This post first appeared October 30, 2007.
So the discussion is spirited (if inclined to the anti-feminist ad hominem) below yesterday’s post on marriage and feminism. One anti-feminist does ask a question that deserves a better answer than I’ve given so far:
You’re in a “passionately feminist marriage� What does that even mean?
I gave my “row boat” description yesterday, and I’ve written before about the central importance of Ephesians 5:21 and the appealing notion of “mutual submission.” I’m aware, of course, that different people have different visions of what equality looks like. Many who do like the comfort of strict gender roles insist that their marriages also reflect equality, arguing that “equality doesn’t equal sameness.” I’ve seen some of those marriages, seen how they thrive, and I don’t disagree that they can be wonderful. And as we’ve discussed recently around here, it’s possible to have healthy, loving marriages in which BDSM plays an important role. That’s not my vision of domestic bliss, but there’s certainly more than one path to marital happiness.
But what do I mean when I say my marriage is “passionately feminist”? In the eyes of the anti-feminists, that may conjure up an image of a timid and fearful Hugo, walking on eggshells around his domineering wife, asking her permission for everything. Anti-feminists tend to think that any man who embraces real egalitarianism has essentially been emasculated, and has surrendered his capacity for action to his wife. Or perhaps they imagine that we have a little dry erase board in the kitchen, on which we keep track of how much time each of us has spent on domestic duties, in order to ensure that each of us is putting in precisely the same amount of effort as the other. And God only knows what the anti-feminists imagine about our bedroom. Perhaps they imagine my wife is some sort of dominatrix, or that our sexual behavior precludes penis-in-vagina intercourse, as that would indicate our acceptance of the “hegemony of the phallus.” Jeepers, the mind boggles at the possibilities!
So if none of that silliness is true, what is explicitly feminist about this marriage? For me, feminism is both a political ideology and a guideline for private praxis. (Similarly, my Christian faith gives me a “public theology” and a private moral code.) As my beloved brother says, we’re all called to “match our language and our lives”. Fighting for justice and inclusion in the world while being a domineering jerk at home is to have missed the point entirely. Obviously, my wife and I have a private life that is not open for public inspection. But even in our most intimate moments, even in the sacred space of our bedroom, we’re called to act in a way that is congruent with our values.
In the comments below yesterday’s post, some anti-feminist voices speculate that a “feminist husband” wouldn’t stand up to his wife. YiddisheMama implies that I’ve never spent a night on the couch after a heated argument, assuming that I’m some sort of “yes man” who is frantically eager to assuage my wife’s anger whenever it flares. Guess what, folks? We fight in our marriage. (Not physically, mind you.) Sometimes voices get raised. Sometimes we say things we regret. Sometimes, but not often, one of us (and it varies which one) sleeps on the day bed in another room. When we fight, we do so not out of hostility or out of deep resentment but because, if only for a short while, we’ve reached an area of serious disagreement over what the best course of action ought to be for our shared life. What makes this relationship work (in the five years we’ve been together) is not the absence of conflict; what makes it work is that we’re mutually committed to using healthy tools to resolve conflict when it arises — as it inevitably will, even in the best of marriages.
Our marriage is feminist because we practice mutual responsibility for each other. My job is not to “protect” my “dainty and fragile” wife from a cruel external world. She’s not on a pedestal, and she’s not going to break if she’s exposed to the ugliness of the world. Her job is not to protect her “well-meaning but clueless” husband from the emotional complexity of women’s “inner world.” The fact that my wife has a uterus doesn’t mean she isn’t capable of strong and decisive action; the fact that I have a Y chromosome doesn’t mean I can’t be emotionally insightful and nurturing. In this marriage, at least, we take turns handling the “emotion work”, providing reassurance. We each take on the role of Inspirer and Primary Care-Giver as circumstances dictate. Illness and exhaustion take their toll from time to time, and it’s absurd to imagine that in an egalitarian relationship, there is no room for the handing off of roles.
Another classic anti-feminist bromide: egalitarianism isn’t sexy. YiddisheMama wrote, in what surely was more than a small slap at my wife as well as at me:
Normal women want to WORK WITH men like you. We do NOT want to sleep with them.
(Future such attacks on my wife will get you banned, by the way. My family and friends are not fair game on this blog.)
Where sex is concerned, I accept the “diff’rent strokes for diff’rent folks” view. But there’s a common misconception that “heterosexual feminist sex” leaves little room for role play and excitement. Newsflash, folks: feminists have sex like a lot of other people do. Sometimes men are on top, sometimes women are on top, sometimes — oh heck, you get the point. I don’t know about YiddisheMama, but one sure-fire way to kill passion in a marriage in my view is to fall prey to any kind of routine. Permit me to be vulgar in the service of making a point: sometimes, it’s nice to have someone you love and trust push you up against a wall and “do” ya. And other times, that same person may need “to be done.” (Let me recommend, tangentially, David Schnarch’s magnificent Passionate Marriage – he talks a lot about this “doing and being done” thing, and it’s the best sex book I know for heterosexual monogamous couples.) Bottom line (pun intended), feminists have sex just like everybody else does: imperfectly and exuberantly.
My wife and I spend a lot of time out in the world. Yesterday, we were both gone from the home for some fifteen hours. We work out, we go to our respective jobs, we volunteer. (We’re both believers that you’ve got to tithe time as well as money.) We’re both extroverts (ENFP and ESTP respectively), and we both spend our days connecting and doing and leading and listening and problem-solving. At the end of the day, we come home to a place that is our sanctuary and our refuge. We take turns, even when we’re tired, washing up and folding laundry. We talk. We go to bed.
Our bedroom is a sacred space, and I mean that literally. Our bed is for sleeping and for sex only. We don’t read in bed. We don’t argue in bed. If we need to argue, we take it outside the bedroom. When we have children — and I’m saying this now and Lord help me if I take it back — they will never spend time in our bed, even if they wail for the privilege. Dogs, when we get around to adopting ‘em, will not be in the bed. I am flexible on many issues, but not on this one. That bed, where we make love together and fall asleep together — and perhaps most importantly of all, dream together is the power plant for our marriage and our lives. I am a better feminist in the outside world, a better Christian, a better teacher, a better friend, a better mentor, a better man because each night I come home and I am spiritually and psychically “recharged” by my marriage. I do the same thing for my wife. She also is out in the world, doing deals and solving crises and handling investments. She is better at what she does because of where she comes home to go to bed — in both senses of the phrase.
Mutual commitment. Mutual responsibility. Flexible, even interchangeable roles. Mutual submission. Mutual accountability. Mutual vision. Mutual dreams, and a sacred shared space in which to dream those dreams. That’s what a feminist marriage means to me.
” When we have children — and I’m saying this now and Lord help me if I take it back — they will never spend time in our bed, even if they wail for the privilege.”
So, has this been taken back? Have your feelings changed now that you’re a dad?
Hugo,
I don’t see what makes your description of marriage particularly feminist. You just describe what I’d consider a pretty healthy marriage – two people who have decided to be accept responsibility for each other and make that formal. I don’t really get the feminist bit.
So… congruence. How do you deal with the epistemological implications of feminism in your bedroom. You touched on that with the “how to fight” post a couple of days ago. But still. Do you check your ‘privilege’? How is the personal political in the privacy of your home? I mean, the thing is, you may not be a timid a fearful Hugo walking on eggshells, but if you’re actually not, how do you reconcile that with your personal opinion that men are privileged and often aren’t even able to understand their privilege. How are you able to argue with her when she says that your point is a matter of male privilege and you are logically unable to contest her position.
I guess that’s what I find so confusing. You’re describing what I consider a healthy relationship and call it feminist. But you’re not dealing with any of the epistemologicyl implications of feminism.
Yes, Meira, I have changed my opinion utterly on babies in bed.
Sam, feminism doesn’t claim that women are more right than men — it’s your misperception that suggests that in an argument between a man and a woman, a feminist assumes justice is invariably on the side of the be-uterused. I do check my privilege, my wife checks her assumptions, we check and double-check and wrestle (figuratively, mostly) through the thicket of our different class backgrounds, different ethnic heritages, different temperaments, different astrological signs and different biological sexes.
I still wanna know the answer to the question you didn’t answer when you first posted this. IN this setup up can you, conversely, have sex anywhere BESIDES the bedroom?
Bill, you can have sex anywhere you like. The bedroom is, in some sense, a concept as much as a specific room.
Well then why isn’t the kitchen a concept? Or the study? Or the gazebo? If you can have sex anywhere you like why not do anything anywhere you like? You seem to be contradicting yourself (I confront because I love).
Hugo,
“it’s your misperception that suggests that in an argument between a man and a woman, a feminist assumes justice is invariably on the side of the be-uterused.”
no, that’s not what I assume. I assume that within the framework of gendered situated knowing and an acceptance of feminist axioms about oppression and privilege, a be-privileged has no morally and logically acceptable way of challenging the oppressed’s version of reality. Other women may challenge her position, since they have the assumed equivalent epistemic insight. But you don’t.
“I do check my privilege, my wife checks her assumptions, we check and double-check and wrestle (figuratively, mostly) through the thicket of our different class backgrounds, different ethnic heritages, different temperaments, different astrological signs and different biological sexes.”
Again, people are different and they have different perspectives. As long as you don’t assign a priori value hierarchies to those perspectives, that’s what pretty much everyone does – trying to get to know the people one likes, particularly the one(s) you love. But feminist epistemology *is* assigning a priori value hierarchies to different positions.
The Stanford Enyclopedia has rewritten the article on feminist epistemology, so I’ve lost some of my favorite quotes about this…
(http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/feminism-epistemology/) I’ll check and see if there are some good new ones
Share when you can, Sam.
Bill, the bedroom is about sacred space — it’s about something that belongs only to the two of you. Kitchens are communal by nature, and as I’ve come to see (see my retraction) beds can be as well. But partners in an enduring monogamous relationship must carve out space — literal and metaphorical — that is theirs and theirs only, a place where they can shut a door and close out the rest of the world and connect. It can be the damn laundry room if need be.
Hugo,
it’s actually quite a good article (by Elisabeth Andersen). I haven’t time to finish it now, but half-way through I think it’s evident how post-modernist thought is having an influence on the logical structure (which, in the end, will lead back to individualism) and claims of situated epistemic privilege for women in feminist epistemology. Sounds markedly different from the last version – particularly, for a feminist scholar, in admitting bias (as epistemic privilege). So, here are two quotes making my point (in opposite order, as that makes more sense for quoting, some parts emphasized by me).
So, if that’s what you believe, (and I am exaggerating here, I know) how do you not “walk around on eggshells” if you want to keep your personal and politital assumptions congruent?
You’re gonna get a nice post in response, Sam — too much for a comment thread.
I’m looking forward to reading it!
Sure s/he does. Lack of privilege has a strong vote, but not a veto.
SamSeaborn: “I assume that within the framework of gendered situated knowing and an acceptance of feminist axioms about oppression and privilege, a be-privileged has no morally and logically acceptable way of challenging the oppressed’s version of reality.”
Would it be possible to start from a position that assumes your wife isn’t a liar, or deranged? Because that’s basically what you are anticipating when you make this statement: that you’ll have to accept an intentionally or pathologically false view of someone else’s reality.
I can understand your fear. Men have done this *for women* for millennia. Continue to do so. It’s no fun.
Can you accept that someone else’s view of reality is real to her? Not even in a postmodern sense, just that she’s not any more likely to misapprehend her life than you are yours, and her reality is no more likely to be insane than yours?
Do you assume such things about people of other races, religions, national origin, sexual orientation? Or is it just women you can’t trust with their own reality?
In any situation where you have privilege, if you wish to be fair and actually communicate fully, you must actually listen to the person who doesn’t have privilege, and take their word for what they experience over the culturally determined script assigned to their experience, or what you imagine you’d think and feel if you were in their situation.
Deborah Tannen almost has it right when she says men tend to talk to come up with solutions when women just want to talk their feelings out. It’s that men come up with solutions that work in some other fantasy world where what the woman just told them isn’t happening. Some world where what a woman does is treated the same as what a man would do. Naturally they’re rejected by women who hear them.
Women when talking to men try to explain to them the reality of their situations. Women talking among themselves already know what it’s like to be a woman and typically come up with suggestions that actually make sense without having to have it explained to them that, no, they can’t just carry a Magnum 44 with them to work.
“My boss doesn’t want to promote women.” “What you need to do is work harder and show him how important your work is.” NOT LISTENING. Not trusting what the woman just said.
And unfortunately, if the woman explains further why this isn’t a good solution rather than just taking his orders like a good little servant, it can lead to accusations like “you’re lazy and lack confidence in yourself and would rather bitch all day than get ahead. You’re just making excuses.”
Again, think about the fact that, if you’re in a marriage, you should be trusting this woman, not imagining she’s out to get you by making up lies about what actually happens to her and what she feels.
By listening, I mean really listening, really paying attention, and using empathy, rather than sympathy, which is not easy for most privileged people. Listening without an attitude of “yeah but that’s not true in my experience.” That should ring warning bells. You’re not a woman, are you? So how does filtering her life through your experience help you understand her better than her own? Unless of course you are a superior being with superior understanding. Privilege, you’re soaking in it.
Listening to the person’s experience and realizing that that experience is just as real as yours, yet it’s missing from almost every discussion, and where it exists, it’s parodied, dismissed, and demeaned, so that you need to be careful about challenging that experience because that’s the default.
Not that her reality trumps yours. But for once you have to consider that it’s reality, too.
oldfeminist,
“Would it be possible to start from a position that assumes your wife isn’t a liar, or deranged?”
Quite frankly, I find it fascinating how you read that into my statement. My point was that within the described epistemological framework *her reality logically does in fact trump mine (or that of any other man)*. So it’s not about not accepting her reality or trying to understand, but about not accepting that *my reality* is axiomatically less valid, which is what I allude to and which is explicit in the quote I gave.
“Listening to the person’s experience and realizing that that experience is just as real as yours, yet it’s missing from almost every discussion, and where it exists, it’s parodied, dismissed, and demeaned, so that you need to be careful about challenging that experience because that’s the default.”
There are so many implicit assumptions in this statement that basically make my point that I don’t really know how to reply. Let’s dissect this – you say something “*IS* missing from alomost every discussion (you don’t say “I think/feel/in my perspective” you say *IS*) and I have to infer from that *IS* that that *IS* only the case in your reality. Because (assuming) in mine it is not. So, well. We have two assumed equally valid, yet mutually exclusive, individual accounts of reality and all we know is that they are right for each of us (assuming we’re not lying about our own perception). So where do we go from here if we can’t develop a joint understanding of what *IS* that we’re talking about?
“Deborah Tannen almost has it right when she says men tend to talk to come up with solutions when women just want to talk their feelings out.”
That’s how I see it sometimes. And that is a valid way of changing perceptions, of making oneself heard. But it’s about establishing truth.
There’s really only two alternatives here: Either we, as humans, do have the ability to rationally construct an understanding of a shared reality in which all individual accounts do matter equally. Or it’s “power politics” – “reality is discourse, not truth”.
I’m right there about saced space. I was coming from the idea of a place for everything and everything in it’s place……or don’t eat where you you know what.
It seems that if the main activity of the sacred space can be done anywhere besides the sacred space then that dilutes the sacred space. But I guess you are talking about connecting in the sacred space in a more comprehensive way.
I’m relieved that you don’t advocate limiting sex to the bedroom btw. In relationships I’ve always been a big fan of ‘house sex’, doing it in every conceivable location (no pun intended).
Actually, Sam, it’s about considering that your perception of reality a) isn’t exactly the same as hers and b) may be less valid, even though it seems pretty real to you.
That is not the same as the dramatic, baiting assertion that feminists are saying women are always right and men are always wrong.
SS: “Quite frankly, I find it fascinating how you read that into my statement. My point was that within the described epistemological framework *her reality logically does in fact trump mine (or that of any other man)*. So it’s not about not accepting her reality or trying to understand, but about not accepting that *my reality* is axiomatically less valid, which is what I allude to and which is explicit in the quote I gave.”
The quote: “Feminist standpoint theory claims an epistemic privilege over the character of gender relations, and of social and psychological phenomena in which gender is implicated, on behalf of the standpoint of women. ”
The oppressed, because it knows about both the oppressor class from cultural conditioning, and its own class through direct experience, has a much broader perspective in terms of understanding gender relations.
Not that whenever there’s an argument between people of different genders, women always win, that everything a woman says is the truth and everything a man says, if it differs, is a lie.
OF: “Listening to the person’s experience and realizing that that experience is just as real as yours, yet it’s missing from almost every discussion, and where it exists, it’s parodied, dismissed, and demeaned, so that you need to be careful about challenging that experience because that’s the default.â€
SS: “There are so many implicit assumptions in this statement that basically make my point that I don’t really know how to reply. Let’s dissect this – you say something “*IS* missing from alomost every discussion (you don’t say “I think/feel/in my perspective†you say *IS*)”
Funny. You haven’t said once in this discussion “I feel” or “I think” or “my perspective is.” You just state these things flatly as if they are truth.
Why is it okay when you do it?
SS: “and I have to infer from that *IS* that that *IS* only the case in your reality. Because (assuming) in mine it is not.”
Because you listen to all conversations and know that people really do pay attention to the female perspective a good part of the time? You’re that sensitive to feminist issues that you listen for it all the time?
Or are you playing the game “don’t tell me I never put away my underwear because I can show that 38 percent of the time I did”? We’ll get to that tactic later.
People who pay attention to issues that “belong” to others when they are privileged to ignore them are very rare. Even when they work hard, they still get it wrong a lot. So forgive me if I don’t think you’re likely to even notice when the genuine female perspective is ignored, bastardized, mocked, or denied.
But hey, let’s get back to the husband and wife in a feminist marriage “problem.” Since it’s so big.
Can you give an example where a husband and wife would disagree on the reality of something related to gender relations, and it would be normal to assume that the husband is right, but now he’s getting screwed because in a feminist marriage she’s automatically assumed to be right?
I hope we can posit that the husband and wife don’t make large numbers of huge and damaging mistakes about reality, and that the mistakes that are made are not the result of a functional gap in the system.
And remember, too, we’re assuming that both parties are arguing in good faith, and neither is mentally or emotionally deranged.
SS: “So, well. We have two assumed equally valid, yet mutually exclusive, individual accounts of reality and all we know is that they are right for each of us (assuming we’re not lying about our own perception). So where do we go from here if we can’t develop a joint understanding of what *IS* that we’re talking about?”
Why would you assume there can’t be a mutual understanding? Why assume they are equally valid? That’s part of the reconciliation of individual accounts of reality, figuring out where one is lacking in validity.
If your wife says something you don’t understand, that seems to counter reality as you live it (in terms of gender relations, be careful to apply it only where this framework claims to apply), you could just shut up and listen. Because if you don’t understand it, there’s a really good chance it’s because you have no experience at all in being a woman.
Then once you actually listen, not listen waiting for her to shut up so you can prove she’s wrong (I picked up my underwear in 1995), not approach it with an adversarial attitude, then you might actually learn something.
OF: “Deborah Tannen almost has it right when she says men tend to talk to come up with solutions when women just want to talk their feelings out.â€
SS: “That’s how I see it sometimes. And that is a valid way of changing perceptions, of making oneself heard. But it’s about establishing truth.”
Yes, that’s how you see it. Because that’s the “good guy” way to see it. But it’s still wrong.
You’re taking it as opinion, which you can simply dismiss.
But it’s usually not being stated as “let’s share,” though that’s the way most men seem to see it, because the alternative is to think that something she said contradicts his assumptions and is relevant to the discussion.
SS: “There’s really only two alternatives here: Either we, as humans, do have the ability to rationally construct an understanding of a shared reality in which all individual accounts do matter equally. Or it’s “power politics†– “reality is discourse, not truthâ€.”
We only have the ability to rationally construct an understanding of a shared reality when all perspectives are actually treated as if they matter equally. When they aren’t, the weight of history, custom, assumption, “common sense” and power all are on the side of the oppressor and not the oppressed.
So when perspectives differ, you bloody well better be sure to listen twice to the oppressed person, and listen carefully, without judging or looking for holes.
I made a point of discounting the second idea, at the very beginning of my comment, but maybe you thought I was just sharing my feelings. So let me repeat — this is not a postmodern perception-is-reality claim.
You don’t know what it’s like to be a woman, so you can’t simply decide that what a woman is telling you in terms of gender relations makes no sense because it’s never happened to you, people don’t act that way, no one is really like that, you must have misunderstood.
Who you are really does affect what you encounter in your reality. If you’re a woman, you are treated fundamentally differently in society. It isn’t possible for a man to experience this unless he can do convincing drag.
Mythago,
“b) may be less valid, even though it seems pretty real to you.
That is not the same as the dramatic, baiting assertion that feminists are saying women are always right and men are always wrong.”
Which I haven’t claimed. I did claim, and I used the quote from a feminist scholar to back up that claim, that, *within* that axiomatic framework, there is no logical way to “win an argument” for either position (as it’s all situated knoeledge). But since there is a claim to an epistemic privilege for women, her position will always be considered more valid than mine, axiomatically.
Oldfeminist.
“The oppressed, because it knows about both the oppressor class from cultural conditioning, and its own class through direct experience, has a much broader perspective in terms of understanding gender relations.”
That’s the point. It’s an axiomatic assumption that “whenever there’s an argument between people of different genders, women always win”, not about 1+1=2, but when it comes to gender issues, because her perspective is accorded an epistemic privilege over his.
“Funny. You haven’t said once in this discussion “I feel†or “I think†or “my perspective is.†You just state these things flatly as if they are truth.”
There’s a difference between induction and deduction.
“Why would you assume there can’t be a mutual understanding? Why assume they are equally valid? That’s part of the reconciliation of individual accounts of reality, figuring out where one is lacking in validity.”
I’m not assuming that, feminist standpoint epistemology is explicitly assuming this.
“So when perspectives differ, you bloody well better be sure to listen twice to the oppressed person, and listen carefully, without judging or looking for holes.”
Again, listening to one another and epistemology are different things.
“You don’t know what it’s like to be a woman, so you can’t simply decide that what a woman is telling you in terms of gender relations makes no sense because it’s never happened to you, people don’t act that way, no one is really like that, you must have misunderstood.”
And vice versa. Yet I don’t claim “an epistemic privilege over the character of gender relations, and of social and psychological phenomena in which gender is implicated, on behalf of the standpoint of” men.
OF:
“The oppressed, because it knows about both the oppressor class from cultural conditioning, and its own class through direct experience, has a much broader perspective in terms of understanding gender relations.”
This is complete and utter nonsense. Both the “oppressed” and the “privileged” have their own experience of the people in their world. They are both equally expert at their own experience, and of the world they have lived in. All this epistemic gobbledygook does is surmise, in a completely unfalsifiable manner, that the “oppressed” are somehow ennobled by suffering, and that their suffering has gained them a clearer view of the world. When just as often as not suffering leads to hatred, and an enduring thirst for revenge.
And yeah, I know I’m privileged. Blah, blah,blah.
“So when perspectives differ, you bloody well better be sure to listen twice to the oppressed person, and listen carefully, without judging or looking for holes.”
Sorry, but if anyone demands that I need to listen extra closely, and without judgment to what they say, just because they are part of some “oppressed” class, I just ask them to check their Victim Privilege.
No. Her perspective may be considered more informed than yours; that doesn’t make it always right, or always “considered” (by whom?) to be more valid than yours.
To take this out of the gender context, if you grew up in Cleveland and I’ve never been there, your perspective on Cleveland is more informed than mine. If we are having a discussion about politics in Cleveland, I would be pretty stupid to say that I understand Cleveland just as well as you do, or that you’re picking on me to say that my views on Cleveland are those of a person who has never experienced Cleveland.
That said, of course, while you will almost certainly be right and I less right about “what it’s like to live in Cleveland”, if we are discussing how the economy of Cleveland works, you could still be wrong and I could still be right.
Mythago,
“or always “considered†(by whom?) to be more valid than yours.”
by feminist standpoint epistemology. Again, I’m quoting.
“Feminist standpoint theory claims an epistemic privilege over the character of gender relations, and of social and psychological phenomena in which gender is implicated, on behalf of the standpoint of women.”
You believe in this axiomatic framework, you believe that her opinion is always more valid than yours – if you want to keep your personal attitude and your public stance “congruent”, as Hugo claims. Hence the eggshell question.
“That said, of course, while you will almost certainly be right and I less right about “what it’s like to live in Clevelandâ€, if we are discussing how the economy of Cleveland works, you could still be wrong and I could still be right.”
I agree. But that’s *not* what feminist standpoint epistemology claims with respect to female epistemic privilege in gender related matters.
SS, you’re quoting one person’s opinion, and interpreting it to mean “all feminists everywhere believe every feminist everywhere is always right when their views about gendered relations conflict with that of men.”
This is false.
“There’s a difference between induction and deduction.”
You’re inducing from this one statement in one publication that all feminists believe that, when husband and wife argue, the wife is always right.
That’s some pretty long-armed induction, on which all of your argument seems to rest.
Oh, and good job coming up with an actual situation where a married hetero couple are having a difference of opinion about gendered relations. As opposed to your much tastier (to the patriarchy) hazy false vision of men always losing arguments because feminism says women are always right.
Admit it, we’re getting closer to stating the scary reality that women can be right without men’s permission. It doesn’t have to be by agreement — you can’t withhold your agreement and thereby make your wife wrong or the question “moot.”
STF: “All this epistemic gobbledygook does is surmise, in a completely unfalsifiable manner, that the “oppressed†are somehow ennobled by suffering, and that their suffering has gained them a clearer view of the world.”
Nope. It means that we as the oppressed class have to know what our oppressors think, for survival reasons, even if we weren’t inundated with it 24/7. Whereas the oppressors have no great need to know what we think, because they have the power.
Or are you ready to say that Black culture is just as well-understood by Whites as White culture is by Blacks, in the US?
OF:
OK, so where is the evidence that the oppressed actually know more about what the oppressors are thinking than the converse? How do you measure and conclude something like that?
“OK, so where is the evidence that the oppressed actually know more about what the oppressors are thinking than the converse? How do you measure and conclude something like that?”
I would say it’s true by inspection.
I explained how it works — that if you’re the oppressed, your culture is (a) less well-known and understood because it’s not portrayed as the “norm,” and (b) you are beholden to the oppressor culture and need to understand it to negotiate through your life.
A Black person who doesn’t understand White culture is not going to thrive, and may find herself/himself in deep trouble for not understanding the dominant culture. It’s hard to go somewhere where White culture doesn’t have a hegemony. In some places this is changing, but nationwide, most places are White-friendly, White-oriented, White-dominated.
A Black person who doesn’t see and hear about White culture on the mass media is either actively choosing to pay attention to only a small subset of mass media, or isn’t paying attention to any of it at all. And didn’t do any schoolwork.
In contrast, a White person who doesn’t understand Black culture might get in trouble if she goes into an all-Black neighborhood and says ignorant things. That’s about it. She’s not required to actually understand Black culture. She has to treat Blacks equitably if she’s got hiring or firing power or is a teacher. They have to “speak the right English” or she can choose not to understand them.
A White person who doesn’t expose herself to Black mass media is … White. It’s very possible to listen to only Country music, watch only shows where White people are the majority and White people dictate the culture. There’s a lot of them out there, from Sex And The City to Seinfeld (no regular Black cast members) to shows where there might be a Black person on the cast but they don’t act or talk “Black” (CSI, Criminal Minds, Law & Order) and there’s nothing they do that you can’t understand if you’ve never seen a Black person before.
Do you seriously question that dual mechanism? Do you seriously think that, again, my example, Black culture is as well-understood by Whites as White culture is by Blacks? By default, the average White Jo/e Sixpack need not know anything about Blacks other than “treat them the same as Whites.” If that.
I don’t know of any studies, but do you really think this is unbelievable?
Now, maybe I read my own interpretations into Sam, but it’s worth noting that Mythago and Oldfeminist jump to (essentially) a discussion of debating women’s experiences, when Sam addresses it more generally.
It has been my experience that in (most) feminist discussions I’m perfectly agreeable to the description of womens’ experiences, (generally) I’d say they’re obviously right (though many are highly biased towards the experience of a single woman, small group of friends or the class of women likely to identify as feminists, as the group gets larger, the more likely I am to respond “Yeah, obviously”). When I object, it is (almost) invariably when what it’s like to be a man is described, or when what it’s like to be a woman is contrasted with what it’s like to be a man. Contrasts like this are especially dangerous, because repudiating the comparison can be attacked as denying womens’ experiences or whatnot.
Contrasting really is the biggest problem, because it encodes so much together. Maybe it isn’t flawlessly true, but I generally understand my reluctance/unwillingness to take on the label of “feminist” or “allied” because it’d require me to repudiate vast swaths of my own experience.
Take, for example, oldfeminist’s comparison between being white and being male. They aren’t really comparable in terms of “privilege”; being white is nothing but cupcakes and rainbows and unicorns; while being white isn’t quite the pure privilege that being cisgendered is, it comes pretty close. And it’s true, I don’t really have to interact with black people if I don’t want to (this is made especially easy living in a country where only two percent of people are black). Neither of these are remotely like being a man. Most feminists will repeat the adage “Patriarchy hurts men too”; nothing remotely comparable can be said about white people getting hurt by racism (we do, but the amount is negligible). I’ve never had a boss who was black, or a landlord, or a roommate; I can’t recall ever even having had a job interview where the interviewer was black, or ever having a black teacher/professor at school; I can’t make any remotely comparable statements about women. I have a few second cousins who’re black; I maybe see them once a year; again, I can’t make comparable statements about women. I’ve never dated anyone who was black. Again, same comparison. I’ve never really been mentored by anyone who was black (though I can think of a possible exception), my Ph.D. supervisor is a woman (as the most obvious example). I can go on, and on, and on; it shouldn’t be necessary. For most of us, from the moment we’re born until probably sometime in our teens, most authority held over us is held by women (mothers, daycare workers, elementary school teachers outweigh fathers, by and large (sorry Dad!)), afterwards, on average a minority of such authority remains with them. They’re usually no black people in positions of authority over me, or representing my interests (except, I guess, that lady who pretends to be the Queen when the Queen is unavailable); they’re large numbers of women.
OF,
“I would say it is true by inspection.”
Yeah right. I’m sure an assertion of “true by inspection” when coupled with some old time religion about the heroics of the oppressed will get you an A in some Skool of Victim Studies course. I’ve noticed that you’ve waffled from the original claim that the experience of oppression yields a relative increase in telepathy – that the oppressed somehow know more about “what the oppressors are thinking.”
“Do you seriously question that dual mechanism?” Of course I do, because this dual mechanism you posit is facile and shallow. Only in this age of postmodern silliness would we even consider weighing oppression in terms of the relative rates of media consumption.
Your claim is just a cartoon view of social dynamics. I never went to Victim Studies Skool, but I’m not exactly going out on a limb when I note that an oppressed person usually has a lot more to fear from the oppressed person right next to them than they do from some far away, lever-pulling oppressor. So when it comes to matters of survival, you’d best maintain your vigilant eye on the poor sod next to you, rather than cracking the books and listening to podcasts about High Oppressor Culture. As the old story goes, it isn’t important to outrun the oppressive bear – the real worry is whether you can get the jump on any nearby oppressed bear food.
Speaking of media, I just watched Ken Burn’s documentary on the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge. Consider some poor tramp that, suckered with the promise of a day’s wages that he desperately needs for his family, or for alcohol, descends into the New York caisson. So there, working beneath the East River, the pressure of thousands of tons of stone above pushes killing nitrogen into his bloodstream. The weight of oppression indeed. There he is, digging into the sand, heedless of the New York commercial and real estate interests that are pressing down upon him. Standpoint Epistemology would have you believe that when he struggles home to Five Points, finally dying in the streets from the bends, he knows more about the experience of the Mr. and Mrs. John Jacob Astor than they know about his eexpeerience. Feminist Standpoint Epistemology would have you believe that, while Mr. and Mrs. Astor might both be relatively ignorant about our little tramp, Mrs. Astor clearly understands a bit more. After all, she’s oppressed too.
“I don’t know of any studies, but do you really think this is unbelievable?”
I see. So it isn’t about considering a hypothesis and coming up with some measures to test whether some supposed dynamic really occurs in the world. It is about “believability.” About whether we can maintain belief in a narrative that is stirring and gratifying to some. Well, if you don’t bother to even consider the possibility of an evidentiary test, I think your faith will remain rock solid.
Yes, Brian, you are indeed reading your own interpretations in here.
Sam, yes, you are quoting a portion of a very long article discussing different types of “feminist standpoint theory” and claiming that because some practicioners of this theory may believe that women are always right about gender issues, I am wrong. Am I missing something?
Mythago,
where did I say you’re wrong. I agreed with your assertion about Cleveland.
Maybe my point would have been clearer if I hadn’t omitted an “IF” in this part -
*IF* You believe in this axiomatic framework, you believe that her opinion is always more valid than yours – if you want to keep your personal attitude and your public stance “congruentâ€, as Hugo claims. Hence the eggshell question.
Personally, I believe that much of the feminist thought structure rests on this kind of epistemology. But that’s a different point.
Brian: “Now, maybe I read my own interpretations into Sam, but it’s worth noting that Mythago and Oldfeminist jump to (essentially) a discussion of debating women’s experiences, when Sam addresses it more generally. ”
This after I discussed the issue in terms of Black and White culture. *sigh*.
Brian: “And it’s true, I don’t really have to interact with black people if I don’t want to (this is made especially easy living in a country where only two percent of people are black).”
In many places you do have to interact with Black people. But you don’t have to interact with Black culture. For instance, if I go to the MVA to get my license renewed, there’s a good chance I will deal with a Black clerk or manager. But that person speaks to me in “standard English” or close enough; if they couldn’t, they would not get the job.
Just as women are all over the place, but they operate in men’s culture, not women’s, most of the time when in mixed-gender groups.
Yes, inevitably because of their numbers, we have to have things like women’s bathrooms and such. But for the most part, when entering a traditionally male environment (e.g. not at home with the babies and the stove), women adapted to male culture.
STF: “I’ve noticed that you’ve waffled from the original claim that the experience of oppression yields a relative increase in telepathy – that the oppressed somehow know more about “what the oppressors are thinking.—
I didn’t waffle from that. Unless you think that culture represents what a group is *not* thinking, I would posit that someone who’s immersed in a culture has a good idea of what members of that culture are thinking, and someone who avoids that culture has less of an idea what members of that culture are thinking. To assume otherwise would be to suppose that culture is a show put on to fool the enemy.
STF: “So it isn’t about considering a hypothesis and coming up with some measures to test whether some supposed dynamic really occurs in the world. It is about “believability.—
I came up with the hypothesis. The lab we all have in which dozens of volunteers are at our beck and call was closed when I posted.
You have just the same responsibility to show that your claim is true, that oppressors know more about the oppressed than the other way around. Yours is not the null hypothesis.
Again, you think it’s absurd that the poor caisson worker “knows more about the experience of the Mr. and Mrs. John Jacob Astor than they know about his eexpeerience”?
The Astors are featured in the newspapers and the radio. He’s not. His wife’s daily work doesn’t make the newsreels; the Astors and their ilk do. So, yes, the poor know more about rich people than the rich know about poor people.
OF:
“Unless you think that culture represents what a group is *not* thinking, I would posit that someone who’s immersed in a culture has a good idea of what members of that culture are thinking, and someone who avoids that culture has less of an idea what members of that culture are thinking.”
Our lowly sandhog is immersed in mud and high-pressure air, not Mr. and Mrs. Astor’s culture. While they may be mentioned in the society pages, I’m doubtful our sandhog is mulling over what to order that night in Delmonicos, where to summer in Europe, or anticipating his daughter’s debut.
“You have just the same responsibility to show that your claim is true, that oppressors know more about the oppressed than the other way around.”
What claim did I make? I’m just waiting for you to produce evidence of your claims about the respective knowledge that the oppressed and the oppressors have of each others thinking, instead of just asserting vague believability.
“The Astors are featured in the newspapers and the radio. He’s not. His wife’s daily work doesn’t make the newsreels; the Astors and their ilk do. So, yes, the poor know more about rich people than the rich know about poor people.”
There you go again, confusing media representations with first hand knowledge.
Reducing an opponent’s views to caricature or indefensible absolutes is a good way to attack them, I agree.
STF:
“Our lowly sandhog is immersed in mud and high-pressure air, not Mr. and Mrs. Astor’s culture. While they may be mentioned in the society pages, I’m doubtful our sandhog is mulling over what to order that night in Delmonicos, where to summer in Europe, or anticipating his daughter’s debut.”
I didn’t say that the “lowly sandhog” knows more about high culture than his own. I said that he knows more about rich people than they do about him.
“What claim did I make? I’m just waiting for you to produce evidence of your claims about the respective knowledge that the oppressed and the oppressors have of each others thinking, instead of just asserting vague believability.”
Your perception is that it’s vague. I asked why you find it unbelievable, and you don’t explain why. I think it’s because you can’t come up with anything better than argument by repeated assertion.
You claim I have to have a hypothesis and then gather data. You won’t accept just reasoning and observation. Should I respond to you asking you to prove your claims? Again, what you seem to think of as the null hypothesis, isn’t, so your “is not” is just as much an assertion as my “is”.
“There you go again, confusing media representations with first hand knowledge.”
Thanks Ronnie.
I never said the “lowly sandhog” has first hand knowledge of rich people’s culture.
And great job avoiding the actual topic, women and their knowledge of men’s culture, or even the other example I gave, Black people and their knowledge of White culture. Women aren’t segregated from men like the “lowly sandhog” is. They see male culture up close and personal.
“Your perception is that it’s vague. I asked why you find it unbelievable, and you don’t explain why.”
My original statement was that you were spouting complete and utter nonsense, making a grand, cosmic pronouncement that the oppressed have more knowledge of what oppressors are thinking, and that they have a broader perspective on things. I ask you for evidence to justify this universal claim and all you do is produce a mix of stereotypical generalities about Blacks and Whites, who watches Seinfeld or CSI, and who gets to go where.
You use media as a proxy for culture, which is a gross simplification. Even if it was a valid proxy, you ignore that fact that quite often any knowledge you gain from media is useless, because significant aspects of the media are exploitative, escapist or wishful-thinking narratives. You talk about marginalized cultures, but you ignore the fact that sometimes oppressors pay special attention to these cultures because they seem exotic. You don’t account for the dismissive scorn that the oppressed might have for the oppressive culture you claim there is no escape from – never mind that countercultures develop because they form an attractive place of respite. You claim that survival demands that the oppressed know what their oppressors are thinking, yet you have no answer to my supposition that when you are really oppressed it may be more beneficial for your survival to focus all your attention on the oppressed people near you.
“You won’t accept just reasoning and observation.”
No, when it comes to universal claims, of course not. Your observations are few, they lack any depth or nuance, and they are clearly not falsifiable, So why should I believe you have discovered some universal pattern of knowledge?
I’ve made no claims about who knows more about each other, the oppressed or the oppressors. It seems to me at the sandhog-Astor extremes, they may as well be in two different galaxies as far as what they know about each others lives. Or cultures. Between those two extremes it seems just a fearsome muddle, where even the roles of oppressor and oppressed are often unclear, let alone what they might know of each other. So yeah, in the absence of any broad evidence, much less clear and convincing evidence, there is no reason to doubt the null hypothesis that there is no relation between relative oppression and relative knowledge.
And so back to the topic. “[Women] see male culture up close and personal.” Sorry, women in general see the same mass – not male – culture as everyone else. They have experiences of those men they’ve come into contact with, just as men have had experiences of women they’ve come into contact with. I see no reason to expect that, in general, women know more about gender relations than men. Or vice versa. Neither gender deserves a privileged voice in any discussion, or deserves a privileged hearing, just because of their gender.
What this debate comes back to, and why I share the same skepticism that STF and SS have over I guess what is called standpoint epistemology or “oppressor/oppressed” dynamics, or whatever we’re calling it these days, is some grand conception of “privilege” or “power”. These seem very much talked about in grand terms as some sort of invariant absolutes on which human experience turns, but are very poorly described or explained, as though they are some sort of phlogiston or aether that explain all human experience the way those substances were once thought to mysteriously and inexplicably govern the natural world. We can see Oldfeminist, when pressed here, defaulting to subjective reason and observation, such that it comes near to resembling a “Just So story”.
What I observe is that power is always contextual and relative to a particular environment and a particular discourse. It exists and is practiced always within a specific framework that allows for one party to be able to do something or to do something better that the other party cannot do as easily. In other words, absolute “power”, if it even exists, is usually meaningless. A classic example is the rich, white, Western businessman trying to negotiate prices with one of several possible low-margin suppliers in a non-Western developing country with an export-oriented-economy (say, China, for the purposes of this example). The Western businessman may have greater “power” in absolute terms than any of his prospective suppliers, in terms of absolute wealth, resources, reputation and credit, and what have you. He may have his pick of which suppliers he will buy from, while they will be forced either to sell or go out of business. His suppliers, however, may well have better information regarding the actual product, the underlying production processes, the local market of other suppliers, their own upstream suppliers, and a great deal of other information that determines what an actual reasonably competitive price in that market is likely to be. Should the entire group of suppliers decide to collude against him, he isn’t likely to know of it, much less be able to stop them. In the context of this particular transaction, the greater absolute “power” of the foreign businessman is unlikely to carry against the greater relative power of the suppliers in this particular exchange.
Just as women are all over the place, but they operate in men’s culture, not women’s, most of the time when in mixed-gender groups.
Yes, inevitably because of their numbers, we have to have things like women’s bathrooms and such. But for the most part, when entering a traditionally male environment (e.g. not at home with the babies and the stove), women adapted to male culture.
Again, the same point, getting maleness wrong. Mixed gender groups have a culture of their own, that isn’t male culture or female culture. Coming into the workplace, women adapted to male culture; male culture where women showed up adapted to them too (and I have seen it where it hasn’t; it isn’t the same thing at all). Now, one can argue men have more than their fair share in creating it, I don’t have a metric for that, so I don’t know.
This after I discussed the issue in terms of Black and White culture.
That you think you can discuss the issue in terms of Black and White means you’ve either completely missed on maleness or whiteness. I can’t say for certain, though I assume it’s maleness, because white privilege is roughly like heterosexual privilege is roughly like cisgender privilege (I have only a very marginal ability to speak to class privilege). If male privilege exists (it certainly can in context; but I won’t conceed some across the board deal), it isn’t remotely like the others.
STF: “My original statement was that you were spouting complete and utter nonsense, making a grand, cosmic pronouncement that the oppressed have more knowledge of what oppressors are thinking, and that they have a broader perspective on things.”
Than the oppressor has of the oppressed.
You act as if I said all oppressed people are magically smart. They’re not, they just hear a lot more about their supposed superiors than the superiors hear about them. And unless you think the media is all lies, in which case we can only trust what we see with our eyes, then you have to admit that the oppressed hear more about the oppressors than vice versa.
And even if they don’t, the oppressor is allowed to speak everywhere, and the oppressed, not so much. So even if we only count actually talking to each other, the oppressed is not going to say things that upset the oppressor, for obvious reasons.
“why should I believe you have discovered some universal pattern of knowledge?”
Nice way to say “I don’t believe you because you’re stupid.”
And nice job on still ignoring White versus Black culture. Again. Maybe it’s too easy to sound like an ignorant racist when you try, no matter how “nuanced” and “deep” you try to be.
STFL “You use media as a proxy for culture, which is a gross simplification. Even if it was a valid proxy, you ignore that fact that quite often any knowledge you gain from media is useless, because significant aspects of the media are exploitative, escapist or wishful-thinking narratives.”
And you don’t think that exploitative, escapist or wishful-thinking narratives written by men for men have something to do with what men are thinking (and feeling)? Wow.
You learn what people wish were true, what they want to have happen. It’s not factual to say that there is a guy named Clark Kent who’s actually from another planet and secretly jumps into a costume when he can fly and has superhuman strength and speed and superpowers and uses them for good, but the woman who works next to him doesn’t recognize his inner strength and prefers the guy in the flashy clothes who’s *the same guy*. But that this is what men see themselves as in some sense.
STF: “You claim that survival demands that the oppressed know what their oppressors are thinking, yet you have no answer to my supposition that when you are really oppressed it may be more beneficial for your survival to focus all your attention on the oppressed people near you.”
Why should they not know both? You speak as if this is either/or.
You need to know oppressor culture when you are in school. You need to know oppressor culture when you have to interact with legal, political, and economic authority. The very lowest of the low may get by without it — but that is part of what makes them the lowest of the low.
Apply this idea to women. Suggesting that women spend more of their time fighting one another instead of fighting The Man is a lovely masculinist catfight theory, one that’s well subscribed. “Women are meaner to each other than men are.” Except that, when they do fight among themselves, what they are fighting for isn’t usually approbation from other women. They still fighting to be accepted by male standards, to win at male games. Are they the prettiest, skinniest, biggest tits, best booty, best blowjob, and as a result do they have the best richest husband?
The standard and the goal are decided by the dominant male gendered culture. The prize is given by the dominant male culture. They learn each others’ strengths and weaknesses only as a means to an end.
STF: “I’ve made no claims about who knows more about each other, the oppressed or the oppressors.”
Yes you have, you’ve claimed they’re equal.
I do not accept the idea that the null hypothesis here is that there is no difference in knowledge. The null hypothesis, if anything, is that whatever a person is exposed to in the media, in school, and directly from others becomes their knowledge. I don’t think you can make a good argument that we learn everything there is regardless of whether we are exposed to it.
So. More exposure for the Astors than the sandhogs. More exposure for mainstream ideas than minority ideas. More exposure for masculinist sexist ideals than feminist ones. More exposure to what men think than what women think.
Simple example of the last — The ratio of opinion pieces in newspapers written by men to ones written by women is about 4 to 1.
Hence person X will know more about the Astors, mainstream ideas, what men think.
Yes, some people reject the mainstream notions. But they wouldn’t be mainstream if most people reject them! Your claim falls apart.
STF: “there is no reason to doubt the null hypothesis that there is no relation between relative oppression and relative knowledge”
I have explained the mechanism, in more detail with each response. You decided I’m too dumb to have come up with a great idea, and therefore it’s got to be wrong.
You disagree about whether mass culture is gendered, about whether mass culture represents real culture in any way, about whether the roles of oppressor and oppressed are clear enough in enough circumstances for there to be any effect on discourse and knowledge of one another, what the null hypothesis is in this case, and probably a dozen other points just on this issue.
Sure. That doesn’t prevent us from making general observations, or noting that in most contexts and environments, certain power structures and privileges exist.
For example, if you move to Crown Heights or walk into Mea Sharim, if you’re not Jewish, you’re in the minority. The majority culture will be Ashkenazic. That doesn’t negate the point that in most of America, Christian cultural norms prevail and Jews are a minority.
OF
You claim to have discovered a pattern of knowledge in the world: That the oppressed know more about what oppressors are thinking than oppressors know about what the oppressed are thinking. It is a variant of standpoint epistemology, one that focuses more on knowledge then sensitivity to and clarity about injustice.
I ask for evidence of your claim. You claim it is “true by inspection”
Our exchanges have been a series of examples and anecdotes, where you give examples of why the oppressed would know more about what the oppressed are thinking, and I give examples where the oppressed would gain no such knowledge, or only illusory knowledge.
“And unless you think the media is all lies, in which case we can only trust what we see with our eyes, then you have to admit that the oppressed hear more about the oppressors than vice versa.”
I point out again that your examples are chock full of media this, media that. Which tells me that while you have stated the law in universal terms, you have trouble thinking outside of affluent, media intensive societies now, or in the past.
Second, lies have nothing to do with hearing. Large numbers of the oppressed have little or no access to the media, or little time for it. Some oppressed groups take great delight consuming exploitative stuff about other oppressed groups. Some oppressors make money by funding wish-fulfilling escapism to the oppressed, and some members of oppressed groups get a leg up by assisting that effort. It seems reasonable to expect that oppressors, since they are oppressors, would have disproportionate control over the mass media, and yet somehow you seem to think that they would not exert this control in a manner that hides their true nature. Or that they wouldn’t exert this control in a manner that deflects the concerns of the oppressed elsewhere. Marx considered religion the opiate of the masses. You seem to believe that mass media is the magic mushroom of the oppressed masses – something that lifts the scales from their eyes, and tells them what oppressors are thinking.
Sorry – the world just isn’t as black and white as you suppose. I don’t have to believe anything so simple as what you said.
You said the oppressed had to know more about what oppressors were thinking, because it is a matter of survival. I said quite often oppressed people are in more danger from other oppressed people. Since survival is a pretty dramatic word, I figured you meant the risks of death from sickness, starvation or murder. How silly of me. From your last note, you think that one example where survival is at stake is High School lunch table intrigue over who gets to make the cheerleader squad.
OF: “And you don’t think that exploitative, escapist or wishful-thinking narratives written by men for men have something to do with what men are thinking (and feeling)? Wow.
You learn what people wish were true, what they want to have happen. It’s not factual to say that there is a guy named Clark Kent who’s actually from another planet and secretly jumps into a costume when he can fly and has superhuman strength and speed and superpowers and uses them for good, but the woman who works next to him doesn’t recognize his inner strength and prefers the guy in the flashy clothes who’s *the same guy*. But that this is what men see themselves as in some sense.”
Makes sense. And soap operas and romance novels probably tell you something about how women see themselves. Indian software developers might gain some marginal benefit in dealing with Microsoft executives from watching Hollywood movies. Microsoft executives might gain some marginal advantage managing Indian software developers by watching Bollywood moves. Again, all this is just a muddle to me, and I lack your razor sharp clarity about the universal law of oppressor and oppressed knowledge.
“You need to know oppressor culture when you have to interact with legal, political, and economic authority.”
Authority is not the same as oppressor culture, and interactions with authority do not necessarily tell you anything about what oppressors are thinking. Quite often you need to interact with people who are only slightly above you in the pecking order. Mr. Astor is not personally hawking sandhog jobs in the streets of lower Manhattan. He invests in companies that hire underlings, who hire other underlings, who hire other underlings who do the hawking. So the promise of cash from some seedy hawker in the streets of lower Manhattan tells our sandhog exactly nothing of what Mr. and Mrs Astor are thinking. Similarly Bill Gates hires executives who engage Indian executives to manage other Indians. You find it significant that an Indian job applicant might surmise that Bill Gates may have read Superman comics as a kid. I fail to see the significance.
“The very lowest of the low may get by without it [knowledge of opressor culture] — but that is part of what makes them the lowest of the low.”
Finally, an acknowledgement that our sandhog doesn’t know really anything about oppressor culture. Before you were arguing that reading about Mr. and Mrs. Astor in the newspapers gave him some insight into their inner lives, and more generally you were arguing that knowledge of oppressor culture was essential for his nsurvival. The supposedly universal law fails once again, because apparently there are some oppressions so deep that they yield no knowledge of what oppressors are thinking.
STF: “I’ve made no claims about who knows more about each other, the oppressed or the oppressors.â€
OF: “Yes you have, you’ve claimed they’re equal.
I do not accept the idea that the null hypothesis here is that there is no difference in knowledge. The null hypothesis, if anything, is that whatever a person is exposed to in the media, in school, and directly from others becomes their knowledge. I don’t think you can make a good argument . . .”
Let me explain what I think a null hypothesis is. It is an alternative to a hypothesis, in this case your initial claim that oppressed people know more about what their oppressors are thinking than oppressors know about what they are thinking. That’s the hypothesis. The null hypothesis is the antithesis of that: what I said was that there is no relation between relative oppression and relative knowledge.
It is like you are making a claim that a coin is biased – by astute observation you have determined that the rascally oppressors have introduced a biased coin into the casino – one that is more likely to turn up heads, and you have discovered this ruse. I claim there is no evidence for that – the null hypothesis is that these are not special coins.
You don’t have to prove a null hypothesis. You prove a claim by designing a measure that can reject the null hypothesis at a certain statistical confidence level.
Your statement reduces to this. You pick pairs of people, one sandhog and one Astor. You measure their respective knowledge and you determine which of them knows more about what the other is thinking. You are saying the person who knows more about the other is likely to be the sandhog. You are saying the coin of relative knowledge is biased. I am saying there is no reason to believe that without evidence.
Heretofore, all you are doing is saying why you think that is true, and you are giving reasons and justifications why it might be true. I explain why I think those reasons and justifications are not strong enough to conclude bias.
The burden of proof is on you. There are tools and techniques to do this – social scientists do this all the time. They are not perfect, but they are far better than the theological certainties of Victim Studies Skool. You can state your universal claim all you want, but absent evidence, it should be treated like what it is: nonsense. All you are doing is giving examples, each a toss of the coin where you shout with excitement at each head, and whenever a tail comes up you say: “well, I didn’t really mean was totally biased. I just said it was somewhat biased. And look! – there’s another head.”
“You disagree about whether mass culture is gendered, about whether mass culture represents real culture in any way, about whether the roles of oppressor and oppressed are clear enough in enough circumstances for there to be any effect on discourse and knowledge of one another, what the null hypothesis is in this case, and probably a dozen other points just on this issue.”
It seems to me that mass culture is necessarily gendered, since humans are gendered and mass culture is influenced by and influences both genders. I have no idea what you mean by real culture, but the introduction of such a term shows you are all over the place in this. Of course culture affects discourse, but it does so in the same manner that gravity affects both biased and unbiased coins.