This C. David Coats quote (from the preface to his 1991 book, Old MacDonald’s Factory Farm) has been floating around the animal rights blogspherz for a few weeks now. While I think Coats is dead-on in his analysis, his choice of phrasing strikes me as a little…curious, shall we say.

Take a look:

Isn’t man an amazing animal? He kills wildlife - birds, kangaroos, deer, all kinds of cats, coyotes, beavers, groundhogs, mice, foxes, and dingoes - by the millions in order to protect his domestic animals and their feed. Then he kills domestic animals by the billions and eats them. This in turn kills man by the millions, because eating all those animals leads to degenerative - and fatal - health conditions like heart disease, kidney disease, and cancer. So then man tortures and kills millions more animals to look for cures for these diseases. Elsewhere, millions of other human beings are being killed by hunger and malnutrition because food they could eat is being used to fatten domestic animals. Meanwhile, some people are dying of sad laughter at the absurdity of man, who kills so easily and so violently, and once a year sends out a card praying for “Peace on Earth.”

In the course of his patriarchy blaming, Coats assumes the language of the very patriarchy he’s indicting. Specifically, he continually employs variants of the term mankind when he’s actually referring to humankind: man is an amazing animal; he slaughters wildlife so that he can raise and eat “food” animals; man suffers from dietary-induced health conditions, which leads man to torture millions of “lab” animals in search of cures for these self-inflicted illnesses, and so on.

In fact, Coats only switches from androcentric to gender-neutral terms near the end of the paragraph - when he transitions from describing the actions of the oppressor (man) to the consequences of these actions on other human animals. To wit: “millions of other human beings are being killed by hunger and malnutrition”; “[m]eanwhile, some people are dying of sad laughter” (”at the absurdity of man,” natch).

Possibly, this is an unintentional example of casual sexism - i.e., Coats accidentally employed largely androcentric verbiage when writing this preface. Since this isn’t primarily a feminist blog*, allow me to explain why Coats’s choice of terminology is problematic. By using language which explicitly refers to men - necessarily, at the exclusion of women - we erase women from the public sphere, from our written and oral histories, from our cultural narratives. These seemingly innocuous, male-specific terms have very real, very harmful practical consequences. Language shapes the way we think; words matter. In eliminating women from our discourse, so too do we eliminate them from our consciousness - shoving them from the public (political) to the private (domestic) sphere. “Man,” “mankind” and the like simply are not inclusive, universal terms for “men and women.” Nor is “convenience” an excuse - it’s not very hard to use “humankind” in place of “man” or “mankind,” “people” in place of “men,” etc.

(More below the fold…)

Of all PETA’s campaigns, I think I find the “fur hag” meme most offensive. While feminists can (and do) disagree on whether nudity and porn can ever be empowering for women, “fur hag” is a rather obvious gender-based slur, and draws upon a number of age-old stereotypes about women - which PETA further elucidates with their “fur hag” artwork.

To be fair, I have no idea whether PETA actually invented the term “fur hag” - but they’ve certainly been quite influential in launching “fur hag” into the mainstream. Wherever fur-wearing celebs are trashed - on gossip blogs, in fashion show protests, or even on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, “fur hag” is inevitably bandied about as an insult. Oftentimes by other women, who apparently see nothing sexist about denigrating women they dislike with misogynist slurs.

Let’s start by looking at the word “hag.”

Dictionary.com defines “hag” as:

1. an ugly old woman, esp. a vicious or malicious one.
2. a witch or sorceress.
3. a hagfish.

The first definition is obviously problematic: a hag is “an ugly old woman, esp. a vicious or malicious one.” While I have no qualms about calling people (women and men) who wear fur “vicious” or “malicious,” the term “hag” also attacks the fur wearer’s physical appearance and gender - a “hag” is “an ugly old woman.” In fact, the primary aspect of this definition involves appearance and gender - a “hag” is “an ugly old woman,” especially [but not necessarily] “a vicious or malicious one.” “Vicious” and “malicious” are somewhat extraneous to this definition; a “hag,” then, is chiefly “an ugly old woman.”

(More below the fold…)

Update, 1/22/09:

Now that this post is making the rounds (which is to say, a few bloggers have mentioned it - lolz on me!), I want to make the following clarifications:

1) As I said at Change.org, I don’t think Obama is a misogynist. In calling his “girly dog” remark sexist, I’m not grouping him with hardcore misogynists like Ann Coulter, Joe Francis, Rick Warren and the like. Rather, I think that Obama occasionally engages in the sort of casual, softcore sexism that’s all too common among men (and women!) who have been raised in a culture steeped in misogyny. An occasional slip is understandable and excusable - after all, we’re all socialized with certain prejudices, which we have to unlearn - but only if you’re willing to recognize, apologize and learn from it.

Here, Mrs. Obama offered her husband several opportunities to reconsider his comments - and he didn’t. To me, his failure to recognize how this gendered stereotype might offend his wife and daughters is worse than the comments themselves.

2) Upon re-reading the post, I see that I conflated “small dogs” with “girly dogs” - my bad! While I think there’s a strong correlation between a dog’s size and his/her perceived “girly”-ness, there are exceptions. The standard poodle, for example, is a larger breed, but might be considered “girly,” inasmuch as it’s “high maintenance” (i.e., is rather well groomed). “Girly doesn’t necessarily equal “small,” but the two are somewhat related.

Nor do I have a problem with Obama preferring a large dog; indeed, as some have pointed out, large dogs are overrepresented in shelters, at least in some areas of the country, and thus it might do more good for Obama to adopt a large breed. That’s fine by me - but he can do so without denigrating “girly” dogs (and, by extension, actual girls and women).

3) Enumerating the consequences of gender-based stereotypes and insults on human men and women is well beyond the scope of this blog.

However, if you:

a) Don’t understand why the term “girly” might be perceived as an insult, and a gender-based one at that;

b) Don’t see the links between misogyny and homophobia; and/or

c) Don’t recognize the practical, real-world effects of gender stereotypes and gendered slurs on men and women (and girls and boys), or understand how men and women (and girls and boys) receive different, gendered socialization, then

I highly recommend adding some feminist blogs to your reading list. For a primer, start with Finally, a feminism 101 blog. As far as non-AR feminist blogs go, I also like Shakespeare’s Sister and Feministe, both of which are relatively light on speciesism.

If you think I need to “lighten up” or “get over myself,” you really need to do some feminist homework!

4) Finally, I’d like to add that the term “girly dog” also invokes class and race stereotypes. When you think of the quintessential “girly dog” and her “owner,” probably you think of a small, white, yappy, puffy little dog with bows in her perfectly groomed hair. The dog - being a lap dog, as Obama also said - is most likely pictured lounging on the lap of an equally perfectly groomed woman, who is either prissy and “diva”-ish, like Paris Hilton (another blogger’s term and example), or older and regally respectable, like Ms. Walters. Either way, she’s white and upper-class. At least, that’s my take on the term.

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Oy. After months of equivocating on the dog issue, the Obama family has announced that they’ve narrowed their choice down to two breeds: the Labradoodle and the Portuguese Water Dog. Unfortunately, as Adopt-a-Pet.com reports, while these are not the only two “hypoallergenic” breeds available, they are harder to find on animal adoption websites:

You recently signed Adopt-a-Pet.com’s petition on www.Presidential-Pooch-Pardon.com asking Barack Obama to adopt a shelter dog. He is interested in adopting, but has narrowed his search to uncommon breeds that are difficult to find in a shelter. Now, on the President-Elect’s website, there’s a section where people can vote for their favorite ideas, and the top vote-getting ideas will be directly seen by Obama. One of the animal shelter workers who posts pets for adoption on Adopt-a-Pet.com has posted an idea urging the president to consider finding a mixed breed dog with the right individual traits that meets his family’s needs.

You can make a huge difference by voting one more time here. If this is your first time on the site, you’ll be asked to create an account, which is super simple. After you create your account, click the link above again to locate the suggestion.

Thank you for being part of this non-partisan effort to promote homeless pet adoption please spread the word to your friends!

Indeed, a search of Petfinder for “Labradoodle” currently turns up zero results, while “Portuguese Water Dog” uncovers seven purebred dogs.

Additionally, in selecting a purebred dog, the Obamas are practically inviting greedy breeders to cash in on their (hopefully) compassionate choice by sexually exploiting and selling the “Obama dog.” (Doubly so if they adopt a breed that’s hard to find through adoption routes.) A mixed breed or mutt - particularly one of unknown heritage, which can’t easily be reproduced - would help minimize this risk.

Also on the Obama dog front, Adopt-a-Pet.com has some crazy cute graphics you can download, encouraging the Obamas to adopt a mutt.

They’re available at muttslikeme.adoptapet.com, which is a riff on Obama’s observation that “A lot of shelter dogs are mutts like me.”

(More below the fold…)

This FSMas marks the third holiday season since the Mr. and I eloped in June of ‘06. As time grinds on, it’s become obvious that some relatives - mostly the older and more conservative of the bunch, but not always - are a-ok with foisting their values on me, vis-à-vis the way(s) in which they choose to address me. Inevitably, we receive more than a few x-mas cards made out to “Shane and Kelly Brady” or - more odiously - “Mr. and Mrs. Brady.” This despite me never having changed my last name upon marrying Mr. Brady - and being extremely vocal about my choice: he and I have separate address labels, with different last names; when we send out joint mail, particularly those FSMas cards, we always sign them with both our surnames; and, for fuck’s sake, I’m the weird hippie librul veg*n feminist heathen in the family - so of course “Mrs.” isn’t gonna fly with me, ya? And yet, certain relatives still insist on referring to me as - blecht! - Mrs. Brady.

And it’s not just on the joint x-mas cards - the worst offenders of the bunch will address birthday cards and other pieces of mail meant specifically for me to “Mrs. Brady” or “Kelly Brady.” You can’t even pretend to use the “timesaver” excuse there, nosiree - it’s only two extra letters, people.

Perhaps most tellingly, the reverse never occurs. I have a few random, extended family relatives who have never met the Mr., and aren’t even sure of his last name. Even so, they are cautious not to commit the egregious faux pas of referring to a man by his wife’s last name - because that would simply be rude and emasculating. Heaven’s no, can’t have that! Mail from these folks arrives addressed to “Kelly Garbato and Shane,” rather than “Mrs. and Mr. Garbato” or “Kelly and Shane Garbato.”

So I wonder, maybe I should start a little experiment wherein I address all my mail to the women - using their maiden names, of course - and their husbands: “Ms. and Mr. Garbato.” (An obvious stumbling block is that there is no male equivalent of “Mrs.”; men are simply men, Misters, no matter their marital status. But, you know, work with me here.) Addressing women, men and couples with no regard for how they wish to represent themselves to the world. Addressing the menses as though they’re just nameless, faceless, unimportant appendages or pieces of property; things without purposes or identities apart from their wives or their children.

How do y’all think that might go over, huh? But, what’s the big deal? It’s “just a name,” right?

Naturally, my lil’ sis is excluded from the above rant; I know she purposefully calls me “Mrs. Brady” just to get a rise outta the hackles on my hairy feminist calves. That’s what little sisters do, no?

By the way, sis, remember when your turtle Henry bit you on the chin and, dangling there, refused to let go, despite your comical levels of hysteria? Good times.

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Tagged: feminism feminist surname marriage fsmas cards mrs. mr. language

Just when I start thinking that Larry King couldn’t possibly get any denser…well, just check it:

KING: OK. A strange story.

We begin here in Los Angeles with Davida Kelley, a former member of the Children of God. It’s now called Family International. She was raised in the household of that sect’s now dead leader, David Berg, whom she says sexually abused her.

Also here is Amy Bril, a former member of the Children of God. She was summoned to the household of David Berg as a young child and married to him at age 13. [...]

KING: At what age were you first tampered with?

Yes, “tampered with”. Because the human body is like a Tylenol bottle, and sexual assault is similar to fiddling with the safety packaging on an unopened package of aspirin.

King returns to this clumsy euphemism for “rape” several times throughout the interview:

KING: And Ricky, Davida, he killed, what, the person who was his nanny?

KELLEY: Yes. She was one of many nannies who…

KING: Tampered with him.

KELLEY: Yes, when he was a child.

Remember, we’re talking about child rape and sexual exploitation. “Tampering” doesn’t even begin to describe the horror of what these children (now adults) endured. You “tamper” with a toilet and a roll of Saran Wrap on April Fool’s Day in order to pull a prank on your younger sibling. To refer to ritualized, lifelong sexual abuse and exploitation as “tampering” is to minimize, deny and obscure the realities of what actually took place.

FYI, though King does use the terms “sexual assault” and “sexual abuse” several times throughout the interview, the word “rape” does not appear once - not once! - in the entire, hour-long transcript. Go figure.

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Tagged: larry king cnn rape sex sexual abuse sexual assault msm

Rape does not equal sex.

Correspondingly, a “rape scene” does not equal a “sex scene.”

Thus, your profile of actress Summer Bishil in the August/September Bust is disappointingly misogynistic. And anti-feminist. Yes, I understand that you’re about as feminist as Planet Green is, well, green, but still. Even for a superfluffyfunfeminism magazine, this is beyond the pale.

You’re better than this:

The first question I want to ask Summer Bishil, star of Alan Ball’s new film, Towelhead, is what it was like to do a sex scene with Aaron Eckhart. “I thought he was attractive prior to meeting him,” she replies, laughing, “so I was pretty nervous.” The response catches me off-guard, because the scene in question is a harrowing one in which Bishil’s character, 13-year-old Jasira, is raped.

Wow, Jasira is raped and raped while underage. Where does the “sex scene” come in, exactly?

Seriously, I’ve come to expect this sort of woman-hating, rape-denying/-minimizing bullshit from the mainstream media; the mental gymnastics they sometimes perform in order to avoid using the word “rape” in a news story about rape truly are Olympian in nature:

‘World’s greatest dad’ charged in online child-sex sting (USA Today)

Child rape sting! ‘World’s greatest dad’ charged in online child-rape sting!

Mental Health Expert, 78, Charged In Internet Child Sex Sting (Tampa Bay Online)

Child rape sting! Mental Health Expert, 78, Charged In Internet Child Rape Sting!

Police: Men had sex with teen runaways (The News & Observer)

Raped! Police: Men raped teen runaways!

Guilty Verdict In Videotaped Sex Slay Case (CBS News)

ZOMFG! Rape slay case! Guilty Verdict In Videotaped Rape Slay Case!

Richard D. Davis and Dena Riley raped, tortured and killed a woman! While videotaping it! Where the mofo was this “sex” of which you speak!?!

Former Coroner Employee Had Sex With Body (WKRC TV Cincinnati)

Raped! Former Coroner Employee Raped Body!

Seriously, I am this close to losing my shit now. How on earth does a corpse consent to anything? That’s not a rhetorical question, I really would like an answer. I’m talking to you, anonymous WKRC TV Cincinnati headline writer!

Rape is not sex:

“The word ‘sex’ implies consent,” she said. “I never once would describe (what happened) as sex. He’s making me commit perjury.”

“Sex” implies mutual consent, while terms such as “had sex with,” “engaged in sex,” etc., say as much; after all, you can’t mutually engage in an act or perform an act with someone unless your partner is doing it, too. Rape victims aren’t “having sex” with their assailants, they are being raped.

So, Ms. Priya Jain & Bust mag editors, I am extremely disappointed, disgusted and appalled to find you, of all peoples, regurgitating the language of the patriarchy. The language which implies that a rape did not, in fact, take place (no matter what that self-hating whore says the morning after); the language which denies and minimizes rape (what are you talking about, I didn’t rape her; we had sex); the language which allows all of society to turn a blind eye to the realities of rape. After all, if the word “rape” never graces the headlines, where’s the problem?

Call me naive, but I expected more from an indie/feminist media outlet.

Signed,

- A soon-to-be-ex-subscriber. (But not because of your unfortunate choice of words to describe rape. I’d already made the decision not to renew when I leafed through your latest issue. I just totally like Bitch better.)

Oh, and P.S.: Decorating your Twin Peaks fashion spread with a decapitated deer head? Totally uncool. Really, would it have killed you and your grand artistic vision to just substitute in some wrought iron doohickey instead? Random acts of violence are so 1942, dontchaknow.

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Tagged: bust msm rape sex misogyny feminism language speciesism fashion

In Thirty Ways of Looking at Hillary: Reflections by Women Writers, Deborah Tannen* brings us entry #105 in Hillary Sexism Watch**:

All human relations pivot on two dimensions: on one hand, closeness/distance, and on the other, hierarchy. We ask of every encounter: Does this bring us closer or push us apart? And also: Does this put me in a one-up or a one-down position? Researchers in my field [linguistics] refer to these dimensions as solidarity and power. You can see them at work in forms of address. If you call others by their first names, you’re exercising solidarity, bringing them closer; using their titles and their last names creates distance. But forms of address also operate on the hierarchy dimension, especially if they’re asymmetrical. Calling people by their first names can indicate their lack of power, as with children and workers in service roles. Addressing someone as Mr., Ms., or Dr. can indicate either formality or the fact that they are above you on the social ladder and, hence, more powerful. This constitutes another double bind, and it brings us back to Hillary.

Why, we might ask, do we refer to Hillary as Hillary? Women are far more often referred to by their first names than are men in similar roles. This is partly because people tend to feel more comfortable with women and find them less intimidating. For a political candidate, that’s a good thing. But being referred to by a first name is also the result, and simultaneously the cause, of women commanding less respect. During the Democratic primary campaign debates, Hillary shared the stage with Kucinich, Edwards, Biden, Richardson, Dodd, and Obama - not Dennis, John, Joe, Bill, Christopher, and Barack. Of course, one obvious reason that Hillary is Hillary to us is that she shares her last name with the other famous Clinton (a choice, recall, that was pressed upon her). Another is that her name is unusual and therefore more recognizable than, say, Susan or Mary. But the name Barack is even more unusual.

If you look back through the archives, it’s plainly obvious that I alternate between referring to Ms. Clinton as “Hillary” and “Clinton”, but very rarely use first names in reference to the male candidates. Barack Obama is usually just “Obama” - even though, as Tannen points out, “Barack” is at least recognizable as “Hillary”.

Given the misogyny directed Clinton (see, for example: “she-devil”, “robot”, “cold”, “calculated”, “Sister Frigidaire”, etc.), I don’t think most people call Hillary “Hillary” because they’re overcome with warm fuzzy wuzzies and want to be one with her. (Her supporters, perhaps, but her detractors? Not so much.) Rather, in many cases I think it’s more likely that “power” (vs. “solidarity”) is the operating principle: it’s a way of infantilizing her, taking the ball-buster down a peg, cutting off another uppity bitch’s feet. Hillary doesn’t seem as powerful, as intimating, when she’s just “Hillary” - as opposed to “Mrs. Clinton” or even (gawd forbid!) “Hillary Rodham Clinton”. And what with all the jokes about castration, I think it’s more than safe to say that a good number of men feel threatened by her, some subconsciously, others more obviously so.

So what does it say of me, that I address Clinton by her first name while addressing most others by their surnames? Probably that I’ve internalized so much misogyny over my thirty years that I’m still trying to shake it off. I want to be a radfem blamer, dammit, but I’ve received the same socialization as the dudez over at the Daily Kos!

* See: “The Double Bind: The damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t paradox facing women leaders”, p. 132-133

** I know, I know, the primaries are so! over!…but the misogyny, my friends…the misogyny will last a lifetime.***

*** Along with the racism, homophobia, transgenderphobia, religious bigotry, speciesism, etc. In singling out the misogyny, I’m not discounting all the other isms, just so we’re clear, mkay?

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Tagged: 2008 elections feminism misogyny hillary clinton language linguistics books book review thirty ways of looking at hillary Deborah Tannen sexism