"People who do not know I am transgendered treat me with much more respect," he says. "I can even complete a whole sentence without being interrupted by a man."
Ha-ha. Good times, good times.
Me, right now I'm pegging on:
As the applause died down, one scientist turned to another and remarked what a great seminar it had been, adding, "Ben Barres's work is much better than his sister's."
Heh. He's sweet, isn't he, this clueless, clueless dude? (Susan G., are you reading this? I'm immersed up to my neck in anecdotes like this one... these are what make me so uncomfortable with your assertion that "no-one would ever be surprised to find out that a particular something was credited to a woman, not a man." Maybe... but, well, for what value of "surprise"?)
But what really, really stuck with me was the Ben Barres quote I read elsewhere:
"Women have heard this stuff so much from people like Larry Summers, some corner of their brain starts to believe it," he said.
Ow. Ow ow ow ow ow. See, THAT.... that is the real value of the Summers/Pinker discussion. Before all this started, I didn't realize that I kind of believed this shit.
So now the question is... how, exactly, do I talk myself out of believing it, deep down inside?
You are -so- misquoting me. I said that no professional SF editor would be surprised to find that a woman had written a good hard science fiction story. Not that some generic "no one" would ever be surprised to find that a woman had done some generic "something".
Wait! I think what I actually said was that no professional editor would be surprised to hear that a woman -could- write good hard SF. For any given story, of course anything might be surprising.
Being a bit toasted around the edges after that discussion I was, of course, aware of how badly I was misquoting you. Or at least, it was a conscious decision on my part to make it more generic. Still, the clarification is useful. But I'll defer my specific objections to your correction for an e-mail which will be sent shortly...
Before all this started, I didn't realize that I kind of believed this shit.
It's that whole "if you hear something often enough..." phenomenon. Which is why it's so important to speak up against people when they make broad statements and expect them to be taken as truth.
So now the question is... how, exactly, do I talk myself out of believing it, deep down inside?
For me, personally, it's an ongoing battle. I tend to be harder on myself than I likely should be, but that's what keeps me going, because I'm a lot more affected by media images and propaganga than I'd like to be. It's one reason I keep the blog: so I can yell or laugh at people who say things that don't jive with the reality that I'm actually living.
Because that's often the thing: people will talk on and on about "how things are" but the moment you stop and question that, you realize that your own experience just doesn't line up with their assumptions.
It's hard. I question a lot of my own base assumptions, and look at the subtext of everything I write, and examine the beliefs I hold. Nothing's "always" certain.
This is my personal blog, and the opinions expressed here are solely, completely, and absolutely my own, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of any past, present, or future employer, business partner, contact, or associate.
Labor is hard work. Forcing
women to labor against their will -
is slavery.
"I'm not afraid of storms,
for I'm learning to sail my ship."
-Louisa May Alcott
"No person is your friend who demands your silence."
-Alice Walker
"I never expect men to give us liberty. No, women, we are not worth it until we take it."
- Voltairine de Cleyre
"The vote means nothing to women.
We should be armed."
-Edna O'Brien
"The dogma of woman's complete historical subjection
to men must be rated as one of the most fantastic myths
ever created by the human mind."
-Mary Ritter Beard
"They sicken of the calm that know the storm."
-Dorothy Parker
"I got kicked out of ballet class because I pulled a groin muscle.
It wasn't mine."
-Rita Rudner
"Adventure is worthwhile in itself."
-Amelia Earhart
"Don't be afraid your life will end; be afraid that it will never begin." -Grace Hansen
"I never realized until lately that women were supposed to be the inferior sex." -Katharine Hepburn
"Everyone has talent. What is rare is the courage to follow
talent to the dark place where it leads." -Erica Jong
"I have always had a dread of becoming a passenger in life."
-Margareth II, Queen of Denmark:
"I'm never going to be famous. My name will never be writ large on the roster of Those Who Do Things.
I don't do any thing. Not one single thing."
-Dorothy Parker
"You can't be brave if you've only had wonderful things happen to you." -Mary Tyler Moore
"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage." -Anais Nin
"No more tears now; I will think about revenge." -Mary, Queen of Scots
"You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in
which you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the
thing which you think you cannot do." -Eleanor Roosevelt
"Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." -Muriel Strode
"People call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat or a prostitute." -Rebecca West:
"If you're going to hold someone down you're going to have to hold on by the other end of the chain.
You are confined by your own repression."
-Toni Morrison
"It is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees." -Delores Ibarruri
"Study as if you were going to live forever; live as if you were going to die tomorrow." -Maria Mitchell
"This is the precept by which I have lived: Prepare for the worst; expect the best; and take what comes."
-Hannah Arendt
"If you surrendered to the air, you could ride it."
-Toni Morrison
"I have no regrets. I wouldn't have lived my life the way I did if I was going to worry about what people were going to say."
-Ingrid Bergman
"We know that we can do what men can do, but we still don't know that men can do what women can do.
That's absolutely crucial. We can't go on doing two jobs."
-Gertrude Stein
"The truth will set you free. But first, it will piss you off." -Gloria Steinem
"It's all make believe, isn't it?" -Marilyn Monroe
"I would venture to guess that Anon, who wrote so many poems
without signing them, was often a woman." — Virginia Woolf
"I'm just a person trapped inside a woman's body."
-Elayne Boosler
"Because I am a woman, I must make unusual efforts to succeed.
If I fail, no one will say, 'She doesn't have what it takes.'
They will say, 'Women don't have what it takes.'"
-Clare Boothe Luce
"Soon they'll be telling you you can't be Batman, Shakespeare, President, or God.
Little fat baby, going on schoolgirl, you can be anyone, but it won't be easy."
-Marilyn Hacker
"We've begun to raise daughters more like sons...
but few have the courage to raise our sons more like our daughters."
-Gloria Steinem
"Remember our heritage is our power; we can know ourselves and our
capacities by seeing that other women have been strong."
-Judy Chicago
"My grandfather once told me that there are two kinds of people:
those who work and those who take the credit.
He told me to try to be in the first group;
there was less competition there."
-Indira Gandhi
"I want to walk through life instead of being dragged through it."
- Alanis Morissette
"Nothing will work unless you do."
-Maya Angelou
"Feminism is the radical notion that women are people."
-Cheris Kramare and Paula Treichler
5 comments so far. What are your thoughts?
My friend Andrea pegged on the sentence:
"People who do not know I am transgendered treat me with much more respect," he says. "I can even complete a whole sentence without being interrupted by a man."
Ha-ha. Good times, good times.
Me, right now I'm pegging on:
As the applause died down, one scientist turned to another and remarked what a great seminar it had been, adding, "Ben Barres's work is much better than his sister's."
Heh. He's sweet, isn't he, this clueless, clueless dude? (Susan G., are you reading this? I'm immersed up to my neck in anecdotes like this one... these are what make me so uncomfortable with your assertion that "no-one would ever be surprised to find out that a particular something was credited to a woman, not a man." Maybe... but, well, for what value of "surprise"?)
But what really, really stuck with me was the Ben Barres quote I read elsewhere:
"Women have heard this stuff so much from people like Larry Summers, some corner of their brain starts to believe it," he said.
Ow. Ow ow ow ow ow. See, THAT.... that is the real value of the Summers/Pinker discussion. Before all this started, I didn't realize that I kind of believed this shit.
So now the question is... how, exactly, do I talk myself out of believing it, deep down inside?
You are -so- misquoting me. I said that no professional SF editor would be surprised to find that a woman had written a good hard science fiction story. Not that some generic "no one" would ever be surprised to find that a woman had done some generic "something".
Wait! I think what I actually said was that no professional editor would be surprised to hear that a woman -could- write good hard SF. For any given story, of course anything might be surprising.
Being a bit toasted around the edges after that discussion I was, of course, aware of how badly I was misquoting you. Or at least, it was a conscious decision on my part to make it more generic. Still, the clarification is useful. But I'll defer my specific objections to your correction for an e-mail which will be sent shortly...
Before all this started, I didn't realize that I kind of believed this shit.
It's that whole "if you hear something often enough..." phenomenon. Which is why it's so important to speak up against people when they make broad statements and expect them to be taken as truth.
So now the question is... how, exactly, do I talk myself out of believing it, deep down inside?
For me, personally, it's an ongoing battle. I tend to be harder on myself than I likely should be, but that's what keeps me going, because I'm a lot more affected by media images and propaganga than I'd like to be. It's one reason I keep the blog: so I can yell or laugh at people who say things that don't jive with the reality that I'm actually living.
Because that's often the thing: people will talk on and on about "how things are" but the moment you stop and question that, you realize that your own experience just doesn't line up with their assumptions.
It's hard. I question a lot of my own base assumptions, and look at the subtext of everything I write, and examine the beliefs I hold. Nothing's "always" certain.
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