A note to men on the internet.
Feb. 3rd, 2010 10:06 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexandraerinDear men,
Like you, I didn't have to deal with the same expectations, programming, pressure, and other suchlike baggage that cisgendered women deal with. This isn't to say that I got none of it, just that the circumstances of my birth and upbringing mean that I necessarily received less of it. We're all exposed to the same social forces, but they don't touch us all equally or push us in equal directions.
If you think of yourself as a liberal dude, as a modern man, as a feminist ally, as pro-woman, and you disapprove of the beauty standards pushed on women by mainstream society and reinforced by the media, by peer pressure, by the expectations of the workplace, and so on, this is a good thing, as far as it goes. But "as far as it goes" should not extend so far as disparaging random women you see who for whatever reasons have "given in" to those standards... and those reasons aren't likely to be apparent to you in the time it takes you to glance at them and judge them.
When you say things like "women who wear makeup are obviously masking low self-esteem" or "When I see women dressed like that, I assume they're vacuous and vapid" or otherwise make it clear that you feel comfortable dismissing the worth or intellect of a woman based on how much time and effort you perceive that she spends on keeping her appearance in line with the mainstream beauty standard, you are not being an ally of women. You might think you're sending the message that women should be free from the shackles of the media-driven beauty industry, but you're only one voice in a very complicated song, and the real message you're sending is that no matter what a woman does for herself, it is wrong and she will be judged for it.
The most radical feminist in the world who still lives and works interacting with society has to pick her battles in order to get anywhere in life. The most fiercely independent women still internalize aspects of patriarchy. You, cool dude who does what he wants and doesn't give a damn what society says, still conform to more superficial standards than you'd probably care to realize... you just don't have to worry about well-meaning "allies of men" coming along and judging you for them.
You can't know what any given woman would be risking or giving up if she decided to reject the mainstream standard in favor of conforming to yours. You don't know why she's doing it in the first place. Possibly you mean well, maybe you think you're doing her a favor, but what you're really saying is "If you're not brave enough and strong enough to take the scorn of the rest of society and all that comes with it, you can have some from someone who claims to respect you instead."
Sincerely,
Alexandra Erin.
ETA:
Dear commenters,
Two conversations that will not be happening in the comments on this post are "But what about the men? They have problems, too!" and "Let's all list and compare our personal physical preferences!" Yes, even if the original post seems like a natural lead-on to discussion of preferences... I don't have a big "on-topic" rule with my blog discussions and I'm generally a fan of organic topic sprawl, but... no. This is not the time or the place. I'm not judging anybody for having physical preferences. I'm not claiming I don't. But... no. Just no.
I have deleted a couple of comments that edged into these two areas, but I did so without prejudice, as it were. I made no note of the names that were on them and in fact I have already forgotten them. If your comment was deleted and you worry that I'm judging you harshly, don't... I'm not judging you at all. The only way this can lead to me having a negative opinion of anybody is if they insist on bringing it up.
Now, if you're a man (or even if you're not) and you're reading the original letter and you feel that in your opinion you don't behave in the manner that it's addressing, please relax... you don't have to defend yourself because I'm not talking about you.
On the other hand, if you feel like you've expressed something to or in the company of women in all innocence and without judgment and were unfairly attacked by someone wielding sentiments like the ones that inspired the post above... well, without having been there to hear it, I can't really agree or disagree with how you choose to characterize your actions.
But even if you were just "expressing a preference", it's perfectly possible for a woman to be legitimately sick of hearing men who feel the need to tell them their "preferences" because, again, no matter what message you mean to be personally sending, society is sending other messages much more strongly, and this can make a "statement of preference" from a man to a woman feel like pointed advice or criticism aimed at her, even when it's meant to be an idle observation.
To employ a metaphor: maybe you're not spitting in anybody's face on purpose, but if you don't check which way the wind is blowing before you hock up a big one you might end up getting an earful (or worse) from the person you hit.
Or to put it another way: the force you put behind your words isn't the only force that can drive them into somebody.
There's a larger context at work any time people interact with each other, especially when it's people who are classed in ways that society treats very differently.
We might not like this fact. We probably don't, for most values of "we". We might want to say "Can't we forget all this divisive crap and just be people?" But it's not something that goes away because one person wants to opt out of it.
Yeah, it can ruin your whole day to get accused of something unfairly in the casual conversational sense, but in terms of actual problems afflicting society, "I'm a member of a privileged class and I got verbal backlash I didn't personally deserve from someone who's frustrated with dealing with other members of my privileged class." can't rank very highly.
Sincerely,
Alexandra Erin.
Like you, I didn't have to deal with the same expectations, programming, pressure, and other suchlike baggage that cisgendered women deal with. This isn't to say that I got none of it, just that the circumstances of my birth and upbringing mean that I necessarily received less of it. We're all exposed to the same social forces, but they don't touch us all equally or push us in equal directions.
If you think of yourself as a liberal dude, as a modern man, as a feminist ally, as pro-woman, and you disapprove of the beauty standards pushed on women by mainstream society and reinforced by the media, by peer pressure, by the expectations of the workplace, and so on, this is a good thing, as far as it goes. But "as far as it goes" should not extend so far as disparaging random women you see who for whatever reasons have "given in" to those standards... and those reasons aren't likely to be apparent to you in the time it takes you to glance at them and judge them.
When you say things like "women who wear makeup are obviously masking low self-esteem" or "When I see women dressed like that, I assume they're vacuous and vapid" or otherwise make it clear that you feel comfortable dismissing the worth or intellect of a woman based on how much time and effort you perceive that she spends on keeping her appearance in line with the mainstream beauty standard, you are not being an ally of women. You might think you're sending the message that women should be free from the shackles of the media-driven beauty industry, but you're only one voice in a very complicated song, and the real message you're sending is that no matter what a woman does for herself, it is wrong and she will be judged for it.
The most radical feminist in the world who still lives and works interacting with society has to pick her battles in order to get anywhere in life. The most fiercely independent women still internalize aspects of patriarchy. You, cool dude who does what he wants and doesn't give a damn what society says, still conform to more superficial standards than you'd probably care to realize... you just don't have to worry about well-meaning "allies of men" coming along and judging you for them.
You can't know what any given woman would be risking or giving up if she decided to reject the mainstream standard in favor of conforming to yours. You don't know why she's doing it in the first place. Possibly you mean well, maybe you think you're doing her a favor, but what you're really saying is "If you're not brave enough and strong enough to take the scorn of the rest of society and all that comes with it, you can have some from someone who claims to respect you instead."
Sincerely,
Alexandra Erin.
ETA:
Dear commenters,
Two conversations that will not be happening in the comments on this post are "But what about the men? They have problems, too!" and "Let's all list and compare our personal physical preferences!" Yes, even if the original post seems like a natural lead-on to discussion of preferences... I don't have a big "on-topic" rule with my blog discussions and I'm generally a fan of organic topic sprawl, but... no. This is not the time or the place. I'm not judging anybody for having physical preferences. I'm not claiming I don't. But... no. Just no.
I have deleted a couple of comments that edged into these two areas, but I did so without prejudice, as it were. I made no note of the names that were on them and in fact I have already forgotten them. If your comment was deleted and you worry that I'm judging you harshly, don't... I'm not judging you at all. The only way this can lead to me having a negative opinion of anybody is if they insist on bringing it up.
Now, if you're a man (or even if you're not) and you're reading the original letter and you feel that in your opinion you don't behave in the manner that it's addressing, please relax... you don't have to defend yourself because I'm not talking about you.
On the other hand, if you feel like you've expressed something to or in the company of women in all innocence and without judgment and were unfairly attacked by someone wielding sentiments like the ones that inspired the post above... well, without having been there to hear it, I can't really agree or disagree with how you choose to characterize your actions.
But even if you were just "expressing a preference", it's perfectly possible for a woman to be legitimately sick of hearing men who feel the need to tell them their "preferences" because, again, no matter what message you mean to be personally sending, society is sending other messages much more strongly, and this can make a "statement of preference" from a man to a woman feel like pointed advice or criticism aimed at her, even when it's meant to be an idle observation.
To employ a metaphor: maybe you're not spitting in anybody's face on purpose, but if you don't check which way the wind is blowing before you hock up a big one you might end up getting an earful (or worse) from the person you hit.
Or to put it another way: the force you put behind your words isn't the only force that can drive them into somebody.
There's a larger context at work any time people interact with each other, especially when it's people who are classed in ways that society treats very differently.
We might not like this fact. We probably don't, for most values of "we". We might want to say "Can't we forget all this divisive crap and just be people?" But it's not something that goes away because one person wants to opt out of it.
Yeah, it can ruin your whole day to get accused of something unfairly in the casual conversational sense, but in terms of actual problems afflicting society, "I'm a member of a privileged class and I got verbal backlash I didn't personally deserve from someone who's frustrated with dealing with other members of my privileged class." can't rank very highly.
Sincerely,
Alexandra Erin.
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no subject
on 2010-02-03 05:19 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2010-02-03 05:52 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2010-02-03 05:53 pm (UTC)