(no subject)

Date: 2007-12-02 11:33 am (UTC)
So men are pure, rational, almost sexless beings, and women are icky and embodied and sexual and emotional--and if you've never heard these tropes before, I can find plenty and plenty of instances of them, but of course I can't "prove" it's systemic.

I'm sure you've also heard of the trope of men as sexually aggressive = normal, desirably manly, whereas women as sexual aggressors = dangerous, evil, undesirably mannish (or pathetically laughable -- see: stereotype of slasher as frustrated housewife). I'm pretty sure the negative evaluation of physicality and emotionality is not inherently a sexism issue given that those qualities are also attributed to other non-powerful categories such as racial minorities.

Phrases like "coopted by this system of patriarchal oppression" make me twitch, because, in my mind at least, it implies that somewhere out there is my monolithic malevolent enemy, The [Straw] Man, waiting to be struck down by the forces of righteousness, and because I've heard it too many times in the context of people who are, if you'll allow me to quote a lyric which in its original context falls between a racist stanza and a sexist one, "idiots who praise with enthusiastic tones every century but this and every country but their own".

I know what you mean about flailing. I also wish I could stay out of gender discussions, but I'm not very good at that. Where's a good old ship war when you need one?

A totally unrelated question: are you a library student?
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