Fawst, the thing about your 'It's not misogyny because you can't prove 100% that the makers/designers absolutely hate women', is that intention doesn't matter. What they've made is functionally identical to all of the other horribly misogynistic gore porn stuff that gets made by people who go about referring to women as 'bitches' or whatever. Whether this was made out of malice or idiocy doesn't matter, because the results are the same.
A bit ago in the thread, someone compared your arguments to someone saying 'well, so and so isn't actually homophobic because they don't literally fear gay people', and you said that that was one of the most distressing comments that has ever come your way (or something along those lines). Do you not see the parallels? If your behaviour is identical to someone who is filled with a burning hate for a group of people, then it does not matter what their intention was. It's not worth the effort to distinguish between those two sorts of bigotry. The only thing intention changes, is how easy it is to change someone's views. If someone promotes misogynistic views out of ignorance, then it is easier to get them to stop doing those sorts of things.
An individual is a misogynist if they do misogynistic things. For them to stop being a misogynist, all they have to do is apologise, say they did the wrong things, and then stop doing that thing and all sorts of related things in the future.
Your message is what you communicate, not what you intend. There's no point debating whether someone is a misogynist, you'll never be able to prove it. Focus on what they did, not what they are.
Once in a blue moon, there's a literal example of sexualized dismemberment advertising, where the sexy dismembered body parts are explicitly rendered to resemble a stylized victim of violence.
And thus, why this entire debacle is deeply, deeply disturbing
(I think this is on-topic, given the current bend in the conversation.)
See, I understand that "misogyny" and "rape culture" are the accepted terms, but I feel like that's an unfortunate evolution in the English language. By applying those terms to attitudes like Fawst's, it implies a flaw in his character, rather than merely a flaw in his thinking. It's an important distinction, and one that causes a lot of resistance in these discussions that wouldn't otherwise be encountered.
If I tell my friend he's thinking about a problem the wrong way, he's likely to listen to what I say next, and give it actual consideration.
If I imply that his wrong thinking is the result of a fundamental character flaw or immoral motivation (for example, because he hates women), the conversation is going to be a lot more difficult and less productive for everyone involved.
I'm not saying we shouldn't use those terms, I understand they're the accepted terminology, at least in academic contexts. I'm saying I wish we had been a bit more careful in developing our terminology, because what we stuck ourselves with is a contributing factor to lots of clusterfucks like this thread.
(That said, I'm comfortable applying the terms to this statue, if not to Fawst's perception of the statue.)
I've been on the receiving end of being told that my beliefs and views were misogynistic. It's unpleasant. Of course, the people who told me that also provided their reasons why, and after I fucking got over myself and the belief that my viewpoint was The Most Important, I understood their views and took them as my own. They were right, and I was wrong. My intentions didnt mean shit, and being called out for sexism and stupidity is nothing compared to being surrounded wvery day by sexism and stupidity.
I also understood why they got so damned frustrated in having these discussions with me, because its the same damned conversation every time. Sometimes it's effective, sometimes it's not.
The reason I personally no longer care to walk on eggshells in conversations with people behaving misogynistically or from a sexist point of view is that I weigh their offense as significantly less important than stating what is actually meant in the terms in which it is understood by the majority of those who care. I'm all for speaking to somebody in the most effective way possible, but when somebody refuses to adjust their positions or arguments in the face of a staggering amount of evidence, they can go fuck themselves.
The thought process that led to that statue was misogynistic. It was sexist. It was people being sexist and misogynistic. I'm not saying they're horrible monsters, I'm saying they fucked up in a way that is easy to avoid by not being ignorant.
If you're first response to being told that you're behaving in an offensive way or contributing to a disgusting culture is, 'NO IM NOT HERE ARE MY EXCUSES WHY WOULD YOU EVER ATTACK ME IM TRRRYYYYYYING' then here's what you do: you shut the fuck up and think about why somebody would say that. You remove yourself from the equation. You understand you can do something wrong and not be a terrible person. If you're still offended, continue to shut up until you get over yourself and understand where those feeling are coming from. Why does that person feel the way they do?
Then try to have the conversation. Stop taking shit personally, because its not about you. These words aren't loaded insults, they're criticisms that assholes don't know how to process without flipping the fuck out.
When the person on the other side of the argument/conversation/debate is being an insufferable goosebag, my first thought isn't going to be "hmm, how am I the problem...?" Especially when I think I'm right. I get your point, but righteous indignation is not a quality I or any sane person is looking for in a conversation partner.
What is really odd about this is I saw a collectors edition being offered where it was like a zombie hula girl ornament and other random shit, including a zombie hand bottle opener, a mini suitcase and a room key.
So apparently they came up with this, and decided "Nah we can make that a lot more offensive and stupid."
I've been on the receiving end of being told that my beliefs and views were misogynistic. It's unpleasant. Of course, the people who told me that also provided their reasons why, and after I fucking got over myself and the belief that my viewpoint was The Most Important, I understood their views and took them as my own. They were right, and I was wrong. My intentions didnt mean shit, and being called out for sexism and stupidity is nothing compared to being surrounded wvery day by sexism and stupidity.
The conflation of terms regarding sexism and misogyny has removed shades of meaning with regards to sexism and misogyny. To use the most obvious example: yes, chivalry is sexism. In today's terminology, that also means that it's misogyny. I will not argue that chivalry is a positive force, but it's fairly mild as negative forces go. When all forms of sexism against women are gathered under the blanket term of misogyny, it serves both as off-putting to any audience that needs to hear it (you essentially say "By holding doors open for women, you're showing that you think women are weak and you hate them"), while also diminishing the power of the word. Ideally, we'd have different terms readily available for degrees of cultural attitudes. A guy who is buying gifts for his four-year-old twin niece and nephew for Christmas and who gets a doll for his niece and a football for his nephew is sexist, but not on the same scale of misogyny as a guy who thinks that it's OK for men to sleep around before they're married but that women are sluts if they do so.
In my personal opinion, current feminist grouping of terminology, where sexism towards women is generally labeled as misogyny regardless of degree, A) serves as an unnecessary barrier to communication with people who need to hear that they're sexist, serves to desensitize language and make it less precise. I'm not saying not to call out sexism when it happens, but consider whether or not you'll call someone misogynistic. In my opinion, if someone does something sexist because they're stupid and don't know better, call them out as sexist. If they should know better, then call them out as misogynistic.
I think this is an issue is only manifest in hypotheticals and straw-man arguments.
I would like you to do two things for me: define "sexism" and "misogyny", and then look at how feminists currently use that term.
Most feminist thinkers have actually stopped using sexism because they have realized that sexism has gendered connotations due to its initial baggage, and have moved to more specific terms like misogyny, misandry, transphobia, et al to more accurately describe behaviors.
Or at least, they have stopped using "sexism" on its own, and started qualifying the type.
"Misogyny" is better defined in current feminist lexicon as "devaluing of the female gender" rather than "hatred or dislike of women" (to quote Wikipedia).
I dislike critical arguments against feminist jargon because they are basically useless.
It is a hypothetical to pretend that people will magically be more accepting of being criticized if only you had used the right words.
If I say "I got burned on a stove", people won't generally get on my case about how being burned is a matter of degree, and I should be more specific because some people will hear "I got burned" and think that I was hospitalized, others will think someone insulted me with particular skill while cooking dinner, and others will think I was ripped off on craigslist trying to purchase an appliance. Generally, people concerned about the situation will ask for clarification.
"Misogyny" serves a similar purpose- we have identified a particular item, behavior, or even (occasionally!) a person as falling into this category. We can argue about the degrees later, but it is important to note that at this stage in the discussion, degrees don't matter yet. There are probably a few things that are misogynist (or can be construed as such) that people will accept don't actually matter. This is not one of them, and every time I have seen someone make the same argument you have, that has not been one of those times either.
If you hear "chivalry is misogynist" and interpret that as "holding doors open for women demonstrates that you think they are weak and you hate them", that is not the fault of the word "misogyny". That is most certainly the fault of the interpreter.
Note: this is not to be twisted into some strange defense of language against "PC police" or whatever. These are terms that are used in feminist discourse, and have an accepted meaning in that arena, and using and interpreting them correctly is a burden the user and the listener must bear.
I make the analogy all the time, but this is similar to claiming that the Cambrian "explosion" was actually an event that happened very quickly.
Yes it did, but it happened quickly in the context of Geology, and was not fast by any other standard. Explosion is evocative to be sure, but those who are employing it correctly all understand the context.
What is really odd about this is I saw a collectors edition being offered where it was like a zombie hula girl ornament and other random shit, including a zombie hand bottle opener, a mini suitcase and a room key.
So apparently they came up with this, and decided "Nah we can make that a lot more offensive and stupid."
Your message is what you communicate, not what you intend. There's no point debating whether someone is a misogynist, you'll never be able to prove it. Focus on what they did, not what they are.
That's sort of why I defined a misogynist by what they did rather than some attempt to look at what they 'are'. Which means that you can just as easily stop being a misogynist if you change what you do. But if straight up calling people misogynistic is problematic, then sure, I can accept that.
I'll just post the pic from that article for convenience.
That is a CE I would probably want to spend money on.
And I know several people who would get a kick out of a zombie hula girl or a zombie hand bottle opener.
edit- In fact reading the article, it seems these were the things the community wanted. Man, how the fuck do you miss the mark like this?
i would be delighted to have a zombie hula girl
A trap is for fish: when you've got the fish, you can forget the trap. A snare is for rabbits: when you've got the rabbit, you can forget the snare. Words are for meaning: when you've got the meaning, you can forget the words.
A bit ago in the thread, someone compared your arguments to someone saying 'well, so and so isn't actually homophobic because they don't literally fear gay people', and you said that that was one of the most distressing comments that has ever come your way (or something along those lines). Do you not see the parallels? If your behaviour is identical to someone who is filled with a burning hate for a group of people, then it does not matter what their intention was. It's not worth the effort to distinguish between those two sorts of bigotry.
That comment was directed at me. I was being directly compared to someone who claims to not be homophobic because they aren't afraid of gay people. I found it to be incredibly insulting. What people are missing is that I'm not condoning or defending this. Yet everyone seems to think that I am. I'm not ignoring your other points, they're actually really good ones. Putting it in the context of "their actions mirror those of a misogynist, it doesn't matter if they are or not" is a great way og looking at it, and the smartest point I've seen made yet. Regardless, I understand and agree that their behavior was terrible, regardless of how it's labeled.
A bit ago in the thread, someone compared your arguments to someone saying 'well, so and so isn't actually homophobic because they don't literally fear gay people', and you said that that was one of the most distressing comments that has ever come your way (or something along those lines). Do you not see the parallels? If your behaviour is identical to someone who is filled with a burning hate for a group of people, then it does not matter what their intention was. It's not worth the effort to distinguish between those two sorts of bigotry.
That comment was directed at me. I was being directly compared to someone who claims to not be homophobic because they aren't afraid of gay people. I found it to be incredibly insulting. What people are missing is that I'm not condoning or defending this. Yet everyone seems to think that I am. I'm not ignoring your other points, they're actually really good ones. Putting it in the context of "their actions mirror those of a misogynist, it doesn't matter if they are or not" is a great way og looking at it, and the smartest point I've seen made yet. Regardless, I understand and agree that their behavior was terrible, regardless of how it's labeled.
No one thinks you are defending it, please stop trying to make this situation out to be "Fawst vs the big meanies on the Penny Arcade forum." Everyone is, however, trying to explain to you how this actually for real is misogynistic even though the people that put it out are not, in fact, members of the He-Man Woman Haters Club.
Fawst, as delighted as I am that you have come to the realization that something that looks, walks, and quacks like something misogynist might as well be treated as actually being misogynist, it is important to note that this nuance was present from the onset of the discussion.
Additionally, your defense of proper labeling is both fallacious (as has been explained multiple times), and most importantly to the context here behavior that is indistinguishable from people who think these things are not problematic.
If you can see how "their actions mirror those of a misogynist, it doesn't matter if they are or not" is a, quote, "great way of looking at it and the smartest point yet," I would like you to keep that idea firmly in mind and read back over your own posts.
Which look eerily similar to anyone who has debated feminist interpretations of culture as the exact same arguments people who want to ignore or diminish these things make.
So you can perhaps see why people have been vociferously arguing against you, despite your insistence that you agree this incident was terrible (regardless of label).
The argument, as I said above, that calling something or someone misogynistic is not helpful or accurate is a poor one that adds nothing to discussions of problems- it is an argument unable to provide valid counterpoints without falling prey to doubling down on dictionary definitions and ignoring nuance, it is an argument that does not provide solutions to current problems, and more importantly it is an argument that either intentionally or not handwaves the issue away because it wasn't presented according to a set of standards not common to the larger accepted body of knowledge.
All that being said, good. We agree this shit is misogynistic as all hell. Finally.
My point is, stop making semantic arguments whenever feminists criticize things.
There is a time and a place for debating whether or not "misogyny" is a clear enough term; when we are discussing problem issues in culture is not that time.
I've been on the receiving end of being told that my beliefs and views were misogynistic. It's unpleasant. Of course, the people who told me that also provided their reasons why, and after I fucking got over myself and the belief that my viewpoint was The Most Important, I understood their views and took them as my own. They were right, and I was wrong. My intentions didnt mean shit, and being called out for sexism and stupidity is nothing compared to being surrounded wvery day by sexism and stupidity.
The conflation of terms regarding sexism and misogyny has removed shades of meaning with regards to sexism and misogyny. To use the most obvious example: yes, chivalry is sexism. In today's terminology, that also means that it's misogyny. I will not argue that chivalry is a positive force, but it's fairly mild as negative forces go. When all forms of sexism against women are gathered under the blanket term of misogyny, it serves both as off-putting to any audience that needs to hear it (you essentially say "By holding doors open for women, you're showing that you think women are weak and you hate them"), while also diminishing the power of the word. Ideally, we'd have different terms readily available for degrees of cultural attitudes. A guy who is buying gifts for his four-year-old twin niece and nephew for Christmas and who gets a doll for his niece and a football for his nephew is sexist, but not on the same scale of misogyny as a guy who thinks that it's OK for men to sleep around before they're married but that women are sluts if they do so.
In my personal opinion, current feminist grouping of terminology, where sexism towards women is generally labeled as misogyny regardless of degree, A) serves as an unnecessary barrier to communication with people who need to hear that they're sexist, serves to desensitize language and make it less precise. I'm not saying not to call out sexism when it happens, but consider whether or not you'll call someone misogynistic. In my opinion, if someone does something sexist because they're stupid and don't know better, call them out as sexist. If they should know better, then call them out as misogynistic.
I think this is an issue is only manifest in hypotheticals and straw-man arguments.
I would like you to do two things for me: define "sexism" and "misogyny", and then look at how feminists currently use that term.
Most feminist thinkers have actually stopped using sexism because they have realized that sexism has gendered connotations due to its initial baggage, and have moved to more specific terms like misogyny, misandry, transphobia, et al to more accurately describe behaviors.
Or at least, they have stopped using "sexism" on its own, and started qualifying the type.
"Misogyny" is better defined in current feminist lexicon as "devaluing of the female gender" rather than "hatred or dislike of women" (to quote Wikipedia).
I dislike critical arguments against feminist jargon because they are basically useless.
It is a hypothetical to pretend that people will magically be more accepting of being criticized if only you had used the right words.
If I say "I got burned on a stove", people won't generally get on my case about how being burned is a matter of degree, and I should be more specific because some people will hear "I got burned" and think that I was hospitalized, others will think someone insulted me with particular skill while cooking dinner, and others will think I was ripped off on craigslist trying to purchase an appliance. Generally, people concerned about the situation will ask for clarification.
"Misogyny" serves a similar purpose- we have identified a particular item, behavior, or even (occasionally!) a person as falling into this category. We can argue about the degrees later, but it is important to note that at this stage in the discussion, degrees don't matter yet. There are probably a few things that are misogynist (or can be construed as such) that people will accept don't actually matter. This is not one of them, and every time I have seen someone make the same argument you have, that has not been one of those times either.
If you hear "chivalry is misogynist" and interpret that as "holding doors open for women demonstrates that you think they are weak and you hate them", that is not the fault of the word "misogyny". That is most certainly the fault of the interpreter.
Note: this is not to be twisted into some strange defense of language against "PC police" or whatever. These are terms that are used in feminist discourse, and have an accepted meaning in that arena, and using and interpreting them correctly is a burden the user and the listener must bear.
I make the analogy all the time, but this is similar to claiming that the Cambrian "explosion" was actually an event that happened very quickly.
Yes it did, but it happened quickly in the context of Geology, and was not fast by any other standard. Explosion is evocative to be sure, but those who are employing it correctly all understand the context.
...I don't understand how this is a hypothetical in any sense, which is problematic because I feel like this statement is at the core of your post. Every single time I've criticized or been criticized by someone else, the choice of words mattered a lot. I'm not exaggerating there, I really do mean every single time.
Like I said, I understand the concept of contextual definitions, but I also know that not everyone regularly participates in jargony conversations about feminism. They may not be familiar with the terms in an academic context.
All I said, and all I meant, was that I wish we had developed (or would develop) less loaded terminology. Because on the one hand, I want to be using the "correct" (haha, correct in linguistics) terms. But I want the correct terms to not suck.
Anyway, I like shades of meaning, I think they're handy.
The thing with the hula girl is also its a tossback to the first game since a lot of the cars had hula girls in them. I'm sure thats even an edition you can buy still, but having seen what their marketing department thinks about the gamers they are appealing to I wouldn't want to encourage them.
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
It is not that using the right words is not important
What the point is, is that there are no right words to use when criticizing someone's sexist/racist/homophobic behavior.
I threw those other ones in there because its basically the same.
I'm going to use race as an example for a second here, and then loop back to sex and gender at the end, so bear with me.
It is racist to claim the African-American President wasn't born here, and is actually a Kenyan citizen. It is racist to call our African American president "lazy" after he performs poorly at a debate. It is racist to make an image macro depicting Obama holding a piece of fried chicken with the caption "Lawdy, I 'sho do love campaignin'!"
Does it help the discussion of systemic racism in America to say "well, this one is only sort of racist, so lets use the word "racette" to describe it."?
Maybe. Maybe not. But I suspect that in every instance of racism above, regardless of the word you use or how gently you phrase it, the individual it is directed at will initially defend how said action is not, in fact *whatever specific context of racism you used*.
This lesson has been learned enough times that it is easier to just say "All that shit is racist" and move from there.
Likewise in discussions of feminism, we gain nothing by splitting hairs. Either something is, or isn't misogynist. Strangely, there may even be worth in some actions that, by a critical reading, are misogynist.
It doesn't matter. You could be as accurate to the exact level of societal harm a particular action causes, and the end result would be the same- the initial response would be one of defense and explanations of how the action did not fit even the new, more accurate category.
The point here is that there is already a power dynamic at play, and it is solely the privilege of one group to ignore arguments that aren't perfectly tailored to their exact and shifting specifications.
Any civil rights movement gains nothing by ceding the power to frame the discussion in the terms of those who are perpetrating oppression on any scale and with any level of intent, and they lose quite a lot by doing so.
It is a hypothetical to pretend that people will magically be more accepting of being criticized if only you had used the right words.
I don't think that it's hypothetical at all. Both tone and word choice are immensely important, especially when telling someone that they're wrong and you're trying to convince them of their faults.
I'm not really going to argue with the rest of what you said, because at the end of the day it all comes down to terminology without disagreement (IMO) regarding underlying principles. But: even when you're describing a burn as in your example, you could say you were scalded, seared, cauterized, singed, etc, and those would each carry different connotations to the listener. Like you yourself say, arguments regarding jargon are essentially useless. I'll just leave this with the opinion that we're better served whenever we have multiple linguistic options to describe the severity of an item. Maybe we don't need seventeen words for sexism against women, maybe "misogyny" really is all we need, but big complex issues are (IMO) best served by having language that implicitly increases description and definition of issues rather than language that decreases description and definition.
But that's getting really off-topic. saying more than I intended to when I started this post, and I'm now arguing about language and the nature of arguments. So, I'll drop this topic myself, and even let you have the last word if you want to reply. :rotate:
Civics is not a consumer product that you can ignore because you don’t like the options presented.
Would this discussion have been better served if we referred to the bust as an "example of a microaggression"?
I posit that it would not, because then we would have gone round in circles about how the initial coining of microaggression referred to incidents of race, and the torso depicted is almost clearly caucasian.
But these are hypotheticals, and as such hypotheticals are basically useless.
This thing happened, it is misogynistic, if that word makes you uncomfortable or seems inaccurate I suggest that you take this as an opportunity to learn more about feminism before arguing semantics, or maybe to shelve some of your own beliefs.
I've been on the receiving end of being told that my beliefs and views were misogynistic. It's unpleasant. Of course, the people who told me that also provided their reasons why, and after I fucking got over myself and the belief that my viewpoint was The Most Important, I understood their views and took them as my own. They were right, and I was wrong. My intentions didnt mean shit, and being called out for sexism and stupidity is nothing compared to being surrounded wvery day by sexism and stupidity.
The conflation of terms regarding sexism and misogyny has removed shades of meaning with regards to sexism and misogyny. To use the most obvious example: yes, chivalry is sexism. In today's terminology, that also means that it's misogyny. I will not argue that chivalry is a positive force, but it's fairly mild as negative forces go. When all forms of sexism against women are gathered under the blanket term of misogyny, it serves both as off-putting to any audience that needs to hear it (you essentially say "By holding doors open for women, you're showing that you think women are weak and you hate them"), while also diminishing the power of the word. Ideally, we'd have different terms readily available for degrees of cultural attitudes. A guy who is buying gifts for his four-year-old twin niece and nephew for Christmas and who gets a doll for his niece and a football for his nephew is sexist, but not on the same scale of misogyny as a guy who thinks that it's OK for men to sleep around before they're married but that women are sluts if they do so.
In my personal opinion, current feminist grouping of terminology, where sexism towards women is generally labeled as misogyny regardless of degree, A) serves as an unnecessary barrier to communication with people who need to hear that they're sexist, serves to desensitize language and make it less precise. I'm not saying not to call out sexism when it happens, but consider whether or not you'll call someone misogynistic. In my opinion, if someone does something sexist because they're stupid and don't know better, call them out as sexist. If they should know better, then call them out as misogynistic.
I think this is an issue is only manifest in hypotheticals and straw-man arguments.
I would like you to do two things for me: define "sexism" and "misogyny", and then look at how feminists currently use that term.
Most feminist thinkers have actually stopped using sexism because they have realized that sexism has gendered connotations due to its initial baggage, and have moved to more specific terms like misogyny, misandry, transphobia, et al to more accurately describe behaviors.
Or at least, they have stopped using "sexism" on its own, and started qualifying the type.
"Misogyny" is better defined in current feminist lexicon as "devaluing of the female gender" rather than "hatred or dislike of women" (to quote Wikipedia).
I dislike critical arguments against feminist jargon because they are basically useless.
It is a hypothetical to pretend that people will magically be more accepting of being criticized if only you had used the right words.
If I say "I got burned on a stove", people won't generally get on my case about how being burned is a matter of degree, and I should be more specific because some people will hear "I got burned" and think that I was hospitalized, others will think someone insulted me with particular skill while cooking dinner, and others will think I was ripped off on craigslist trying to purchase an appliance. Generally, people concerned about the situation will ask for clarification.
"Misogyny" serves a similar purpose- we have identified a particular item, behavior, or even (occasionally!) a person as falling into this category. We can argue about the degrees later, but it is important to note that at this stage in the discussion, degrees don't matter yet. There are probably a few things that are misogynist (or can be construed as such) that people will accept don't actually matter. This is not one of them, and every time I have seen someone make the same argument you have, that has not been one of those times either.
If you hear "chivalry is misogynist" and interpret that as "holding doors open for women demonstrates that you think they are weak and you hate them", that is not the fault of the word "misogyny". That is most certainly the fault of the interpreter.
Note: this is not to be twisted into some strange defense of language against "PC police" or whatever. These are terms that are used in feminist discourse, and have an accepted meaning in that arena, and using and interpreting them correctly is a burden the user and the listener must bear.
I make the analogy all the time, but this is similar to claiming that the Cambrian "explosion" was actually an event that happened very quickly.
Yes it did, but it happened quickly in the context of Geology, and was not fast by any other standard. Explosion is evocative to be sure, but those who are employing it correctly all understand the context.
...I don't understand how this is a hypothetical in any sense, which is problematic because I feel like this statement is at the core of your post. Every single time I've criticized or been criticized by someone else, the choice of words mattered a lot. I'm not exaggerating there, I really do mean every single time.
Like I said, I understand the concept of contextual definitions, but I also know that not everyone regularly participates in jargony conversations about feminism. They may not be familiar with the terms in an academic context.
All I said, and all I meant, was that I wish we had developed (or would develop) less loaded terminology. Because on the one hand, I want to be using the "correct" (haha, correct in linguistics) terms. But I want the correct terms to not suck.
Anyway, I like shades of meaning, I think they're handy.
If I invent "zargleplume" as a word meaning what we've taken misogyny to mean in this thread and by some Christmas miracle this becomes a word people use and not jargon, I can absolutely guarantee the discussion we would be having would instead be, "Yeah, but it's not really zargleplume, is it?"
What is meant by misogyny has been made rather clear in this thread, but still the use of it is debated because people have problem with the referent, not the sign. Replacing the sign with a different one is not going to solve any of those problems -- people will still attempt to minimize the issue by debating the sign and it's application.
This thing happened, it is misogynistic, if that word makes you uncomfortable or seems inaccurate I suggest that you take this as an opportunity to learn more about feminism before arguing semantics, or maybe to shelve some of your own beliefs.
I'm wrong to firmly oppose what I believe to be a misuse of the dictionary definition of a word because I don't understand enough about feminism. That's what I just read. I think it's inaccurate so I need to learn more about feminism. I need to shelve some of my own beliefs, such as "if I look up a word to find its meaning I will trust that definition," because I'm not a feminist. Got it.
This has officially reached a level of stupid that I was never aware existed.
People complain about words, but words just describe concepts.
So, now, the accepted definition of various terms such as "misogyny" and "rape culture" have been provided along with everything else necessary to comprehend these words and the context we're using them in. I know that when I invoke these terms, I am simply using them to describe the concepts they describe. It doesn't matter if the words is "misogyny" or "farfenoogin" because it's the concept I'm talking about. Can we all just get off this "that's a loaded word" shit, and all the whole semantics debate to begin with? It's the concept that is important here.
If I may?
I think some of the problem (besides the obvious one that people don't want to think they're at fault, or that their beliefs are wrong, etc etc, which is pretty much universal) is that some people - especially, IMO, those who would identify as "geeks" - are very, very literalist when it comes to things like the meanings of words. There is no room for fuzziness or ambiguity when it comes to language; this is the word they (believe they) carefully and deliberately chose, this is what they (believe they) meant by it, no more and no less, and you are either ignorant or deliberately distorting their intent by using it in any other way.
Problem is, language doesn't actually work that way. (Hell, even math and physics don't work that way if you dig down far enough, which has caused people no end of bother over the years.) Language is fluid, living, evolving, imprecise, defined and redefined by consensus. Language does not merely name and label simple, immutable things like "two" (and again, there are the edge cases which end up being "... for certain values of 'two'"), but also larger and more complex things that two (or more) people may have very different ideas about... including whether "_______" is the best word to describe that concept.
It's... (I want to say "cute", but that would be sarcasm*) unfortunate that some seem to think there's a platinum-iridium "misogyny" in a vault somewhere in Brussels, or free-floating atoms of it in the interstellar vacuum, just waiting to be observed, or that If It's In The OED It Must Be So Now And Forever, but it's not that simple. It can't be. It's big and complicated and messy, like most of life, and I'm sorry that this conflicts with the urge to put everything in neat little boxes of exactly the right size to contain the thing, labeled in some Serious Font to indicate the contents.
(*another fine example of language's imprecision, by which a word can be used in such a way to actually convey a very different meaning than its usual or accepted one.)
Meanings change faster than dictionaries change. I would posit that the definition of misogyny that you're running with, Fawst, makes misogyny such a niche word as to be almost completely useless for any level of discussion about anything in practical terms.
Literally 99% of the discourse on this topic accepts the definition we've used for misogyny as being proper.
The 1% who don't are either A) hardcore prescriptivists or fighting that fight because they can't win on substance.
If you're A) then you're hijacking the thread. If you're then there's no point in continuing the discussion.
Either way (and I'm going to eat an infraction for this, I'm sure), stop being an annoying fucking pedant and address something of substance instead of having your own battle over the meaning of the word 'misogyny'.
The alpha and omega of making sure one is implicitly familiar with specialized jargon.
You are wrong to oppose what you "believe" to be a misuse of the dictionary definition of the word because you don't understand enough about modern feminist usage of the word, even after it has been explained that the modern usage is divorced from the dictionary definition.
Spoiler- words have potentially different meanings in different contexts.
Would this discussion have been better served if we referred to the bust as an "example of a microaggression"?
I posit that it would not, because then we would have gone round in circles about how the initial coining of microaggression referred to incidents of race, and the torso depicted is almost clearly caucasian.
But these are hypotheticals, and as such hypotheticals are basically useless.
This thing happened, it is misogynistic, if that word makes you uncomfortable or seems inaccurate I suggest that you take this as an opportunity to learn more about feminism before arguing semantics, or maybe to shelve some of your own beliefs.
A) You're right, calling the bust a microaggression would be inappropriate; however, the terms I have personally preferred to use are "creepy" and "sexually exploitative." Thank you for introducing to me the term microaggression; it's one that I'll definitely use going forward, along with "microinvalidation" and "microinsult."
Civics is not a consumer product that you can ignore because you don’t like the options presented.
I mean, the thing is the concept is static: The idea we are talking about here is a behavior/attitude that (in part) marginalizes and objectifies women. It doesn't really matter whatsoever if the word "misogyny" means that or not, at least once we actually get all our cards on the table and explain what concept we are referring to when we invoke the word. At that point, you could call the concept "tablism" or "tigerism" or whatever else you want because the concept isn't going to go away even if we agree that a word isn't appropriate to describe it. (Even though in this case it is.) So we really shouldn't be going off on a multi-page tangent on whether or not misogyny means THIS or THAT because it is irrelevant. The concept being discussed is THIS and that ain't changin'.
I'm wrong to firmly oppose what I believe to be a misuse of the dictionary definition of a word because I don't understand enough about feminism. That's what I just read. I think it's inaccurate so I need to learn more about feminism. I need to shelve some of my own beliefs, such as "if I look up a word to find its meaning I will trust that definition," because I'm not a feminist. Got it.
It shouldn't come as a surprise that general-use dictionaries lag far behind the evolving use of terms in discourse. You're giving far more credence to the dictionary's authority than it deserves. It's descriptivist: it describes the way people use language and updates periodically to reflect this. General-use terms are often pretty useless in specialist discourse, because they're overbroad or imprecise or inaccurate or wanting in some way. You're entering a conversation with a great deal of academic thought attached to it and the terms have evolved way beyond definitions recorded centuries ago.
Gender used to mean physical sex, but now it means social construct. Wanna guess which offered that definition first, sociology or Merriam-Webster?
Your argument is literally nothing other than "the dictionary says so!" and you keep getting offended that people try to explain why that ain't so. Ask a lexicographer aka the people who make dictionaries or a linguistics professor at your local university and find out how authoritative the shaky ground you're standing on is.
So, are we just not allowed to put boobs in anything anymore? Is that where this is? Should all women in video games be dressed like Eskimos or in a Burqa?
You know, I was like you once. I didn't see the problem with this kind of shit. Then, my sisters became teenagers and all of a sudden all those images that I found harmless were sending very negative messages to them. It normalized what beauty is in society to them and they developed image issues. I was already picky about what I showed them when I played video games, but now I go out of my way to avoid gratuitous sexualization of females in games so I don't look like a hypocrite in front of them. Granted, I can't protect them from everything and they still like things that probably still send the wrong message about beauty. That doesn't mean they have to think that their older brother agrees with that and doesn't see them as two beautiful young woman.
I remember reading a discussion a bit ago in D&D, where someone was claiming that transgender issues and gender dysphoria didn't exist because they found a dictionary that listed sex and gender as synonyms.
Don't get attached to dictionary meanings. They aren't always useful.
Would this discussion have been better served if we referred to the bust as an "example of a microaggression"?
I posit that it would not, because then we would have gone round in circles about how the initial coining of microaggression referred to incidents of race, and the torso depicted is almost clearly caucasian.
But these are hypotheticals, and as such hypotheticals are basically useless.
This thing happened, it is misogynistic, if that word makes you uncomfortable or seems inaccurate I suggest that you take this as an opportunity to learn more about feminism before arguing semantics, or maybe to shelve some of your own beliefs.
A) You're right, calling the bust a microaggression would be inappropriate; however, the terms I have personally preferred to use are "creepy" and "sexually exploitative." Thank you for introducing to me the term microaggression; it's one that I'll definitely use going forward, along with "microinvalidation" and "microinsult."
While you are welcome, I would urge you to potentially reconsider A).
I'm fairly certain under the definition I am familiar with (which diverges from Wikipedia slightly) the bust stands as a good example.
That is, a microaggression is basically the hallmark of pervasive sexism. It is an act of othering, generally intentional and portrayed as non-directed, against a specific group of individuals who are not the "majority" (in context of power relationships).
In that sense, a bust reducing women down to just tits is a microaggression, and it becomes more uncomfortable when you mix the violent imagery in.
Basically, most of gaming's real dirty problems right now deal with microaggressions, because they are usually harder for people to recognize, harder to accept and change, and less "obvious" than things like the Sarkeesian backlash, or the Crossfire thing.
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Zxerolfor the smaller pieces, my shovel wouldn't doso i took off my boot and used my shoeRegistered Userregular
I once read a comment for something where the poster was indignant of the author's use of the word "decimate," because he had used as to mean a great destruction of something instead of the proper use as the killing of a population as defined in Roman antiquity.
This sort of slavishly literal nonsense helps no one, least of all yourself. Don't be that kind of ubernerd.
Literally 99% of the discourse on this topic accepts the definition we've used for misogyny as being proper.
The 1% who don't are either A) hardcore prescriptivists or fighting that fight because they can't win on substance.
If you're A) then you're hijacking the thread. If you're then there's no point in continuing the discussion.
Either way (and I'm going to eat an infraction for this, I'm sure), stop being an annoying fucking pedant and address something of substance instead of having your own battle over the meaning of the word 'misogyny'.
Well I hope you don't get infracted, I'm not offended. Mainly because I'm not actually doing either of those things.
I have agreed that the statue is misogynist by both the feminist and possibly even the common-use meaning of the word. My point was that, here in this thread, we have an example of a clusterfuck that could have been avoided by more nuanced language, that's all.
You can guarantee me, or be absolutely certain, that the conversation with Fawst would have gone identically if different terms were in play, but I'll continue to disagree on that point. To say otherwise is to assume bad faith on his part, which is generally not a good way to start a discussion.
In my experience, avoiding the terms "misogyny" and "rape culture" outside of academic contexts has been a constructive way of doing things. Your mileage may vary!
It certainly hasn't varied in this thread, though.
Gotta consider that microaggressions will always exist.
Our tutor told us this two years ago when I was a psych student, but I have no idea where the source paper is so take this with a grain of salt.. Apparently microaggressive behaviour occurs at a subconscious level between the sexes, so for example, a male psychologist will display some behaviors which we don't notice consciously and he isn't aware that they are occurring, but will subconsciously affect the patient in some way. Consequently, a lot of people more comfortable with female psychologists.
The statue is really messed up when we consider the overarching message sent to us about women through the medium. It feels like the context of the piece is what makes it so sexist. I don't feel it is necessarily sexist all by itself, but the lack of Whedon-like characters in games/movies/tv really messed this up.
Literally 99% of the discourse on this topic accepts the definition we've used for misogyny as being proper.
The 1% who don't are either A) hardcore prescriptivists or fighting that fight because they can't win on substance.
If you're A) then you're hijacking the thread. If you're then there's no point in continuing the discussion.
Either way (and I'm going to eat an infraction for this, I'm sure), stop being an annoying fucking pedant and address something of substance instead of having your own battle over the meaning of the word 'misogyny'.
Well I hope you don't get infracted, I'm not offended. Mainly because I'm not actually doing either of those things.
I have agreed that the statue is misogynist by both the feminist and possibly even the common-use meaning of the word. My point was that, here in this thread, we have an example of a clusterfuck that could have been avoided by more nuanced language, that's all.
You can guarantee me, or be absolutely certain, that the conversation with Fawst would have gone identically if different terms were in play, but I'll continue to disagree on that point. To say otherwise is to assume bad faith on his part, which is generally not a good way to start a discussion.
In my experience, avoiding the terms "misogyny" and "rape culture" outside of academic contexts has been a constructive way of doing things. Your mileage may vary!
It certainly hasn't varied in this thread, though.
Sorry, I really should've directed that post at the appropriate person.
Occasionally saying 'hey I don't know if that's the best word but I don't know what it is so *shrug*' is not the problem!
Continuously hijacking the discussion to say 'WELL MAYBE IT'S BAD BUT IT'S NOT SPECIFICALLY BAD BECAUSE OF THIS DEFINITION HERE' then you are wasting everyone's time and derailing the conversation for... what? What possible gain?
Posts
A bit ago in the thread, someone compared your arguments to someone saying 'well, so and so isn't actually homophobic because they don't literally fear gay people', and you said that that was one of the most distressing comments that has ever come your way (or something along those lines). Do you not see the parallels? If your behaviour is identical to someone who is filled with a burning hate for a group of people, then it does not matter what their intention was. It's not worth the effort to distinguish between those two sorts of bigotry. The only thing intention changes, is how easy it is to change someone's views. If someone promotes misogynistic views out of ignorance, then it is easier to get them to stop doing those sorts of things.
An individual is a misogynist if they do misogynistic things. For them to stop being a misogynist, all they have to do is apologise, say they did the wrong things, and then stop doing that thing and all sorts of related things in the future.
Steam // Secret Satan
And thus, why this entire debacle is deeply, deeply disturbing
When the person on the other side of the argument/conversation/debate is being an insufferable goosebag, my first thought isn't going to be "hmm, how am I the problem...?" Especially when I think I'm right. I get your point, but righteous indignation is not a quality I or any sane person is looking for in a conversation partner.
So apparently they came up with this, and decided "Nah we can make that a lot more offensive and stupid."
http://stickskills.com/2013/01/10/dead-island-riptide-has-a-rigor-mortis-collectors-edition/
pleasepaypreacher.net
I think this is an issue is only manifest in hypotheticals and straw-man arguments.
I would like you to do two things for me: define "sexism" and "misogyny", and then look at how feminists currently use that term.
Most feminist thinkers have actually stopped using sexism because they have realized that sexism has gendered connotations due to its initial baggage, and have moved to more specific terms like misogyny, misandry, transphobia, et al to more accurately describe behaviors.
Or at least, they have stopped using "sexism" on its own, and started qualifying the type.
"Misogyny" is better defined in current feminist lexicon as "devaluing of the female gender" rather than "hatred or dislike of women" (to quote Wikipedia).
I dislike critical arguments against feminist jargon because they are basically useless.
It is a hypothetical to pretend that people will magically be more accepting of being criticized if only you had used the right words.
If I say "I got burned on a stove", people won't generally get on my case about how being burned is a matter of degree, and I should be more specific because some people will hear "I got burned" and think that I was hospitalized, others will think someone insulted me with particular skill while cooking dinner, and others will think I was ripped off on craigslist trying to purchase an appliance. Generally, people concerned about the situation will ask for clarification.
"Misogyny" serves a similar purpose- we have identified a particular item, behavior, or even (occasionally!) a person as falling into this category. We can argue about the degrees later, but it is important to note that at this stage in the discussion, degrees don't matter yet. There are probably a few things that are misogynist (or can be construed as such) that people will accept don't actually matter. This is not one of them, and every time I have seen someone make the same argument you have, that has not been one of those times either.
If you hear "chivalry is misogynist" and interpret that as "holding doors open for women demonstrates that you think they are weak and you hate them", that is not the fault of the word "misogyny". That is most certainly the fault of the interpreter.
Note: this is not to be twisted into some strange defense of language against "PC police" or whatever. These are terms that are used in feminist discourse, and have an accepted meaning in that arena, and using and interpreting them correctly is a burden the user and the listener must bear.
I make the analogy all the time, but this is similar to claiming that the Cambrian "explosion" was actually an event that happened very quickly.
Yes it did, but it happened quickly in the context of Geology, and was not fast by any other standard. Explosion is evocative to be sure, but those who are employing it correctly all understand the context.
Goddamit that actually looks kinda cool
That is a CE I would probably want to spend money on.
And I know several people who would get a kick out of a zombie hula girl or a zombie hand bottle opener.
edit- In fact reading the article, it seems these were the things the community wanted. Man, how the fuck do you miss the mark like this?
That's sort of why I defined a misogynist by what they did rather than some attempt to look at what they 'are'. Which means that you can just as easily stop being a misogynist if you change what you do. But if straight up calling people misogynistic is problematic, then sure, I can accept that.
Steam // Secret Satan
i would be delighted to have a zombie hula girl
That comment was directed at me. I was being directly compared to someone who claims to not be homophobic because they aren't afraid of gay people. I found it to be incredibly insulting. What people are missing is that I'm not condoning or defending this. Yet everyone seems to think that I am. I'm not ignoring your other points, they're actually really good ones. Putting it in the context of "their actions mirror those of a misogynist, it doesn't matter if they are or not" is a great way og looking at it, and the smartest point I've seen made yet. Regardless, I understand and agree that their behavior was terrible, regardless of how it's labeled.
That would sell like crazy! What an epic failure.
No one thinks you are defending it, please stop trying to make this situation out to be "Fawst vs the big meanies on the Penny Arcade forum." Everyone is, however, trying to explain to you how this actually for real is misogynistic even though the people that put it out are not, in fact, members of the He-Man Woman Haters Club.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
Additionally, your defense of proper labeling is both fallacious (as has been explained multiple times), and most importantly to the context here behavior that is indistinguishable from people who think these things are not problematic.
If you can see how "their actions mirror those of a misogynist, it doesn't matter if they are or not" is a, quote, "great way of looking at it and the smartest point yet," I would like you to keep that idea firmly in mind and read back over your own posts.
Which look eerily similar to anyone who has debated feminist interpretations of culture as the exact same arguments people who want to ignore or diminish these things make.
So you can perhaps see why people have been vociferously arguing against you, despite your insistence that you agree this incident was terrible (regardless of label).
The argument, as I said above, that calling something or someone misogynistic is not helpful or accurate is a poor one that adds nothing to discussions of problems- it is an argument unable to provide valid counterpoints without falling prey to doubling down on dictionary definitions and ignoring nuance, it is an argument that does not provide solutions to current problems, and more importantly it is an argument that either intentionally or not handwaves the issue away because it wasn't presented according to a set of standards not common to the larger accepted body of knowledge.
All that being said, good. We agree this shit is misogynistic as all hell. Finally.
There is a time and a place for debating whether or not "misogyny" is a clear enough term; when we are discussing problem issues in culture is not that time.
...I don't understand how this is a hypothetical in any sense, which is problematic because I feel like this statement is at the core of your post. Every single time I've criticized or been criticized by someone else, the choice of words mattered a lot. I'm not exaggerating there, I really do mean every single time.
Like I said, I understand the concept of contextual definitions, but I also know that not everyone regularly participates in jargony conversations about feminism. They may not be familiar with the terms in an academic context.
All I said, and all I meant, was that I wish we had developed (or would develop) less loaded terminology. Because on the one hand, I want to be using the "correct" (haha, correct in linguistics) terms. But I want the correct terms to not suck.
Anyway, I like shades of meaning, I think they're handy.
pleasepaypreacher.net
What the point is, is that there are no right words to use when criticizing someone's sexist/racist/homophobic behavior.
I threw those other ones in there because its basically the same.
I'm going to use race as an example for a second here, and then loop back to sex and gender at the end, so bear with me.
It is racist to claim the African-American President wasn't born here, and is actually a Kenyan citizen. It is racist to call our African American president "lazy" after he performs poorly at a debate. It is racist to make an image macro depicting Obama holding a piece of fried chicken with the caption "Lawdy, I 'sho do love campaignin'!"
Does it help the discussion of systemic racism in America to say "well, this one is only sort of racist, so lets use the word "racette" to describe it."?
Maybe. Maybe not. But I suspect that in every instance of racism above, regardless of the word you use or how gently you phrase it, the individual it is directed at will initially defend how said action is not, in fact *whatever specific context of racism you used*.
This lesson has been learned enough times that it is easier to just say "All that shit is racist" and move from there.
Likewise in discussions of feminism, we gain nothing by splitting hairs. Either something is, or isn't misogynist. Strangely, there may even be worth in some actions that, by a critical reading, are misogynist.
It doesn't matter. You could be as accurate to the exact level of societal harm a particular action causes, and the end result would be the same- the initial response would be one of defense and explanations of how the action did not fit even the new, more accurate category.
The point here is that there is already a power dynamic at play, and it is solely the privilege of one group to ignore arguments that aren't perfectly tailored to their exact and shifting specifications.
Any civil rights movement gains nothing by ceding the power to frame the discussion in the terms of those who are perpetrating oppression on any scale and with any level of intent, and they lose quite a lot by doing so.
I don't think that it's hypothetical at all. Both tone and word choice are immensely important, especially when telling someone that they're wrong and you're trying to convince them of their faults.
I'm not really going to argue with the rest of what you said, because at the end of the day it all comes down to terminology without disagreement (IMO) regarding underlying principles. But: even when you're describing a burn as in your example, you could say you were scalded, seared, cauterized, singed, etc, and those would each carry different connotations to the listener. Like you yourself say, arguments regarding jargon are essentially useless. I'll just leave this with the opinion that we're better served whenever we have multiple linguistic options to describe the severity of an item. Maybe we don't need seventeen words for sexism against women, maybe "misogyny" really is all we need, but big complex issues are (IMO) best served by having language that implicitly increases description and definition of issues rather than language that decreases description and definition.
But that's getting really off-topic. saying more than I intended to when I started this post, and I'm now arguing about language and the nature of arguments. So, I'll drop this topic myself, and even let you have the last word if you want to reply. :rotate:
It is called a "microaggression".
Would this discussion have been better served if we referred to the bust as an "example of a microaggression"?
I posit that it would not, because then we would have gone round in circles about how the initial coining of microaggression referred to incidents of race, and the torso depicted is almost clearly caucasian.
But these are hypotheticals, and as such hypotheticals are basically useless.
This thing happened, it is misogynistic, if that word makes you uncomfortable or seems inaccurate I suggest that you take this as an opportunity to learn more about feminism before arguing semantics, or maybe to shelve some of your own beliefs.
If I invent "zargleplume" as a word meaning what we've taken misogyny to mean in this thread and by some Christmas miracle this becomes a word people use and not jargon, I can absolutely guarantee the discussion we would be having would instead be, "Yeah, but it's not really zargleplume, is it?"
What is meant by misogyny has been made rather clear in this thread, but still the use of it is debated because people have problem with the referent, not the sign. Replacing the sign with a different one is not going to solve any of those problems -- people will still attempt to minimize the issue by debating the sign and it's application.
I'm wrong to firmly oppose what I believe to be a misuse of the dictionary definition of a word because I don't understand enough about feminism. That's what I just read. I think it's inaccurate so I need to learn more about feminism. I need to shelve some of my own beliefs, such as "if I look up a word to find its meaning I will trust that definition," because I'm not a feminist. Got it.
This has officially reached a level of stupid that I was never aware existed.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
So, now, the accepted definition of various terms such as "misogyny" and "rape culture" have been provided along with everything else necessary to comprehend these words and the context we're using them in. I know that when I invoke these terms, I am simply using them to describe the concepts they describe. It doesn't matter if the words is "misogyny" or "farfenoogin" because it's the concept I'm talking about. Can we all just get off this "that's a loaded word" shit, and all the whole semantics debate to begin with? It's the concept that is important here.
I think some of the problem (besides the obvious one that people don't want to think they're at fault, or that their beliefs are wrong, etc etc, which is pretty much universal) is that some people - especially, IMO, those who would identify as "geeks" - are very, very literalist when it comes to things like the meanings of words. There is no room for fuzziness or ambiguity when it comes to language; this is the word they (believe they) carefully and deliberately chose, this is what they (believe they) meant by it, no more and no less, and you are either ignorant or deliberately distorting their intent by using it in any other way.
Problem is, language doesn't actually work that way. (Hell, even math and physics don't work that way if you dig down far enough, which has caused people no end of bother over the years.) Language is fluid, living, evolving, imprecise, defined and redefined by consensus. Language does not merely name and label simple, immutable things like "two" (and again, there are the edge cases which end up being "... for certain values of 'two'"), but also larger and more complex things that two (or more) people may have very different ideas about... including whether "_______" is the best word to describe that concept.
It's... (I want to say "cute", but that would be sarcasm*) unfortunate that some seem to think there's a platinum-iridium "misogyny" in a vault somewhere in Brussels, or free-floating atoms of it in the interstellar vacuum, just waiting to be observed, or that If It's In The OED It Must Be So Now And Forever, but it's not that simple. It can't be. It's big and complicated and messy, like most of life, and I'm sorry that this conflicts with the urge to put everything in neat little boxes of exactly the right size to contain the thing, labeled in some Serious Font to indicate the contents.
(*another fine example of language's imprecision, by which a word can be used in such a way to actually convey a very different meaning than its usual or accepted one.)
Literally 99% of the discourse on this topic accepts the definition we've used for misogyny as being proper.
The 1% who don't are either A) hardcore prescriptivists or
If you're A) then you're hijacking the thread. If you're
Either way (and I'm going to eat an infraction for this, I'm sure), stop being an annoying fucking pedant and address something of substance instead of having your own battle over the meaning of the word 'misogyny'.
The alpha and omega of making sure one is implicitly familiar with specialized jargon.
You are wrong to oppose what you "believe" to be a misuse of the dictionary definition of the word because you don't understand enough about modern feminist usage of the word, even after it has been explained that the modern usage is divorced from the dictionary definition.
Spoiler- words have potentially different meanings in different contexts.
See also: "theory" and "goose".
A) You're right, calling the bust a microaggression would be inappropriate; however, the terms I have personally preferred to use are "creepy" and "sexually exploitative."
It shouldn't come as a surprise that general-use dictionaries lag far behind the evolving use of terms in discourse. You're giving far more credence to the dictionary's authority than it deserves. It's descriptivist: it describes the way people use language and updates periodically to reflect this. General-use terms are often pretty useless in specialist discourse, because they're overbroad or imprecise or inaccurate or wanting in some way. You're entering a conversation with a great deal of academic thought attached to it and the terms have evolved way beyond definitions recorded centuries ago.
Gender used to mean physical sex, but now it means social construct. Wanna guess which offered that definition first, sociology or Merriam-Webster?
Your argument is literally nothing other than "the dictionary says so!" and you keep getting offended that people try to explain why that ain't so. Ask a lexicographer aka the people who make dictionaries or a linguistics professor at your local university and find out how authoritative the shaky ground you're standing on is.
You know, I was like you once. I didn't see the problem with this kind of shit. Then, my sisters became teenagers and all of a sudden all those images that I found harmless were sending very negative messages to them. It normalized what beauty is in society to them and they developed image issues. I was already picky about what I showed them when I played video games, but now I go out of my way to avoid gratuitous sexualization of females in games so I don't look like a hypocrite in front of them. Granted, I can't protect them from everything and they still like things that probably still send the wrong message about beauty. That doesn't mean they have to think that their older brother agrees with that and doesn't see them as two beautiful young woman.
Don't get attached to dictionary meanings. They aren't always useful.
Steam // Secret Satan
While you are welcome, I would urge you to potentially reconsider A).
I'm fairly certain under the definition I am familiar with (which diverges from Wikipedia slightly) the bust stands as a good example.
That is, a microaggression is basically the hallmark of pervasive sexism. It is an act of othering, generally intentional and portrayed as non-directed, against a specific group of individuals who are not the "majority" (in context of power relationships).
In that sense, a bust reducing women down to just tits is a microaggression, and it becomes more uncomfortable when you mix the violent imagery in.
Basically, most of gaming's real dirty problems right now deal with microaggressions, because they are usually harder for people to recognize, harder to accept and change, and less "obvious" than things like the Sarkeesian backlash, or the Crossfire thing.
This sort of slavishly literal nonsense helps no one, least of all yourself. Don't be that kind of ubernerd.
Well I hope you don't get infracted, I'm not offended. Mainly because I'm not actually doing either of those things.
I have agreed that the statue is misogynist by both the feminist and possibly even the common-use meaning of the word. My point was that, here in this thread, we have an example of a clusterfuck that could have been avoided by more nuanced language, that's all.
You can guarantee me, or be absolutely certain, that the conversation with Fawst would have gone identically if different terms were in play, but I'll continue to disagree on that point. To say otherwise is to assume bad faith on his part, which is generally not a good way to start a discussion.
In my experience, avoiding the terms "misogyny" and "rape culture" outside of academic contexts has been a constructive way of doing things. Your mileage may vary!
It certainly hasn't varied in this thread, though.
Our tutor told us this two years ago when I was a psych student, but I have no idea where the source paper is so take this with a grain of salt.. Apparently microaggressive behaviour occurs at a subconscious level between the sexes, so for example, a male psychologist will display some behaviors which we don't notice consciously and he isn't aware that they are occurring, but will subconsciously affect the patient in some way. Consequently, a lot of people more comfortable with female psychologists.
The statue is really messed up when we consider the overarching message sent to us about women through the medium. It feels like the context of the piece is what makes it so sexist. I don't feel it is necessarily sexist all by itself, but the lack of Whedon-like characters in games/movies/tv really messed this up.
Sorry, I really should've directed that post at the appropriate person.
Occasionally saying 'hey I don't know if that's the best word but I don't know what it is so *shrug*' is not the problem!
Continuously hijacking the discussion to say 'WELL MAYBE IT'S BAD BUT IT'S NOT SPECIFICALLY BAD BECAUSE OF THIS DEFINITION HERE' then you are wasting everyone's time and derailing the conversation for... what? What possible gain?