Highlights
In her third chapter called “Discriminating Sexism,” Manne delves into the relationship between sexism and misogyny. While she acknowledges that misogyny could have a more general definition that encompasses “any belief, claim, or narrative that portrays women as inherently or naturally inferior to their male counterparts,” she argues that her ameliorative proposal has “the advantage of inviting a clean, useful contrast between misogyny and sexism” (78).
“Sexism,” she explains, “often works by naturalizing sex differences, in order to justify patriarchal social arrangements” (79). She says, “It will often consist in assumptions, beliefs, theories, stereotypes, and broader cultural narratives that represent men and women as importantly different in ways that… would make rational people more inclined to support and participate in patriarchal social arrangements” (79). Put sexism in dialogue with misogyny, however, and Manne explains that whereas sexism “will tend to discriminate between men and women… misogyny will typically differentiate between good women and bad ones, and punish the latter” (79-80). Misogyny, as the policer and enforcer, “attempts to force women back into [the female archetype], or punish them for desertion. Alternatively, it may punish women for taking men’s place or trying to” (84).
In the workings of misogyny, however, Manne explains that it is “related… to this important form of patriarchal thought, a subject of considerable interest to feminists. The idea is that a central feature of personhood–namely, autonomy–can be denied in cases of sexual objectification in one of the following two distinct ways:” the non-attribution of autonomy to a subject, and the violation of autonomy to a subject.
Non-attribution cases “may be the result of an agent’s being ignorant of a subject’s fully autonomous and minded nature, or perhaps just not caring about what (or, rather who) she really is” (86). The violation cases “of objectification often result from an agent positively desiring to disrupt a subject’s peace of mind or to ‘get inside her head,’ by overriding her will, causing her to suffer, or violating her bodily integrity” (86). Ultimately, these forms of treatment can serve as both punishment and “ways of diffusing the psychic threat that certain women pose… there is always a threat toward women lurking…” (86). And, as Manne explains, these “smackdowns” aiming to keep women “in line” “have primarily taken the form of sexual harassment, sexual assault, and grade-school insults of the women who cross or threaten them” (86).
Manne then uses Donald Trump to demonstrate the possibility of misogyny without sexism in practice. She says, “The metaphor of misogyny as the law enforcement branch of a patriarchal order is particularly apt here, given (a) Trump’s marketing of himself as the “law and order candidate,” and (b) his being the embodiment of toxic masculinity… misogyny taken alone involves anxieties, fears, and desires to maintain a social order, and commitment to storing it when it is disrupted” (88). One example Manne uses here is the fact that Trump employs many successful women. While this is not sexist (under her definition), she says “he needs to control them, and head off the risk of their outshining him” (89), thus, she believes, he demonstrates misogynistic practices.
From there, Manne makes three crucial points about misogyny (abbreviated here):
1. People can show hostility toward women who are held to wrong others, including those deemed the most vulnerable and in need of defending, protection, and justice.
2. Misogyny comprises of social practices and institutions, as well as agents’ actions and attitudes, toward women.
3. Misogyny and racism are inseparably connected; and the treatment of nonwhite women (especially poor ones) within a white supremacy seems particularly liable to encompass various forms of erasure (90-91). Here, Manne uses the incarceration of “brown bodies” for “abortion crimes” as an example.
But when misogyny points the finger at a specific woman, Manne tries to answer the question: “What are women held to be guilty of doing or being?” Her answer: it’s all in the context misogyny frames their actions in. Women who seek abortions, for example, “are a blank canvas on which to protect a set of grievances borne of unmet felt needs in turn borne a sense of entitlement… Fluke also felt illicitly entitled. She expected something from [the American taxpayer], without repaying them in the coin of personal attention. And underneath it all, in the background, she was failing to nurture, refusing to give life or to care for the vulnerable (100). While feminism has been successful in many ways, Manne argues that “it has led to resentment, anxiety, and misogynistic backlash… [it] may manifest itself when women’s capabilities become more salient and hence demoralizing or threatening” (102).
Ultimately, Manne argues that “women who reverse gendered hierarchies and aspire to masculine-coded social roles are therefore liable to provoke misogyny… even if women like Clinton aren’t subject to false beliefs or defunct gendered stereotypes per se, they may be viewed and treated in a hostile way precisely because of their manifest competence” (102). But when it comes to gender, “the notion of implicit bias seems to be ambiguous between inchoate sexism and inchoate misogyny” (103). The real question, Manne says, is: How much moral criticism do women face, and how much damage does this do to their moral reputation, in relation to their male counterparts? Manne argues that Clinton was depicted as more entitles than Fluke, and more “bloodthirsty and callous than Newman’s murdering mothers” (104). Therefore, it would be practical to answer this question by saying that women do, indeed, face misogynistic incentives, as well as (largely) moralistic suspicion from our society.
Questions
1. Manne says, “Sexism often works by naturalizing sex differences, in order to justify patriarchal social arrangements… [it] will tend to discriminate between men and women, typically by allegating sex differences beyond what is known or could be known, and sometimes counter to our best current scientific evidence. Misogyny will typically differentiate between good women and bad ones, and punishes the latter” (79-80). On this basis, in action, do we think that Misogyny can exist without Sexism? Could Sexism exist without Misogyny? Could they exist separately? For clarification, if someone is acting sexist, is that always a result of misogyny’s enforcement of the patriarchy? And if someone is being a misogynist, can that person even be a misogynist without being sexist? [Let us discuss Manne’s argument about Donald Trump here…]
2. Manne says that “a central feature of personhood–namely, autonomy–can be denied in cases of sexual objectification in one of the following two distinct ways:” Non-attribution cases “may be the result of an agent’s being ignorant of a subject’s fully autonomous and minded nature, or perhaps just not caring about what (or, rather who) she really is” (86). The violation cases “of objectification often result from an agent positively desiring to disrupt a subject’s peace of mind or to ‘get inside her head,’ by overriding her will, causing her to suffer, or violating her bodily integrity” (86). Do we believe that this denial of autonomy exists in all forms of sexism and misogyny? For clarification, do we think that exists as the underlying (consciously or subconsciously) intention of all forms of sexist and misogynistic acts? Or perhaps one (sexism or misogyny) and not the other?
3. Manne argues that women are “guilty” of entitlement, as well as (in the cases of Fluke and women who want to abort) “failing to nurture, refusing to give life, or to care for the vulnerable” (100). Putting this in conversation with Strawson’s reactive attitudes, do we see this argument (which points the “guilty” finger at women) more so as something coming from a place of hostile misogyny? Or is it a result of “resentment, anxiety, and misogynistic backlash? Is hostility capable of being a form of backlash, but the reverse is not possible? Refer to the previous class’s discussion to answer this question as well… could years of the reactive emotion of resentment lead to hostility (a theory)?
Shared by: Katherine Finch and Steven Chen
Image Credit: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/12/opinion/letters/family-working-women.html