Feminist Philosophy

[Spicyryan]

Had a brief run in with a feminist today. Can't seem to get the hell away from it. Like jet fuel comments on Youtube videos or something ridiculous.
Just wanted to drink my tea and listen to some videos from the festival while crowd searching them.
Only to take the earbuds out and hear "male privilege" at the other table.
So I raise my eyebrows in a 'shit what have I just overheard' look. Eyes met and I'm dragged into it simultaneously.

Blah blah males have been the dictators and tyrants throughout history. Domestic violence is no laughing matter, some Australian statistic (that I found was incorrect later), matters more than terrorism because it affects us more, etc etc.

So, I give the whole, nothing in life is too serious that you can't find humor in it despite how bad it is. That anyone in power can be a tyrant or a Bloody Mary and not just men, and that any equality movement doesn't fully stop until it replaces the oppressors and takes their throne.
Sooooo once again its a stfußpicy and no one agreed with me. Somehow it doesn't matter if women can oppress because "that's hasn't happened and probably never will".
Feminism is like a fungus or something. Just wanted tea and some zen.

[Gokku]

Read this article and I know it applies to alot of the arguments that occur:
liberal college professor says new age liberals ruin teaching

All the old, enlightened means of discussion and analysis —from due process to scientific method — are dismissed as being blind to emotional concerns and therefore unfairly skewed toward the interest of straight white males. All that matters is that people are allowed to speak, that their narratives are accepted without question, and that the bad feelings go away.

Link
http://www.vox.com/2015/6/3/8706323/...ofessor-afraid

[Andalusian girls]

In 2009, the subject of my student's complaint was my supposed ideology. I was communistical, the student felt, and everyone knows that communisticism is wrong.

ah that made me chuckle

[Blubbartron]

That was a really great article. I disagreed on a few points, such as the idea that ideas should be judged based on the identity of the person speaking them. That may be the case for the majority of people, but that doesn't make it the right thing to do. Being identity-blind, so to speak, is not "ignoring persecution". It's being logical. Also the idea that evolutionary psychology is bullshit just because they disagree with the current conclusions of the science. That's ridiculous. It's also the exact same reason many people find sociology to be bullshit. Unfortunately for sociology, there's more evidence that there are biological (leading to psychological) differences between sexes, races, etc, than there is evidence that we're all blank slates to be impressed upon by society.

[Ragnus]

Read that article a few days ago. I think that if you're seriously going into higher education you have to have the maturity level to handle things that make you uncomfortable. The whole "OMG TRIGGERED" mentality isn't going to change history, or what has happened in the past, or what is written in mythology. It's belittling people who people who actually have PTSD and similar things to constantly have other people try and turn life into a padded room so they never have to see or deal with the subjects anymore.

[Stumblingdrunk]

You guys all realize that you're just the old dude yelling at clouds about kids these days right?

[archibaldcrane]

That was a really great article. I disagreed on a few points, such as the idea that ideas should be judged based on the identity of the person speaking them.

Sounds like something a white man would say.

(great article though)

[Tyrath]

Just as bad as saying that it should solely depend on the identity of the person. You have to take everything into account.

[Thunder]

Sounds like something a white man would say.

(great article though)

wouldn't a white man want people's speech to be judged by their social standing? Blubb confirmed for dirty minority

That was a really great article. I disagreed on a few points, such as the idea that ideas should be judged based on the identity of the person speaking them. That may be the case for the majority of people, but that doesn't make it the right thing to do. Being identity-blind, so to speak, is not "ignoring persecution". It's being logical. Also the idea that evolutionary psychology is bullshit just because they disagree with the current conclusions of the science. That's ridiculous. It's also the exact same reason many people find sociology to be bullshit. Unfortunately for sociology, there's more evidence that there are biological (leading to psychological) differences between sexes, races, etc, than there is evidence that we're all blank slates to be impressed upon by society.

idk about the evo psych stuff you said. It's true he does kind of throw it under the bus but he only has one sentence about it and only 1/2 of it is about evo psych:

She realizes, correctly, that evolutionary psychology is flawed,

and I too have a problem with this because this is present tense and the next piece of that sentence is past tense so he's differentiating them on purpose,

and that science has often been misused to legitimize racist and sexist beliefs.

:\ should have said evo psych has been known to be flawed, because it certainly isn't saying much "to keep the black man down" today. 1930s though, yeah, it was and that's wrong on a good-science level and on a moral/ethical level. But I don't really mind this comment - it wasn't so much about evolutionary psychology than it was about the twitter comment's fall down a really steep and really slippery slope of "all science is white and bad!". I'd rather have that as the focus rather than divert focus with little jabs at people's misunderstandings of evolutionary psychology. The funny thing about that girl's comment is that evolutionary psychology's reach throughout history is generously 1.5 million years (when it comes to human psychology)... "shady colonizer white man" has been around what fraction of that? It's exactly like having a problem with all black people because one of them is a bad person. Which is probably something the twitter gal would have a problem with

And as far as being "identity blind" being a marker for logical... eh. I'd say it's the opposite. You need both. If warren buffet says to diversify your portfolio.. that has a lot more weight to it than anybody else saying it - and it SHOULD. A professor of physics telling you x and your friend saying y should not be weighed the same - you SHOULD put more of your time and brain's resources to understanding the professor's x rather than your friend's y. Only on the internet with anonymity should things be taken more equally



I thought it was a super great article btw - love when smart teachers out there chip in their 2 cents. It's so rare these days, which is too bad because they've got such a unique experience with our future

[Blubbartron]

I'm Schrodinger's Minority. I am both oppressed and oppressor until someone actually looks at me.

[Blubbartron]

And as far as being "identity blind" being a marker for logical... eh. I'd say it's the opposite. You need both. If warren buffet says to diversify your portfolio.. that has a lot more weight to it than anybody else saying it - and it SHOULD. A professor of physics telling you x and your friend saying y should not be weighed the same - you SHOULD put more of your time and brain's resources to understanding the professor's x rather than your friend's y. Only on the internet with anonymity should things be taken more equally

Had a similar argument with someone on Facebook. I agree that what you're saying is useful as a logical shortcut, for every day life. However, we're discussing things in terms of academics. In academics, your history of being successful or right in your conjectures is utterly meaningless if your current conjecture is unsupported by evidence. It's the difference between Warren Buffet giving a lecture in an economics course, and Warren Buffet talking to some of his colleagues/relatives/etc.

[Byrthnoth]

I took issue with this paragraph due to its lack of support rather than content:

A sensible response to Chait's question would be that this is a false binary, and that ideas can and should be judged both by the strength of their logic and by the cultural weight afforded to their speaker's identity. Chait appears to believe only the former, and that's kind of ridiculous. Of course someone's social standing affects whether their ideas are considered offensive, or righteous, or even worth listening to. How can you think otherwise?

[archibaldcrane]

There's a lot of "if black people can say nigger than I should be able to as well" going on here

[Gokku]

^ wtf are you talking about

[archibaldcrane]

As a society, we "allow" black people to say that word without much criticism because of their identity, while we don't allow those of other identities to use it.

Stripping the importance of speaker identity would mean that either all are "allowed" to use that word, or all would be criticized for doing so.

This really shouldn't need an explanation, keep up.

[Blubbartron]

This is a red herring to take away from an otherwise useful discussion of a great article.

[Gokku]

anyone can use the word , just some face an ass whopping for doing so dont act like a college professor reading 2pac to a lit class is going to be flogged in the streets for saying it. if it makes you feel better they can be white and male and straight and voting for bush2016.

[Thunder]

Had a similar argument with someone on Facebook. I agree that what you're saying is useful as a logical shortcut, for every day life. However, we're discussing things in terms of academics. In academics, your history of being successful or right in your conjectures is utterly meaningless if your current conjecture is unsupported by evidence. It's the difference between Warren Buffet giving a lecture in an economics course, and Warren Buffet talking to some of his colleagues/relatives/etc.

I somewhat agree, but I don't think the article is about the points of view of academics towards other academics in academics. It's the very general view of society he's talking about and the way we, as a whole (whole nation, or average person works here), judge information

He's getting at that even if hawkings, dawkins, buffett, whatever "genius" in x field, is talking about their field, even at a dinner table or on the sidewalk, - and obviously in a classroom, book, or conference speech - we should take a look at who they are, what they've worked on their whole lives, how it related to the information they're saying, and finally the information they're saying. Rather than... how does this make me feel? if good, it's ok. if bad, it's not ok

edit: saying it's a logical shortcut is ignoring, I think, a lot of good reasons for judging the person who's giving you the information. Even in an "academic" setting

last edit: for instance (since I foresee my saying "even in an academic setting" causing problems), einstein was very biased towards quantum mechanical functions because he firmly believed "god does not play with dice" (obv. he didn't really believe in god, just that things needed to be ordered etcetc). That's a more famous example but this one's been self-admitted by einstein to be a mistake and bias: he, and his contemporaries, believed (with about 0 evidence) the universe to be static so in einstiein's equations of general relativity he added stuff (not useful to explain, but can search wiki for Cosmological constant for more info) until hubble proved the universe to be not static. In academics it's always useful to look at people's theories through the eyes of the author. I agree wholeheartedly with you it's meaningless when it comes to experiments and their results... but a lot of science on the forefront is working on theories first, experimental results second. Especially given how difficult it is to "check" some things in psychology, physics, biology, or any science out there [probably]

[Thunder]

I took issue with this paragraph due to its lack of support rather than content:

definitely, I rolled my eyes and just moved on without much thought into it... looking at it again it's definitely kind of counterproductive/hypocritical to his entire point.. lol

"how could you think otherwise?" is so.. something. I'm sure there's a word out there for what this is. It's like he's stating it as undeniable fact but it's just not. I can very easily "think otherwise" lol. Sounds like it's supposed to be a "first principle: basic, foundational proposition or assumption that cannot be deduced from any other proposition or assumption" but it's so.. not

maybe he's trying to win social status by saying that so matter-of-factly (I assume most people would agree) so that he can more reliably get the attention of readers on the rest of his points. I wouldn't be too upset with that since it's a legitimate strategy

[thetruepandagod]

Found this while posting stuff in RIT. Figured it belonged here rather than there.