Re: [Pan-users] Re: updated info - O.T.

[Steven D'Aprano]

On Fri, 6 Aug 2010 01:18:25 pm Alan Meyer wrote:
> Steven,
>
> Our postings have crossed in the ether.  I didn't see this before
> posting a reply to your last one, and of course you hadn't seen
> my reply.
>
> Steven D'Aprano <address@hidden> wrote:
> > > Perhaps if more of us would transpose remarks like Stallman's,
> > > substituting our own favorite gender, religion, race,
> > > nationality, or cultural group for "women", we'd better
> > > appreciate the vulgarity of Stallman's remark.
> >
> > That is excellent advice. While you are working yourself up
> > into a frenzy of condemnation, did you even bother to take your
> > own advice?
> >
> > "The virgin of emacs is any programmer who has not yet learned
> > how to use emacs. And in the church of emacs we believe that
> > taking their emacs virginity away is a blessed act."
> >
> > "The virgin of emacs is any white male who has not yet learned
> > how to use emacs. And in the church of emacs we believe that
> > taking his emacs virginity away is a blessed act."
> >
> > Sounds fine to me. And I don't even use Emacs and don't
> > particularly like it.
>
> Your first one eliminates the gender bias and, for me, turns it
> into legitimate, if not particularly funny, humor.
>
> Your second one on the other hand strikes me as strange.  It
> doesn't appeal to the standard stereotypes.  I think people would
> have trouble understanding it.  They would ask the question, "Why
> white males?"  That many in the audience do not ask, "Why
> females?" is part of what women find offensive.

Exactly. You said:

[quote]
Perhaps if more of us would transpose remarks like Stallman's,
substituting our own favorite gender, religion, race,
nationality, or cultural group for "women", we'd better
appreciate the vulgarity of Stallman's remark.
[end quote]

I did what you suggested. I substituted a gender-neutral noun, and my 
own gender/cultural group, and there was no vulgarity to be seen. 
Stallman's comment seemed entirely reasonable. That was entirely the 
point.

*Why* do some people consider it offensive and terrible to talk about 
taking away the virginity of *female* virgins, but not of males, or 
programmers, or doctors, or fishermen, or just about any other group? 
The idea that programmers should be offended by talk of taking away 
their figurative virginity would be ... bizarre. Why are women singled 
out?

Actually not quite singled out. The only other group of people that 
comes to mind where it would be shocking to talk about taking their 
virginity is pre-pubescent children and babies. Is that where feminist 
consciousness raising has led us, to believe that adult women are 
sexually equivalent to children?

There's historical precedent for this. The previous great sexual 
revolution -- the Suffragette movement in the late 19th and early 20th 
centuries -- started off by fighting for equal rights for women, and 
ended up treating women as weak, child-like things who needed 
protection, not equality. The same thing is happening with modern 
feminism. People who claim to be in favour of equality of the sexes are 
hoping into bed (figuratively speaking) with religious conservatives 
who want to "protect" women from, well, everything, especially the 
right to be treated as an autonomous adult human being. No wonder only 
a minority of young woman are willing to describe themselves as 
feminists, even though by their actions and expectations that's exactly 
what they are.



> And how about the ad with the young woman?  How would it look
> with a pretty young man, with similarly large lips, and all the
> text exactly the same?  Will the corporate manager who sees the
> ad think it's funny that he is being appealed to as a man who
> would ask a young fellow for a blow job?

We live in a homophobic society, so no. I'm not exactly sure what your 
point is there.

[...]
> Duncan's example was, "He took the keys," versus, "He took away the
> keys."

And what makes you think that either one implies anything involuntary?

"Hey, boss, I need to get into the server room."

"Sorry Fred, you'll have to wait. Jack took the keys away to get some 
spare copies made, but he'll be back in 15 minutes."



> The distinction between the two that I thought he was making was
> that, "He took the keys," can mean something like: "He took the
> keys from the table."  "He took away the keys," is stronger, more
> like "He took the keys away from me."

Certainly "take away" can be stronger or more emphatic, but it doesn't 
need to be. It depends on the context. But we're not talking about how 
emphatic "taking away" virginity is, but whether it implies the lack of 
consent.


> > > we should imagine
> > > something more dramatic like being locked in a cell with a
> > > powerful and aggressive male prisoner who decides to take away
> > > our virginity with respect to what he has in mind.
> >
> > Or we could imagine somebody saying "Won't somebody please take
> > away my damn virginity? It does me no good, I don't want it."
> >
> > Or we could imagine somebody saying "Take me, take me now!".
>
> I can imagine a male writer putting such words in the mouth of a
> woman.

Did I say it was a woman? For somebody who is trying to raise my 
consciousness, you have an awful lot of unconscious assumptions that 
need raising yourself.


> I can imagine a male writer dreaming of a woman saying 
> such a thing to him.  I can imagine a writer of either gender
> writing such a thing in a book of fantasy.
>
> But I'm having a real tough time imagining any woman I know
> saying such a thing - though I suppose it's always possible that
> women say such things all the time, but never to me.

The words themselves are awfully Mills and Boons. Or Penthouse Letters. 
The phrasing itself is terribly stylised. But the attitude is quite 
common. Sometimes it's voiced more crudely, sometimes hinted at, 
sometimes not voiced at all, but it's amazing how much you can say 
without saying a word.

And sometimes it's suppressed entirely, especially among those who been 
brought up to imagine that sex is dirty, disgusting, or shameful. They 
tend to be the sort of people who read fantasies about women who 
say "Take me now sir!" but would never, ever in a million years say it 
themselves.



> > But if you're a fan of Firefly, you're probably having a hard
> > time *not* thinking of Zoe in "War Stories", after her jealous
> > husband Wash had wrongly imagined she had sexual feelings
> > towards Mal and suggested that the two of them sleep together
> > to get it out of their system, she turns to Mal and, absolutely
> > deadpan, says "I understand. We have no choice.  Take me, sir.
> > Take me hard.", and thereby completely shredding the last
> > vestiges of Wash's jealousy. (As well as being a deeply funny
> > scene in an otherwise dark episode about the best and worst of
> > human nature.)
>
> I don't know Firefly, but I can see that that is pretty funny.
> But I don't see the parallel with either the ad or the Stallman
> story.

It wasn't so much a parallel as an observation. 



-- 
Steven D'Aprano