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Nov. 2nd, 2010 06:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nnyThere's a tweet going around twitter at the moment: RT if you want Stephen Fry to come back to twitter.
For those not in the know, Stephen Fry came out with some quite ridiculously ignorant misogynist comments and then blew them off as 'humorous' and 'misquoted' before dramatically flouncing off twitter when people took him to task over it. Not the best way of dealing with things.
The problem with being Stephen Fry, of course, is that he's white and male and rich and educated, plus a well-loved celebrity to boot; he's also gay, and in that respect hasn't had it as easy as many, but the intersection of all those privileges in all likelihood means that he's really not used to being told he's wrong, very often. He rather makes a career out of not being so. So I understand that hundreds if not thousands if not millions of tweets suddenly pointing out that he'd made a bit of a tit of himself might have been rather jarring, but the way that he dealt with it was graceless.
So yeah, what probably started off as a helpful note that his shoe was untied turned quickly into mockery and disappointment and possibly even anger that he'd never learned to tie his shoes properly, but that's the internet for you. When he fell publicly on his face and then got angry and blotchy and huffed off... well. Frankly he's nothing to do with me. I'd give him a brusque dusting off, certainly, but I'm not kissing it better and no way am I begging him to come back and play.
For those not in the know, Stephen Fry came out with some quite ridiculously ignorant misogynist comments and then blew them off as 'humorous' and 'misquoted' before dramatically flouncing off twitter when people took him to task over it. Not the best way of dealing with things.
The problem with being Stephen Fry, of course, is that he's white and male and rich and educated, plus a well-loved celebrity to boot; he's also gay, and in that respect hasn't had it as easy as many, but the intersection of all those privileges in all likelihood means that he's really not used to being told he's wrong, very often. He rather makes a career out of not being so. So I understand that hundreds if not thousands if not millions of tweets suddenly pointing out that he'd made a bit of a tit of himself might have been rather jarring, but the way that he dealt with it was graceless.
So yeah, what probably started off as a helpful note that his shoe was untied turned quickly into mockery and disappointment and possibly even anger that he'd never learned to tie his shoes properly, but that's the internet for you. When he fell publicly on his face and then got angry and blotchy and huffed off... well. Frankly he's nothing to do with me. I'd give him a brusque dusting off, certainly, but I'm not kissing it better and no way am I begging him to come back and play.
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Date: 2010-11-02 08:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-11-02 10:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-11-02 06:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-11-02 06:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-11-02 06:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-11-02 07:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-11-02 07:46 am (UTC)No, I am sorry, sfry, you are wrong this time. IT ISN'T THAT HARD TO JUST SAY "SORRY, I STUFFED UP, I'LL LEARN BETTER." You are a very intelligent man and I respect you a lot, but really. I mean, really.
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Date: 2010-11-02 10:34 am (UTC)Not that I feel any great kinship for, or interest in, celebrities who say stupid things which find their way into print, but I'd like to suggest using an individual's race/sex/sexuality/socioeconomic background as a credible explanation for their behaviour is almost always a bad idea.
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Date: 2010-11-02 12:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-11-02 01:26 pm (UTC)Was anyone saying his being gay was a causal explanation for saying weird, ignorant things about female sexuality?
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Date: 2010-11-02 01:29 pm (UTC)I was referring to the claim that his being white, male, rich, educated and famous was the cause of him going off in a sullen strop
the fact that these things in combination have led to him not being told he's wrong very often, which may well be the cause of him having a huff and storming off when people call him up on saying something stupid and offensive. they're not a direct cause but I think it'd be stupid to discount them as a contributing cause.
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Date: 2010-11-02 01:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-11-02 01:54 pm (UTC)Is there any obnoxious behaviour you would feel happy as being attributed to "being female"? Or "being black" or "being gay" or "being short"?
Sure. "Being female in a society that prizes men more highly" will lead to some obnoxious female behaviour, just as "being male in a society that prizes men more highly" will lead to obnoxious male behaviour.
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Date: 2010-11-02 02:46 pm (UTC)For example, if I were to say something dumbtarded about trans* folk and someone said, "she's used to not being told she's wrong about gender because she's cis*", they'd be right. They wouldn't be sayig, "hey, everyone who is cis* is automatically wrong about trans* people", just that things have been weighted in my favour because I'm on the team that's got the power.
I appreciate that. But what they would be saying is that if you weren't cis* you would be used to being told you were wrong about gender. That's what "x causes y" means. Without x, y doesn't happen. The extended suggestion is that if Stephen Fry were some different enthographic makeup, he wouldn't have had his strop, which I simply don't think is a justifiable claim.
Sure. "Being female in a society that prizes men more highly" will lead to some obnoxious female behaviour, just as "being male in a society that prizes men more highly" will lead to obnoxious male behaviour.
With respect, that wasn't what I asked. Can you name a specific obnoxious behaviour which you would be happy described as being carried out by someone "because she's female"? Could you honestly provide that as an explanation for someone's behavour and not think it's at least a little bit wrong?
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Date: 2010-11-02 02:56 pm (UTC)If you want to take the argument to the absurd conclusion, you can, but it doesn't have much basis in what I'm saying; I think "fame" probably has the most to do with his strop, but that his background has led to him not being corrected much and therefore that has also contributed to his strop. The weather, his blood sugar levels, and whether or not he had a hangover could equally well have contributed to it.
With respect, that wasn't what I asked.
Yes, but what you asked had nothing to do with our conversation. You were asking about innately female, innately black, innately "short" behaviours under the impression that I was saying that Fry was being innately male; the fact that I know buttloads of men of every sexual orientation who don't make such stupid remarks about women's sexuality would suggest that the behaviour isn't something inherent to "being male"; and I really don't think you can have "behaviour that's male in isolation to society" - if that's what you're asking - because there's no real way to have normal human behaviour without the society of the human being factored in. We're social animals! Everything around us affects the way we think.
Can you name a specific obnoxious behaviour which you would be happy described as being carried out by someone "because she's female"?
YMMV as to what counts as obnoxious.
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Date: 2010-11-02 03:30 pm (UTC)In what way is that taking it to an absurd conclusion? That's what it means to say one thing caused another. If that isn't what the statement is saying, it's a meaningless statement.
but it doesn't have much basis in what I'm saying;
In fairness, you're the one responding to me, and the "absurd conclusion" is basically my beef with the whole thing, so it's probably fairer to say that what you're saying doesn't have much basis in what I'm saying. :-P
I think "fame" probably has the most to do with his strop, but that his background has led to him not being corrected much and therefore that has also contributed to his strop. The weather, his blood sugar levels, and whether or not he had a hangover could equally well have contributed to it.
So why draw a big circle around his white rich educated maleness? Why promote it over all the credible situational suggestions? What makes it special?
Yes, but what you asked had nothing to do with our conversation.
Au contraire. Here (http://villainny.livejournal.com/1593414.html?thread=12079942#t12079942) you say 'I'd say that "being male" may have been the cause of them', referring to Stephen Fry's stupid statements. You were happy to use it as an explanation in that case. I wanted to know if you'd be happy to swap "male" out for some other group and still use it as an explanation.
(I'd quite like to start a meta-conversation at this point, to check that neither of us are feeling unduly antagonised or anything. Sometimes these are more interesting than the conversations themselves. I am at this point pretty sure we're having two mostly different arguments that occasionally intersect. What do you actually think we're disagreeing about?)
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Date: 2010-11-02 03:33 pm (UTC)voila (http://apiphile.tumblr.com/post/1427138091/plain-english-guide-1-privilege)!
I wanted to know if you'd be happy to swap "male" out for some other group and still use it as an explanation.
No, for the reasons above.
What do you actually think we're disagreeing about?
I think you're conflating privilege and prejudice, and I'm trying (albeit badly because about 70% of my attention is on NaNo right now) to separate the two without turning into a Feminist Stompbeast, because that helps absolutely no one. Admittedly, I am probably not making a lot of sense.
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Date: 2010-11-02 04:33 pm (UTC)I'm not entirely sure what we're disagreeing about, to be honest. Possibly "the concept of privilege doesn't supersede logic or language or reality"? I believe we try to find causes for events to (a) explain them, and (b) gain predictive power over similar future events. (a) is nice, but (b) is genuinely useful.
Taking "people saying stupid things about female sexuality" as an example, anything can explain this. I could say it's caused by invisible moon creatures and this still fulfils (a), but it doesn't let me predict future cases of people saying stupid things about female sexuality. Until I can predict it, I don't know if the causal link exists, and until I can establish that causal link, I can't do anything about people saying stupid things about female sexuality.
To do that, "X causes Y" needs to mean that "no X means no Y". If I let "Tesco causes Y" through because I think Tesco is an incredibly important social issue, it doesn't work.
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Date: 2010-11-02 05:24 pm (UTC)I will say though that my point was not that white/rich/male/gay was the factor that caused the flounce, but that white/rich/male means that he is most likely less used to being told he is wrong than other groups may be, which may have contributed to his flounce.
I am a teacher, for the record, with a degree in English Language studies; this means that I have studied research in which it has been shown to be statistically less likely for teachers to tell male students they are wrong, or at least it certainly was the case a few years ago. Other research on the language side of things shows a significant difference between the speech of females and males, or the expectation thereof. Female speech tends to include more hedging and less decisive statements, more back channeling and support (nodding, agreeing noises etc.) Female speech has been shown to include far less in the way of direct disagreement, so possibly what I should have said was not that he has likely not been told he's wrong, but that it's far less likely that he's been told he's wrong by women. I genuinely think here that the factor of his maleness, then, could have a considerable affect on the resulting behaviour, and if I was more up on my classism and racism I could probably cite various things that'd support my argument there too.
Frankly, though, I have to do lesson planning for tomorrow. ;)
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Date: 2010-11-02 06:49 pm (UTC)If we're honest, I don't think any of us can say we don't have better things we could be doing.
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Date: 2010-11-02 10:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-11-02 12:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-11-02 03:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-11-02 04:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-11-03 12:17 am (UTC)I would quite like him to come back to Twitter - he's often entertaining - but my God, he needs to learn how to cope with being told he's wrong.Surely he has spent enough time on the internet by now to know how inevitably badly throwing a strop and flouncing always ends.
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Date: 2010-11-04 01:30 pm (UTC)