The NationStates Feminist Thread III

[Liriena]

Do you think Oprah is from the third world? That is the west supporting the education of girls in the third world, it is people volunteering their resources to aid girl's education.

That's...not what I meant. I guess I should have worded it better. People like Oprah have tons of money, but she's a celebrity and she has more money than most people in the United States. What I was trying to say that we, the normal Westerners, who hope for a better future for all girls, should support the girls in third-world countries, and we can't just leave it up to celebrities to do so. Which means yes, volunteering resources to help young girls is awesome. And we should be doing more of it, and helping girls in the third-world should be a more mainstream part of feminism.

The problem comes with how exactly you choose to support these women, and with whose help. Private charity led by billionaires is its own can of philosophical and practical worms, since there is an argument to be made that the function of private charity by people like Oprah is less to create a definitive, practical, long-term solution to a given issue, and more to wash their own hands, to disavow themselves of their responsibility as part of the overarching socioeconomic and cultural systems that help create these dire circumstances.

So... yeah, normal people in our regions can and should support progress elsewhere, but "charity" probably ain't gonna cut it. Rather, your best bet might be just giving people in the "third world" the political and economic tools to create their own path forward on their own terms.

[Mardla]

That's...not what I meant. I guess I should have worded it better. People like Oprah have tons of money, but she's a celebrity and she has more money than most people in the United States. What I was trying to say that we, the normal Westerners, who hope for a better future for all girls, should support the girls in third-world countries, and we can't just leave it up to celebrities to do so. Which means yes, volunteering resources to help young girls is awesome. And we should be doing more of it, and helping girls in the third-world should be a more mainstream part of feminism.

The problem comes with how exactly you choose to support these women, and with whose help. Private charity led by billionaires is its own can of philosophical and practical worms, since there is an argument to be made that the function of private charity by people like Oprah is less to create a definitive, practical, long-term solution to a given issue, and more to wash their own hands, to disavow themselves of their responsibility as part of the overarching socioeconomic and cultural systems that help create these dire circumstances.

So... yeah, normal people in our regions can and should support progress elsewhere, but "charity" probably ain't gonna cut it. Rather, your best bet might be just giving people in the "third world" the political and economic tools to create their own path forward on their own terms.

That will probably only happen as a way to expand the international market, ultimately to benefit American investors.

[Galloism]

Like all things, I'm sure it can be debated to death, but University of Missouri (US) and University of Essex (UK) designed a new Basic Index of Gender Inequality (BIGI) to measure the inequality between men and women to determine where men and women are the most equal and unequal. They measure three things - educational opportunities, healthy life expectancy and overall life satisfaction.



https://munews.missouri.edu/news-releas ... ell-being/

And the actual study for your perusal:

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/artic ... ne.0205349

Kudos to the researchers. This is good stuff.

Being somewhat critical by nature, I will say I find the metric of overall life satisfaction to be... unreliable.

People have a tendency to regress towards their own outlook, regardless of what their real life situation is. People who are clearly privileged (I.E., billionaires) are often less satisfied than those who are upper middle class, because of their own predispositions towards satisfaction or lack.

I mean, it's an important metric for lots of reasons (quantity of life and quality of life are possibly the only thing that truly matter to basically all people), but I'm not convinced it's a particularly reliable metric overall.

That's my complaint on this study.

Still, it's a lot better than most. The Global Gender Gap index quite literally says that women need to have a 6% longer lifespan than men, at least, or it's discrimination against women. Women having a lifespan anything less than 106% of men is considered discrimination against women. 106% or more is considered equality.

[Liriena]

Kudos to the researchers. This is good stuff.

Being somewhat critical by nature, I will say I find the metric of overall life satisfaction to be... unreliable.

People have a tendency to regress towards their own outlook, regardless of what their real life situation is. People who are clearly privileged (I.E., billionaires) are often less satisfied than those who are upper middle class, because of their own predispositions towards satisfaction or lack.

I mean, it's an important metric for lots of reasons (quantity of life and quality of life are possibly the only thing that truly matter to basically all people), but I'm not convinced it's a particularly reliable metric overall.

That's my complaint on this study.

I agree. I was actually trying to think of how to bring it up, but one thing that concerns me is that it seems like a lot of research along these lines doesn't really talk much about differences between socioeconomic classes when it comes to gender-related issues. I mean, it'd be nice to have more research that's focused on, for example, how poor men and women are doing on various gender-related metrics.

[Galloism]

Being somewhat critical by nature, I will say I find the metric of overall life satisfaction to be... unreliable.

People have a tendency to regress towards their own outlook, regardless of what their real life situation is. People who are clearly privileged (I.E., billionaires) are often less satisfied than those who are upper middle class, because of their own predispositions towards satisfaction or lack.

I mean, it's an important metric for lots of reasons (quantity of life and quality of life are possibly the only thing that truly matter to basically all people), but I'm not convinced it's a particularly reliable metric overall.

That's my complaint on this study.

I agree. I was actually trying to think of how to bring it up, but one thing that concerns me is that it seems like a lot of research along these lines doesn't really talk much about differences between socioeconomic classes when it comes to gender-related issues. I mean, it'd be nice to have more research that's focused on, for example, how poor men and women are doing on various gender-related metrics.

Yeah, there’s a lot of things amongst the poor particularly that disproportionately affect men (homelessness, crime victimization, incarceration, suicide - to start with). Both privilege and oppression seems to be disproportionately concentrated among men - based largely on class.

[The Xenopolis Confederation]

That's pretty true.

My boss lived there several years and she loved it. Although my boss has a very old-fashioned persprctive on criminal justice, that seemed to be what impressed her the most

What perspective is that exactly?

[Mardla]

My boss lived there several years and she loved it. Although my boss has a very old-fashioned persprctive on criminal justice, that seemed to be what impressed her the most

What perspective is that exactly?

A few miles to the right of mine. She's incredibly compassionate though

[The Xenopolis Confederation]

What perspective is that exactly?

A few miles to the right of mine. She's incredibly compassionate though

Doesn't sound so compassionate to people accused of a crime.

[Ostroeuropa]

Over half of judges under 40 are Women in the UK, ranging from 51% to 64% dependent on their field.
https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/upl ... 2016-2.pdf

Of judges under 50, they compose around 45%.

It's only when you reach 60 years and up that the number plummets, down to just north of 30%. This distorts the statistics significantly.

This kind of pattern is fairly common now and it seems to undermine the notion that feminism is an equality movement frankly. In generational terms, we can see that all they have achieved is reversing the older pattern (Which, say it with me, if the old one was misogynist that makes this one what exactly?), but this is masked by beneficiaries of that older pattern not being dead yet. To go from producing 70% Male Judges to producing 64% Female Judges is not equality. In terms of society and its environment, its impact on people and the lives they lead, it's clear we've gone too far in this area. Again, this pattern commonly replicates. The obsession with "history" the feminist movement pushes to justify its misandry really is becoming more and more like protestant rhetoric against catholics, day by day.

It's also worth noting that younger judges are the ones driving reform, and the reforms they're driving are strikingly gynocentrist and anti-male, such as the "close womens prisons" movement.

[Mardla]

A few miles to the right of mine. She's incredibly compassionate though

Doesn't sound so compassionate to people accused of a crime.

She's just and protective and not a sentimentalist. I once found a mouse or rat stuck in a horse's feeder, and she told me to bop him with a nearby hammer (we sterilized the feeder of course); she's also gentler with all living creatures, even bugs and plants, than anyone I know, so long as she doesn't consider them threatening. This is her outlook in general.

[The Xenopolis Confederation]

Doesn't sound so compassionate to people accused of a crime.

She's just and protective and not a sentimentalist. I once found a mouse or rat stuck in a horse's feeder, and she told me to bop him with a nearby hammer (we sterilized the feeder of course); she's also gentler with all living creatures, even bugs and plants, than anyone I know, so long as she doesn't consider them threatening. This is her outlook in general.

I'm sure she's a wonderful person, but compassion and gentleness doesn't mean much unless it's extended to the people you find threatening or objectionable or evil. It's even in the bible you love so much, Matthew 5:43-48.

[Knask]

Over half of judges under 40 are Women in the UK, ranging from 51% to 64% dependent on their field.
https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/upl ... 2016-2.pdf

Judicial Diversity Statistics 2016

The percentage of female judges in courts increased from 25% in 2015 to 28% in 2016; in
tribunals it remained stable at 45%

It's a travesty! I mean, 28%, who can tolerate such numbers? Too many women are judges, we need to get them out!

[Mardla]

She's just and protective and not a sentimentalist. I once found a mouse or rat stuck in a horse's feeder, and she told me to bop him with a nearby hammer (we sterilized the feeder of course); she's also gentler with all living creatures, even bugs and plants, than anyone I know, so long as she doesn't consider them threatening. This is her outlook in general.

I'm sure she's a wonderful person, but compassion and gentleness doesn't mean much unless it's extended to the people you find threatening or objectionable or evil. It's even in the bible you love so much, Matthew 5:43-48.

She isn't a Christian. That's also about the personal enemy, not the enemy of the people.

[Des-Bal]

Over half of judges under 40 are Women in the UK, ranging from 51% to 64% dependent on their field.
https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/upl ... 2016-2.pdf

Judicial Diversity Statistics 2016

The percentage of female judges in courts increased from 25% in 2015 to 28% in 2016; in
tribunals it remained stable at 45%

It's a travesty! I mean, 28%, who can tolerate such numbers? Too many women are judges, we need to get them out!

Put another strawman on the board.

[Galloism]

Over half of judges under 40 are Women in the UK, ranging from 51% to 64% dependent on their field.
https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/upl ... 2016-2.pdf

Judicial Diversity Statistics 2016

The percentage of female judges in courts increased from 25% in 2015 to 28% in 2016; in
tribunals it remained stable at 45%

It's a travesty! I mean, 28%, who can tolerate such numbers? Too many women are judges, we need to get them out!

You don't understand generational effects, do you?

[Des-Bal]

You don't understand generational effects, do you?

Or aging apparently.

[Galloism]

You don't understand generational effects, do you?

Or aging apparently.

[Knask]

Judicial Diversity Statistics 2016

The percentage of female judges in courts increased from 25% in 2015 to 28% in 2016; in
tribunals it remained stable at 45%

It's a travesty! I mean, 28%, who can tolerate such numbers? Too many women are judges, we need to get them out!

You don't understand generational effects, do you?

Sure I do. In a generation there might be 50% female judges. As Ostro says, such results undermine the notion that feminism is an equality movement.

The best way to fix the gender inequality would have been to do nothing. Hiring many young women in order to reduce the percentage of male judges from 75% is just reverse sexism.

[Galloism]

You don't understand generational effects, do you?

Sure I do. In a generation there might be 50% female judges. As Ostro says, such results undermine the notion that feminism is an equality movement.

The best way to fix the gender inequality would have been to do nothing. Hiring many young women in order to reduce the percentage of male judges from 75% is just reverse sexism.

Well, if his numbers are accurate (I didn't really dig in), there will be 50% in half a generation (fine), and 60% in a full generation (probably not fine for the same reason 60% male judges is probably not fine). This is because of age effects.

If you want equality it takes time, but here's the deal: if you use inequality to push towards equality, you're going to overshoot the mark - chronically.

It's like in an airplane. When you are climbing towards an altitude, you typically climb at a very high rate. Depending on your aircraft's performance, you may climb anywhere from 500 feet per minute to 3000 feet per minute. However, as you close in on your altitude, you have to gradually reduce your rate of climb to smoothly capture the altitude. If you are still climbing at 3000ft per minute when you hit your assigned altitude and then try to level off, you'll overshoot and bust your clearance.

With age effects, it's even more dramatic, as you can't just stop people from living longer and continuing in their positions (well you can, but people tend to frown on it). So it will continue the trend whether you like it or not, which means your level off must be much earlier.

Besides that, there's a group vs individual effect. If you have, due to historical discrimination, 80% men in X and 20% women in X, and you enact discrimination to elevant 80% women to X and 20% men to X, what does it do to the people who are attempting to enter now? You're discriminating against them on the basis of gender based on historical discrimination the other way. This is not only unjust at the individual level, but creates a seesaw effect (if you're intellectually honest about discrimination, which society at large isn't - men have been discriminated against in education for decades and no one cares).

[The Xenopolis Confederation]

I'm sure she's a wonderful person, but compassion and gentleness doesn't mean much unless it's extended to the people you find threatening or objectionable or evil. It's even in the bible you love so much, Matthew 5:43-48.

She isn't a Christian. That's also about the personal enemy, not the enemy of the people.

I don't see the difference.

[Mardla]

She isn't a Christian. That's also about the personal enemy, not the enemy of the people.

I don't see the difference.

The enemy is not merely any competitor or just any partner of a conflict in general. He is also not the private adversary whom one hates. An enemy exists only when, at least potentially, one fighting collectivity of people confronts a similar collectivity. The enemy is solely the public enemy, because everything that has a relationship to such a collectivity of men, particularly to a whole nation, becomes public by virtue of such a relationship. The enemy is hostis, not inimicus in the broader sense; πολέμιος, not ἐχθρός. As German and other languages do not distinguish between the private and political enemy, many misconceptions and falsifications are possible. The often quoted “Love your enemies” (Matt. 5:44; Luke 6:27) reads “diligite inimicos vestros,” ἀγαπᾶτε τοὺς ἐχθροὺς ὑμῶν, and not diligite hostes vestros. No mention is made of the political enemy. Never in the thousand-year struggle between Christians and Moslems did it occur to a Christian to surrender rather than defend Europe out of love toward the Saracens or Turks. The enemy in the political sense need not be hated personally, and in the private sphere only does it make sense to love one’s enemy, i.e., one’s adversary. The Bible quotation touches the political antithesis even less than it intends to dissolve, for example, the antithesis of good and evil or beautiful and ugly. It certainly does not mean that one should love and support the enemies of one’s own people.

[The Xenopolis Confederation]

I don't see the difference.

The enemy is not merely any competitor or just any partner of a conflict in general. He is also not the private adversary whom one hates. An enemy exists only when, at least potentially, one fighting collectivity of people confronts a similar collectivity. The enemy is solely the public enemy, because everything that has a relationship to such a collectivity of men, particularly to a whole nation, becomes public by virtue of such a relationship. The enemy is hostis, not inimicus in the broader sense; πολέμιος, not ἐχθρός. As German and other languages do not distinguish between the private and political enemy, many misconceptions and falsifications are possible. The often quoted “Love your enemies” (Matt. 5:44; Luke 6:27) reads “diligite inimicos vestros,” ἀγαπᾶτε τοὺς ἐχθροὺς ὑμῶν, and not diligite hostes vestros. No mention is made of the political enemy. Never in the thousand-year struggle between Christians and Moslems did it occur to a Christian to surrender rather than defend Europe out of love toward the Saracens or Turks. The enemy in the political sense need not be hated personally, and in the private sphere only does it make sense to love one’s enemy, i.e., one’s adversary. The Bible quotation touches the political antithesis even less than it intends to dissolve, for example, the antithesis of good and evil or beautiful and ugly. It certainly does not mean that one should love and support the enemies of one’s own people.

That passage merely says that a "private enemy" and "public enemy" are different and should be treated differently, it does not explain why. Also, who wrote that passage? Was it you or someone else?

[Mardla]

That passage merely says that a "private enemy" and "public enemy" are different and should be treated differently, it does not explain why. Also, who wrote that passage? Was it you or someone else?

Carl Schmitt. It's in the work, The Concept of the Political, which explains why they should be treated differently.

[The Xenopolis Confederation]

That passage merely says that a "private enemy" and "public enemy" are different and should be treated differently, it does not explain why. Also, who wrote that passage? Was it you or someone else?

Carl Schmitt. It's in the work, The Concept of the Political, which explains why they should be treated differently.

Can you paraphrase it?

[Des-Bal]

Just had a conversation so I thought I'd throw this out there:

Campaigns directed at believing or supporting female victims of sexual crimes seek to grant more privilege to an already privileged group.

I find the idea of "privilege" reductive and somewhat dehumanizing but female victims of sex crimes, without question, are taken much more seriously than male victims. To frame the way victims are doubted, dismissed, or ignored as being the result of women not being taken seriously ignores the fact that they're being treated better than the only other point of comparison. If feminism is about advancing women towards equality with men then advocating for better treatment of female victims is entirely non-feminist.