It's not about nice. It's about power.
Feb. 17th, 2020 09:28 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elfsJoseph Gentle has an all-up rant (he calls it that) called “The War Over Being Nice,” in which he tries to isolate two cultures, “Culture A” which says that your feelings are your own responsibility and no one else’s and respect comes from contributing to the shared values of the group, and “Culture B,” which says that feelings are a communal responsibility and everyone is responsible for them, and respect flows from how you make people feel. He asks if these feel gendered to you, says that he believes they are, but that “A isn’t inherently sexist, it’s just a set of different cultural norms.”
My bullshit meter went off loudly.
Let’s start with the obvious: Cultural norms can be sexist. The cultural norm of the United States and, hell, the world, has been sexist for a long time. The distinction between the two is wholly artificial.
The other thing that Gentle avoids discussing, which is odd because he seems very aware of the consent conversation. He makes a huge, secondary bullshit argument– that “consent culture” requires a kind of verbal game. It has never required a verbal game; it has required sensitivity on the part of both participants, and let’s face it, if your partner isn’t sensitive to your needs you must stop playing immediately.
But the big elephant in the room, forever and today, is the power differential between two culturally different groups of people. Straight white guys dominate the culture, and expect the rest of the culture to put up with them. They feel like they can ask all the questions they want and never get pushback; they can regulate the lives and bodies of others, but get furious and exercise their power in violent ways whenever someone tries to regulate their lives.
This is how when a straight white guy makes a joke about homosexuals, the “Man, I was only kidding” or “Man, see it from my point of view” comes back. When I ask him to see it from my point of view. He wants me to have patience, again, with his shitty behavior. And I’ll tell you, after 53 years on this planet, thirty-plus of them out of the closet, I’m really, really fucking tired of extending that patience without getting any in return.
Bro-Culture, “Culture A,” wants the same safe space as “Culture B.” They just want it to be a much, much smaller space.
My bullshit meter went off loudly.
Let’s start with the obvious: Cultural norms can be sexist. The cultural norm of the United States and, hell, the world, has been sexist for a long time. The distinction between the two is wholly artificial.
The other thing that Gentle avoids discussing, which is odd because he seems very aware of the consent conversation. He makes a huge, secondary bullshit argument– that “consent culture” requires a kind of verbal game. It has never required a verbal game; it has required sensitivity on the part of both participants, and let’s face it, if your partner isn’t sensitive to your needs you must stop playing immediately.
But the big elephant in the room, forever and today, is the power differential between two culturally different groups of people. Straight white guys dominate the culture, and expect the rest of the culture to put up with them. They feel like they can ask all the questions they want and never get pushback; they can regulate the lives and bodies of others, but get furious and exercise their power in violent ways whenever someone tries to regulate their lives.
This is how when a straight white guy makes a joke about homosexuals, the “Man, I was only kidding” or “Man, see it from my point of view” comes back. When I ask him to see it from my point of view. He wants me to have patience, again, with his shitty behavior. And I’ll tell you, after 53 years on this planet, thirty-plus of them out of the closet, I’m really, really fucking tired of extending that patience without getting any in return.
Bro-Culture, “Culture A,” wants the same safe space as “Culture B.” They just want it to be a much, much smaller space.
