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About the best way I can put this is via analogy. Imagine a patient with appendicitis who goes to a doctor, and the doctor just hands over a prescription for p
by gthrowaway 13y ago
About the best way I can put this is via analogy.
Imagine a patient with appendicitis who goes to a doctor, and the doctor just hands over a prescription for pain medication and says "no worries, this will make you feel better right away".
The pain meds will make the patient feel better for a bit, but really they're just masking a symptom of the underlying disease, which is still there. And sooner or later that appendix must be treated or got rid of, or the patient's going to die.
The pop-feminism practised in places like SRS, Jezebel, Tumblr, etc. is the social-justice equivalent of giving the appendicitis patient pain meds. "Smashing the patriarchy" will still leave the underlying disease of which it's a symptom (essentialism and roles assigned on the basis of gender) untreated.
Of course, that's an oversimplification, since the popular conception of "patriarchy" is deeply flawed in other ways (it lacks the explanatory power to say anything more glib than a 101-style "of course it hurts you too, sweetie" to men who are also being harmed by the deeper disease of essentialism, to take one example).
But I've long since given up trying to get this through to most people on internet boards, which is why I now do it under throwaway accounts.
- rmc 13y agoThe pop-feminism practised in places like SRS, Jezebel, Tumblr, etc. is the social-justice equivalent of giving the appendicitis patient pain meds. "Smashing the patriarchy" will still leave the underlying disease of which it's a symptom (essentialism and roles assigned on the basis of gender) untreated. Now I'm confused. I'm an SRSer, and "the patriachy" is gender roles. "smashing the patriachy" means ending gender roles & essentialism. * the popular conception of "patriarchy" is deeply flawed in other ways (it lacks the explanatory power to say anything more glib than a 101-style "of course it hurts you too, sweetie" to men who are also being harmed by the deeper disease of essentialism, to take one example).* Here's a thread on SRS talking about how the patriachy hurts men: http://www.reddit.com/r/SRSDiscussion/comments/1a0bef/xpost_from_rsrsmen_call_for_resources_how_the/ http://www.reddit.com/r/SRSDiscussion/comments/1a0bef/xpost_... Believe me, us social justice/feminist/SRS people do have serious conversations about lots of things, including men.
- gthrowaway 13y agoWell. Firstly, the fact that you continue to use and insist on an overladen (with decades' worth of baggage) term that obscures what you're talking about, rather than just say what you claim to mean, is not an encouraging sign to me. Secondly, if SRS is really a place where "serious conversations", as you put it, take place, then they certainly were adept at hiding it from me back when I frequented. After a while, one gets rather tired of the LOL DILDZ and LOL MRAS and wants to actually accomplish some good. Perhaps it's now a better place, but given how toxic the culture was I very much doubt it.