Enter the mansplainer

December 6, 2012

There’s a little thing I’ve been noticing since posting more at The Standard.  Mansplaining.

…

Good, the Evil Feminist Jargon should have scared away the wankers.

Here’s the Know Your Meme summary.  Ah, the good old days of Livejournal.

In practice, it looks like this:

Woman blogger:  “It really bugs me how passionfruit cheesecake usually has those gritty pips on the top.”

Male commenter:  “You’re completely missing the point!  Cheesecake doesn’t have to be passionfruit flavoured!”

Because given two options:

1. the woman blogger likes passionfruit cheesecake except for the pips or
2. the feeble lady-brain is too small to encompass thoughts like “there are other types of cheesecake”,

… option 2 is obviously the one a rational, helpful dude is going to come to.

Woman blogger:  “I hate the way recreational drugs like marijuana are stigmatised by a society which embraces tobacco and alcohol.”

Male commenter:  “You and Barry Bonds!”

Because given two options:

1. engage with a thoughtful, step-by-step argument about recreational drug use
2. try to derail the conversation with something completely irrelevant and assume the feeble lady-typist won’t notice while you also try to associate her argument with a Big Bad Icon,

… option 2 is clearly the choice of guys who want to engage sincerely with your post.

Woman blogger:  “I really hated working in retail.”

Male commenter:  “Well, sure, but there are lots of other types of job out there and you shouldn’t be hating on all forms of paid and unpaid work.”

Because given two options:

1. the woman blogger is quite aware of the boundless variety of career paths in the world but was specifically commenting on a specific case which she specified
2. the silly bint doesn’t know what she’s typing!  She only thinks she’s mentioning a specific instance but everyone with ManVision (now in Technicolor) can see she’s talking about something completely different!

… option 2 is the one for men who respect your intellect and ability to determine what you want to talk about.

Woman blogger:  “Tonight I think I’ll have scrambled eggs for dinner.”

Male commenter:  “But you do realise don’t you that to get a souffle to properly rise you have to … [okay, QoT doesn’t actually know how souffles work but go with it anyway.]”

Because given two options:

1. a woman blogger is talking about a specific, fairly simple concept because that’s the concept she wants to talk about
2. you just don’t understand that there are more complex things related to that concept!  I must educate you!  For your own good!  Fuck what you actually posted about, my topic is far more important!

… you’ve almost certainly figured out the pattern by now, haven’t you?

I’m happy to be proven wrong, but I simply do not see this behaviour as frequently when dude-identified authors post.  Sure, you get the trolls, the pointless abuse (as opposed to pointed abuse, which I am of course largely in favour of), the derailing … but none of it seems to come from that same starting point of “Now see here, young lady …” and none of it could have the phrase “you silly bitch” added to the end without really changing the tone of the comment at all.

(Go on, try it.)

I know it’s one of the crosses I must bear as an avowed bloggerette.  And fuck knows it’s never going to change until we get some real social dynamic shifting going on.  But sometimes it does you good to vent.  Even if that just inspires more of the same …

Written by QoT Posted in Uncategorized Tagged with mansplaining, sigh