queerbychoice | Sexist Biological Essentialism on AlterNet

I just submitted the following to AlterNet's feedback form:

The reason I started reading AlterNet was to see articles written from a pro-equality perspective. The new article "My Problem with Her Anger" by Eric Bartels, however, instead assaulted my eyes with sexist claims about "the degree of intuition and empathy that seem an integral (natural) part of a woman's nurturing instinct." It's a betrayal of everything that AlterNet supposedly stands for when AlterNet actively helps perpetuate the patriarchal myth that biology rather than patriarchy is what stuck women with an unequal share of the childcare, that women posses some fictional "nurturing instinct" beyond what men possess that causes having an unequal share of these chores forced upon them to just magically not really be as unpleasant for them as men know perfectly well that it would be if they men were stuck doing it.

If I cannot receive any assurance that AlterNet is a forum I can read without its writers actively oppressing me in their writings here, the unnecessary stress added to my life by encountering such statements here will cause me to stop reading AlterNet at all.

I can't imagine why they ever published that article in the first place. It's just some guy complaining for several pages that his wife complains too much, and although I can agree with him that based on the quotes he provided it seems that the tone of the conversations in their household would make their household an unpleasant place to live, the question of exactly how the anger level in their household escalated to the point of such rudeness and to what extent the fault lies with her or with him is very difficult to determine when we only hear his own version of it in this article. As a result, the political analysis viability of the article is pretty much zero, and then he makes it even worse when the ridiculous "Men Are from Mars"-style of gender-relations "analysis" he attempts to tack on is just blatantly sexist and insulting.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

The issue is that it was published on AlterNet, and I have a problem with AlterNet publishing things that aren't "supposed to be a non-sexist fair view of things." If it had been published on, say, MSN, I would consider it totally standard MSN crap that I just have to put up with. But AlterNet bills itself as a pro-equality website working to put an end to war, hatred, class oppression, and discrimination. When AlterNet starts publishing pieces that aren't "supposed to be a non-sexist fair view of things," that's like if Alan Keyes's senate campaign suddenly turned out to be financed by the NAACP.

Except the actual article, I feel, isn't sexist. What you cited wasn't an article, it was an exerpt from two books. The actual article was the interview of the editors, which I thought was fair and insightful.

Nothing in the interview apologized for or retracted the sexist biological essentialism statement made in the excerpt, and I do not find it acceptable for alternet to publish statements like that (regardless of whether the statements appear in "articles" or "book excepts") unless it is for the purpose of actively and specifically criticizing those statements.

Nothing there did, but I believe, when I looked up to two books, that they are essays by many different people with many different extreme and different viewpoints.

I think you are missing the point of the essay. It is an "example." It is pretty obviously an example of how traditionalist views make it difficult for men to understand the frustration a woman feels in child rearing and marriage sometimes.

I think they do deal with it, although indirectly in the interview

"Often they aren't the bad guys so much as they're the most convenient recipients of their wives' frustrations. But also, traditional role models are hard to shake. No matter how enlightened we all try to be, many of us spent our entire childhoods absorbing the often more traditional roles of our parents. So it's not so surprising, to me at least, that we lapse into those roles every now and then."

"CATHI: I'm not advocating a return to traditional roles"

I think by those comments, and the rest of their interviews, they make it clear that their essays are "studies of behaviors" and that they don't support all of the views presented. I don't think they could since those views are conflicting.

For example, there's an essay of a stay at home father, whom I'm sure doesn't share the kind of opinion that this fellow does. Altnet probably picked this as an except because it was so inflammatory.

If they were going to pick an excerpt because it was inflammatory and offensive, they should have refuted the inflammatory statements. They did not. The fact that not all the essays say such things is not good enough for me. I do not believe AlterNet should publish sexist statements unless they simultaneously publish a specific refutation of those statements. Nothing whatsoever in the interview quote that you cited here clarified that the notion that women are born with a biological 'nurturing instinct' that men are not is sexist nor that it is incorrect. For that reason, the interview does not constitute a refutation. By "specific refutation" I mean an asterisk after the statement, followed by a notation at the bottom of the page stating: "AlterNet absolutely does not support this sexist notion of that women are born with a biological 'nurturing instinct' that men are not." If they fail to publish such a statement or to email me promising never to publish sexist assertions of biological determinism again, I'm not going to continue reading their RSS feed.

The link to the interview is on the front page of Altnet. And the two articles you've listed are exerpts.

Sexist Biological Essentialism on AlterNet

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject