How Narya Blames

Here's the thing.

Patriarchy isn't something to which we can choose to respond; it's there, whether we recognize its manifestations or not. And we can't get away from it, mostly. It's part of the air we breathe. I think what Twisty tries to do is point out the manifestations, as she sees them, on the principle that, to quote her, "There can be no liberation if women cannot become aware of the ways in which they are enjoined to participate in their own oppression." I don't necessarily agree with her with regard to particular manifestations, but her commentary always makes me think. Why do we do the things we do? I regard sociobiological explanations as just-so stories, not least because, as part of my research, for one thing, I've seen biology "explain" completely contradictory things. After awhile, you start to see patterns--or I did, anyway--in these explanations.

I eventually concluded that biology (or genes, or sex, or genitalia) does not "determine" anything. We are born with a set of capacities, a kind of limiting boundary of what's possible (e.g., men will not become pregnant). In my mind, though, it's a boundary condition, rather than a determination, and the boundary conditions in place for any given person aren't always apparent. (For another pregnancy example, I never tried to get pregnant and I took decided measures to prevent pregnancy, so I have no idea whether I could have become pregnant; thus, using "pregnancy potential" as some kind of determining factor fails.) As an example of how boundary conditions work, anyone can develop heart disease or an addiction or breast cancer or depression. Some people are more likely to do so than other people, in part, but only in part, because of their particular genetic makeup. Others would have to work much harder to develop that particular affliction or be exposed to particular carcinogens in the environment. In every case, it's a combination of a person's particular genetic makeup in combination with his or her particular life circumstances. (For example, someone who has an alcoholic parent may minimize his or her use of alcohol--I know several people for whom this is true. That reduces the chances he or she will become an alcoholic, but it might also be the case that the genetic markers that would have made alcoholism more likely are absent. Thus, neither the genetic nor the environmental conditions for alcoholism were met.)

I think sex is very similar. Our genitalia do not "determine" much of anything. (I saw a book yesterday called "The Female Brain" or something like that, and I wanted to set it on fire.) Our current popular notion that men and women are "opposite" kinds of things/bodies is actually a product of late Victorian thought; before that, men and women were regarded as somewhat different manifestations of the same kind of thing/body. The notion that men and women are "opposites" is destructive (and vile) in a vast number of ways, into which I will not go at the moment, but the most important one is that many people end up having the notion that men are in this bell curve over here and women are in that bell curve over there, and rarely will the twain meet, they being on different planets and all. It's simply not the case, first of all, and, second, it's not at all clear what effect environment has on any of the things that we use to designate male or female. (Treating male babies and female babies differently might affect how their brains grow, for example--and numerous studies have shown that people talk to and handle babies differently depending on the sex they think the baby is.)

Thus, I am profoundly suspicious when someone says "men do X" or "women do Y." Really? Why is that so? Do you have reliable data, or is it just the men and women you happen to know? And, frankly, many data sets are unreliable, in my opinion: what is coded as "aggression" in a woman might be coded as "assertiveness" in a man, to use a commonplace example. Thus, one must ask which behaviors were observed, who did the observing, how much coding took place, etc. And don't even get me started on the leaps from this or that species to humans (go read Donna Haraway's Primate Visions first, and then we can talk). So, Larry, when you say that women comment on other women more than men comment on other men, I need an explanation--one that takes into account an assortment of possible factors--if you want me to take that statement as meaning something other than "I know a lot of women who seem to talk about how other women look." That statement says more about the women and men you know than about men or women in general, and it's often a mistake to generalize from the people we know.

As for feminism, I see a lot of people--including some of you, gentle readers--reading Twisty and then kind of apologizing for not being a "good enough" feminist. Stop it! It's not a test! In my opinion, a "good" feminist is one who examines his or her practices and thought patterns as closely as he or she is able to do, and continues to do so over the course of his or her life. Just because I recognize marriage as an instrument of the patriarchy doesn't necessarily mean that I am going to eschew marriage or criticize married people; it means I recognize the limitations the patriarchy has imposed, or some of them, and I am choosing my actions from within that set of limitations. It might also mean that I fight, in some way, to change the notions of what a marriage can be--for example, arguing for gay/lesbian marriage rights. The truly important part is the willingness to examine, to think about, to recognize the patriarchy's influences, and, to the best of my ability, to imagine and live alternatives and provide opportunities for others to do likewise. (It's precisely in that arena that I find Twisty so useful: She makes me think.)

I also think our ability to examine our lives changes over our lifetimes. Gloria Steinem once said that women get more radical with age, and I think that's right. It's true I started out at a relatively radical spot on this continuum, but I've only moved more to the radical side (and I'm not anywhere near as radical as many of the commentariat at Twisty's). I am fascinated by Twisty's suggestion that we give up gender, for example; I like thinking about what would happen if we didn't classify human beings in that way (and, really, that's long been a fantasy of mine). It's not as though sexual desire or sexual reproduction would suddenly become impossible, it just changes the scope of possible relationships between and among humans. Here's the other thing, too: I'm sufficiently old that I remember the 1960s and, even more, the 1970s. Part of the reason I claim the label of feminist is precisely because of the way that term has been used to vilify women (and men) who want simple human rights for everyone. So, yes: I am a feminist.

And, last, part of what that label means to me is that I think everyone should assume that he or she will have to support and care for himself or herself. We should know how to feed and clothe ourselves; we should be able to manage our resources; we should expect to earn our own resources. I see way too many women who expect they'll marry and their husbands will support them; I see way too many men who expect some woman will take over the "mother" functions and manage their laundry and cooking and so on; I see way too many couples saying they want kids without thinking about who, exactly, is going to do the work of raising them. (Not my friends, in general--my friends are a motley assortment, not surprisingly, and include several men who have spent time as the at-home parent, for example.) If everyone makes those assumptions, learns those skills, then I think everyone is in a stronger position when it comes to arranging partnerships of various sorts--overall, everyone is better off, in my opinion, and better prepared to face a wider range of circumstances. John Adams thought it was the obligation of each of us to work to become the best person each of us can be, and, at the same time, to do what we can to make sure others have that opportunity as well. (It's the difference between a boss who recognizes and utilizes your strengths and a boss who is threatened by your strengths.) I think feminism is directly related to that goal.

Thus, I find it entertaining, over at Twisty's when she points out an aspect of the patriarchy and is greeted with shouts of condemnation and accusations of men-hating and so on. (It's also worth pointing out that blaming the patriarchy isn't the same as blaming men, even though men benefit from the patriarchy.) To me, it seems that she's often posing a thought experiment of some kind and asking her readers to do likewise; our analyses may differ, as may our proposed solutions or our preferences with regard to possible solutions, but that makes things more interesting. And if someone thinks I'm not a "good enough" feminist? Hell, I'll go find a dozen men and women who think I'm "too" feminist, and I'll let them fight it out among themselves while I go have a beer.