Comments

1
Imus.
2
I've done my own research. Much of what people like West say is wrong. Given how knowledgeable she claims to be about the subject, and how often she has been corrected, I can only assume these false statements are deliberate lies.
3
Glad I missed it this year. Sounded both unfunny and offensive.
4
Lindy's recent post on horse meat was also funny. "I've eaten an IKEA horseball." I miss Lindy.
5
Snore
6
@2: Oh, wow. Thank you so much for mansplaining sexism! I see now that my lived experience has been all wrong!
7
@ 2, you better give us some concrete examples of that. What has Lindy gotten wrong? What correction has she been given but refused to accept? You'll need links. (And no, I won't look for it myself - you brought it up, so it's your burden.)
8
@2: "People like West": Yes, all women are wrong about unspecified things, Trollie McTrollinstuff. Thank you!
9
@2

Good. Cite your sources, since you've done the research.
10
@2 can't cite "everything", people. it's just obvious, ok?

inequality between the sexes, races, classes, climate change, the holocaust, the moon landing, jfk, rfk, 9-11, they're all mostly wrong.

i researched it all, ok? on the internet.
11
The actual pay gap between men and women that may be due to discrimination, i.e the residual pay gap that remains after controlling for factors like actual hours worked, education, experience, and occupational choice, is about 3-5%, not the 23-28% feminists claim. http://www.stlouisfed.org/publications/p…

Intimate partner violence affected more men than women in 2010, contrary to feminist claims that women are overwhelmingly the victims. http://www.saveservices.org/2012/02/cdc-…

Counting rape in prison, men may experience more sexual violence as well, again counter to feminist claims. http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/20…

The popular rape graphic that went viral a couple months ago? Also false. Here's an amateurish but passionate debunking http://i.imgur.com/gowAx.gif

The influential study claiming women experience a big fall in standard of living after divorce and men a big rise was false. http://www.nytimes.com/1996/05/09/garden…

Anorexia is mostly genetic, not caused by the "patriarchy." http://www.youbeauty.com/body-fitness/an…

Naomi Wolf's claim of 150,000 deaths a year from anorexia off by a factor of 3,000. http://www.scienceofeds.org/2012/06/07/n…

Really, when a feminist tells you something, you are safer assuming the opposite is true.
12
I'm sympathetic to West's point, but, to use an old homiletic dictum "you have to damn them before you can save them." I get that it can be incredibly frustrating to deal with intentionally blind sexists that can't see what is seemingly right in front of their faces. However, if a person (usually a man but sometimes a woman) doesn't believe that sexism is rampant, telling them to do their own research is pointless. Why would they do their research on something that they don't think exists? So, as tiresome as it is, if you want to be an effective voice for feminism, you have to come up with something a little more compelling than "do your own research." I've actually got a handful of examples I use with students (and others) of male privilege. They are not hard to find. Privilege is notoriously hard to point out to those that have it (I was 30 before I really saw it), but being dismissive and disengaged from people of good faith who honestly just don't see it isn't going to do anyone any good.
13
The human race is largely selfish and evil.

Someday we may evolve into something less atrocious than what we currently are, but that day is thousands of years away.

It sucks, but it is what it is.
14
Was it sexist?
Was it satire?
Was it effective and offensive?
Should we care?
At all?

Yes. Yes. Yes. No. No.

Breaking news: sexism in Hollywood is like water in the ocean. Also, how many of the boob-outraged rolled out the artillery against Zero Dark Thirty? Torture trumps boobs, but rippings of that rubbish are rarer than hen's teeth. Here's to easy targets!
15
Change doesn't happen with silence.
17
@2, and most of the comments on Jezebel, do a lovely job of proving Lindy's point. The lack of understanding of why this is a big deal, and why it should be a conversation, constantly, is best expressed in apathy, or denial (#2 again). Fatigue hits everyone, consciously or not, and how you respond to it shows how aware and committed you are. Lindy proved herself yet again.
18
I agree with the basic thrust of what Lindy West is saying, but she's a horrible writer with little or no grasp of argument.
19
#11 i have to say it: well played!
20
@11: Regarding the wage gap... So a woman is more likely to make less because she takes time off to bear children, or care for an aged parent, both tasks that primarily fall to women and which have no comparable effect on men's career advancement. And this is your argument AGAINST the existence of rampant sexism?
21
@11, Let's just take your claim (via amateurish but passionate poster, a citation about as credible as a Daily Mail story) about false rape accusations. Dr. Kanin’s study was incredibly poorly done; it found every accusation that did not result in conviction to be "false", even ones dropped for any reason (including police pressure against the victim) well before things got to an arrest. The FBI estimate is 8% -- an unrealistic number going by the rates found for every other crime, but at least within the realm of possibility.

This really has very little to do with Lindy's article. I guess that can count as "well played" if the goal is to turn any discussion about women into "but what about the men?!??!!?"
22
@20: Anyone whose argument against the existence of sexism can be neatly summed up as "never believe what women say" is clearly not worth arguing with. Don't waste your energy.
23
The fun part was when I tweeted Lindy a simple question—

It's @SethMacFarlane, FFS. Who expects PC or feminist humor? Don't presume nobody notices. It's just part of the expectation.

—and she responded by blocking me, and posting a picture of Alithea masturbating wrongly.

The reality is that the Rush Limbaugh brand of feminoia is rampant in this culture, and Ms. West does women in general no good whatsoever when dressing herself up as the shrieking harridan myth she pretends to hate in order to feed the misogynists.

It's too bad she doesn't want to have a discussion. If all she wants to do is stand in the town square and shriek at the top of her lungs about ... um ... well, poor her, I guess, she's welcome to do so. Meanwhile, she's making human equality and decency that much harder for the next generation of women—such as my daughter, for instance—to attain.

Good job, Lindy! Maybe "wannabe wanker" is a badge of honor in your book, but in mine it just means you're too bumbling to be a real one. Thank you for proving the feminoiacs' point; they couldn't ask for a better spokeswoman than you managed to make yourself today.
25
@20 If you want to have a conversation about the choices people make, the extent to which those choices are dictated by gender roles, family-unfriendly workplaces, etc., we can have it. But that is not how feminists present the issue. It's always presented in terms of "equal pay for equal work." Even the White House does it, claiming that a $.23 gap remains even after controlling for "personal choices like education or occupation."
http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/06/0…

@21 Reliable statistics on false rape allegations are hard to come by, both due to the nature of the beast and due to what seems to be a lack of good research in the area. But if the FBI figure you cite of 8% is correct, that is still 4 times the rate of false reports for other crimes, and also 4 times what feminists have been claiming, without empirical support, for years. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_p…

That rather proves my point that feminists lie, don't you think?

I don't claim to know what the real figure is. I do know that several intensive studies have found rates of false reports (in most of which the "victim" actually admitted the report was false, often either just before or just after taking a lie detector test) ranging from 41% to 65%. Here's a long article on the issue: http://www.theforensicexaminer.com/archi…

And all this does relate directly to Lindy's article. Her claim is that the facts of women's oppression are so settled, so proven and obvious, that she shouldn't even have to argue them. I'm pretty sure that the things I've mentioned--domestic violence, sexual assault, the supposed wage gap, female body image, economic disempowerment--are the kinds of things she is claiming are settled. Do you disagree?

@22 I didn't say "women." I said "feminists." I'd qualify that to be "modern feminists." The movement was obviously necessary when it began, and did a lot of good. Unfortunately, instead of fulfilling its promise of liberating everybody from harmful gender roles, it's become an intellectually bankrupt movement that seeks to advance women at all costs, justice and truth be damned. Anyone who tries to swim against the tide gets accused of trolling and trying to make it all about teh menz.

And *now*, I think I can stand with Lindy in saying, do your own goddamn research. I am going to bed.

Please wait...

Comments are closed.

Commenting on this item is available only to members of the site. You can sign in here or create an account here.


Add a comment
Preview

By posting this comment, you are agreeing to our Terms of Use.