Feminism and Proof

[alixtii]

If you haven't figured it out from the frustrated rant I made yesterday, there's been some gender discussions going on this weekend, mostly in response to the FanLib thing. I made a comment here that I'm pleased enough with that I'm going to copy it here:

Doesn't it trouble you at all, in regard to the selection of the board and whether this is gender motivated or incidental, that the definition of sexism you're employing is a non-disprovable hypothesis?

I can't prove that "patriarchy" exists any more than I can prove that "liberal democracy" exists, and yes, you can't disprove it anymore than you can disprove liberal democracy. So we have two choices: we can either become positivists and be skeptical about anything we can't touch or feel, and never talk about freedom or love or justice, or we can accept that non-disprovable hypotheses are the bedrock of interpreting our world. What we can do is look at individual situations and connect the dots so as to see a larger pattern.

We're talking about interpretative lenses, and no, a lens cannot be proven or disproven. That does not mean that one lens is just as good as another, though. A conspiracy of evil robots that look just like humans is no more or less disprovable than "patriarchy" or "liberal democracy," but it doesn't help us to communicate or to live justly in this world; indeed, such a lens works against those ends. The concepts of "liberal democracy" and "patriarchy," on the other hand, along with all of feminism, allow us to better work for justice and equity along gender lines, which is useful.

(A worldview including invisible pink unicorns is, I think, neutral as to the way it allows us to live justly in our world.)

Comments

[paradox-dragon.livejournal.com]

I just wanted to thank you for articulating that, because I was having trouble doing so in that discussion. (Partially because my brain is numb after answering twenty bazillion comments there, but also because I find it such a difficult argument to respond to in general; it makes me feel like I'm living in a different reality than the person asking the question).

And regarding what you said in your rant yesterday about the British vs. American feminism thing, a great big word to that. I had to just back off and let commenters from the UK take over.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

Than you, both for your kind words and for your icredible involvemen in those discusions, both the post itself (which is awesome) and the many comments that went both before and after. I'm really happy about how the discussion has been going; obviously we'll never convince our most fervent interlocutors but we have demonstrated to more neutral readers that, yes, we do have answers to these objections.

That's the main reason I re-posted my comment here, because I think the idea that feminism is "not even wrong" can be a real concern to reasonable, open-minded people, and I think it's a good thing

I find it such a difficult argument to respond to in general; it makes me feel like I'm living in a different reality than the person asking the question

I know what you mean. I was brought up a feminist from the beginning, that systemic injustice exists is as deeply engrained an article of faith as there is for me, and so to have someone say "Prove it!" is always a little flail-indcing, because my first response is always "How can you not see it?"

[cathexys.livejournal.com]

I love seeing you in these gender debates, b/c sadly for the kind of people who argue against gender biases and systemic sexism, your voice seems more neutral (not b/c you're male but b/c you're not female if that makes sense).

Just...thank you!

[http://users.livejournal.com/peasant_/]

Nice answer. Of course it is non-disprovable, just as the counter arguments are non-disprovable, in all politics, including social politics, right down at the bottom of things we all have a 'belief' that underpins our stance. And I think it is important that we first admit it and then move on and continue to discuss the issues. Your fundamental belief in patriarchy is no different from my fundamental belief in a liberal interpretation, and however much your patriarchy makes me feel uncomfortable, I have to acknowledge that is because it jars with my fundamental belief, not because there is anything inherently illogical* about it. It feels 'wrong' to me, not illogical in the strict sense. And I assume the reverse is true for you. I think (not a hundred percent sure on this) I have even read there is research that shows these things have a genetic basis, just as religious belief does - if you don't have the gene you don't have the gene.

As so often on LJ, there is this big problem when people who want to discuss things come up against people who only want to persuade other people that they are right. I wish people could be given ratings and handicaps or something so we all knew were we were from the start. Apart from anything else, as someone who is very much a 'discusser' not a 'persuador' I resent that unless I either know the person already or perform a huge fan-dance of explanation every time, I may well be interpreted as trying to persuade people when all I really want to do is talk and find out why they think what they think at the same time as explaining why I think what I think.

Should I look at the discussion you link, or would it just depress me further into my current belief that the Big Three can't be discussed with strangers on LJ without causing a kerfuffle? I really don't think I can face another kerfuffle right now.



*Which is not to say I don't reserve the right to point our illogicalities when I see them, and also to tease you mercilessly in the process ;o)

[slashpine.livejournal.com]

Mmm, good analysis. Here from metafandom, but I also read that discussion. You argue *so* well and I'm glad you do, because I just find it tedious to hear one more person always insist "but my friend X isn't like that, so no one is!" and "I never noticed, so it can't be true!"

Aaargh. They should start teaching statistical sampling, and how not to use the commonest ... oh, 20 ... fallacies in kindergarten. Maybe more people would learn them.

But actually, you're making a strong "abductive" argument, which is nearly an unassailable form when made explicit. Where deductive arguments point to necessary truths (which are often quite narrow), and inductive point to only probable truths (which are thus easily attacked as speculative, and relative), abductive arguments are laid out to show that a particular theory is superior to all its competitors and that it is therefore the one most likely to be true. Physics uses lots of abductive arguments, for example, when positing that if process X takes place, and result Y is unexplained by any known fact, some new particle Z must exist such that all other current "laws" are satisfied, and the new result is also explained.

Abductive arguments are really quite conservative, due to that requirement that they not ignore what is already known (compatibility). Your argument does this. The *cough* British feminist school (or shall I say, neo-liberal feminist school), on the other hand, violates compatibility by pointing to random isolated examples of "never saw any sexism."

You also met other main criteria for sound explanatory arguments -- clarity, logical consistency, coherence (as part of a larger picture), comprehensiveness. Again, the argument for the existence of systemic and structural sexism is not just a possibility; under the definition of abduction, it is a compelling argument, because it explains far, far more than the converse claim that "it's only a few bad apples." It is more comprehensive. The few-bad-apples argument is not comprehensive, because it's micro-scale, quite literally a piecemeal and case-by-case explanation.

The "few bad apples" argument also fails because it has no predictive value: if there are no systemic factors at work causing sexism, how do we know who will suddenly do something sexist? Your argument for systemic (or structural) injustice, however, has powerful predictive value. That's why Title IX (in the U.S.) and civil rights legislation has (if slowly) worked.

And that last example also shows that your argument for societal structures of sexism meets the compatibility criterion better than arguments that sexism is individual, isolated, or doesn't even exist (or only in the U.S. *cough, snort*). Because it *is* agreed that pervasive social structures of racism exist; sexist structures arise and operate in many similar ways.

Anyway ... rambling; it's late. I just wanted to say first, that I admired the *hell* out of your calm, deliberate discourse. When I see people piling up fallacies higher and higher, my tendency is to either walk away, or assign more reading, LOL.

And second? I think you should give your argument more credit than just calling it a non-disprovable hypothesis. No, it's not "deductively" provable. But abduction is a type of strong argument that this meets the criteria for: it is an inference to the best explanation that meets all criteria for good arguments, and is vastly superior to its numbskull competitors. Yay you!

[beliael.livejournal.com]

(Here from Paradox_dragon's post and metafandom community)

I'm just wondering how you would respond to evil_mr_tim's reply to your original comment. I'll quote it below:

I agree with your assertion that all presuppositions don't necessarily have equal utility.
What I would disagree with is the claim that you can neither prove [nor disprove that] we live in a patriarchy and a liberal democracy.
There's ample empirical evidence that we, in fact, do live in both.
I would suggest, though, that the identification of social privilege in favour of a particular group, is insufficient grounds to take sexism (or indeed, any big 'ism) as an explanatory presumption in any given situation. It is not only pejorative against the group in question (which is a pretty big concern), but it dilutes the significance of genuine, motivated, sexist behaviours when we encounter them. We don't need to assume sexism in order to recognise it.

(Emphasis his, additional note in square brackets mine)

[evil-mr-tim.livejournal.com]

I wonder that myself. :|