Theory Thursday: Lenses and Malleability

After posting about Armchair Feminism, it's probably not a fantastic idea to do a post that is theory-heavy, but here it is.

In the comments from a recent post, Eric notes some problems with the idea of understanding the world through a feminist lens:

See, I sometimes think the "lens" is the problem itself. I am cautious about adopting lenses that produce rigorous conceptual models; I would prefer to gain some insights into the world from various philosophies and political movements and literatures and ideas and worldviews and religions by keeping an open mind. Thus the eclectic part, I grab bits and piece from all over the place and rethink things. Now, of course, that's what works for me at this point in my life.

I admit a lot of this is also very intellectual/academic for me. I'd rather understand and be able to teach/explain/discuss/lecture rather than necessarily agree with/internalize a particular viewpoint. My problem with framing it as a "lens" is that it implies your applying them a priori to reading something or looking at something or watching something. I find this problematic because it then prevents you from developing other possible lens, of opening other possible world-views, or ways of looking at the world or experiencing the world gained from those works.

I agree that the conceptual tool of 'lenses' is problematic in some of the ways Eric points out--though I find it useful to quite a large degree, when people think I mean something apart from, and prior to, experience, problems can arise. The main weakness of the 'lenses' metaphor is that it can imply that a person can pick and choose lenses prior to experience, when in fact even the very choice of which lenses we choose from is given by our current world-view. But one strength of the 'lenses' metaphor is that it allows for, I think, one of the things that Eric also values: Malleability of a world-view. I can choose to look at something through the lens of feminism. And then I can look at it through lenses of race theory, and atheism, and class theory--and even where these conceptual frameworks don't intersect, I can gain more insight into the world as a whole.

On a related note, I'm all for malleability. In fact, that's central to my truck with traditional gender roles (which is one basis of my interest in feminism): I don't have a problem that there are roles. My problems begin to arise when the roles are seen as forever-and-ever-amen, writ in stone, and very not-malleable. (Not that I believe they are infinitely malleable, either, of course, which becomes important rather quickly.) And many varieties of feminism focus on anti-essientialist conceptions of gender roles (among other things), which is one of the things I like about feminism.

I think I get Eric's take on an eclectic world-view, using concepts he's chosen from various other world-views--and I tend to do that more than most as well.

I do think there is a danger of letting the malleability of one's thoughts provide an excuse to stay on the sidelines regarding the world. I start wondering if this happens to Eric as often as it happens to me, when he says this:

I'd rather understand and be able to teach/explain/discuss/lecture rather than necessarily agree with/internalize a particular viewpoint.

For me, one place that I come to feel ok with identifying as a feminist is as regards real violence done by what I see as a patriarchal dominance hierarchy; when I look at my mother's life, and the hurdles she had to overcome, the violence she faced by virtue of being a woman, it makes me want to get off the sidelines and take to the streets (so to speak) more, even if I may be subscribing, for however long, to a set of concepts that I may not agree with at some point in the future. When I see men suffering violence at the hands of other men over what amount to traditional conceptions of masculinity, when I see women going through something like what my mother has gone through, I want to do more than teach/explain/discuss/understand/lecture, and I think that's a good thing--and I think internalizing a viewpoint, if one recognizes that such a viewpoint is often just a starting-point, and that the viewpoint itself is malleable, isn't such a bad thing. In fact, It's doubtful to me that we can avoid internalizing viewpoints to some degree in order to better understand them. And I think using the conceptual tool of 'lenses'--as long as we do recognize the limits of conceptual tools in general--can be powerful.

What Men Can Do Wednesday: Armchair Feminist, Part Two

Months ago now, I wrote about the idea that men who identify as feminists or feminist allies have to watch out that they don't get caught up in too much 'armchair feminism'--that is, we have to keep in mind that we may too often slip into a detached sort of conceptualizing of feminism, in part because we don't as often or as easily find ourselves face-to-face with the harms that patriarchy and misogyny can cause.

But the more I read and think about the conceptual frameworks that help create our relationship to gender and to power, the more I think that men can gain some motivation for better understanding feminism by paying attention to the ways in which patriarchy harms boys and men. This is not to take away from how these things harm people of other genders, of course--and for many people, avoiding harm to others is a pretty powerful motivation. But for many of us, avoiding harms to ourselves is also a powerful motivator, and I think feminist men should better understand this.

Thing is, the harms that men experience as a result of rigid gender roles, rigid hierarchical societal structures, and the like, are sometimes more subtle than the harms that women often face, or harder for men to see. Some of this just has to do with the way that men are harmed by rigid gender roles, and some of it flows pretty directly from men being at the top of the dominance hierarchy--it's tough to see the water that we're swimming in.

In addition, because of the very way that masculinity is envisioned and enforced, often these harms go unclaimed by men themselves, for fear of being seen as unmanly. Rather than, for instance, feeling the immediate, visceral effects of being verbally accosted while doing something like trying to buy some gas, men have to face the stress of being thought of as, and being taught to think of themselves as, protectors and providers, even in contexts where such things are impossible (as one example). Which is not to say that women don't face subtle forms of harm, or that men don't face visceral, physical and obvious harm in part by virtue of conceptions of masculinity--but it may be that men need to more often look harder to find a harm that exists.

Part of the risk of armchair feminism for feminist men comes from not recognizing these harms--once recognized, we might better feel the passion of our ideals.

(Part one.)

Ally Work: Argument and Influence

The recent dustup that started as an innocent posting of a puppy picture on feministing that has blown up into a pretty angry 'discussion' has got me to thinking about how we all communicate with each other, the responsibility of feminists to each other in general, and the responsibilities of feminist allies to communicate well with each other and the larger world. Recently, Geo expressed some disappointment with the community aspects of Feminist Allies as agroupblog--I don't think he'd mind my mentioning that he felt a lack of community here. And I think there is a decided lack of community here--part of that is just blogging reality (we're all busy), part of it is personality quirks (we interact and communicate in various ways) but part of it probably has to do with lack of direction as far as what allies (and feminists in general!) ought to be doing, at least as far as my understanding of it all. So I've begun thinking of narrowing focus over here, of thinking more about what I (we?) want to do here, and about the larger question: What are the best ways for feminist allies to go about trying to change the world?

Framing Feminist Work as Ally Work
One of the reasons that I frame the flavors of feminism that I embrace from the perspective of an ally is that I think doing so pays tribute to some of the intricacies of working passionately on something in the face of not always being explicitly invited to the party, of feeling directly influenced by something on a deep level and wanting to influence right back. I also frame things this way because I think men are in a particularly interesting position to change the minds of other men as regards feminism--because patriarchy is so ingrained, female feminists have some roadblocks set up before them in terms of changing the minds of men, roadblocks set up explicitly and implicitly by some of the basic structures of culture itself. Put more bluntly: It's possible that many men are more likely to listen to other men about feminism than they are to listen to women about feminism.

Choosing an Audience
This is not a happy thought. It sort of pisses me off that it might be the case, but really it's just a vestige of the current social system, an accident of history that comes from a long, long period of patriarchy. It's something that feminists have to face up to, and make decisions about, if one of their goals is to influence those who don't (yet) agree with them. I think many feminists understand this, and do make choices based on the current situation. Sometimes they choose to not want to influence men so much (i.e. radical feminists often see changing the minds of men as merely a possible byproduct of changing the world so that it's not so misogynist). Sometimes they choose to keep men in the mix, but not focus so much on men, since in many ways the focus of everything is often on men. Some feminists (bell hooks comes to mind) get a lot of flak for suggesting that we need to enlist men as allies just as much as we need to enlist women. I imagine there are some feminists who focus on men almost exclusively, thinking to change things from within the current power structure (though I haven't met any, which is interesting). I think all of these strategies are valid, that they all get some work done. I try to not fault anybody for choosing one over the other, even though I, of course, fall into the camp that thinks enlisting men as allies is one of the more important things we can do as feminists (especially as feminist men). Even if we share a lot of the same concerns, our paths for getting to our goals may be different.

How Do We Go About Actually Changing the World?
But aside from basic questions about choosing an audience as writers (and activists) who do feminist work, what are the best ways to actually change the world? What are the best ways to change minds? What are the 'central' causes we need to champion? When is it ok to not respond to criticism, to draw lines, and when do we owe it to each other, to feminists and self-identified non-feminists to respond?

I understand that there are no blanket answers here, though there may be some general guidelines. And one of the most general tenets of what I want to accomplish is this: I think that passionate-though-reasoned discussion (not simply laying out arguments) can get some work done. At times I wonder if I'm of the disposition to get any of this work done, because I oftentimes feel like I'm not getting my ideas across, or that I'm not understanding the ideas of others. But I'm convinced that such discussion is possible, and worth a lot of work--and, I'm convinced that such discussion can actually change people's minds.

It's not that only discussion can do this. Sudden changes in one's life can cause basic opinions to change. Some opinions tend to change 'naturally' with age and experience. But I also think that discussion, when it's enjoined by people who care about each other as people, who respect each other to a large degree as people, can get us somewhere. Not all of the time. Not in every way. But I wouldn't spend so much time writing if I didn't think that I might, at times, be able to give a take on something that somebody else maybe hasn't thought of, if I didn't think that something I say might lend itself to changing minds.

Of course, writing--and blogging in particular--isn't always about changing minds. Sometimes it's about cheerleading and preaching to the choir. And there are lots of times and places for that. It's good to feel a sense of community, and preaching to the choir can serve that purpose. I am still suspicious when people seem to be only preaching to the converted, but I also see that there is a lot of good to be done by doing so, some of the time. And, frankly, the jury is still out on whether or not blogging engenders discussion, in my mind. Short, angry posts seem to get a lot more attention, and more "discussion" than longer, well-reasoned arguments tend to get. There is kindling enough for flamewars forever and on into eternity, probably, for as long as the Interweb exists, because of the nature of the medium. (Of course, impassioned, angry responses to the opinions of others aren't only happening in the land o' blogs. It happens in classrooms, on TV, and even among my close friends at the dinner table.)

How Do We Go About Changing Minds?
Despite all of this, I still think that discussion, with respect and care, can change minds. My opinion in this regard is probably partly because of my background in academic philosophy, which sort of hinges itself on the idea that communication of ideas can change minds (though some philosophers would disagree). But part of why I believe this is simply from experience. I have changed, in part, because people have pointed out blind spots to me, because people have offered perspectives that I didn't think of (or didn't have access to). Discussion has increased my understanding of things, and it has increased my ability to empathize with others. So one way in which I think we go about changing minds, the main way for me, is to talk, talk, talk. That doesn't mean that I will discuss anything ad nauseum with anybody--we all draw our lines, based on limits on our time, as well as lines based on moral intuitions (I don't, in general, tend to care to take time to try to change the minds of hardcore misogynists, for instance).

Armchair Feminism, Part One

I got some good constructive criticism recently about the ways that I express myself regarding feminism, and it's got me to thinking. A friend of mine who is active in various feminist realms, pointed out to me that my writing about feminism often feels "detached", and as such is frustrating to her, because she sees that from other men who identify as feminists (or pro-feminists) as well. From her point of view, when it comes to men and feminism, the ways that men express themselves often betray that it's 'Just Theory' to them.

I started off writing this post imagining that I would write something definitive, but then i recognized what a big issue it was--for me and perhaps for others--that I thought I'd just throw some ideas out there and see what sticks to the interweb, and hopefully write some follow-up posts.

The Armchair
On the face of it, it's pretty obvious why feminist men have to be careful to not slip into Armchair Feminism. Women feminists have constant, personal reminders (all too constant) of why the world needs feminism -- they experience (for instance) sexism daily on the street, at work, and at home, and they experience it as a loss of freedom, of safety, of fairness. But of course men also live in this world, and once men start viewing the world through feminist lenses, we also have daily reminders -- living in a sexist world, how could we not? And I would even say that we experience a loss due to sexism: Men lose out on being fully human, for instance, due to the gender socialization that teaches them (oversimplifying here) to "be strong" and "be a man". I think it's important to not play that experience of loss down, because I think it is lived experience, and because it affects men on deep levels that aren't acknowledged enough (especially by men themselves!). That's one reason why I find myself talking about it quite a bit here at FA.

That said, from where I'm standing, talking to friends and interacting with other feminists in various ways, there is a way in which feminist women have less choice about being active in feminism, in fighting the good fight. Women feminists (at times) have to fight the good fight because the fight is so often brought right up to them. Feminist men more often have the luxury of being able to speak from a theoretical perspective, and we are to various degrees blind to the ways in which male privilege encourages us to speak only from a theoretical perspective.

(Meta Note: Writing about Armchair Feminism is, in many ways, an expression of Armchair Feminism itself.)

Men's Place in Feminism
Some of the, shall we say, "tentativeness" with which I write about feminism comes from the complexities of being a feminist man, of wanting to carefully navigate space that has been created by (mostly) women, and in some cases is thought of as a safe space for women, a refuge from a sexist world. Which is not to say that I haven't felt entirely welcome in some feminist spaces--in fact, I've felt very welcome in most feminist spaces, both online and in the Real World. But feeling comfortable doesn't stop me from being careful, looking for blind spots related to male privilege, and making an effort to listen when my socialization encourages me to talk. My constructively critical friend might say that I'm too careful, and that may very well be so. Or perhaps I just haven't learned (yet) how to navigate without being overly careful. Or, perhaps, I'm comfy in my Feminist Armchair, and I'm using this stuff as an excuse. Likely it's a mix of all of this stuff.

Feminist Styles
Another facet of all of this is that I have learned to avoid (perhaps to a fault) styles of communication that have been taught to me as a man, based on traditional male gender roles, and I'm continually learning to change in that regard. My background is in academic philosophy, which is (still, I think) a bastion of the Logical Argument, of the debate, of forcefully convincing your audience, who are also to whatever degree your enemies because they don't yet agree with you. In my experience, the Logical Argument is most often an excuse to badger somebody who disagrees with you. In my experience, the way one argues, the style of arguing, is often taken as the force of the argument itself. Do you include personal experience? Then you're probably offering up invalid arguments. Do you acknowledge (and give voice to) alternatives to your point of view? Then you're not proving you're right. Do you put forth opinions as less-than-certain-but-still-important? Then you're just wrong, because Truth is Certainty. All of these points of view are put forth by supposedly objective people who think that perfect objectivity is doable, that anything less isn't at all convincing, and that men are better at this (In my experience, the Logical Argument part of traditional male masculinity, at least in the cultures I grew up in.)

I'm much more interested in discussions these days than I am in debates. The two often overlap in various ways, and it does come down to a matter of style, which will resist strict definitions. But for the most part, if somebody comes to the table with a point and some questions about it, I'm much more likely to want to interact with them than with somebody who comes to the table wanting to prove to me me that they have a point.

This tendency toward encouraging discussion rather than debate, which I'm nurturing in myself and which I see as partly arising from the futility of arguing in ways that men are socialized to argue, may, in fact be frustrating for a lot of other feminists. It may come off as if I'm not speaking with the courage of my feminist convictions, that I don't care enough to really stand up for my feminist beliefs. And implicit in my coming off that way is the judgment that I'm blind to my privilege, that I don't recognize that I can, as a feminist man, choose to speak with conviction or not--whereas feminist men don't have as much of a choice in the matter. (Of course, being able to choose to not debate, but rather to discuss, may be another reflection of being an Armchair Feminist--feminist men have the luxury of discussion, whereas feminist women feel a more pressing need to change the minds of others more forcefully.)

And I agree that this is a problem. But to me (so far), it's more of a problem that, unchecked, men tend to talk about everything (including feminism) as if it's some sort of pissing contest--and I'm willing to (for now) be seen as wishy-washy (a bit) in my feminist convictions in order to not buy into the pissing contest mentality. There are plenty of other feminists (of all genders) who are willing to put forth their ideas in a more straightforward way (*waves to Dave*!)--and indeed, female feminists can utilize the debate approach without some of the baggage that I think male feminists automatically bring to the table (i.e. traditional male masculinity). There is room within feminism(s) for all of us to change some minds, using various methods. (This too, of course, can be seen as a result of my male privilege--one might suggest that I can take the 'many methods' approach because I don't as readily see the dire need for change.)

Where I Make My Stands
There are places where I'm not as flexible regarding my convictions, where things play out more definitively. I vote for candidates, as often as I can, who vote along the lines of my feminist ideals. I call out sexism at work, and out on the street. I wear the label of feminist (although I don't make an issue of it if I'm in a space where such a label on a man isn't very welcome). I call out sexism in my personal life (and in myself). I interact with other men as a feminist. And it may be the case that, as I learn to better navigate feminist spaces, I begin to once again push my feminist ideals more forcefully, especially now that it's been pointed out to me that at least some other feminists think that I ought to.

More later.