I‘ve got a nice long review essay on Michael Kimmel’s new book Angry White Men: American Masculinity at the End of an Era up at the American Prospect. Check it out!
Categories
Check out my review of Michael Kimmel’s Angry White Men on The American Prospect
RE: daintydougal
Yeah, but how many MRAs are actually medical-grade delusional, honestly? I dunno that I want to play with that kind of stuff.
No, I know you’re right. I guess words are just used far too loosely. Another thing I’ve found from creepily lurking here are gender words. If I say ladies and gentleman I always now qualify it, like, and everyone in between, but then there are those who aren’t necessarily in between…then I get in a knot.
STUPID LANGUAGE
“our age’s most prominent discontents: the men’s rights movement.”
Lol c’mon, even you can’t possibly believe that. Compare the money and industry given to the civil rights “social justice” crowd, then look at MRAs, it’s not even close. See if you exaggerate that much, it’s hard to take the rest of your essay seriously.
Also, it is in the interest of the nation to privilege males of the majority ethnic/racial group, even if it fosters inequality. They’re the power base of your society – the most nationalistic and vigilante people and usually the first to react to competitive threats. In fact, declining societies are often marked by excessive concern for women and minorities instead of outward projection of power and influence. Sounds alot like America, yes?
Also double linked
Oh and I also have to add, there is very little in the MRA crowd that would count as “hate” outside of Western countries. Maybe a little in the PUA crowd, but it’s still not that bad. Hardly “white hot rage” unless you live in really SWPL areas.
I think the only requirement for something like the men’s rights movement to exist is for it to have momentum. We know from Fox News and their ilk that grievances need not be based on reality, it’s perfectly possible to engineer a world made out of lies where you simply pile up disingenuous arguments, selective reading of news and made up statistics with the final goal of having a construction designed to attract people of a certain psychological profile that are vulnerable to feelings of disenfranchisement and general paranoia. Once enough people are trapped in this world view it basically becomes self-sustainable, because they are too emotionally invested and there might be many people with financial interests as well. And even when the societal changes that are speculated to have sparked the movement disappear, this will not matter for a long time because of inertia.
And well, there don’t even need to be actual grievances, as opposed to imagined ones, it’s for a large part about force of arguments. That’s why the men’s rights movement largely consists of people that like to argue things on the internet, because that’s the group that is the most exposed to these sort of arguments. You only need a vulnerable subsection to lure to the men’s rights movement.
What about using pluralized language for gender neutral? They, them, their
I use ‘they’ all the time. It has the added bonus of allowing me to be both gender AND number neutral, which is handy for my plural friends who may not want to get outed.
I’ve started using “dear gentlefolk” for that one, daintydougal. Seems to cover the overall intent, and has the advantage of actually being shorter, rather than adding an extra clause, which causes a lot of mental resistance.
On ‘delusional’: Yes, it should be avoided, but I admit, “believes things that are obviously completely wrongheaded, no matter how often confronted by the evidence to the contrary” just lacks a good single-word option.
RE: Freemage
Wrongheaded? Dense? Impervious to facts?
“Oh and I also have to add, there is very little in the MRA crowd that would count as “hate” outside of Western countries. ”
Just because child brides and martial rape are still legal in some countries doesn’t make it okay or acceptable for people to want to return to that. FFS.
Freemage, LBT — denser than a black hole.
*marital
Fucking spelling
LBT,
Dense is equivalent to retarded in my neck of the woods. I wouldn’t use that word.
Oops, I wondered if that would get me moderated,
LBT,
Dense is equivalent to r*tarded in my neck of the woods. I wouldn’t use that word.
I just have to say that bodycrimes’ take on this is brilliant, if you haven’t yet read it.
http://bodycrimes.wordpress.com/
Oop. Thanks, daintydougal! Lesson learned. <.<
Unfortunately it does, and it’s the go-to word of Asshat Atheists too. I’ve been called delusional by chucklefucks like that, to which I can only say I think my delusion’s made me a whole lot happier than their “reality,”.
Wilfully-anything is definitely workable for these creeps. Wilfully obtuse, wilfully ignorant …
freemage – I like gentlefolks. I also like Mr K’s choice, “persons.” He tends to use that instead of “people,” not sure why.
Of the suggestions offered, I like “Impervious to facts”–there’s that deliberate willfulness that needs to be stressed.
Best insult I’ve heard, that wasn’t one of pecunium’s vocab lessons? Houseplant.
Hey, houseplants are good! Kitties like chewing ’em, they’re decorative and soothing and generally nice to have around. Can’t say any of that about MRAs (though I bet if a big enough kitty got hold of ’em, they’d get chewed).
Now the question is whether kitty thinks MRAs taste yummy. I’m not inclined to torment kitties with MRA for dinner.
@Argenti
pecunium would probably use ‘mango’ instead. 🙂
nah. I hope the kitty just bats the mra around for a while. I’d hate to think of the tummy aches the kitty could get if it actually chewed on the mra
That is perfect. And almost all the synonyms, too…
Is “blockheaded” ablist? I have a math block, so I’m on the fence with that one. Or does it connote more the wooden kind of block, as I think it does? MRAssholes are a bunch of real Pinocchios, without the latter’s basic attempts at goodness. Too bad their noses don’t grow…
I’m thinking of lions, tigers, jaguars … I think their tummies would be tough enough to deal with even such poor food as an MRA would be.
http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/9c/c8/42/9cc8428c44924924a056a2cb5e59515d.jpg
No, it is NOT. Precisely BECAUSE it fosters inequality. Inequality leads to insecurity and lowered quality of life. Here, have a little light reading. And until you actually know what you’re talking about, kindly STFU.
@Cloudiah,
*squees* Animals? Puns? Obscure words? Internet memes? This hits so many of my buttons, and I love it.
@Opium,
I was told that “they” was for a person of unknown gender, and “ze” (or “zie”) was for someone of known, nonbinary gender (unless they use something else). To use “ze” for a man or woman would be misgendering, just as using “s/he” to refer to a nonbinary-gendered person.
@ Dumb & Dumber
Cetatian needed. Also, lol @ equality being “excessive concern”.
GB2 Stormfront with this bullshit. This is a posteriori reasoning at its finest.
Unless you ask the women in those countries, but I guess they don’t count. Also, I thought you people hated cultural relativism?
*Cetacean. Damn it!
I thought ze/zie etc were meant to include everyone, regardless of gender. But I’ve only seen them used or talked about here, so my knowledge is kinda limited.
“I thought ze/zie etc were meant to include everyone, regardless of gender”
I thought the same, that is why the word seems so handy (iif I knew how to pronounce it, does zie rhyme with pie or fee?)
they for a singlet feels like a misnumbering and I don’t like to be referenced with they.
RE: Argenti
Best insult I’ve heard, that wasn’t one of pecunium’s vocab lessons? Houseplant.
I’m honored.
RE: talacaris
they for a singlet feels like a misnumbering
Thing is, I know genderqueer singlets who use ‘they,’ and I also don’t know if a lot of folks are singlet or not. Since I have some plural friends who flip their shit if they aren’t conjugated properly, ‘they’ seems to be the safest base-coverer for all my friends. I won’t use it for you.
” I won’t use it for you.” Thanks
I was thinking if zie couldn’t be constructed as number indeterminate word (I don’t think the use is fixed in most people’s minds), that would be really handy.
Interesting; I’ve never associated “they” with someone thinking of me as multi, though that’s hardly surprising. I’m cushioned enough not to be bothered by what pronoun people use of me; on the odd occasion I get misgendered it’s usually because of my gravatar, and it amuses me (“that’s not MY portrait yanno”).
Oh, speaking of amusing, I told the boss about Prester John/Drunken James’s efforts last night and how he said I’d an attempted mass murderer in my gravatar.
“But how do you know Katie hasn’t attempted mass murder?” the boss asked.
@Kittehs
The boss has a point there.
I’m aware that “they” has been used as a gender-neutral singular pronoun for years. It’s how I use it on academic papers (because I’m not sure if my professor would accept zie/zir/zirs). So I’m accustomed to using it as such. *shrug*
Of course, if people request me not to use it, I’ll honor that request. So don’t worry talacaris, I’ll try to remember to use zie/zir/zirs instead of they/them/theirs.
He does. I reckon she’d do it if she could, and the fancy took her.
Yeah, talacaris, if you prefer ze, by all means! I’ve just only seen it used in singlet style.
All cats could.
http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/4e/3d/03/4e3d038e8ddbd242de624114d8813521.jpg
http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/4e/3d/03/4e3d038e8ddbd242de624114d8813521.jpg
I’m quite partial to the singular “they”, myself; even Shakespeare and Jane Austen have used it, and the English major in me likes the fact that a commonly used non-gender-specific term has such a long (if unofficial) history. (I’m guessing that use was not so uncommon even then, regardless of what the prissy old “he”-purists may say.) Lots of my Facebook friends are using it, and I’ve been using it myself, casually, for as long as I can remember.
I also must admit to being confused by the whole hir/zie/ze/zir thing, partly because it’s new and not fully standardized, and partly because I keep hearing someone speaking pidgin Dutch in my head whenever I see it. I can’t help it, and I’m not proud of the fact. Gotta work on that, I guess…I hope I don’t come off as bigoted if I muff it!
BTW, does anyone recall that recent-ish news item about some high school kids who spontaneously started using “yo” as a non-gender-specific singular pronoun? I thought that was also interesting.
Oh yeah, I heard about yo ages ago.
One of the kids here uses ze/zer/zers. We know some GQ folks who would rather drop dead than be called ze, others who avoid they because of too many multi pals around, and so on. People have different preferences, and that’s okay.
Ah, the joys of the confusing English language…I kind of envy the Swedes, who were able to easily make a third-gender/nonspecific pronoun for their language. And I can’t honestly say I blame anyone currently learning ESL who’s seeing all this pronoun debate and throwing up their hands in confusion. I often do, and I’ve been speaking it all my life, and even majored in it…
I couldn’t resist.
http://i.imgur.com/TDemhE5.jpg
Serrana that is the greatest
That picture
I died
serrana – DAMN YOU AND YOUR PUNNINESS. DAMN YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!
Bwahahahahha!
Cloudiah gets most of the credit.
Serrana, you took a silly pun and you really committed to it. ::applause:: 🙂
“I kind of envy the Swedes, who were able to easily make a third-gender/nonspecific pronoun for their language.”
“Hen” , which btw is a loanword from Finnish I think, is not so commonally accepted, and it has been great debate if it should be used. One common ridicule is pointing to the words meaning in English.