privilege as a meme

yeah, being mean to weak people is a patriarchal move, so deploying patriarchy -- even against someone who might subscribe to its values -- seems problematic/a less-than-ideal feminist tactic. like, that tumblr isn't ridiculing those guys *only* from a feminist standpoint, but also from the standpoint of "they are weird and gross" and i just think its shitty.

i never said "every" -- i don't know if ppl who identify as nerds are more likely to act sexist but i certainly don't think they're less likely than any other social dude group. but the public perception of nerds = harmless innocents is still pretty huge especially within their own ranks ime. there is certainly a more specific brand of horribleness that exists in reddity places/xbox headsets and w/e and i think the discourse abt that is still pretty new

but this is sort of veering off topic, sry

xp

ok "being mean = always patriarchal" is where i peace out

I feel like one of the worst things the internet has done is to accelerate the breakdown of many people's ability to distinguish "some" from "all"

maybe that's just adulthood, though

i didn't say that you said "every" but i think, i don't know, the consolidation of the nerd stereotype with the misogynist stereotype seems to be a real thing that is happening, and it seems to be a part of the logic of that blog, i.e. "look at these kinds of people!" i don't think people have thought nerds are essentially harmless since after columbine.

Your objection to that tumblr doesn't seem different to me than some of the objection to Adria Richards' taking and posting that guy's photo, which is basically: oh noes some people who we depended on not having much power changed the playing field and now we can't be quite as sure of "winning" when we attack them.

The boys and men whose okc profiles were part of the "Nice Guys" phenom were most similar to each other in that they placed themselves there with their sexism and their willingness to show it off and claim it and call it a virtue. No one did that TO them. If some of them shared a quality of not being very highly placed in a patriarchal system, it didn't stop them from turning it on people even lower than them AND WANTING TO BE PRAISED AND REWARDED IN THE SYSTEM FOR IT.

Rewarded with access to women's bodies and sexuality, I feel that should be said right out because it's so offensive that I don't want anyone to lose sight of it.

I'm not even sure that higher/lower "in the system" is all that useful here. If a male construction worker catcalls a female corporate attorney, on one hand, the female corporate attorney is probably in the grand scheme "higher in the system" than the blue collar guy, but in that moment there's male privilege at work. In another kind of interaction between the exact same people, there could be her class privilege at work.

deploying patriarchy -- even against someone who might subscribe to its values -- seems problematic/a less-than-ideal feminist tactic. like, that tumblr isn't ridiculing those guys *only* from a feminist standpoint, but also from the standpoint of "they are weird and gross" and i just think its shitty.

yeah, that's really the side of all of this that's bothering me a bit lately, not the ideas, but how easily they often get invoked on the Internet as yet another cover for people to be really cruel, politics be damned. which I think is defended too often, seemingly out of a fear of appearing to be on the 'wrong side' or something

this thread has gotten so weird!

thanks chris. and yeah, i also agree with hurting 2: people who are underprivileged can still invoke privileges, including and especially male privilege, and they are NEVER justified in doing that. it's just that, i don't know, i want to be a person who is anti-sexism and also be a person who is anti-bullying.

what is the context for talking about "nice guys"?

Okay this is now waaaay off topic but this is why we can't have nice things: because any talk about types of privilege is clogged with people in quite privileged categories insisting that their category isn't really as privileged as everyone else seems to think, which is just a way of dismantling the conversation and invalidating the tools.

I agree w/ in orbit. They posted these things on a public website where anyone could see them. No one's privacy is being infringed upon and no one is entitled to be protected from being embarrassed by their own behavior. If anything, public mockery + censure is how we enforce cultural norms and teach people what is appropriate. Also, no one is obligated to be nice.

hl: I think they mean the trope of the forlorn "nice guy" who is resentful of women for not sleeping with him (subtext being "I don't get it, I though just by virtue of being male and not openly being a violent, hateful prick I was entitled to sex. Yet I am not easily getting laid, therefore women are (hypocrites/whores/whatever epithet)" Ironically, this of course makes them not very nice at all, just somewhat passive. There have been a lot of pretty good explanations of this phenomenon, can't find one right now.

and the corollary idea that that guy is not really "privileged" because look at what a loser he is

xp ok, i have not been saying that i am not privileged or anything like that and i am definitely not defending those people featured in the tumblr. it's possible, though, that i am (due to privilege) underestimating the necessity of public mockery and censure as a tactic because i find it distasteful.

yeah, I'm aware of the trope. thanks for the context. this thread has gotten dizzying.

http://s3.amazonaws.com/auteurs_production/images/film/revenge-of-the-nerds/w448/revenge-of-the-nerds.jpg

like, i don't want to understate how ugly and hateful their attitudes are. it's just that i wish the force of the tumblr was somehow able to more geared toward the ugly theses nerds' ideas are and not, you know, the nerds themselves.

Again, WHY are you identifying them all as nerds? Iirc there were many different types of men and boys, SOME OF THEM OBJECTIVELY QUITE GOOD LOOKING. I think the nerd similarity is your own lens here.

maybe, from what i could gather (looking briefly at the tumblr, but also mostly at the images included in the banner image of the jezebel article) the "nice guys" featured were sort of inept and lame. i mean, you would have to be to include bitter misogynist remarks in a dating profile.

this thread has gotten so weird!

i'm not in favor of bullying but tbh i don't feel a bit sorry for those guys. pretty much every woman i know who's ever had an okc profile has gotten barraged with creepy and demeaning and outright hateful messages from random strangers on a regular basis. if stuff like this discourages that behavior, more power to tumblr imo.

also, mordy + in orbit generally otm

And also again (and again, and again), singling out a category that for whatever reasons is meaningful to you and saying the whole exercise of identifying and breaking down invisible-knapsack privilege is less useful or suspect in some way because that specific category is underrepresented in the diagnosis is BAD. STOP DOING THAT. It makes the speaker seem like a blindered twit who only wants to weasel some conception of themselves out of perceived blame.

from what i remember the vast majority (if not all) of the posts on nice guys of okc were guys with "ugly ideas" over the pictures. there are other ones that do a lot of shaming but for that one the point seemed to be mostly abt highlighting the hypocrisy

i think i might be confusing this tumblr with "fedoras of okc" where the emphasis seemed to be on the pictures.

And if anyone else wants to whine that straight white men are really so much worse off than everyone who is not them thinks they are, I AM GOING TO KNIFE A BITCH TONIGHT. Shut it. I have a class at 7.30, someone else will have to take over holding this fort in my absence.

xp indeed, while there is some overlap between the fedoras & nice guys of okc, ppl are conflating them to strange effect itt

also -

"i can't speak for the us but ime in the uk i don't think i've ever worked with somebody who wasn't middle class, or came from a poor background"

this is crazy, for how many ppl is this true?

yeah, sorry, i think i definitely made that mistake. i am still uncomfortable with the idea of public shaming -- like, i wouldn't make a tumblr like that -- but i think, idk, pointing out people with sexist ideas is justified. i also want to add that i am not saying that straight white men are worse off than people say they are. that's not what i think. i think institutional privilege is weighted toward that category overwhelmingly and that dismantling the system that favors them is an important and urgent project.

I do have to take issue with this:

If some of them shared a quality of not being very highly placed in a patriarchal system

I don't really buy that hierarchies based on attractiveness, social ease, etc. are inherently "patriarchal"

otherwise agree with most of what you posted and hope i have not caused you to want to knife a bitch

"i can't speak for the us but ime in the uk i don't think i've ever worked with somebody who wasn't middle class, or came from a poor background"

That got away from me in the press but thank you for bringing it back: what LG said is completely bonkers to me. I know a signif number of ppl personally who grew up with welfare, food stamps, etc, who now are professionals, have advanced degrees, and are fully integrated into my work and social circles with everyone else. And I know there are more than a couple of ilxors who grew up poor and disadvantaged in multiple ways and yet are educated, media savvy, internet-using moderns just like everyone else. I do not recognize my own experience anywhere in his account.

public shaming can be good and can be bad. depends on who's doing it to whom, why and how, etc. for instance, i'm glad to see see bigots and bullies shamed down, but less glad to see the weak and ostracized ridiculed for being "weird". sometimes the twain meet, i suppose.

i also am kind of flabbergasted by the "never meet a poor" business. maybe america really does allow a lot more social mobility than the old world, i dunno.

it's ok guys ronan was public schooled

(he's gonna go fucking nuts when he reads that)

oi

xp to contenderizer. that is all i was saying. there was a resemblance b/w the nice guys tumblr (and to a greater extent, the fedoras tumblr, which was in the back of my mind) sort of bordered on conventional bullying. i still think the "nice guy" attitude/entitlement is a real problem, i guess i should have been clearer about that.

idk it can be tough to know you're talking/working with 'a poor person' but i do run into the odd one on the bus or street, tho obv i'd never approach the rough beast like

wtf is going on here

I want to back up this public shaming thing ("public shaming") because when a person HAS DONE A THING AND IS NOT SORRY, it is not necessarily "shaming" to just make it known that they did it and stand behind their actions. If that thing is fucking shameful then that is the consequence for them.

^xp

whenever LG talks abt poor ppl itt i imagine him thinking of like street urchins with newsy caps and typhus

Also, no one is obligated to be nice.

sure, but that argument can be made to undermine the problematization of 'privilege', or identity politics, etc, as well fwiw

would like to think that a concern for the underprivileged is not just about power dynamics, that there's maybe some level of compassion or belief in human worth in there as well. hard to ask for respect for your cause/position while also declaring your right to take pleasure in senseless dickishness (not suggesting anyone's innocent of this, don't get me wrong)

and on that note, not so sure about your defense of public ridicule/bullying - hardly that noble usually, and even when it is about 'enforcing norms', eh that's a pretty amoral and cruel process sometimes(and sometimes pretty conservative one), and hardly beyond criticism

sort of reminds me of the woody allen joke, "I'm a bigot, but for the left." but i guess from a tactical perspective, people who defend the blogs would say it is necessary to go through a cruel process of enforcing "new norms." as you can gather from my posts, i don't want to think that is necessary... i am a believer in civil discourse, and in treating everyone with dignity, even violent criminals or whatever... but i guess that is its own discussion.

xp i'll repeat what i said before: not everyone is concerned with gaining "respect for their cause", not everything a woman does is meant to reflect on "the feminism movement" on the whole, and angry catharsis can be a lifesaver

and ppl who have been systemically shat on and held down their whole lives are not obligated to have a belief in everyone's beautiful human worth, the right to anger is necessary

Going to self-defense class, sharpening knife. Behave.

and ppl who have been systemically shat on and held down their whole lives are not obligated to have a belief in everyone's beautiful human worth except nerds