What do forum members (more particularly the women) think of this?

[oddoneout]

I was interested in the reference to Wittgenstein's concept of 'Blik' which I hadn't come across before. I've found that when women who complain about sexism make sexist remarks themselves and are reproved, they react with incredulity, as if it had not occured to them that women could be sexist. And I think the tendency to see 'misogyny' everywhere ,when a man says something a woman doesn't agree with, is an example of 'Blik'.

The last ten years have shown that many women have not taken Natasha Devon's advice. Behavour provokes behaviour, sadly. I don't think sexism will be diminished unless we have equality of utterrance. Many of you will have noted the recent incident where a woman on a TV show has been acclaimed for 'calling out' what was seen as an example of men not understanding women's situation. I don't think such publicity would be given if a man 'called out' a sexist remark by a woman. If anything he'd be called a 'misogynist'.

I can't access the article referred to so can't comment on issues raised in it, but I'm assuming you mean the incident on the Graham Norton show with Saoirse Ronan's comment about mobile phones and self-defence. Perhaps it's a question of perception, but having watched the clip a couple of times I still think it was simply a statement of fact in response to a query.

Mescal questioned how someone would have time to take their phone out while being attacked, to the amusement of Norton and Washington, before Ronan said: “That’s what girls have to think about all the time. Am I right ladies?”

Is it actually sexist to point out( quite calmly, having waited for a break in proceedings) that for a significant part of the population the question isn't a joke, it's a part of life? Is it any different from a wheelchair user pointing out that non-working(or non-existent) lifts are more than a minor inconvenience for instance? It's a lack of understanding in many cases, rather than entrenched "anti" views. In terms of the male/female "lived experience" the Sarah Everard case and what has followed opened quite a few eyes, and secondary schools are supposed to cover such issues for all their pupils, not just girls, so that each side has some idea of the challenges the other faces.

[richardfinegold]

Prompted by recent discussion on the What are you reading now? thread, I thought I would retrieve this post from 10 years ago, in case anybody considered it worthwhile following it up?

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[smittims]

Yes, I think the Norton/Ronan incident has been 'overinterpreted'. I didn't see it as a heroic feminist 'calling out' of sexism., but I'm told it has 'gone viral' and that's how it's been seen . At worst, one could say that the men were thinking of the theory of being attacked and she was reminding them of the reality. But as I said elsewhere ,it has led to the Independent article 'Nine things women wish men understood' which, understandably, in view of the print-newspaper situation, tries to make topical capital out of it. I just couldn't imagine the media reacting this way if a man had pointed out a shortcoming in something a woman had said. I don't think he'd be a hero. He'd probably be vilified and asked to apologise. It's Jackie Weaver and Handforth Parish Council all over again. But then, as Edward Fox said 'nothing can be a lady's fault'.

[Historian]

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It was printed in full (with some accompanying discussion) on page one of this thread rfg. Hope that works for you.

[vinteuil]

Or it could be: "What do forum members (more particularly the women) think of this?"

... what a long time ago 2014 now seems!

French Frank was absolutely doing her best to steer towards a generally acceptable form of words, and for 2014 that was fine.
Nowadays perhaps a more prudent approach might be " What do forum members (more particularly those who identify as women) think of this?"

I hope 'member' is not a triggering word...

:erm:



.

[teamsaint]

I can't access the article referred to so can't comment on issues raised in it, but I'm assuming you mean the incident on the Graham Norton show with Saoirse Ronan's comment about mobile phones and self-defence. Perhaps it's a question of perception, but having watched the clip a couple of times I still think it was simply a statement of fact in response to a query.

Is it actually sexist to point out( quite calmly, having waited for a break in proceedings) that for a significant part of the population the question isn't a joke, it's a part of life? Is it any different from a wheelchair user pointing out that non-working(or non-existent) lifts are more than a minor inconvenience for instance? It's a lack of understanding in many cases, rather than entrenched "anti" views. In terms of the male/female "lived experience" the Sarah Everard case and what has followed opened quite a few eyes, and secondary schools are supposed to cover such issues for all their pupils, not just girls, so that each side has some idea of the challenges the other faces.

“ Walk a while in my shoes”, We can read, empathise, support all we like. There isn’t much substitute , I think, for that lived experience. And that can apply in very many ways indeed.
White,straight , male, middle class English people living in their native country ( for example) might wait a long time for a personal level lesson in how various discriminations work. But that wait might make that lesson all the more dramatic.

[eighthobstruction]

White,straight , male, middle class English people living in their native country ( for example) might wait a long time for a personal level lesson in how various discriminations work. But that wait might make that lesson all the more dramatic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BoLh8xgOdI Edward Burra....if you scoot to 31 minutes it all suddenly gets very dramatic....

[french frank]

French Frank was absolutely doing her best to steer towards a generally acceptable form of words, and for 2014 that was fine. Nowadays perhaps a more prudent approach might be " What do forum members (more particularly those who identify as women) think of this?"

The form of words, of course, was not mine! In 2014, I think there were in fact more women forumites than there are now. smittims says:

I just couldn't imagine the media reacting this way if a man had pointed out a shortcoming in something a woman had said. I don't think he'd be a hero. He'd probably be vilified and asked to apologise. It's Jackie Weaver and Handforth Parish Council all over again. But then, as Edward Fox said 'nothing can be a lady's fault'.

Without wishing to suggest all cases are comparable in degree, and speaking very generally, if the long oppressed (be they women, men, gays, Jews, Muslims, Blacks &c) turn on the oppressors, who shall criticise them for it? Well, Laurence Fox, apparently.

NB Jackie Weaver reacted to being put down by an aggressive man who apparently resented her chairing the meeting. That's why she was lauded.

[Ein Heldenleben]

The form of words, of course, was not mine! In 2014, I think there were in fact more women forumites than there are now. smittims says:


Without wishing to suggest all cases are comparable in degree, and speaking very generally, if the long oppressed (be they women, men, gays, Jews, Muslims, Blacks &c) turn on the oppressors, who shall criticise them for it? Well, Laurence Fox, apparently.

NB Jackie Weaver reacted to being put down by an aggressive man who apparently resented her chairing the meeting. That's why she was lauded.

I’ve been to literally hundreds of committee and management meetings as a participant and I’ve never witnessed behaviour like that man’s …
…..except at local council meetings that I’ve attended as a journalist. The behaviour (always men) was little short of appalling . Their role model ? The House Of Commons of course ,,,

[Serial_Apologist]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BoLh8xgOdI Edward Burra....if you scoot to 31 minutes it all suddenly gets very dramatic....

I only knew of Burra through the picture of the black 1930s jazz club, so watching this documentary was a powerful experience, for which many thanks, 8th.

[smittims]

I found it difficult to gather exactly what happened and didn't happen in that notorious Handforth meeting, from the little that was published. Where feminists rushed to acclaim Jackie Weaver as a heroine all I heard was one man (no more 'aggressive' to my ears than were the others) trying to make a valid point and repeatedly being shouted down and eventually 'cancelled' by someone who, it afterwards turned out, did not have the authority to do so.

It all history now and there's little point in speculating about a second shouter behind a grassy knoll. Maybe it's another example of people finding what they wanted to find.

[oddoneout]

I would but I'm not sure many here would :smiley:

Because it was brought up on the other thread, I would take up the point about education, albeit, I suspect, in a rather different direction than was intended. Education was something of which girls were deprived, and in some societies still are. In the UK women were not allowed to enter universities (Oxbridge essentially at this time). When they were finally admitted to Cambridge they were not allowed to graduate. When they were granted admission, one student Philippa Fawcett was the first woman to take the Cambridge Mathematics Tripos. She graduated with the top marks for her year but wasn't allowed the traditional title of Senior Wrangler which was a title for men only. This went to the student who came second that year. Nor, as a woman, was she granted a degree. Fawcett's mother was a suffragette. Both had to struggle in a man's world.

When I was teaching in Aberdeen way back in the 70s, the medical school's policy was to accept a broadly equal male/female ratio for its students. There was some controversy when the women applicants on average had better exam results so there had to be adjustments to make sure the men were fully represented. Teenage girls still do better than boys in school exams supposedly because, on the whole, they tend to work harder and more conscientiously. And one sees where all this goes. Andrew Tate.

That's just one aspect: I could quote others.

The eternal attainment gap. When my daughter was in High School single sex teaching of certain GCSE subjects was tried(can't remember if it was 2 years or just Year 10). As hoped the boys' results improved - but so did the girls'(as my daughter said scathingly - what did they expect), so although a good result for the pupils concerned, and boosted the value-added tables, it didn't close the gap. The experiment was not repeated, and when I became a school governor there in 2001, the gap continued to be a source of concern. While it is true that the girls were more inclined to knuckle down and do the work for exams, it also has to be said that there was a maturity gap as well, and I think that probably still is the case. The current exam sausage factory approach to education simply makes that worse.

[eighthobstruction]

....I gift to you Chapter 6 of Howard Zinn's A Peoples History of the United States (a book that led to many another book. It is also perhaps a book that so many people took exception to; and many a diametrical opposition to those exceptions, which led to the Alt -Right to start their Culture Wars after 1980, and terms like Replacement Theory, Critical Race Theory to be created). It is a chapter about white womens early status in the colony and with that I hand over to the narrator : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZ-sk8o3S1Q&list=PL1Blig_Wn136VOW2se4xjcjUReWIvUDbH&i ndex=6 ( the subject of Slave Women is in a later chapter)

[Serial_Apologist]

I found it difficult to gather exactly what happened and didn't happen in that notorious Handforth meeting, from the little that was published. Where feminists rushed to acclaim Jackie Weaver as a heroine all I heard was one man (no more 'aggressive' to my ears than were the others) trying to make a valid point and repeatedly being shouted down and eventually 'cancelled' by someone who, it afterwards turned out, did not have the authority to do so.

It all history now and there's little point in speculating about a second shouter behind a grassy knoll. Maybe it's another example of people finding what they wanted to find.

I always took the repeated showing of that as a trope standing for pettyfogging procedurals stereotypical of community meetings involving "people with nothing better to do with their lives". :sadface:

[Serial_Apologist]

The eternal attainment gap. When my daughter was in High School single sex teaching of certain GCSE subjects was tried(can't remember if it was 2 years or just Year 10). As hoped the boys' results improved - but so did the girls'(as my daughter said scathingly - what did they expect), so although a good result for the pupils concerned, and boosted the value-added tables, it didn't close the gap. The experiment was not repeated, and when I became a school governor there in 2001, the gap continued to be a source of concern. While it is true that the girls were more inclined to knuckle down and do the work for exams, it also has to be said that there was a maturity gap as well, and I think that probably still is the case. The current exam sausage factory approach to education simply makes that worse.

Endemic social expectations have a way of cementing stereotypes, stereotypes models to be complied with: "Boys will be boys", etc etc.