Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Equality, Not Sameness - And What That Means

A friend sent me an article, thought that I would disagree with its argument, and suggested I write something on it so we could argue. What kind of person would I be - nay, what kind of friend would I be - if I were to ignore such a suggestion? Especially when he was right in that I disagree with it - vehemently. The article in question is If She Says She Wants "Equality, Not Sameness", She's Lying by Helen Rittelmeyer, and it is about inherent gender inequalities, and how "gay marriage pretends they are [equivalent], and so reinforces a falsehood that's already dangerously prevalent". I'm not even sure what I make of that argument, that gay marriage automatically declares an equality of the sexes. I'm pretty sure that argument is full of the bull and the shit for a variety of reasons, and I'll get to those a little later (later, meaning a second post). But first, for the ones about gender.

Rittelmeyer tells her readers, "If you take one idea away from this post, let it be this: Don't be fooled when feminists say they want equality, not sameness. It may sound like a concession, but it isn't one". On that point she's (partially) right. It isn't a concession. Wanting equality is different from wanting to turn the world into something depicted in the Fairly Odd Parents season 1 episode "The Same Game" - where Timmy wishes the world into a uniform grey by wanting everyone to be the same. Feminism, at its heart, celebrates differences; feminism, at its heart, allows for choices to be made. Feminism, at its heart, celebrates both the career woman and the stay at home mom as being representative of women being free to make the choice that is best for them. Feminism, at its heart, celebrates the same sort of choice for men, so men who want to be caregivers or are more comfortable with the job that allows them flexible hours are not discouraged from those jobs either by societal pressure or by that industry's own standards. The difference between "sameness" and "equality" is something that almost every student of history can describe; when Jefferson wrote "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal", would Rittelmeyer declare that Jefferson was a latent communist who meant that all men are created the same? Well, it is possible she would; I'm not too familiar with her writings, as this is the first piece I've ever read by her; but generally, the accepted reading of the line is not that all men are inherently the same - with the same talents and skills and deficiencies - but that all men are of equal worth, especially before such institutional forces like the law; that a man's place in the hierarchy of life should be determined by his own pursuits and his own luck and strengths rather than who birthed him. It is the declaration of that, and an aspiration that a man like John Adams or Andrew Jackson or Barack Obama should and can attain the highest office in the land even without being of noble birth, or having familial contacts. Obviously, it doesn't always work. Obviously, things like inherited wealth and inherited poverty and legacy privileges and racial privileges and gender privileges can greatly (and often unduly) shape the course of one's life.

And that gendered privilege is where Rittelmeyer loses me again when she says, "Put it a different way and this becomes obvious: 'Men and women can be different, but the differences can't matter'. A pipe dream only marginally less foolish than trying to eliminate gender differences altogether". I think Rittelmeyer needs to do some fact checking; first and foremost, what needs to be checked is the idea that "men" are a homogeneous mass of sameness, and that "women" are a separate homogeneous mass of sameness. Really, haven't we ever met someone of our gender and had nothing at all in common with them other than our chromosomes/genitals? Wouldn't Rittelmeyer be a little perturbed to be grouped as the same as women like, say, me? After all, I'm one of those crazy feminists who believes in equality of the sexes! Then there's this: men and women can be different, just like women can be different from other women and men can be different from other men. But - and this is a big but - biological differences like who came out with what sex organs is not a worthwhile enough difference to deny a woman a job in a traditionally male field or a man a job in a traditionally female field. If a woman wants to be a mechanic and is good at it and can fix my car up nice, let her have at it. If a man wants to be a kindergarden teacher and is good at it and can get all of those kids to take a nap, then what argument is there for not letting him?

And then there's this other part in the equality business, the part about perception and the role it plays in wage disparity. And that is that gender inequality leads to an inequality of wages, both in the wages paid and opportunities presented in the same company (like Lilly Ledbetter vs. Goodyear) and in wages earned in traditionally masculine professions versus feminine professions (can anyone tell me the difference between a hairdresser and a barber, aside from gender, for one to make $10.68 an hour while the other pulls in $11.31?). Which in turn plays into what areas of study we push men into and women into. For instance, women were once thought to be too delicate to write anything considered serious fiction. There is a reason the Brontes wrote under male pseudonyms. So there are two issues here; one is, if there are differences among the sexes, is one ostensibly and objectively weaker as to deduce that they are, in point of fact, unequal? Or does that perception of inequality stem not from objective fact but from personal and societal prejudices?

That idea of societal prejudices deciding who is better and keener and finer and who is less is right in another statement Rittelmeyer makes, that being "If you need more evidence, consider...  ...the difference between telling a child to be more grown up and telling him (not her) to 'be a man'." That isn't evidence of gender essentialism. It is very possibly evidence that gender - and gender norms and ideals - are constructed by society, and that they must be learned. It is evidence that we put great emphasis on what we see as "guy" behavior and what we attribute to "girl" behavior. It is the same as "boys don't cry"; except, boys do, until they have it beaten into them that it is not manly to cry, that to cry is to be weak, and that emotions are weaknesses not to be entertained. We see the world through a gendered prism; we find fault with those who do not live up to our idea of what the different genders should be. A guy who likes romantic comedies is derisively called a "fag"; a girl who excels at basketball has it scribbled on the bathroom stalls that she likes "pussy". And if Rittelmeyer does not think that kind of policing of gender conformity doesn't have an affect on how people behave and how they interact with the world, then - to quote Rittelmeyer directly, "I'm at a loss". If Rittelmeyer can't see how the opposite is true, how girls are socialized to play with Barbies and boys with Matchboxes, how we gender children from the moment they emerge from the womb, how we see and construct their behaviors through the gender we interpret them as being, then again, "I'm at a loss". I will say this, though; more than a lifetime ago, the (rich, white) women were expected to faint early and often - and no doubt they did, what with the corsets. There were fainting couches, and women were not expected to overly exert themselves, lest they hurt their feeble woman brains - as The Yellow Wallpaper scarily depicts. Now? We're hating on men who take naps, because we are inherently prone to exerting ourselves; we are "wired" to clean, to see the home as the place "where the real work gets done". The reason I can't believe in gender essentialism and the inherent differences in the sexes is this very fact. The lines and definitions of what is inherent to each gender change based on time and cultural inclination.

I disagree with Rittelmeyer on yet another point, that being "A culture that cannot acknowledge gender differences has hobbled itself". I think a culture that cannot acknowledge how it creates gender differences has hobbled itself. A culture that honestly believes that the genders are inherently different has little sense of history, because if it acknowledged history it would have to acknowledge the progression and mutation of gender differences. A culture that honestly believes that genders are inherently different and unequal has less ability to prosper and to accept ideas and innovations coming from a diverse group of people. But what's more, a culture that fails to recognize the various ways gender is constructed and how one half of its population is diminished due to the perception of gendered importance fails to recognize how it has failed its own people.

As I have said before, I am not a full-fledged, card-carrying member of the "it's all nurture!" club. But that doesn't mean that I am not wary of the science surrounding gender; after all, that science has burned my gender before, and burned severely. That doesn't mean that I can't recognize how being inundated with gendered images changes my perception of myself and my abilities. It doesn't mean that I am not affected by the fact that there are so few female protagonists, and even fewer proactive female protagonists. It doesn't change the fact that Pixar - one of the biggest and most talented and most successful children's film studios - hasn't made a film with a female protagonist yet. It doesn't change the fact it took me through WALL•E to recognize that fact. It doesn't change the fact that shows and movies with female characters can very rarely pass the Bechdel Rule. And it doesn't change the fact that I have been shaped and at times neutered by gender expectations the world holds even as my parents tried valiantly to raise me in a gender neutral environment. It doesn't change the fact that in saying that I don't know how to cook, I've been declared "a princess", but it is just expected for boys not to know how to cook. These are ways our world genders us. That isn't to say that some girls aren't more girly and some boys aren't more manly - and let's just acknowledge that sad state of affairs for a moment, shall we, that feminine behavior is given a childish and diminutive description and masculine behavior is given the grown up description; that right there is an affirmation that the inequality between the genders is more societally based than biologically based. But it does demonstrate how truly entwined the two are in creating who we are and who we grow up to be.

11 comments:

mikhailbakunin said...

If a woman wants to be a mechanic and is good at it and can fix my car up nice, let her have at it. If a man wants to be a kindergarden teacher and is good at it and can get all of those kids to take a nap, then what argument is there for not letting him?

I don't think that Rittelmeyer would disagree with that. I think what she's rejecting is the hostility to even the suggestion that biology may play a role in explaining why some fields are dominated by a particular gender. For example, when Larry Summers suggested that biology might explain part of the disparity between men and women working in the physical sciences, he was universally vilified.

Even if what Summers said is wrong (which it could be), isn't it outrageous that the man was condemned as a bigot for proposing a reasonable scientific hypothesis?

mikhailbakunin said...

One other point:

We can argue about wage disparities in specific professions, but the fact is that Labor Department statistics in general are based on single-variable correlations. They don't control for ANY other factors aside from gender. So, it's not entirely fair to say that those wage differences automatically imply discrimination - there could legitimate reasons for those disparities. For example, perhaps more men OWN their barbar shops, while more women work as employees.

petpluto said...

"Even if what Summers said is wrong (which it could be), isn't it outrageous that the man was condemned as a bigot for proposing a reasonable scientific hypothesis?"

If Larry Summers was the first person to ever postulate that women were just naturally bad at some academic field, yes. And I can almost say that the amount of ire directed at Larry Summers was over the top. But this is the same argument women have been facing for centuries at this point; this is the same hypothesis that has been proven wrong in areas like history and literature. There has been a strong historical trend of keeping women out of certain areas of study - the distinguished, well-paying areas, I might add - either by actual institutional rules or by pervasive pressure about what counts as feminine behavior and what does not. Larry Summers' argument, had he actually been testing it and not just using it as the trite excuse it was as to why more women weren't in sciences, may have been a valid one if actually done in a lab and separated from the historical context of women forever being told "you can't do that, because you can't handle it".

The reaction to Larry Summers wasn't wholly about Larry Summers, but toward a scientific community - and a society - that has continually postulated on the weakness of women. Even to this day, if girls do not perform as well on math and science tests as boys, it is biology. If boys' scores start to slip, it is blamed on the quality of education and the "feminizing" of education. I was pissed at Larry Summers as well, because even if he's fully within his scientific rights to reasonably theorize, taken within the context of female experience from being thought we can't throw a ball up and through the sciences is beyond infuriating. And it is too bad that Larry Summers was so completely vilified, and not exactly right; but at the same time, it is was less about Larry Summers as a person and more about women continually being thought of as being unable - by scientific fact! - to do X,Y, and Z. And whenever women succeed in a prestigious area (usually just as that area is being bumped down the prestige line while ze boys flock to some other area of expertise), the line about what women are biologically or genetically or scientifically capable of shifts to the Next Big Male Dominated Field. It really does become exasperating and frustrating and infuriating.

And what's more than that, if the scientific community actually is correct about it this time, that women actually are biologically incapable of succeeding in the maths and sciences to the same degree that men are, the community as a whole has pretty much used up its credibility on this particular subject with me. Maybe Summers was right, and this is where the line will finally be found. But because that line has been drawn and crossed so many times before, I'm going to take that report with a salt lick's worth of grains or salt.

As for Rittelmeyer, she's arguing for the inequality of the sexes. Even if science comes out and says, "Hey, women actually can't do math; weird, huh?", how come women are on the bottom of the hierarchical pole (and I assume they are in Rittelmeyer's world since the position she's arguing from is that of a defense of the traditional marriage and the 'complementary' roles men and women play within it)? I think it is because we as a society value things we associate with the masculine and devalue things we associate with the feminine. Not everything inherently exists on a hierarchical scale. Doctors and lawyers, for instance - two different skill sets, and yet they are (or were) able to coexist at the upper tiers of what are prestigious and well-paid occupations. Even if women are naturally inclined to clean and men are naturally inclined to not, why is one more valued than the other? The real problem with her argument for inequality of the sexes is that even if every other argument she makes is true, we have imposed that inequitable system upon ourselves. We are the ones who value what men do and what men bring to the table over what women do and what women bring to the table. So arguing for the inequitable nature of the sexes because unless things are the same they cannot be equal is a foolhardy argument in its own right - because it predicates the belief that we should value X over Y, without any explanation as to why we should other than because.

John said...

I was under the impression that there were precious few occupations that women were categorically inferior to men at performing (the only one I can think of now is fighter jet pilot, because of the effect of multiple Gs on a woman's physical structure.)

Is Rittlemyer really using "Read any great novel, ever" as proof that gender norms are a natural part of human life? That seems like a dodgy argument, to say the least.

I don't know about this whole argument. It seems like a rehash of the arguments that got tossed around 50 years ago, in the days of "separate, but equal." Are males biologically different from females? Of course. Should a person's rights or privileges be determined by his/her sex organs? That just seems silly.

mikhailbakunin said...

If Larry Summers was the first person to ever postulate that women were just naturally bad at some academic field, yes. And I can almost say that the amount of ire directed at Larry Summers was over the top. But this is the same argument women have been facing for centuries at this point; this is the same hypothesis that has been proven wrong in areas like history and literature . . . "you can't do that, because you can't handle it."

Let me begin by saying (just as a general caveat) that I don’t think women should be barred from any profession, I believe that socialization is an very significant factor in shaping gender roles, and I agree that workplace discrimination may account for some – though certainly not all – of the wage disparity between men and women.

Summers wasn’t just postulating; he was citing statistical research that showed dramatic differences between men and women in a number of areas (testing, etc.) related to the physical sciences. The data showed far more men at the top AND bottom of the sciences, and most women clustered in the middle – in other words, the variance among men was very different from the variance among women. Summers suggested that this may help to explain why there are so few women in high-level university positions in the physical sciences.

I think you and I would agree that questions like the one Summers was considering don’t really matter all that much on an individual basis. You could be (and probably are) way better than me at science. Your gender has nothing to do with it. The fact that there is GENERALLY less variance among women doesn’t mean that particular women can’t be incredible at science. But it may mean that, in general, there are fewer women who rise to the top of this profession.

If you don’t believe that it’s possible for there to be and kind of inherent difference between men and women, then you may attribute this solely to discrimination – and you may champion affirmative action programs to make SURE that there is “equality” in the number of men and women who achieve high-level positions.

Now, everything Summers said may be bullshit. Maybe there are no real differences. Maybe all of that variance can be attributed to socialization – women being discouraged from taking any interest in a traditionally masculine subject. I’m sure that’s part of it. But the fact that you can’t talk about gender demographics and biology without being called a sexist is pretty troubling to me.

I think that’s the point Rittelmeyer was trying to make.

petpluto said...

"I think that’s the point Rittelmeyer was trying to make."

I think you're wrong about the point Rittelmeyer was trying to make, and I think she made her point poorly. She wasn't just talking that there may be gendered differences, but that those gendered differences produce an immutable inequality, and that the inequality between the sexes is both fact (based on such compelling arguments like novels, as John points out, and the phrase "be a man") and reason to disallow gay marriage. Where in that argument is the good?

"the fact that you can’t talk about gender demographics and biology without being called a sexist is pretty troubling to me."

And while that may be troubling (and I agree that it is, to a point, so), I find it infinitely more troubling that scientific research has forever shown women to not be capable of succeeding in fields they clearly are able to. And there are still wounds open and people who are still alive and had experienced being pressured to take home ec over a more mentally stimulating course, and they aren't going to be happy to see and hear the things they've seen and heard a hundred times before being applied in this way. That doesn't mean that Summers was necessarily wrong (though I do believe that he is, to an extent, wrong and that tests and the like do not clearly and competently show where biological factors begin and where societal factors end), but it does mean that when you're exploring a meme that has been used to keep women down for centuries, a backlash is almost inevitable. Again, not fair, but understandable. Because there is still the mindset that one woman not being good at something = "girls suck at ___" where the opposite isn't true for boys, and that genuinely affects women.

But regardless, Larry Summers was not mentioned once in the article, nor was the backlash he endured (which he seems to have weathered fairly okay, seeing as he's now director of the White House National Economic Council). And I'm not saying your point is not a valid one, that scientists should be allowed to study these issues without fear of a public flogging; but at the same time, I think that scientists and other figures should recognize why such an outcry occurred. It isn't simply because feminists hate the idea of any differences between the sexes, but because of a very real and historical use of science to oppress women and block them from certain fields - in particular, the most respected and in many cases well paying fields.

"So, it's not entirely fair to say that those wage differences automatically imply discrimination - there could legitimate reasons for those disparities. For example, perhaps more men OWN their barbar shops, while more women work as employees."

I agree - to a point. If it were only in one or two cases where men earned more than women in similarly qualified professions, I would contend that your point may be the best explanation. And it very well may explain the difference in wages between barbers and hairdressers. But when most workers in feminized fields earn lower wages than most workers in masculinized fields, I think that - even owning for the different variables - there is in all probability a very real problem. Even if it is just how we see the importance of "women's work" versus "men's work".

mikhailbakunin said...

1) I think part of Rittelmeyer's point is that it's inconsistent for progressives to assert a biological basis for homosexuality, but then refuse to acknowledge a biological basis for gender. That's why I brought up Summers.

2) I can understand why people (especially women) react with such hostility to any suggestion of gender differences, but I can acknowledge the historical basis for that hostility and still roll my eyes at it. Ultimately, I think the moral outrage - all of the overblown rhetoric and indignation - is really, really bad for our country. It stifles dialogue. It inhibits progress. It places political correctness above truth and understanding. I obviously think it's important to combat gender discrimination, but the sensitivity surrounding gender issues often seems to distract us from pursuing the facts - which I believe leads to other kinds of inequity.

I feel the same way about racial tensions in America. I can acknowledge broadly that institutionalized racism exists, but still think that the touchiness and stubbornness of many black leaders HURTS our country (and reinforce racial hostility) far more than it helps African-Americans.

3) I don't agree with Rittelmeyer's argument about gay marriage, but I think she makes a very good point. More on that later. I have to go to bed now. Pbbbt.

petpluto said...

"I think part of Rittelmeyer's point is that it's inconsistent for progressives to assert a biological basis for homosexuality, but then refuse to acknowledge a biological basis for gender."

This is something I'm going to talk about more in-depth when I get into it in my next post, but I'll give a brief overview here; that argument is ridiculous. If gender and sexuality were inextricably linked, maybe she would have a point. But it isn't. That would be like arguing that because there is a biological basis my hair is red, then it is ridiculous to acknowledge a biological basis for gender. Just because one aspect of the human condition is decided by biology does not mean all are.

Secondly, through historical examination we can actually see how gender changes and shifts throughout the centuries. How blue was the color for baby girls until around the 1950s, etc. There's numerous examples. Meanwhile, as far as I know, there is no real proof as to the shifting of sexual alignment in society.

"I obviously think it's important to combat gender discrimination, but the sensitivity surrounding gender issues often seems to distract us from pursuing the facts - which I believe leads to other kinds of inequity."

Here's the thing: you can roll your eyes at it, but it is still an area of science that I would say anyone not white and male and straight has a right (and is right, IMO) to be suspicious of. The pursuance of facts, if we do it from a sexist perspective, doesn't always (or often) lead to the finding of facts. Even scientists can be biased, and even scientists can recognize patterns based on those biases. And so I don't think calling out old and often debunked scientific arguments is moral outrage that hinders progress. It may, but it also may expose something else that has hindered progress and that is the continued discouragement of women and minorities to enter certain fields.

There is room for both sides here, and I think dismissing a position that is suspicious of authority for good and historically sound reason, a position built upon not limiting scientific research but recognizing how that science has been manipulated in the past and therefore not taking it on faith that new findings are not also tinged by sexism (or racism) is to not recognize that this isn't about psychic wounds or about a time long past but a time that I would argue is still very much present.

As I said, maybe Summers et al are right and this is finally where the line will stay. But gender sensitivity in science isn't based upon this idea that PCness must be held but that a lack of PCness and a lack of recognition of societally prevalent sexism has often resulted in dubious science with regards to the relationship of biology and gender. We still do need watch groups for these things.

mikhailbakunin said...

[T]hat argument is ridiculous. If gender and sexuality were inextricably linked, maybe she would have a point. But it isn't . . . . Just because one aspect of the human condition is decided by biology does not mean all are.

You're really begging the question here. There's a lot of debate over what the term "gender" really means (the term itself comes from the same root as the word "gene"), and the degree to which biology impacts gender. I think it's pretty clear that there is a biological basis for gender. There are real and undeniable biological differences between men and women - differences in the way that our brains are hardwired. This isn't a debunked scientific argument at all.

Again, I think that socialization plays a major part in determining gender roles. But biology does, too. I just don't understand how you can make such a hard-line "nurture" argument with regard to gender.

petpluto said...

"I just don't understand how you can make such a hard-line "nurture" argument with regard to gender."

I've said it before, and I'll say it again - I'm not an advocate of the "just nurture" argument; I don't think personality, or strengths, or even necessarily interests are inherently determined by nurture. But I am extremely wary of the biological argument of what men and women can and cannot do - or which gender is better at what. It is almost impossible to separate biological factors from sociological factors; and so if someone like Larry Summers uses tests to decide that women are less likely to ascend to the highest echelons of scientific thought because of their biology based on tests of women and men who have grown up within the culture in question that devalues women especially in the sciences and maths, then I am not going to take that sort of conclusion on faith. Pull in past historical factors, and I would almost be a fool to do so.

"You're really begging the question here."

Rittelmeyer's entire article is begging the question. Rittelmeyer takes the dubious "fact" that what makes someone gay or straight is also responsible for what makes our brains "male" or "female" and uses that for the basis of much of her argument for biological gender differences, which in turn is the basis for her argument against gay marriage. The whole idea of "Gays are that way due to wiring, ergo men and women are different due to wiring" is not a proven fact.

And it isn't begging the question to suggest that just because sexual attraction may be biological based, it does not predicate that every other aspect of who we are is. I'm not arguing that sexual attraction is biologically based; I'm not arguing that gender is obviously and completely separate from biology. I'm saying that what Rittelmeyer states as fact is not one, and that there is no basis - scientific or otherwise - for believing that gender and sexual preference stem from the same biological point.

"I think it's pretty clear that there is a biological basis for gender. There are real and undeniable biological differences between men and women"

And I've never argued that there are not biological differences; but I think there are real and undeniable and historical proof that what we consider male and female behavior is not based solely or even mostly on biology but on societal decree. And given the amazing plasticity of the brain and how it is able to form new connections and how it is able to shift important tasks from area to area in the event of factors such as trauma, even the very set up of the brain is subject to societal influences. Again, not to say that men and women are totally and forever indistinguishable, because even if there is not one iota of stringent and solitary biological factors in what makes men's intelligence (both academic and social) different from women, there are more than enough sociological factors that can and do create a difference.

Gender is something I can acknowledge, and I do. But I can't discount perceptions and biases within any culture, or historical precedent when even those objective-oriented scientists evaluate data.

Jess said...

I think that the nature vs. nurture becomes such a chicken and egg question. In the article Jer linked to, it talks about more pronounced brain areas in men and in women. As a fact, this accounts for the modern brain, but we have no idea what the first humans' brains were like. It is wholly possible that as a result of society and nurturing, brains have changed, and thus the behaviors that were encouraged became more hardwired, turning nurture into nature.