[I'm eastsidekate and I'm new here? I've been around since the days when Melmanda Marcewen was terrorizing America (sorry to bring it up, tho' I love that graphic). Liss recently gave me the chance to become a contributor. After a weekish of posting, I've finally put together a comprehensive history of my life, as it pertains to the internet.]
:clears throat:
I won't get off the internet because I'm depressed. I play the same damn stuff over and over and over in my head. Always have, probably always will. It's really useful for me to process stuff by putting it into words, getting it out of my skull, and discussing it with other people. It's also useful for me to discuss what's in other people's skulls.
I won't get off the internet because I'm transsexual. As far as I can tell, transsexual people invented the internet as a way to share information about, um, how to survive, as well as a means of starting vicious flame wars. I understand that some people have corrupted the 'net to the point that folks now watch Lady Gaga videos and share large scientific data sets, but that's not so much my fault. Except for the data sets. I apologize.
It would be hyperbole to say that the internet saved my life. Or maybe not. I honestly don't know. I do know that hearing stories from folks who came out without internet access sends chills up my spine and makes me a bit nauseous. The internet is a good thing. I can use it to find people who are just like me. Once I developed skills at that, I used the internet to find out (and gasp, interact with) people who weren't exactly like me. That's been pretty useful, too.
I won't get off the internet because I'm a feminist. I enjoy tons of privileges, including, but not limited to the internet. However, that gender transition? Involves a massive amount of self-examination, and a massive loss of privilege. I've got a lot of first-hand knowledge that I didn't have several years ago, and it's been really useful to discuss that knowledge with others, and put it into the context of other people's experiences.
I won't get off the internet because I'm a writer. I came to Shakesville when I was finishing my Ph. D. thesis, and also trying to find a job in the academy (and also starting puberty-- I don't necessarily recommend that combo). I faced a lot of criticism that I wasn't exactly like a scientist, what with the earrings, and the use of active voice in my writing and whatnot.
The internet can be an amazing place to write. We can be playful here. See Liss' post about neologisms. They're not just for funny-- they're also meaningful. Recently, Sady fucking Doyle wrote an epic post about why she makes jokes on the internet (so she uses this word in the title I don't much like, but I still have a writer crush on her, okay?). If you haven't read it yet, I encourage you to. I'll wait.
And wait.
Hi! One of the women I admire most is the late Molly Ivins, who was effectively forced out of a job with the New York Times (or at least made to feel unwelcome), on account of how her vicious use of the English language was fomenting a pervy leftist revolution or some such bullshit. My dream is for all of us to get fired from the Times.
Lastly, I won't get off the internet because I'm an educator. I don't plan on talking much about my paying job (because I'm professional?), but it definitely relates to the 'net. I teach at a “non-traditional” college. One of the things we do is allow students to receive credit for college-level learning they've acquired in life-- with or without the help of pointy-headed know-it-alls. And I keep learning my feminism on the street. And on the internet. And what I've learned about feminism and social justice and activism is at least as important as anything I've ever learned in a classroom. So, there's that.
I'm fortunate enough to have the freedom to experiment in how (and what, for that matter) I teach. And you can learn a lot on the internet. I'm learning a lot about teaching (and learning) from the internet. In a very real sense, Shakesville is closely related (and perhaps intertwined) with my professional life. With slightly more swearing. I hope.
So that's me. Oh, and I have cats.
I'm really, really happy to be here, because I love this community, and view it as yet another home. Folks here are amazing, and not just Liss and all of the contributors who have been here forever, but also everyone who contributes at any level. That Clay Shirky guy's right, y'all are doin' it right.
Why I won't get off the internet
Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"
[Background. And background.]
See Deeky's archive of all previous Conniving & Sinister strips here.
[In which Liss reimagines the long-running comic "Frank & Ernest," about two old straight white guys "telling it like it is," as a fat feminist white woman (Liss) and a biracial queerbait (Deeky) telling it like it actually is from their perspectives. Hilarity ensues.]
World Cup of Ugh
[Trigger warning for sexual and domestic violence.]
That FIFA chose to allow South Africa to host the World Cup, despite the fact that, at the time of the selection, " a woman born in South Africa ha[d] a greater chance of being raped, than learning how to read," underlines the depth of institutional misogyny associated with the World Cup.
So it is no surprise that there are a slew of aggravating articles about the World Cup embedded with misogyny and narratives of the rape culture. Still, I've got to give it to Yahoo Sports for featuring not one but two real doozies this week.
Shaker Tammy forwarded this pile of dogwank that ran Wednesday about English footballers' wives and girlfriends, which contains such gems as: "The WAGs, as they have become derisively known, are a marauding force of champagne-guzzling, credit card-wielding, wild-partying paparazzi fodder who did such a spectacular job of focusing the spotlight upon themselves at the last World Cup that they were cited among the primary reasons behind England's failure to get past the quarterfinals."
And I saw this delightful piece yesterday, in which the author "debunks" the rumor that there will be 40,000 prostitutes pouring into South Africa for the World Cup, casually conflating consensual prostitution with human trafficking:
But the only evidence of any organized prostitution rings – the kind of movement that would generate great numbers – is that there appear to be more women from Thailand. Yet even then, the source suspects, there are hundreds of them. Not thousands.
He even found a lady to quote who laments soccer fans getting "targeted" by the nasty rumors they might want to have sex with prostitutes.
…Back in 2006, when the World Cup was held in Germany – where prostitution was legal – there was talk that the country would be buried by 40,000 sex workers. Interest in them was said to be great. Yet they mostly wound up sitting around brothels waiting for the parade of willing men that never happened. Later, a study commissioned by the European Union and uncovered by the British internet magazine Spiked found only 33 cases of human trafficking at that time. And just five of those cases turned out to be related to the World Cup.
Meanwhile, Iain sends along this piece about England's awareness-raising about domestic violence, which reportedly rises on days when Team England has matches: "[The Association of Chief Police Officers] is using a football jersey covered in blood reading 'Strikeher' to encourage people to report domestic abuse, and so-called experts on domestic violence are recommending, per the usual, that women do something to preemptively protect themselves."
I cannot begin to convey the depth of my odium at the bullshit preemptive victim-blaming that imagines staying out late is really going to stop a monstrous fuckwad who uses football as an excuse to beat his partner and/or kids. I'm sure he'll use that extra time while his partner is "staying out with friends of family members on England game nights or arranging for their children to go to a friend's house for a sleepover" to cool down, not build up a big head of steam wondering where his punching bag is.
And "Strikeher"—seriously? Ugh.
It's Your Fault Old People Are In Pain
Why, fat people? Why are you hurting the old folks?
So I'm reading this interesting story in the New York Times about the fact that there is a fairly risk-free vaccine which reduces the chance of developing shingles by more than half and the risk of post-herpetic neuralgia by over two-thirds. Shingles is caused by a reactivation, years later, of the virus which causes chicken pox, which most often occurs in older people. Post-herpetic neuralgia is an extremely painful complication of shingles.
The good news is that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved a vaccination against shingles in 2006, which the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2008 recommended all people aged 60 and older receive.
The bad news is that few do, because, according to the Times it costs ten times more than other adult vaccinations at $160 to $195 per dose (it need be administered only once), may not be fully covered by insurance or even Medicare, and the reimbursement process is stupid (my word, not the Times).
Private insurers generally require patients to pay for it themselves and then apply for reimbursement. Medicare classifies it as a presecription drug, unlike other vaccinations for older people, and it therefore invokes the rather complicated payment structure currently in place for prescription drugs under Medicare.
Well, this ain't right, I'm thinking, and wondering if there will be in this article an explanation of why the vaccine is so expensive to begin with (there isn't), when, deep in the explanation of how burdensome all this is to physicians (the article was written by an M.D.), I come across this pearl of sad wisdom:
“There’s just so much that primary care practices must take care of with chronic diseases like obesity and diabetes and heart disease,” Dr. Hurley noted. “If a treatment isn’t easy to administer, then sometimes it just falls to the bottom of the list of things for people to do.”J'accuse, fattiez! (Ok, I'm fat, too, but I'm speaking for the righteously non-fat here. They have so little voice.) Simply by virtue of having a BMI over 30, regardless of whether you have any actual illnesses (besides the chronic disease of obesity, of course) you are keeping the physicians of the world so damn busy that administering a shot which can keep old people from suffering excruciating pain for long periods of time goes to the bottom of their list of things to do.
You, O carrier of the Deathfatz! You have perpetrated this cruelty upon our elders! Unless you happen to be both fat and older, in which case you deserve to be in pain, because if you weren't so fat your doctor would have had time to prevent it.
The article does discuss a real problem in the reimbursement structure for this vaccine. As another quoted physician, Dr. Allan Crimm, says:
“It’s indicative of how there are perverse incentives that make it difficult to accomplish what everybody agrees should happen.”But thank goodness we didn't manage to get through even one article on a medical problem without someone having the courage to point out who is really to blame, although I must say the connection was not exactly spelled out. Still, most people are perfectly willing to take for granted that anything and everything, and certainly any problems with health care, are the fault of the fat people. They don't require any actual documentation; they just need a little reminder now and then to keep that in the forefront of their minds. Fortunately, Dr. Laura Hurley was happy to provide that.
Friday Blogaround
This blogaround is brought to you by Shaxco, makers of Liss and Deeky's EqualityBound Tandem Bikes. EqualityBound: you'll look sweet upon the seat of a bicycle built for everyone!
PLoS One: First Direct Evidence of Chalcolithic Footwear from the Near Eastern Highlands
In 2008, a well preserved and complete shoe was recovered at the base of a Chalcolithic pit in the cave of Areni-1, Armenia. Here, we discuss the chronology of this find, its archaeological context and its relevance to the study of the evolution of footwear.
Knitting Clio: Sexism in Science, or Why There Was No Alberta Einstein
Via Dr. Isis, the Kids Read Science and Teens Read Science Summer Science Reading Contests:
Contest rules are simple: 1) read a nonfiction book on a topic in science, technology, engineering, or math; 2) make a video about the book that's less than 5 minutes long; 3) upload the video and submit the entry form by 11 pm (Central Daylight Time) on 22 September 2010.
KidsReadScience is for kids ages 8 through 12; TeensReadScience is for young adults ages 13 through 18. Anyone anywhere may submit one entry (in English), although prize distribution is currently restricted to locations in the US and its territories. Details are at the contest websites.
The Feminist Hulk Twitter feed and the Feminist Hulk Interview with Ms. Magazine blog.
HULK POLITELY REQUEST CHANGING TABLE IN MEN’S ROOM. HULK CHOOSE NOT TO EMPLOY SMASH IN THIS MOMENT. MULTIPLE TOOLS FOR CHANGE.
fannie’s room: In Which Commenters Make My Case
C.L. Minou at Tiger Beatdown: What We Write When We Don’t Write For the Internet: Looking For A Voice In All The Wrong Places
Ethan (via Samia): Propaganda for your Pants
Ladysquires: Tales from the Writing Center: The Engineering Group Project and Why I’m Not Proud of You for Correcting Other People’s Grammar
Dinosaur Tracking: Leonardo da Vinci – Paleontology Pioneer
Wellcome Trust Blog: Old diabetes drugs offer hope for a new Hepatitis C treatment
Ideas in Food: King Salmon Belly. For this project they use Activa RM (pdf on usage and ingredients). Activa is transglutaminase, the amino acid cross-linking enzyme that allows Wylie Dufresne to make noodles with no starch.
Responsible Teenager Reportedly Fine
ABC News: Teen Sailor Abby Sunderland Found Alive; Family Is 'Relieved'
After having her boat turned on its side in the Indian Ocean, it appears that Abby Sunderland is safe. My thoughts go out to Ms. Sunderland and her family. Not only is it stressful to be temporarily stranded in the middle of the ocean, it also puts a kink in Ms. Sunderland's goal of sailing around the world. This year.
You may recall that there was a lot of handwringing about Ms. Sunderland's trip, including accusations that her parents were doing it wrong.
Now one of the worst things that could have happened has happened, and Ms. Sunderland appears to be fine, in part because a) she's responsible, and b) she knows her way around a boat. Of course, things could have been worse. Things could always be worse, something that Abby Sunderland knew was true for people of all ages.
You can follow Ms. Sunderland's blog here.
Your Objective Media
[Trigger warning for domestic violence and homophobia.]
So, there's this article in the New York Times about federal prosecutors being given the ability to use interstate stalking and domestic violence provisions in the Violence Against Women Act in cases involving same-sex couples. Boo that it's necessary, but yay for the tools to legally address such issues using a successful model.
Brian Moulton, the chief legislative counsel of the Human Rights Campaign, is quoted in the article noting: "It's a step towards equality and recognizing that our relationships exist and are subject to the same sorts of issues that face other committed couples. Unfortunately, sometimes that is domestic violence and other issues that need to be dealt with through the criminal justice system."
And because that CONTROVERSIAL STATEMENT from a purveyor of the RADICAL GAY AGENDA couldn't go uncontested, couldn't possibly be allowed to stand on its own as if same-sex couples' rights are the business of same-sex couples and their advocates, we get this charming paragraph toward the end of the story where "the Other Side has its say" quote usually resides:
Several social conservative commentators who have opposed same-sex marriage rights did not respond to requests for comment.First of all, LOL at the idea of the fucknecks at the American Family Values Children Christian Liberty Freedom Patriot Association Foundation Organization scrambling to try to come up with a response: "Well, we hate gay people—but we can't actually come right out and say we support domestic violence, right? Crap, this is a tough one!"
Secondly, fuck off, New York Times, with your stupid reflexive need to include a comment from hatemongers in every goddamn article about social justice. We get it. We know there are bigots out there who believe that same-sex couples shouldn't ever ever ever be given any rights or legal protections lest same-sex relationships be legitimized and society crumble and the Baby Jesus cry tears shaped like dildos or whatever.
Providing some bullshit quote from ideological dinosaurs doesn't serve to provide new information; it doesn't create parity; and it sure as shit doesn't approximate objectivity—because, objectively, these people are assholes with a rationale that isn't even legally viable under our Constitution.
"God says so" isn't merely childish and aggravating; it's totally subjective. See, there are also religious people in this country who believe that denying equality is immoral, but being gay isn't. That's the whole conundrum of invoking God as the singular rationale for or against public policy—God says lots of different things to lots of different people, and all of them think that they're right.
Opponents of LGB equality don't have any facts on their side; their every claim (same-sex marriage will destroy America! / will undermine the sanctity of marriage! / will be bad for children! / will require churches to perform gay marriage ceremonies! / will cause hurricanes! / will make the earth spin off its axis!) is demonstrably false.
Stop treating them like they've got anything to add to a public conversation besides irrational hatred dressed up unconvincingly as principled opposition.
An Irregular Series on Depression?
Edit: Please read the comment thread before commenting yourself. For some very good reasons, with which I agree completely, this series won't be running here. I posted before thinking things through entirely.
-=-=-
Hey, Shakers - I've been working, on and off, on a post (well, posts) I'm finding really hard to write, for reasons that are part of what I'm writing about, actually. It's no secret here that I struggle with depression on a chronic basis, with it having a notable and serious impact on my life.
I'm wondering if there'd be interest here in my writing an occasional/irregular (sorta like everything else I do, I guess - another of its insidious effects) series on how depression interacts with my life, how I fight it without meds, that kind of thing?
One of the effects of the thing is that it's not always easy to judge one's actions or intents, thus the question. My thinking on the post/series is that in addition to talking about things that come to me, I'll invite questions from you, and answer them to the best of my ability/knowledge. I'm only an expert in that I've been living with it my whole life; it runs in my family, as my sister and mother have, as I have, been hospitalized for it at one time or another, and I'm sure if such things had been done at all in the UK of the mid-20th or earlier, more of my relatives, particularly the women, would have been treated for it. I certainly claim no special ability to cure it - all I know is how I live with it.
Given that this can be an extremely private and shameful-feeling thing for some folk, I would like to specifically invite people who wish to comment personally, or to ask questions they wouldn't like to ask in public, to write me e-mails, whose contents and originators I can protect/obscure while answering.
So? Does this sound like something people would want to read?
I should add one thing: while I deeply appreciate the thoughtful impulse of people suggesting things which have worked for them, I'm not actively seeking advice on how to live with depression. I will probably make a post in the series asking for people to lay out any suggestions they have found effective for them, to offer affected readers as wide a range of options they can look into, but there's not really anything I've not already tried at some point in the 28 years since my first diagnosis. Thanks for understanding. :)
Support the Female Troops
As has been previously mentioned in this space, it is illegal for military hospitals to provide abortion services to female soldiers, with exceptions for life endangerment and rape/incest (and soldiers must foot the bill for the latter), but that may be changing:
[T]ucked into the same 852-page Pentagon policy bill as the repeal of "don't ask, don't tell" is a little-noticed amendment that takes on another emotionally charged issue: making abortion easier for military women in war zones.I'll bet he "supports the troops," though, right? Just not the female troops, who are being denied the very equality they're willing to put their lives on the line to defend.
In a vote that advocates of abortion rights sought beforehand to keep quiet, the Senate Armed Services Committee passed a provision on May 27 to allow privately financed abortions at military hospitals and bases. Current law bans abortions in most cases at military facilities, even if women pay themselves, meaning they must go outside to private hospitals and clinics — an impossibility for many of the estimated 100,000 American servicewomen in foreign countries, particularly in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The result, the advocates say, is that military women serving overseas do not have the same access to basic health care that other American women do, or that is ensured by the laws of the country they are fighting to protect. "It's an issue of basic fairness," said Cecile Richards, the president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, one of eight women's advocacy groups that lobbied heavily last month for the amendment's passage.
Opponents say that because the abortions would be performed in government facilities, taxpayer money would still help subsidize the underlying costs — the reason that Senator Ben Nelson, a Nebraska Democrat who is opposed to abortion, voted against the amendment. "He opposes government-provided or funded abortion," said Jake Thompson, a spokesman.
As the article notes, "women have been at war in Iraq and Afghanistan for nearly a decade." It's truly absurd that women risking their lives (ostensibly) to defend their country are not guaranteed access to the same rights, to a legal medical procedure, that women at home (ostensibly) can access.
It would be positively stupendous if we could repeal DADT and the military abortion ban in one fell swoop.
Question of the Day
Did you have any childhood hobbies? Is it still part of your life?
Other than reading, my only "hobby" was drawing. I was constantly, constantly drawing stuff. Oh, and collecting Star Wars figures, of course.
Daily Dose o' Cute
"What?"
A bunch of people have asked me for an update on how things are going at Shakes Manor since Dudley arrived, and I can report that everything is going splendidly. The girls are all back to their normal routines, and don't let their new brother stand in the way of getting the inordinate levels of attention and affection to which they are accustomed. All four happily share space under my feet and in my way while I'm making dinner, angling for a treat.
And they all happily accept treats in a frenzy of controlled chaos, with nary a moment of worrisome food aggression.
Dudz continue to be the most lovely dog, whose desperately sweet and luminously silly personality has revealed itself in blossoming waves as his confidence has grown.
Recently, he's started doing the hard greyhound lean against my legs when he wants attention; I reach down and wrap my arms around his sinewy neck and kiss the top of his head, and he swivels his head around to lick my face and nibble my chin. When Iain arrives home from work, he leaps with joy from play-bow to play-bow, and wags his tail with an energy that innovative green engineers might endeavor to harness.
He is an absolute, undiluted pleasure, and his life has woven so seamlessly into ours that it is strange to imagine he hasn't been here all along.
I knew I was going to love him, but I didn't imagine I would love him this hard.
One last but vital note: I have recently discovered that there is nothing more amusing in the entire world than talking to Dudley in a Ringo Starr voice. Importantly, it's not just the Liverpudlian accent, but Ringo's mellow 'tude. "Doodleh, d'yeh think we should go fer a walk, mate?" His ears perk up; his head tilts. And Iain says: "Since when is our dug a fooking Beatle?"
Headline Nooz
by Shaker superior olive
[Trigger warning for violence and misogyny.]
So, I was reading my local paper a few evenings ago, and in the front section came across something that reminded me of Liss' Headline Nooz series.
In the World News part of the A section, they have a round-up of stories culled from news services. (The tag at the end just says "from the news services".) Actually, they are more like article synopses, each being about 200-250 words. On June 8th, there were four short summaries, two of which caught my attention:
• Egypt drops Blockade…(short blurb about Egypt dropping the blockade)
• Lightning kills girlfriend…(story about lightning striking a woman hiking with her boyfriend)
• Shooter targeted women…(story about a gunman in Hialeah, Fla. shooting and killing his wife, then three other women and injuring three more before shooting himself)
• Gas Line explosion deadly… (story about a gasline exploding in Texas.)
In case you haven't guessed already (pfft, yeah right) I'm writing about the middle two headlines: Lightning kills girlfriend; Shooter targeted women.
Starting with the first of the two… Let's see, I know the age of the man, his relationship to the woman, his name, where he is from, his plan to ask her to marry him, his injuries, that he had the ring in his pocket. About the woman, I know her name, her age, and that she died. Oh, and she was a girlfriend. The entire article (articlet?) is framed from his point of view, we don't know who she was, where she was from, anything about her family, what she did for a living, even whether they had discussed marriage before. All things that are easy to include even in short articles. Right from the headline, she is framed only in relation to him, a girlfriend, and her death is framed as how it affects him.
The next article is about a gunman in Florida who went to the restaurant where his wife worked, shot and killed her before bypassing men to shoot more women and then himself. I haven't heard anything other than what is presented here about this story. I'm taking "wife" at face value; she may have been separated from him, or they were about to sign divorce papers, both of which can trigger this kind of violence.
What I'm focusing on here is the juxtaposition of these two articles next to each other. We tell men that women are only important insofar as how they relate to you specifically. These messages come in a myriad of ways, some of them are almost invisible. And yet, we are surprised when those messages are taken to their logical conclusion.
Lightning kills girlfriend; Shooter targeted women.
The patriarchy, in six words.
Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"
[Background.]
See Deeky's archive of all previous Conniving & Sinister strips here.
[In which Liss reimagines the long-running comic "Frank & Ernest," about two old straight white guys "telling it like it is," as a fat feminist white woman (Liss) and a biracial queerbait (Deeky) telling it like it actually is from their perspectives. Hilarity ensues.]
I Write Letters
Dear Al Krieger:
Do shut the fuck up.
I know that as mayor of Yuma Arizona you are on occasion afforded a platform on which to run your mouth, but that doesn't mean you should. Sometimes it's better to keep your yap shut. And when you say you "cannot believe a bunch of lacey-drawered, limp-wristed" queers in the military can "do what those men have done in the past" you're just showing your boneheaded ignorance.
Just FYI, queer men and women have fought and died in battle, past and present, in service to this country, to the world's armies, and your douchebagged comments not only insult them, but insult all who serve.
So, please, please, please, shut the fuck up. You don't know what you're talking about.
Yours,
Deeky W. Gashlycrumb
Mayor of Faggottown
I'll Give You This, Gibbs...
But you're no Scott McClellan.
I still miss you, Scottie Boy.
Quote of the Day
"Lots of [the clothes I wear are] meant to be kind of a rejection of what people think about women. I guess I'm a feminist. I am a feminist. And I want to change the way people view women."—Lady Gaga, in a recent interview (@ 2:45) with Larry King. (Full transcript here.)
Whether any or all of Lady Gaga's work is feminist is debatable (and feel free to debate away in comments), but, irrespective of that discussion, it is, in my estimation, both notable and valuable that a provocateur and pop culture icon with the platform and audience that Lady Gaga has self-identifies as a feminist.
[H/T to Shaker Matt.]
Part II
A tangential idea to the post below, which didn't quite fit into that piece…
The gap between what our culture promises privileged men and what it delivers to and expects of them also underlies the mystification shared by many people (men and women, privileged and marginalized alike) that a sexist joke (for example) could still be a "big deal" in a culture where many women are out-performing their male peers.
A person born into a world in which his humanity, agency, dignity, autonomy are not in question views achievement as a personal and individual pursuit—"I want to get an education, I want to get a good job, I want to succeed in my career, I want to attain certain material possessions and comforts."
A person born into a world in which hir humanity, agency, dignity, and autonomy are in question, philosophically and often legally, on the other hand, often views achievement not merely in personal and individual terms but also as a collective pursuit—"I want [all members of the marginalized group(s) to which I belong] to have access, opportunity, respect, equality" because attainment of those things on a personal and individual basis, with rare exceptions, is elusive.
(Which is not to discount the compelling motives of solidarity and empathy born of mutual struggle.)
Thus, a sexist joke (for example) can deny a different kind of achievement, even as women may have lots of forward momentum in educational or professional achievements.
It should also be noted that the little stuff of sexism is one way in which the kyriarchal narratives that inhibit privileged men's progress are promulgated. So it's not exactly doing privileged men any good to treat them as an insignificance, either. They're just conveying the bars of their own cages.
The End of...Something
Hanna Rosin's piece in The Atlantic is titled "The End of Men," but a more accurate title might be "The End of Male Privilege."
Well, it would be a more accurate title if she'd ever managed to tease out the idea that struck me as a glaring omission from the piece: Privileged men's achievement gap, and the associated atrophy born of the observable resistance, or inflexibility, to make quick course corrections, is the inevitable result of a culture that continues to sell privileged men a patriarchal narrative of birthright entitlement, despite the fact that it is nothing but an empty promise of an illusory bounty in which most men will never share.
Simply: American culture continues to promise straight, white, cis, able-bodied men success and supremacy, in exchange for nothing but their being straight, white, cis, and able-bodied. But that shit just ain't enough anymore.
(Which is not to suggest that privileges of all flavors do not frustratingly remain compelling and material benefits.)
Our culture has progressed enough that most people cannot trade exclusively on their privilege, but not so much that the desperate, obdurate, and still-plentiful enforcers of the kyriarchy have stopped selling that possibility nonetheless.
The result is a lot of men who have been sold a bill of goods, and don't understand why everything's gone pear-shaped, and don't have the tools to set a new course, because the kyriarchy assured them their whole lives they didn't need those tools. They only needed to be men.
Privilege has robbed them of the means to succeed in a changing world.
And that is not all of which they've been robbed. Privilege has robbed them of the self-assurance hard-won by struggling to be proud despite one's marginalization.
It has robbed them of the unquenchable hunger for self-improvement that doesn't reside in the bellies of the privileged who are assured they are the Norm, the ideal to which marginalized people aspire, who spend their lives being heard and respected and presumed to be acting in good faith.
It has robbed them of the self-esteem conferred only by earned pride.
It has robbed them of the determination and flexibility and capacity to create one's own rules, honed during a lifetime of being told "You can't" and having one's ambitions deterred by the seemingly unnavigable barriers put in one's way by people who don't want to see one succeed.
It has robbed them of the ability to see when the game is rigged so that they will fail, too, and how to achieve, in defiance of the expectation that we will settle for less than we want, by carving out routes that are nontraditional and using strategies neither obvious nor logical by traditional standards.
Privilege tells them that those traditional standards are the best and the only standards—the standards that make men men—and coerces them into complacency by the damnable illusion that they have everything already that they will ever need, and need never expect more of themselves.
So if they are failing, it is someone else's fault and someone else's responsibility to fix.
Women never had that luxury, that burden.
[Related Reading: With All Due Respect, In Which Another Dunderheaded Dodobrain Fails Utterly to Realize Feminism is His Friend, Not His Enemy, Angry Men, Searching Men—and What They Can Learn From Girls and Queers.]
