Highlights
\nIn her third chapter called \u201cDiscriminating Sexism,\u201d Manne delves into the relationship between sexism and misogyny. While she acknowledges that misogyny could have a more general definition that encompasses \u201cany belief, claim, or narrative that portrays women as inherently or naturally inferior to their male counterparts,\u201d she argues that her ameliorative proposal has \u201cthe advantage of inviting a clean, useful contrast between misogyny and sexism\u201d (78). <\/p>\n
\u201cSexism,\u201d she explains, \u201coften works by naturalizing sex differences, in order to justify patriarchal social arrangements\u201d (79). She says, \u201cIt will often consist in assumptions, beliefs, theories, stereotypes, and broader cultural narratives that represent men and women as importantly different in ways that\u2026 would make rational people more inclined to support and participate in patriarchal social arrangements\u201d (79). Put sexism in dialogue with misogyny, however, and Manne explains that whereas sexism \u201cwill tend to discriminate between men and women\u2026 misogyny will typically differentiate between good women and bad ones, and punish the latter\u201d (79-80). Misogyny, as the policer and enforcer, \u201cattempts to force women back into [the female archetype], or punish them for desertion. Alternatively, it may punish women for taking men\u2019s place or trying to\u201d (84). <\/p>\n
In the workings of misogyny, however, Manne explains that it is \u201crelated\u2026 to this important form of patriarchal thought, a subject of considerable interest to feminists. The idea is that a central feature of personhood\u2013namely, autonomy\u2013can be denied in cases of sexual objectification in one of the following two distinct ways:\u201d the non-attribution of autonomy to a subject, and the violation of autonomy to a subject. <\/p>\n
Non-attribution cases \u201cmay be the result of an agent\u2019s being ignorant of a subject\u2019s fully autonomous and minded nature, or perhaps just not caring about what (or, rather who) she really is\u201d (86). The violation cases \u201cof objectification often result from an agent positively desiring to disrupt a subject\u2019s peace of mind or to \u2018get inside her head,\u2019 by overriding her will, causing her to suffer, or violating her bodily integrity\u201d (86). Ultimately, these forms of treatment can serve as both punishment and \u201cways of diffusing the psychic threat that certain women pose\u2026 there is always a threat toward women lurking\u2026\u201d (86). And, as Manne explains, these \u201csmackdowns\u201d aiming to keep women \u201cin line\u201d \u201chave primarily taken the form of sexual harassment, sexual assault, and grade-school insults of the women who cross or threaten them\u201d (86). <\/p>\n
Manne then uses Donald Trump to demonstrate the possibility of misogyny without sexism in practice. She says, \u201cThe metaphor of misogyny as the law enforcement branch of a patriarchal order is particularly apt here, given (a) Trump\u2019s marketing of himself as the \u201claw and order candidate,\u201d and (b) his being the embodiment of toxic masculinity\u2026 misogyny taken alone involves anxieties, fears, and desires to maintain a social order, and commitment to storing it when it is disrupted\u201d (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 \u201che needs to control them, and head off the risk of their outshining him\u201d (89), thus, she believes, he demonstrates misogynistic practices. <\/p>\n
From there, Manne makes three crucial points about misogyny (abbreviated here):
\n1. 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. <\/p>\n
2. Misogyny comprises of social practices and institutions, as well as agents\u2019 actions and attitudes, toward women. <\/p>\n
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 \u201cbrown bodies\u201d for \u201cabortion crimes\u201d as an example. <\/p>\n
But when misogyny points the finger at a specific woman, Manne tries to answer the question: \u201cWhat are women held to be guilty of doing or being?\u201d Her answer: it\u2019s all in the context misogyny frames their actions in. Women who seek abortions, for example, \u201care a blank canvas on which to protect a set of grievances borne of unmet felt needs in turn borne a sense of entitlement\u2026 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 \u201cit has led to resentment, anxiety, and misogynistic backlash\u2026 [it] may manifest itself when women\u2019s capabilities become more salient and hence demoralizing or threatening\u201d (102). <\/p>\n
Ultimately, Manne argues that \u201cwomen who reverse gendered hierarchies and aspire to masculine-coded social roles are therefore liable to provoke misogyny\u2026 even if women like Clinton aren\u2019t 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\u201d (102). But when it comes to gender, \u201cthe notion of implicit bias seems to be ambiguous between inchoate sexism and inchoate misogyny\u201d (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 \u201cbloodthirsty and callous than Newman\u2019s murdering mothers\u201d (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.<\/p>\n
Questions
\n1. Manne says, \u201cSexism often works by naturalizing sex differences, in order to justify patriarchal social arrangements\u2026 [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\u201d (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\u2019s 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\u2019s argument about Donald Trump here\u2026]<\/p>\n
2. Manne says that \u201ca central feature of personhood\u2013namely, autonomy\u2013can be denied in cases of sexual objectification in one of the following two distinct ways:\u201d Non-attribution cases \u201cmay be the result of an agent\u2019s being ignorant of a subject\u2019s fully autonomous and minded nature, or perhaps just not caring about what (or, rather who) she really is\u201d (86). The violation cases \u201cof objectification often result from an agent positively desiring to disrupt a subject\u2019s peace of mind or to \u2018get inside her head,\u2019 by overriding her will, causing her to suffer, or violating her bodily integrity\u201d (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?<\/p>\n
3. Manne argues that women are \u201cguilty\u201d of entitlement, as well as (in the cases of Fluke and women who want to abort) \u201cfailing to nurture, refusing to give life, or to care for the vulnerable\u201d (100). Putting this in conversation with Strawson\u2019s reactive attitudes, do we see this argument (which points the \u201cguilty\u201d finger at women) more so as something coming from a place of hostile misogyny? Or is it a result of \u201cresentment, anxiety, and misogynistic backlash? Is hostility capable of being a form of backlash, but the reverse is not possible? Refer to the previous class\u2019s discussion to answer this question as well\u2026 could years of the reactive emotion of resentment lead to hostility (a theory)?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Highlights In her third chapter called \u201cDiscriminating Sexism,\u201d Manne delves into the relationship between sexism and misogyny. While she acknowledges that misogyny could have a more general definition…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":315,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-316","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-questions"],"splot_meta":{"author":"Katherine Finch and Steven Chen","license":"","source":"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2019\/05\/12\/opinion\/letters\/family-working-women.html"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallegft.sites.wfu.edu\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallegft.sites.wfu.edu\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallegft.sites.wfu.edu\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallegft.sites.wfu.edu\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallegft.sites.wfu.edu\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=316"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gallegft.sites.wfu.edu\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":673,"href":"https:\/\/gallegft.sites.wfu.edu\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316\/revisions\/673"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallegft.sites.wfu.edu\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallegft.sites.wfu.edu\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=316"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallegft.sites.wfu.edu\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=316"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallegft.sites.wfu.edu\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=316"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}