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From the Geek Feminism Wiki: Clawed my way up is an excuse for sexism used in some geek discussions: "I clawed my way up all on my own, why can't you?" Essent
by rmrfrmrf 14y ago
From the Geek Feminism Wiki:
Clawed my way up is an excuse for sexism used in some geek discussions: "I clawed my way up all on my own, why can't you?"
Essentially, this argument is a denial of the effect of privilege on success. The person making it argues either that:
they, despite being oppressed in some way (often but not always experiencing poverty in childhood), are now very successful, and anyone who isn't is lazy
they, despite being oppressed in some way, never took advantage of any scheme designed to ameliorate oppression (such as scholarships targeted at certain groups)
there is no such thing as institutional privilege, there's just people who work hard and whining people who don't
that natural selection operates at the level of success in society, and by attempting to ameliorate oppression, society is in fact doing itself harm
There are various problems with these arguments:
oppressions don't map perfectly to each other: someone who experienced, say, poverty can't map their experience onto someone who isn't white or is a woman, etc (see Oppression Olympics)
the experience of people with intersecting oppressions is generally discounted
it is unlikely in the extreme that the person speaking did not in some way benefit from privilege: for example, access to enough resources for the child to have a computer (perhaps a cheap secondhand one, but nevertheless), access to a library and time to read any books borrowed from the library, household members who did chores while the person speaking studied, etc.
it is at least unlikely that the person did not in some way benefit from schemes designed to ameliorate oppression, examples include but aren't limited to: free or cheap public schooling and free or cheap healthcare.
- sneak 14y ago> I'm not going to try to compare my pain with your pain or anyone else's;
- zasz 14y agoHe goes on to do just that, though. His comment is claiming that because he was able to tune out his problems, he just knows that whatever she's going through, she can too.
- hacker789 14y agoYou're responding to a point he isn't making. He's not claiming that one's circumstances don't contribute to one's success; obviously, we're all "privileged" to be living in the first world in the 21st century. You took this opportunity to dismiss his personal experiences, and bizarrely, you implied that one's insight regarding a situation is entirely unwelcome without having personally experienced that exact same situation. If that's the case, take your own advice and leave him alone. You're poisoning this discussion. Just stop.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- wpietri 14y agoThe difference being where the discussion started. When a discussion starts with the experience of sexism, then a post that basically says, "well my life as a guy was also hard" derails the discussion. Your criticism would be valid if this were a discussion that had started with Ed's personal experiences. It didn't.
- triplesec 14y agoDo you know this guy? Perhaps there other other unprivileged issues he has had to deal with by being a member of one or more of those groups.
- triplesec 14y agoher experiences, maybe? i believe the poster in question is more likely than not to be female Edit: ah, it seems most people are saying "he" so I suspect prior knowledge of a known poster (though still unclear). My "male assumption" sexist lights were flashing pretty heavily though.