RE: I am a feminist. (Full Version)

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Alumbrado -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/5/2008 11:26:54 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Smith117
You're funny. Too bad you don't notice that the condescending posts only started about two posts ago. There were many before that, which I already addressed to the other girl. I guess, like her, you just see what you want and leave the rest by the wayside huh?



Project much? 



Aswad -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 2:29:40 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: ShaktiSama

The study of language acquisition in children reveals that the "primary" role which Western culture assumes for the maternal figure is largely a myth.  There are many societies in which, for example, maternal language games are non-existent or very different than those we practice in the West--children in those societies learn to speak at roughly the same rate and with roughly the same patterns of development as Western children. Language acquisition is independent of specific maternal input:  children acquire language as a hard-wired human trait.  It's just a basic element of being Homo sapiens


They still don't learn to speak English. [;)]

I'm not disputing the point, and would agree with Pinker on the point of language being the defining instinct of the human species. But I would point out that children seem able to distinguish between games aand reality, and it seems credible that this will also extend to such things as cculture acquisition.

quote:

I suspect that cultural acquisition is a similar holistic process.


I would go one step further, and say that it is the same process.

One part of the brain learns passive items, while another learns active items (i.e. patterns and transforms). That would account for the usually poor distinction between the individual elements of the semantic fields of words, as well as the similar distinction between the denotative and connotative aspects of a word. Language is closely tied to culture and morality, and the tie seems bidirectional. Few people, apart from aspies and such, use language in a primarily denotative and orthogonal fashion.

quote:

Regardless of any individual mother's intent, her child will acquire culture at the prescribed human rate.


Given exposure, yes. And exposure does not need to imply the parents, so it depends on the rearing model used. For instance, a recent study showed that lesbian couples are better at providing good male role models for their children than heterosexual couples are, and they accomplish this by ensuring the child spends time around suitable men. Endogamous groups and extended families do well in this regard, I suspect. But a society with limited exposure outside the home would presumably be more problematic.

quote:

Cultural acquisition is something that all humans (and even all other great apes) do.


Quite so, although aspies and the like provide something of a counterexample. It's not just body language that doesn't stick.

quote:

Overall, I'd say the one element of maternal care which is not replaceable is in the creation of an emotionally sound human being--i.e., the mother's input of physical contact, emotional empathy, attention and concern in the first 24 months of life.


That one depends on continuity, not a specific individual, it would seem. Deprivation of contact for a certain amount of time will cause part of the bond to be lost, but that period can be extended by in a more tightly bound family unit.

quote:

They see no contradiction whatsoever between their matriarchal values and the writings of the Prophet!


Just out of curiosity, I'd like to know what society this is; it's an interesting counterexample for some debates.

quote:

My impression of the Gorean lifestyle has been based upon my independent assessment of the literature, which I read on my own--I feel any book deserves an independent reading, including the Bible.  And of course, there was my personal impression of the man who wrote it.


Ah. Well. Yes, that will give a certain impression. I use the word in a less lexicographic manner. [:D]

quote:

I am sorry. There is no offense intended in re-stating this experience, I'm just explaining why I've always stayed away from Gor, as a lifestyle and a comunity.


None taken. Mine was similar. Encountering people who were more concerned with the interesting juxtaposition of cultural and philosophical elements underneath the abrasive satire gave a rather different impression. Again, I didn't arrive at it through the books.

quote:

This being said, one of the most sadistic and controlling dominant women I ever met was a "graduate" of sorts from the Gorean subculture. I'm sure there is much more to it than outsiders know.


If that's the one I think, then that may have had more to do with torturing animals while growing up, so I'd hope she's not used as an example. [:D]

Health,
al-Aswad..



Aswad -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 2:53:06 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: FirmhandKY

Both you and Aswad are firmly on the "nurture" side of the "nature versus nurture" debate?


I don't see that there is a "versus" or a "side."

There are definite differences in the brain structures of men and women, and those are undeniable differencess of nature.
There are definite differences in the cultural influences men and women are exposed do, differences of nurture.
There are some of these that are complementary, and some that are anything but complementary.

In a more ideal society, the norm would be a nurture that starts out in line with the best guess at nature and converges on that individual's developing nature, such that generalizations are only used to provide a "best guess" starting point, but with everything moving toward a nurture that is individual and adapted to the specific nature of the person in question as their individuality grows apparent. Add the bit about treating people according to who they are, rather than what boxes they are perceived to fit in, and you're gettting somewhere. Over time, that strategy will reveal whether sexual dimorphisms in brain structure are the result of differences in rearing, or intrinsic, and things will converge on what nature "intended" for us, whatever that is (your guess is as good as mine).

quote:

To me, it appears to be illogical to claim that human's are born "blank slates" and then attempt to make the argument that certain functions and intellectual areas (such as language) are "hard-wired".


Blank slates in the sense that they are not fully developed, and are not born with ideas, but instincts.

Differences are present, but they gain full expresssion through nurture. A man can be born with a sadistic streak, but nurture will have a huge impact on deciding whether that results in becoming a sociopath or a BDSM sadist, for instance. Similarly, high testosterone will tend to tell you to get laid. Rearing will tell you that this requires a willing partner. Or that it doesn't. Depending on how you are raised to express this. You can, of course, go your own way in life, but that is exceedingly rare for people to do to any great extent.

Health,
al-Aswad.



Aswad -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 3:18:56 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: kitttty

Honestly, this is the dumbest thing that has been said in this debate.


Casting the first stone may not be the advisable course of action, given this next statement:

quote:

This is exactly why the Middle East can't grasp democracy. Because they think that it means majority rule.


It does. Here's one of the definitions from Princeton Wordnet:

«majority rule- the doctrine that the numerical majority of an organized group can make decisions binding on the whole group»

quote:

The holocaust happened because no one stripped the majority of the right to choose in favor of the minority.


The holocaust was democratically enacted via the election of the DNVP and later the Enabling Act and so forth.

quote:

Slavery existed for the same reason.


Slavery existed for the reason that some people wanted slaves and imposed their will on others by raiding for them, or that some people wanted slaves and bought them from those who wanted profits and in turn imposed their will on others by capturing and selling them in the first place.

quote:

Do you want the vanilla majority to persecute kink? They do not have the right.


Do I want it? No.

Do they have the right? Yes.

Will I fight if they use it on me? Hell, yes.

quote:

What the hell is wrong with you to say that those people with the same thinking as people here have, should be oppressed simply because they happen to live in areas where others want to persecute them for thinking differently. It just so happens that the principle of live and let live could exist in the rest of the world too.


Live and let live is not what you expressed when you said you'd send their men to concentration camps, rather than evacuating the women.

Up here in Norway, a motion was forwarded by my favorite party to legalize poly marriages. That motion is not likely to pass, as the bulk of the people will not see that the intention is to let people have whatever relationships they want, because they can't conceive of it, due to lack of exposure. Most will see it as a way to justify mistreating women (never mind that it's poly, period, not polygamy). Should I force this motion upon the majority who oppose it, just because I think it's a damned good idea?

How would that not be a case of me (a minority) oppressing them (the majority)?

Democracy is two wolves and a sheep, voting on what's for dinner.

Fortunately for us, wolves in the West are mostly vegetarians.

quote:

WTF. So the west can't impose our will on nations in order to make them recognize that gay people and sexually active women have a right to life because that is oppression. Yet, mullahs and clerics can sentence them to death with the auspices of the majority and that is not oppression?


I'm saying that both are oppression, and that oppressing a large group to stop them from oppressing a smaller group is hypocritical.

I'm not saying you can't go out and be the oppressor yourself ...
... I'm just saying get down from the high horse and call a spade a spade.

Health,,
al-Aswad.



Aswad -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 3:28:06 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: LadyHibiscus

Equality of pay, parity of benefits, does not mean that we are all the SAME, it means that we are all on a level playing field.


I will add my standing ovation to this.

Health,
al-Aswad.



Aswad -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 4:00:09 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: kitttty

They will get offended if the men talk about her as though she is a peice of meat with wet holes.


Commonly, yes. Just as some men will be offended when women talk about a man having a nice tush or whatever. It's not exactly in good taste, coming from either gender, but it doesn't seem sensible to kick someone out of the workplace for being crude. There's a major difference between denoting that such is his interest in her (crude) and claiming that such are her only qualities (defamatory) or the only qualities women in general possess (sexist). I've had women tell me plainly that they want me for the sex, but that regardless of how it turns out, they're not looking for anything else. My love of 10 years told me she wanted a companion, and was asexual. Recent articles in women's magazines around here have denoted that the sex is much better with an ex-boyfriend, because there is no pressure to worry about anything other than the physical enjoyment of fucking someone who already knows your buttons. What people seek in a given coupling will depend on the people involved and can range from a one-night stand to a lifetime of asketic transcendance.

For that matter, if women are to dictate that men speak in a certain manner, why not dictate that women speak so men can understand them? [;)]

quote:

Women get offended when men talk about other women as things they fucked- not as people with feelings and personalities but just some hot girl they got the panties to drop on.


Not if they're into objectification kink and think it's totally hot. [:D]

quote:

It is about not accepting behavior that implies women are sex objects.


Sex often means different things to men and women, and that whole madonna/whore complex affects a lot of men.
Consequently, there's a certain tendency to deal with those aspects of a woman as seperate people.
This gets reinforced when one can't talk about sex around women outside the bedroom.

quote:

Men's 'sensibilities' have been to view women as sex objects (mainly) as speak of them as such.


Those are not my sensibilities, yet I will discuss their abilities in that department just as I've heard women do a million times when they don't realize there's a "fragile male ego" around to be "damaged" by such talk. Would've been better if men and women didn't live in seperate, secret worlds, thinking and talking about the same things, never with each other, but instead could be equals in the sense of peers who live in the same world and talk to each other, rather than pretending each gender must be shielded from the other.

quote:

They should chance not because I say so but because their view is wrong and detrimental.


Getting them kicked out of the job will cement their views, not change them.

quote:

If its behavior that offends women categorically, it is clearly sexist behavior. You seem to keep denying it, but it is.


Or perhaps it is an expression of sexism that women are offended by a bit of coarse language.

Women often take offense at something men say, without the men ever realizing why, and without the women in question ever explaining to them why they take offense. Those times I have seen women actually explain what offends them, the outcome is usually that it turns out their perception of what was said was entirely different from the intentions of the man in question. Usually, though, they go to HR instead, and the guy gets a warning without any explanation (and thus no way to improve), and the next time Mars and Venus need to speak, Mars loses his job, and starts developing a really nasty opinion of women that could've been avoided by any slight effort on her part to bridge the gap.

It's no secret that men and women sometimes almost speak different languages.

quote:

You are talking about water cooler talk, not the job itself.


As someone who is allergic to water cooler talk, I'll note that in almost all workplaces, water cooler talk is part of the job.

Health,
al-Aswad.



Aswad -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 4:03:41 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: kitttty

You SUCK.
[...]
Your HR people should lecture you a lot more than they do for your attitude.


This is not dialogue.

Health,
al-Aswad.



Aswad -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 4:22:22 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Smith117

I can't make you see the logic, but then that's a problem that's faced men while relating to women throughout time.


No. Please do me a favor, as a man, to not misrepresent my gender.

The problem that has faced men while relating to women throughout time, is communication breakdown.
The problem that has faced people while relating to extremists throughout time, is that extremists do not care to see logic or reason at all.

In this case, it would seem doubly difficult, but taking the high road would've been preferrable, and your generalization simply does not hold, because it ascribes to gender what should be ascribed to extremism. Your problem with her is not that she is a woman. It is that her mind is closed to your words, and that her reading is colored by the gender of the author (another form of sexism that gets little attention around the world). The correct response is to keep it rational in the hopes that she will eventually listen, or to leave her alone to pursue her own perceptions of the world without forcing her to see other points of view. The fact that she strongly opposes giving other women that opportunity needn't prompt you to act the same.

I hope you will find that this logic is impeccable in your frame of reference and act accordingly.

Health,
al-Aswad.

P.S.: To other readers, his is an instance of the sort of misattribution I referred to, and an example of how sample bias can cause it to grow.



OrionTheWolf -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 5:57:33 AM)

~FR~

Reading this thread, someone said that Men should not talk about a Woman as a piece of meat. I find this an odd statement on a BDSM site, where many people want to be treated as a piece of meat. How do you know that the female a Man is talking about, does not find the statements satisfying? Is it the fact of the statements that upset some, or the fact that some people like being a sex toy?



kittinSol -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 7:50:03 AM)

I think it's one thing to fulfill  a woman's fantasies and tell her she's a piece of meat; and it's another to say that all women are pieces of meat.

Not all women in BDSM are into being quarry.



Smith117 -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 8:17:53 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Aswad



[sm=applause.gif][sm=applause.gif][sm=applause.gif][sm=applause.gif][sm=applause.gif][sm=applause.gif][sm=applause.gif][sm=applause.gif][sm=applause.gif][sm=applause.gif]



LadyHibiscus -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 8:33:11 AM)

I put this thread under off topic because it is a NON BDSM issue.  Whether a woman or man wants to be objectified in a scene context should have nothing to do with the rights of people in the workplace. 

Smith, SWEETIE, I never thought anyone could beat Aswad at the condescension game, but you did!  Congratulations may or may not be in order... 

Thanks for much interesting reading.



Owner59 -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 9:02:54 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: kittinSol

I think it's one thing to fulfill  a woman's fantasies and tell her she's a piece of meat; and it's another to say that all women are pieces of meat.

Not all women in BDSM are into being quarry.


True that.

Perhaps only on a bd/sm site will you see men referred to as "pieces of meat"and worse.lol This is a pan-fetish site,with all tastes and POVs.

Being off topic should have clued in the clueless ,that we were talking about real life,the real world,vanilla-ville ,etc. and not the lifestyle.



candigirrl -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 9:08:07 AM)

Hi -   

I am a humanist.

I read that the head of  the N.Y. chapter of  NOW said all women should vote for Sen. Clinton to be the next US president.

I am appalled.   I thought feminism was for equal rights under law.

To vote or deny for any candidate based on gender or race is (to me)  a mistake.
Talk about discrimination, bias - are we gonna have "an old girl's club" NOW? 

I vote for a candidate with a reasonable plan of action thats best for the nation .

I think 'people' always.

PS I got an "A" in womans studies in college. ( can a girl say this modestly?)
I did a paper on the status of women in India. [sm=smile.gif]




kittinSol -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 9:08:12 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Owner59

Being off topic should have clued in the clueless ,that we were talking about real life,the real world,vanilla-ville ,etc. and not the lifestyle.



Yeah well, what can you do? Some carry their burden around with them... always and everywhere.
If a man's a submissive, he's going against nature; if a woman's a submissive, she's fulfilling her biological destiny. WTF?

Rant over.



Smith117 -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 9:20:40 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: LadyHibiscus

I put this thread under off topic because it is a NON BDSM issue.  Whether a woman or man wants to be objectified in a scene context should have nothing to do with the rights of people in the workplace. 

Smith, SWEETIE, I never thought anyone could beat Aswad at the condescension game, but you did!  Congratulations may or may not be in order... 

Thanks for much interesting reading.


Awwww thanks darlin'. I would like to point out, however, that although I did allow myself to be taken 'there,' that wasn't where I began. What does that say about me? Well, I just love a good argument, debate, fight, etc. and am not above hitting below the belt if my opponent does so first.

If someone wants to discuss a certain topic, then let's discuss. If they want to argue, fine. If they think I will take an insult, without at least firing back an equal, opposite insult, they are talking to the wrong guy. Sure, I usually 'take the high road' or at least come back with an insult that's so highbrow the target doesn't know they've been insulted, but occasionally, depending no the mood....sometimes the best and most satisfying comeback is "ppppppffffffttttthhhhhhhhhttttt!!!!!"

But anyway, thanks for the compliment (at least the one intended for the interesting reading anyway). [sm=flowers.gif]



candigirrl -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 9:25:37 AM)

edited due to silliness and respect for OP's topic.

Thanks.



Owner59 -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 9:50:51 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: candigirrl

Hi -   

I am a humanist.

I read that the head of  the N.Y. chapter of  NOW said all women should vote for Sen. Clinton to be the next US president.

I am appalled.   I thought feminism was for equal rights under law.

To vote or deny for any candidate based on gender or race is (to me)  a mistake.
Talk about discrimination, bias - are we gonna have "an old girl's club" NOW? 

I vote for a candidate with a reasonable plan of action thats best for the nation .

I think 'people' always.

PS I got an "A" in womans studies in college. ( can a girl say this modestly?)
I did a paper on the status of women in India. [sm=smile.gif]




Did she say vote for Hillary b/c she`s a woman?

Or because she feels Hillary is better overall and not just on women`s issues?

I think you`re making the same old tired assumptions.



candigirrl -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 10:10:15 AM)

 She directly stated All women must vote for a woman - to be true to the feminist cause



fluffyswitch -> RE: I am a feminist. (2/6/2008 3:02:41 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: candigirrl

She directly stated All women must vote for a woman - to be true to the feminist cause


yes but there are more organizations than just NOW (which people always seem to forget) and even then it wasn't the national president either. feminism has always had more than one interest or 'branch.' we had this conversation as an undergrad in several of my women's studies courses, just because she's a woman doesn't mean that she's a feminist or will help feminist causes.



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