Battling sexism

Recently there have been yet more stories centred around sexism and misogyny in our culture. I’d like to discuss two that have interested me this week.

At least they got the apostrophes right..? Via guardian.co.uk

A battle won

Today, thankfully, there has been some Good News! A rarity, it sometimes seems, and something to be celebrated. Congratulations to the Science Museum and everyone who spoke up about Boots separating their children’s toys by gender, and including the sciencey ones only in the boys’ section.

Other retailers have binned this outdated, damaging stereotyping behaviour so, while it’s unfortunate that it’s taken a company like Boots so long, it’s good to see them following suit.

“…It’s clear we have got this signage wrong, and we’re taking immediate steps to remove it from store.” – Boots

Yes, it’s wrong. I’ve said so before and will continue to be angered by needless gender separations in stores for e.g. toys and magazines.

It may well be a bit of a chicken and egg situation. So they say they organised it with the separation because of “customer feedback” – parents want to find toys for their boy/girl easily? They can’t just browse a toys section and pick out something they’d like?

photo by Andrew Holding

To be honest, that sounds like it’s parental stereotyping at work. I’m not going to buy dolls for my boys or cars for my girls, that wouldn’t be right. Well, parents, I implore you – consider your child as a person, irrespective of their genitals/chromosomes, and encourage them in what they enjoy, what they find fascinating, whether you think it’s “gender-appropriate” or not. Be better.

Unfortunately there are other stores – such as Morrisons and Clarks (see image) – who continue to separate toys like this, and it’s frustrating for some parents. Read more in this article by Andrew Holding.

Edit: I have also contacted Wilkinson regarding their toy section that I spotted in Stratford recently. Through this I have discovered this excellent Twitter account, LetToysBeToys! They even have a petition.

A new conflict

You may also have heard that the Bank of England is suggesting that Churchill replace Elizabeth Fry on our £5 notes, which would likely come into effect in a few years, in 2016. This would leave no women on our banknotes. If you really think people are so stupid that you have to point out that the Queen is a woman, you are entirely missing the point. If I must explain, the figures on our notes (apart from the current monarch) are there because of their achievements; their contributions to society and UK progress. Not because they were born into a royal family. So be quiet.

At first glance, this might not seem like the worst thing. The figures on our bank notes change periodically, when we have to redesign the notes to counter fraud. Elizabeth Fry has been on £5 notes since 2002, and we had Florence Nightingale on £10 notes from 1975 to 1994. But they are the only two women, and replacing Fry will erase all acknowledgment of female achievement from our notes for some time – unless one of the others is redesigned with a new female figure at the same time.

Today’s BBC Radio 4 Woman’s Hour episode included a discussion on the banknotes decision (8 mins long in the link). Plenty of female candidates were pointed out; that most won’t have heard of many of them, despite their amazing work (for example, Beatrice Webb, economist and co-founder of the LSE), is surely reason to increase visibility of forgotten female influences in our history.

Wut about the menz?

I do not accept the argument that history has recorded men as the winners, therefore we should accurately represent that. Here and now we are trying to create a more equal society (well, some of us are) and part of that is doing what we can to correct the mistakes of the past. Acknowledge that sexism and misogyny are alive and well, and used to be even worse – so let’s pull the suppressed achievements of women out of the dark and show them to people living and growing up now. Similar instances of just that include the edit-a-thons in which people have dedicated time to editing pages to give due credit to women, for example in the history of science.

This is important for young women (and men) – to realise that gender is not a barrier to achievement, despite what the history books may show. These little sexist acts build up, and while lacking female role models on banknotes may be a little thing in isolation, it’s one of many that add together to give young people the message that women are underachieving and undeserving of recognition.

I do not agree that striving to have at least one woman on our notes, giving some small recognition to the contributions of approximately half of the population that have been systematically erased, is overcompensating or being unfair to men. Striving for something closer to equality instead of extreme (pro-male) bias, whether that bias be “historically-accurate” or not, is not overcompensating, only pushing for equality. That’s feminism, it’s not asking for no men to be recognised, only to make a positive change that will address an imbalance.

Aside from the gender balance issue, there are other reasons we might object to putting Churchill in particular on our notes (thanks to Liz for pointing that one out).

This will depend on your view of what our currency is for. If you think it’s simply a leaf out of the history books, then this is unlikely to bother you.  The Guardian have picked up on the story and are running a poll. If, however, you would like to object to the removal of all female achievers from our bank notes, you can sign the petition. Also follow @weekwoman and @TheWomensRoomUK on Twitter for more.

Edit: spectacularly on-topic and brilliant is Suzanne Moore’s article today about successful women eschewing feminism as if they don’t need it and never benefited from it. I have had direct experience of this kind of sentiment and am very glad someone has hit the nail on the head with a piece like this.

Another edit: I have also had a rant about the banknotes on this week’s Pod Delusion. Indeed, it is worth acknowledging that Clydesdale bank do in fact have two women on their banknotes; Mary Slessor on the £10 note (bit of a double-edged sword; women’s rights yay! Christianity-spreading boo) and Elsie Inglis on the £50 note – an excellent physician and suffragist.

LiftGate: QEDcon2013

Hello everyone.

So you know before we get going, some of this is meant to be tongue-in-cheeck, mainly because I wanted to make use of a pun. It’s also got little serious bits in it and partly it’s because I just got home from QED and I need a bit more of it in my life before I let it go for another year…

Also I haven’t been blogging much lately, I don’t know why. Haven’t been inspired, also busy with new job(s) and imminent moving house! I didn’t write a post about QEDcon 2012 because I was mega-stressed with thesis-writing at the time (nearly couldn’t attend because of it) but this year I shall follow from the 2011 posts:

I love QED

As does everyone I speak to who’s been. This was its third year and it certainly lived up to expectations based on the last two. I’d looked forward to it since I left in 2012; extremely tired on the Sunday evening, I slept through the whole train journey back to Euston. Cleverly, this year I booked the room for Sunday night too – to anyone who can afford a bit of Monday off and the extra expense, I highly recommend this!

Some of the organisers are good friends of mine (do listen to Skeptics with a K if you haven’t before; one of my favourite podcasts! Also check out the infrequent but giggle-inducing InKredulous) but even if they weren’t I’d still have to give them many hugs/hi-5s/no-contact congratulations (delete as preferred) because, together with all the volunteers, they do a truly amazing job. I think I’ll be joining their ranks next year!

Highlights

Rocking up on Friday evening for the mixer in the bar, coming back to a now familiar place and seeing lots of familiar faces (as well as plenty of new ones!) is brilliant. Some drinks, some chat, some hugs and a lot of excitement.

On Sunday we made a bit of a snap decision to listen to Natalie Haynes talk about similarities between Greek tragedies and soap operas, and the relevance of other classical authors such as Pliny, Juvenal and Virgil in modern life. Her explanation of why people saying quis custodiet ipsos custodes is quite hilarious was just perfect. Despite clearly being high on caffeine and sleep-deprived (which she acknowledged with comedic excellence), I hugely enjoyed her talk. With a Latin A level from school, I have missed classical literature and ancient history ever since and it was a lovely reminder.

Just before this, Carrie Poppy, all the way from the US of A, gave her talk on the value of anecdotes. I very much appreciated this. As an intactivist, a lot of the research I do in this area involves listening to people’s stories of how circumcision has had a negative impact on their lives. This is not valueless, quite the opposite. When an argument in defence of something often contains “but I’ve never heard anyone complain about it/I’m fine!”, exposing the truth that in fact a great deal of people have been harmed is very important indeed. I think a lot of skeptics could learn from this, and rein in the (often appropriate, admittedly) data or gtfo kind of attitude.

An excellent set from Chris Coltrane included a perfect bit on being bisexual and biphobia, which definitely resonated with a selection of us in the room! We shook his hand for that.

There were so many other things. I collected a promised hug from Colin, due to my having Tweeted a semi-regular plea for cheery thoughts when I was feeling sad one time… and having walked past him on the way to the station one day but not managing to stop and say hi in time!

ElevatorGate

For the unaware, here’s a quick bit of background on an incident you’ll need to know something about for the rest of this section to make sense.

There are other skeptical conferences. At one such event, a female speaker gave a talk that included some advice on being respectful to women, and after some time at the bar got into a lift (or an elevator, if you’re from the other side of the pond) to go to bed.

In said lift, a male delegate at the conference decided to ask her to his room for coffee. Possibly innocently, possibly with hopes of some kind of friendlier-than-that situation, who knows. After the event, said female skeptic (who is well-known to most skeptics) made a video for her website that was about an hour long, which included a short statement on this incident.

She asked him, and guys like him, not to do that kind of thing. If it’s late and you’re in a confined space alone with a woman, don’t proposition her (or say something that’s likely to be interpreted as such). It’s just a bad idea.

Fair point. Unfortunately this exploded into ridiculous discourse and all kinds of people jumped in with their views; why is she implying he might be a rapist and why doesn’t she shut up and die – together with deeper and deeper analyses of male privilege, misogyny and all sorts. Including a very misjudged and sexist comment from Richard Dawkins. The fall-out is still happening, somewhat absurdly.

Given this, just about every time a few of us got in the lift, someone would make a joke about “ElevatorGate”, as it’s now known. It was very funny.

We giggled. It was also nice when loads of us packed into the lift at one point and, to save space, partner and I took the opportunity to have a cuddle. After laughing about the close quarters, one girl did ask: “You do know each other, right?” – I think it’s great that people are coming out and asking that, rather than making assumptions or keeping quiet when they witness what might be an uncomfortable situation. Progress.

LiftGate

What wasn’t so funny was when I was chatting, wine in hand, with some other drunk folks after the Saturday night entertainment, trying to work out what strange game they were playing (it involved placing a wine bottle upright on the floor, using teamwork to avoid touching the floor with anything other than that bottle past a certain point).

When my flatmate said something like “Maz, be on our team, you’re light!” and picked me up briefly, a little way off the floor, to demonstrate this fact, we were amused.

However, when a random guy I had never met, who did not introduce himself or ask before going ahead with his copycat behaviour, proceeded to wrap his arms around the tops of my thighs and pick me quite high up off the ground with a grin on his face, which was pressed against my front – we did not laugh.

In fact, my partner told me afterwards that he’d felt like punching him at that point (not usually a violent person). In different circumstances, I might have let him.

Now, I’m not insinuating that this person was anything other than an inebriated reveler who saw something mildly amusing (he was not to know the previous lifter was well-known to me) and decided to join in the fun – I hope that’s the long and short of it.

However, at the risk of kicking off #liftgate, here is my advice – don’t do that. Don’t approach strangers and touch them somewhat inappropriately, even in a partying environment. My displeasure at this may have been enhanced by the fact I was wearing a loosely hanging dress I hadn’t worn before – and I don’t wear dresses often anyway.

But there it is. In the grand scheme, a small thing – I am not traumatised or accusing this person of deliberately treating me a bit like a bit of sports equipment free to be tried out in the shop, I expect he just wasn’t thinking.

That’s the point though; a lot of us are socially awkward, and it’s worth taking a second to think before you act (or speak). All of that is overridden by meeting loads of brilliant people this weekend, catching up with friends, learning some cool stuff and having a generally awesome holiday. Plus I got to use my pun-thing.

Edit: Following some commenting and Twittering, all is well – let this be an example of How Not To Be A Dick. We all make mistakes. Pointing things out, accepting our errors, apologising for them and being forgiven – it’s easy and it doesn’t have to turn into a giant flame war. Live and learn.

Links

I will try to update this over the coming week or two with links I find to other posts, picture albums and so on relating to this year’s event. Feel free to tweet them at me, that would be helpful!

The amazing intro video can be watched over and over again here!! The 2011 and 2012 videos are also available. Everyone gets Milton Mermikides‘ theme tune stuck in their head for a while!

Here’s Stevyn (with whom we had a lovely lunch discussing Qi curiosities and other things on Saturday) with his favourite bits. He mentions our protesters, and I’ll try to find more mention of them. You can also read more about his Skeptical Bobby talk!

You can even listen to Saturday’s Pod Delusion Live recording!

Robin Ince mused on his panel conflict, which I unfortunately missed, but I liked reading this anyway. Here’s a summary of that session by Violetta Crisis. Daphna Shezaf has also written about the conference, and the aforementioned panel.

Some of Robin’s rage was expertly captured by @gwendes – have a look here.

Pixie359 thinks about what more can be done in skepticism.

Alex Gabriel defends Atheism+ for The Heresy Club (I missed this session too).

Hayley has put her thoughts into words.

Eventifier keeps track of twitter traffic generated by events, pretty cool stuff. Over nine thousand tweets… >480 photos, 26 videos – from more than 1200 accounts, apparently!

See Liveskeptic for some storify (collections of tweets on a particular subject/talk).

Here’s a Flickr album from Richard Cooper and here’s an open Flickr group by Kevin Friery that anyone can upload their images to. Friday (including afternoon tweet-up), Saturday and Sunday photos by Rob McDermott, plus a lovely pan of the RDF hall. The Hampshire Skeptics page also has some great images.

My photos are here but I’ll try to put them on Picasa at some point.

Life of Pi

I’ve moved this book/film review over from my Posterous space because, well, Twitter bought them and it’s closing down. Boo!

Towards the end of 2012 I picked up, read and passed on my copy of Yann Martel’s Life of Pi.

I wanted to read it before I went to see the film, because generally I prefer to compare film adaptations to books than the other way around. Once you see a film, you have your visuals and you carry them over to the book. I quite like to let my imagination (and the author’s words) do the work first time around.

Anyway, I enjoyed the book; it’s bite-sized compared to most of the 1000-odd page fantasy tomes I tend to wade through. It is at times amusing, upsetting, magical – there were some poignant lines I noticed and should have made a note of as I went along.

Before seeing the film, my impression of the story was that it was one of interpretation. The reader is left with questions and decisions to make by the end and I suppose the conclusions you come to are probably guided by the kind of person you are and the values you hold.

It can be about God if you want it to be – I don’t think it is, but I’m biased. I don’t find it pro-religion, and I don’t find the film to be pushing that agenda either. But you could probably interpret it that way if you really wanted to. Some have decided to take issue with the “I will tell you a story that will make you believe in God” line but I find that unnecessary.  I think it’s more about considering how we view and deal with things that happen in life and the power of storytelling.

The book, compared to the film, does make more of a point of there being logical explanations for animal behaviour. Pi’s father is knowledgable on the matter and tries to impart this wisdom to his sons, which ultimately benefits Pi himself. The film seems to cut down on this aspect, which is perhaps why those who have seen the film (but haven’t read the book) might think the emphasis is more on the religious stuff than I felt it was?

Overall I think the film represented the story very well indeed, with only a couple of additions that didn’t spoil anything, but they didn’t necessarily add much for me. There was one omission but I understand why it wasn’t included as it would have required the filmmakers to make a decision when that’s better left to the reader in the story. It’d be *spoilers* to expand on that but I did have a quick facebook chat about it and someone agreed it would have been tricky.

Visually, it’s fantastic. Colourful, joyful, sometimes surprising (greatly enjoyed the people next to me jumping half out of their chairs at one point!), emotional. It is definitely worth seeing in 3D, the technology is used well (but do sit quite far back!).

I recommend going to see it, and do let me know what you think.

LGBT+

I don’t know why I suddenly started thinking about this (and asking Twitter about it) today. But I did, and the conversation was quite good, so I wanted to write a post. It’s kind of about labels and acronyms and diversity and inclusivity and other things – choice, importantly. A bit of privilege. All those words that crop up a lot when you move in “liberal” kinds of circles. And like thinking about issues. Also I propose a competition! Read on…

For the uninitiated, if you have no idea what I’m banging on about and need some definitions, I wrote a Background section at the end for you – if you’re open to learning something today, that is.

So, somehow there began a tendency to define some sexualities and gender identities (I find it interesting that the two seem to go hand-in-hand still, despite the increasingly clear message that one need not follow the other) and lump those definitions together in acronyms/initialisms. I don’t profess to know why that happened, but I have some of my own thoughts on a) why people choose to identify with certain labels and b) how that can be useful to them.

Acronyms & Initialisms

I asked Twitter for people’s thoughts on the use of “LGBT” vs. longer versions like “LGBTQQIAA” – lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans*, queer, questioning, intersex, asexual and allies – if you’re wondering. Again, skip to the end for more on the details of those labels.

Obviously the longer version is quite unwieldy, perhaps not easily remembered and sends a lot of people into a strange rage because they don’t know what you’re talking about (ask?) or have for some reason turned into an Express reader who’s annoyed about the “PC brigade”. Apparently an option growing in popularity is GSM (gender & sexuality minority).

For me, the lengthier initialism (which could be even longer, actually) proves a point in itself; there are so many types of people (when we’re concentrating on gender identity and sexuality alone) that the use of such categories begins to lose meaning once you open your mind to that fact.

The longer version also introduces the people who do decide to ask to previously unknown concepts. In our conversation yesterday at least 3 people replied asking about the 5 letters at the end. Education is generally the first step in promoting understanding and tolerance, so surely that’s a good thing?

I really enjoyed having the discussion. I think it’s a good way to increase awareness, the capacity for welcoming environments, and helping people to feel comfortable in explaining their own views and stories, with the result of, hopefully, reducing prejudice and discrimination.

For funsies, here are some christian folks freaking out about all these heathens, because it will obviously end up with human-animal partnerships and worse (however, skipping to the end of that post, noting that the writer is an attorney is less amusing).

A competition

Given acronyms tend to work better, being pronouncable words, can you come up with some using some or all the letters? To choose from you could have any or all of the above plus some extra Bs and Gs (bigender, genderqueer/genderfuck etc.), P (pansexual), particles (and, in, for etc.), bits of words (e.g. Bi) and anything else you can justifiably think of.

To kick off, there’s a (fairly well-known?) one that was sent to me by @bishtraining: QUILTBAG.

And that one’s for Queer, Questioning, Unidentified, Intersex, Lesbian, Transgender, Bisexual, Asexual, Allied, Gay and Genderqueer.

Gender And Sexual Minority And Noble-minded People In Solidarity and Support: GASMANPISS, simple. – @jonny_boy27

Please post your acronym suggestions (serious or otherwise) and what they stand for in the comments below! Personally I think I’ll stick with LGBT+ for now.

Conversations

I’ll just put some thoughts forward as prompted by people’s tweets from here on, and if you’ve something to add about any of the points, again please do add it in the comments below!

I think it’s more helpful to embrace people as individuals. We won’t have true equality until we stop having to fit an “identity” - @DPWF0

While I agree it’s ideal to just take people for who they are, each separately, it’s also the case that lots of people like to have an identity. We all do, and how we define ourselves comes in different forms. People can and will choose labels for themselves. They could be hobbies, jobs, nationality/ethnicity, religion, sporting allegiances, even disabilities… subscribing to these kinds of cultural communities can offer people support. We often like to share experiences. Birds of a feather.

Martin had some objections to the ever-expanding initialism usage, specifically that it’s chiefly defining a ‘majority’ (cis heterosexuals).

But does such a majority even exist? What is it? Are there really so many 100% cis hetero people around? We both suspect that a lot of people, given a different environment (i.e. one that’s more aware of these issues and tolerant of the spectra involved), would be less inclined to so rigidly pigeonhole themselves into what is traditionally the ‘normal’ category (obviously I strongly object to the use of normal in this kind of discussion).

However, it seems to be quite likely that cis & hetero is at least for now the most common “skin to be in” and we may as well assume so until we have evidence to the contrary. Which perhaps makes the shorter xyz minority initialisms preferable.

Everyone but..?

Perhaps we’re reaching that almost ideal situation where it’s so uncommon to be bigoted about these things that it’s no longer necessary to define as “other”, because having a problem with something you don’t need to have a problem with is actually the most notable characteristic. The ideal situation obviously being a zero-bigotry one.

can that not just be reduced to “everyone but the bigots”… I take some issue with people rejecting labels because “we are all individuals” who have the luxury of rejecting them. – @endless_psych

Absolutely agree with this – it’s good if you say ‘differences are irrelevant to me’ – you are confident in yourself and other people’s choices, you probably treat people well as a result. It’s always nice when people can ‘come out’ to their friends about things and get a mildly surprised (or not) reaction coupled with not caring. It’s nice to know your friends well, and sexuality may or may not be a part of that, but it being unimportant is often a relief, given what some people have to go through.

But not everyone has the luxury of finding differences irrelevant; people facing discrimination, isolation, rejection and hatred have the ‘relevance’ of their difference pointed out to them in horrible ways. Identifying the bigotry, what it’s targeted at and why it’s unacceptable is important.

Activism

It’s all very well saying “we’re all human/people” but not everyone believes human rights are universal, still, and if we’re to continue pushing for their application to everyone, groups who face injustice need to be able to campaign on specific issues. Otherwise nothing would ever change. Having a banner to unite under can help to bring about changes for the better for specific groups, via increasing recognition:

esp if that recognition is bound up with state support and sciences e.g. The #Transdocfail tweets – @drdaveobrien

An article here on what that hashtag revealed, although not news to some.

Invisibility is a problem for minorities that is caused not just by the majority but also other minority groups. I’ve written about bi-erasure coming from the gay/lesbian community previously. By denying someone’s claims about their own identity, you are only serving to support any discrimination they face, and in no way helping their struggle – which may be very similar to your own.

I think one reason for the expansion of the acronym is the inevitable failure of labels… To define a ‘Lesbian and Gay’ society, other groups become more visible by their absence. - @anandamide

Which fits perfectly with an article I read the other day about some universities in the USA and their student groups, from the POV of Stephen, who identifies as queer.

All of this finally led me to reading a bit about “intersectionality“, a word that’s been doing the rounds lately because of certain incidents. Sociology of the day!

Worries

I don’t think I agree with these concerns really, but I see where they’re coming from, and again am interested in others’ views. Regarding the longer initialism:

It’s unwieldy and few will ever know what it means. As EP said, it’s everyone but bigots. I’m sure it has it’s uses somewhere … Just not sure it’s ever going to be useful in combating prejudice in the wider public. - @frozenwarning

I’d go as far as to say that the increasingly complex ‘in-group’ language risks alienating the public… The easier it is to screw up by not knowing the right terms, the less well-meaning people will want to speak. - @mjrobbins

Again, please chip in below.

Some background

When it comes to sexuality, the world is clearly not only populated by heterosexuals (people who are attracted to people who identify as a different gender from themselves), whatever some conservative/religious types would like to believe. There you have your L for lesbian and G for gay – the homosexuals, or people who are attracted to people who identify as the same gender as they do. Most people are now familiar with these labels, and most are fine with it – but not all, there’s still nasty homophobic prejudice floating around.

For your B, the bisexuals; those attracted both to people who identify as the same gender as they do, and to those whose gender identity is different from theirs. A little more complicated, as the inadequacy of the gender binary means this doesn’t have to just include cisgender individuals, it could include trans* peeps too – some may therefore choose to identify as pansexual or omnisexual – though these don’t come into the main initialisms discussed here.

As for the T, that’ll be trans. Generally shortened to trans* now, because there’s a lot more to gender even than is widely thought at the moment. See here, but there’s also plenty of disagreement about it, and this post discusses that. Gender is a simple concept for a lot of people, as that’s how we’re taught, usually, growing up. Man/woman, male/female. But that’s not always adequate. Sometimes people’s bodies don’t match the gender they feel they are, if indeed they choose to acknowledge gender at all – most of us are lucky and things mostly match up, and there’s a term for that: cisgender (or cis for short). For those whose gender identity and physical gender are at odds to some degree, we can say transgender (from the Latin cis- prefix meaning on the same side, and trans- meaning on the opposite side. [Bio]Chemists will be familiar with these).

Moving on, there’s Queer – the old insult that has been reclaimed for people who prefer a less restrictive label but wish to identify with an “atypical” sexuality/gender ID group. Questioning has a variety of definitions; unsure, actively looking for something to settle on, or rejecting available options. Intersex is anyone whose genitalia are ambiguous to whatever degree; neither fully ‘male’ nor ‘female’, which is more common than often thought (unfortunately these people are subject to genital mutilation without their consent, which can have terrible consequences). Asexual is what it says on the tin – it’s perfectly valid for people to be uninterested in sex. This is often derided and pathologised, including by some in the so-called sex positive community, which is irritating.

Allies, finally, being anyone who is willing to fight against discrimination based on any of these things.

Edit: here’s a good video about it from a while back

Cuts, labels and preferences

Last night I stumbled upon (via a friend) what is probably one of the best posts I’ve read in a long time about male circumcision – it’s got just about everything there. The religious angle, of course, since the article is written by Jewish Nobel prize winner, George Wald.

But more than that, it highlights what a complex issue genital cutting is and expands upon the probable motivations that drive people to it. Where angry victims tend to place the blame (squarely upon mothers, except in Judaism); FGM; issues of gender and misogyny; the less reported forms of MGM outside of the USA and Europe; basic embryology; health myths (for the skeptical readers!); and personal perspectives from those involved.

—

My one problem with article is minor but it started me thinking, so here it is. His use of the term “bisexual“. I think in the article’s context he means something more along the lines of intersex/hermaphroditic. He’s talking about the first people in creation myths being of both genders, parallel with the contested view of a god who is “both male and female”. That’s not what bisexual means, at least now – what it actually means is being attracted both to people who identify as the same gender as you do, and to those whose gender identity is different from yours.

To improve understanding, a common point is that you wouldn’t be surprised by someone who likes people whatever their hair/skin colour, height, or weight. For many bisexual people, gender is also no bar to attraction or, indeed, love. Through ignorance and misunderstanding, there are so many misconceptions and insults thrown at those who self-identify as bi, and in recent years I have become more aware of it and more annoyed by it. Bisexuality does not imply greed or promiscuity, it is not a product of indecisiveness, immature experimentation or a phase. Assumptions along these lines are offensive.

Bisexual pride colours

Biphobia, including the assumptions listed above, may not be a concept everyone is familiar with. Sometimes people argue bisexuality doesn’t even exist, but I disagree very strongly for many reasons. Bi-invisibility is part of biphobia; people often (consciously or otherwise) try to erase bisexual identity when they find it. Settling down with a partner of the opposite or same sex does not then magically make you straight or gay! Just as a prolonged involuntary dry spell does not make anyone who would rather be sexually active in fact asexual. Bisexual individuals who have only had sexual experiences with the opposite sex do not have to identify as “curious” – would you question someone’s professed heterosexuality at age 21 just because they happen to have remained a virgin?

Not everyone chooses a label for themselves. Some do not find it necessary, some find it restricting – people who have absolutely no boundaries with respect to gender (or anything else) and their relationships may, for example, prefer pansexual. However, there are good arguments against using semantics and etymology as reasons to shun labels – but especially, against criticising other people’s self-identification with them.

Many labels are reductive, they kind of have to be by their very nature. But people often like to be part of a group, it helps us to feel we belong and are accepted. Most of us crave that; we seek out communities that value similar ideas and this helps us value ourselves. It can be integral to our happiness, though may not be essential for everyone. Uniting under a banner – literally or figuratively – can also help push forward the drive for equality and fair treatment. It is important to bear in mind that identification with labels is (or should be) a choice that people make and when minority groups attack each other for it (bisexuals are somewhat famously persecuted by both gay and straight communities) it is so self-defeating.

Coming to grips with these ideas in theory is one thing. Living them in practice is another. For example, having seen otherwise sensible and lovely people come out with some nasty transphobia (something I have shamefully done in the past myself), I still consider direct experience – meeting people and getting to know them – to be one of the best ways of overcoming irrational prejudices. Once you meet people and see that your assumptions were total crap, it’s much easier to move on and make positive changes to opinions and behaviours. This, for me, is also one of the strongest arguments against segregated education, particularly on religious grounds.

I did go to a single-sex school, but that didn’t preclude my having male friends. It did mean I encountered a lot of homophobia (obviously going to school with pupils of one gender automatically makes you gay!) and, indeed, biphobia (well if you fancy any of the girls, you must fancy all of them! Another stupid biphobic idea that’s so obviously ridiculous if you apply it to straight or gay people) – but ultimately I feel positive about my education at least in academic terms. That’s a whole other post, though. Feel free to leave your views, teachers and single-sex/co-education fans!

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The “gender binary” is a problematic idea for lots of people and even male/female labels can be oppressive. This fantastic article sparked a little debate recently. I have had abuse shouted at me when I’ve not been looking obviously female – which probably isn’t too often but still – and people are often shocked by this. I hate that women and men are expected to look certain ways, and if you look out for it I’m sure you’ll see that insults based on this are common.

For some reason, not being able to work out the contents of someone’s pants (or indeed their sex chromosomes) is a legitimate source of comedy or, worse, justification for derision or violence. “Justin Bieber looks like a girl in that photo! Hahaha!” “Is that person over there a boy or a girl? I don’t know! Let’s beat the shit out of them to teach them a lesson.” – what? Why are people required to be open books? Misogyny, homophobia, transphobia – people don’t realise it, and they continue it.

Yet this kind of restriction is something that the majority don’t think about – they probably don’t have to, if they’re lucky to fit within the “normal” boxes that the culture has predefined. That extends to many lifestyles, decisions and qualities – we are not all the same and society’s (as opposed to the individual’s) need to label is often so restrictive that it oppresses huge numbers of people. But something else that annoys me is hypocrisy around protecting people’s right to choose and the nature of preferences.

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I believe people can do whatever they like, especially when it comes to sex, if all necessary consent is obtained and no one is being harmed. So, I get pretty angry when people start throwing around accusations of -isms and -phobias based on other people’s sexual preferences. Thankfully we do have the right to decide who we sleep with! We have no obligations to anyone in that regard, from asexuals to enthusiastic sex workers, our choices are (or should be) our own. Don’t talk about choice and how important it is and then dictate to people what they should and shouldn’t do with their sex lives.

Attraction (or lack thereof) is innate, not chosen, as pro-equality campaigners will tend to argue. If you’re not attracted to someone of the same sex, not sleeping with them does not make you a homophobe, obviously – similarly, not being attracted to people from a particular “race” – or to none except similar to yours – does not make you racist. As long as your only discrimination is not sleeping with them, I don’t see how you could possibly come to any other conclusion. You’re looking for things to be angry about, perhaps. I witnessed a bit of a Twitter argument about this recently, and it’s one I’ve had myself, so now is a good time to make the point.

There are also different kinds of attraction: including (but perhaps not restricted to) physical, emotional, intellectual – different people place different levels of importance on those things and choose their partners accordingly. I’m a fan of all three at once, which is reflected in my history (that’s my own business unless I choose to talk to people about it!) and preferences – some decide to call that “picky”. Those with broader tastes might say they don’t have “a type”, or disconnect their physical experiences from other aspects of their lives.

These are all choices we can make, yet often we find ourselves judged for them. The “less discerning” among us might be labelled sluts or studs (again, depending on your gender and the ridiculous expectations people hold based on it) and those who are very selective about who they sleep with or simply place little importance on the physical might be frigid or gay – that most pathetic of insults that I still struggle to banish from my vocabulary because of the university environment.

This destructive judgmental behaviour is a bit like feminists sneering at women who have chosen to be stay-at-home-mums when that’s what makes them and their family happy and works in their relationships. Or when polyamorous folk start calling their monoamorous friends “weird”. When people with a particular fetish put down those who happen not to share it. Acceptance has to be given as well as received, and if you are going around being very negative about groups you don’t identify with then I’m not sure you’re helping, however active you are in other progressive causes. Live and let live.

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Choice is what it’s all about. You should be free to choose things for yourself, in your own life, especially when you are harming no one. However, the imagined “parental choice” to cut the genitals of their children needs to go. That dangerous decision takes away choice from the victim, who can never regain what is taken from them, who can never choose for themselves what was done to their body. Irreversible damage. Adults choosing body modification/cosmetic surgery/assignment surgery for themselves is clearly different and irrelevant to the GM debate.

I might write a post that’s actually about GM soon..!