6 ms·

Prejudice, as in, a default judgment/assessment weighing against an individual? I submit that the idea that it's permitted to treat this person less respectfull

Prejudice, as in, a default judgment/assessment weighing against an individual? I submit that the idea that it's permitted to treat this person less respectfully because they are a woman is such a judgment, and it is on the basis of sex. Stereotyping, as in a belief... about specific types of individuals or certain ways of doing things, but that belief may or may not accurately reflect reality. Again, I submit that the entire story is about OP having to contend with the notion that any and all women are available and open to sexual advances, and that the prejudice against respectful behavior toward them makes it easier/permissible to make those advances. The fact that you simply cannot conceive of a plausible reverse scenario does not mean that something is not sexism. There doesn't have to be a reverse scenario, nor do mitigating life circumstances matter; everyone has a back story. Your last line is one small step away from saying that women who wear short skirts are asking to be groped. It's tantamount to saying women don't deserve to be treated respectfully or feel safe, if enough of the males surrounding them are losers. You might as well be saying, "don't have boobs, some men haven't seen those."

redthrowaway 14y ago
>the notion that any and all women are available and open to sexual advances Advances, in and of themselves, are fine. All people are subject to them, and simple rejection should suffice to show a lack of openness. The line is crossed when those advances are disrespectful and/or inappropriate. If you put 950 men and 50 women together, those women will get hit on, and there's nothing wrong with that. The wrongness comes from treating the women as objects or somehow not as deserving of respect as their male counterparts. We wouldn't be hearing about this if the advances were restricted to, "would you like to grab a drink later?".
gavanwoolery 14y ago
Wow, way to put a bunch of words in my mouth. Actually, what I am saying is that nature is not always nice or civilized. When you get a bunch of drunk males into a room, their super ego goes down and they will begin to behave (almost literally) like animals. Is it right or wrong? I don't know, but it is not sexism. Is it to be expected? Yes. How do I know it is to be expected? Because you can easily replicate the situation. Go to Cancun if you want to see males in their most animal-state. Is it condonable? I do not know, but it is the way nature made us. Nature designed us to want reproduce - without our rules, morals, and what-have-you, we would be doing much worse things than asking to see private parts. Unfortunately, nature also gave us language, which means a lot of times males will utter really stupid things because their sex-drive takes over and their brain reaches a state of near-retardation (hence the popular phrase "show us your tits"). In shorter words - if you are a female in a bar that is overwhelmingly packed with males -- yes, you should very much expect to get harassed. Yes, it is not "right", but its the way nature made us so there is not a lot of sense in complaining about it. You could just as well complain about people being obese, because nature designed us to enjoy food. Am I saying women deserve to be harassed when they dress sexually? No, of course not. But what I am saying is that some males have less super ego than others, and it varies with the situation, so there are certain situations (like this one) in which a female could certainly expect to be harassed.
- mkramlich 14y ago
  Upvoted you to counter-act the "college P.C." brigade.
  - gavanwoolery 14y ago
    Awesome. :)
  - derleth 14y ago
    "PC" just means "Being polite to everyone"
    - gavanwoolery 14y ago
      Sometime's PC goes overboard. It is not a bad thing necessarily, unless abused. One example of PC going wrong is the word "retarded" - the PC crowd thought "mentally challenged" would be a better term, even though retarded just means you are a bit slow, mentally-challenged makes it seem like thinking is an arduous task.
      - mkaltenecker 14y ago
        No. You are not supposed to use retarded because that word has consistently been used to insult and denigrate disabled people. It's the same with gay. You are not supposed to use it as an insult. It doesn't matter whether the person you are insulting is gay or not.
        gavanwoolery 14y ago
        My gay friends prefer "gay" or "queer" over homosexual. My black friends prefer "black" over African American. I could very well be wrong about the word retarded though. :)
        mkaltenecker 14y ago
        You did not understand me. Using “gay” as a positive term isn’t a problem. “He came out first as a gay footballer” is a perfectly alright sentence. Using ”gay” (or “retarded”) as an insult is where the problem lies (with “retarded” the additional problem is that no one uses it as a positive term – and since it’s so overwhelmingly used negatively, using it neutrally isn’t really possible). When someone tells you he likes My Little Pony and you respond with “Man, you are so gay!” then that’s a problem. You are using “gay” as in insult, as if being gay were a bad thing. That’s the reasoning behind why many people think using “gay” in that manner is a bad idea. That works analogously for “retarded”. That’s not to say you can’t express, say, disgust at someone liking My Little Pony. “Man, your taste fucking sucks!” is a perfectly alright response no one will have a problem with (beyond disagreeing whether My Little Pony is good or bad). Again, I don’t want to ban people from using “gay” or “retarded” as insults. But when they do I will call them out and explain my reasoning.
drostie 14y ago
This is the Correct Response. I would only add one thing: Even if you don't agree that this sort of prejudice and stereotyping amounts to discrimination, the discussion still makes sense. Why? Because most discrimination -- whether racist or sexist -- really happens at the level of social institutions rather than at an individual level. (Like, if you think that you are not a racist because you personally don't see anything wrong with black people, then you probably don't understand racism as it exists today.) The original post is actually trying to cut at the heart of the problem of sexism, which exists prior to (and matures into) the phenonena that gavanwoolery considers "properly" sexist. It's a seed for the problem which matures into institutional sexism.
- gavanwoolery 14y ago
  The foremost cause of sexism is the fact that many males (consciously or subconsciously) perceive women as mentally and physically weaker (and indeed the average woman is physically weaker than the average male, that's just the way nature played the cards for the human species). Sex-drive is not really as much of a problem with regards to sexism. Sex-drive causes sexual harassment, which is not sexism. If a male were to sexually harass a female, it would not be sexism because he is not giving males special preference over females). If a male were to make a female employee engage is sexual activity for a raise, it would be sexual exploitation, not sexism. My main gripe here is basically that "sexism" has become an umbrella term to describe many things it does not apply to, and thus, a misnomer.
  - swa14 14y ago
    >If a male were to sexually harass a female, it would not be sexism because he is not giving males special preference over females Well, seeing how he's not sexually harassing the males I'd say there's a noted difference in "special preference". Anyway, I'd argue that sexism is almost inherent to any sexual harassment, as the male put himself in a position of power/dominance based on little more than gender difference and the perceived inequality/role expectations that go along with that.
    - 14y ago

redthrowaway 14y ago

>the notion that any and all women are available and open to sexual advances Advances, in and of themselves, are fine. All people are subject to them, and simple rejection should suffice to show a lack of openness. The line is crossed when those advances are disrespectful and/or inappropriate. If you put 950 men and 50 women together, those women will get hit on, and there's nothing wrong with that. The wrongness comes from treating the women as objects or somehow not as deserving of respect as their male counterparts. We wouldn't be hearing about this if the advances were restricted to, "would you like to grab a drink later?".

gavanwoolery 14y ago

Wow, way to put a bunch of words in my mouth. Actually, what I am saying is that nature is not always nice or civilized. When you get a bunch of drunk males into a room, their super ego goes down and they will begin to behave (almost literally) like animals. Is it right or wrong? I don't know, but it is not sexism. Is it to be expected? Yes. How do I know it is to be expected? Because you can easily replicate the situation. Go to Cancun if you want to see males in their most animal-state. Is it condonable? I do not know, but it is the way nature made us. Nature designed us to want reproduce - without our rules, morals, and what-have-you, we would be doing much worse things than asking to see private parts. Unfortunately, nature also gave us language, which means a lot of times males will utter really stupid things because their sex-drive takes over and their brain reaches a state of near-retardation (hence the popular phrase "show us your tits"). In shorter words - if you are a female in a bar that is overwhelmingly packed with males -- yes, you should very much expect to get harassed. Yes, it is not "right", but its the way nature made us so there is not a lot of sense in complaining about it. You could just as well complain about people being obese, because nature designed us to enjoy food. Am I saying women deserve to be harassed when they dress sexually? No, of course not. But what I am saying is that some males have less super ego than others, and it varies with the situation, so there are certain situations (like this one) in which a female could certainly expect to be harassed.

mkramlich 14y ago
Upvoted you to counter-act the "college P.C." brigade.
- gavanwoolery 14y ago
  Awesome. :)
- derleth 14y ago
  "PC" just means "Being polite to everyone"
  - gavanwoolery 14y ago
    Sometime's PC goes overboard. It is not a bad thing necessarily, unless abused. One example of PC going wrong is the word "retarded" - the PC crowd thought "mentally challenged" would be a better term, even though retarded just means you are a bit slow, mentally-challenged makes it seem like thinking is an arduous task.
    - mkaltenecker 14y ago
      No. You are not supposed to use retarded because that word has consistently been used to insult and denigrate disabled people. It's the same with gay. You are not supposed to use it as an insult. It doesn't matter whether the person you are insulting is gay or not.
      - gavanwoolery 14y ago
        My gay friends prefer "gay" or "queer" over homosexual. My black friends prefer "black" over African American. I could very well be wrong about the word retarded though. :)
        mkaltenecker 14y ago
        You did not understand me. Using “gay” as a positive term isn’t a problem. “He came out first as a gay footballer” is a perfectly alright sentence. Using ”gay” (or “retarded”) as an insult is where the problem lies (with “retarded” the additional problem is that no one uses it as a positive term – and since it’s so overwhelmingly used negatively, using it neutrally isn’t really possible). When someone tells you he likes My Little Pony and you respond with “Man, you are so gay!” then that’s a problem. You are using “gay” as in insult, as if being gay were a bad thing. That’s the reasoning behind why many people think using “gay” in that manner is a bad idea. That works analogously for “retarded”. That’s not to say you can’t express, say, disgust at someone liking My Little Pony. “Man, your taste fucking sucks!” is a perfectly alright response no one will have a problem with (beyond disagreeing whether My Little Pony is good or bad). Again, I don’t want to ban people from using “gay” or “retarded” as insults. But when they do I will call them out and explain my reasoning.

drostie 14y ago

This is the Correct Response. I would only add one thing: Even if you don't agree that this sort of prejudice and stereotyping amounts to discrimination, the discussion still makes sense. Why? Because most discrimination -- whether racist or sexist -- really happens at the level of social institutions rather than at an individual level. (Like, if you think that you are not a racist because you personally don't see anything wrong with black people, then you probably don't understand racism as it exists today.) The original post is actually trying to cut at the heart of the problem of sexism, which exists prior to (and matures into) the phenonena that gavanwoolery considers "properly" sexist. It's a seed for the problem which matures into institutional sexism.

gavanwoolery 14y ago
The foremost cause of sexism is the fact that many males (consciously or subconsciously) perceive women as mentally and physically weaker (and indeed the average woman is physically weaker than the average male, that's just the way nature played the cards for the human species). Sex-drive is not really as much of a problem with regards to sexism. Sex-drive causes sexual harassment, which is not sexism. If a male were to sexually harass a female, it would not be sexism because he is not giving males special preference over females). If a male were to make a female employee engage is sexual activity for a raise, it would be sexual exploitation, not sexism. My main gripe here is basically that "sexism" has become an umbrella term to describe many things it does not apply to, and thus, a misnomer.
- swa14 14y ago
  >If a male were to sexually harass a female, it would not be sexism because he is not giving males special preference over females Well, seeing how he's not sexually harassing the males I'd say there's a noted difference in "special preference". Anyway, I'd argue that sexism is almost inherent to any sexual harassment, as the male put himself in a position of power/dominance based on little more than gender difference and the perceived inequality/role expectations that go along with that.
  - 14y ago