In response to Brandon's post "Intersectionality" (12/2/2012):
The idea of identifying as a 'humanist' is intriguing and, I believe, wise. However, are all smaller-category labels harmful? I would argue that they are not. Labels such as feminism and masculism have two components - firstly, they apply to a certain issue (gender inequality) and secondly, they take up a certain side on that issue (women's rights or men's rights, respectively). The second part is, I think, most definitely a problem, because it excludes people. Masculism, by focusing only on men's rights, ignores women, and feminism does the reverse. One cannot benefit from both, since (currently) society recognizes each person as only a man or only a woman.
The first part, on the other hand, does not seem problematic. Gender inequality effects all people because all people have a gender orientation - even agendered people are distinguishable by their lack of gender. By addressing the issue of gender equality, one is not excluding anyone, although one might well be ignoring various other issues. I think that choosing labels for different issues can help people by breaking down the vast conglomeration of social ills facing today's society into manageable chunks without excluding anyone. While the ideal social activist is aware of all inequalities and works to right them, in reality it is very difficult for someone to effectively advocate for everything at once. Instead, people usually specialise, supporting the rights of all people but putting the majority of their efforts into eliminating inequality based on one factor. Thus, while I promote the extinction of exclusive labels, like feminism and masculism, or gay rights and queer rights, I support the existence of inclusive but issue-specific labels, such as gender egalitarianism or non-discrimination regarding sexuality. I also like the idea of an umbrella label, like human rights, to increase awareness of the multitude of issues while not forcing anyone to attempt to spread their effort out too thinly.
Sunday, December 2, 2012
Seeing Differently - Sex-based Advantages
The articles we read for class suggested that certain groups - in the reading, specifically women - have an advantage in seeing the world objectively. While I do not agree with the articles' reasoning, I do think that sex-based advantages exist, and that it would be a mistake to attempt to erase these from existence.
For example, many people are outraged by the rarity of female engineers and mathematicians. Less well-known, but still just as marked, is the rarity of male clothing designers and decorators. While some of this employment inequality is certainly societal, some of it may be biologically based. Research has suggested that, due to mental structures, men have a tendency to be better than women at mathematics (although this is far from a rule, of course; many women are very good at math, and many men are very bad) and women, due to optical structures, tend to have better colour perception than men (although, again, this is not universal. Some men have excellent colour perception, and some women have a lot of difficulty distinguishing colours) - women really do see differently from men. These tendencies skew various careers in favour of one gender or another.
Due to this, I think that efforts to balance careers by gender - trying to force various career workforces to be composed of 50% and 50% men (or a little less of each, allowing for non-binary people) - ignores the fact that there really are sex-based differences, and would probably result in an overall less skilled workforce, and potential employees would be excluded on the grounds of their genders. Nor, however, do I think that employers should base their employee choosing on assumptions about which gender will be better at the particular job they need to do - this would also result in a less skilled workforce, as most sex-based tendencies are not all that strong, and have many exceptions. Instead, I think that employers should evaluate people based on their individual abilities.
For example, many people are outraged by the rarity of female engineers and mathematicians. Less well-known, but still just as marked, is the rarity of male clothing designers and decorators. While some of this employment inequality is certainly societal, some of it may be biologically based. Research has suggested that, due to mental structures, men have a tendency to be better than women at mathematics (although this is far from a rule, of course; many women are very good at math, and many men are very bad) and women, due to optical structures, tend to have better colour perception than men (although, again, this is not universal. Some men have excellent colour perception, and some women have a lot of difficulty distinguishing colours) - women really do see differently from men. These tendencies skew various careers in favour of one gender or another.
Due to this, I think that efforts to balance careers by gender - trying to force various career workforces to be composed of 50% and 50% men (or a little less of each, allowing for non-binary people) - ignores the fact that there really are sex-based differences, and would probably result in an overall less skilled workforce, and potential employees would be excluded on the grounds of their genders. Nor, however, do I think that employers should base their employee choosing on assumptions about which gender will be better at the particular job they need to do - this would also result in a less skilled workforce, as most sex-based tendencies are not all that strong, and have many exceptions. Instead, I think that employers should evaluate people based on their individual abilities.
Flawed Labels
In response to Skyla's post "Feminism vs. Masculinism" (12/2/2012):
I think that both feminism and masculinism (or masculism) are unfortunately biased. Feminism, as determined by its linguistic roots and the actions and views of the majority of feminists, focuses on fixing social issues by granting women more rights, so that they will not have less rights than men in any area. However, feminism neglects areas in which men are less privileged than women, such as in cases of criminal law, child custody, and sexual assault prevention. Masculism (contrary to what Skyla says in her article; she may have unknowingly gone to a radical site and obtained misleading information) focuses on remedying the ways in which men have less rights than women - including, but not limited to, the areas I mentioned above. However, it does nothing about areas in which women are less privileged than men.
Thus, I believe that both views are severely lacking. Both labels, in addition, are tainted by their linkage to significant numbers of radicals - radical feminists who believe that men have no problems (or deserve the ones which they do have), are evil and inferior to women, and as such must be reduced to a lesser state in society, and radical masculists who believe that women are taking over the world, or that the misogynistic culture of the American past was the ideal society. Some people attempt to compensate for the lacking areas in both feminism and masculism by identifying with both labels, but this ignores the existence of people outside the gender binary, such as agendered, androgynous, or genderqueer individuals. These obvious deficiencies in feminism and masculism are why I choose to identify as a gender egalitarian.
I think that both feminism and masculinism (or masculism) are unfortunately biased. Feminism, as determined by its linguistic roots and the actions and views of the majority of feminists, focuses on fixing social issues by granting women more rights, so that they will not have less rights than men in any area. However, feminism neglects areas in which men are less privileged than women, such as in cases of criminal law, child custody, and sexual assault prevention. Masculism (contrary to what Skyla says in her article; she may have unknowingly gone to a radical site and obtained misleading information) focuses on remedying the ways in which men have less rights than women - including, but not limited to, the areas I mentioned above. However, it does nothing about areas in which women are less privileged than men.
Thus, I believe that both views are severely lacking. Both labels, in addition, are tainted by their linkage to significant numbers of radicals - radical feminists who believe that men have no problems (or deserve the ones which they do have), are evil and inferior to women, and as such must be reduced to a lesser state in society, and radical masculists who believe that women are taking over the world, or that the misogynistic culture of the American past was the ideal society. Some people attempt to compensate for the lacking areas in both feminism and masculism by identifying with both labels, but this ignores the existence of people outside the gender binary, such as agendered, androgynous, or genderqueer individuals. These obvious deficiencies in feminism and masculism are why I choose to identify as a gender egalitarian.
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