Thinking about Talking: Keeping your cool in discussions on gender

[redqueen]

Check out this insightful teenage girl's blog.

Last week was crepe week in my French Club meeting. Everyone brought toppings and Madame brought an electric crepe maker - voila! - fine french cuisine in 5 minutes or less. There was a handful of us, and we were all waiting in line to sample the skinny pancakes when it was Mr. Tinsman’s turn. He’s a good person: generally kind, well-spoken, intelligent, ambitious and athletic. He took the crepe and paused for a moment. He then turned to me, handed me the crepe and said, “ladies first”.

With those two small words he had stirred the equalist in me (I consider myself an equalist, not a feminist)! I immediately said, “No thanks, I don’t want special treatment because of my gender.” I probably should have phrased it better, but it was the most concise way I could think to put it at the time. He was taken aback. Seeing the look on his face, I explained to him that sexism works both ways, and that for me to accept special treatment but disavow discrimination was not cool. I told him that the code of chivalry he was employing dated back to the era of the Antebellum South when women were expected to submit to men in exchange for such perks as “ladies first”.

None of it was meant spiteful, none of it was meant to be judgmental. I honestly thought that I could have an intelligent conversation about my opinions with another intelligent person! His response to me was, “Wow!! I try to do something nice and you call me a sexist!!! It’s not sexist to let ladies go first, it’s polite.” I tried to tell him that I was not calling him a sexist person, but it was no use. Later that week, he brought up the story in our french class. Another boy in my class quickly lost his mind at what I had said. “I am not a sexist, I never tell women to go into the kitchen and make me a sandwich!”, were his exact words. Why do people react to progressive ideas with such narrowed perspective and animosity?

It’s pretty difficult to be a socially progressive and outwardly opinionated teenager in today’s high school climate. It seems like every time I attempt to express an opinion to my fellow classmates they tend to respond with a limited perspective. They will take anything that I have said as a personal attack on them or their opinions and become extremely offended or unnecessarily hostile. They will brush me off as an “angry feminist” and will refuse to take anything I say seriously. And they will smile, nod, and then look at each other like I am crazy. It is infinitely frustrating to deal with. I suppose I get through these things by having a reliable outlet in blogging for PBG, but that doesn’t make it easy. A lot of times it feels like it’s just me against the rest of the world -at least through the PBG connection I can know that this isn’t true.

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http://poweredbygirl.org/blog/thinking-about-talking-keeping-your-cool-discussions-gender#

It makes me so happy to see such awareness and outspokenness at such an early age.

I hope when she grows up people are less indoctrinated. It's sad how mistaken she is in thinking those kinds of defensive, angry overreactions are limited to high schoolers.

[geek tragedy]

1. There's a bit of a double bind.

Say nothing, and the behavior continues unabated.

But, expressing discomfort runs the risk of causing the person to dig in and get defensive and retrench in their beliefs while refusing to listen. In which case worse than nothing has been accomplished.

It can be a very fine needle to thread, unfairly so.


In this case, the young woman would perhaps have been well advised to stopp after "for me to accept special treatment but disavow discrimination was not cool."

Yes, everything she said after that was equally true, and yes the young man should have been mature enough to listen to it. But, we try to communicate with the listeners we have, not the listeners we wish we had.

Side note: ugh on the "I'm an equalist not a feminist" line.

[redqueen]

2. Ha yes, well she is young.

That said, feminists in one of the Scandinavian countries stopped calling themselves feminists and started using equalists or some similar term, after deciding it was helpful to do so. So...

Also I think she was talking to a teacher. :/

[geek tragedy]

3. Yes, you're right--it was a teacher.

It's a big challenge penetrating the haze of the patriarchy. The light has to be bright enough to illuminate, but not so bright that it causes the person to wince.

[seabeyond]

4. ok. gotta say, havent fininished the snippet. BUT.... after the second paragraph

i am a gigglin' luvin this gal.

now... i will finish reading.

oh.. god, i love this girl. heart to heart hug. she is so right on.

now... i am gonna check out the site.

[redqueen]

5. My kids have got me looking at tumblr...

checked a feed tonight... kids, teens... passing around miss representation.

Gotta share this:

I’m a 17 year old white guy living in middle class America. I’ve never exactly been a supporter of feminism because that kind of thing has never really affected me personally. I don’t notice it and I don’t care about it. But in nine minutes this video has made what is truly a serious problem extremely apparent. Those “why I need feminism” posts or those slut-shaming or rape culture campaigns never convince me of anything. But this video actually did I think.
tl;dr This video kicks ass, just watch it.

And to think of all the grown ass men who see that shit and STILL don't fuckin get it.

Dare I hope?

[seabeyond]

6. yes. yEs. YES. i had son read that one article i just talked about in the other thread. he says mom,

i always KNEW you were RIGHT. right right right. i agreed with you.

made him read it anyway, lol.

yes. this is what i keep saying. the teens today are tired of seeing the adult fuck up of mid 20's and beyond. they want more. and they see this shit interfering with what they want.

oh, and there is a video in ... video .... about a woman talking about media and the imbalance and what it is creating in our society. another old hag, ok, young and cute.... totally saying what we in hof continually say that we are razzed on all over the place.

another.... we are fuckin' RIGHT.

[seabeyond]

7. here is the video. the biggest challenges women face in media

&feature=player_embedded

[redqueen]

10. Great interview, love her comments about independent and progressive media.

Have you posted that in v&m?

[seabeyond]

11. it is in V&M. that is where i pulled it from. here is the link

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1017113913

[redqueen]

12. Thanks. I hope a lot of people listen to that.

I love that she pointed out some of the few places one can go to get truly feminist and racially diverse insights... I'm a big fan of some of those sites.

[gollygee]

13. I love that interview so much

I bought the Kindle version of the book. New reading material! Yay!

[Whisp]

8. “Wow!! I try to do something nice and you call me a sexist!!!

hey fella, do something nicer by standing up to sexist jokes that your buddies might spew. Do something nice by standing up to racist and homophobic 'jokes'.

Do something that matters and takes some guts, you gutless wonder.

[redqueen]

9. What, you expect him to consider the big picture and the wider societal implications?

BUT SHE INSULTED HIM!!1!1!!@!

I'm starting to think there are some people who are so wrapped up in their own ego that they can't see anything as being about anything but themselves. They actually think everything is about them.