Newsgroups: soc.women
Subject: Communication responsability wasRe: <None>
From: rivero@mdcbbs.com
Date: 8 Apr 92 10:59:28 GMT
 <1992Apr2.180644.1@fnalo.fnal.gov> <1992Apr6.124251.1@mdcbbs.com> <1992Apr7.161026.1@fnalno.fnal.gov>
Organization: M&E (Division of EDS), Cypress CA
Nntp-Posting-User: mdhc

IIn article <1992Apr7.161026.1@fnalno.fnal.gov>, holzman@fnalno.fnal.gov
writes:> In article <1992Apr6.124251.1@mdcbbs.com>, rivero@mdcbbs.com writes:
>> of this is simple. If you take on the mantle of communicator, any failure
>> to communicate is YOURS. You cannot blame your audiance if they don't
>> understand what you are saying, and just dismissing them because they
>> haven't
>> read the correct books and magazines is a cop-out royale!
>
> Ah, but I am not the only communicator here.  You assumed the mantle of
> communicator in making a critique of feminism.  Your critique is refuted by
> contradictory data, and now you are complaining that it wasn't spoon-fed to
> you, so feminists are to blame for your ignorance of feminism.

 No, I say that feminists who don't communicate well are resposnible if I
haven't heard their view of femimism. There is a difference. The mass
audience is under no obligation to do their homework for them.

  The original issue was when I commented on the public face of feinism, and
you responded that the public image I responded to wasn't "real" feminism,
and rather tha provide the opposing data, simply referred me to a magazine
(which frankly I had never heard of), as if you are somebody's English Teacher.

  First off, your view of what constitutes "real" femimism is an arbitrary
distinction based on your own values, and I won't fault you for that.
But the feminists who DO command the attention of the media also have
a view of what constitutes feminism. Their view of what constitutes
"real" feminism is equally valid to yours. The only real difference is 
that they understand the realities of how to use the media in a political 
context and you do not. I also understand how media works (I have the
advertising awards to prove it) and I know that if I fail to get the message
across, it's my fault, not the fault of the audiance because they didn't
read the books I thought they should.

  Let's say I produce a commercial to sell a car, and the audience 
doesn't respond. The Burk scores suck verily and the cars are gathering
dust on the showroom floor. I can't go back to the car maker and say
it's the audiences fault because they didn't read Consumer Reports, can I?
(Well, I can, but I'll never make commercials for that account again.)
The same thing applies to the public perception of feminism. The public
view of the media is based on those feminists who effectivly use the media.

  My original response was to a facet of the public face of feminism. That is
the face that I and the majority of the voting public get exposed to. If there
is another, more moderate aspect, which has not made it's way into the
public eye, that's the fault of those who wish to communicate that view.
You can't blame the public for not reading your specific view of feminism. They
might not even agree to begin with, and you can't blame them for that either.


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|  Michael Rivero rivero@mdcbbs.com Homo Cyberneticus-Computational Man  |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
|  While advertisiers like to pretemd that they "own" the mind of the    |
|  viewer, the fact is that people watch (and spend money on) only       |
|  those things they can identify with, whether it is soap, cars, or     |
|  politics. The fact that the femnist extreme gets the media response   |
|  it does while the referenced magazine has such a small circulation    |
|  suggests that the former, rather than the latter, represents the view |
|  of the majority of feminists.                                         |
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Newsgroups: soc.women