Ila Vista, MRA, and Feminism

[RyukaTana]

I don't know. Don't you think that's a bit nitpicky? Every time someone mentions sex, they have to append an explicit statement of non-objectification? Doesn't that take us to a Seinfeld-esque joke made real? You know, the old "not that there's anything wrong with that" vein.

My thoughts on the subject pretty much exactly. This is why I often end argument with how I'm not about to waste time arguing further, because so many people seem entirely incapable of taking a story or argument and recognizing it as only a single piece of something bigger. My opinion, the nature of any given subject, and the realities of the world are all far more than any single article, blog post, story, movie, review, thought, argument, etc. can encompass, and somehow that just escapes so many people.

[crayzz]

I don't know. Don't you think that's a bit nitpicky? Every time someone mentions sex, they have to append an explicit statement of non-objectification? Doesn't that take us to a Seinfeld-esque joke made real? You know, the old "not that there's anything wrong with that" vein.

My thoughts on the subject pretty much exactly. This is why I often end argument with how I'm not about to waste time arguing further, because so many people seem entirely incapable of taking a story or argument and recognizing it as only a single piece of something bigger. My opinion, the nature of any given subject, and the realities of the world are all far more than any single article, blog post, story, movie, review, thought, argument, etc. can encompass, and somehow that just escapes so many people.

Uh, what? Did either of you actually read the piece?

In all of these pieces, where men talk about their days longing after women from afar, they are talking about objectifying women. And then they come to the denouement, where they finally figure out how to talk to women, huzzah, but individual men figuring out how to talk to women is not a solution to the systemic oppression and attendant objectification which produces men like Elliot Rodger.

But it isn't luck, and it often isn't personal fortitude, that stops people primed with resentful, entitled privilege from enacting violence against the marginalized people they scapegoat for their frustrations.

It is usually the opportunity and obligation to interact with those people in a way that makes it impossible to maintain the illusion those people are responsible for your unhappiness.

Meaningful, humanizing interaction.

Passages in many of these pieces that essentially boil down to "once I realized I wasn't entitled to women, I got one, and that saved me" merely entrench the notion that women are prizes for straight men to be won, if only they figure out the magic combination to get in a lady's pants.

If you want to help bust the fuck out of the toxic culture that produces men like Elliot Rodger, you have to stop writing pieces that effectively explain how there's a "nice way" to be like Elliot Rodger.

Don't write a piece about how you learned how to get laid. Write a piece about how you learned that women are human beings.

The complaint is not merely about failing to make an explicit statement of non-objectification; the complaint is that pieces in question, while ostensibly disavowing objectification, support objectification.

I'm also not sure how you interpreted "Every time someone mentions sex, they have to append an explicit statement of non-objectification" from that piece in the first place. McEwan's complaint was specific to discussions about objectification,* not sex in general.

*Technically, it was specific to discussions about Elliot Rodgers, but the principle behind that complaint can be generalized to any discussion about objectification. It can not be generalized to discussions about sex in general, and McEwan doesn't do that. It's purely an invention on your part to think that anyone suggested that we should.

[MysticWav]

And one of the things I'm seeing over and over in these pieces, despite their ostensibly being about how acknowledging women's humanity and agency is important, is a distinct failure to acknowledge women as anything but the sex class. That is, there is very little discussion about how straight men should and do have other reasons for interacting with women than trying to have sex with them.

I'm sure many of the men writing these pieces would argue that should be taken as read: Of course I believe that. As though it's self-evident. But it is not self-evident to the many men who treat women precisely like this every day, and to the many women who are treated every day like we have no value beyond our willingness to fuck men. Or their desire to fuck us.

I did read the piece and, I didn't pull my complaint out of thin air, so I'm not sure where your outrage is coming from.

[crayzz]

My outrage is also purely an invention of your own. Bemusement would be better.

Yes, I read that bit, and it does not mean "[every] time someone mentions sex, they have to append an explicit statement of non-objectification." That is in no way a reasonable interpretation.

[MysticWav]

That's pretty much that complaint of that segment. People wrote pieces about sex. People let non-objectification go without saying. The author complained this was unacceptable. What am I missing?

[RyukaTana]

EDIT: I wrote this before the last three posts and I don't really care to fix it. I've spent more time on this than I care to, so this is the last I'm posting about this article anyway.

Yes, I too can quote only the pieces of an article which support only my stance on the article, especially if you only read them literally. However, this article is asinine because it's saying: 'In light of this tragedy, wherein a man who objectified women killed a bunch of women, a bunch of people started to write articles about how men view women in a sexual context, and that's objectifying.'

And one of the things I'm seeing over and over in these pieces, despite their ostensibly being about how acknowledging women's humanity and agency is important, is a distinct failure to acknowledge women as anything but the sex class. That is, there is very little discussion about how straight men should and do have other reasons for interacting with women than trying to have sex with them.

I'm sure many of the men writing these pieces would argue that should be taken as read: Of course I believe that. As though it's self-evident. But it is not self-evident to the many men who treat women precisely like this every day, and to the many women who are treated every day like we have no value beyond our willingness to fuck men. Or their desire to fuck us.

To truly and meaningfully challenge the dynamic of entitled misogyny, the men who write these pieces need to make explicit that women do not exist to be sex toys for men.

This is how the article starts, it speaks to the rest of the article, and it says exactly what Mystic and I were suggesting. That one cannot simply have a discussion about how men view women sexually, it must be explicitly discussed that men can see women in other ways. I'm not going to append everything I say with definitions of all the things that aren't 'self-evident' to other people. It isn't my failure that has created idiots and bigots and just generally ignorant individuals, and it's not my problem to waste time on.

Not to mention the BULLSHIT that is suggesting that men can only view women as sex objects, never equal and meaningful partners in sex. As long as we keep talking about sex that way, there's a MUCH bigger fucking problem. It's my choice, and a perfectly valid one, to want to view all my potential relationships with women as sexual ones. I'm not suggesting all women owe me sex, and I'm not going to rape them. Just like men like Elliot Rodgers don't get to insist that all women should want to fuck him, women don't get to insist that all men can't want to fuck everyone.

The non-sexual view is not more valid, so long as the sexual one does not insist that sex is something people owe or should take without consent.

[crayzz]

People wrote pieces about sex.

That's about as reasonable as saying, "people wrote pieces about social interaction."

What am I missing?

That it is unrepresentative of the article in question. I've phrased it 3 different ways; I'm not sure how else to phrase it.

Just like men like Elliot Rodgers don't get to insist that all women should want to fuck him, women don't get to insist that all men can't want to fuck everyone.

You're back to making stuff up again. You should really see to that habit of yours.

[MysticWav]

I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree then, because I'm not sure how else to more clearly phrase it myself. It seems baffling that two people who speak the English language are coming to such widely divergent concepts of what is being said without even being able to see the fork the other is going down.