Because you demanded it!

[andrewducker]

[Poll #1413754]

Comments

[andrewducker]

I strongly suspect that a lot of people will be fine with sexism, but not with racism or homo/heterophobia.

[likeneontubing.livejournal.com]

I just took the option the other day to be a light hearted joke, but today the context made it not jokey, if you get me?

You certainly didn't offend me the other day at all.

[aberbotimue.livejournal.com]

I didn't see one the other day, so question one, I saw as jokey, when the next question was similar , thats when it looked seriouse, and I got uncomfortable..

I wonder how it would have played out, if he started with black and white.

[zz]

i'm taking "uncomfortable" to include a "this is irrational" reaction, rather than just PC moral outrage.

[andrewducker]

Surely the moral outrage is about the use of irrational reasons to make judgements about people?

[zz]

the problem being irrational doesn't automatically justify a given negative response or make that response rational either, and PC and/or moral outrage are usually more about fashion and social conditioning/indoctrination than considered thought.

[meihua.livejournal.com]

"I did it on purpose and was kidding" isn't entirely an excuse for posting polls which suggest the non-existence / irrelevance of genderqueer and intersexed gender identities, bisexuality and asexuality and non-black, non-white race.

[andrewducker]

Who said that they don't exist or are irrelevant?

If I asked you whether bread was better than cheese, would that suggest the non-existance of eggs?

[meihua.livejournal.com]

If those things were traditionally bandied about as dualities, yes. That "and the other things don't exist" clause (which *IS* meant most of the time the duality is stated) gets bundled up into the "x/y" expression and pretty much needs to be explicitly called out every time the duality is stated to avoid reinforcing that.

I feel like it's a duty for those people who know that there's more than male/female to do that work.

[meihua.livejournal.com]

Eh, I dunno, now I read this again. Maybe jumping at shadows. Not sure. :)

[meaningrequired.livejournal.com]

I dislike one group of anything saying they are better than others. Groups are *different*.

I explained the myers briggs personality tests when used in workshops/businesses as a tool to highlight differences and the appreciation of this rather than thinking of people in terms of better or worse.

[ladysisyphus.livejournal.com]

Re: the poll from the other day: When you present me with a pick-only-one poll that has two 'real' answers, neither of which I think is entirely correct, and a 'joke' answer, chances are good I'm going to pick the 'joke' answer as a protest vote at being unable to nuance my answer.

As for these questions? Well, I find it very difficult to take any inquiries that end in 'Duh!' very seriously.

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

Thanks - interesting answer.

I'm curious (and I am NOT assuming anything nor attacking here) - did you feel uncomfortable about expressing that opinion even in jest? I know I'd feel a bit uncomfortable about saying "I think men are better than women", even joking, but this may be a boundaries thing - I tend to view the Internet as a public medium.

[ladysisyphus.livejournal.com]

No more uncomfortable than I'd feel casting my vote behind, say, 'Girls rule and boys drool!' At the point where we're basically lobbing schoolyard taunts at one another (and obviously doing so in jest), I have a genetic obligation to stand beside my fellow vagina owners and declare that, yes, girls are the rulers and boys are the droolers. If the penis owners are going to counteract my declaration with an argument and ruling boys and drooling girls, well, I find it difficult to get my feelings hurt too bad by that scathing commentary.

On a more serious note, I'll admit that I sided with the oppressed in all three 'duh!' statements above (though I only identify with the first two oppressed categories) partly because claiming superiority there is contradicted by general cultural attitudes, and thus is more of a joke; really, as much as 'femi-nazis' get picked on, there really aren't a bunch of people who say GIRLZ R BETTER!!!!! and get a lot of credibility and/or authority from it. However, there are people who say 'boys are just better' (usually followed by 'at [culturally valued skill]') and get taken seriously. Same for racial issues -- hell, 'whites are just better' is a long-standing cultural assumption in the West.

With the hetero/homo divide, it's not so much 'heteros are better!' as 'homos are nasty horrid filthy etc.', meaning that hetero superiority is implicitly supported by fag-bashing.

[cybik.livejournal.com]

I thought it was pretty obvious the question in your last poll wasn't entirely serious and therefore it didn't bother me. It's *you*, so the chances of it being actually sexist are teensy.

[andrewducker]

Thank you :->

I didn't expect people to actually tick it. But ladysisyphus gives the explanation for why people did.

[seph-hazard.livejournal.com]

I think that it is generally ok for oppressed groups/minorities to take the piss a bit. Rude comments about straight people in a queer-only context are usually hilarious, I have a long rant about why sexism against men doesn't really exist, and I imagine that many non-white people feel much the same about comments about whites.

[seph-hazard.livejournal.com]

My point being that it is NOT OK if it is the other way around. Straight white men don't get to make those comments about queer black women, not without being an arsehole.

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

Why?

[andrewducker]

So you feel it's ok to be derogatory about a whole group of people based on generalities, because some of them, in the past, have done so themselves?

Just want to get this straight...

my two cents

[beachpsalms.livejournal.com]

Not to answer for seph_hazard, but for me the difference isn't about history (except that it kinda is), but about current power differences.

So humour (sarcasm, parody) is used by groups who are oppressed to resist oppression; but used by groups with power to further oppression. Even if that use is unintentional. The context is really important.

There's an running joke among some of my friends about clergy in my denomination, the preponderance of middle aged white women with short hair, and how we can't tell them apart. My friend K. was the first one to joke about it: and although it might be funny on it's own, it is sarcastic and resistant and funny because K. is Japanese-Canadian, and constantly deals with racist crap, including "I can't tell you apart."

[broin.livejournal.com]

"I have a long rant about why sexism against men doesn't really exist..."

So when a friend, a play leader, is refused jobs because he's a man... what's at work there?

Or: a friend who's a father who wasn't allowed to join a parent's group as 'the women were uncomfortable with a man joining'. Seemingly, he's the first father to ever take an interest in his child in that town.

Or: I work for an all-woman organisation. It's me, and about 500 women. I'm regularly on the receiving end of variations on 'Well, you're just a man' or 'You're such a man' or 'How like a man'. Or, for that matter, 'We wouldnt have been able to do such-and-such until you came along'.

How isn't that sexist?

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

I'd be really interested to hear responses to those too.

Discussions of discrimination are peculiar in that anecdotal evidence actually is important.

(Thanks for the great examples.)

[missedith01.livejournal.com]

I am OK with jokes about any minority or majority so long as the joke itself, the context in which it is delivered and my own perception combined tell me that the joker is not truly racist, sexist or a homophobe.

[cheekbones3.livejournal.com]

I didn't answer the previous poll because of that question!