“Stupid feminists…”

At much the same time, but aside from the whole fallout following the ‘ElevatorGate’ non-controversy, has been a curious little phenomena I’ve seen over the past few years on the Australian blogosphere/Twitterverse. It’s not something I’m going to generalise to the wider population – it’s more a case of who’s been saying it that makes it interesting.

It’s too far out to name names – to dredge up something say three years old, for what at best would be a shit-storm, but I’ll provide a few biographical details when and where it’s relevant.

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The phenomena; “…stupid feminists…”.

Taken at face value, logically, the phrase refers to feminists-who-are-stupid. You could, if this was as far as you wanted to go, write this off as another reference to stupid people among the whole range of walks of life; stupid lefties; stupid right-wingers; stupid arts students; stupid accountants; stupid brick layers and so on.

You could be forgiven for simply concluding that as a concession, the phrase implies the existence of feminists who aren’t stupid – I mean, why point out that a given feminist is, or a group are, stupid, if they’re all stupid?

I’d be lying if I said I thought every feminist I’d ever encountered was a genius, or honest, or sane. In fact, I find some of what I’ve come across that’s been passed off as serious, worthy of harsh parody. Luce Irigaray’s drivel about E=mc² being gendered (‘Sujet de la science, sujet sexué?’, 1987), and fluid dynamics being underprivileged on account of being feminine (‘The “mechanics” of fluids’, 1985), come to mind as being particularly bankrupt.

(I was once told, by someone trying to advance a particularly weird epistemological argument, that intellectual clarity was masculine because clear delineations resemble the sheer outline of an erect penis. This was served up to me, in all seriousness, as academically sound feminism.)

It’s not just amongst academic feminism – Laurie Penny, in line with a series of other criticisms by feminist authors, lambasts the recent writing of popular feminist Naomi Wolf for being particularly silly. I’m inclined to sympathise.

My subjective impression though, is that most of the feminists I’ve encountered are on average, smarter than average, truthful in as far as human nature allows, and perfectly sane. Ditto for the feminist literature I’ve read (I tend to find authors like Laurie Penny quite reasonable).

This is, I repeat, a subjective impression; I don’t have a statistically sound survey of feminist thought, and neither do the people using the mentioned phrase, “…stupid feminists”.

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Now back to the curious phrase…

Again, we could take the logic at face value, and it would at least be a charitable way of taking it out of context. But context matters.

During the last three years, in addition to the repetition of the phrase, I’ve witnessed a relatively high-profile Australian “Skeptic” swear off the night’s QandA on the ABC, on account of having had to have put up with too many “stupid feminists” at university. Incidentally, it was one of Leslie Cannold’s appearances on QandA that night, that got the fellow all riled up.

I’d liked to have asked two questions at the time, questions I think it’s worth revisiting now, albeit with less heat.

What proportion of “stupid feminists” at university warrants being considered intolerable, such that a reasonable person would avoid future contact where possible?

And…

What exactly was the fellow’s objection to Leslie Cannold, and his familiarity with “stupid feminists”, such that he could dismiss her in advance? (Put another way – “how is his data predictive?”)

Answering the former, if you were being charitable, you could suggest was due to a generally low tolerance to stupidity – he’s just sensitive.

But the “Skeptic” in question engages with creationists on a semi-regular basis, all without affording them relief from a single drop of his vitriol. Even if you assume he’s right about “stupid feminists”, why can’t he engage with his feminist opponents equally?

A low tolerance to stupidity clearly isn’t the answer.

As for the second question… an honest “Skeptic” should be able to point out the error in attributing such significance to subjective impressions. Surely as a “Skeptic”, he’d seek an opportunity to be proven wrong?

Bloviation and a beard does not a rationalist make.

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Leslie Cannold seems to have a knack for bringing this out in some of the guys. This is especially the case Twitter, and it’s a kind of response that’s always another disincentive to using the technology.

I can recall in 2010, one chap who will also go unnamed, placing scare-quotes around “ethicist” and going on to call Cannold a “cunt” (as a supposedly more apt job description). This apparently in response to this article at Crikey.

At no point did he actually address the substance of the article. Rather he simply treated the conclusion as if it was self-evidently wrong, and proceeded to engage in sanctimony.

“So what?” you may ask. It’s Twitter after all!

I’ll tell you what.

The guy in question was (and I think still is) a respected tech-writer, who’s been published at the ABC, and has in fact had more articles published at Crikey than Cannold. He’s also often re-tweeted by a clique of journos from the ABC – a crowd he is in with in the material world.

He’s not exactly a nobody. (He’s also not an ethicist.)

And back on topic, he does seem to float in the same wonkish circles I’m reading this “stupid feminists” meme in. Albeit, with a little more standing than most.

While I haven’t seen him deploy the phrase himself, instances of it do seem to be captured in his orbit like space junk around a suitably massive object.

There’s something to be said about a sub-culture where a semi-prominent journalist can slag off like this at another media figure, without much in the way of a response. This is the culture I’m seeing the phrase deployed in.

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“…Stupid feminists…” has been doing the rounds of wonk circles for a while now; “Stupid feminist…” doesn’t understand X. “Stupid feminist…” called me a misogynist just for criticising her ideas. “Stupid feminist…” etc.

No, the phrase itself, in isolation, doesn’t logically connote a sexist generalism, but there’s always something iffy about the context. It’s never just a criticism of a feminist’s argument, if you’re also calling them stupid.

And it seems a rarity that anyone wants to discuss the points of contention at length, in essay form, or even as a blog post –  even if they’re willing to call someone else stupid on account of their disagreement.

You know who else doesn’t understand the points of contention? People who can’t articulate the points of contention, that’s who.

Sure, there’s the complexity-stifling aspect of Twitter. It’s never a good forum for a detailed discussion. But these wonks having trouble with “stupid feminists” often either contribute to popular blogs, or have the option of articulating themselves via the established media.

They express their vex so strongly. Surely if it’s all that important, they could go to the lengths to spell it out in detail?

“X accuses people of misogyny with as much discretion as people throwing rice at weddings.”

We’ve all heard the story about the boy who cried wolf. Nobody’s going to balk at someone crying “Naomi Wolf”  if it’s a fair cop, save perhaps the occasional, random troll.

I find some people’s actions in all of this, to be at odds with their expressed or apparent motives.

~ Bruce