From: garry@rice.edu (Garry C. King)
Newsgroups: alt.feminism
Subject: Re: Why I Am a Feminist
Date: 12 Oct 92 16:09:53 GMT
Followup-To: alt.feminism
Organization: Rice University

In article <1992Oct11.151548.28112@panix.com>, gcf@panix.com (Gordon Fitch)
wrote:

> garry@rice.edu (Garry C. King) writes:
> | Why not call yourself a classical liberal then ?
> | Parochialism is seldom a virtue.

gf: 
> Classical liberalism doesn't go far enough.... -- we're 
> all classical liberals; modern liberalism and modern 
> conservatism both descend from it and accept most of its 
> ideas.  

Does this mean that feminism's attraction to you is that it marks you out
as somehow "different", or "special" ?

gf:
> I don't know what to do about the condition of men.  For
> many generations, being male was the only way to be fully
> human.  As a result the majority of them still seem to be
> interested only in preserving their own oppression.  There's
> no credible movement to liberate them -- except feminism, of
> course.

Shouldn't that be "the majority of us" ?   
Have you made a break with the rest of us ?  (Sorry guy, you don't escape
that easily.  Those things dangling between your legs mark you for life).

> gk:
> | Whatever the "feminine" is (let me guess: the nice things ?).
gf:
> Yeah, the nice things.  You don't like the nice things?

I just don't define the "nice" things as "feminine".

gf: > Nobody else likes the nice things.

Untrue, and self-indulgent.
 
gf: > The idea of synthesis doesn't occur to you....

Sure, but it usually originates in contention.

> gk:
> | I've seen enough logical gymnastics in this newsgroup to keep me quietly
> | amused for days.  I particularly like the reference to barricades.  You'll
> | have to forgive me, but I'd have thought that you were one of the prima
> | barricadistas.

gf:
> I'm not referring to having an opinion; I'm referring to
> treating every social interaction as a conflict in which
> there's a winner and a loser -- a zero-sum game.  That goes 
> from the people who read articles only to find knock-off 
> points, to those who evidently feel that any success for 
> feminism somehow detracts from their well-being.  The name
> of MacKinnon was brought up, for example, only to make
> feminism look bad.  

There is a prevalent (and correct) view that a good deal of current
feminist action involves improving the lot of women *at the expense of*
men.  You can argue that the zero-sum game is invalid, but that's the way
it's being played. Now.

MacKinnon is frequently brought-up to highlight a dangerous, retrograde
aspect of current feminism, but this is easily countered by feminists
responding "Yep.  MacKinnon is a wacko" as some have done in this very
group.  Answering "Well, she once said something semi-rational" is not an
honest answer to non-feminists' concerns about the strength of the
man-hating faction.

gf:
> To provoke a demonstration of this, 
> all I needed to do was point out that the quotations from 
> MacKinnon seemed fairly rational.  Immediately, I became a 
> "supporter of censorship" because I did not ritually 
> denounce MacKinnon as totally evil -- I wasn't on the 
> team.  

But Gordon, you have already defined yourself as being not "on the team". 
(See above).  You can't be surprised that men would go after you.  In fact,
you did it deliberately, no ?

gf:
> Q.E.D.  So strong was the smell of team spirit that 
> some of those who tried to portray me as a "supporter of 
> censorship" were almost certainly well aware that I had 
> posted several articles promoting the idea that social 
> repression of sexual material was not only undesirable 
> but impossible.

Yeah well, feminists don't have a monopoly on sophistry.  You post enough
to make your points clear if they're misunderstood.  

gf:
> As a famous un-feminist said, "Winning isn't everything.  
> It's the only thing."  Maybe I should require you all to 
> denounce Lombardi by name.

I only read some of the articles here, but I don't recall anyone saying
that Vince Lombardi's views on football were particularly relevant to this
group. Your problem is that MacKinnon and The D Thing are perceived to be
"on your side" (don't tell me you don't have a side: to repeat, you
wouldn't call yourself something as literally exclusive as a "feminist" if
you didn't), and you have to work out what to say about them.  
To be fair, I'll ask directly: what are your considered views on MacKinnon
?

Garry.