Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

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BRD-98
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by BRD-98 »

I'm leaving this lively debate behind me for good after this post so I don't get smacked by the ban hammer on the way out.
Rex Kramer wrote:There is justification for that position, too -- the very use of a gendered term always runs the risk of sexism, for one thing -- and I will even grant that people sometimes misuse the term in a sexist way, to dismiss the opinions of men just because they are men; but those people are clearly not employing the original intended use.
Oh dear, oh dear. Time to dust off the bagpipes!
Rex Kramer wrote:And the assertion that "mansplaining" is inherently offensive -- with the concurrent citation of patently ridiculous misuses of the word -- runs the risk of denigrating not just the word but the concept it represents: the disregard of the value of women's knowledge and opinions based on societal messages about women's worth.
I must say, I had real hope for this sentence. I've addressed the so-called "patently ridiculous misuses" above. Moreover, the "concept it represents" is completely based upon your preconceptions of societal structure, which, I guess, must be controlled by the Patriarchy™.
Lampy wrote:I don't think, just for example, that the term "manscaping" involves an assertion that all men are hairy. There's a bit of an overcharacterization happening, whether or not one agrees with Rex's correct assessment of context.
"Mansplaining" refers, pejoratively, to a negative action taken by a man that is injurious to someone else (typically a woman) because the man lacks the context or understanding of an issue due to his sex. "Manscaping" is just some silly portmanteau that would be much more difficult to use in a misandrist way. I don't see the connection, and I don't think Rex's assessment is anywhere near correct, but that's neither here nor there.
zakharov wrote:I've never been accused of "reverse sexism" before. It's almost as bad/hilarious as "reverse racism." I never thought this could happen to me on a game show message board. Thank you Internet!
Dude, from seeing your posts, I'm getting the feeling that "sexist" may work just fine.
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TheSunWillComeOut
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by TheSunWillComeOut »

BRD-98 wrote:
Rex Kramer wrote:And the assertion that "mansplaining" is inherently offensive -- with the concurrent citation of patently ridiculous misuses of the word -- runs the risk of denigrating not just the word but the concept it represents: the disregard of the value of women's knowledge and opinions based on societal messages about women's worth.
I must say, I had real hope for this sentence. I've addressed the so-called "patently ridiculous misuses" above. Moreover, the "concept it represents" is completely based upon your preconceptions of societal structure, which, I guess, must be controlled by the Patriarchy™.
Oh, honey:
BRD-98 wrote:I'm a junior at a very progressive high school who has its own diversity council, "affinity groups," and feminism club.
Forgive me for "adultsplaining," but I would advise spending at least a few years navigating the world outside a "very progressive high school" before you start correcting others with full confidence on how our entire culture actually works in practice.

Source: Been there, done that, got the university T-shirt.
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by Magna »

TheSunWillComeOut wrote:Source: Been there, done that, got the university T-shirt.
Ah, but do you still have the student loan payments?
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by lerr »

TheSunWillComeOut wrote:
lerr wrote:A comment elsewhere threw up red flags for me that he's still at it.
mike johnson
September 21, 2015 at 8:59 pm

Take your glasses off, Natalie. Let your hair down. [Playful toss of the hair]
That's not him. His writing style is more stilted than that.

Zach Horan is hardly the only person scrawling weird things on the internet about female J! players; his defining trait is that he does it to nearly all of them systematically, with a certain pattern that he varies slightly but from which he doesn't really deviate unless called on it, at which point stranger (far stranger than this) comments start coming out. I'm still getting the occasional icky comment since my run, but I know they're not from him because they don't sound like him.
Thanks for your thoughts. I did wonder if it was an impostor or someone not even intending to come across as him. I am glad I put it out there, though, just in case.
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by Rex Kramer »

BRD-98 wrote:
Rex Kramer wrote:There is justification for that position, too -- the very use of a gendered term always runs the risk of sexism, for one thing -- and I will even grant that people sometimes misuse the term in a sexist way, to dismiss the opinions of men just because they are men; but those people are clearly not employing the original intended use.
Oh dear, oh dear. Time to dust off the bagpipes!.
You are confused about several things, but this is the only one I can help you with. The "No True Scotsman" fallacy depends upon a subjective standard (like "true Scotsman" or "real American"). If someone is making an assertion about whether or not something is objectively determinable ("these people are not employing the original use"; "that water is not hot enough to boil"; etc.), then the No True Scotsman argument is not even possible, and attempting to use it just sounds silly ("oh, just because you say 80-degree water won't boil at sea level doesn't mean it won't!").

Rex
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by gnash »

Rex Kramer wrote:
gnash wrote:
Rex Kramer wrote:
BRD-98 wrote:If "mansplaining" is a real problem, so is a hypothetical equivalent, "womansplaining."
Yeah, and white lives matter, too!
Ugh. As much as I loved your previous post, this one contains a terrible analogy. "Black Lives Matter" does not project a message of reverse racism, either taken literally or as actually used.
There are PLENTY of people out there who disagree with you and say things like, "Oh, so you're saying that white lives don't matter? That Black lives are the only lives that matter? Or are you just saying that Black lives matter more than white lives? Either way, that is so racist!" (There is also the "So cops' lives don't matter?" rhetoric, which is logically the same but does not specifically involve reverse racism.) We can agree that those are neither the intended uses nor the most logical literal interpretations, but that won't change the facts that those readings exist and that the diversity of the English language means that there is some weak justification for such readings.
I am not buying any "weak justification". That interpretation is malicious, stupid, or both. Yes, there are PLENTY of malicious and stupid people. That doesn't make their interpretation valid.
gnash wrote:The term "mansplaining" clearly conveys reverse sexism.
There is justification for that position, too -- the very use of a gendered term always runs the risk of sexism, for one thing -- and I will even grant that people sometimes misuse the term in a sexist way, to dismiss the opinions of men just because they are men; but those people are clearly not employing the original intended use. If your true complaint is about the misuse of the term, I am on your bandwagon, for both humanitarian and linguistic reasons. But the fact that there are some people out there misusing the term does not invalidate the word entirely. I am still allowed to use the word "literally" properly, despite the prevalent improper use.
I don't see how the term is misused and how there can be a proper use of it, outside of comedy (where it is also not very good anymore because it's getting hackneyed). I don't see how you can interpret the word so that it does not imply that the actions of the person being criticized stem directly from that person being a man.
And the assertion that "mansplaining" is inherently offensive -- with the concurrent citation of patently ridiculous misuses of the word -- runs the risk of denigrating not just the word but the concept it represents: the disregard of the value of women's knowledge and opinions based on societal messages about women's worth.
That's a fallacious argument. A worthy concept can be expressed in words that don't pervert it or turn the speaker into an equivalent of the intended target of critique. But there are plenty of terrible words commonly being used (or, rather, misused) for something intended to sound positive. Take, for example, Citizens' Crusade Against Poverty and many other uses of "crusade". Obviously well-intentioned, but named for genocidal pillage campaigns. I hope I don't need to mention how much worse the word sounds today than in 1964, with all our military adventures in the Middle East that happened in the meantime. Yet, why would the fact that "crusade" is an inherently offensive word denigrate the concept of various positive campaigns to which it has been applied, such as efforts to lift people from poverty? (You could say similar things about "War on Poverty", but not every war has been as evil as the Crusades.)
This is precisely what happened to the term "politically correct", which started off as a well-intentioned term to gently point out culturally inconsiderate behavior. The misuses of the term were wildly played up by that portion of our society that does not believe it should be forced to admit or confront cultural inconsiderateness, until in the eyes of the public "political correctness" became a grotesque symbol for overreaching closeminded authority. And now the phrase is used as a cudgel to beat down any criticism of actually culturally inconsiderate behavior.
That's another term that clearly never should have been used, and no one in their right mind would ever have come up with it. The connotation of language imposed from authority, of Newspeak, is unavoidable. Imagine how those of us who grew up under an authoritarian system of government feel about the term.
It is a well-used reactionary ploy that Orwell would recognize: if someone attempts to identify a previously unarticulated (or not well articulated) injustice by coining a new term for it, first you ridicule the term, and eventually you can ridicule the injustice as well.

Orwell would also recognize that how you coin a new term influences the way people will think about the concept. If the new term implies that negative behavior is conditioned by gender, its usage will make people think the behavior is in fact caused by gender (and will, in turn, make people of that gender defensive about it). If the term implies political authority over language, it will make proponents more likely to impose such authority, and it will make people who want to perpetuate prejudices through language oppose legitimate criticism by claiming victimhood at the hands of such authority.
I understand why those of us who care about language and logic would be offended by the misuses of the term "mansplaining", but I would not allow those concerns to play into the hands of those who would just prefer we not even recognize that women are sometimes treated poorly because they are women, by men who do so because of what society has taught them.

Rex
Caring about language and logic, I am a bit offended by such an argument. (OK, I'm kidding about "offended", I just think it's a bad argument.) I won't repeat why, as I've already explained it. BTW, men are also sometimes treated poorly because they are men, by women who do so because of what society has taught them. (I won't get into "who does more" - both are prevalent, both are bad, and neither can justify the other.) We don't have a word for it and, frankly, I don't think we should. We definitely shouldn't if such a word carried a negative connotation about women's nature.
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

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#JeopardyLivesMatter
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

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harrumph wrote:#JeopardyLivesMatter
A little bit TOO much to ZH.
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by Vanya »

I agree (!) with gnash about mansplaining, although I'm not sure how much language influences behavior in a free society. AFAICT, mansplaining hasn't caught on; on this board is the first time I heard it. I do take issue with comparing it to "crusade," as that word in its definition of "lead or take part in an energetic and organized campaign concerning a social, political, or religious issue" is far removed from the foreign entanglements of the middle ages.
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by Vanya »

TheSunWillComeOut wrote:
Forgive me for "adultsplaining," but I would advise spending at least a few years navigating the world outside a "very progressive high school" before you start correcting others with full confidence on how our entire culture actually works in practice.

Source: Been there, done that, got the university T-shirt.
So you dismiss BRD because of his age, yet you hate it when people dismiss you because you are a woman.
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by Magna »

Vanya wrote:So you dismiss BRD because of his age, yet you hate it when people dismiss you because you are a woman.
I read it as based on her perception of BRD's inexperience.
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by TheSunWillComeOut »

Magna wrote:
Vanya wrote:So you dismiss BRD because of his age, yet you hate it when people dismiss you because you are a woman.
I read it as based on her perception of BRD's inexperience.
This. Frankly, I leaned much more toward BRD's reading of the world when I was his age - we're all equal, aren't we? What's this fuss about? We solved all that sexism stuff back in the '60s, didn't we? Navigating life outside the classroom as a grown woman and running into various previously invisible gendered road blocks along the way has significantly altered my views on this.

Again, nothing against BRD himself - I think most of us here were that same sort of bright teenager who's already figured out many important lessons about the way the world works long before others do, but lacks the life experience necessary to accurately shade in between the lines of those views. I called him on it because I recognize it from my own background. Books alone do not give the full scope of how messy life is, how all the self-reliance and self-confidence in the world isn't always enough to overcome institutional barriers (not limited to sexism, either - also race, class, etc.).
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by Rex Kramer »

gnash wrote:I don't see how you can interpret the word so that it does not imply that the actions of the person being criticized stem directly from that person being a man.
Okay, okay. No need to get hysterical.

Rex

P.S. -- As usual, gnash's logic and precision is at least as coherent as my fustian, if not more so. As he is basically right, and yet so am I, I can only conclude that our disagreement stems from an irreconcilable difference of opinion about the meaning and the use of "mansplaining": I believe it means "basing one's condescension on the fact of one's maleness", and gnash seems to believe it means "compelled to condescension by one's maleness". Sort of like the distinction between those who think New Yorkers are obnoxious when they won't stop boasting about how great their city is, and those who think New Yorkers are obnoxious because living there contorts their souls. I suppose you could believe both at once.
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by Bamaman »

I had never heard of mansplaining before, much less that people had such passionate opinions on it.
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by JyV92 »

Fwiw, men. "mansplain" to other men all the time. the example is that a man meets a woman at a party, the subject of physics comes up. And the man, an amateur of science, starts to explain something to the woman about physics. He hasn't bothered to ask her if she knows anything about the field, and in our case, she's a professional physicist with a federally funded lab at a major research institution.

But two guys may go through the same thing. But when the assumption on the part of the mansplainer is pointed out, it doesn't reinforce a cultural assumption that the other fellow didn't know as much about physics. In the mixed gender discussion, the assumption is reinforced by sexist assumptions. So there you go. My two cents.
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by Magna »

JyV92 wrote:But two guys may go through the same thing.
I agree that definitely happens more than you'd think.
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by gnash »

Rex Kramer wrote:
gnash wrote:I don't see how you can interpret the word so that it does not imply that the actions of the person being criticized stem directly from that person being a man.
Okay, okay. No need to get hysterical.

Rex
Well played. (Though few English (or probably any other non-Greek) speakers would even get the idea to think of the etymology until they needed a hysterectomy.)
P.S. -- As usual, gnash's logic and precision is at least as coherent as my fustian, if not more so. As he is basically right, and yet so am I, I can only conclude that our disagreement stems from an irreconcilable difference of opinion about the meaning and the use of "mansplaining": I believe it means "basing one's condescension on the fact of one's maleness", and gnash seems to believe it means "compelled to condescension by one's maleness". Sort of like the distinction between those who think New Yorkers are obnoxious when they won't stop boasting about how great their city is, and those who think New Yorkers are obnoxious because living there contorts their souls. I suppose you could believe both at once.
I agree that our disagreement is small as measured by the Pythagorean distance of our positions in the space of possible opinions, but then such differences often lead to both the most fervent and the most logically argued debates. Little debate is really possible when people come to it from different universes.

But I am fond of New York, and if I could afford to live there, I would, and I'd be very much tempted to condescension of others based on my New Yorkness.
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by gnash »

JyV92 wrote:Fwiw, men. "mansplain" to other men all the time. the example is that a man meets a woman at a party, the subject of physics comes up. And the man, an amateur of science, starts to explain something to the woman about physics. He hasn't bothered to ask her if she knows anything about the field, and in our case, she's a professional physicist with a federally funded lab at a major research institution.

But two guys may go through the same thing. But when the assumption on the part of the mansplainer is pointed out, it doesn't reinforce a cultural assumption that the other fellow didn't know as much about physics. In the mixed gender discussion, the assumption is reinforced by sexist assumptions. So there you go. My two cents.
I agree 100%, and would add that women do that too (to both women and men).
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by brick »

Rex Kramer wrote:
gnash wrote:I don't see how you can interpret the word so that it does not imply that the actions of the person being criticized stem directly from that person being a man.
Okay, okay. No need to get hysterical.

Rex

P.S. -- As usual, gnash's logic and precision is at least as coherent as my fustian, if not more so. As he is basically right, and yet so am I, I can only conclude that our disagreement stems from an irreconcilable difference of opinion about the meaning and the use of "mansplaining": I believe it means "basing one's condescension on the fact of one's maleness", and gnash seems to believe it means "compelled to condescension by one's maleness". Sort of like the distinction between those who think New Yorkers are obnoxious when they won't stop boasting about how great their city is, and those who think New Yorkers are obnoxious because living there contorts their souls. I suppose you could believe both at once.

I have to ask. Is your use of the word 'hysterical' intentional irony?
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Re: Zach Horan (legendneverdies) Banned

Post by brick »

No. Men do not mansplain to one another and women do not mansplain to anyone. Those are examples of garden variety condescension. Mansplaining is a very specific subset of condescension. Conflating the two and talking about them as though they are the same thing utterly misses the point.
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