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I just graduated from undergrad in mathematics, so perhaps I have less perspective, or perhaps I have a "fresher" perspective! I don't know.
A few classes that I enjoyed without expecting it:
-a class called "Feminism and Science." I would be very surprised if there were classes in feminist science studies at your school, but they have a perspective on rationality and science studies that is unique and valuable.
--relatedly, I wish that I had taken courses in feminism. It wasn't until the last year that I realized how much of feminism deals with things like resolving hidden inferences (first link NSFW!)
--also, science studies classes will almost certainly benefit from having someone from LessWrong in them. So will feminism classes!
-"Politics and Religion," a class about the stale religious metaphors that get used in modern politics. Again you may not have a perfect analog, but a cursory class or two in politics or religion could give a lot of insight about how other people operate, and also expose them to how you operate, if you care about other people's rationality as well. (whereas math classes will be much more homogenous.)
-a topical course from the linguistics department. Linguistics is very, very interesting. When I say a "topical course" I mean I took a course for non-majors which was more of a class in "why people study linguistics" and less in "how people study linguistics." I learned a lot about what makes questions of linguistics important in questions of rationality (again, see hidden inferences above!)
-language classes. I took Japanese, and it was enjoyable, stretched my mind a bit (for reasons detailed in the above class!) and kept my work ethic going. Also let me interact with people from various backgrounds, instead of only math majors.
-Playwriting. I actually expected to enjoy this. Whether it's good for rationality... well there are some applications of behavioral psych, and some ability to learn about how much of the theory of writing actually has a foundation.
classes I wish I had taken but didn't:
-any psychology classes, especially evolutionary psych!
-more linguistics
-more than one computer science course (though I wouldn't want to major in it)
-evolution and ecology
-science fiction-themed literature classes
-I mentioned feminism and science studies earlier
-lots of different languages. Having a designated place and time to speak different languages (at least in my experience) makes it a lot easier to learn, and college is a great opportunity for that that won't come back.
-bioethics, legal studies
-game theory
classes I didn't enjoy as much as I expected:
-real analysis. But that's because I like algebra.
-economics. I once had a TA tell me, when I asked about a question on a test, "well I was grading that problem, and I thought what you had was okay, but the answer key said it was (c) so I marked it off."(sic). I never took another econ class again. Not sure if that would be a problem in other places.
-history. Too much reading and not enough real knowledge.
Repeating stuff I think is important
I think that both feminist studies and linguistics have a lot more potential for carving reality at the joints than, say, mathematical physics. Of course, the background that mathematical physicists have is better for actively doing this, and you might have to fight some cultural battles in feminist studies classes. But rationalists and feminists have a lot in common and I think more crossover is important there.
magfrump:
That's interesting. In my experience, when one attempts to study human mating behavior -- and the human behavioral sexual dimorphism in general -- in a completely detached manner, as if one were a space alien without any agenda or preconceptions, the resulting insights tend to sound shockingly evil from a feminist perspective, and regularly elicit instinctive condemnation with little actual understanding from feminist authors.
Of course, it could be that my view of what constitutes neutral and detached observations is skewed by various biases, or that I am oblivious of more intellectually competent and honest feminist authors. Therefore, I think it would be interesting to see a top-level post, or at least an open thread comment, elaborating on your insights in this area. This with all the usual caveats that apply to politically and ideologically charged topics, of course.
The thing is, "space alien" thought experiments are very hard to do, given that we're not space aliens, and they have come out both ways -- read Joanna Russ for speculative, "alien's-eye" fiction about gender that comes out very feminist.
The closest thing to a genuine "alien's-eye" view of gender and society would have to come from people who perceive both gender and society very differently: perhaps autistics or the transgendered or intersex. Even there it's shaky.
The transgendered or intersex have more reason to be biased, not less. The very core of their identity is at stake!
Biased, yes. I thought of that. But I don't think "bias" is really the issue here.
If you want to know what the corpus callosum does, find some people who don't have one. If you want to know what gender does, find some people whose gender is different than the rest of us. Natural experiments.
Are we investigating the guy without the corpus callosum here or are we taking on faith what he says about the population at large?
I don't think you take anyone's word on faith -- we don't have genuine "space aliens," neutral and unbiased. But, because these are social questions, you "investigate" different kinds of people not by cutting their brains open but by listening to them tell their side of the story.
That is a good start and we must take care not to stop there. The risk with social questions is the temptation to give social answers. To look at 'sides of a story'. As well as absorbing social perspectives it is necessary to look at the raw science. To look at the behaviors of mammals in general and in particular those of the apes that have mating patterns similar to ours. To compare and contrast the expected outcome of game theoretic models with our observations of human behaviour. The answers those investigations give are not always popular. They also don't always match the stories that we like to tell ourselves!
SarahC:
That is undoubtedly true. I certainly don't claim that my views on these matters are entirely free of bias and emotional investment. However, a claim that I would be ready to defend is that there are particular conclusions that would be made, or at least considered plausible, by an ideal detached observer, but whose mere mention provokes virtually unanimous hostility from feminists. At least in principle, one doesn't have to be an ideal detached observer across the board to form correct judgments of this sort in particular cases.
I am curious about this. Which particular works would you recommend?
The Female Man as a novel, "When it Changed" gets roughly the same idea across in short story form.
Basically the great insight of feminism is that when you charge into a politically and ideologically charged topic and try to study it like a space alien in a totally detached manner, you loose all sorts of relevant information.
For example, when you try to ask in quantum physics, is this a particle or a wave, it stops making any sense because your question is bad. The experience I have, which may not be everywhere because I took a feminism class where the professor was a quantum physicist, is that asking questions like "are women less intelligent than men" or "are women more vengeful than men" carry implicit value judgments which lead to generally bad decisions among politicians.
So while being "detached" from your context may help when doing math problems, it gives you a certain perspective on, say, affirmative action. If you're supposed to forget about context...
Anyway I'm rambling. I have been meaning to write a top-level post about it all, but it's a bit intimidating given the high quality of posts in general and I've been really busy. Probably in a couple of weeks I will have more time and hopefully get around to it.
How sure are you that you have a handle on human mating behavior in general, rather than a subset which is relatively easy to hack?
Feminism isn't just about mating behavior.
I believe they do. I would not recommend anyone attend them unless they are already well versed in sociology and evolutionary psychology. That allows them to put what is really going on into the right perspective.
This post seems hostile toward the subject of feminist studies. In general, I shared this perspective (which I interpret as: skeptical of feminism, thinking of it as identity politics) before: (a) meeting feminist studies majors and (b) taking feminist studies classes.
While feminist rhetoric can seem anti-scientific, or be used in anti-scientific ways, I have found that feminist theory is more often in league with applied rationality. I am currently composing a post on the subject.
magfrump said:
I share wedrifid's opinion on feminism and feminist studies. Yet I have also taken feminist studies classes, and my experiences also overlap with yours, though I had significant experience with feminism prior to taking those classes which undoubtedly colored my judgment. I will briefly outline the development of my views around gender politics:
As a teenager, I started out with feminist intuitions, believing that feminism could do no wrong.
I got into pickup, and I read Why Men Are The Way They Are by Warren Farrell. My experience as a shy, romantically-challenged, gender non-conforming young man, combined with Farrell's book and the arguments of the pickup and seduction community, led to a perspective on gender politics that became increasingly different from feminism. Feminists emphasized the oppression of women and "male privilege." I could see these phenomena, but I also say phenomena that looked pretty clearly like male oppression and "female privilege," which feminists didn't seem to talk about.
I read more books, such as Spreading Misandry and Legalizing Misandry by Nathanson and Young, and Heterophobia by Daphne Patai. I started discussing feminism on the internet, yet my interactions with feminists on blogs taught me very fast that many feminists have trouble defending certain ideas in feminism, and have a low tolerance for criticism of their ideas. My agreement with a larger segment of feminist positions didn't matter; unless I accepted certain concepts (e.g. "male privilege") and embedded assumptions, I was treated like an outgroup member, regardless of how civil or reasonable I tried to be.
I came to believe that ideological and biased thinking was highly prevalent in feminism. Yet I found that many critiques of feminism, were also biased and wrong. For example, the Men's Rights Movement criticizes feminism in many areas, yet it also sometime replicates some of the errors of feminism, such as playing fast and loose with the facts to support ideological positions. I started a blog on feminism with a couple other people to have a critical, but fair evaluation of the movement: FeministCritics.org.
In college, I took several feminist studies courses. Although I had a lot of negative experiences with feminism prior to these courses, I tried to counteract my biases. I tried really hard to like feminism.
My experience with feminism in real life was much more positive than my experience with feminists on the internet. I had a lot of fun, and made several new friends. I got one B+, and several As, in these courses (these grades serve as evidence that I understand a lot of the basics of feminist theory). I voiced a lot of agreement with certain feminist positions, and I also managed to raise a few objections to feminist ideas in classes and in papers. Most of these objections were heard and treated respectfully, though I did not try to insist on them in a way that would take up lots of class time. I did get one D on a paper in one class, where the professor didn't seem to understand my objection to some ideas in the reading, and said that I had "failed to engage with the reading" (I toed the party-line better in subsequent assignments, and got an A in the class). Other papers I wrote were on the similarities between misogyny and misandry, and the seduction community. I recently posted one of my old feminist studies papers that I got on A on to my blog.
Feminists I encountered in real life seemed a lot more open to new ideas. Perhaps real life led to less polarized communication than the internet. Also, feminists who are motivated to talk about it on the internet may be more convinced by it and treat it more as an ideology. "Real life" feminists seemed a lot more open to considering notions-that-should-be-compatible-with-feminist-theory-but-are-treated-as-politically-incorrect, like the oppression of men, sexism towards men, and female privilege; they haven't yet learned that these things aren't supposed to exist, according to academic feminism. (Though I did have a brief disagreement with another student during a feminist studies class who claimed that women are oppressed, but that bad stuff that happens to men does not qualify as "oppression.") I also found that some feminist students were open to hearing about men's experiences and perspectives, and consider them evidence of problems in society, just as feminism treats women's experiences as evidence of problems in society.
Even though I had a better experience with "real life feminists" in women's studies than with "internet feminists," my conceptual criticisms of feminism weren't alleviated by experiences in feminist studies, and some were intensified. I've read several books which criticize women's studies and academic feminism, such as Professing Feminism by Daphe Patai, the aforementioned Spreading Misandry and Legalizing Misandry by Nathanson and Young, Fashionable Nonsense by Sokal and Bricmont (an excellent rationality text), and Higher Superstition by Gross and Levitt. My experiences with feminist studies weren't quite as bad as what they describe, but there was definitely overlap. Here are a couple examples that stand out in my memory:
Whenever I debated feminists online, couldn't defend their foundational terms and assumptions, and would resort to saying "go take Feminism 101." So I did... yet, the premises of feminist thought were really explained and justified there either, but rather assumed.
As for sexual orientation being socially constructed, I have a funny story. The queer professor in my masculinity and feminist theory class claimed that sexual orientation is "socially constructed." A student objected, saying something like "well, I'm queer, and I've heard a lot of queer people say that they feel like they are born that way... isn't biology a factor?" The professor brushed off this objection and maintained that homosexuality is socially-constructed, marginalizing the experience of this student, many queer people, not to mention a lot of scientific research and queer history. During the break in the class period, the student thanked the professor and walked out of the class never to return, but not before I befriended her at the water fountain and told her she was my hero.
...continued
...continued
Some of the biggest problems with feminist studies from an epistemological standpoint were not things that feminists said, but what they didn't say. Feminist professors and writing just start throwing around all these terms like "patriarchy," "male privilege", "oppression", "power", "dominance", and "sexism." Yet the conceptualization of these terms was never explained or defended. I view them as a castle built on sand.
Nowadays, you can find some 101 explanations of feminism, such as Finally Feminism 101, but I wonder if anyone else finds the quality of reasoning to be pretty bad. For example, try to figure out why there is no such thing as "female privilege":
This argument assumes that there is a linear hierarchy of men over women. This is a persistent claim of feminism. While it is plausible that the people at the top of the hierarchy of a certain type of status are disproportionately male, this doesn't mean that males in general are ranked higher than females in general; there could be more men at the bottom, also: a greater variance of advantage in men.
This argument assumes a metric by which we can discover a hierarchy of men over women, but the metric is unspecified. Another assumption is that hierarchy is unidimensional. To me, it seems plausible that males are advantaged over females on some dimensions of power, while females are advantaged over males on other dimensions of power; who is on top of this hierarchy depends on what dimension we are looking at, or on some way of aggregating measurements on different dimensions. A multi-dimensional model of power is unexplored by feminists, who simply assume that the dimensions of power and status that women rank lower on are the only dimensions that exist or matter. From this biased assumption, feminists declared a hierarchy of men "as a class" (whatever that means) over women "as a class," self-servingly defined "institutional privilege" as only held by the class at the top of the hierarchy, and denied that women have gender privilege.
As far as I can tell, most of feminist theory isn't about rational arguments, it is a morass of biased and self-serving reasoning. Feminist theory is highly foundationalist with its dependence on ubiquitous terms like "male privilege" and "patriarchy" that are loaded with unexplained and unexamined assumptions. If you believe in gender equality, but you don't believe in the concept of patriarchy, and you think female privilege and male oppression exist, then you can still be a feminist, right? Not in the feminist blogosphere or academia you can't, at least not if you argue for these opinions at length. Ironically, many "real life" feminists who haven't been inducted into the higher forms of feminist dogma on the internet and in academia probably believe at least the last two things, because they have not yet been taught to subordinate their sense of fairness and empathy (being open to the idea that the other gender has disadvantages, too, not just advantages) to the convoluted sorts of reasoning that I criticize above.
There are forms of feminist thought that are better than others. Some feminist philosophers, such as Helen Longino, do have insightful ideas and seem epistemically responsible (even though I don't always agree with them). Many feminists are empathetic and interested in learning about men's experiences with gender in ways the broader culture is not, which I view as the human capacity for empathy rising above the limiting conceptual framework of ideological feminist thought (the typical response of blogosphere feminists to male experiences of oppression is "patriarchy hurts men, too" used as a dismissal). For an example of what feminist theory could be (but unfortunately isn't most of the time), see this discussion of a feminist paper that I like.
So magfrump, I do agree that there is potential for learning stuff about applied rationality from feminism. It's kind of a needle in a haystack, but if you've found the needle, I would love to see it, and I look forward to your post on the subject. As I've written, I like a look of the analytical tools developed by feminists, and I wish feminists would use them more often, and in an unbiased and consistent way.
Don't take my word for any of this. Read Finally Feminism 101. Read feminist blogs. Participate on feminist blogs, call out ideas that seem fishy to you (general you), and see what kind of response you get. Read The Gender Knot. Take some feminist studies courses. Then get back to me.
I have a notion that oppression is done by the most dominant/aggressive people in each group. Sometimes groups have historical advantages over other groups, but you really have to keep an eye on what individuals are doing.
A couple of things stand out that I would like to reply to. For the most part, you seem vastly better-informed than I feel, and I have a lot of reading to do, so I will save a longer-form reply for the post itself.
Things that stood out:
Saying that something is socially constructed, to me, is about the map/territory distinction. Thus in the case of queerness, I would say that things such as "gay" and "straight" are socially constructed, and our concepts of sexual orientation are socially constructed, which does not at all contradict that they may be biologically based. For example, I would also say that a table is socially constructed (why is it a table vs a bed vs a chair?). The set of people that you may or may not be attracted to is not socially constructed, but the labels you apply to communicate that information are.
In regards to the response to Fausto-Sterling; I don't agree that (as they claim) her claims about a continuum rely on her claims of abundance. I also noticed that when discussing vaginal agenesis they did not discuss consent or comfort, although the comparison to a cleft palate makes that implicit. Finally, they conclude by defending pathology only with an example, and by saying that her theories are "not helpful to clinicians," whereas I feel that her intended audience was not so limited. I also feel very strongly that on page five about "these...individuals deserve the same care..." is pure window dressing, for reasons that I will mention but not in detail. On the other hand, purely in terms of statistics, I feel somewhat betrayed by my Professor who is, for the most part as far as I can tell, of a feather with Longino (we had assigned reading from Longino, for example).
I agree with you that feminism includes specific political ideals at its roots, including fairness and inclusivity, and while I don't mean to say that this means everyone should "tow the party line" I do think that effort put into, for example, reasserting the sexual dimorphism or discussing female privilege could be better used in other ways and lead to self-images which create artificial conflict. Of course this somewhat assumes epistemological hygiene on the part of feminists which may not exist...
I'm cutting myself off because this is at least five times the length I intended and I need to go to a barbecue.
I don't deny that your prof holds similar views, but in general this isn't an accurate indicator. Some things are just stuff everybody has to assign or they're accused of not covering the material, and I've also had teachers assign things specifically to complain about how awful they were in the next class.
I'm pretty sure that our professor said we should read the Longino assignment twice, because we probably wouldn't get it and it was very important. But that is of course extra information that convinced me that I didn't provide, and I do see your point.
Looking forward to your post, magfrump! As a person who doubts that most social scientists have the inclination and ability to practice their craft from an ideologically-neutral vantage point, I am always interested in projects that attempt to correct the biases of scientists. Feminist theory sometimes holds itself out as such a project, but, as you point out, some feminist rhetoric simply comes off as anti-science, and not as "anti-scientism." Thus, I eagerly await your identification of some parts of feminist theory that do not share this flaw.
I should add that I would never recommend anyone attend feminism classes until they have developed the psychological maturity required to resist threat of shaming as a dominant factor in forming their beliefs about reality.
Expanding on my earlier suggestion that it is best to form an understanding of evolutionary psychology before immersing oneself in to feminist studies, I suggest that the critical indicator of whether you are ready to extract the most insight from the "Feminism and Science" subject is when you are able to explain the evolutionary psychological reasons why there is no male counterpart for the 'feminist' movement. If you will, why there is a "her" but neither a "him" nor an "er".
I mentioned that I have done previous studies in education. As one would expect in a postgraduate teaching degree there was a disproportionate number of Arts graduates among my peers, including not a few feminism majors. (What else does an Arts degree with one of the non practical majors qualify you for?) In my experience I was able to get along well with that subset who a) had left behind the raw idealism of a first year student and b) appreciated the fact that I had the same pride in my own masculine identity that they had in their femininity. In such cases I was able to have sometimes heated but always respectful and informative conversations on their course related ideas.
To me, it seems obvious that there hasn't previously been a male counterpart to the feminism movement because men haven't been institutionally lower-status the way that women have been. And now that the situation is in some respects reversing, we are seeing the beginnings of an equivalent movement for men, although it isn't anywhere near as organized yet. Also, because some strands of feminism do work to improve mens' rights as well as womens' rights, there's been less of a need for a separate movement for men.
Bringing evpsych to this seems superfluous to me. What am I missing?
What does it mean to say that women are "institutionally lower-status" than men, and what is the metric for institutional status? This notion is counter-intuitive to me, because I think there are multiple institutions and multiple dimensions of status. Although I think it's plausible that men were indeed institutionally higher-status in many cultures throughout history, specifying why is actually a nontrivial philosophical problem that I don't feel feminists have thoroughly confronted.
For example, in Colombia, institutions may grant males more prestige, yet grant women more protection. Which gender has more "status" depends on whether your metric of status is something like "who is more likely to be in charge of the household," or "who is more likely to die horrible deaths to chainsaws or machetes." I'm not sure how we we can aggregate these metrics, considering how dramatically different the units are; it's kind of like adding up feet and pounds. Do dead men have status?
My preferred definition for status is "the ability to control (or influence) the group", which as a special case includes the ability to control yourself. Children are in general far more protected than adults, but a lot of that protection comes at the cost of having harsh restrictions on your freedom, so under this definition children would be considered to be low-status. (You could also word this as "status is the amount of optimization power you are allowed to exert". Hmm. I wonder this would be worth a top-level post.)
Women have historically had a number of restrictions on their ability to control themselves and the broader group. They didn't always have the right to vote or to spend money without their husband's permission, and to some degree they persist in having less sexual freedom, a smaller pay than males, be less likely to be found in positions of authority or to be taken seriously when in authoritative positions, be less likely to be found in prestigious occupations, and so on.
Rather, it's godshatter counterpart of that. You can have status without ability to influence the group, or ability to influence the group without status. The pattern is explanatory, but doesn't quite work as definition.
Ah, I think you've stated what I was trying to more clearly than I did. Its godshatteriness/proxiness is why we need a characterization rather than a definition.
Edit: Made less ambiguous.
That is a great measure of status but at as a definition it is just wrong. While strongly correlated these two concepts are not the same. I can think of ways to influence a group while still having low status. And I can think of situations in which it is better to stay low status even though group influence is still desirable.
Examples that are not necessarily practical but which unambiguously demonstrate that the two concepts are different:
There are examples that are much less extreme than the above (which means less useful as definitive demonstration). I will say that I routinely sacrifice dominance in order to win. Most people focus more on dominance than winning. This can be exploited. This winning is obviously integrally tied up with influence.
Conclusion: Make a post on the ability to influence the group and perhaps show how it relates (both ways) to status. But definitely do not waste the insights you would be expressing in the post by premising them on a false definition.
It's also common, if low status people attempt to influence a group, for their ideas to not be heard until the idea is picked up by a higher status person. The low status person never gets credit, but has influenced the group.
I was in a pagan group for a while which met at somewhat irregular times and places. A high status person in the group would call people to tell them about when and where.
I later found out that one of the reasons the group eventually dissolved was that the low status person who'd been reminding the high status person to do the phone calls had moved out of the area.
I don't know how common that sort of thing is, but it wouldn't surprise me if it's an important but almost invisible feature of how things work.
I suspect extremely high. Social dominance independent of domain knowledge and competence is common and in a subset of such cases the group still functions.
Thank you; these are good examples. You and the other commenters are right, my definition was inadequate. I need to think about it some more.
On reflection, I think your original insight is basically correct, but acquires explanatory capacity only when supplemented with what I'm going to call a theory of conversions.
I've actually been aware of "power conversions" for several years (the topic is discussed in Jerry Weinberg's Becoming a Technical Leader), but I only thought to apply that to that frustratingly elusive "status" notion tonight as I was turning in. (And had to get up to take some notes; so much for a good night's sleep.) Something went click; the two seem to be a very nice fit, and to make sense of a whole bunch of things that were previously perplexing to me. It has interesting implications, for instance it suggests that "raising your status" is meaningless. It neatly incorporates Vladimir's observations of "godshatteriness". I could go on.
Would you be interested in collaborating on a top-level post on this idea? My plan would be to send you a draft of the core ideas and some implications, have you turn a critical eye on it, and if it still stands after that, incorporate your own take on it.
Did Hitler have high status in the concentration camps?
Warmer
Are you serious? So Robinson Crusoe can actually be high or low status, even without Friday?
I think you're defining something like "power", not status.
I'd like to see that top-level post. Your definition of status is the only one I've seen on LW that is clear and testable.
Is a definition really the appropriate way to handle the concept? I was under the impression that the word "status" refers to some collection of internal variables in the human brain, where by "internal" I mean intermediate, not necessarily corresponding to individual features of the outside world; what might be a called a hanging node if not for the fact our actions depend on it and other people care about it. In such a case, attempting to define it makes no sense, only to describe how it interacts with the rest of the system, as it's not even meaningful on its own.
I'm not sure if I understand what you mean.
A definition for "status" is simply an answer to the question "what do you mean by status". If we frequently use the word, then we should have some relatively agreed-upon definition for it, or at least give our own definition whenever someone asks. If we everyone means something else when they say "status", then we'll never succeed in communicating to others the things we want to communicate to them.
If you say the term "status" refers to some collection of internal variables in the human brain, and then describe how those variables interact with other things, then that's a definition of status as well.
Ah, you are using the word "definition" in a more inclusive way than I am. I would call that a characterization, not a definition.
I would also like to see the top-level post, but there are a couple problems with this definition. First of all, if we're talking about how much influence people have, it would be clearer to use a word like, say, "influence". Second, status usually suggests some element of what people think of you, which is related to though not the same as influence. One can be highly influential but poorly-regarded, and vice versa. Note that in this sense status can be multi-dimensional: for instance, people can regard you as a good person to spend time with, but think poorly of your intelligence.
This is a good point, thank you. I have an intuition that while status is the ability to control the group, you can have influence without having status, although you cannot have status without having influence. That points to an flaw in my definition, one which I should resolve somehow before making that post.
I should probably note that I think that there are actually two different terms to which we refer when we say "status". Status1 (or "influence") is the ability to control the group, so it's the one I was talking about above. Status2 is stuff like official titles or other considerations that cause a situation where it's expected that people grant you Status1. I believe that people liking you would fall under Status2.
See here for a recent mention of an example.
Is that true? A few counterexamples come to mind, such as figurehead monarchs and Paris Hilton. Or is the assumption that their status is such that they could 'control the group' to some degree if they so chose, even without any formally recognized authority?
I think they do. People often seem to care a lot about how they die. Often they will much prefer the 'honour' of beheading by a sword rather than the gallows like a common thief. Even 'sword' vs 'axe' matters rather a lot. Ordering someone to commit ritual suicide is in some cases a kinder act than having them killed.
The desire for men to keep their status when they die is also rational, not just an outcome of having status seeking mechanisms that aren't calibrated to care that you're about to die anyway. The status of a parent, grandparent or in some cases even more distant ancestor significantly influence reproductive potential.
GIWIST. (*)
I would buy "there hasn't previously been a male counterpart to the feminism movement because males as a social class have (almost) never been disenfranchised" as an argument. (Not necessarily a correct one, but a testable one. My possibly flawed assumption, prior to any fact-checking, is that the feminist movement has its roots in the women's suffrage movement.)
Once more, "status" here seems to only muddy the waters, and invite a definitional argument starting here which goes nowhere close to answering the original query.
(*) Explanatory link for the acronym-impaired
If men work very hard to keep women out of male roles (which seems to be the case), and women don't work especially hard to keep men out of female roles (which also seems to be the case), what do you think is going on?
A hypothesis: Men are more aggressive than women, and more apt to defend territory. This doesn't prove anything about which territory is more valuable.
For many people, their gender is an incredibly important aspect of their identity. One can think of a given subculture as having an ideal performance of masculinity. Men and women both respect that ideal. Certain occupations have been traditionally seen as very good ways of achieving that ideal. If women enter into such an occupation, the occupation is no longer seen as validating mens' manly virtues.
I oppose sex-discrimination in hiring, but there is no denying that this is a very serious loss for some men. Eventually, norms and ideals evolve in a way which allows men to continue to have their masculinity validated, and/or de-emphasizes gender as a component of one's identity, but this is a slow process. Moreover, with any change in values, there will always be winners and losers.
I think that's part of what's going on, but (if it matters), do you think people just happen to have gender performance as a major part of their identity, or are they trained into it?
Both, I'd guess. While there is a lot of socialization around gender performance, there also seem to be biological factors the predispose people towards gender performance. To the extent that biological factors influence gender expression, I'm not even sure it is correct to say that gender is "socially constructed," at least not entirely.
For one example, look at the experience of some trans people as experiencing a strong gender identity as long as they remember (just one at odds with their socially assigned gender). I doubt that all of those feelings can be explained by social factors.
Your observations about reality differ to mine. In fact, in some cases the reverse seems to be the case.
I was thinking specifically about the efforts to keep women out of the military, and complaints from women that other women give too much credit to men for doing child care.
What have you got in mind?
That one I can see. Bizarre too... as far as I can see every woman who is out getting shot puts me one dead body further away from being conscripted. (Mind you I feel instinctively uncomfortable writing that statement. In many circumstances I would censor myself because I estimate it would lower my sexual attractiveness in the eyes of females.)
Really? There are men that get too much credit for doing child care? What I would expect is women getting criticism from other women for being with a man who is low status (perhaps not in so many words). It is the kind of role that men are encouraged to take on but in most cases penalised socially for submitting to that pressure.
My own occupation/training (IT).
I perhaps have a more cynical outlook on human nature than you. I don't think low status helps a movement become popular ever. There is always something deeper at play. I recall reading relevant posts on overcomingbias on the topic. Along the lines of "anti-discrimination is never about equality". But I cannot find a reference. Can anyone help me out?
I can't find it, but Steve Barnes has said that no political movement is ever for equality, which I take to mean both that political movements aim for an advantage rather than equality and that the leaders of a political movement aren't looking to be equal with their followers. Neither of these imply that political movements are never trying to address actual injustices.
Were you thinking of "Affirmative Action Isn’t About Uplift"?
http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/07/affirmative-action-wasnt-about-uplift.html
Thanks mindviews. That is one of them.
Low status might not help, but that's a different claim from saying that a movement for improving the rights of a lower-status group can't become popular for other reasons. We're not talking about a small low-status minority, or even a low-status phase that's generally thought to be transitory the way childhood or having no sexual experience is. Nor is it something that can be thought of being the person's own fault, like some people view poverty or alcoholism. We're talking about group that consists of 50% of the population and needs to implement society-wide changes if they want to improve their position. Feminism has certainly been unpopular among many men, but there were also enough women to make it succeed regardless.
If I promise not to take more classes on feminism and science, will you PM me the answer? [grin]
I think the problem is not with feminism, but with noisy feminists: the ones that you hear about the most are often highly irrational. My source of info in this is largely Blank Slate by Pinker.
It's a type of availability bias where the biased person is largely not at fault. Pinker did point to quite a few feminists of very apparently sound mind.
This comment is great, an unexpected but interesting perspective.
This claim sounds obviously wrong to me. But I suspect we're working with different ideas of what "reality" is.
When I say "reality" I mean "situations you will encounter in life" not "some objective notion of the world around us on a fundamental level" which is often the sort of thing people mean when they say reality.
I'll allow any definition of 'reality' in most cases. But when you say "carving reality at it's joints" you are engaging with a specific concept, one that you cannot merely redefine away. This difference is exactly the sort of thing that studying linguistics can help one understand. It's the difference between "just my point of view" and "wrong".
I meant to engage with that specific concept. You seem to agree with my usage with respect to linguistics, so I assume you have some hostility towards feminist studies. I did reference that concept purposefully, please allow me to explain why.
The professor in my feminism course was a particle physicist, so she used quantum mechanics to draw metaphors for social circumstances.
For example, when establishing some idea such as "gender," we often consider only two options; male and female. These are unusually dense points in "genderspace," though by no means the only points, and they are bounded by our maps, not by the territory. Similarly, when dealing with Newtonian mechanics, we often refer to "position" and "momentum" as inherent properties of objects. This is not how things work, but it is helpful for our maps. Unfortunately, as we attempt to build smaller and smaller things, this ends up driving us crazy, because our maps have the wrong symbols written on them and don't make sense anymore. As our society becomes more diverse and more accepting, and as we attempt to raise the quality of life of its inhabitants, it becomes the case that the male/female dichotomy starts being harmful. Around 1% of the general population (I don't have a citation on me but I could find one) does not meet (every part of) the standard definition for male or female. Among other things, it may be difficult for these people to decide which bathroom to enter in a restaurant. By expanding our notions of gender, we can carve reality in more detail, but by studying gender we may find higher-definition joints.
If you can think of any other class in which that sort of analysis happens (and it almost certainly doesn't happen in every feminism class, although probably in more than you might expect), I would be very interested to hear about it.
You probably ran into Anne Fausto-Sterling's claim that 1.7% of human births are intersex. But it looks like Fausto-Sterling got the science wrong. Yet her work is widely cited by feminist academics.
I had to mostly disengage from this reply when you used "you must be hostile to X" as an excuse to not understand my comment. In fact, my point is completely irrelevant to feminism.
The definition you have declared for 'reality' is a completely incompatible with the 'carve reality at its joints' concept that you are appealing to.
Some of the other points that you make are ones that I would address in a different context (perhaps in reply to my other reply in this tree) and with a different introduction.
Sorry, but I haven't seen that either. magfrump's concept ("situations you will encounter in life") seems quite compatible with "carve reality at its joints".
(I agree that saying "I assume you have some hostility towards feminist studies" is not very useful at this point)
I am sorry about the hostility comment, I had a a lot of replies to sort through so I assumed you referred to the original comment rather than the later comment where I introduced the definition.
As Emile notes, however, I don't see any incompatibility between my definition and the concept outlined in the post he links.
Evidently I have concluded that college is a great opportunity that can come back whenever I choose. ;)
I am considering doing a concurrent Diploma in Languages (German). If leverage the breadth component of my course efficiently and achieve the required marks I could finish the diploma in the same time it takes to finish the rest of the degree (with a little overloading). The motivation for learning a language would be very similar to the motivation for learning dance, yoga or acting.