From the propaganda department
An item that Dawkins retweeted this morning:
Yes, that’s right, Richard, feminists get upset by a tits and ass shirt worn by the talking head for a big exciting space event, and they don’t get upset by women being shot in the head on the street.
Except no it’s not. It’s not right, it’s a lying crock of shit, and you’re a mean bullying ideologue for repeating this kind of thing.
Not to mention how fucking callous it is to use that photo to make a cheap and dishonest point about feminism.
What. An. Arsehole.
I can just feel your fierce anger. Thank you for calling Dawkins on his vile tactics.
And he somehow manages to call himself a feminist. I am amazed he can do that and still sling mud at the label every chance he gets. What has he done in the last few years to demonstrate he is a feminist, under any definition of the term, other than just making the claim?
Dawkins is absolutely correct: he’s an ardent feminist (according to himself), and he didn’t get upset about that woman being executed. Not even a tiny bit upset.
But…but…I care about the shirt AND islamic misogyny. Am I some sort of double secret probation feminist, then?
OK, this has been bugging me, and he’s just done it again. Here are Dawkins words
“One of these two pictures upsets Feminists. The other one shows the execution of a woman.”
As they say on Wikipedia, citation needed. Who are these feminists? Name one. Quote them. His previous foray was
“Obviously doesn’t apply to vast majority of feminists, among whom I count myself. But the minority are pernicious.”
Again, citation needed. Who is this minority? Name one. Quote them. Describe the harm that they do. (It was later reported that the linked cartoon does, in fact, portray a particular feminist, but Dawkins claims not to have known that when he made the Tweet.)
For all I know Dawkins is right, and these feminists do exist, and are doing harm, and we should be informed of this harm, and maybe try to mitigate it. But there is no way to know that, because Dawkins never gives specifics. It is always vague; unsourced; ungrounded; data-free.
What makes this specially mystifying–and galling–is that Dawkins is a scientist. Scientists don’t write this way in professional discourse. Say someone is pushing their flat-earth theory [http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/29/entertainment/neil-degrasse-tyson-bob-flat-earth-twitter-spat/index.html], but you have evidence that the earth is actually cube shaped. You can’t just write
“Some people think the earth is flat. In this paper, we present evidence for an alternate cubical theory.”
No, you have to begin
“The earth is widely held to be flat [1] [2][3][4][6][9][15][18]. In this paper…”
where all those numbers are footnotes, and each footnote is a citation to a paper in the peer-reviewed flat-earth literature. Look at any paper in a scientific journal. They all start this way. Citing your sources and grounding your arguments in data is at the core of the modern scientific method, going back to the Enlightenment.
Again, Dawkins is a scientist. This is the language of his profession: he lives and breaths this stuff. Then he gets on Twitter and it all goes out the window. Yes, his tweets are obnoxious, mean-spirited, toxic, destructive; but beyond all that they are just plain sloppy thinking, and that is really hard for me to understand.
Something tells me that NECSS is totally not regretting its decision to disinvite Dawkins right now.
That is contemptible of the man.
I don’t think it’s unfair to point out that Twitter feminists (for example) went nuts over the shirt but not the execution. That did actually happen, and facts matter. Of course, it’s Dear Muslima (relative privation) fallacy to say that we shouldn’t worry about the shirt because of the evils of sharia.
You don’t understand. In strict logic, “One of these two pictures upsets Feminists” is not incompatible with “Both of these two pictures upset Feminists”. Dawkins is simply making a logical point here. If we sloppy, everyday language users take him wrongly, that’s not his fault. As I’m sure he will explain given a chance.
But the feminists he mentions do exist. You meet a lot of them if you dabble in anti-imperialist leftwing politics. It may be a clumsy contribution to the debate, but the problem really is there.
Pinkeen: Name one.
Lindsey German. Do you really doubt they exist?
But the feminists he mentions do exist. You meet a lot of them if you dabble in anti-imperialist leftwing politics. It may be a clumsy contribution to the debate, but the problem really is there.
I think that,s a fair statement. There are a number of western feminists, especially of the anti-imperialist bent who often act as apologists for Islam’s misogyny.
This is the month of February, and islamist organizations all across American and Canadian univeristy campuses are gearing up for ‘World Hijab Day’, a disgusting event that promotes the denigration and demonisation of the female body. This ‘celebration’ is a direct assault not just on women, but on ‘femaleness’ in general. This event actively promotes the idea that a women’s body is shameful and that therefore should be hiden as much as possible. Foolish young western women are being encouraged to celebrate a garment mandated by theocratic misogyny, a garment for which women in Muslim countries can be killed if they refuse to wear it.
I’m am wondering when mainstream feminists will take on these salafist-funded Muslim ‘feminists’ who’ve co-opted feminist vocabulary and who have now harnessed it to the promotion of male, islamist inspired misogyny. After all, even in North America young women have been killed by male relatives for not wearing it, and so where one stands on this IS a kind of litmus test for genuine feminist principles.
I looked up Lindsey German. From my admittedly brief look, it appears she is among those who assign primary blame to the West for creating the conditions that led to the creation of Boko Haram and other groups, and thus also primary blame for the atrocities committed by those groups. This position is familiar to me, as I have several friends who hold it. It seems to me quite a stretch to say that this position equates to not being disturbed by a the image of a woman being executed on a roadside. Perhaps there is a different position she takes that is more applicable, but I did not see it.
Sackbut, she believes that armed Islamist movements are, historically, progressive and has publicly said that we must not allow feminism to become a ‘shibboleth’ of the left when analysing these revolutionary politics. These people really do exist.
When Maryam Namazie was heckled and abused at a UK university she met a load more of them.
While I think it’s clear Ms. German has spectacularly unwise taste in allies, and quite regardless of what one makes of her comments on the merits of intervention in Africa, generalising from her to all of ‘Feminism’, to quote that image–is not merely ‘clumsy’. It’s flagrantly dishonest, and reinforces a lie the MRAs and certain of their allies are always delighted to repeat, for self-interested reasons of their own, I expect…
But oh, yes, by all means let’s derail and demean all efforts to address endemic sexism as trivial, as women are (also) murdered elsewhere, by theocrats. Let’s paint feminism as silly and obsessed with trivialities, so long as it addresses domestic issues for which we actually have direct, personal responsibility. Let’s stick to problems we’re not ourselves part of, please…
The real message, I figure, is: doing dishes is _hard_, showing respect is _hard_, dealing with our own issues is _hard_… Isn’t there some place we can maybe bomb for you, so we can somehow fix sexism _there_, instead?
But re ‘she believes that armed Islamist movements are, historically, progressive’…
But heh. Yes. I’ve met those, too. To borrow Ophelia’s word: oy.
AJ, I don’t tar all feminists with the same brush, just claim that this is a trend, significant I think, in feminism and it shouldn’t be ignored. Reducing opposition to the sort of brutal and bloody patriarchy perpetrated by many Islamist groups to a kind of fetishism for bombs is puerile, I think.
And re ‘reducing opposition to the sort of brutal and bloody patriarchy perpetrated by many Islamist groups to a kind of fetishism for bombs is puerile, I think’…
On the contrary, assuming this propaganda is solely motivated by ‘opposition to patriarchy’ is comically naive.
I think lots of the people seeking this line are perfectly fucking _fine_ with of patriarchy… But happy to oppose it anywhere they’re not.
I disagree, I think patriarchy is pretty much universally reviled in the west, which is why using the term to mean ‘sexism’ is such a problem. When some people come face to face with actual patriarchy, the don’t know what to do, it just doesn’t compute.
Re #20:
And I think that’s extremely wrong.
First of all, it’s perfectly clear our society is by no means post patriarchal. Movements and groups associated with Dawkins included. Look especially at the leaky pipelines in academia and science, things he, personally, could probably have a real, positive impact upon, if he were simply arsed to do so. And speaking of, the line between ‘sexism’ and ‘patriarchy’, for my money, is in how tolerated and even promoted the behaviours that perpetuate the power imbalances are, not what people say about them. You can give lip service to equality and still perpetuate inequality, and plenty do. Dawkins included, witness his trouble dealing with Watson’s really quite mild rejoinder about behaviour at conferences, and plenty since.
As to ‘when people come face to face with actual patriarchy, they don’t know what to do’: just no. Yes, I think plenty of leftists are naive about the actual nature of Islamist movements, and the prognosis for what follows should they ever gain power. But plenty of the opposition to military interventionism is also simply practical, skeptical about its probable benefits, quite sensibly, from recent history, and _far_ from naive, I might mention, on the other hand, about _that_. Trying to imply it’s just some completely irrational bewilderment I’m sure is convenient for anyone wishing to dismiss their objections, but it’s a much more complex story.
And patriarchy is not ‘universally reviled’ in the west. Look across the web, at dudebro upon dudebro happily trying to silence anyone actually threatening to have an impact upon _his_ social reality. _That’s_ what you’re seeing. It’s fine when they don’t have to pay the price, quite another when they imagine their man card is at stake. Dawkins and the kind of people he’s now effectively promoting, especially.
Francine Prose, Henriette Reker…
What about them?
Francine Prose was badly wrong about PEN and Charlie Hebdo, certainly, but does it follow that she is indifferent to violence against women in Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan? No it does not. So what about her? What are you claiming?
Damion @ 9 – how do you know that? How do you know “Twitter feminists (for example) went nuts over the shirt but not the execution”?
Dawkins is a scientist, yes. But he’s also an aging Don with an inflated sense of self-importance. He’s enjoyed decades of fame and adulation. He’s all too willing to play to MRAs. He comments (unwisely) on any and all topics, including those he is spectacularly misinformed on. He garners the wrong kind of media attention for our movement, feeding stereotypes that are already present in the public mind.
Dawkins has long been coddled. He sits atop of an ancient academic hierarchy. His self-aggrandizement is so common in the world he inhabits that he rarely gets questioned or called out for the harm he does. He apparently, sees all this as his due. (He reminds me of T.Rump).
Yet Dawkins puts his pants one leg at a time. For me, humility is a humanist virtue. It keeps us honest. This misogynist needs to come down to earth and stop being a major part of the problems women face in Humanist/Atheist circles. But who will ‘bell this cat’?
Pinkeen @22
As we still live in a firmly patriarchal society that is pretty much a dead in the water argument, but lets assume for the moment it isn’t.
What is there to like about a power structure that disempowers huge sections of the population (nearly all women, young men, poor men, gays, trans and intersex)? A power system that enforces a state of childlike dependence and obedience on those who are less powerful. It reeks frankly and it’s bad for everyone who isn’t at or near the top of the heap; and even those at the top of the heap lead twisted and distorted lives embedded in their comforts as they are.
For the record, matriarchy would be just as bad. As would any other system that achieves a similar outcome.
So, what the fuck is your point?
Ophelia Benson @25, I was responding to A Masked Avenger @12, who was questioning the proposition that there may indeed exist a left-wing feminist who has expressed indifference to Islamist violence.
To that list, btw, I would also add another name you may have heard somewhere, Goldsmiths Feminist Society
Pinkeen #20, Western society is largely patriarchial, and sexism is an important tool in maintaining (enforcing) that -archy. If you think otherwise, then you need to give us your definitions of these words, because you don’t seem to be using them the same way others do.
#13 and #24 give us names but no quotes or citations. This discussion remains remarkably data-free.
‘Homeopathy vs Climate Change’
One of these make scientists really angry; the other will kill millions.
Huge, if true.
@ Pinkeen #20
I disagree, I think patriarchy is pretty much universally reviled in the west
I’m not sure which bright shiny corner of the “west” you live in, but even in my part (liberal urban Canada), there are many pockets where patriarchy is alive and well.
As I commented on facebook (in response to a woman expressing her discomfort at being told how nice her legs were), “western culture” enables males to feel entitled to comment on a woman’s body. And the woman is not permitted to be offended if the comment is negative (they can just improve themselves, amirite?) And the woman is obliged to express appreciation if the comment is positive. This *is* patriarchy. It’s a continuum of ownership and control. Sure, having one’s legs commented on in the NYC subway is not as horrible as being executed for adultery, but it’s a continuum nonetheless.
I have already cited Goldsmiths femsoc several times.
I just thought of something. Dawkins is British! This matters. Really, it does.
You’ve heard the phrase “British empiricism”? It’s not just a cliche, and it’s not just historical.
There is a book: _Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands: Doing Business in Over 60 Countries_. For each country, it describes the customs, and the formalities, and also the substance of doing business there. One item that it cites is what people will accept as establishing truth. You need to know this in order to negotiate with someone.
In some societies, truth is established by consulting religious authorities. The entry for the U.S. says that generally, empirical evidence is accepted as establishing truth, with exceptions in favor of the ideologies of democracy and capitalism. The entry for the U.K. says that the *only* thing that is accepted as establishing truth is empirical evidence. I’m American, and I consider myself to be pretty data-driven, but it turns out I’m second-place to the British on this.
Once I read this in the book, I started hearing it on the BBC. A politician will discredit his opponent’s argument by saying that it is “without evidence”. That isn’t something that you would hear an American politician say.
I’ve even heard this when the matter at hand is a question of policy, not fact, which means that evidence is not to the point. And that suggests that this standard–empirical evidence–is so important, so understood, and so accepted in British society that it can be used as a ready made attack to be hurled at anyone that you disagree with, for any reason. And these are politicians speaking for broadcast; speaking to a general audience. This matters to the British.
So when Dawkins goes on Twitter without evidence, he is flouting not just the tenets of his profession (science), but also the tenets of his tribe (British). This is really, really (really squared?) hard for me to understand.
The straw position attacked by these un-funny, hateful memes has never been evidenced by any feminist to my knowledge.
I had *thought* there was utterly no foundation to the notion that feminists forgive Islamist atrocities, and was baffled where it could be coming from.
Then I read about the Goldsmith university Islamic Society, belligerently disrupting and bullying Maryam Namazie when she appeared at the invitation of the university’s Atheist, Secularist, and Humanist society. They are thugs and bullies and bigots and hateful, hateful theocrats.
Then I read statements from the same university’s feminist society and LGBTQ society condemning the freethinkers, condemning Maryam Namazie, and expressing sympathy for the mistreatement of the Islamist thugs. Huh?
None of that justifies perpetuating awful lies about feminists, and none of it justifies harrassment of women online. Dawkins is doing harm, and the people whose garbage he broadcasts are vile.
But it did go some way to helping me see that I can agree with Dawkins on this point: there *is* a prominent category of people who call themselves feminist, that nonetheless actively shelter and support anti-woman Islamist arseholes and undermine the good work of actual feminists. And I do want those people shunned and ridiculed.
Yes, but it’s possible – indeed easy – to do that without doing what Dawkins is doing. I wrote posts about the Goldsmiths femsoc myself. I didn’t need to include any dishonest “jokes” like the one in the above post to do it.
Ben Finney #36
Mostly agreed (my only reservations concern the shunning, which is something that I’m extremely wary about. Bad personal experience, probably).
About the jokes and strawmanning: I prefer to be careful with the whole “but it’s dishonest because it’s no one’s position!” approach. Satire* is a genre which uses caricature and exaggeration as a matter of course. Would you criticize “A Modest Proposal” as dishonest for such reasons? Would you object that “sure, the rich were callous towards the poor, but certainly no one advocated selling children for food! That’s a strawman, that’s dishonest, that’s no one’s position”? Exaggeration, provocation, going to the unrealistic extremes – these elements in themselves do not disqualify (in my eyes) a given satirical work. One needs far, far more to present a good criticism of a piece belonging to this genre.
Incidentally, as so often in such situations, I have this stubborn feeling that indignation and outrage is a very inefficient weapon against mockery. Satirizing Dawkins and his supporters would be (imo) much better. Unfortunately, I’m not talented enough to do this.
*I’m using the word as just a general name of the genre. Calling something “satire” in this sense is not the same as nobilitating or approving it. In this respect, the word “satire” is similar to “novel”: both novels and satires can be either excellent or crappy. This is also a satire.
So, what the fuck is your point?
My pint is that we don’t live in a patriarchy, although the system we do live in has many faults. I am relaxed at the way ‘patriarchy’ has become a useful word to mean something like ‘remaining sexist obstacles to women’ but when we are faced with actual patriarchy it is unhelpful. If we did live in a patriarchy we should be able to point to its mechanics, show how it works, who works it, and what it explains which can’t be otherwise explained. Easy to do in the Hindu Kush, but not, I think, in Nebraska.
I think Ariel is pretty much on the money with this. I don’t like the meme that stared off this whole discussion, but it is not dishonest, just crude. It is making a point, powerfully, through satire. Charlie Hebdo does the same thing uses sometimes crudely bludgeoning hyperbolic cartoons to make satirical points. You can disagree with the style and/or the content, but they are not ‘dishonest’ although those who disagree with the target of the satire often try to dismiss them in those terms. If satire is a legitimate discourse (it is), we have to allow it even when we disapprove.
but also the tenets of his tribe (British).
Just as an aside, I should say that ‘British’ only looks like a tribe from outside Britain.
Pinkeen @39 I guess you can define patriarchy so narrowly you can ‘prove’ it doesn’t exist in the west, but frankly that stretches credulity. You’ll need to try harder than simply asserting that patriarchy doesn’t exist in the west. Sure, it’s under some challenge, but frankly I think it’s holding its own quite comfortably. Elsewhere it’s happily in control.
Sylvia Walby proposes six overlapping structures that define patriarchy in different forms in different cultures:
– The state: women are unlikely to have formal power and representation
– The household: women are more likely to do the housework and raise the children.
– Violence: women are more prone to being abused
– Paid work: women are likely to be paid less
– Sexuality: women’s sexuality is more likely to be treated negatively
– Culture: women are more misrepresented in media and popular culture
Even evolutionary sociologists don’t deny patriarchy, they just say that’s the way we’ve evolved because reasons.
I’ve never been to Nebraska, but assuming it is a modern western culture broadly similar to New Zealand, Australia, UK, Italy, France, Argentina, Mexico, Netherlands, Chile, Illinois and Canada (all of which I have spent time in), I’ll bet that the State and local government are dominated by males, women do a greater percentage of housework and child raising, women are more likely to be victims of abuse and rape, women are paid less for the same jobs on average, women are more likely to get slut shamed or to be portrayed negatively.
And, did you really mean to run a variation of the ‘Dear Muslima’ argument on this blog? Not for the first time I’m left feeling that you do not argue in good faith.
Ophelia @26
There was a hashtag campaign for the shirt.
Executions for victimless crimes by misogynist regimes not so much.
@pinkeen #40
but it is not dishonest, just crude
At Goldsmiths, ISOC says Namazie is Islamophobic. Femsoc agrees that Namazie is Islamophobic. It is dishonest (not just crude) to say that agreeing that Namazie is Islamophobic* equates to not being upset by seeing a woman executed under Islamic law.
As for patriarchy (#39), it’s worth pointing out that patriarchy is bad for men as well – child custody still defaults to mothers, boys are strongly discouraged from careers, hobbies, clothing, toys, etc that is identified as female (and I think this has actually been getting worse in western society over the past 20 years, at least according to my observations).
* for the sake of argument
Rob, none of the things you describe require an idea of ‘patriarchy’ to explain them. Occam and all that. If there is a patriarchy, point to it, show how the mechanism works.
That is because you have a weird idea of what patriarchy means. You think it is a literal committee or secretive cabal of men deciding how to keep power from women or whatever. Instead, it is as Rob suggests: a social environment that generally benefits men to a greater extent than women.
Damion @ 43 – again, how do you know that? How do you know what hashtag campaigns there weren’t?
@Damion Reinhardt #43
Less than a minute on google yields https://twitter.com/hashtag/srilankanmaid and https://twitter.com/hashtag/stonedtodeath