Thursday Short Poem: Lorde’s “Who Said…”

Posted on January 20, 2005 by Hugo Schwyzer

If there’s one famous feminist debate that seems to happen in my classes each semester, it’s the one over the twin oppressions of race and sex in the lives of women of color. Feminist women of color have had disagreements on this issue. The late Shirley Chisholm, the first black congresswoman, often said that her sex was a greater obstacle to her success than her color:

I’ve always met more discrimination being a woman than being black,"
she told The Associated Press in December 1982, shortly before she left
Washington to teach at Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts. "When I
ran for the Congress, when I ran for president, I met more
discrimination as a woman than for being black. Men are men."

Audre Lorde, one of my favorite feminist writers whom I discovered in college, had a more nuanced view. I often think of these lines, which for me capture the complexity of the intersection of race and gender perfectly.

Who Said it Was Simple

There are so many roots to the tree of anger
that sometimes the branches shatter
before they bear.

Sitting in Nedicks
the women rally before they march
discussing the problematic girls
they hire to make them free.
An almost white counterman passes
a waiting brother to serve them first
and the ladies neither notice nor reject
the slighter pleasures of their slavery.
But I who am bound by my mirror
as well as my bed
see causes in color
as well as sex

and sit here wondering
which me will survive
all these liberations.

Some musings on the motherhood dilemma

Posted on January 19, 2005 by Hugo Schwyzer

I have mixed feelings about this past week’s David Brooks op-ed piece in the Times: Empty Nests and Hearts (a tip of the hat to Lynn and Mary for bringing it to my attention for bringing it to my attention). It starts thus:

Over
the past 30 years, the fraction of women over 40 who have no children
has nearly doubled, to about a fifth. According to the Gallup
Organization, 70 percent of these women regret that they have no kids.

It’s possible that some of these women regret not having children in
the way they regret not taking more time off after college. But for
others, this longing for the kids they did not have is a profound,
soul-encompassing sadness.

The first question this raises is an obvious one: assuming the Gallup poll is right, to what do we attribute that regret? Is it because, as traditionalists would have it, these childless women ignored their own natural instinct to bear and raise offspring? Have they missed out on the defining experience of a woman’s life? Or, as progressives might have it, is that regret at least partially socially imposed, the consequence of living in a society that still defines women’s worth in reproductive terms? I’m leaning towards the latter explanation myself.

Anyhow, Brooks manages a nice line here:

Women now have more choices over what kind of lives they want to
lead, but they do not have more choices over how they want to sequence
their lives.

For example, consider a common life sequence for
an educated woman. She grows up and goes to college. Perhaps she goes
to graduate school. Then, during her most fertile years, when she has
the most energy for child-rearing, she gets a job. Then, sometime after
age 30, she marries. Then, in her mid-30′s, when she has acquired the
maturity and character to make intelligent career choices, she takes
time off to raise her kids.

Quite a bit there to unpack. First off, Brooks’ "educated woman" is an economically elitist image indeed! (Mary Garth makes this point as well). My classes are filled with young and not-so-young women pursuing educations, many already with children. Brooks’ woman "gets a job" after college. Heck, I don’t have many students of either sex who don’t already have at least one job, perhaps two. Close to a third of my students work full-time hours. I’m not sure that they would recognize themselves in the Brooks piece.

But I’ll admit he’s dead on about the "sequencing problem". Our contemporary work culture is ill-matched to biology! Many of my female students do long to lead the life of Brooks’ "educated woman", even though they haven’t thought through the problem of timing very well. I often ask my students in my women’s studies classes when they think the "ideal" age to get married is. I note that in the last couple of years, the median age they give as a response seems to have gone up (it’s now about 27, if my unscientific sampling can be trusted). Many do expect to finish college, get a graduate degree, have children in their early 30s, and somehow balance that with a career. While I applaud their ambition, I want them to be clear about two things — the real potential of infertility if they wait "too long", and the reality that contemporary corporate culture is not particularly compatible with their aspirations.

My goal is to make these young women better prepared for blending their future career and reproductive decisions. But I also want to make them mad. I want to turn them into activists who will begin to agitate for changes in workplace culture. A feminist response must be more than merely asking young women to decide early on what they intend to give up in order to try and have both motherhood and career! We’ve got to ask critical questions about corporate culture,and where possible, seek legislative remedies (increased paid maternity leave with job security, etcetera). At the same time, we’ve also got to ask whether we need to do more to dispel the "only a mom" stigma that leaves many women convinced that motherhood is not, in and of itself, a real "career."

And as a man, I’m interested in challenging other men to become part of the solution. Men have been far more willing, on the whole, to invite women into the workplace than to take over the domestic duties that make it feasible for a woman to fulfill her potential. It’s not enough for us to say to our wives and gal friends, "you go, girl!" We have to place our encouragement into tangible action, which may mean cooking and cleaning and shopping and taking care of our children. It may mean rethinking the real meaning of success and career in our lives. I’m happy to say that I do see many men of my generation willing to become visible and committed allies with their partners. But we still need many more men to step up to the plate.

Taking on “His Side with Glenn Sacks”

Posted on January 19, 2005 by Hugo Schwyzer

Well, folks, I’m going to be on Glenn Sacks‘ radio show this Sunday. We’ll be discussing the men’s movement, and I expect things will get a bit fiery. For those who don’t know him, Glenn is a fellow Angeleno, newspaper columnist and talk-show host. Glenn sent me this bit of info:

You can
call the show and join the discussion in progress at 1-800-439-4805 (lines
open this Sunday from 5-6PM PST).

For those who are outside of our radio stations’
coverage ranges, you can listen to the show live this Sunday (1/23/05) via our
station’s excellent Internet stream at Listen Live.

His Side with Glenn Sacks can be heard on
WSNR AM 620 in New York City and North-Eastern New Jersey, and on WWZN AM 1510
in Boston on Sundays at 10 PM EST. The show can also be heard in Southern
California on KTIE AM 590 at 5 PM PST

Glenn is a more moderate figure than some in the Men’s Rights Movement. (To start with, he’s civil, which immediately differentiates him from his hostile and bitter brethren who can be found at places like Manpower). That doesn’t mean he doesn’t take profoundly offensive positions! (A list of his columns may be found here). For example, Glenn supports Choice 4 Men, a movement which seeks to give men the right to evade responsibility for the children they help to conceive:

…when a woman forces a man to be responsible for a child only she wants, and when the state child-support apparatus takes a third or more of his income and jails him if he comes up short, isn’t the government exercising control over his life? The "Choice for Men" movement seeks to give fathers the right to relinquish their parental rights and responsibilities within a month of learning of a pregnancy, just as mothers do when they choose to give their children up for adoption.

We might want to touch on that on Sunday.

What I’m really hoping to discuss with Glenn, however, is the notion of "men as victims." Men’s rights advocates like to emphasize male powerlessness. Whether it be in marriage or custody battles, on campus or in the workplace, men’s rights advocates claim that women have the "real" power. The legal system discriminates against men, and the broader culture humiliates and demeans them.

I’m not denying that many men today feel unhappy and overwhelmed. But they are wrong to blame women and the feminist movement for that discomfort. American men live in a patriarchal system that bestows tremendous, but often invisible, privilege upon them. The fact that men aren’t aware of that privilege doesn’t mean it isn’t there! Men, after all, still control virtually every facet of power in our society. Our political, religious, economic and military leaders are overwhelmingly men.

On Sunday, I’m going to make the case that men’s unhappiness is rooted not in women’s power, but in their own failures to live up to the impossibly high expectations of our culture. One of my favorite pro-feminist writers, Allan Johnson, puts it this way in his superb The Gender Knot:

As with other aspects of patriarchal societies, the price men pay for gender privilege has mnore to do with their relationships with other men and the social institutions that men control than it does with women. It’s easier and safer to project power and responsibility onto women, but, like so many paths of least resistance, it takes us away from the truth.

I’ll have more to blog on this soon. In the meantime, tune in on Sunday and consider calling in.

Feminist mothers

Posted on January 18, 2005 by Hugo Schwyzer

I was happy to be back in my hometown this weekend. One of the things about growing up in a small community of 4700 people is that no matter how long one has been away, one still comes home to familiar (if aging) faces on the street. And every block is filled with memories. I hadn’t been home to Carmel in over a year, and I had missed it very much.

Both Trish and Amanda have posted about feminists raising boys. Since my fiancee and I were visiting my mother this weekend, I’ve got a few reflections of my own on the subject.

I’m happy to say that my brother and I were raised by a feminist mom. My parents divorced in 1973, when I was six and my brother three. I won’t blog much about my family, but I will say that it was an amicable, even cordial separation. I have never heard either of my parents speak ill of the other, and for that blessing, I am immensely grateful! After the divorce, my mother and brother and I moved to Carmel, where I would live until I graduated from high school.

I remember, as a child of six or seven, flipping through my mother’s copies of Ms. Magazine. It (along with the New Republic and the New York Review of Books) was a regular arrival in our household. I don’t remember much about the articles, but i had a general sense of what the magazine was about: women like my mother. I already knew that my mother went by "Ms." after the divorce, because I had seen that title on most of the mail that came to our house. Mom had gently explained what the word meant in terms I could comprehend: a "Ms." was a woman who was not going to have her title defined by whether or not she was married. On some level, I accepted that quite happily. I’m still rather partial to the term "Ms." as a result.

The greatest feminist gift my mother gave her sons was not, however, an appreciation for the National Organization for Women or Ms. Magazine. It was the firm awareness that as males, we ought never expect women to do for us what we could do for ourselves. Women were not there to please us and meet our needs. When I was a small boy, I remember my mother saying to us "I love you both with all my heart. But though you are very important to me, you are not the only thing that matters to me. My life matters too." She said that in a loving way, and because she was so present and involved in every aspect of our growing up, neither my brother nor I ever felt deprived by our mother’s insistence that her happiness was also important.

My mother had many women friends who were active in local politics. In our childhood, Mom was active with the League of Women Voters. On a few occasions, League meetings were held in our house. I remember, as a small boy, doing little tasks like plugging in the coffee maker and arranging cookies on platters for League meetings. But above all, I remember so many wonderful older women who filled our home with talk of politics and laughter, and, in those days, cigarette smoke. I don’t remember most of the issues under discussion, though I do remember hearing quite a bit in the late 1970s about the Equal Rights Amendment. (Thanks to my mother, I was one of those boys who knew that that was what ERA stood for long before I ever heard about baseball’s Earned Run Average!)

I was raised to believe that women were my equals emotionally, intellectually, and even physically. Women were to be respected, but not placed on pedestals. Strong women who spoke their minds were to be admired, and it was little wonder that my first crushes in pre-adolescence were all on the most athletic and (dare I say it) "tomboyish" of girls! I was never afraid of competing with women, or ashamed of being beaten by a woman (something that most of my male friends struggled with). My mother’s example was a tremendous gift.

Of course, my mother’s feminist lessons were about much more than one’s
personal interactions with other women. She instilled in both my
brother and me a commitment to social justice and gender equality that
has stayed with us into our professional lives. I would never have
started teaching women’s history a decade ago if it hadn’t been for my
mother. Mom and I disagree now about quite a few things. She’s most decidedly not a Christian, and my own conversion experience has helped shift some of my beliefs about issues like abortion rights. We still have vigorous debates from time to time, and a few areas where we have simply "agreed to disagree". But when it comes to the basic principle that women deserve full and complete equality with men politically, socially, and economically, we are in total agreement.

Even my parents divorce was both an important feminist lesson and a wonderful, if difficult, opportunity for growth. Divorce is never easy on children, and I won’t pretend that it was. But my parents’ decision to separate sent me a lasting message that I could not take women for granted. Just because you’ve married and had children doesn’t mean you will stay, regardless of external circumstances. When you’re certain that you won’t ever be left, no matter how badly you behave, you have far fewer incentives to exercise self-control than when you know darned well that if you blow it, the other party may well say goodbye. I’d like to think that was a good and important lesson for my brother and me to learn, and that it has helped us enormously in our adult relationships with women to the present day.

Hurrah for the feminist mothers of sons!

Shock and discomfort

Posted on January 14, 2005 by Hugo Schwyzer

I’m going to be gone for the weekend — no posting again until Tuesday. I’m taking my fiancee up to Carmel, my hometown, for the MLK holiday weekend.

A colleague of mine at PCC e-mailed me this story from our local paper yesterday, and it has me a bit stunned:

A former Pasadena community activist has been ordered to return to
California to face a 21-year-old murder charge. John Laurence Whitaker,
57, has been held in an Oregon jail since July. Laguna Beach detectives
had linked his DNA to fingernail scrapings taken from a prostitute
murdered in December 1983, police said.

Whitaker was known as John Whitaker Betances when he was
involved in Pasadena education. He worked for a year with the Pasadena
Unified School District and helped organize Pasadena D.A.D.S., which
stood for Dads Are Doing Something.

He also ran for a seat on the board of Pasadena City College,
claiming to be an Army colonel and a Vietnam veteran. Records show
Whitaker did not serve in the Army.

He had served 10 years in prison for rape before being released in 1994, records show.

Police said that Whitaker is also considered a suspect in a
1975 sexual assault and murder in Santa Monica. Police say DNA evidence
links Whitaker to that crime as well, though he has not been charged.

I knew John very, very, well. About five or six years ago, he started taking my classes. A tall, solid, gregarious black man in his 50s, he sat up front, asked interesting questions, and periodically cracked some terrific jokes. He had a real interest in military history, and though he never boasted about his status as a combat veteran, his references to Vietnam were frequent. He came often to my office hours, where we talked at length about any number of topics in which he had an interest.

Military history is not my specialty. In my ancient history survey course, I tend to rush through the battles to get to the cultural and social history I find more interesting. On one occasion, in my office hours, John took me to task for downplaying the importance of the Thermopylae in the Persian Wars, and took it upon himself to do a considerable amount of research in order to further educate his professor. He did so with humor, not with condescension, and I appreciated it.

In 2001, he ran for a seat on the Pasadena City College board of trustees. He was one of three candidates running in my home district (northwest Pasadena). He sought the endorsement of our local CTA chapter,taking a strong pro-union stance. The union split its endorsement between John and the eventual winner of the race, a professor at East Los Angeles College who was also friendly to the teachers’ asssociation. But I voted for John, and gave him a small amount of money. In defeat, he was his usual jovial self, promising to continue to fight for young people and for the good of the college.

I hadn’t seen John since 2002. But I had often thought of him as the epitome of our returning student success stories. I’ve had many older veterans in my classes, and so many of them bring valuable and interesting insights to the courses. John was among my favorites, and the stunning severity of the charges he faces, as well as his long criminal record, has me floored.

I have never claimed to be a great judge of character. I’m liberal in my politics and I’m equally liberal in my friendships — I tend to be trusting to the point of naivete. In community colleges, we get all kinds of students, and I’ve had them all. I’ve seen cops walk into my classes and arrest a student in front of all of us. I’ve had a woman go into labor in one of my classes. I’ve had a very well-known porn star take a class as she transitioned out of her industry, I’ve had students leave class mid-semester to go on active duty. I’ve had a couple of students killed. But somehow, the story of John Whitaker-Betances has me deeply shaken today. He was my friend — and in some sense, I suppose he still is, and I’m trying very hard to reconcile this delightful man I knew with the appalling crimes I read about in the paper.

I’m praying for the victims of these horrible crimes today. And I’m praying for my friend John.

UPDATE: Some quick research with Google shows that I must have been under a rock to miss all of the coverage of John’s arrest. This story indicates that he has, in fact, confessed to at least one of the murders, which removes my hope from earlier this morning that this was some sort of mistaken identity problem.

I am very sad. But you know what? I’ll still use what he taught me about Thermopylae.

Anniversary, and another chinnie pic

Posted on January 13, 2005 by Hugo Schwyzer

Today is the one-year anniversary of this blog.

This morning, I was reduced to an absolute panic when it appeared that we had lost Matilde. Somehow, she escaped from our bedroom and hid in our guest room while my fiancee and I tore apart the bed, peered into closets, rummaged through the bureau, and examined bathroom cupboards. My gal was far calmer than I was; I confess I was on the verge of tears before our little chin was discovered. I had to be stopped from ripping open the cloth that covers the underside of a box spring mattress in case she had secreted herself within. Gosh. What will I be like with human children?

She is now sleeping in her favorite position, sitting upright, paws folded over one another, rocking back on her hind feet.

Now, of course, she opened her eyes when I first snapped the photo, but the posture is right. (Click to enlarge.) And no, she isn’t fat! That’s just the glorious abundance of chinchilla fur, which, as I’ve blogged before, should always remain attached to chinnies themselves. I have recovered from my own upset this morning, and will take her out for a late afternoon romp around in a few hours.

This morning, I ran for the first time in 11 days. It’s been a while since I’ve had that much time off. It certainly shows in my body, and it showed on the run. Still, as fast as fitness leaves, it can be recovered. The hard part is believing that it will indeed come back. When I am sick, I fall victim to the fear that I will never be healthy and strong again. (Not surprisingly, I find considerable comfort in the psalms when I am sick.) My run today was just about 5.5 miles, a short distance indeed, but more than enough to make me feel that I am on the road to wellness.

Thursday Short Poem: Gluck’s The Mirror

Posted on January 13, 2005 by Hugo Schwyzer

The gals at Candied Ginger and I share a fondness for Louise Gluck, and I can’t think why she hasn’t provided one of my Thursday poems before. This is easily my favorite of hers.

The Mirror

Watching you in the mirror I wonder
what it is like to be so beautiful
and why you do not love
but cut yourself, shaving
like a blind man. I think you let me stare
so you can turn against yourself
with greater violence,
needing to show me how you scrape the flesh away
scornfully and without hesitation
until I see you correctly,
as a man bleeding, not
the reflection I desire.

We know darned well that men frequently see only the desired reflection when they gaze at women; Gluck makes clear that women are prone to the same misperception and distortion. That need to be seen "correctly" is a powerful one indeed! Lots of good stuff to reflect on around image, relationship, sexuality — and woundedness.

Some reflections on older men, younger women and integrity

Posted on January 12, 2005 by Hugo Schwyzer

Hugo is posting a lot today.

My fiancee and I did make it out of the house this past weekend, despite the rain and our mutual flu affliction. We went to see A Love Song for Bobby Long starring Scarlett Johansson and John Travolta. It was a passable film if not a deeply memorable one, and the two leads were quite fine. (I do want the soundtrack.)

Johansson’s character, "Pursey", is 18 and lovely. Travolta plays the title character, a 50ish alcoholic former English professor prone to quoting George Eliot and making odious sexual remarks to Pursey. At one point,following a particularly obscene comment, Pursey turns to Bobby in hurt and frustration and cries out "But I’m just a girl." It’s the line that lingered for me. Pursey is legally an adult, and the film makes clear she is not sexually unexperienced — but the plain power of that one line drove home for me the reality we often choose to ignore, that those who appear outwardly fully adult may still be in need of our care and protection.

I thought about this just now as I read this post by Sofia at Volsunga. Among other things, she touches on issues of older men dating younger women, and I thought I’d add some musings. No, there will be no personal disclosures in this post. All I will say is that I can say in all honesty that today my private life matches my public pronouncements on this issue, and to God be the glory for that.

I don’t think I need to defend the proposition that we live in a culture that sexualizes and objectifies young women starting very early in life. I work with junior high and high school age girls in my church youth group, and am well aware that a substantial number of them struggle with the overwhelming pressure to be alluring, to be sexy, to be powerful. In frank group discussions, we’ve touched on these pressures many times over the years. I’ve had countless similar (if slightly more sophisticated) discussions in classes with my students at PCC.

I see a great many young women eager for attention and validation from older men. By "young", I mean both underage girls and college-aged women. (What I mean by "older" depends on the age of the girl who is the subject of the conversation. 20 is an "older man" for a 16 year-old; 30, or even 40, might be an older man for a 21 year-old.) For all of the progress our culture has made on some issues, it is truly remarkable how the older man/younger woman ideal has persisted. Though there remains considerable disagreement about how old might be "too old" and how young might be "too young" (especially given legal considerations), most folks seem quite prepared to accept these relationships not only as normal, but perhaps even ideal.

Now, I don’t think that significant age gaps in relationships are always a problem, but I do think that they are far more problematic than we are willing to let on. When we are talking about men over, say, 27 and women under 21, they are almost invariably a very poor idea.

I’ve often written about how much I enjoy working with young men and adolesecent boys. I’ve talked about the importance of male role models, and about how crucial it is that older men take an active interest in the emotional and spiritual development of young men, not just their athletic and intellectual achievements. I love "my guys". But I also think it’s equally vital that adult men work with adolescent girls and young women. I’m convinced that young girls badly need the presence of loving older men who are not parents or relatives, but who are still fundamentally safe.

I’ve heard, over and over again, how shocking and upsetting it is the first time a young girl realizes that an older man is sexually attracted to her. The first catcall, the first leer, the first whistle, the first inappropriate remark — these are seldom forgotten, and they leave deep and enduring wounds. (The younger the girl and the older the predator, the deeper the scar, it seems.) After these early experiences, by the time they arrive at college, many young women expect to be seen as objects of desire by men in their thirties, forties, and perhaps beyond. Young women employ different strategies to cope with this onslaught of attention. Some hide from it, making a conscious effort to deemphasize their sexuality, to appear less desirable. Others, more troublingly, see it as an opportunity to get much-wanted validation and attention.

In my work, it is absolutely critical that I never, ever, respond to the sexuality of the young women with whom I interact. This has nothing to do with preserving my job, and everything to do with the precious integrity of my work on gender issues. Now, at the risk of the accusation of narcissism, I will share that I do get plenty of female students who flirt with me, a few quite brazenly. (My colleagues tell me it will happen less after I turn 40.) I don’t let it go to my head much, because I understand that it’s not Hugo they really want. At the risk of sounding paternalistic, what they really want is to be noticed, to be seen, to be validated as good and worthy and interesting individuals. And they believe — with good reason in most cases — that using their sexuality is hands down the best (if not the only way) to get that attention that they rightly want.

If I were to flirt back, or if I were to date a student, I am convinced I would send a devastating message about what older men "really" want. Young women need older men in their lives who will respect and care about them, who aren’t their fathers or brothers but who aren’t prospective lovers, either. They need to know that they bring more to the table than their sexuality. They need to be seen as complete human beings. Paradoxically, seeing young women as complete human beings means that in actions, words, and yes, even in thought, older men cannot see them as objects of sexual desire. That doesn’t mean that we (older guys) shouldn’t acknowledge that younger women are sexual creatures. But we must (and the burden is on us alone here, fellas) love them with radical unselfishness,and that requires that we ourselves always refrain from sexualizing them. We need to see them as Pursey wanted to be seen.

When I first started teaching, I wanted to be admired. The older I get, I am happy to report, the less I worry about that. I do still do care what my college students (and my youth group kids) think of me. I don’t care all that much if they think I’m brilliant or eloquent or handsome (though, oh, one likes to hear that sort of flattery). But there is something I do care very much about. I want all of the young people I work with, be they 14, 18, or 21, to think I’m safe. The longer I do this work, the more that becomes my goal. I want my kids to know I love them for who they are, I want my students to know I respect and honor their minds and their spirits, not their bodies.

I will not sit in judgment of others’ relationships, save those that are obviously exploitative. Clearly, not all young women are equally mature at the same chronological age. But I will say that older men do well to see younger women as full human beings rather than objects of desire. If more of us would take small steps to make the younger women around us feel both seen and safe, our culture would be a damn sight better off.

A link…

Posted on January 12, 2005 by Hugo Schwyzer

Camassia has an absolutely superb post on sexuality and idolatry today. Go and read it at once.

My favorite bit, to which I give a wholehearted "amen, sister":

My own problem with the cult of Eros isn’t really that it allows
non-traditional relationships. It’s that it hogs all of love to itself.
When I read about the attributes of marriage — love, sharing,
self-giving, commitment, duty — I often think to myself, "But aren’t
Christians supposed to do that with everybody?" Especially since I’ve
been immersed in Anabaptist ecclesiology lately, I can’t help noticing
that describing those as special features of marriage tacitly assumes
that no other relationships have them.

Back in my college Family Sociology course, one point we discussed
was how in the industrial era, the family came to be viewed as a "haven
in a heartless world." Previously most families had doubled as economic
units, running the family farm or the family shop. But from the 19th
century onward the husband would go out into the competitive,
impersonal capitalist machine and then want to come back to a haven of
love and peace overseen by a domestic angel of a wife. Interestingly,
this view continued in a much more recent study of female abortion
activists. Many pro-life women felt they were defending nurturant
motherhood against a ruthless achievement culture — the very culture
pro-choice women usually wanted the right to participate in.

But both those viewpoints tacitly accept the "heartless world."
Surely Christians should not do that. The call to love neighbor and
enemy alike was a call to love beyond the bounds of family. Isn’t Jesus
supposed to transform the cruel world, and not just create a hideout
from it?

(Bold emphases are mine).

Now if that isn’t a corrective to both left and right, I don’t know what is.

Defining misogyny

Posted on January 12, 2005 by Hugo Schwyzer

In a comment on yesterday’s post, Jeff JP (who remains convinced that I am sonehow filled with self-loathing) does manage to ask a good question that deserves a thoughtful response. I wrote:

It wasn’t until I started to do men’s work with other
pro-feminist men that I began to feel sufficiently empowered to start
calling guys on their (sometimes) unintentional miosgyny.

Jeff JP replied:

Thanks for proving that "misogyny" is one of those words–just like
"patriarchy"–that feminists have abused and misused so extensively
that it’s nearly devoid of meaning. I just checked several current
dictionaries of Standard English, and they define "misogyny" as "hatred
of women." Please explain how "hatred" can be unintentional.

On reflection, I should have used the word "unthinking" instead of "unintentional"; a small distinction that seems to capture my point a bit better.

I’d suggest that the parallel to "misogyny" is "bigotry." When it comes to racial issues, are there not many different types of bigots? Not every bigot wanders around in a white sheet, aware of and proud of their race hatreds. Some bigots deny that they are bigots: "Oh, some of my best friends are black, but in general…" Hatred is a powerful word, and it would be too simplistic to believe that it always manifests itself in violent, obvious ways.

To hate someone, feminists suggest, is to see them as less than fully human. Hatred is far more than an emotion of intense, conscious dislike. Hatred is the absence of compassion, the absence of imagination, the absence of a recognition of a common humanity. Rape is a profound expression of hatred, because it is misogyny expressed in brutal physical terms. But just as misogyny has defining actions (rape and assault), it also has defining language. The language of misogyny can range from vicious verbal abuse that reduces a woman to an object (c*nt, the primary example in American English) to blanket statements about women’s abilities (women can’t drive as well as men.)

Much of the misogyny of the men’s rights movement is directed towards feminists. Just as racists in the Old South divided blacks into "good negroes" and "uppity troublemakers", so misogynists create a dichotomy of "good women" (submissive, eager to please, able to "take a joke", uncritical of bad male behavior) and "feminazis" (women who demand accountability from men and who ask to be taken seriously as human beings.) To say one likes individual women, therefore, is no defense against the charge of misogyny. Plenty of racists like individual members of other ethnic groups. To be hostile to the movement that seeks to liberate women is enough, in my book, to merit the charge of misogyny.

Misogyny is also institutionalized in our society. Perhaps it is my Christian faith informing my feminism, but I am convinced that pornography is the representative art form of a woman-hating culture. In porn, women exist to fulfill men’s desires — they have no real agency of their own. To see anyone as existing only to serve you and to fulfill you is, feminists have argued, a practical form of hatred. Relatively few men who use porn are conscious of hating women. But regular use of porn inevitably desensitizes the viewer to the humanity and dignity of all of the women with whom he interacts. It defies all we know about human psychology to say that a fellow can go from masturbating to images on his TV or computer screen into interactions with real women without objectifiying them.

Let’s be clear here. Most folks, if they are really honest about it,
go through periods of their lives where they experience (with varying
degrees of intensity) authentic dislike for the other sex. Many will
go through periods where they also dislike their own. ( Self-loathing
among young women is famous — if I had a dollar for every young woman
I’ve worked with who’s said "All my good friends are guys" or "Girls
are too competitive, I don’t like them" I’d have enough money to pay
for a sweet honeymoon!) Most of us take our own personal negative
experiences and, at least for a while, allow them to make us
fundamentally suspicious of (and perhaps openly hostile to) the other
sex. This is one form of genuine misogyny — or, yes, misandry.

We are eager to evade personal responsibility. An anti-Semite can comfort herself by saying, "Oh, I don’t hate Jews — Hitler hated Jews. I just think that they have too much influence in our culture." A racist can say: "Oh, I don’t agree with the Klan. But if my daughter brought home a black man, well, I’d be pretty unhappy about that." Surely we’d all agree that these are examples of bigotry? Similarly, a man can say "I don’t hate women. I love women. But I think that feminists are out to control and manipulate us."

That’s misogyny too, Jeff.