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Gender roles are a package. Men as a group perpetuate gender roles like male disposability because it comes with gender roles like male status. Likewise, women as a group perpetuate gender roles like fewer female rights because it comes with gender roles like fewer female responsibilities and female protection. In other words, putting women on a pedestal is simultaneously advantageous in some regards and disadvantageous in others, so depending on the situation, women as a group might very well prefer that.
Men, as a whole, don't do things. I don't understand what you're saying. Men aren't an organization. Men aren't the Borg. Some men perpetuate gender roles. Some men try to break gender roles. Some men are totally apathetic. In fact that's probably most men.
Homosexuals as a group do not perpetuate homophobia, the way that men and women as groups perpetuate their own gender roles.
I don't know what this means. Closeted Homosexuals have been some of the most virulent homophobes around. Likewise, insecure men can be the most macho. Many blacks carry viciously anti-black racism.
These groups of people may have united solidarity in their respective problems, but they aren't a borg-like hivemind. There were slaves that defended their masters. There were Jews against the creation of Israel.
What I actually think is that when people don't like their overall treatment, they tend to do something about it, as evidenced by revolutions (violent as well as social) throughout history. When they prefer their overall treatment compared to the alternatives, they then revolt.
This is Sampling Bias. Obviously they didn't revolt until they did. Obviously the ones that didn't revolt didn't make history for not revolting. Only the revolutions would be noteworthy. The non-revolutions would not.
Also it is a little unrealistic to relate this to women, because women can't really be segregated the same way that other ethnicities can. Obviously women are in every family. The idea that all these individuals from various socioeconomic standings and such would somehow collude together and rise up against their own families is bizarre, if not downright silly. Feminism has always been a remarkably peaceful movement.
The connection with violence and sexism is actually rather striking, when you think about it. But if you agree that there is a powerful connection there, then there's going to be an equal connection between feminism and pacifism.
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On June 21 2013 11:06 sunprince wrote:Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 11:01 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 21 2013 08:42 Acrofales wrote:On June 21 2013 08:39 Thieving Magpie wrote:Backtracking on what you're saying  I love these sunprince-isms Let's go back to when I joined this discussion. On June 20 2013 04:54 Thieving Magpie wrote:On June 20 2013 04:25 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 20:24 marvellosity wrote:On June 19 2013 08:57 kwizach wrote:On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 06:54 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
No, the problem is that you're refusing to address the points I'm making, in this case going as far as completely changing the topic. The analogy was there to respond to your assertion that we were demeaning women. My reply to you was that "pointing out that a group does not hold the social/political power and authority to achieve structural change at a given point does not equate to demeaning/objectifying that group". Except that your argument is that women never had the power to achieve structural change, when the reality is that they did. [Citation again needed] On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:
You're demeaning them by calling them incapable, when in fact they were capable, but chose not to. No, I'm not demeaning them, because I just explained to you why remarking a group has limited power to achieve structural change, and is affected by social norms that make it harder to challenge its inferior place in society, is not the same as demeaning that group. Regarding "choice", see below (again). On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 06:54 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
Why are you even replying to me if all you're going to do is repeat your initial statement which I thoroughly debunked? Here, let me copy/paste the entire relevant section of my initial post:
[quote]
Feel free to reply when you have actual counter-arguments to put forward. There is nothing to answer here, because you are once again arguing with the assumption that women were powerless in the first place. I disagree with that fundamental assumption, so there is no point in arguing further down the line of reasoning when it's broken near the beginning. No, see, that's you reducing my argument to a caricature and calling it an "assumption" to avoid having to discuss the actual argument. It's also not even a matter of "arguing further down the line" since I directly replied to your assertion that they had a choice and chose willingly to have an inferior place in society. You, on the other hand, have been shutting your ears and repeating that they had a choice without ever providing any evidence (or even logic) to support that claim. Again, here is my response to you : Next, the false premise: you assume that agents necessarily can "exercise their own choices". This is false on two levels, with regards to resources and ideas. First, like we've seen, agents do not necessarily have the material, social or political resources to exercise their own choices. This doesn't mean that they're not "competent agents"; it simply means that agents are not omnipotent and are restrained in the choices that they can actually translate into action/change, in particular at the societal level.
Second, you are assuming that agents necessarily prevail over, and more precisely are completely independent of, structure. I dispute that assumption, and so do plenty of social science scholars. As a constructivist, I consider agent and structure to be co-constitutive, meaning that structure plays a role in shaping the decisions, and even identity, of agents, but that agents can also shape their own identity and in turn bring about structural change (to make it quick). More concretely and to come back to the issue at hand, you'll find plenty of examples of people who have internalized social norms that do not necessarily benefit them and do not attempt (or even think about attempting) to challenge them, precisely because that internalization "prevents them" from reaching the kind of costs/benefits calculation you speak of, or makes them discard such calculation as inappropriate. Of course, this certainly does not mean that personal reflections, external events, interactions with others, acquisition of new knowledge and plenty of other mechanisms cannot bring about a questioning and possibly a rejection of these norms, and you'll again find plenty of such examples throughout history. The point, however, is that you can't simply assert an agent is completely independent in the choices he considers, or even in the bringing about of a consideration of choice in the first place, as if this was necessarily true. If you're going to defend that position (namely that certain accepted social norms play no role in determining in part the position and decisions of certain agents, in this case women with regards to their place in society), you're again going to need to provide evidence.
To sum up, your idea of an agent free to exercise his "own choices" is flawed with regards to the debate at hand both in terms of the various types of resources (or lack thereof) at the disposition of the agent in question and in terms of your assertion of how agents necessarily have access to, and can exercise, choice on an ideational level. If you have no counter-argument, no need to reply. You've already stated your position several times. On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 06:54 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
Yes, and socially-accepted gender roles can prevent individuals from exercising their choices the way they would want to - for example by voting. Thank you for agreeing with me. Except that this doesn't support your argument that women as a group were oppressed. Except that I already told you that's not what I was discussing with you - I was discussing access to choice and possibility to act upon choice. You just agreed with me that individual women could not act upon their choices, thanks! sunprince, you'd do well to actually directly address his points that he's bringing up, because kwizach is right, you keep skirting around them without directly addressing what he's actually written. Otherwise this (interesting) conversation will keep going round in pointless circles. Edit: for example, you tell kwizach "you're demeaning them by saying they're incapable" - this simply is nowhere near the thrust of his argument, yet you keep repeating it. It's not what he's saying. Alright, let's see if I can clarify my argument: Premise: Every other (read: actually) oppressed groups throughout history successfully revolted within a few centuries. Premise: Unlike those oppressed groups, women were unable to achieve "freedom" for nearly all of human history. Conclusion #1: There must be some reason that, unlike all other marginalized groups, women did not revolt. Premise: Women are just as capable of revolting and achieving freedom when they want to. Premise: Women as a group have had substantially better treatment than the aforementioned oppressed groups. Premise: When women did eventually revolt, they faced minimal resistance, especially compared to oppressed groups. Conclusion #2: Women did not fail to revolt because they were too oppressed, nor because there was too much resistance. In other words, they did not lack resources, as kwizach argues, since other groups demonstrated you need less than what women had. If we put those all together, we can see that women chose not to revolt. kwizach's argument on agency is that women didn't actually have a free choice because they were too oppressed or something (or, in his words, too constrained in their choices), but we know that other marginalized groups, who were treated substantially worse, apparently had a free choice. In light of the fact that women are just as capable as those other marginalized groups, and that they had easier circumstances and eventually faced less resistance when they did revolt, one can only conclude that it is because they made the choice not to. Furthermore, attempts to deny these women their agency by arguing that they didn't have a free choice is perpetuating a misogynistic view of gender issues, in which the poor wittle wimminz are merely helpless objects without choice since they are so oppressed by the big, bad menz. TL;DR: Women either perpetuated gender roles because they were too oppressed to do anything about it, or because they chose not to (most likely because it benefitted them). kwizach is arguing that they had no choice, therefore he is arguing for the former. This is not only incorrect (because groups who were treated worse than women managed), but misogynistic (because he's implicitly considering women helpless objects). I just watched someone go from victim blaming to gender blaming in one single post. I never realized people would actually argue that "since women didn't complain as a gender, they obviously must like what we're doing to them." I'd be impressed if I wasn't horrified. Wherein I was horrified at your conclusion about women's oppression. "If we put those all together, we can see that women chose not to revolt." Or, in more common terms "They wanted to be oppressed, they didn't say anything about it, and hey, she got wet, so its not like they don't enjoy it." You then responded by talking about how victim blaming is this imaginary thing that people are just making up. Which makes sense to someone who believes that women's problems over the centuries could be solved in the phrase "we can see that women chose not to revolt." While I intuitively disagree with what Sunprince claims, the question is really whether someone can be said to be oppressed if they don't even realize they are being oppressed and are leading an otherwise healthy (relatively) and happy life. And does it, by any standard you choose, matter? The answer to your question is undeniably yes, and large swaths of the psychological community and the philosophical community agree, although there is more disagreement on it in the latter than the former. If you are conditioned to accept something that isn't good for you/just/fair/whatever word you want to use, it is wrong. The question that is interesting, however, is who is to do something about it. The answer to that question is definitely a different answer than to the question, "Who does something about explicit oppression?". How arrogant of you to decide for other people that they are oppressed. How misogynistic of you to tell women that you know what's best for them, and that they're just too "conditioned' to know what's good for them.
I'll step right up to the plate and admit arrogance if arrogance means being able to apply objective standards of justice following from agreeable axioms to the entire human population.
For what seems like the thousandth time, oppression is unjust subjugation. Women were subjugated. It was based on untrue ontological premises ergo it was necessarily unjust.
Q
E
fucking
D
Stop arguing this moronic point.
People don't need to inform me if they're being oppressed. We don't ask the North Koreans if they're being oppressed. We didn't ask the gulag prisoners if they were being oppressed. They just fucking were. It wasn't a matter of opinion.
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On June 21 2013 11:06 sunprince wrote:Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 11:01 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 21 2013 08:42 Acrofales wrote:On June 21 2013 08:39 Thieving Magpie wrote:Backtracking on what you're saying I love these sunprince-isms Let's go back to when I joined this discussion. On June 20 2013 04:54 Thieving Magpie wrote:On June 20 2013 04:25 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 20:24 marvellosity wrote:On June 19 2013 08:57 kwizach wrote:On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 06:54 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
No, the problem is that you're refusing to address the points I'm making, in this case going as far as completely changing the topic. The analogy was there to respond to your assertion that we were demeaning women. My reply to you was that "pointing out that a group does not hold the social/political power and authority to achieve structural change at a given point does not equate to demeaning/objectifying that group". Except that your argument is that women never had the power to achieve structural change, when the reality is that they did. [Citation again needed] On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:
You're demeaning them by calling them incapable, when in fact they were capable, but chose not to. No, I'm not demeaning them, because I just explained to you why remarking a group has limited power to achieve structural change, and is affected by social norms that make it harder to challenge its inferior place in society, is not the same as demeaning that group. Regarding "choice", see below (again). On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 06:54 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
Why are you even replying to me if all you're going to do is repeat your initial statement which I thoroughly debunked? Here, let me copy/paste the entire relevant section of my initial post:
[quote]
Feel free to reply when you have actual counter-arguments to put forward. There is nothing to answer here, because you are once again arguing with the assumption that women were powerless in the first place. I disagree with that fundamental assumption, so there is no point in arguing further down the line of reasoning when it's broken near the beginning. No, see, that's you reducing my argument to a caricature and calling it an "assumption" to avoid having to discuss the actual argument. It's also not even a matter of "arguing further down the line" since I directly replied to your assertion that they had a choice and chose willingly to have an inferior place in society. You, on the other hand, have been shutting your ears and repeating that they had a choice without ever providing any evidence (or even logic) to support that claim. Again, here is my response to you : Next, the false premise: you assume that agents necessarily can "exercise their own choices". This is false on two levels, with regards to resources and ideas. First, like we've seen, agents do not necessarily have the material, social or political resources to exercise their own choices. This doesn't mean that they're not "competent agents"; it simply means that agents are not omnipotent and are restrained in the choices that they can actually translate into action/change, in particular at the societal level.
Second, you are assuming that agents necessarily prevail over, and more precisely are completely independent of, structure. I dispute that assumption, and so do plenty of social science scholars. As a constructivist, I consider agent and structure to be co-constitutive, meaning that structure plays a role in shaping the decisions, and even identity, of agents, but that agents can also shape their own identity and in turn bring about structural change (to make it quick). More concretely and to come back to the issue at hand, you'll find plenty of examples of people who have internalized social norms that do not necessarily benefit them and do not attempt (or even think about attempting) to challenge them, precisely because that internalization "prevents them" from reaching the kind of costs/benefits calculation you speak of, or makes them discard such calculation as inappropriate. Of course, this certainly does not mean that personal reflections, external events, interactions with others, acquisition of new knowledge and plenty of other mechanisms cannot bring about a questioning and possibly a rejection of these norms, and you'll again find plenty of such examples throughout history. The point, however, is that you can't simply assert an agent is completely independent in the choices he considers, or even in the bringing about of a consideration of choice in the first place, as if this was necessarily true. If you're going to defend that position (namely that certain accepted social norms play no role in determining in part the position and decisions of certain agents, in this case women with regards to their place in society), you're again going to need to provide evidence.
To sum up, your idea of an agent free to exercise his "own choices" is flawed with regards to the debate at hand both in terms of the various types of resources (or lack thereof) at the disposition of the agent in question and in terms of your assertion of how agents necessarily have access to, and can exercise, choice on an ideational level. If you have no counter-argument, no need to reply. You've already stated your position several times. On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 06:54 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
Yes, and socially-accepted gender roles can prevent individuals from exercising their choices the way they would want to - for example by voting. Thank you for agreeing with me. Except that this doesn't support your argument that women as a group were oppressed. Except that I already told you that's not what I was discussing with you - I was discussing access to choice and possibility to act upon choice. You just agreed with me that individual women could not act upon their choices, thanks! sunprince, you'd do well to actually directly address his points that he's bringing up, because kwizach is right, you keep skirting around them without directly addressing what he's actually written. Otherwise this (interesting) conversation will keep going round in pointless circles. Edit: for example, you tell kwizach "you're demeaning them by saying they're incapable" - this simply is nowhere near the thrust of his argument, yet you keep repeating it. It's not what he's saying. Alright, let's see if I can clarify my argument: Premise: Every other (read: actually) oppressed groups throughout history successfully revolted within a few centuries. Premise: Unlike those oppressed groups, women were unable to achieve "freedom" for nearly all of human history. Conclusion #1: There must be some reason that, unlike all other marginalized groups, women did not revolt. Premise: Women are just as capable of revolting and achieving freedom when they want to. Premise: Women as a group have had substantially better treatment than the aforementioned oppressed groups. Premise: When women did eventually revolt, they faced minimal resistance, especially compared to oppressed groups. Conclusion #2: Women did not fail to revolt because they were too oppressed, nor because there was too much resistance. In other words, they did not lack resources, as kwizach argues, since other groups demonstrated you need less than what women had. If we put those all together, we can see that women chose not to revolt. kwizach's argument on agency is that women didn't actually have a free choice because they were too oppressed or something (or, in his words, too constrained in their choices), but we know that other marginalized groups, who were treated substantially worse, apparently had a free choice. In light of the fact that women are just as capable as those other marginalized groups, and that they had easier circumstances and eventually faced less resistance when they did revolt, one can only conclude that it is because they made the choice not to. Furthermore, attempts to deny these women their agency by arguing that they didn't have a free choice is perpetuating a misogynistic view of gender issues, in which the poor wittle wimminz are merely helpless objects without choice since they are so oppressed by the big, bad menz. TL;DR: Women either perpetuated gender roles because they were too oppressed to do anything about it, or because they chose not to (most likely because it benefitted them). kwizach is arguing that they had no choice, therefore he is arguing for the former. This is not only incorrect (because groups who were treated worse than women managed), but misogynistic (because he's implicitly considering women helpless objects). I just watched someone go from victim blaming to gender blaming in one single post. I never realized people would actually argue that "since women didn't complain as a gender, they obviously must like what we're doing to them." I'd be impressed if I wasn't horrified. Wherein I was horrified at your conclusion about women's oppression. "If we put those all together, we can see that women chose not to revolt." Or, in more common terms "They wanted to be oppressed, they didn't say anything about it, and hey, she got wet, so its not like they don't enjoy it." You then responded by talking about how victim blaming is this imaginary thing that people are just making up. Which makes sense to someone who believes that women's problems over the centuries could be solved in the phrase "we can see that women chose not to revolt." While I intuitively disagree with what Sunprince claims, the question is really whether someone can be said to be oppressed if they don't even realize they are being oppressed and are leading an otherwise healthy (relatively) and happy life. And does it, by any standard you choose, matter? The answer to your question is undeniably yes, and large swaths of the psychological community and the philosophical community agree, although there is more disagreement on it in the latter than the former. If you are conditioned to accept something that isn't good for you/just/fair/whatever word you want to use, it is wrong. The question that is interesting, however, is who is to do something about it. The answer to that question is definitely a different answer than to the question, "Who does something about explicit oppression?". How arrogant of you to decide for other people that they are oppressed. How misogynistic of you to tell women that you know what's best for them, and that they're just too "conditioned' to know what's good for them.
How arrogant of you to decide for other people that they aren't oppressed.
Idiot.
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This whole Sunprince telling us that women asked to be subjugated and then calling us misogynist for disagreeing with hims is rather high school level argumentation. I expect better than this.
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On June 21 2013 11:03 Shiori wrote:Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 08:31 sunprince wrote:On June 20 2013 10:30 Acrofales wrote:On June 20 2013 09:32 sunprince wrote:On June 20 2013 06:32 Thieving Magpie wrote:On June 20 2013 06:08 sunprince wrote:On June 20 2013 06:04 Thieving Magpie wrote:On June 20 2013 05:52 sunprince wrote:On June 20 2013 05:45 Thieving Magpie wrote:On June 20 2013 05:29 sunprince wrote:
[quote]
Nowhere did I say they were asked to be robbed, and nowhere did I say that it was okay to rob them. Saying that they could improve their chances of staying safe is not the same thing as excusing the criminal or blaming the victim.
Apparently, all you can do is falsely accuse others of saying things they didn't, instead of actually owning up to the fact that you have no argument. When you are robbed/rape the state of the how locked/dressed you are has no bearing on whether or not you were robbed/raped. It is irrelevant to the person you are talking to whether what state their outfit/locks were during the time of the attack. You asking them that is placing burden on the event on that one aspect of the circumstance instead of the totality of the circumstance. People don't rob *because* doors are unlocked much like people don't rape *because* the dress was short. Women dress in short skirts all the time--not everyone is raped. Telling the victim that she shouldn't do what she likes doing does not address the issue in any way shape or form. Not everyone who leaves their car doors unlocked is robbed, but that doesn't mean leaving your car door unlocked is a good idea. You're deliberately ignoring the concept of probability in order to pretend as if <100% safety = 0% safety. On June 20 2013 05:45 Thieving Magpie wrote:
For example, if you got robbed and I asked you "do you live in east side oakland CA?" (an area of higher crime rate than the rest of oakland CA) You would respond that it doesn't fucking matter where you live--you shouldn't have been robbed and asking you that question is completely nonsense.
Telling someone to stop being themselves or else something bad happens to them is not, as you call it, "giving helpful advice." It is showing that in the subject of Rape/Robbery, you'd rather talk about what the victim should fix instead of what society should fix. Hence why it is called Victim Blaming. You're reshaping the contexts to suit your argument. Nowhere is it implied by any of my posts that you should go around telling robbery victims that they should live elsewhere. However, this doesn't change the fact that it is objectively true that living in a better neighborhood reduces your chances of being robbed. Stating this objective fact is not victim blaming. Reshaping the context? Robbery was your fucking example! When someone has just been robbed/raped asking them about how locked their door is means absolutely shit. When someone who has not been robbed/raped yet lives in a neighborhood where everyone leaves their door locked/dresses nice for the club--do you walk up to them and tell them to stop doing what they are doing or else someone will rob/rape them? You're reshaping the context of how the information is stated. When you take an objective fact and shove it in the face of someone who was just victimized, then of course a reasonable person may get the impression you are blaming them. However, that's not what we're talking about here. People generally say that you should lock your doors. They sometimes give cautionary advice to others to learn from someone else's mistakes. They don't generally go around rubbing it in the faces of recent robbery victims. On June 20 2013 06:04 Thieving Magpie wrote:
At no point is it relevant before they are robbed/raped and at no point is it relevant after they are robbed/raped. TIL that locking your doors does not decrease your chances of being robbed. /sarcasm There is no reshaping involved. If a community doesn't lock their doors--it's their business. If a person locks his door--it's his business. I was sick for two weeks once, never left the apartment. You know how often people tried opening the door? 0. You know why? Because, for the most part, you're not going to get robbed by whether or not you lock the door. I do tell people what I practice. Such as "I don't like leaving *my* door unlocked because I don't trust *this* neighborhood that *I* am living in and *if* you move into *this* neighborhood I would suggest you do the same as *me*." Could you imagine telling a girl that? "I never wear short skirts, every time I do I get raped. Oh right! I don't actually wear short skirts because I'm a man, I simply assume that if someone is wearing a short skirt that they'll be raped without realizing that women have been raped while wearing pants but I'm choosing to ignore that fact because I'm a male and I assume skirt equals fuck me. but don't worry, at least I'm not victim blaming." Your entire line of reasoning is based on ignoring that increased safety ≠ perfect safety. Just because locking your car door does not perfect theft 100% of the time, does not mean locking your car door is useless. You are deliberately conflating the two. Locking your car door decreases the odds of theft. Do you disagree, yes or no? I have no idea how this discussion became so incredibly stupid, but I blame you. Firstly, if you're arguing that girls shouldn't wear short skirts because it increases the chance of being raped, I will say: [citation needed]. However, even if it is does, I fail to see how it is relevant. Rape is illegal, regardless of what clothes the girl was wearing when she was raped. Just as theft is illegal regardless of whether you locked your door or not. So I don't see how this is in any way relevant to the discussion AT ALL? Blame me as much as you like, but the victim blaming line of discussion was begun by Thieving Magpie, who made a false accusation of victim blaming as a strawman to hide from discussing the real issues. I'm not arguing that girls shouldn't wear short skirts, since I'm well aware that this has little to no effect on rape victimization rates. However, I am arguing that feminists like Thieving Magpie are quick to scream "victim blaming" when no such thing is taking place. And you're right, it's not relevant, so I have no idea why Thieving Magpie brought it up except as a personal attack and thought-terminating cliché. On June 21 2013 00:05 Shiori wrote:On June 20 2013 23:33 NovaTheFeared wrote:
I agree of course, but it does seem to bolster sunprince's point. If it wasn't that women weren't capable of social change, what was it that prevented them from doing so? Sunprince suggests choice. What do you suggest? Matrilineal societies were extremely rare, generally short-lived, and, as far as I can recall from history, pretty isolated. They are obviously exceptions rather than the rule, and it's worth noting that no major, long-lasting civilization was matrilineal. Quite possibly because matrilineal societies tend to be outcompeted when pitted against patrilineal societies. Whether you agree or disagree with the arrangement, men as disposable breadwinners/soldiers/cannon fodder + women as birth machines/homemakers is simply a more efficient means of both outcompeting and winning wars than the other way around. This is also why the arrangement is no longer necessary today, because (a) technology has utterly changed the equation, and (b) the world is a much safer, less competitive place. On June 21 2013 04:17 DoubleReed wrote:On June 21 2013 04:09 ComaDose wrote:On June 21 2013 04:05 Hryul wrote:On June 21 2013 03:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:
Most rape victims, in the west, are raped by people they know.
This statistic shows that when you zoom out from the west and include the rest of the world, 80% of the rapes comes from people women know.
That tells me that women aren't stupid and are more often raped by people they trust instead of some boogieman out there in the world who hides in back alleys waiting for stupid horror movie bimbos to walk to them. Now this is the problem: in some countries women opting for divorce can't cite "rape" as divorce reason and are stigmatized for divorce. This leads to a situation where women can't realistically avoid the rape because they are legally tied to the rapist. And as your number originally came from the discussion of "how women can avoid being raped - don't walk down a dark road" this shows nothing. well other than the fact that women are still being unwillfully oppressed. Well, sunprince would disagree with that. I would say citation needed, because people are very quick to scream "oppression" while manipulating the definition, exaggerating or flat-out making up "facts", and elevating feelings over reality. The arrangement was never "necessary" for the vast majority of modern history. You're presenting a false dilemma between patrilineal and matrilineal societies. Actually, the correct terms would be matriachal and patriarchal, but whatever. There's no reason it needed to be one versus the other. Besides, the discussion is centered around many things other than the barebones "men as 'breadwinners'*" vs women as babymakers, as if men did nothing other than win bread for their family and women had no time on their hands except to make babies. tl;dr yes, it's true that societies that operated under certain sexual divisions of labour (i.e. men as hunters/soldiers in place of women, though I'd dispute that women are innately any better at caring for children than men, frankly speaking) were more successful than those that pursued a suboptimal division of labour, but none of these necessitate of imply division of rights or responsibilities beyond the bare basics of men doing things that required long periods of brute strength. History has numerous examples of women having less rights or more rights and civilization functioning just fine regardless. Clearly, whether or not women are allowed to do things has very little bearing on the success of a society. If your hypothesis were true, we'd observe threshold changes even below the optimal level of rights granted to women (i.e. even though all ancient civilizations oppressed women (more or less) the ancient Romans gave them more rights than, say, pre-Roman Italian tribes, the Roman Republic/Empire functioned quite well and was able to flourish for hundreds of years). *- it is actually not really true that men were breadwinners and women sat on their hands in pre-modern society. While it is true that men were generally the ones tasked with hunting and other such things while women were left to manage the settlements (talking about pre-empires here) pretending as if the women weren't engaged in difficult physical labour is pretty disingenuous. Settlements don't maintain themselves, and we know even from relatively modern history that agricultural families expected all family members to contribute to maintaining the farm, even if that meant a boy spent all day baling hay while a girl spent the same amount of time churning butter.
You're missing the point. Societies throughout history have faced different conditions. It is no coincidence that patriarchies are strongest in societies that faced difficult environments, such as the Inuit that I described.
If a society is under no particular selection pressure, then it is able to allow for a less optimal set-up, and demands less of its members. By contrast, a society under high selection pressure must optimally use men as disposable breadwinners and cannon fodder and women as babymakers and domestic workers. So yes, there's variety, but there's a very observable trend in how this variety occurs. A society under intense selection pressure does one of either two things: it adapts by developing these "patriarchal" gender roles, or it gets outcompeted or absorbed by a society that does. By contrast, when a society's selection pressures decrease (such as in the cases of the powerful Roman Empire you mentioned, or in recent modern history), society can afford to offer more freedom for both men and women and move away from strict gender roles.
This is consistent for non-human species as well. Species that face strong selection pressures must optimize for their environment, or they go extinct. Species that have easy idyllic conditions, on the other hand, don't need to be as optimized, because they can afford not to be. Our closest cousins, bonobos (an example of the latter) and chimpanzees (an example of the former), perfectly illustrate this. Bonobos society is a matriarchal hook-up culture where females will put out for nothing much in return, and where males sit around with part time jobs, no paternal investment and an entitlement to sex, have at it. They're going extinct now that they're facing selection pressures. Chimpanzees, on the other hand, have a patriarchal tournament system, where dominant alpha males manage harems of females and subordinate males. Chimpanzees faced substantial stronger selection pressures in the past than bonobos, and are now sustaining their populations better than bonobos for that reason.
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On June 21 2013 11:15 Thieving Magpie wrote:
This whole Sunprince telling us that women asked to be subjugated and then calling us misogynist for disagreeing with hims is rather high school level argumentation. I expect better than this.
My argument is still, as it has always been, that women were not actually subjugated as your baseless feminist talking points would suggest.
Your pathetic attempts at strawmanning won't work on anyone capable of reading comprehension, so feel free to keep embarrassing yourself.
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On June 21 2013 11:09 Shiori wrote:Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 11:06 sunprince wrote:On June 21 2013 11:01 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 21 2013 08:42 Acrofales wrote:On June 21 2013 08:39 Thieving Magpie wrote:Backtracking on what you're saying I love these sunprince-isms Let's go back to when I joined this discussion. On June 20 2013 04:54 Thieving Magpie wrote:On June 20 2013 04:25 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 20:24 marvellosity wrote:On June 19 2013 08:57 kwizach wrote:On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:
[quote]
Except that your argument is that women never had the power to achieve structural change, when the reality is that they did. [Citation again needed] On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:
You're demeaning them by calling them incapable, when in fact they were capable, but chose not to. No, I'm not demeaning them, because I just explained to you why remarking a group has limited power to achieve structural change, and is affected by social norms that make it harder to challenge its inferior place in society, is not the same as demeaning that group. Regarding "choice", see below (again). On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:
[quote]
There is nothing to answer here, because you are once again arguing with the assumption that women were powerless in the first place. I disagree with that fundamental assumption, so there is no point in arguing further down the line of reasoning when it's broken near the beginning. No, see, that's you reducing my argument to a caricature and calling it an "assumption" to avoid having to discuss the actual argument. It's also not even a matter of "arguing further down the line" since I directly replied to your assertion that they had a choice and chose willingly to have an inferior place in society. You, on the other hand, have been shutting your ears and repeating that they had a choice without ever providing any evidence (or even logic) to support that claim. Again, here is my response to you : Next, the false premise: you assume that agents necessarily can "exercise their own choices". This is false on two levels, with regards to resources and ideas. First, like we've seen, agents do not necessarily have the material, social or political resources to exercise their own choices. This doesn't mean that they're not "competent agents"; it simply means that agents are not omnipotent and are restrained in the choices that they can actually translate into action/change, in particular at the societal level.
Second, you are assuming that agents necessarily prevail over, and more precisely are completely independent of, structure. I dispute that assumption, and so do plenty of social science scholars. As a constructivist, I consider agent and structure to be co-constitutive, meaning that structure plays a role in shaping the decisions, and even identity, of agents, but that agents can also shape their own identity and in turn bring about structural change (to make it quick). More concretely and to come back to the issue at hand, you'll find plenty of examples of people who have internalized social norms that do not necessarily benefit them and do not attempt (or even think about attempting) to challenge them, precisely because that internalization "prevents them" from reaching the kind of costs/benefits calculation you speak of, or makes them discard such calculation as inappropriate. Of course, this certainly does not mean that personal reflections, external events, interactions with others, acquisition of new knowledge and plenty of other mechanisms cannot bring about a questioning and possibly a rejection of these norms, and you'll again find plenty of such examples throughout history. The point, however, is that you can't simply assert an agent is completely independent in the choices he considers, or even in the bringing about of a consideration of choice in the first place, as if this was necessarily true. If you're going to defend that position (namely that certain accepted social norms play no role in determining in part the position and decisions of certain agents, in this case women with regards to their place in society), you're again going to need to provide evidence.
To sum up, your idea of an agent free to exercise his "own choices" is flawed with regards to the debate at hand both in terms of the various types of resources (or lack thereof) at the disposition of the agent in question and in terms of your assertion of how agents necessarily have access to, and can exercise, choice on an ideational level. If you have no counter-argument, no need to reply. You've already stated your position several times. On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:
[quote]
Except that this doesn't support your argument that women as a group were oppressed. Except that I already told you that's not what I was discussing with you - I was discussing access to choice and possibility to act upon choice. You just agreed with me that individual women could not act upon their choices, thanks! sunprince, you'd do well to actually directly address his points that he's bringing up, because kwizach is right, you keep skirting around them without directly addressing what he's actually written. Otherwise this (interesting) conversation will keep going round in pointless circles. Edit: for example, you tell kwizach "you're demeaning them by saying they're incapable" - this simply is nowhere near the thrust of his argument, yet you keep repeating it. It's not what he's saying. Alright, let's see if I can clarify my argument: Premise: Every other (read: actually) oppressed groups throughout history successfully revolted within a few centuries. Premise: Unlike those oppressed groups, women were unable to achieve "freedom" for nearly all of human history. Conclusion #1: There must be some reason that, unlike all other marginalized groups, women did not revolt. Premise: Women are just as capable of revolting and achieving freedom when they want to. Premise: Women as a group have had substantially better treatment than the aforementioned oppressed groups. Premise: When women did eventually revolt, they faced minimal resistance, especially compared to oppressed groups. Conclusion #2: Women did not fail to revolt because they were too oppressed, nor because there was too much resistance. In other words, they did not lack resources, as kwizach argues, since other groups demonstrated you need less than what women had. If we put those all together, we can see that women chose not to revolt. kwizach's argument on agency is that women didn't actually have a free choice because they were too oppressed or something (or, in his words, too constrained in their choices), but we know that other marginalized groups, who were treated substantially worse, apparently had a free choice. In light of the fact that women are just as capable as those other marginalized groups, and that they had easier circumstances and eventually faced less resistance when they did revolt, one can only conclude that it is because they made the choice not to. Furthermore, attempts to deny these women their agency by arguing that they didn't have a free choice is perpetuating a misogynistic view of gender issues, in which the poor wittle wimminz are merely helpless objects without choice since they are so oppressed by the big, bad menz. TL;DR: Women either perpetuated gender roles because they were too oppressed to do anything about it, or because they chose not to (most likely because it benefitted them). kwizach is arguing that they had no choice, therefore he is arguing for the former. This is not only incorrect (because groups who were treated worse than women managed), but misogynistic (because he's implicitly considering women helpless objects). I just watched someone go from victim blaming to gender blaming in one single post. I never realized people would actually argue that "since women didn't complain as a gender, they obviously must like what we're doing to them." I'd be impressed if I wasn't horrified. Wherein I was horrified at your conclusion about women's oppression. "If we put those all together, we can see that women chose not to revolt." Or, in more common terms "They wanted to be oppressed, they didn't say anything about it, and hey, she got wet, so its not like they don't enjoy it." You then responded by talking about how victim blaming is this imaginary thing that people are just making up. Which makes sense to someone who believes that women's problems over the centuries could be solved in the phrase "we can see that women chose not to revolt." While I intuitively disagree with what Sunprince claims, the question is really whether someone can be said to be oppressed if they don't even realize they are being oppressed and are leading an otherwise healthy (relatively) and happy life. And does it, by any standard you choose, matter? The answer to your question is undeniably yes, and large swaths of the psychological community and the philosophical community agree, although there is more disagreement on it in the latter than the former. If you are conditioned to accept something that isn't good for you/just/fair/whatever word you want to use, it is wrong. The question that is interesting, however, is who is to do something about it. The answer to that question is definitely a different answer than to the question, "Who does something about explicit oppression?". How arrogant of you to decide for other people that they are oppressed. How misogynistic of you to tell women that you know what's best for them, and that they're just too "conditioned' to know what's good for them. I'll step right up to the plate and admit arrogance if arrogance means being able to apply objective standards of justice following from agreeable axioms to the entire human population. For what seems like the thousandth time, oppression is unjust subjugation. Women were subjugated. It was based on untrue ontological premises ergo it was necessarily unjust. Q E fucking D Stop arguing this moronic point. People don't need to inform me if they're being oppressed. We don't ask the North Koreans if they're being oppressed. We didn't ask the gulag prisoners if they were being oppressed. They just fucking were. It wasn't a matter of opinion.
If you want to make an affirmative claim, like "women were subjugated", the burden of proof is on you to support your argument with evidence.
Instead, you've simply been taking that assumption for granted, and arguing from that instead of substantiating your premise.
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On June 21 2013 11:06 sunprince wrote:Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 11:01 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 21 2013 08:42 Acrofales wrote:On June 21 2013 08:39 Thieving Magpie wrote:Backtracking on what you're saying I love these sunprince-isms Let's go back to when I joined this discussion. On June 20 2013 04:54 Thieving Magpie wrote:On June 20 2013 04:25 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 20:24 marvellosity wrote:On June 19 2013 08:57 kwizach wrote:On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 06:54 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
No, the problem is that you're refusing to address the points I'm making, in this case going as far as completely changing the topic. The analogy was there to respond to your assertion that we were demeaning women. My reply to you was that "pointing out that a group does not hold the social/political power and authority to achieve structural change at a given point does not equate to demeaning/objectifying that group". Except that your argument is that women never had the power to achieve structural change, when the reality is that they did. [Citation again needed] On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:
You're demeaning them by calling them incapable, when in fact they were capable, but chose not to. No, I'm not demeaning them, because I just explained to you why remarking a group has limited power to achieve structural change, and is affected by social norms that make it harder to challenge its inferior place in society, is not the same as demeaning that group. Regarding "choice", see below (again). On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 06:54 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
Why are you even replying to me if all you're going to do is repeat your initial statement which I thoroughly debunked? Here, let me copy/paste the entire relevant section of my initial post:
[quote]
Feel free to reply when you have actual counter-arguments to put forward. There is nothing to answer here, because you are once again arguing with the assumption that women were powerless in the first place. I disagree with that fundamental assumption, so there is no point in arguing further down the line of reasoning when it's broken near the beginning. No, see, that's you reducing my argument to a caricature and calling it an "assumption" to avoid having to discuss the actual argument. It's also not even a matter of "arguing further down the line" since I directly replied to your assertion that they had a choice and chose willingly to have an inferior place in society. You, on the other hand, have been shutting your ears and repeating that they had a choice without ever providing any evidence (or even logic) to support that claim. Again, here is my response to you : Next, the false premise: you assume that agents necessarily can "exercise their own choices". This is false on two levels, with regards to resources and ideas. First, like we've seen, agents do not necessarily have the material, social or political resources to exercise their own choices. This doesn't mean that they're not "competent agents"; it simply means that agents are not omnipotent and are restrained in the choices that they can actually translate into action/change, in particular at the societal level.
Second, you are assuming that agents necessarily prevail over, and more precisely are completely independent of, structure. I dispute that assumption, and so do plenty of social science scholars. As a constructivist, I consider agent and structure to be co-constitutive, meaning that structure plays a role in shaping the decisions, and even identity, of agents, but that agents can also shape their own identity and in turn bring about structural change (to make it quick). More concretely and to come back to the issue at hand, you'll find plenty of examples of people who have internalized social norms that do not necessarily benefit them and do not attempt (or even think about attempting) to challenge them, precisely because that internalization "prevents them" from reaching the kind of costs/benefits calculation you speak of, or makes them discard such calculation as inappropriate. Of course, this certainly does not mean that personal reflections, external events, interactions with others, acquisition of new knowledge and plenty of other mechanisms cannot bring about a questioning and possibly a rejection of these norms, and you'll again find plenty of such examples throughout history. The point, however, is that you can't simply assert an agent is completely independent in the choices he considers, or even in the bringing about of a consideration of choice in the first place, as if this was necessarily true. If you're going to defend that position (namely that certain accepted social norms play no role in determining in part the position and decisions of certain agents, in this case women with regards to their place in society), you're again going to need to provide evidence.
To sum up, your idea of an agent free to exercise his "own choices" is flawed with regards to the debate at hand both in terms of the various types of resources (or lack thereof) at the disposition of the agent in question and in terms of your assertion of how agents necessarily have access to, and can exercise, choice on an ideational level. If you have no counter-argument, no need to reply. You've already stated your position several times. On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 06:54 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
Yes, and socially-accepted gender roles can prevent individuals from exercising their choices the way they would want to - for example by voting. Thank you for agreeing with me. Except that this doesn't support your argument that women as a group were oppressed. Except that I already told you that's not what I was discussing with you - I was discussing access to choice and possibility to act upon choice. You just agreed with me that individual women could not act upon their choices, thanks! sunprince, you'd do well to actually directly address his points that he's bringing up, because kwizach is right, you keep skirting around them without directly addressing what he's actually written. Otherwise this (interesting) conversation will keep going round in pointless circles. Edit: for example, you tell kwizach "you're demeaning them by saying they're incapable" - this simply is nowhere near the thrust of his argument, yet you keep repeating it. It's not what he's saying. Alright, let's see if I can clarify my argument: Premise: Every other (read: actually) oppressed groups throughout history successfully revolted within a few centuries. Premise: Unlike those oppressed groups, women were unable to achieve "freedom" for nearly all of human history. Conclusion #1: There must be some reason that, unlike all other marginalized groups, women did not revolt. Premise: Women are just as capable of revolting and achieving freedom when they want to. Premise: Women as a group have had substantially better treatment than the aforementioned oppressed groups. Premise: When women did eventually revolt, they faced minimal resistance, especially compared to oppressed groups. Conclusion #2: Women did not fail to revolt because they were too oppressed, nor because there was too much resistance. In other words, they did not lack resources, as kwizach argues, since other groups demonstrated you need less than what women had. If we put those all together, we can see that women chose not to revolt. kwizach's argument on agency is that women didn't actually have a free choice because they were too oppressed or something (or, in his words, too constrained in their choices), but we know that other marginalized groups, who were treated substantially worse, apparently had a free choice. In light of the fact that women are just as capable as those other marginalized groups, and that they had easier circumstances and eventually faced less resistance when they did revolt, one can only conclude that it is because they made the choice not to. Furthermore, attempts to deny these women their agency by arguing that they didn't have a free choice is perpetuating a misogynistic view of gender issues, in which the poor wittle wimminz are merely helpless objects without choice since they are so oppressed by the big, bad menz. TL;DR: Women either perpetuated gender roles because they were too oppressed to do anything about it, or because they chose not to (most likely because it benefitted them). kwizach is arguing that they had no choice, therefore he is arguing for the former. This is not only incorrect (because groups who were treated worse than women managed), but misogynistic (because he's implicitly considering women helpless objects). I just watched someone go from victim blaming to gender blaming in one single post. I never realized people would actually argue that "since women didn't complain as a gender, they obviously must like what we're doing to them." I'd be impressed if I wasn't horrified. Wherein I was horrified at your conclusion about women's oppression. "If we put those all together, we can see that women chose not to revolt." Or, in more common terms "They wanted to be oppressed, they didn't say anything about it, and hey, she got wet, so its not like they don't enjoy it." You then responded by talking about how victim blaming is this imaginary thing that people are just making up. Which makes sense to someone who believes that women's problems over the centuries could be solved in the phrase "we can see that women chose not to revolt." While I intuitively disagree with what Sunprince claims, the question is really whether someone can be said to be oppressed if they don't even realize they are being oppressed and are leading an otherwise healthy (relatively) and happy life. And does it, by any standard you choose, matter? The answer to your question is undeniably yes, and large swaths of the psychological community and the philosophical community agree, although there is more disagreement on it in the latter than the former. If you are conditioned to accept something that isn't good for you/just/fair/whatever word you want to use, it is wrong. The question that is interesting, however, is who is to do something about it. The answer to that question is definitely a different answer than to the question, "Who does something about explicit oppression?". How arrogant of you to decide for other people that they are oppressed. How misogynistic of you to tell women that you know what's best for them, and that they're just too "conditioned' to know what's good for them.
How condescending and pseudo-intellectual of you to be so relativist that you call me misogynistic and arrogant for telling women that they had it worse when they didn't have basic human rights.
This isn't the fucking nanny state telling you how to act; it's an incredibly common-sense claim that says that a group of people is worse off and unjustly treated when they are not treated as equal individuals to another group in society.
If you want to make an affirmative claim, like "women were subjugated", the burden of proof is on you to support your argument with evidence.
Instead, you've simply been taking that assumption for granted, and arguing from that instead of substantiating your premise.
Wrong. It is a commonly accepted fact in sociology/history that women were oppressed throughout history. YOU are the one going against the grain and challenging this, so YOU have to bring up the evidence. YOU need to prove that women were either 1) simply not oppressed or 2) that the true definition of oppression doesn't fit women. But of course, since you're so lazy and you want everyone else to do your intellectual work for you, you won't.
This whole Sunprince telling us that women asked to be subjugated and then calling us misogynist for disagreeing with hims is rather high school level argumentation. I expect better than this.
It's not high school level. It's White-supremacist-logic level. It's white-slave-owner-sympathizer level. It's Christians-are-being-persecuted-in-modern-society level. This dude has the intellectual integrity of a Holocaust denier, and he would have been laughed or slapped out of any intellectual conversation long ago if this were a face-to-face discussion for being such an idiot.
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On June 21 2013 11:09 Shiori wrote:
Q
E
fucking
D
Stop arguing this moronic point. .
On June 21 2013 11:11 DoubleReed wrote:
Idiot.
On June 21 2013 11:15 Thieving Magpie wrote:
high school level argumentation.
On June 21 2013 11:30 Stratos_speAr wrote:
pseudo-intellectual
It's White-supremacist-logic level. It's white-slave-owner-sympathizer level.
This dude has the intellectual integrity of a Holocaust denier
idiot.
I'm actually starting to enjoy how angry people are getting towards sunprince. Still, it's kind of unnecessary.
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On June 21 2013 12:08 datcirclejerk wrote:Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 11:09 Shiori wrote:
Q
E
fucking
D
Stop arguing this moronic point. . Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 11:15 Thieving Magpie wrote:
high school level argumentation. Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 11:30 Stratos_speAr wrote:
pseudo-intellectual
It's White-supremacist-logic level. It's white-slave-owner-sympathizer level.
This dude has the intellectual integrity of a Holocaust denier
idiot. I'm actually starting to enjoy how angry people are getting towards sunprince. Still, it's kind of unnecessary.
The insults toward sunprince or the hilarious derail of the thread???
Though it's not like sunprince hasn't been calling people names and things as well. Passions are running high!
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On June 21 2013 11:30 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 11:06 sunprince wrote:On June 21 2013 11:01 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 21 2013 08:42 Acrofales wrote:On June 21 2013 08:39 Thieving Magpie wrote:Backtracking on what you're saying I love these sunprince-isms Let's go back to when I joined this discussion. On June 20 2013 04:54 Thieving Magpie wrote:On June 20 2013 04:25 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 20:24 marvellosity wrote:On June 19 2013 08:57 kwizach wrote:On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:
[quote]
Except that your argument is that women never had the power to achieve structural change, when the reality is that they did. [Citation again needed] On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:
You're demeaning them by calling them incapable, when in fact they were capable, but chose not to. No, I'm not demeaning them, because I just explained to you why remarking a group has limited power to achieve structural change, and is affected by social norms that make it harder to challenge its inferior place in society, is not the same as demeaning that group. Regarding "choice", see below (again). On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:
[quote]
There is nothing to answer here, because you are once again arguing with the assumption that women were powerless in the first place. I disagree with that fundamental assumption, so there is no point in arguing further down the line of reasoning when it's broken near the beginning. No, see, that's you reducing my argument to a caricature and calling it an "assumption" to avoid having to discuss the actual argument. It's also not even a matter of "arguing further down the line" since I directly replied to your assertion that they had a choice and chose willingly to have an inferior place in society. You, on the other hand, have been shutting your ears and repeating that they had a choice without ever providing any evidence (or even logic) to support that claim. Again, here is my response to you : Next, the false premise: you assume that agents necessarily can "exercise their own choices". This is false on two levels, with regards to resources and ideas. First, like we've seen, agents do not necessarily have the material, social or political resources to exercise their own choices. This doesn't mean that they're not "competent agents"; it simply means that agents are not omnipotent and are restrained in the choices that they can actually translate into action/change, in particular at the societal level.
Second, you are assuming that agents necessarily prevail over, and more precisely are completely independent of, structure. I dispute that assumption, and so do plenty of social science scholars. As a constructivist, I consider agent and structure to be co-constitutive, meaning that structure plays a role in shaping the decisions, and even identity, of agents, but that agents can also shape their own identity and in turn bring about structural change (to make it quick). More concretely and to come back to the issue at hand, you'll find plenty of examples of people who have internalized social norms that do not necessarily benefit them and do not attempt (or even think about attempting) to challenge them, precisely because that internalization "prevents them" from reaching the kind of costs/benefits calculation you speak of, or makes them discard such calculation as inappropriate. Of course, this certainly does not mean that personal reflections, external events, interactions with others, acquisition of new knowledge and plenty of other mechanisms cannot bring about a questioning and possibly a rejection of these norms, and you'll again find plenty of such examples throughout history. The point, however, is that you can't simply assert an agent is completely independent in the choices he considers, or even in the bringing about of a consideration of choice in the first place, as if this was necessarily true. If you're going to defend that position (namely that certain accepted social norms play no role in determining in part the position and decisions of certain agents, in this case women with regards to their place in society), you're again going to need to provide evidence.
To sum up, your idea of an agent free to exercise his "own choices" is flawed with regards to the debate at hand both in terms of the various types of resources (or lack thereof) at the disposition of the agent in question and in terms of your assertion of how agents necessarily have access to, and can exercise, choice on an ideational level. If you have no counter-argument, no need to reply. You've already stated your position several times. On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:
[quote]
Except that this doesn't support your argument that women as a group were oppressed. Except that I already told you that's not what I was discussing with you - I was discussing access to choice and possibility to act upon choice. You just agreed with me that individual women could not act upon their choices, thanks! sunprince, you'd do well to actually directly address his points that he's bringing up, because kwizach is right, you keep skirting around them without directly addressing what he's actually written. Otherwise this (interesting) conversation will keep going round in pointless circles. Edit: for example, you tell kwizach "you're demeaning them by saying they're incapable" - this simply is nowhere near the thrust of his argument, yet you keep repeating it. It's not what he's saying. Alright, let's see if I can clarify my argument: Premise: Every other (read: actually) oppressed groups throughout history successfully revolted within a few centuries. Premise: Unlike those oppressed groups, women were unable to achieve "freedom" for nearly all of human history. Conclusion #1: There must be some reason that, unlike all other marginalized groups, women did not revolt. Premise: Women are just as capable of revolting and achieving freedom when they want to. Premise: Women as a group have had substantially better treatment than the aforementioned oppressed groups. Premise: When women did eventually revolt, they faced minimal resistance, especially compared to oppressed groups. Conclusion #2: Women did not fail to revolt because they were too oppressed, nor because there was too much resistance. In other words, they did not lack resources, as kwizach argues, since other groups demonstrated you need less than what women had. If we put those all together, we can see that women chose not to revolt. kwizach's argument on agency is that women didn't actually have a free choice because they were too oppressed or something (or, in his words, too constrained in their choices), but we know that other marginalized groups, who were treated substantially worse, apparently had a free choice. In light of the fact that women are just as capable as those other marginalized groups, and that they had easier circumstances and eventually faced less resistance when they did revolt, one can only conclude that it is because they made the choice not to. Furthermore, attempts to deny these women their agency by arguing that they didn't have a free choice is perpetuating a misogynistic view of gender issues, in which the poor wittle wimminz are merely helpless objects without choice since they are so oppressed by the big, bad menz. TL;DR: Women either perpetuated gender roles because they were too oppressed to do anything about it, or because they chose not to (most likely because it benefitted them). kwizach is arguing that they had no choice, therefore he is arguing for the former. This is not only incorrect (because groups who were treated worse than women managed), but misogynistic (because he's implicitly considering women helpless objects). I just watched someone go from victim blaming to gender blaming in one single post. I never realized people would actually argue that "since women didn't complain as a gender, they obviously must like what we're doing to them." I'd be impressed if I wasn't horrified. Wherein I was horrified at your conclusion about women's oppression. "If we put those all together, we can see that women chose not to revolt." Or, in more common terms "They wanted to be oppressed, they didn't say anything about it, and hey, she got wet, so its not like they don't enjoy it." You then responded by talking about how victim blaming is this imaginary thing that people are just making up. Which makes sense to someone who believes that women's problems over the centuries could be solved in the phrase "we can see that women chose not to revolt." While I intuitively disagree with what Sunprince claims, the question is really whether someone can be said to be oppressed if they don't even realize they are being oppressed and are leading an otherwise healthy (relatively) and happy life. And does it, by any standard you choose, matter? The answer to your question is undeniably yes, and large swaths of the psychological community and the philosophical community agree, although there is more disagreement on it in the latter than the former. If you are conditioned to accept something that isn't good for you/just/fair/whatever word you want to use, it is wrong. The question that is interesting, however, is who is to do something about it. The answer to that question is definitely a different answer than to the question, "Who does something about explicit oppression?". How arrogant of you to decide for other people that they are oppressed. How misogynistic of you to tell women that you know what's best for them, and that they're just too "conditioned' to know what's good for them. How condescending and pseudo-intellectual of you to be so relativist that you call me misogynistic and arrogant for telling women that they had it worse when they didn't have basic human rights.This isn't the fucking nanny state telling you how to act; it's an incredibly common-sense claim that says that a group of people is worse off and unjustly treated when they are not treated as equal individuals to another group in society.
You keep on using your conclusion as your assumption. "Common sense" is also a ridiculously anti-intellectual argument.
To remind you, the point I'm making is that women and men had different sets of rights, responsibilities, and expectations, and that neither could be defined oppressed for it, if you're using the term "oppression" in the sense that is true for all historical underclasses.
On June 21 2013 11:30 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +If you want to make an affirmative claim, like "women were subjugated", the burden of proof is on you to support your argument with evidence.
Instead, you've simply been taking that assumption for granted, and arguing from that instead of substantiating your premise. Wrong. It is a commonly accepted fact in sociology/history that women were oppressed throughout history. YOU are the one going against the grain and challenging this, so YOU have to bring up the evidence. YOU need to prove that women were either 1) simply not oppressed or 2) that the true definition of oppression doesn't fit women. But of course, since you're so lazy and you want everyone else to do your intellectual work for you, you won't.
It's commonly accepted by feminists, and though they might have a stranglehold on politically correct discourse on the topic, that doesn't mean it's a fact.
If it is indeed an obvious fact, then why don't you go ahead and prove it. It should be pretty easy to prove me wrong if it's commonly accepted fact, right?
Again, the burden of proof is on the person making the affirmative claim. You are making the affirmative claim that women are/were oppressed, so it's on you to support that. I've also presented plenty of arguments and evidence to debunk the expected talking points in advance, but feel free to actually prove me wrong if you can. Define "oppression" in a sense that is true for all oppressed groups, and explain why women as a group have historically fit in that category. I've already repeatedly explained why this doesn't work, but feel free to prove me wrong.
On June 21 2013 11:30 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +This whole Sunprince telling us that women asked to be subjugated and then calling us misogynist for disagreeing with hims is rather high school level argumentation. I expect better than this. It's not high school level. It's White-supremacist-logic level. It's white-slave-owner-sympathizer level. It's Christians-are-being-persecuted-in-modern-society level. This dude has the intellectual integrity of a Holocaust denier, and he would have been laughed or slapped out of any intellectual conversation long ago if this were a face-to-face discussion for being such an idiot.
In other words, you don't actually have any arguments, so you're reduced to fallacies similar to argumentum ad Hitlerum. Likening someone to a white supremacist, white slave owner, or a Holocaust denier is pretty solid proof that you are the one with no intellectual integrity.
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On June 21 2013 11:01 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 08:42 Acrofales wrote:On June 21 2013 08:39 Thieving Magpie wrote:Backtracking on what you're saying I love these sunprince-isms Let's go back to when I joined this discussion. On June 20 2013 04:54 Thieving Magpie wrote:On June 20 2013 04:25 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 20:24 marvellosity wrote:On June 19 2013 08:57 kwizach wrote:On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 06:54 kwizach wrote:On June 19 2013 06:19 sunprince wrote:
[quote]
The problem is that you've started your argument with the assumption that women were oppressed, instead of concluding this after providing evidence. In reality, virtually all of the objective metrics that we use to conclude that African Americans are oppressed and discriminated against such as the sentencing gap, the prosecution gap, the likelihood of violent crime victimization, the percentage of workplace deaths, the suicide rate, the homelessness percentage, the amount of federal aid given, etc. are all reversed when it comes to women, and have been historically as far as we have data.
What objective metric do you have to conclude that women are or were oppressed in the first place, when all of the common measures used to determine quality of life show that women are and have been ahead? No, the problem is that you're refusing to address the points I'm making, in this case going as far as completely changing the topic. The analogy was there to respond to your assertion that we were demeaning women. My reply to you was that "pointing out that a group does not hold the social/political power and authority to achieve structural change at a given point does not equate to demeaning/objectifying that group". Except that your argument is that women never had the power to achieve structural change, when the reality is that they did. [Citation again needed] On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:
You're demeaning them by calling them incapable, when in fact they were capable, but chose not to. No, I'm not demeaning them, because I just explained to you why remarking a group has limited power to achieve structural change, and is affected by social norms that make it harder to challenge its inferior place in society, is not the same as demeaning that group. Regarding "choice", see below (again). On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 06:54 kwizach wrote:On June 19 2013 06:19 sunprince wrote:
[quote]
The fact that they didn't, when they could (given that they were in better circumstances than other groups that did) means that they chose not to. Why are you even replying to me if all you're going to do is repeat your initial statement which I thoroughly debunked? Here, let me copy/paste the entire relevant section of my initial post: Next, the false premise: you assume that agents necessarily can "exercise their own choices". This is false on two levels, with regards to resources and ideas. First, like we've seen, agents do not necessarily have the material, social or political resources to exercise their own choices. This doesn't mean that they're not "competent agents"; it simply means that agents are not omnipotent and are restrained in the choices that they can actually translate into action/change, in particular at the societal level.
Second, you are assuming that agents necessarily prevail over, and more precisely are completely independent of, structure. I dispute that assumption, and so do plenty of social science scholars. As a constructivist, I consider agent and structure to be co-constitutive, meaning that structure plays a role in shaping the decisions, and even identity, of agents, but that agents can also shape their own identity and in turn bring about structural change (to make it quick). More concretely and to come back to the issue at hand, you'll find plenty of examples of people who have internalized social norms that do not necessarily benefit them and do not attempt (or even think about attempting) to challenge them, precisely because that internalization "prevents them" from reaching the kind of costs/benefits calculation you speak of, or makes them discard such calculation as inappropriate. Of course, this certainly does not mean that personal reflections, external events, interactions with others, acquisition of new knowledge and plenty of other mechanisms cannot bring about a questioning and possibly a rejection of these norms, and you'll again find plenty of such examples throughout history. The point, however, is that you can't simply assert an agent is completely independent in the choices he considers, or even in the bringing about of a consideration of choice in the first place, as if this was necessarily true. If you're going to defend that position (namely that certain accepted social norms play no role in determining in part the position and decisions of certain agents, in this case women with regards to their place in society), you're again going to need to provide evidence.
To sum up, your idea of an agent free to exercise his "own choices" is flawed with regards to the debate at hand both in terms of the various types of resources (or lack thereof) at the disposition of the agent in question and in terms of your assertion of how agents necessarily have access to, and can exercise, choice on an ideational level. Feel free to reply when you have actual counter-arguments to put forward. There is nothing to answer here, because you are once again arguing with the assumption that women were powerless in the first place. I disagree with that fundamental assumption, so there is no point in arguing further down the line of reasoning when it's broken near the beginning. No, see, that's you reducing my argument to a caricature and calling it an "assumption" to avoid having to discuss the actual argument. It's also not even a matter of "arguing further down the line" since I directly replied to your assertion that they had a choice and chose willingly to have an inferior place in society. You, on the other hand, have been shutting your ears and repeating that they had a choice without ever providing any evidence (or even logic) to support that claim. Again, here is my response to you : Next, the false premise: you assume that agents necessarily can "exercise their own choices". This is false on two levels, with regards to resources and ideas. First, like we've seen, agents do not necessarily have the material, social or political resources to exercise their own choices. This doesn't mean that they're not "competent agents"; it simply means that agents are not omnipotent and are restrained in the choices that they can actually translate into action/change, in particular at the societal level.
Second, you are assuming that agents necessarily prevail over, and more precisely are completely independent of, structure. I dispute that assumption, and so do plenty of social science scholars. As a constructivist, I consider agent and structure to be co-constitutive, meaning that structure plays a role in shaping the decisions, and even identity, of agents, but that agents can also shape their own identity and in turn bring about structural change (to make it quick). More concretely and to come back to the issue at hand, you'll find plenty of examples of people who have internalized social norms that do not necessarily benefit them and do not attempt (or even think about attempting) to challenge them, precisely because that internalization "prevents them" from reaching the kind of costs/benefits calculation you speak of, or makes them discard such calculation as inappropriate. Of course, this certainly does not mean that personal reflections, external events, interactions with others, acquisition of new knowledge and plenty of other mechanisms cannot bring about a questioning and possibly a rejection of these norms, and you'll again find plenty of such examples throughout history. The point, however, is that you can't simply assert an agent is completely independent in the choices he considers, or even in the bringing about of a consideration of choice in the first place, as if this was necessarily true. If you're going to defend that position (namely that certain accepted social norms play no role in determining in part the position and decisions of certain agents, in this case women with regards to their place in society), you're again going to need to provide evidence.
To sum up, your idea of an agent free to exercise his "own choices" is flawed with regards to the debate at hand both in terms of the various types of resources (or lack thereof) at the disposition of the agent in question and in terms of your assertion of how agents necessarily have access to, and can exercise, choice on an ideational level. If you have no counter-argument, no need to reply. You've already stated your position several times. On June 19 2013 07:05 sunprince wrote:On June 19 2013 06:54 kwizach wrote:On June 19 2013 06:19 sunprince wrote:
[quote]
Gender roles, including rights and responsibilities, are determined at the aggregate level by societies. Exceptions exist, but for those people there are also exceptions to gender roles too. Yes, and socially-accepted gender roles can prevent individuals from exercising their choices the way they would want to - for example by voting. Thank you for agreeing with me. Except that this doesn't support your argument that women as a group were oppressed. Except that I already told you that's not what I was discussing with you - I was discussing access to choice and possibility to act upon choice. You just agreed with me that individual women could not act upon their choices, thanks! sunprince, you'd do well to actually directly address his points that he's bringing up, because kwizach is right, you keep skirting around them without directly addressing what he's actually written. Otherwise this (interesting) conversation will keep going round in pointless circles. Edit: for example, you tell kwizach "you're demeaning them by saying they're incapable" - this simply is nowhere near the thrust of his argument, yet you keep repeating it. It's not what he's saying. Alright, let's see if I can clarify my argument: Premise: Every other (read: actually) oppressed groups throughout history successfully revolted within a few centuries. Premise: Unlike those oppressed groups, women were unable to achieve "freedom" for nearly all of human history. Conclusion #1: There must be some reason that, unlike all other marginalized groups, women did not revolt. Premise: Women are just as capable of revolting and achieving freedom when they want to. Premise: Women as a group have had substantially better treatment than the aforementioned oppressed groups. Premise: When women did eventually revolt, they faced minimal resistance, especially compared to oppressed groups. Conclusion #2: Women did not fail to revolt because they were too oppressed, nor because there was too much resistance. In other words, they did not lack resources, as kwizach argues, since other groups demonstrated you need less than what women had. If we put those all together, we can see that women chose not to revolt. kwizach's argument on agency is that women didn't actually have a free choice because they were too oppressed or something (or, in his words, too constrained in their choices), but we know that other marginalized groups, who were treated substantially worse, apparently had a free choice. In light of the fact that women are just as capable as those other marginalized groups, and that they had easier circumstances and eventually faced less resistance when they did revolt, one can only conclude that it is because they made the choice not to. Furthermore, attempts to deny these women their agency by arguing that they didn't have a free choice is perpetuating a misogynistic view of gender issues, in which the poor wittle wimminz are merely helpless objects without choice since they are so oppressed by the big, bad menz. TL;DR: Women either perpetuated gender roles because they were too oppressed to do anything about it, or because they chose not to (most likely because it benefitted them). kwizach is arguing that they had no choice, therefore he is arguing for the former. This is not only incorrect (because groups who were treated worse than women managed), but misogynistic (because he's implicitly considering women helpless objects). I just watched someone go from victim blaming to gender blaming in one single post. I never realized people would actually argue that "since women didn't complain as a gender, they obviously must like what we're doing to them." I'd be impressed if I wasn't horrified. Wherein I was horrified at your conclusion about women's oppression. "If we put those all together, we can see that women chose not to revolt." Or, in more common terms "They wanted to be oppressed, they didn't say anything about it, and hey, she got wet, so its not like they don't enjoy it." You then responded by talking about how victim blaming is this imaginary thing that people are just making up. Which makes sense to someone who believes that women's problems over the centuries could be solved in the phrase "we can see that women chose not to revolt." While I intuitively disagree with what Sunprince claims, the question is really whether someone can be said to be oppressed if they don't even realize they are being oppressed and are leading an otherwise healthy (relatively) and happy life. And does it, by any standard you choose, matter? The answer to your question is undeniably yes, and large swaths of the psychological community and the philosophical community agree, although there is more disagreement on it in the latter than the former. If you are conditioned to accept something that isn't good for you/just/fair/whatever word you want to use, it is wrong. The question that is interesting, however, is who is to do something about it. The answer to that question is definitely a different answer than to the question, "Who does something about explicit oppression?".
No no No no No no No no No no No no No no No no No no No no No no No no No no No no
The question that is interesting it "who decides what's good/just/fair. This screams of One Piece where Doflamingo made his speech. To paraphrase: "justice will prevail? Of course it will. The winner will become JUSTICE!!!" This is why I have to agree with Sunprince's point on this.
It is up to the people in the situation to judge whether they are unhappy with how they are and are being oppressed. Any other way brings so many other logical problems it's ridiculous. Humans do not know everything ever and cannot look from a completely outside view at their own lives.
Now, for the other points. Everyone including Sunprince (only the people caught up in this argument of course) are just going back and forth calling each other misogynistic. It's really freaking stupid, because when you adopt either side and look, you are. Someone else brought it up in the thread. Oppression is unjust subjugation. Since you're all arguing like pros and bringing in philosophical terms, I'm sure you can all define what the word "unjust" means.
It's actually kind of funny. I don't know how many other people see this, but each argument brings up pretty good points when looking at them from each side, but when you can't switch sides of thinking each argument looks completely retarded. I completely understand why Sunprince is arguing against everyone. He's saying controversial things, but if I use his terminology for different definitions and then look at the evidence he's presented, everyone else does look retarded. Though everyone else does provide less evidence, the evidence they do present (which is more in line with sociology and such) makes a lot of sense too.
Essentially, everyone is trying to debunk theories which all carry at least some weight to them. Women were better in some places and worse off in others. Women were brought into life many generations being told their gender roles. Now, here's how we can end this.
Sunprince, to prove your point, please provide arguments against the sociological evidence brought up against you. Everyone else, provide evidence that women were unhappy with how things were in, let's say, the past 2000 years excluding a certain amount of years to the present. We have to pick a point in time somewhere where women for sure started wanting what men had due to cultural and technological changes.
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Literally the first Google search for subjugation is 'to be subordinate to.' You have lost this debate. Just stop talking. Women were legally subordinate to men. You can't dispute this. Stop talking as if you're standing by some high standard of evidence based argument. You take studies and twist them to an agenda using speculative rhetoric. You'd benefit from a basic primer on philosophy or sociology.
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In the case of rape, I would have to concede to the mother's decision whether or not to carry the baby to term. That's very difficult for me to do, being strongly anti-abortion, but she should not have to pay for another's infringement on her rights. I disagree with it on a moral level regardless, and I would strongly encourage and financially support such individuals in any way I could if they elected to keep the child.
For incest, again, I believe it's morally reprehensible and downright stupid genetically, but ultimately you cannot outlaw stupidity. If there is nothing forced in a sexual, incestuous relationship, (i.e. not a rape) the parties involved are responsible for their actions and should hold themselves accountable for them. I would not exempt incest from anti-abortion legislation.
For these two specific cases, I form this opinion on principle. The time of the pregnancy at which abortion is considered is irrelevant to me, pre-20th week or not.
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On June 21 2013 14:25 cLAN.Anax wrote:
In the case of rape, I would have to concede to the mother's decision whether or not to carry the baby to term. That's very difficult for me to do, being strongly anti-abortion, but she should not have to pay for another's infringement on her rights. I disagree with it on a moral level regardless, and I would strongly encourage and financially support such individuals in any way I could if they elected to keep the child.
For incest, again, I believe it's morally reprehensible and downright stupid genetically, but ultimately you cannot outlaw stupidity. If there is nothing forced in a sexual, incestuous relationship, (i.e. not a rape) the parties involved are responsible for their actions and should hold themselves accountable for them. I would not exempt incest from anti-abortion legislation.
For these two specific cases, I form this opinion on principle. The time of the pregnancy at which abortion is considered is irrelevant to me, pre-20th week or not.
That's an unusual abortion stance, strongly anti-abortion but pro-abortion in some instances at 39 weeks.
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On June 21 2013 14:36 NovaTheFeared wrote:Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 14:25 cLAN.Anax wrote:
In the case of rape, I would have to concede to the mother's decision whether or not to carry the baby to term. That's very difficult for me to do, being strongly anti-abortion, but she should not have to pay for another's infringement on her rights. I disagree with it on a moral level regardless, and I would strongly encourage and financially support such individuals in any way I could if they elected to keep the child.
For incest, again, I believe it's morally reprehensible and downright stupid genetically, but ultimately you cannot outlaw stupidity. If there is nothing forced in a sexual, incestuous relationship, (i.e. not a rape) the parties involved are responsible for their actions and should hold themselves accountable for them. I would not exempt incest from anti-abortion legislation.
For these two specific cases, I form this opinion on principle. The time of the pregnancy at which abortion is considered is irrelevant to me, pre-20th week or not. That's an unusual abortion stance, strongly anti-abortion but pro-abortion in some instances at 39 weeks.
What do you mean?
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On June 21 2013 14:43 cLAN.Anax wrote:Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 14:36 NovaTheFeared wrote:On June 21 2013 14:25 cLAN.Anax wrote:
In the case of rape, I would have to concede to the mother's decision whether or not to carry the baby to term. That's very difficult for me to do, being strongly anti-abortion, but she should not have to pay for another's infringement on her rights. I disagree with it on a moral level regardless, and I would strongly encourage and financially support such individuals in any way I could if they elected to keep the child.
For incest, again, I believe it's morally reprehensible and downright stupid genetically, but ultimately you cannot outlaw stupidity. If there is nothing forced in a sexual, incestuous relationship, (i.e. not a rape) the parties involved are responsible for their actions and should hold themselves accountable for them. I would not exempt incest from anti-abortion legislation.
For these two specific cases, I form this opinion on principle. The time of the pregnancy at which abortion is considered is irrelevant to me, pre-20th week or not. That's an unusual abortion stance, strongly anti-abortion but pro-abortion in some instances at 39 weeks. What do you mean?
Most people who are anti abortion don't support abortion legality days or minutes before birth. Even people who are strongly pro-choice usually oppose abortions that late. What is your reason for being anti-abortion?
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On June 21 2013 14:53 NovaTheFeared wrote:Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 14:43 cLAN.Anax wrote:On June 21 2013 14:36 NovaTheFeared wrote:On June 21 2013 14:25 cLAN.Anax wrote:
In the case of rape, I would have to concede to the mother's decision whether or not to carry the baby to term. That's very difficult for me to do, being strongly anti-abortion, but she should not have to pay for another's infringement on her rights. I disagree with it on a moral level regardless, and I would strongly encourage and financially support such individuals in any way I could if they elected to keep the child.
For incest, again, I believe it's morally reprehensible and downright stupid genetically, but ultimately you cannot outlaw stupidity. If there is nothing forced in a sexual, incestuous relationship, (i.e. not a rape) the parties involved are responsible for their actions and should hold themselves accountable for them. I would not exempt incest from anti-abortion legislation.
For these two specific cases, I form this opinion on principle. The time of the pregnancy at which abortion is considered is irrelevant to me, pre-20th week or not. That's an unusual abortion stance, strongly anti-abortion but pro-abortion in some instances at 39 weeks. What do you mean? Most people who are anti abortion don't support abortion legality days or minutes before birth. Even people who are strongly pro-choice usually oppose abortions that late. What is your reason for being anti-abortion?
I believe life begins at conception, when the sperm reaches the egg. Because I believe a fetus is human (if highly underdeveloped and as yet unborn), I oppose abortion as it infringes on the life of a person. In the case of a pregnancy brought about by a rape, I do not consider it morally justifiable to take the life of the unborn person, but legally, I respect the right of the woman to abort them if they so chose, as they had their own right infringed upon that happened to create that situation. Legally, the child was forced upon her by another individual; she has the right to do to her body what someone forced onto her. This is also why if she consents to sex, she is agreeing that the possibility of a pregnancy is a responsibility she will uphold to term, in my belief.
Gah. I'm starting to doubt myself, lol. It "sounds" so right to let victims of rape choose to abort their unborn, but more and more seem to be supporting the idea that those said unborn are humans with the right to life also. I'll stand by what I've said, however, until I hear a better argument that changes my mind.
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On June 21 2013 15:10 cLAN.Anax wrote:Show nested quote +On June 21 2013 14:53 NovaTheFeared wrote:On June 21 2013 14:43 cLAN.Anax wrote:On June 21 2013 14:36 NovaTheFeared wrote:On June 21 2013 14:25 cLAN.Anax wrote:
In the case of rape, I would have to concede to the mother's decision whether or not to carry the baby to term. That's very difficult for me to do, being strongly anti-abortion, but she should not have to pay for another's infringement on her rights. I disagree with it on a moral level regardless, and I would strongly encourage and financially support such individuals in any way I could if they elected to keep the child.
For incest, again, I believe it's morally reprehensible and downright stupid genetically, but ultimately you cannot outlaw stupidity. If there is nothing forced in a sexual, incestuous relationship, (i.e. not a rape) the parties involved are responsible for their actions and should hold themselves accountable for them. I would not exempt incest from anti-abortion legislation.
For these two specific cases, I form this opinion on principle. The time of the pregnancy at which abortion is considered is irrelevant to me, pre-20th week or not. That's an unusual abortion stance, strongly anti-abortion but pro-abortion in some instances at 39 weeks. What do you mean? Most people who are anti abortion don't support abortion legality days or minutes before birth. Even people who are strongly pro-choice usually oppose abortions that late. What is your reason for being anti-abortion? I believe life begins at conception, when the sperm reaches the egg. Because I believe a fetus is human (if highly underdeveloped and as yet unborn), I oppose abortion as it infringes on the life of a person.
It seems like quite a leap to go from calling fetus a human in the early stages of its development, to calling it a person later in the same sentence.
Are these terms interchangeable in your opinion?
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On June 21 2013 14:10 Shiori wrote:
Literally the first Google search for subjugation is 'to be subordinate to.' You have lost this debate. Just stop talking. Women were legally subordinate to men. You can't dispute this. Stop talking as if you're standing by some high standard of evidence based argument. You take studies and twist them to an agenda using speculative rhetoric. You'd benefit from a basic primer on philosophy or sociology.
Declaring yourself the winner does not make you correct.
Oppression is the exercise of authority or power in a burdensome, cruel, or unjust manner. Note the importance of the second half of the sentence. There are many situations (e.g. government, employers, social hierarchies like family, etc.) in which someone has authority or power over you, but not all of these are unjust. In order to argue that someone is oppressed, you must not only prove that someone has authority/power over them, but that this authority or power is exercised in a burdensome, cruel, or unjust manner.
Thus, if you want to make the affirmative claim that women as a class were systematically oppressed by men as a class, you must demonstrate that men as a class not only held power/authority over women, but exercised this power in a burdensome, cruel, or unjust manner. Otherwise, you are merely assuming that all authority/power is unjust, which is a different argument altogether.
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EPT
