See, i don't fully agree with some of the things the article says. In particular with calling "Feminism" a "hobby" (unless they mean Ishida thinks it's a hobby). Pre and Post feminism Sinfest are complete opposite? no shit sherlock. it's almost like a 15 years-long webcomic would change overtime! The use of the "Why shouldn't I hate my oppressor?", for example, is actually a decent comic. But then you have stuff like "pornography is evil" or Ishida mocking third-wave feminism or the whole "The Patriarchy is The Matrix" which feels like a parody of feminism to me.
I think the Patriachy is the Matrix is a metaphor for how some people see 'the patriarchy'. It's not a subversive force out to hurt women, it's baked into the 'source code' that people don't even see unless they've learned to look for it (and put on their 'special filters').
It's basically a fancy metaphor for how it's so ingrained into our culture in invisible and pervasive ways that it's almost like it's this hidden thing until you start to critically think about it, and then you start seeing examples everywhere.
Because it actually has a point: the anger of the oppressed is never the same as the hatred of the oppressor. the idea of "anger" as something wrong that you should NOT have, even though it is an anger born out of injustice, is usually spouted by those already on the privileged position. I could go a long post about how the different ways in which oppressed people being angry for being oppressed is treated as a "bad" thing (or how any instance of minorities complaining inherently is them being "angry" for no reason). but i will try to simplify it.
take "Fox News" demonizing black riots and saying MLK would NEVER support such behaviour... except MLK did, he said "riots are the language of the unheard". And, despite people claiming that Riots "only damage the cause", they actually move them forward a lot of the time. like police officers having to wear body cam.
I also like it because it does let Pig ask questions, get answers and actually sit down and consider things.
While you do have a good point about the anger of the oppressed, I think that gender oppression is not quite the same as racial oppression, because it's all mixed up. Females are born and raised amongst males and, if they have children, have 50% chances of giving birth to and raising males.
Why shouldn't women hate men? Because if they do, they'll hate their fathers, brothers, sons. Even if you (general you) as a woman choose to never have any male friends (and there is just no way that refusing to form bonds with 50% of humanity won't massively fuck up your career and general living conditions), even if you are a lesbian or just choose never to get married to a man, chances are very high that you'll be close to men anyway because of blood relations.
It's just not practical for a woman to hate men. It's like drinking poison and hoping the other person dies.
Plus, it dismisses that fact that individuals are not necessarily representative of their group. If Jon Stewart and Sarah Palin got in an argument about women's rights, would you root for Palin?
Yeah but that's not what women mean when we say "I hate men". Like, ever.
It's a metonym. When someone says, "I hate men", they're not saying "I individually despise every single man on the planet". They're using a shorthand. They might be saying that they hate men who disregard and belittle and discomfort and hurt and abuse women (and so on). They might be saying that they hate the society and institutions and power structures that privilege men over women. But it's a mouthful to say that, and when you're angry and hurt and exhausted with the enormity of all the sexist bullshit in the world, it's easier to boil it down to "I hate men".
And when a man inserts himself into that conversation to say, "Whoa, hold on just a minute, you can't be saying you hate [i]every man in the world[/i], NOT ALL MEN are that bad" -- he's derailing the discussion. He's making it about himself and his feelings (but you don't hate me, do you? you know I'm not like that?) and taking the focus away from the woman's experiences.
Yeah but that's not what women mean when we say "I hate men". Like, ever.
I used to think that too, but Tumblr changed my mind. 99,9% of women use it as a shorthand out of exhaustion and don't really mean it, but there is a tiny minority that is actually completely serious >_>
Though I agree that, given it's a super micro tiny minority, mentioning it in normal discussions is derailing. I just talked about it here because the question was outright asked.
On the one hand, I can fully understand that nine-point-nine times out of ten it's just a metonym, that the majority of women don't mean it in a literal sense (although like janegrey notes, there is arguably a [sub]minority that do), that it's far quicker and easier to vent in one short phrase rather than listing out all the specific complaints against men and patriarchy you might possibly have, and that taking it too literally is often an attempt at derailing the argument and shouting down the woman.
On the other hand, though, looking at it purely as a rhetorical device, it is one that almost seems to invite that kind of abuse. I mean, purely as statements go, "I hate men" on the surface seems pretty simple and unambiguous, and is (apparently) hard to misinterpret. Particularly when its used in a context like this where the character/author (apparently) does mean it literally. So yeah, nine-point-nine times out of ten anyone who thinks the woman using it means it literally is just being an asshole, but as a rhetorical device IMHO it doesn't seem the most helpful in avoiding or preventing that kind of asshole to begin with,
True, there are contexts where it's not necessarily the most helpful thing to say. And in the case of that particular comic strip, it's just wince-worthy. Ishida's feminism is frequently over-simplistic (not to mention deeply flawed with the sex-shaming, anti-porn, demonising of sex work and other shitty things), and while he can sometimes make an incisive point, more often he's just disingenuous. The "why shouldn't I hate my oppressor?" strip skirts around some relevant issues ("why do you hate men?" as a derailing device, for instance), but in execution it just... doesn't really work.
Note that the character never says that they hate men. She's beating up a dummy clearly labeled 'misogynist', and the pig wanders up and asks her why she hates men. There's obviously a leap of logic here. But instead of trying to engage him sincerely, she escalates even further and goes 'why shouldn't I hate my oppressor?' And he doesn't have a response to that and is baffled.
This is what I don't like about Sinfest, is that all the characters talk in hyperbolic catchphrases to each other, so it's impossible to tell if you're supposed to legitimately agree with them or to laugh at how absurd they sound.
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scans_daily2016-03-11 09:33 pm
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The use of the "Why shouldn't I hate my oppressor?", for example, is actually a decent comic.
But then you have stuff like "pornography is evil" or Ishida mocking third-wave feminism or the whole "The Patriarchy is The Matrix" which feels like a parody of feminism to me.
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It's basically a fancy metaphor for how it's so ingrained into our culture in invisible and pervasive ways that it's almost like it's this hidden thing until you start to critically think about it, and then you start seeing examples everywhere.
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Why do you like the "Why shouldn't I hate my oppressor?" strip? Honestly curious, I don't understand it at all.
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take "Fox News" demonizing black riots and saying MLK would NEVER support such behaviour... except MLK did, he said "riots are the language of the unheard". And, despite people claiming that Riots "only damage the cause", they actually move them forward a lot of the time. like police officers having to wear body cam.
I also like it because it does let Pig ask questions, get answers and actually sit down and consider things.
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Why shouldn't women hate men? Because if they do, they'll hate their fathers, brothers, sons. Even if you (general you) as a woman choose to never have any male friends (and there is just no way that refusing to form bonds with 50% of humanity won't massively fuck up your career and general living conditions), even if you are a lesbian or just choose never to get married to a man, chances are very high that you'll be close to men anyway because of blood relations.
It's just not practical for a woman to hate men. It's like drinking poison and hoping the other person dies.
Plus, it dismisses that fact that individuals are not necessarily representative of their group. If Jon Stewart and Sarah Palin got in an argument about women's rights, would you root for Palin?
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It's a metonym. When someone says, "I hate men", they're not saying "I individually despise every single man on the planet". They're using a shorthand. They might be saying that they hate men who disregard and belittle and discomfort and hurt and abuse women (and so on). They might be saying that they hate the society and institutions and power structures that privilege men over women. But it's a mouthful to say that, and when you're angry and hurt and exhausted with the enormity of all the sexist bullshit in the world, it's easier to boil it down to "I hate men".
And when a man inserts himself into that conversation to say, "Whoa, hold on just a minute, you can't be saying you hate [i]every man in the world[/i], NOT ALL MEN are that bad" -- he's derailing the discussion. He's making it about himself and his feelings (but you don't hate me, do you? you know I'm not like that?) and taking the focus away from the woman's experiences.
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I used to think that too, but Tumblr changed my mind. 99,9% of women use it as a shorthand out of exhaustion and don't really mean it, but there is a tiny minority that is actually completely serious >_>
Though I agree that, given it's a super micro tiny minority, mentioning it in normal discussions is derailing. I just talked about it here because the question was outright asked.
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On the other hand, though, looking at it purely as a rhetorical device, it is one that almost seems to invite that kind of abuse. I mean, purely as statements go, "I hate men" on the surface seems pretty simple and unambiguous, and is (apparently) hard to misinterpret. Particularly when its used in a context like this where the character/author (apparently) does mean it literally. So yeah, nine-point-nine times out of ten anyone who thinks the woman using it means it literally is just being an asshole, but as a rhetorical device IMHO it doesn't seem the most helpful in avoiding or preventing that kind of asshole to begin with,
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This is what I don't like about Sinfest, is that all the characters talk in hyperbolic catchphrases to each other, so it's impossible to tell if you're supposed to legitimately agree with them or to laugh at how absurd they sound.
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