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No, he's relaying his anecdote just like everyone else in this thread. Please don't use "mansplaining", it's highly offensive.

MBCook 11y ago
Highly offensive? I haven't heard that before. It seems like a pretty good term for what it describes. Is this a case of people not liking a term that is used to call them out for poor behavior? Such as saying bigoted things and then objecting to being called racist? I haven't run across someone calling it 'highly offensive' in the time since I learned it.
- exstudent2 11y ago
  Its use in this case demonstrates why it's highly offensive. It's being used to label someone's opinion as negative and discount it for no good reason. Attaching words with negative connotation to a specific gender is highly offensive.
  - MBCook 11y ago
    Ok, so what term would you suggest for discussion when a man talks down to a woman to explain something they already know (possibly better than the man) while trying to be 'helpful'?
    - exstudent2 11y ago
      Nothing. Since that's a fabricated situation being used to justify the existence of the word. Two people have a conversation. Sometimes one knows more than the other, sometimes the person that knows less is unaware of that. I don't think that needs its own term and if it did have a term it absolutely doesn't need to be a gender based insult.
      - MBCook 11y ago
        Are you suggesting that you haven't seen that situation occur? I only learned the word last year, but I've definitely seen it happen in real life. I've even seen it used as the situation for sitcoms, which would imply that it's common enough for people to be able to relate to or at least understand. Does it need its own term? I don't know how you'd gauge that. Clearly there are people who think it does. Enough of them have decided to use it that eventually I learned the word without seeking it out.
        exstudent2 11y ago
        No, I've not seen this behavior exclusively displayed by men often enough to warrant gendering the insult. There are lots of gender stereotypes in sitcoms that are unhealthy. That this particular one is currently en vogue in mass media should tell you that it's exploitative and not actually descriptive.
    - dragonwriter 11y ago
      > Ok, so what term would you suggest for discussion when a man talks down to a woman to explain something they already know (possibly better than the man) while trying to be 'helpful'? I think its unwarranted, and arguably sexist, to put that characterization, regardless of the word used, on the question offered upthread along with an anecdote that provided context.
- zxcvcxz 11y ago
  I think it's offensive. Imagine if we had a phrase called "womansplaning" to describe someone who sounds uneducated about the subject they're explaining, Would that be ok?
  - MBCook 11y ago
    The point of the term (as I understand it) is the situation where someone one in the majority explains something to someone in a minority that that person already knows, possibly quite a bit better, ending up bro condescending while possibly trying to be helpful. Since that seems to be a very frequent occurrence for men to do to women (relative to the reverse) it seems fair to me. Let's take a different context. When southern white racists would explain to African Americans in the south how they were well treated and free after the civil war (say the 1930s) would a term like 'whitesplaining' not fit? Seems like a clever portmanteau to me.
    - exstudent2 11y ago
      This word does not come from a good place and is meant to be a pejorative. Equating male developers to slave owners is both sexist and racist as well. It's not ok to make that kind of comparison.
    - ectoplasm 11y ago
      You just mansplained what it means to mansplain something. Are you offended by this remark?
      - MBCook 11y ago
        I was trying to make sure we were working from the same definition, but many people who were "mansplaining" might say the same thing. Your comment made me smile, that would be ironic wouldn't it. And no, I don't find the term offensive.
        ectoplasm 11y ago
        :) No worries. I personally don't like the term because I'm a man who is quite capable of explaining things well. Most of the things I see labelled as mansplaining I think are poor explanations that lack nuance, introspection, and social / emotional awareness, and as you pointed out they are usually condescending. But how does it relate to my own manhood when something someone else writes is labelled as mansplaining, since I've also been attacked due to my membership in the class? Am I not a real man because I'm not lacking in these things? No, of course not. Would I be offended if some angry person labelled my own writing as mansplaining? Not really, they'd have to attack me on the specifics, in which case I'd listen, etc. I would however use it as a filter indicating I should be wary of their future arguments though, just as I use other slurs as a filter. In general I think it's pointlessly divisive to invent slurs for the other side in the push for egality. That said, men probably have 10x the number of slurs for women (at least if our names for genitals is an indication), so it does make for an uncomfortable object lesson.
- Nadya 11y ago
  It's offensive because it assumes I identify as a man - and that assumption, to me, is explicitly implied in the term itself. I refuse to see the term as a neutral-term applied equally to both genders for three reasons. One being the term itself is gender-loaded (includes "man" in it) and the next being that the majority of the users of the term are femininsts using it to discount any opinions or explanations held by a man; regardless of validity. Lastly, even the wiki article goes to great lengths to emphasize "usually a man" and "usually towards a woman". Though I'm probably mansplaining right now aren't I? You probably know more about the term than I do and here I am explaining to you why it's a sexist term! Their usage also missed that the very problem of being misgendered is something I'm accustomed to and I'm aware of the reasons behind why it happens. It only sees that I tried to "mansplain away" why she was misgendered as the male in the picture rather than pitching in my $0.02 as to why the mistake was a genuine mistake and not explicitly or implicitly sexist. In mrrgn's defense, she provided a better example of the "coded sexism"/implicit sexism in a reply to me. It's also a much better example as it is implicit sexism rather than a "genuine mistake" because it's making an assumption based on gender. >Other examples: going to conferences and being asked if I was covering it for a blog. The usage against me makes an assumption that I am not frequently misgendered and know less about being misgendered than mrrgn does (since the term "mansplaining" itself assumes the lack of knowledge of the one "mansplaining" in regards to the person they are "mansplaining" towards"). I'd wager I'm misgendered far more frequently and thus this assumption is wrong and I can't possibly be mansplaining by its own definition. The largest problem, in my biased opinion, is it misuses a negatively-loaded term against a rather lengthy reply. People may glance at their reply and disregard my post without actually reading the content due to the length of my post. I find that unfair to me and unhealthy towards discussion (and discussion is the point of HN comments...right?)
  - MBCook 11y ago
    > I refuse to see the term as a neutral-term applied equally to both genders for three reasons. One being the term itself is gender-loaded (includes "man" in it) [...] I agree here. In my mind there is no question that the 'mansplainer' is a man and the 'mansplainee' is almost certainly a woman. I read the first bit of the Wikipedia article, seems like one of those cases where Wikipedia is going out of its way to be 'neutral' on a one sided subject. It is clearly a gendered term, not universal.
- dllthomas 11y ago
  Personally, I find it mildly offensive - and it's my interpretation of the social context that some offence is generally the intent (though possibly jocularly).

MBCook 11y ago

Highly offensive? I haven't heard that before. It seems like a pretty good term for what it describes. Is this a case of people not liking a term that is used to call them out for poor behavior? Such as saying bigoted things and then objecting to being called racist? I haven't run across someone calling it 'highly offensive' in the time since I learned it.

exstudent2 11y ago
Its use in this case demonstrates why it's highly offensive. It's being used to label someone's opinion as negative and discount it for no good reason. Attaching words with negative connotation to a specific gender is highly offensive.
- MBCook 11y ago
  Ok, so what term would you suggest for discussion when a man talks down to a woman to explain something they already know (possibly better than the man) while trying to be 'helpful'?
  - exstudent2 11y ago
    Nothing. Since that's a fabricated situation being used to justify the existence of the word. Two people have a conversation. Sometimes one knows more than the other, sometimes the person that knows less is unaware of that. I don't think that needs its own term and if it did have a term it absolutely doesn't need to be a gender based insult.
    - MBCook 11y ago
      Are you suggesting that you haven't seen that situation occur? I only learned the word last year, but I've definitely seen it happen in real life. I've even seen it used as the situation for sitcoms, which would imply that it's common enough for people to be able to relate to or at least understand. Does it need its own term? I don't know how you'd gauge that. Clearly there are people who think it does. Enough of them have decided to use it that eventually I learned the word without seeking it out.
      - exstudent2 11y ago
        No, I've not seen this behavior exclusively displayed by men often enough to warrant gendering the insult. There are lots of gender stereotypes in sitcoms that are unhealthy. That this particular one is currently en vogue in mass media should tell you that it's exploitative and not actually descriptive.
  - dragonwriter 11y ago
    > Ok, so what term would you suggest for discussion when a man talks down to a woman to explain something they already know (possibly better than the man) while trying to be 'helpful'? I think its unwarranted, and arguably sexist, to put that characterization, regardless of the word used, on the question offered upthread along with an anecdote that provided context.
zxcvcxz 11y ago
I think it's offensive. Imagine if we had a phrase called "womansplaning" to describe someone who sounds uneducated about the subject they're explaining, Would that be ok?
- MBCook 11y ago
  The point of the term (as I understand it) is the situation where someone one in the majority explains something to someone in a minority that that person already knows, possibly quite a bit better, ending up bro condescending while possibly trying to be helpful. Since that seems to be a very frequent occurrence for men to do to women (relative to the reverse) it seems fair to me. Let's take a different context. When southern white racists would explain to African Americans in the south how they were well treated and free after the civil war (say the 1930s) would a term like 'whitesplaining' not fit? Seems like a clever portmanteau to me.
  - exstudent2 11y ago
    This word does not come from a good place and is meant to be a pejorative. Equating male developers to slave owners is both sexist and racist as well. It's not ok to make that kind of comparison.
  - ectoplasm 11y ago
    You just mansplained what it means to mansplain something. Are you offended by this remark?
    - MBCook 11y ago
      I was trying to make sure we were working from the same definition, but many people who were "mansplaining" might say the same thing. Your comment made me smile, that would be ironic wouldn't it. And no, I don't find the term offensive.
      - ectoplasm 11y ago
        :) No worries. I personally don't like the term because I'm a man who is quite capable of explaining things well. Most of the things I see labelled as mansplaining I think are poor explanations that lack nuance, introspection, and social / emotional awareness, and as you pointed out they are usually condescending. But how does it relate to my own manhood when something someone else writes is labelled as mansplaining, since I've also been attacked due to my membership in the class? Am I not a real man because I'm not lacking in these things? No, of course not. Would I be offended if some angry person labelled my own writing as mansplaining? Not really, they'd have to attack me on the specifics, in which case I'd listen, etc. I would however use it as a filter indicating I should be wary of their future arguments though, just as I use other slurs as a filter. In general I think it's pointlessly divisive to invent slurs for the other side in the push for egality. That said, men probably have 10x the number of slurs for women (at least if our names for genitals is an indication), so it does make for an uncomfortable object lesson.
Nadya 11y ago
It's offensive because it assumes I identify as a man - and that assumption, to me, is explicitly implied in the term itself. I refuse to see the term as a neutral-term applied equally to both genders for three reasons. One being the term itself is gender-loaded (includes "man" in it) and the next being that the majority of the users of the term are femininsts using it to discount any opinions or explanations held by a man; regardless of validity. Lastly, even the wiki article goes to great lengths to emphasize "usually a man" and "usually towards a woman". Though I'm probably mansplaining right now aren't I? You probably know more about the term than I do and here I am explaining to you why it's a sexist term! Their usage also missed that the very problem of being misgendered is something I'm accustomed to and I'm aware of the reasons behind why it happens. It only sees that I tried to "mansplain away" why she was misgendered as the male in the picture rather than pitching in my $0.02 as to why the mistake was a genuine mistake and not explicitly or implicitly sexist. In mrrgn's defense, she provided a better example of the "coded sexism"/implicit sexism in a reply to me. It's also a much better example as it is implicit sexism rather than a "genuine mistake" because it's making an assumption based on gender. >Other examples: going to conferences and being asked if I was covering it for a blog. The usage against me makes an assumption that I am not frequently misgendered and know less about being misgendered than mrrgn does (since the term "mansplaining" itself assumes the lack of knowledge of the one "mansplaining" in regards to the person they are "mansplaining" towards"). I'd wager I'm misgendered far more frequently and thus this assumption is wrong and I can't possibly be mansplaining by its own definition. The largest problem, in my biased opinion, is it misuses a negatively-loaded term against a rather lengthy reply. People may glance at their reply and disregard my post without actually reading the content due to the length of my post. I find that unfair to me and unhealthy towards discussion (and discussion is the point of HN comments...right?)
- MBCook 11y ago
  > I refuse to see the term as a neutral-term applied equally to both genders for three reasons. One being the term itself is gender-loaded (includes "man" in it) [...] I agree here. In my mind there is no question that the 'mansplainer' is a man and the 'mansplainee' is almost certainly a woman. I read the first bit of the Wikipedia article, seems like one of those cases where Wikipedia is going out of its way to be 'neutral' on a one sided subject. It is clearly a gendered term, not universal.
dllthomas 11y ago
Personally, I find it mildly offensive - and it's my interpretation of the social context that some offence is generally the intent (though possibly jocularly).