I came across this article on Slate today. The subject is a new study that shows that men are victims of rape about as often as women. Even when one factors in all of the rape that occurs in prison, apparently a substantial amount is woman-against-man violence.
I will admit, I have not looked at the study itself in great detail, and I perhaps do not have the skill required to evaluate its merits. Furthermore, I have not found any reporting on the study beyond this Slate article. So there is a possibility that it is flawed.
I do think it is important to consider the results seriously, though. Regardless of what the evidence shows, it is important to have an accurate understanding of the circumstances under which rape occurs (if one wishes to stop it).
That said, I am a little concerned about how the results of this study may be used by those who like to claim that feminists make things up and resort to wild exaggerations to maintain their "victim" status.
Let's ask ourselves: do the results of this study, if true, really prove that men have it "just as bad" as women? That patriarchy is a figment of feminists' imaginations?
Well, first of all, your conclusions will depend on how you understand rape. If rape is merely an outgrowth of uncontrollable sexual desires, then the results of this study indicate that a not-insignificant portion of humanity, male and female alike, is so unable to control its sexual appetites that it cannot but help inflicting violence on fellow humans in order to satisfy primal urges.
Some people do hold such a view of humanity and I don't know that there is anything I can do to convince them (on a blog, at least) otherwise. I have written previously, however, in opposition to the idea of an innate, unchangeable "human nature" that is ultimately unaffected by the forces of society and history.
A more sociologically informed view of rape sees it as an instrument of domination, a manifestation of hierarchy, rather than simply a means of obtaining sexual pleasure. From this perspective, what the results of the recent study would mean is that there are forms of subjugation other than those based on male domination of females, which may be carried out, on a micro level, through sexual assault.
The discussion in the Slate article fails to address any social dimensions other than gender. What we don't know is how class, race, sexual orientation, gender identity, and other social realities factor into this. There is, however, evidence that the oppressed among all of these categories are far more likely to be subject to sexual violence. Therefore, it should not be so shocking that men are raped very often too.
But it should also not be overlooked that this study (once again, if true) undermines some of the key arguments of feminism's detractors. Namely:
1. There's not much we can do about rape, because men just can't control their sexual desires
2. There's not much we can do about rape unless women change the way they dress or how they act at parties
3. There are fundamental, biological differences between men and women
3.a. Men are naturally aggressive
3.b. Women are naturally passive, helpless
Obviously, women are just as capable of perpetrating acts of violence and men are just as capable of falling victim to them.
It will be interesting to see what information further research provides.
Thursday, May 1, 2014
Thursday, February 6, 2014
Myths about Communism and Capitalism
Someone sent me this article, and I think it's worth a read. I believe I have raised some or many of these points in my blog; however, it is nice to get them from someone who can write more eloquently than I can.
Saturday, February 1, 2014
Stand Your Ground in Vietnam and Florida
Recently I've been reading Kill Anything That Moves: The Real American War in Vietnam by Nick Turse. Turse examines the evidence of countless declassified reports (accessed by the Freedom of Information Act) and eyewitness accounts (the latter of which he even travels around Vietnam to procure) to provide a better understanding of the nature of the war waged in Vietnam. His conclusion: My Lai was the norm. The U.S., along with its Vietnamese allies, was essentially destroying everything in South Vietnam - killing anything, bombing anything, setting fire to anything, bulldozing anything. Now, this does not suprise me at all. I critiqued war, in general, before and have specifically argued against the myths of what war entails.
Still, something struck me.
Turse was describing many of the institutional characteristics that encouraged this destructive behavior - everything from the body count incentive to the ethos of basic training. He mentioned, regarding the latter, the racism that was embedded in the discourse of the military. From the beginning, recruits were told not to think of the Vietnamese as fully human. They habitually used racial epithets to refer to the Vietnamese people. Still, though, at this point, nothing surprising. I have written before about the way in which racism is inherently linked to warefare.
Turse went on to describe how civilian deaths were justified. First, there was an exhaustive (and contradictory!) list of behaviors that marked a person as "the enemy": say, running away, or staying still, or making eye contact, or not making eye contact. The list was so comprehensive, in fact, that any behaviors a civilian exhibited prior to being killed would invariably be on the list. So, you could always classify a civilian as an "enemy."
Sometimes, though, trigger-happy individuals were looked upon with some suspicion. For example, they said they had 10 enemy kills, but no recovered weapons. How likely was it that it was really the enemy?
Apparently, Stand Your Ground logic could be applied. One could say that they thought they heard gun shots, and they were just acting in self-defense. (Actually, the list of enemy behaviors also fit into this logic, because one could claim that those behaviors led them to believe they were being ambushed by the enemy, and therefore they were acting in self-defense.)
This is what struck me: the similarity of the logic employed in Vietnam and in Stand Your Ground laws.
1. You can kill an innocent person if you are acting in self-defense.
2. You are acting in self-defense if you are legitimately afraid for your life.
3. Your fear may be legitimized by a set of behaviors (real or imagined) that, when applied to a specific racial group, is supposed to indicate likely impending aggression.
4. But really, you can kill an innocent person because that person is deemed to be less human according to their race; the justification above is just for mental solace.
If you are Vietnamese, running away in fear from helicopters is a sign that you are Viet Cong and therefore you must be killed. If you are a black Floridian, walking through a neighborhood in the evening with a hoody on is a sign that you are a murderous criminal and therefore you must be killed.
Once again, there is a strong link between violence and racism. Violence is facilitated by dehumanization of victims. And dehumanization precipates violence.
Still, something struck me.
Turse was describing many of the institutional characteristics that encouraged this destructive behavior - everything from the body count incentive to the ethos of basic training. He mentioned, regarding the latter, the racism that was embedded in the discourse of the military. From the beginning, recruits were told not to think of the Vietnamese as fully human. They habitually used racial epithets to refer to the Vietnamese people. Still, though, at this point, nothing surprising. I have written before about the way in which racism is inherently linked to warefare.
Turse went on to describe how civilian deaths were justified. First, there was an exhaustive (and contradictory!) list of behaviors that marked a person as "the enemy": say, running away, or staying still, or making eye contact, or not making eye contact. The list was so comprehensive, in fact, that any behaviors a civilian exhibited prior to being killed would invariably be on the list. So, you could always classify a civilian as an "enemy."
Sometimes, though, trigger-happy individuals were looked upon with some suspicion. For example, they said they had 10 enemy kills, but no recovered weapons. How likely was it that it was really the enemy?
Apparently, Stand Your Ground logic could be applied. One could say that they thought they heard gun shots, and they were just acting in self-defense. (Actually, the list of enemy behaviors also fit into this logic, because one could claim that those behaviors led them to believe they were being ambushed by the enemy, and therefore they were acting in self-defense.)
This is what struck me: the similarity of the logic employed in Vietnam and in Stand Your Ground laws.
1. You can kill an innocent person if you are acting in self-defense.
2. You are acting in self-defense if you are legitimately afraid for your life.
3. Your fear may be legitimized by a set of behaviors (real or imagined) that, when applied to a specific racial group, is supposed to indicate likely impending aggression.
4. But really, you can kill an innocent person because that person is deemed to be less human according to their race; the justification above is just for mental solace.
If you are Vietnamese, running away in fear from helicopters is a sign that you are Viet Cong and therefore you must be killed. If you are a black Floridian, walking through a neighborhood in the evening with a hoody on is a sign that you are a murderous criminal and therefore you must be killed.
Once again, there is a strong link between violence and racism. Violence is facilitated by dehumanization of victims. And dehumanization precipates violence.
Saturday, January 25, 2014
"States' Rights" - the Refuge of Racism
With the recent success of the Tea Party and resurgent popularity of Ayn Rand and libertarianism, I think it is useful to trace the history of these strains of thought, as embedded in the "states' rights" discourse. It is important to remember how particular constellations of conservative thought have been shaped by race related issues since the founding of United States. It is too easy to become seduced by the myth that these debates have centered around abstract, noble considerations of individual rights and protection from tyranny. In fact, the debates have always been grounded in very practical concerns about race.
Some of the Founding Fathers were famously uneasy about the issue of slavery, believing it to be cruel and inhumane, even while continuing to own slaves themselves. There was strong opposition to slavery, to varying degrees, from different quarters. Hence, there was a real concern among slave owners that, if the Constitution were ratified, or if the federal government were strong, the abolition of slavery could easily enter into the Constitution. Now, of course, there were other concerns, one of which related to the economic relationship among states. However, that economic system was founded on slavery. The history of race in America has always been entangled in economic concerns, and that is important to this day.
Up until the time of the Civil War and beyond, the South united under the slogan of States' Rights. Resentment toward federal government intervention was particularly salient during the Reconstruction Era. Jim Crow seemed to be a nice way around many of these meddling regulations. ...Until the liberal activist Supreme Court screwed everything up by mandating the desegregation of schools.
It was this desegregation issue that fueled the States' Rights movement for decades. The Republican Party as Americans know it today (or, at least until it started to disintegrate as of late) and the Religious Right that formed its most loyal and important base both took shape in the 1970s. Once again, there were issues fairly unrelated to race that concerned Evangelicals: feminism, sexual liberation, social unrest, etc. Yet, it was the desegregation issue that ultimately spurred them to action. Religious schools were told that they would lose their tax-exempt status if they were segregated. And boom, the Religious Right is formed.
Lately there has been a shift in the Evangelical community, with the younger generation becoming more focused on social justice than social issues. The biggest detractors of "Big Government" are now often more libertarian in orientation. They are worried about all of the taxpayer money being spent on entitlements and social services. They want to cut spending and balance the budget. On the face of it, this seems purely economic. However, examine the discourse a bit, and it is not hard to find racially loaded words and images, playing on the correlation between race and poverty. Tea Party gatherings are no stranger to overt, blatant racism. There is a fear that lazy black and brown (illegal immigrants) people are living high off the hog on the taxpayers' hard-earned money.
And then there is good old fashioned re-imposing racially biased voting laws.
Unfortunately, it seems States' Rights has had less to do with upholding individual dignity than reinforcing a racial caste system.
Some of the Founding Fathers were famously uneasy about the issue of slavery, believing it to be cruel and inhumane, even while continuing to own slaves themselves. There was strong opposition to slavery, to varying degrees, from different quarters. Hence, there was a real concern among slave owners that, if the Constitution were ratified, or if the federal government were strong, the abolition of slavery could easily enter into the Constitution. Now, of course, there were other concerns, one of which related to the economic relationship among states. However, that economic system was founded on slavery. The history of race in America has always been entangled in economic concerns, and that is important to this day.
Up until the time of the Civil War and beyond, the South united under the slogan of States' Rights. Resentment toward federal government intervention was particularly salient during the Reconstruction Era. Jim Crow seemed to be a nice way around many of these meddling regulations. ...Until the liberal activist Supreme Court screwed everything up by mandating the desegregation of schools.
It was this desegregation issue that fueled the States' Rights movement for decades. The Republican Party as Americans know it today (or, at least until it started to disintegrate as of late) and the Religious Right that formed its most loyal and important base both took shape in the 1970s. Once again, there were issues fairly unrelated to race that concerned Evangelicals: feminism, sexual liberation, social unrest, etc. Yet, it was the desegregation issue that ultimately spurred them to action. Religious schools were told that they would lose their tax-exempt status if they were segregated. And boom, the Religious Right is formed.
Lately there has been a shift in the Evangelical community, with the younger generation becoming more focused on social justice than social issues. The biggest detractors of "Big Government" are now often more libertarian in orientation. They are worried about all of the taxpayer money being spent on entitlements and social services. They want to cut spending and balance the budget. On the face of it, this seems purely economic. However, examine the discourse a bit, and it is not hard to find racially loaded words and images, playing on the correlation between race and poverty. Tea Party gatherings are no stranger to overt, blatant racism. There is a fear that lazy black and brown (illegal immigrants) people are living high off the hog on the taxpayers' hard-earned money.
And then there is good old fashioned re-imposing racially biased voting laws.
Unfortunately, it seems States' Rights has had less to do with upholding individual dignity than reinforcing a racial caste system.
Saturday, November 30, 2013
The Conservative Life and Death of Obamacare
I never did write a second series of post on health. However, I think it's about time I said something about the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, aka the Socialist Scourge of the Earth.
Let's start with the obvious: Obamacare is not socialist. Yes, it involves government regulations and mandates, but last time I checked, that is not the definition of socialism. From what contact I have with them, I often see the undereducated folks from Real America and brainwashed Tea Party ideologues complain about the imposition of a "national healthcare plan" to accomplish the goal of making sure every American has access to health care. Apparently, they think that Obamacare is a public health insurance plan. They may have forgotten, or never realized, that Obama was forced to drop his public option from the ACA. So no, sadly, Obamacare is not a public option, does not contain a public option... and as has now become clear, never will have anything to do with a public option.
Now, one could argue that increasing government regulations and mandates equates to socialism. Then, of course, they are going to have to try to explain how to clearly distinguish socialism from capitalism when the difference is only a matter of degree, with no clear dividing line. The truth of the matter is, many of the provisions of Obamacare were dreamed up by conservatives. A republican governer (Romney, former republican presidential candidate) employed a version of the law in Massachusetts, and was heavily supported by conversatives activists and think tanks, like the Heritage Foundation. Obamacare is a conservative idea.
Furthermore, the ACA depends on and works through private insurance companies. Insurance companies have helped write the law and develop the national health exchange. Insurance companies also stand to benefit from the increased coverage, especially that of healthy young adults (who are now penalized for not having insurance).
Simply put, the ACA is an idea conceived in conservative circles and given flesh by private corporations. It is about the furthest thing from socialism I can possibly think of.
For these reasons, also, Obamacare is largely crap.
Yes, it makes somes attempts to cut costs (mostly in order to pay for itself, not to make health care more affordable, as the name of the law implies). Yes, it provides subsidies to some people who will better be able to afford insurance. Yes, it allows young adults the option to stay on their parents' insurance a little longer. Yes, it has gotten rid of pre-existing conditions restrictions. Etc.
This will undoubtedly be very helpful to a few people.
But it does nothing to address the exorbintantly high cost of health care (which is the main problem with the U.S. health care system), caused mainly by: 1) price gauging by hospitals, medical device manufacturers, and pharmaceuticals (the provision to allow Medicare to negotiate drug prices was stripped from ACA, as was the public option, both of which could have addressed price gauging by competetive downward pressure); 2) High overhead/beaurocratic costs (increasing the complexity of the insurance marketplace will only make this worse); and 3) Over-use of treatments and medications.
The last point, in particular, is a sensitive one .Americans, saturated as they are in the "rugged individualist" mentality, completely blind to the effects individual actions have on the rest of society, insist on their right to opt for whatever absurd, costly, and unnecessary treatments they want. "No one is going to tell me what treatment I need!" And then, of course, we like to sue medical care providers when they are not able to work miracles. All of this results in an over-reliance on expensive diagnostic imaging, over-prescription of antibiotics, and the like. In addition to conbributing to the rise of antibiotic resistant superbugs, this dramatically increases the cost of medical care for everyone. The poorest of society are harmed the most, of course. And since ill health follows lines of political/economic/social marginalization, the poorest are often most in need of this expensive care that they can't afford.
So, as nice as it might sound to have the "freedom" to keep your 97-year-old father on life support for another 2 weeks, because you are emotionally incapable of dealing with the inevitability of death, that "freedom" comes at the direct expense of poor people who have their whole lives ahead of them.
'Murrica.
Let's start with the obvious: Obamacare is not socialist. Yes, it involves government regulations and mandates, but last time I checked, that is not the definition of socialism. From what contact I have with them, I often see the undereducated folks from Real America and brainwashed Tea Party ideologues complain about the imposition of a "national healthcare plan" to accomplish the goal of making sure every American has access to health care. Apparently, they think that Obamacare is a public health insurance plan. They may have forgotten, or never realized, that Obama was forced to drop his public option from the ACA. So no, sadly, Obamacare is not a public option, does not contain a public option... and as has now become clear, never will have anything to do with a public option.
Now, one could argue that increasing government regulations and mandates equates to socialism. Then, of course, they are going to have to try to explain how to clearly distinguish socialism from capitalism when the difference is only a matter of degree, with no clear dividing line. The truth of the matter is, many of the provisions of Obamacare were dreamed up by conservatives. A republican governer (Romney, former republican presidential candidate) employed a version of the law in Massachusetts, and was heavily supported by conversatives activists and think tanks, like the Heritage Foundation. Obamacare is a conservative idea.
Furthermore, the ACA depends on and works through private insurance companies. Insurance companies have helped write the law and develop the national health exchange. Insurance companies also stand to benefit from the increased coverage, especially that of healthy young adults (who are now penalized for not having insurance).
Simply put, the ACA is an idea conceived in conservative circles and given flesh by private corporations. It is about the furthest thing from socialism I can possibly think of.
For these reasons, also, Obamacare is largely crap.
Yes, it makes somes attempts to cut costs (mostly in order to pay for itself, not to make health care more affordable, as the name of the law implies). Yes, it provides subsidies to some people who will better be able to afford insurance. Yes, it allows young adults the option to stay on their parents' insurance a little longer. Yes, it has gotten rid of pre-existing conditions restrictions. Etc.
This will undoubtedly be very helpful to a few people.
But it does nothing to address the exorbintantly high cost of health care (which is the main problem with the U.S. health care system), caused mainly by: 1) price gauging by hospitals, medical device manufacturers, and pharmaceuticals (the provision to allow Medicare to negotiate drug prices was stripped from ACA, as was the public option, both of which could have addressed price gauging by competetive downward pressure); 2) High overhead/beaurocratic costs (increasing the complexity of the insurance marketplace will only make this worse); and 3) Over-use of treatments and medications.
The last point, in particular, is a sensitive one .Americans, saturated as they are in the "rugged individualist" mentality, completely blind to the effects individual actions have on the rest of society, insist on their right to opt for whatever absurd, costly, and unnecessary treatments they want. "No one is going to tell me what treatment I need!" And then, of course, we like to sue medical care providers when they are not able to work miracles. All of this results in an over-reliance on expensive diagnostic imaging, over-prescription of antibiotics, and the like. In addition to conbributing to the rise of antibiotic resistant superbugs, this dramatically increases the cost of medical care for everyone. The poorest of society are harmed the most, of course. And since ill health follows lines of political/economic/social marginalization, the poorest are often most in need of this expensive care that they can't afford.
So, as nice as it might sound to have the "freedom" to keep your 97-year-old father on life support for another 2 weeks, because you are emotionally incapable of dealing with the inevitability of death, that "freedom" comes at the direct expense of poor people who have their whole lives ahead of them.
'Murrica.
Thursday, September 12, 2013
Liberation Rhetoric: Of Robin Thicke and Syria
Due to my recent busy schedule, I haven’t had time for writing. So, I realize my delay in drafting this post puts me a little behind, at least as far as Robin Thicke is concerned. Well, he’s still popular so maybe not.
The first time I heard Blurred Lines, I was flipping through radio stations while driving around in another state. I listened for a minute, trying to determine exactly which song it reminded me of (later on realized it was Marvin Gaye’s Got to Give It Up), but as soon as I heard the lyrics, “Let me liberate you,” I gave up and changed the station.
As it turned out, there were many other reasons why the lyrics to this song were offensive. Then there’s the music video, which generated perhaps the most controversy of all. However, to this day, I remain most bothered on a visceral level by the lyrics, “Let me liberate you.” Hopefully I don’t need to explain why. But just in case, here is my begrudging (shouldn’t need to do this) half-assed summary: 1) Men don’t liberate women, women liberate themselves; and 2) Liberation is not tantamount to acquiescing to men’s sexual desires, just as not consenting isn’t a manifestation of oppression. If a woman doesn’t want to, that does not mean she needs to be “liberated.”
Both of these principles have broader application, as the idea of “liberation” has been employed as a justification for domination in a variety of domains. I have already written about its function in the colonial enterprise (link). I have also discussed the continuation of its use in the logic of humanitarian interventions (aka humanitarian imperialism). Want to invade a country? Come up with a reason why the people need to be liberated. Considering all the many negative consequences of the global capitalism, it’s never hard.
We see it playing out once again in Syria. Syria has been on the U.S. “kill list” for more than decade. Finally, there is an opportunity to exploit a mild, short-lived protest movement and transform it into national upheaval (to change the regional balance of power). Of course, Saudi Arabia and other external participants get more of the credit for this role. Still, the American people are told now that we have to bomb Syria in order to save the people from chemical weapons attacks. As of now, the plans are on hold, but I would not be surprised if the U.S. becomes dissatisfied with the efforts of the Syrian regime to hand over their weapons.
Obviously, the most effective discursive elements are able to circulate widely and quickly in multiple domains. And we tend to draw on pre-formed discourses to from other areas to form arguments in new domains. However, as the “liberation” rhetoric is so thoroughly enmeshed in a particular mode of domination, it brings sharp relief to the way in which that mechanism of power itself operates in seemingly different circumstances. In other words, if one wishes to understand the inviolable connection between patriarchy and imperialism, critically examining the role of “liberation” rhetoric is not a bad place to start.
The first time I heard Blurred Lines, I was flipping through radio stations while driving around in another state. I listened for a minute, trying to determine exactly which song it reminded me of (later on realized it was Marvin Gaye’s Got to Give It Up), but as soon as I heard the lyrics, “Let me liberate you,” I gave up and changed the station.
As it turned out, there were many other reasons why the lyrics to this song were offensive. Then there’s the music video, which generated perhaps the most controversy of all. However, to this day, I remain most bothered on a visceral level by the lyrics, “Let me liberate you.” Hopefully I don’t need to explain why. But just in case, here is my begrudging (shouldn’t need to do this) half-assed summary: 1) Men don’t liberate women, women liberate themselves; and 2) Liberation is not tantamount to acquiescing to men’s sexual desires, just as not consenting isn’t a manifestation of oppression. If a woman doesn’t want to, that does not mean she needs to be “liberated.”
Both of these principles have broader application, as the idea of “liberation” has been employed as a justification for domination in a variety of domains. I have already written about its function in the colonial enterprise (link). I have also discussed the continuation of its use in the logic of humanitarian interventions (aka humanitarian imperialism). Want to invade a country? Come up with a reason why the people need to be liberated. Considering all the many negative consequences of the global capitalism, it’s never hard.
We see it playing out once again in Syria. Syria has been on the U.S. “kill list” for more than decade. Finally, there is an opportunity to exploit a mild, short-lived protest movement and transform it into national upheaval (to change the regional balance of power). Of course, Saudi Arabia and other external participants get more of the credit for this role. Still, the American people are told now that we have to bomb Syria in order to save the people from chemical weapons attacks. As of now, the plans are on hold, but I would not be surprised if the U.S. becomes dissatisfied with the efforts of the Syrian regime to hand over their weapons.
Obviously, the most effective discursive elements are able to circulate widely and quickly in multiple domains. And we tend to draw on pre-formed discourses to from other areas to form arguments in new domains. However, as the “liberation” rhetoric is so thoroughly enmeshed in a particular mode of domination, it brings sharp relief to the way in which that mechanism of power itself operates in seemingly different circumstances. In other words, if one wishes to understand the inviolable connection between patriarchy and imperialism, critically examining the role of “liberation” rhetoric is not a bad place to start.
Friday, July 26, 2013
The Soft Sexism of Women's Empowerment
Confession: I tune out whenever anyone mentions “women’s empowerment” as a solution to Third World problems. Before I tune out, I roll my eyes and sigh. And I am a feminist.
If you've had any involvement in human rights circles you will be familiar with the idea: empower women – give them an education or a microloan or whatever constitutes empowerment – and they will “fix” poverty. However, the belief that women are the key to human progress is not new, and it is not feminist. In fact, it has always been essential to the functioning modern patriarchy – that is, patriarchy in fortified imperialist/racist form. More than that, this belief is the most insidious element of patriarchal ideology, because it only superficially, and very disingenuously, values women.
Consider, for example, the American women's rights movement in the Reconstruction Era. White women were encouraged to stay home and raise children to fulfill their role as guardians of the White Race. The suffragists did not want to stay home and have tons of babies, but they happily accepted the fact that they would further the progress of their race. They insisted that voting rights for women was the only antidote to the impending peril of the Black Vote. White women, they argued, were educated and enlightened, and they outnumbered all of the uncivilized blacks and immigrants who would be tarnishing every election from here on out. White women could properly serve their function as guardians of the race only if they had the right to vote. Sadly, in constructing their argument on the basis of the Woman Savior, the suffragists merely strengthened the sexist and racist ideological framework that was instrumental in their oppression.
Of course, there is also a long history of using "women's liberation" as a pretext for imperial conquest. This may be even more pertinent to discussions about the developing world, particularly coming from the propaganda mills of powerful NGOs.
When a child has a crappy role in a school play, you make her feel better by telling her that, even though she doesn't have any lines, it is actually the most important, super special part in the play. Guardianship of the race (/humanity) works in pretty much the same way. Women have to clean up all the messes caused by capitalism, and they are told it is an honor. Whatever society as a whole used to provide, women now have the responsibility of taking care of as best they can on their own.
Valuing women does not mean forcing the entire burden of human progress onto their shoulders. It is not women’s job to fix poverty. As far as I can tell, men created the problem, so why should women have to solve it alone? I have heard, in the context of microloans, that men can’t be trusted because they waste money on alcohol and they don’t care as much about their families. Although I can’t prove that this is an exaggeration born out of Western ideas about masculinity, I can still ask: don't we want to raise the bar for men a little bit? Are the women supposed to do all the work of lifting their families out of poverty while the men drink themselves into oblivion?
But the larger issue is this: the responsibility for “fixing” poverty does not lie with any individual poor people, male or female. Poverty and inequality must be treated as a global systemic problem, one that involves a complex network of transnational social relations manipulated by a handful of people with incomprehensible amounts of wealth. It must be confronted en masse. A few individuals may be able to raise their standards of living with a good education or a loan, but poverty will continue to exist on the same scale until enough people, men and women, decide that they are not going to put up any longer with the capitalist system that creates it.
If you've had any involvement in human rights circles you will be familiar with the idea: empower women – give them an education or a microloan or whatever constitutes empowerment – and they will “fix” poverty. However, the belief that women are the key to human progress is not new, and it is not feminist. In fact, it has always been essential to the functioning modern patriarchy – that is, patriarchy in fortified imperialist/racist form. More than that, this belief is the most insidious element of patriarchal ideology, because it only superficially, and very disingenuously, values women.
Consider, for example, the American women's rights movement in the Reconstruction Era. White women were encouraged to stay home and raise children to fulfill their role as guardians of the White Race. The suffragists did not want to stay home and have tons of babies, but they happily accepted the fact that they would further the progress of their race. They insisted that voting rights for women was the only antidote to the impending peril of the Black Vote. White women, they argued, were educated and enlightened, and they outnumbered all of the uncivilized blacks and immigrants who would be tarnishing every election from here on out. White women could properly serve their function as guardians of the race only if they had the right to vote. Sadly, in constructing their argument on the basis of the Woman Savior, the suffragists merely strengthened the sexist and racist ideological framework that was instrumental in their oppression.
Of course, there is also a long history of using "women's liberation" as a pretext for imperial conquest. This may be even more pertinent to discussions about the developing world, particularly coming from the propaganda mills of powerful NGOs.
When a child has a crappy role in a school play, you make her feel better by telling her that, even though she doesn't have any lines, it is actually the most important, super special part in the play. Guardianship of the race (/humanity) works in pretty much the same way. Women have to clean up all the messes caused by capitalism, and they are told it is an honor. Whatever society as a whole used to provide, women now have the responsibility of taking care of as best they can on their own.
Valuing women does not mean forcing the entire burden of human progress onto their shoulders. It is not women’s job to fix poverty. As far as I can tell, men created the problem, so why should women have to solve it alone? I have heard, in the context of microloans, that men can’t be trusted because they waste money on alcohol and they don’t care as much about their families. Although I can’t prove that this is an exaggeration born out of Western ideas about masculinity, I can still ask: don't we want to raise the bar for men a little bit? Are the women supposed to do all the work of lifting their families out of poverty while the men drink themselves into oblivion?
But the larger issue is this: the responsibility for “fixing” poverty does not lie with any individual poor people, male or female. Poverty and inequality must be treated as a global systemic problem, one that involves a complex network of transnational social relations manipulated by a handful of people with incomprehensible amounts of wealth. It must be confronted en masse. A few individuals may be able to raise their standards of living with a good education or a loan, but poverty will continue to exist on the same scale until enough people, men and women, decide that they are not going to put up any longer with the capitalist system that creates it.
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