debitage

18.5.07

A Non-Falwell Obit

Whenever I had to answer one of those "who would you like to meet" questions, I always said "Gilbert White or Mary Douglas." Alas, it was not to be -- White passed away earlier this year, and Douglas died yesterday.

Stentor Danielson, 19:37, |

17.5.07

Kiosk Update

I haven't updated the Kiosk in a long time, but Chris Clarke has reminded me of another pet peeve: when people parody vegetarians and vegans by talking about how it's wrong to kill plants for food. It's not that I'm offended, or that I mistakenly think they're offering some kind of philosophical argument. Rather, it's that people usually do it as if it's some exceedingly clever idea, when in reality it's so painfully cliched.

Stentor Danielson, 23:28, |

Merger Mania

I'm linking to this update on the New Jersey fires, out of all of the ones available, because it comes from the "Journal Gazette Times-Courier" of Mattoon and Charleston, IL.

Stentor Danielson, 23:10, |

16.5.07

Jersey Burning

Just days after I got my last survey responses back, a big wildfire broke out in New Jersey. Thank you to the fire gods for holding off until after I finished my data collection.

Stentor Danielson, 21:21, |

14.5.07

Why The FGC Post Is Obligatory

Dora has a good post summarizing the problems with how many feminists talk about female genital cutting in ways the reinforce racism. The basic principle of progressive politics, as I see it, is that everyone should have a say in anything that affects them. This entails a right to control over one's own body, and therefore Dora is right to conclude:

there is always the option to support the women who are helping themselves.

In seeking the causes of the paternalistic and othering strain of feminist thought about FGC, she correctly points to the racial and imperialist assumptions of white first-world people. But I think a share of the blame can also be laid on anti-feminists, in recognition of the fact that any discourse is in part shaped by reaction to its opponents.

One of the most common charges made by conservatives against any type of leftist thinking is "moral relativism." Leftism by its nature advocates change from the well-known way of doing things, and tries to avoid privileging a single way of life, making it vulnerable to being portrayed as "anything goes." On the other hand, almost nobody -- even on the left -- is actually a moral relativist.

One common way that conservatives try to exploit the seeming tension between the left's commitment to diversity and its inability to accept relativism is to pose the dilemma of FGC. FGC makes a very appealing case for conservatives who want to force leftists to defensively denounce relativism, because the combination of body modification and sex makes the practice particularly viscerally horrifying to Westerners.

The FGC dilemma puts the left on the defensive, and the "stop it or allow it" choice makes it difficult to bring out the non-paternalist and non-relativist solution described above. The prominence of this dilemma leads leftists to spend lots of time dealing with this issue, either reactively or preemptively. Indeed, Dora even titles her post "The Obligatory FGC Post."

Stentor Danielson, 11:42, |

Benedict the Conquistador

It's common to talk about how social conservatives wish we could go back to the 1950s (or rather, a false santitized version thereof). But the Pope has decided to up the ante -- he's pining for the 1550s (via Echidne):

Indigenous peoples welcomed the arrival of European priests as they were "silently longing" for the Christian faith, and embracing it purified them, the Pope said in the last major speech of his trip before leaving Brazil on Sunday night.

Many Indian groups believe the conquest brought them enslavement and genocide.

The actions of the conquistadores (and similar coercive missionizing by Protestant groups) are one of the greatest stains on the history of the Church. The Pope should be on his knees begging for forgiveness from the people of Latin America (and Jesus). Instead he's on his balcony proclaiming that they secretly liked it when their people and their culture are destroyed.

Note too how Reuters enables the Pope's bigotry -- "many Indian groups believe" that being conquered led to bad stuff. In the real world, it's a basic historical fact that the Indians were enslaved. It's a basic historical fact that entire tribes were wiped out. The reason only "many Indian groups believe" these historical facts is because people like Reuters' craven reporters won't admit when there's a fact behind the claims.

Stentor Danielson, 11:18, |

13.5.07

Progressive Privilege

Chris Clarke recently had a very good post about the troubled relationship between environmentalism and feminism. Specifically, he pointed out that many of the lifestyle changes advocated by environmentalists, such as giving up energy-intensive modern conveniences, entail an increase in the sort of domestic work that has traditionally been assigned to women. Thus, pursuing environmentalism without attention to feminism will increase women's oppression.

The main blame for such counter-progressive impacts must, of course, rest on male privilege. Men who advocate environmentalist lifestyles can conveniently forget how their programs depend on exploiting women's labor. But in reflecting on my own "oh yeah, I hadn't thought of that before" reaction, it occurred to me that there was another form of privilege at work -- progressive privilege. Progressive privilege consists in a failure to recognize how things that you advocate will play out for other people due to a mistaken assumption that the world is more progressive in other respects.

Take the case of environmentalist eating habits. My wife and I are (lax) vegetarians and members of a CSA, among other lifestyle changes advocated by environmentalists. Clarke's post highlights how these practices, done in a context of a traditional gender division of labor, can increase women's oppression. However, I would venture to say that my household has a comparatively progressive division of labor. With respect to food issues, I do all of the meal planning and cooking, a good majority of the cleaning, and at least half of the grocery shopping (including picking up our CSA vegetables). Because I'm most familiar with how eco-friendly eating works in my own gender-progressive environment, it's easy to forget how it would play out for other people.

Polyamory/polygamy is another example. When I think about people with multiple partners, what springs to mind for me are several friends (all women) who have/had multiple partners in the northeast/west coast liberal fashion associated with the term "polyamory." In that context, loosening the norm of monogamy is not in conflict with feminism -- indeed, it arguably supports and extends feminism. But of course the environments in which my friends practice polyamory are unusually progressive. It's easy for me to lose sight of the fact that in most of the country, the prevailing unfeminist norms mean that polyamory would become fundamentalist-Mormon-style polygamy, which is oppressive toward women.

This is not to say that advocating eco-friendly eating or acceptance of polyamory is wrong. Indeed, progressive privilege is rooted in the fact that these things are not detrimental to the feminist cause when practiced in conjunction with feminism. The point is that progressive successes can make us lax about remembering the importance of pursuing progressivism as an interconnected whole rather than as a set of separate issues.

Stentor Danielson, 14:08, |