What counts as woman

Our discussion today in class reminded me of a few articles that I read recently. First, here’s this article about the standards for admittance into the US Marine Corps. It’s an interesting look at the things we require and don’t require and the skills that we value and don’t value so much. Female members of the military are held to different standards on and off the battlefield. They are absolutely the Other and the negative in discussions of the military.

http://jezebel.com/5876787/should-lady-marines-get-a-break

Second, here is an article on Caster Semenya, who is the South African runner that Tim mentioned today. We read this New Yorker article for our Queer Theory class. Semenya identifies as a female but her “biological femaleness” has been consistently called into question as a result not only of her physical appearance but also as a result of her speed and testosterone levels. The article notes the ridiculous number of times that Semenya has undergone tests (both official, by doctors, and unofficial, by other athletes who ask her to prove herself in the restrooms before a meet) that violate her privacy. Semenya was raised as and has always identified as a woman.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/11/30/091130fa_fact_levy

I guess I was thinking about all of these things in class today because they all point to the difficulties of being a woman, or of being the Other in general, but they all also relate to the Butler reading for Thursday. As de Beavoir famously said, we are not born but become women. Butler uses the idea of performativity, of the “stylized repetition of acts,” to explain our relationship to gender expression. She notes, “Discrete genders are part of what ‘humanizes’ individuals within contemporary culture; indeed those who fail to do their gender are regularly punished” (99). This is certainly true for Semenya, whose failure to “do” her gender correctly (both biologically and culturally) led to an international controversy. It also brought to mind two other examples of punishment for those who, as trans individuals, failed to appropriately express gender. (Sorry for putting so many articles in this; clearly I read too much Jezebel.)

The first article is on the recent controversy over a Colorado Girl Scout troop that admitted a transgendered 7 year old. Finally, there is an article on a Macy’s employee who was fired over her treatment of a trans customer who went into the women’s changing rooms.

http://jezebel.com/5878240/girl-scout-troop-in-louisiana-disbands-to-protest-tardy-ban-on-transgender-children/

http://jezebel.com/5866187/employee-fired-for-harassing-transgender-customer-accuses-macys-of-religious-discrimination

The questions for me, given de Beauvoir and our Butler reading are, can we ever become woman enough? What do we accept as woman and why do we draw the lines where we do? Where does trans identity fit into our understanding of gender?

The Agonistic Worldview

There is something of an ideological tendency in mainstream America, coupled with our adherence to Darwinian capitalism, to view ourselves as wholly autonomous and independent, separate from others. We are in constant competition, we are told, for jobs, homes, salaries, etc. We can depend on no one but ourselves. The individual is lauded as the first and only important unit. I am the only important thing in my world.

I'm drawn to María Lugones' explanation of the "agonistic" worldview because it's so damn useful in describing the underlying notions of this mainstream ideology. She also points out where this worldview fails and why it is ultimately a false one. To recap, "agonsitic" play always centers around some sort of game, and the goal of any "game" is to win (77). Agonistic play is defined by rules, the importance of competition, and the need for "competence" (77). She also identifies that a participant in a game has "a fixed conception of him or herself" (77). Not all games are free-for-alls. Some require team play, in which case, those teams which are most unified are most likely to be victorious.

The essay that she cites (Homo Ludens, by Johann Huizinga) holds that this agonistic form of play pervades all aspects of culture. This is certainly true of our own. Everybody wants to be a winner. Success in our culture, the measure by which we "win" or "lose" that mysterious "game" of life, is judged by the amount of money one has, the way one looks, acts, etc. These are narrow parameters, however. Being fashionable or clean cut has a certain criterion, and there are a finite set of jobs that earn one the significant sums of cash to qualify as successful. The vast majority of these are positions in the machinery of finance capitalism.

The measures of success in our corporate and mainstream culture necessitates a certain kind of unity. To use Lugones' idea of "worlds", the corporate "world" is very hostile to outsiders. If you are male, you don't walk into the office with long hair, and, regardless of who you are, you certainly don't walk into the office in shorts and flip-flops. You wear a suit and tie. You wear a skirt and jacket. You wear a watch. It is not a "world" that allows you to be playful in the sense Lugones champions, to engage in playful self-construction. Your conception of yourself is already fixed by company dress code, by company policy. Your person is defined. It is a "world" that demands agonistic play.

It is also a world that is populated largely by men. As of 2011, women fill less than 15% of executive officer positions in Fortune 500 companies and slightly more than 16% of executive board seats.* Aside from this, our culture is still predominantly male-dominated. Images of male success in the corporate world are abundant, in movies, TV shows, advertisements, etc. Images of women's success are harder to come by, to say nothing of images of success for people of color. 

But that predominantly masculine world is something of a paradox. The agonistic players are unified by ideology, unified in looks, but they are, necessarily, in competition with one another. The unity is such that, in certain circumstances, the movements of the all-important individual are reduced to  lockstep. They are individuals, independent and autonomous, only in certain turns of the game where competition amongst each other is permitted. Individuals gun for better positions and corporate entities squabble for bigger pieces of the pie (the working poor, invisible and inconsequential as they are, get only the crumbs).  

But are we really autonomous? We depend on others for myriad thing. Food, clothing, iPods, everything we buy is made by someone. We depend on others for the things we consume. More poignantly, we depend on our parents for our lives, on our friends and family for enjoyable, playful, creative experiences that Lugones sees as the heart of being. Without constructive play "we do not make sense, we are not solid, visible, integrated, we are lacking" (73). 

American agonsitic ideology seems something of a lie. On the one hand, it claims the individual to be the "fountainhead of human progress," as Ayn Rand says of the ego. But then it reduces the individual can act as that individual wills to act only in certain circumstances, like a piece on a chessboard. It denies a person the possibility of meaningful self-construction.

_____________
*Catalyst, "Statistical Overview of Women in the Workplace"

Sexism in Commercials

When we were watching the Dodge ad during class on Tuesday, I was offended by how they were portraying women, but I was also shocked at how they were representing men. The commercial made it seem like men only do things because women nag them. Is this commercial assuming that men only go to work so that their wives or girlfriend stop nagging them? Or only separate the recycling? Not because they want to be helpful but because they feel like that have to. That discredits men and their ability to do things by their own volition. I know that there are men who do things to maintain the house or help their significant other because they want to, not just to get her to stop nagging him. I do not feel bad for men, as the response ad suggested sarcastically, but I don't think that this represents men well either.

After reading Frye, I now believe that oppressors cannot be oppressed. I had never thought about it that way before, but I think that it is true. There are individual acts of sexism towards men, but overall, they cannot be oppressed in the same way because they are the oppressors. This is because they set up the system of oppression and because they are responsible, we should not fight against the "oppression" of men.

That being said, I still think that commercials like this need to be eliminated from TV because they harm both women and men. I think that the makers of the commercial were being sarcastic, but they are still perpetuating ideas about genders and gender roles. If I had not been presented this commercial in class, I would have been offended by it but I would not have really thought about it, and I think most Americans are the same way. The humor of the ad also detracts from people thinking about the social implications.

I found the responses very interesting as well. Especially when Dr. J pointed out that most of the things the women said could not be applied to men, but everything a man said applied to women as well. That is what really drove the point home for me. Men may have a negative stereotypes, but they are nothing compared to stereotypes that are used against women.

I seem to be extra sensitive to these issues since our class started and being aware of such sexism and oppression has really change how I see everyday interactions. I haven’t seen many commercials yet, but I know that I will be a lot more conscious. Do you feel the same way? Have there been things that you have noticed recently as well?

Feminist Rhetoric

In class we spent a good deal of time talking about Marilyn Frye's Oppression.  While I do believe Frye's work has some validity, I think a lot of it is overshadowed by somewhat incendiary language.  This seems to be characteristic of a lot of feminist doctrine, and I am curious to see what the rest of the class thinks about this.
Only in the latter part of my time at Rhodes did I begin to self-identify as a feminist, and, even now, I do so somewhat hesitantly.  I know that many of the feminists who came before me did great things that affect my life today.  I can vote.  I can be more than a secretary.  I can decide to have children, or not to have them.  I can receive an equal education to my male counterparts.  But what repelled me from feminism for so long? Well, the bra-burning.  And the man-hating.  And the aggression.
I am certain that I am not the only woman who feels this way about the feminist notions of the past.  I do recognize that some of this comes from our sex-gender system that devalues and alienates women who behave in such a way as many feminists of the past did.  But, if, as Lorde says in "The Master's Tools," the strength of feminism comes from the diverse participation of women, and from the interdependency of women, then why does so much of the feminist canon alienate?
A fraction of the offensive nature of the feminist can be justified because truth is inherently offensive (if it were not, there would be no reason for illusions or untruths).  But the incendiary, accusatory language?  How can we justify this as necessary? It seems that it only deters others from aligning with the causes of feminism, and, if the goal of feminism is social revolution, is this deterrence not counterproductive?

Further Thoughts on "Man's Last Stand"

While at first, the advertisement for the Dodge Charger seems overtly sexist and offensive towards women, I do not believe that it is. My reason for this claim lies in the words of the original ad itself, and the voice-over version of the video we watched in class.
First and foremost, nowhere in the original ad are women mentioned or shown, and it takes over half the “I wills” to get to something that can be close to positively identified as something a man would do for a women, but even then all the “I wills” are things that can be considered done out of necessity rather than being "oppressed" by a female in a relationship. Also, in the original ad, the man speaks in a rather somber, monotone voice, much unlike the parody with the voiceover.
In the parody, however, the woman speaking takes a much harsher tone that seems very critical and angry, and even though she sounds much different, until she gets to the end of the ad, says the same exact thing as the man. If she had followed the script verbatim, it would be perfectly gender neutral, with the only part mentioning any sort of gender being the “Man’s Last Stand” that pops up on the screen. The voice-over female version of the ad seems more offensive than the male version, especially with her tone of voice and diatribe at the end.
It is important to note too, the circumstances upon which this ad was aired on television. It was shown during the Super Bowl, and clearly has a target audience which I have no qualms saying was a majority of men. This ad was meant to serve the purpose of showing the men watching that it is a car they should drive.
Although the ad may seem sexist and offensive, the same exact script and type of advertisement could be used to effectively market a product to women, as long as a woman is used as the speaker and it could even then still say “Women’s Last Stand” at the end. I think we are taking a particular, prescriptive view of this ad given the context of our discussions that puts a certain weight and perspective on the ad that we would not do if we were to just see it on tv.
What I want to ask then, is if the ad was reversed (to Women’s Last Stand), with the same script, and a different product was used, would it still get the negative attention and outcries of sexism that it does now, in its current version?

Positive Stereotypes?

I want to return to an interesting question that Matthew asked in his Precis for Bartkey/McIntosh.  He asked, "Bartky claims that stereotyping leads to those holding the stereotypes to negate or even ignore the opinions and rights of those stereotyped.  Is it fair for her to assume that all stereotypes are negative, and that everyone, if they hold them, acts upon them in such a way." 

I think this is an important question, considering that much of the public humor in our culture, i.e. Tosh.O, Saturday Night Live, Larry the Cable Guy, Chappelle's show, are, at the core, often based on stereotypes.  Even on MadTV, there was a recurring character named Ms. Swan, for example, who was a Chinese woman speaking broken English and working at a nail salon.  So, I think that even though we often pretend to not hold or believe in stereotypes, we often laugh in agreement with them and use them on a daily basis.  Even the world of advertising, functions largely on stereotypes.  Women are often commodified and sold (but only certain kinds of women) under the guise of selling cars, axe cologne, or bud light. 

In response to Matthew's question, I would assert that there is no such thing as a positive stereotype, because the very act of stereotyping (categorizing based on perceived characteristics) is dehumanizing and oppressive.  It reminds me a lot of the Lugones essay and the idea of not being able to define yourself in certain worlds because via stereotypes, and other racist, and sexist, and heterosexist constructions, you’ve already been defined before you even get there.  I think the process of classifying and categorizing people (putting them into boxes based on facets of prescribed identity) allows us to interact with people in a lazy way.  Rather than actually getting to know people as humans and individuals,  we can depend on all of our stereotypes to tell us who the person is, without asking.  In that sense, stereotypes are a mechanism, or a tool for othering, romanticizing, and exoticizing whether they appear to be positive or not. 

I’m interested to hear what people think of this.  Would you answer Matthew’s question differently?  What do you think about the relationship between ‘isms’ (racism, classism, sexism, heterosexism, age-ism) and humor? And what about the defense that people always offer: Well, there’s always a little truth in every stereotype, right? 

Battle of the Sexists?

I thought it might be helpful to some of you if I posted the ads that we watched in class yesterday. Now, you'll have easy access to them all.

Again, I think one of the more interesting things to ask about the first two ads is whether or not they simply represent two versions of the same kind of sexist "stereotyping." In my view, the third ad makes it difficult to hold that is the case. If the complaints of the man and the woman in the first two ads were really just two sides of the same coin, then it ought to be easy for each to substitute him- or herself in the narrative of the other. Yet, as I suggested in class, it seems impossible to substitute the voice of the man in the "Woman's Last Stand" ad.

First, the original Dodge Charger Super Bowl advertisement, "Man's Last Stand":


Next, the feminist parody, "Woman's Last Stand":


And finally, the "cross-voicing" parody:

Welcome to Class!

Welcome to the blog-home for Dr. J's Spring 2012 seminar in Feminist Theory! This site will serve as a forum for students to discuss the material we cover in class, as well as a place to raise questions we may not have addressed in class or to make connections between our material and current real-world events. Each week, students will be divided into two groups, with half of the class designated as "Authors" and the other half designated as "Commenters." In any given week, "Authors" will post a short essay (minimum 400 words) related to the course material before Friday at 5pm. "Commenters" will respond to at least two of that week's Author-posts before the beginning of Tuesday's seminar. Students are encouraged to post or comment beyond the requirements stated here, as frequent and quality blog activity will be rewarded in the final grade.

Blog-writing differs from the writing you might do for "traditional" papers in some ways, but not in others. Here are some things to think about as you compose your posts and comments:

FOR AUTHORS:

• Do not wait until the last minute to write your post! Students should think of the blog as a community exercise. In this community, Authors are responsible for generating that week's discussion and Commenters are responsible for continuing and elaborating upon it. In order for the Commenters to be able to provide the best commentary they can, it is necessary that Authors do not wait until the last minute to post entries in any given week. Like traditional papers, it is almost always obvious when a student has elected to write his or her blog-posts at the last minute, as they end up being either overly simple, poorly conceived or poorly edited. Your contribution to the blog discussion is important, so take care to show the respect to your classmates that you would expect them to show you.
  
• Be concise, but also precise. The greatest challenge of blog-writing is to communicate complex ideas in a minimal amount of words. It is important that you keep your posts short, in keeping with the blog format, but also that you do not sacrifice the clarity or completeness of your ideas for the sake of brevity.
• Be focused. If you find that your blog-entry is too long, it is likely because you have chosen too large a topic for one post. (Consider splitting up long entries into two or more posts.) It should be eminently clear, on the first reading, what your blog post is explaining/asking/arguing. Use the Post Title to clearly state the subject of your entry.
• Choose a topic that will prompt discussion. The measure of a good blog post is how much commentary it can generate. To that end, do not use your blog posts for simple exegesis or to revisit questions already settled in class. Good discussion-generators often include bold claims about, or original interpretations of, our classroom texts. Connecting the course material to current events or controversies is also a good way to generate discussion. Pay special attention to in-class conversations, as many of the issues that generate discussion in class will also do so on the blog.
• Proofread. Proofread. PROOFREAD. As a rule, blog-writing is (slightly) less formal than the writing you might do for a paper you hand in to your professor. For example, you may write in the first person, and a more "conversational" style is usually acceptable. However, ANY writing with glaring punctuation, spelling or grammatical mistakes not only will be difficult to read and understand, but also will greatly diminish the credibility of its Author. It is NOT ADVISABLE to "copy and paste" the text of your post into blog's "new post" box, as you will inevitably end up with a format that is difficult to read. Be sure to familiarize yourself with the formatting buttons above, and always preview your post before publishing it.
  
• Make use of the "extras" provided by new technology. When you write a traditional paper for class, you don't have many of the opportunities that blog-writing affords. Take advantage of the technologies available here to insert images, embed video or employ hyperlinks to other relevant materials.
  
• Respond to your commenters. Authors should stay abreast of all the comementary their posts generate. If you are asked for clarification by a commenter, or if one of your claims is challenged, it is the Author's responsibility to respond.
  

FOR COMMENTERS:

• Read carefully BEFORE you comment. The biggest and most frequent error made by commenters is also the most easily avoidable, namely, misreading or misunderstanding the original post. Don't make that error!
• Simple agreement or disagreement is not sufficient. Sometimes it will be the case that you fully agree or disagree with an Author's post. However, a comment that simply states "I agree" or "I disagree" will not count for credit. You MUST provide detailed reasons for your agreement or disagreement in your comment.
• Evidence works both ways. Often, the source of disagreement between an Author and a Commenter will involve a textual interpretation. If an Author claims in his or her post that "Advocates of the death penalty are obviously operating within a Kantian moral framework," the Author should have also provided a page citation from Kant supporting that claim. If you (as a Commenter) disagree, it is your responsibility to cite a passage from Kant that provides evidence for your disagreement. For disagreements that are not text-based-- for example, disagreements about statistical claims, historical claims, claims about current events, or any other evidentiary matters-- hyperlinks are your friend.
  
• Dr J's Rule #7. Be sure to read Rule #7 under "Dr. J's Rules" on your syllabus. There are no exceptions to this rule. Even on the blog.

Although this blog is viewable by anyone on the Web, participants have been restricted to member of the PHIL365/GSST400 class only. This means that only members of your class can post or comment on this blog. However, anyone can read it, so students are reminded to take special care to support the claims that they make, to edit their posts and comments judiciously, and to generally represent themselves in conversation as they would in public. If you are new to blogging, you can visit the sites for other Rhodes course blogs listed in the column to your right.

I look forward to seeing your conversation develop over the course of this semester!
--Dr. J