commercial that it was a biased send-up of "gay/feminine traits" was, again, self-serving to your agenda to portray women as perpetual victims.

FWIW, I'd be glad to "just ignore you" because I think that you have a lot of bias when it comes to gender topics, but your ignorance can't go unchallenged.

Um. If you say so. I initially was only discussing the tragedy of people who choose to conform to rigid gender roles who also want to impose those rigid gender roles on others, but if you want to contort that into me being a self-serving contortionist, knock yourself out. I still don't see how anything I said was so incredibly disagreeable to you, except that I'd wonder if it's not merely because it's coming from me. And you seem to think I'm part of the scary FeministSistahood, and I must admit I find your paranoia hilarious.

Er, yeah, I'm already well aware of that. That's why I said "many" and not "all" or even "most".

Um, no...I was talking about the specific guy in the commercial, who was walking effeminately.

Zing! Whatever, AR. By the way, you and Eric should totally join the MRAs. You really have a lot in common with them, and they're a fine group of people who definitely don't have a persecution complex of any kind.

*snicker*

If you two don't watch yourselves, Stevo is going to barge in here and hug you both! Just sayin'...

deep breaths, everyone.

dan savage, among others, has made a fairly convincing case that homophobia grows out of misogyny, because by rejecting heterosexual roles/ideals/behaviors and whatnot, they are automatically shunted into the feminine category, or an "other" category that is feminized because gender is seen as being very binary by the culture at large. i think their point is strongest when you listen to the "damn fags" type talk of people who are genuinely freaked out by homosexual men; there is often a pointed obsession with penetrative sex, for example, even when attempting a show of tolerance - i.e. "i don't care if you take it in the ass, i just don't want to hear about it." penetration being, at least sexually, a male role.

on the other track, i don't think anyone here is "oppressing" men or into it or whatever. i don't even think the most radical of feminists who is hardcore on the "all men are rapists to one degree or another" (they exist as a very tiny minority) can even begin to oppress men in a general fashion. they simply do not have that power. maybe that's a fear some people have, or perhaps merely a kind of incoherent rage. the lure of victimhood is strong, as you see in any hit and run thread about colleges, the academy, or even book reading at this point.

or perhaps more baldly, does it really get much better than being a white man in america, as a general population pool? i can see worrying about the irs and their guns, or the government and their, well, guns. but radical feminists are about as influential as radical libertarians - that is to say, not very influential at all beyond certain small pockets.

as to eric's earlier point about fighting against the, uh, what we'd call the "hurr hurr hurr a girl hurr hurr" tendency, both in real life and especially in the semi-real space of the internet, it is an uphill climb. if i knew more about the whole 70s "male movement" thing, i'd be able to make the proper jokes, but speaking to the context of heterosexual males, at the very least it's certainly worth examining within ourselves, because it deeply affects how we treat 1/2 of the population. this behavior is most probably rooted in natural desires - to a huge degree - but i also think objectification is a kind of socially-communicated disorder as well. when we see it displayed in racism - mistaking the traits of a human for the traits of an often-imagined class - it seems very clear. it becomes less clear in a kerry howley post, but the thing that throws it over the edge for me is that the constant comments on the appearance/attraction to a particular woman is a denial of her humanity and does indeed treat her like an object. she is a thing for someone's sensory pleasure, not a human being that probably doesn't care that much what anonymous people think of her appearance.

as a personal anecdote, the last time i interjected myself into a public space dispute of the hurr hurr hurr a girl variety - asking a guy what he got out of conveying his attraction to random women on the street, the very first question i was asked was "are you a fuckin' homo or something?"

edit: i do think this is what some people are pushing at when they talk about men speaking out against rape and sexual harassment, etc, though i think they do a tremendously shitty job of communicating this, generally speaking.

I agree with Smacky's basic sentiment here on the Mr. T. commercial. That's my annoyance with it, to.

(I do disagree in detail for the simple reason that we don't know whether the character of the speedwalker is gay, straight, or bi. Many people do assume he's gay, but that's unfortunately of a kind to the homophobic sentiment actually being expressed. The guy doesn't do anything else stereotypically or logically gay, so it's reaching to suggest his choice of exercise hints at his sex life. It looks a lot more like Mr. T's chastising an assumed-to-be-straight man for doing something "unmanly" - in other words, "faggy" - rather than Mr. T harassing someone because he actually thinks the man is gay. It's the same sort of phenomenon that causes boys and men to throw most homophobic insults at other boys and men they don't even slightly suspect as gay.)

Nope, and as I think y'all are talking somewhat distinct issues from what I was with smacky, I'm not really relevant, beyond my brief comment above.

well, i remember a conversation with a friend who was grappling with his emergent catholicism; the topic of gay marriage came up, which set him off to no end. his question was "why do gays have to deal in identity politics so much" among other topics. i pointed out that when the government, state or federal, sets out to criminalize an entire class of people based on behavior (i.e. anti-sodomy laws) it's fairly difficult to not begin to think of oneself as part of a larger class of people. and indeed, the law creates cultural subsets - in this case, an entire criminal class - as social pressures do, if with more force and decisiveness.

is the law experienced singularly? sure. but it can also be experienced by a whole group of otherwise disparate people, as the pink triangle symbol indicates.

obviously the category of "white male" doesn't include all males, all "whites" and definitely doesn't deal with the issues of mixed-race people, recent eastern european immigrants, etc. on the other hand, i think the generalization is hard to ignore when one looks at income breakdowns, arrest rates, and the like. there is a benefit to being white in america that is expressed through a variety of data points, some of which are the result of cultural and legal legacies.

i don't think it's the crux of all things, but it certainly is something a lot of libertarians avoid engaging, particularly the older school, perhaps because of the culture war implications. i think this is also part of some of the general hostility to anything that smacks of the left, which obviously includes feminism, particularly the cartoonish varieties that generate the most heat and least light.

one of the few exceptions is the war on drugs, though that sometimes comes across as an afterthought.

I'm willing to cop to the fact that I'm a little sensitive to the minimization of male issues...I don't think I'm oversensitive about feminism if it's just as forthrightly arguing to end the injustices that are, in fact, perpetuated against males.

I know that, on these issues, I'm usually "the lone voice", but I see a lot of injustice in say, the fact that women have 100% of the say of what happens to their pregnancies but only 50% of the fiscal responsibility of that outcome. Prison rape is a joke in this country, primarily because it happens to males. The favorable custodial decision rate for females is atrocious. Or perhaps the sperm donor who was forced to pay child support?

I'm not going to jump up on some Robespierre-like horse and proclaim that people who disagree with me are either not libertarians or are the Enemies of Man (as smacky is wont to do in the other direction), but I find the lack of empathy on these issues maddening. It's almost as if society thinks that declaring men shouldn't be mistreated or maligned is, in and of itself, a whining "non-male" activity.

Oh, Eric, I'm just...I'm...I don't know what to say...thank you?

Really, I'm absolutely crushed. :)

Says a lot about the person who delights in making unsubstantiated smears.

HURRAY! I've been cited in a scholarly publication!

Er, yeah, JsubD...last time I checked, in general women aren't the ones who are always agitating for war and chomping at the bit to shoot things and blow other people up. And nobody's "forcing" anyone to go to jail for crimes they didn't choose to commit, nonviolent crimes notwithstanding. And life expectancy is also influenced by men's own personal choices, like diet and lifestyle. So yeah. I will agree that more men like the ones posting on the Russian sexual harassment thread ought to kill themselves.

Peace out, y'all.

What happened to you in your past that makes you de facto think that the Y Chromosome is a scourge on the human race? Men are piggy war advocates now? Did I miss out on Madeline Albright? Janet Reno? Hillary Clinton?

Just go, smacky. you're really not well.

No, you moron. JsubD brought up all of these problems that men suffer that are self-imposed and was trying to contrast and/or equate that with the problems that women are suffering that are imposed on them by other people, usually men. War, early death, and incarceration have nothing to do, and do not serve as excuses for the harassment and imposition that is forced on women by men, which is what the current discussion was addressing. So, JsubD, take your snark and fuck off.

Actually, I'm quite well. You're the one with a serious persecution complex, talking about oppressed men. Goodbye and good riddance.

Because no one asked, my $.02

The most profound level of human interaction is who can hurt whom. When push comes to shove (esp literally), nothing else matters. The history of western culture's treatment of gender can in my view be distilled down to the observations that women were for greatest part of history utterly dependent on men for physical protection and that women bear children. Women could not, arguably up to the present, stand up for themselves and assert identities that had to be taken seriously by men.

As libertarian minded folk, we are inclined to think in terms of mutually beneficial contracts and free exchange and so forth - sometimes forgetting the cold fact that no woman can negotiate with a man on equal footing if the man turns out to be crazy enough. Police and laws mitigate this problem, and we are consequently in a much better place than we ever have been, but mitigation is not the same as elimination. I would suggest that the stamping out of dismissive attitudes toward women won't occur until at a fundamental level the average man is afraid that the average woman can physically hurt him. It is from that level of monkey-brain that things can be set aright.

That said, modern institutions are pretty good at helping us move past this to the extent we can. People generally fear incarceration. I don't think I've heard a credible argument so far that suggests to me a general, institutional oppression of women in this culture of ours. There is dismissiveness in places and there are more boys clubs running things, but neither of these are monolithic features of the landscape. Women make different choices that account for a great deal of the payroll disparity. Those who don't make those choices are paid plenty well in my experience.

The rest of this stuff, people being rude on teh internets, dismissing your arguments, that sort of thing? It may be the priviliged male in me, but I can't see this as some sort of lens through which one should view the world. It seems too petty and irrelevant.

http://www.reason.com/blog/show/127899.html

first comment:

sigh.

you have to ask though: what's the purpose in the term "lipstick libertarian" anyway? We all know what sexuality it invokes...

I'm just curious as to the motivation of the use of the term.

Well, things can get a little heated between "lovers", right Aresen? :-D

Maybe it's an age thing, but I long ago ceased to be bothered by the "roles" that people attempted to box me in or whether I conformed to them or not.

I remember once going into a grocery store in my riding clothes - tight breeks and knee-high leather boots and overhearing two kids sniggering about the "faggy" outfit I was wearing. My only reaction was amusement at the thought of either of them trying to control a highly trained, powerful and spirited horse.

OTOH, when I do fall into a stereotype - staring lustfully at a shapely woman passing by, for example - I refuse to get my nickers in a knot because someone thinks I am 'sexist.'

I do get exasperated at women who fall into the "passive, timid, dumb" stereotype, but that is because I have known so many highly intelligent and assertive women.

the only expectation i have for h+r is to avoid the whole "so what? black people *are* fast!" at least until the next YOU RUINED THE ELECTION FOR DR PAUL thing pops up.

the usage is clearly a pun, as well as a reference to this less than flattering article.

if the phrase hadn't been used, would the comments be any different?

as a weird aside i was searching for some psa's for a project (long story short nyc elder services hasn't updated their materials in decades, and don't like answering the phone either) and i found a very long powerpoint presentation on female homicide victims in nyc. that's not weird, but the presentation was called "femicides in nyc, 1995-2004" and i don't think i'd ever seen the term "femicide" before, at least outside of a very specific context. (i.e. targeted killings of lesbians in south america)