oneil@zeus.unomaha.edu (Truth or Dare?) (06/04/91)
In article <1991May29.182720.349@MDI.COM>, gannon@MDI.COM (Alden Gannon) writes: > Based on my experiences, and those of many other men, men do not feel > oppressed by women per se. In fact, oppression is prehaps too strong a term. > Men feel *disadvantaged* in at least the following areas in society: > > 1. The draft (this one is more like oppression). > 2. Parental choice (Women have it, men don't). > 3. Alimony, child support, and custody. > 4. Rape and domestic abuse law. > 5. Affirmative Action for only women and minorities. > 6. Hate crimes against gay men (this one *is* oppression). > > I challenge Sharon to produce a list of ways women feel oppressed and show > how alleviating that oppression will also address the above six points. I would also ask other women and men to contribute to this discussion. It would be interesting to find out what other people (men and women) perceive to be oppression. I'd like to address Alden's list first and then I'll produce my own list. Please be aware that this is a long post. THE DRAFT: As I've said before, I do agree that drafting only men is oppressive to men. First of all, however, let's keep in mind that there is currently NO draft. There IS a draft registration which obligates all men reaching the age of 17 to register with selective service. Alden Gannon maintains that because womena are not subject to the registration/draft according to current law, they enjoy an unfair benefit. I agree and disagree with Alden's position. Of course, I agree it's oppressive to men and that women do benefit from not being subject to this compulsory service -- BUT I feel that the blame is misplaced upon women. Women did not choose the current system. And there are women -- feminists -- fighting to change this system, including Pat Schroeder, who is working on enabling women to fight combat. I am not completely familiar with Pat Schroeder, but it sounds like she might favor a draft of women. (Someone know for sure? Mail me) PARENTAL CHOICE: Alden says "Women have it, men don't." I'd maintain that women are in a quite different position than men -- given that women get pregnant and men don't. I'm not saying that biology makes women superior to men, but please understand that the woman's stake in a pregnancy is a lot more demanding than a man's. Pregnancy is not a little thing to have to deal with. I'd ask someone who is medically versed to illuminate on this topic. Furthermore, I'd also like to give my personal philosophy on parental choice -- Honesty, Respect and most of all Communication. If the man and the woman are honest and if they respect each other, they will TALK about what happens if she gets pregnant. That way both partners will know where they stand and can choose if they want to risk pregnancy. Some have written me some very rude and anger-filled letters (not Alden who has been the most reasonable correspondent I've had the /pleasure/ of disagreeing with) that respond to my suggestion with retorts like: "Well, it's not advantageous to the man to tell the truth!" Well, in my opinion if he's going to lie to her and say "Sure, babe, I'll help you out!" and then he doesn't and wants her to get an abortion, he's quite frankly an ass and if she wants to go ahead and make her own decision, he's certainly given her the leeway to do it by lying. The other possibility is harder to deal with -- if the women lies then there's not much the man can do about it. That is, unless he desires to FORCE her to have an abortion or to carry on the pregnancy. The question I have for the men is this: Do you honestly want to force a woman to have your child if she doesn't want to carry it for nine months? Conversely, do you want to force the woman to terminate the pregnancy (assuming that she would NOT collect child support from you)? ALIMONY/CHILD SUPPORT/CHILD CUSTODY: In my opinion, alimony is almost obsolete. I don't really believe in alimony -- except in the most extreme of cases. There /are/ cases where I believe that it is acceptable for both men and women to demand alimony and I'll outline those. First of all, there are many women who got married to their husbands in the forties and fifties and who worked /at home/ and who are now finding themselves newly divorced. These women are in their upper fifties and early sixties, have no jobs, no skills and are now unable to support themselves. I believe that these women /do/ have the right to ask for alimony. They /did/ work supporting their husbands and families and I think that alimony is not unreasonable in these cases. I think that men and women who support their spouses through medical/ dental/law school and who then find themselves dumped afterwards do have the right to demand at least some compensation (maybe not alimony) if they can prove that their labor paid for their ex-spouse's education. And if the man and woman have a premarital agreement then I believe that if those terms were fairly entered upon, then it's fine. But for the most part, I think that alimony is unfair -- if the spouse is able to work and earn money, then there's no reason for it. Child support is very different from alimony. Child support is supposed to support ONLY the child. Now, if this is a parental choice issue, then it's more complicated. If one parent (m/f) wishes to raise the child I do think that the other parent (m/f) should absolutely contribute financially to the child's support if that non-custodial parent wishes to have contact with that child. If (for example) the father wants the woman to have an abortion and she wishes to carry through the pregnancy, he should not be compelled to pay child support -- but he shouldn't expect visitation. For children born out of wedlock, it's different, because I assume that the father and mother both consented to the pregnancy and birth. The non- custodial parent should pay support and if s/he does not pay that support, then s/he should not expect visitation -- even if the custodial parent can afford to raise those children by him/herself without financial assistance. I believe that it is the responsibility of both parents to contribute to their child's upbringing. You divorce your spouse -- you don't divorce your kids. But if you don't contribute to your kid's upbringing, then I guess you do divorce them. Now, support should be reasonable and it shouldn't cause an undue burden on the non-custodial parents. Custody cases are often decided in favor of the woman and I think this is unfair -- ideally, the child should go with the parent best able to provide for them in both family environment and basic needs. Often, it's said women "are more nurturing" -- I think that's a lie. Men can be just as nurturing. Often it's said "Men can provide better financially." That's no reason to send Junior off with Dad -- if Mom can provide a reasonable living, then money shouldn't prevail. Ideally, both parents should continue parenting the child. And what the child wants is also important to consider. RAPE/DOMESTIC ABUSE LAW: Oh man! If I really, really talk about this this will be WAY too long. What shall I say? I am an idealist in this matter and I'd like to reconcile that idealism with reality. I'd like to see more uniform rape laws that acknowledge sexual assault against men as well as against women -- for example, men can be raped through penetration and also by being forced to participate in oral sex and I think that is not always recognized by the current sexual assault laws. There's a big debate over publicity surrounding rape cases -- perhaps we are too voyeuristic of a society. We often publicize the names of suspected murderers -- always the victim's names are known. But murder victims can't really suffer mental cruelty given that they are dead. And we consider crimes involving death to be less complicated than crimes involving sexual penetration. No one deserves death (at least as a society we agree that killing should not be arbitrary) but sometimes we wonder if a person did give consent to sex, since we do associate the sexual act with pleasure. Perhaps we should stop publicizing the names of suspected rapists and victims -- some have suggested that the victim's name must be publicized since the suspected rapist's is being publicized. It's hard -- we publicize murder suspect's name without much concern for their reputations. So why are we so concerned about suspected rapists? Except that we do associat sex with pleasure and so we do wonder if the victim didn't really give consent and is now dragging the rapist through the mud? I don't think I've heard anyone suggest we don't publicize rape suspect's names at all but maybe that's the real solution to this dilemma. And once a person IS convicted, we could make the name part of public record? Would this be a satisfactory solution? Domestic abuse is a little different than rape but let me just say that marriage doesn't mean consent to sexual intercourse -- we associate sexual intercourse with marriage but the male and the female are still separate entities and they don't possess the other as a slave. Domestic abuse (with or without rape) /usually/ happens to women -- but it can happen to men. What can I say? Violent beatings are violent beatings. And wrong. And grounds for divorce. And civil and criminal suits. Etc. And people should begin to take assault upon men (and older people as well) more seriously! End of that thought. What else? Affirmative action. Another toughie. I think that affirmative action is not necessarily a bad thing. I'm wondering if it's something that should be permanent. I don't think so. I think that this is the thing I'm shakiest on in my whole liberal viewpoint: there definitely IS a point where it starts to oppress white men. But one has to wonder: if men and women and blacks and whites truly are equal, then why are white men the ones to occupy the best jobs. Are these people truly the most intelligent, the most ambitious, the ones with the most drive? Or did they start out with an advantage? I won't address this one any further right now. I want to hear what other's think. Is there some reason at my university that all of the top administrators are men? Is it because men are inherently smarter and better? What's going on here? Last one: violent attacks against gay men. Well, violent attacks against gay PEOPLE -- lesbians, gay men, bisexuals or people who supposedly "look or act gay" is reprehensible. But what's going on here? My friend was attacked last semester at a Queer Nation rally and fortunately he happened to be the one videotaping the demonstration: some guy came up to him and started yelling "You faggot! I'm going to fuck you up, you pussy! You fag, you pussy, you cunt." Now just stop for a second and reread that. I have the videotape and those are the words used. It sounds like the attacker is using words to describe the FEMALE anatomy about my GAY MALE friend. I think that there's a connection between sexism and homophobia AT LEAST IN THIS ISOLATED CASE. My lipstick lesbian friends have a less trying existence than my butch lesbian friends -- the butch women get hassled because they wear their hair in a "masculine" fashion, don't wear makeup and dress in "butch" shirts. Why are they persecuted while the "femmes" are not? Is there again a connection? Do we have a problem when we perceive "gender bending"? I do think that if we stop sexism, then young males won't feel the need to beat up my gay male friends because they are "pussies." > As > for being the *cause* of these inequalities, consider the "liberal" > Afrikaaners that say they are not the cause of the systematic oppression of > Blacks. Sharon lives in this country and enjoys many of its benefits. By > not actively standing out against these inequalities, Sharon tacitly > supports them. I agree. And I am doing my best to try to reconcile what may be contradictory positions in order to be the MOST just person I can be. It's very hard -- because there's a lot to keep in mind. I /do/ try to be as consistent as I can be. And I don't feel I'm a hypocrite because I do try to be as honest as I can be. > Indeed, without supporters of the status quo, the opposition > would easily rectify the imbalance, but this country's policies are dictated > by the will of voting constituencies (*not* men) consisting of a majority of > women. I do try to encourage my female friends to vote and I do vote! But there are more white male VOTERS in this country -- even though white males are not necessary /the/ majority. Whose fault? I'd agree it is probably that those who are not voting have no one to blame but themselves, but still, I think that is not license for the voting majority to deny rights. > If men hold the power, where did I get my six points? Why is it in the > interests of men to create AA, or sexist abuse laws? Men do *not* hold > sovereignty (in the Rouseauian sense). It is held by powerful voting > constituencies; one of which is NOW. ONE. There are /how many/ PACS on capitol hill? How many lobbyists? There are conservative lobbyists, liberal lobbyists, middle of the road lobbyists -- Christians, Fundamentalists, Catholics, Jews, the NRA, NOW, the Moral Majority (now called the Liberty Foundation or something like that), Vietnam Vets, people who want to ban flag burning, people who want to ban animal research, people who want more AIDS money, corporations, the military, defense contractors. Let's not forget the Tobacco Lobby! NOW is powerful, yes, but not the most powerful and certainly one of many. > On the subject of the <PC Controversy>, Sharon must be speaking of a > different issue than I do when discussing this topic. The main thrust > of the anti-PC argument is that PC people and institutions (most notably > academic ones) strive to *silence* opposing viewpoints. Alden -- I do think you misunderstand me with regard to PC. I oppose ANYONE who wishes to silence opposing viewpoints -- no matter what their political leanings. A free intellectual environment MUST HAVE opposing viewpoints in order to breeed new viewpoints. The problem I perceive is that there is a cadre of liberals who do want to silence conservative viewpoints. I do think that this cadre does NOT comprise the entire liberal perspective. I think most liberals like myself favor an open environment and not a restrictive one. Unfortunately there are those who would use the restrictiveness favored by that small cadre to badmouth the /entire/ liberal movement. If a person wants to propagate sexist and racist viewpoints at the university level, well that's fine but that person must tolerate dissent to his/her viewpoint academically. I've seen depts. refuse to hire people because of their non-traditional viewpoints and I think that just weakens the conservative viewpoint because CHALLENGE is what provides intellectual rigor. Don't you agree? > I, being a > member of that camp, encourage empowerment and outspokeness of any > minority view, and in this forum, that includes Sharon's. Thank you. And I hope you understand I would extend that to anyone who wishes to SERIOUSLY disagree/discuss these matters with me. Sometimes I get letters from people who resort to insulting me -- and I don't feel I have to respond to them because they're not giving me the respect I would extend to an intelligent adversary. I realize this is long. I didn't get to my own list, given that I wanted to address Alden's. I'll get around to that later as the machine I'm on right now is very, very S-L-O-W and it's very frustrating. :-( > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Alden B. Gannon, a.k.a. Zarathustra. INTERNET: gannon%mdi.com@uunet.uu.net > "Gotta find a woman be good to me, USENET: ..uunet!mdi.com!gannon > Won't hide my liquor, try to serve me tea." --Grateful Dead. -- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Sharon Lindsey O'Neil "I could be happy/I could be quite naive/ Bitnet: oneil@unomai1 It's only me and my shadow/Happy in our Internet: oneil@zeus.unomaha.edu make believe/Soon." -- Tears for Fears ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
gannon@MDI.COM (Alden Gannon) (06/05/91)
In article <15713.28498dc4@zeus.unomaha.edu> oneil@zeus.unomaha.edu (Truth or Dare?) writes: >In article <1991May29.182720.349@MDI.COM>, gannon@MDI.COM (Alden Gannon) writes: [Sharon comes up with a perfectly reasonable opinion of the draft. No refutation.] >PARENTAL CHOICE: Alden says "Women have it, men don't." I'd maintain Again, Sharon seems perfectly reasonable in this passage. I invite readers to refer to my other posts on this thread for clarification of my viewpoint, which is far less radical than the viewpoints Sharon cites. >ALIMONY/CHILD SUPPORT/CHILD CUSTODY: In my opinion, alimony is almost >obsolete. I don't really believe in alimony -- except in the most >extreme of cases. I found no area of disagreement here. I'm beginning to wonder if Sharon is an opponent or ally :-) >Child support is very different from alimony. Child support is >supposed to support ONLY the child. Now, if this is a parental choice >issue, then it's more complicated. If one parent (m/f) wishes to >raise the child I do think that the other parent (m/f) should >absolutely contribute financially to the child's support if that >non-custodial parent wishes to have contact with that child. If (for >example) the father wants the woman to have an abortion and she wishes >to carry through the pregnancy, he should not be compelled to pay >child support -- but he shouldn't expect visitation. Hear hear! Refer to my article proposing how such as system can be implemented. [Rest of child support passage deleted. Reread it at your pleasure.] >Custody cases are often decided in favor of the woman and I think this >is unfair... Hooray! [Passage on rape deleted. Full agreement.] >Perhaps we should stop >publicizing the names of suspected rapists and victims -- some have >suggested that the victim's name must be publicized since the >suspected rapist's is being publicized. Publicizing rape victims' names is abhorrent, and will only serve to keep victims from reporting. On the other hand, the accused will suffer from the same social stigma if falsely accused. The alleged rapist should have publicity protection as well until the verdict is rendered. >Would this be a satisfactory solution? In a word, yes. >Domestic abuse (with or without rape) /usually/ happens to women -- >but it can happen to men. Whoops, a little bone to pick here. Prepare for a flame from the militants on the net. I would refer you to a good study on domestic abuse that concluded that men are abused by women just as much as women abused by men to the same degree (I'm sure the source cite will be forthcoming. It's from a book). Male victims of abuse are far more reluctant to report, have little chance in court, and are victims of social stigma (as are rape victims). >But >one has to wonder: if men and women and blacks and whites truly are >equal, then why are white men the ones to occupy the best jobs. Are >these people truly the most intelligent, the most ambitious, the ones >with the most drive? Or did they start out with an advantage? I tend to accept the argument that white men benefit from a society that tends to give us advantages. The judicial system, educational system, and virtually every other institution in this country was created without any input from women and minorities (recall that these institutions are much older than women's suffrage), and the gender roles of which Janet spoke have served to enforce these inequalities when the legal enforcement crumbled. However, I believe AA (in its present form) is a poor attempt at rectifying the imbalance. It is treating the symptom, rather than the disease. We should direct our energies to scrutinizing the institutions that cause these inequalities (such as our education system), and giving women and minorities proportional executive power over them. AA is feeding people, not teaching them to fish. [Sharon draws an interesting parallel between gay bashing and sexism] Maybe so. >It's very hard -- because there's a lot to keep in mind. I /do/ try >to be as consistent as I can be. And I don't feel I'm a hypocrite >because I do try to be as honest as I can be. Indeed, it *is* very hard, and my pathetic mind is too small to contain it all. Perhaps we should share the burden of reminding each other of our own inconsistencies. [Passage on voting with which I agree.] [Sharon suggests that power is shared among the many PACs and lobbying groups. Astute. I agree.] >Alden -- I do think you misunderstand me with regard to PC. Yes, it appears I did misunderstand. I concur with you assessment. >I've seen depts. refuse to hire >people because of their non-traditional viewpoints and I think that >just weakens the conservative viewpoint because CHALLENGE is what >provides intellectual rigor. Don't you agree? Whole heartedly. >Thank you. And I hope you understand I would extend that to anyone >who wishes to SERIOUSLY disagree/discuss these matters with me. >Sometimes I get letters from people who resort to insulting me -- and >I don't feel I have to respond to them because they're not giving me >the respect I would extend to an intelligent adversary. Insults are the refuge of weak minds. You do well to ignore them. However, you have disappointed me, Sharon. We seem to be running out of issues on which we disagree. I may have no more reason to answer your posts. :-) >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > Sharon Lindsey O'Neil "I could be happy/I could be quite naive/ > Bitnet: oneil@unomai1 It's only me and my shadow/Happy in our > Internet: oneil@zeus.unomaha.edu make believe/Soon." -- Tears for Fears >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alden B. Gannon, the Chaste. INTERNET: gannon%mdi.com@uunet.uu.net "Become who you are!" - F. Nietzsche. USENET: ..uunet!mdi.com!gannon