How to be sexist but get women to like you anyway

Well, at least the feminine ones who know their place. Watching the "liberal" men at Stoller's blog scramble to claim the mantle of feminism while making sure that women fall in line is pretty amusing. I particularly liked this comment by Jay Currie. He seems to be working off the standard crib sheet to put the bitches back into their place.

#1. It's not sexism that keeps women down, it's that women aren't that interested in being on top.

My own impression is that there are fewer women doing political blogs; but the numbers even out in terms of blogging in general. (Who knew you could blog about knitting? We get a nomination a month on knitting. None for male knitting so far.)

See, I'll bet some of you broads know how to knit. That's why you're not into politics.

#2. Women are different than men and it's nature so there's nothing that we can do about inequality. Sexism, again, is not the issue.

Second, any one who watches the play styles of very young children will be quickly disabused of any serious belief in the absence of gender differences. Little boys are far more agressive, much more likely to fight and significantly less committed to playing with a specific group of friends to the exclusion of others. Little girls, within group can be pretty forceful, but they will go shy with strangers and are not terrifically inclined to make newcomers welcome.

He neglects to mention the part where any female, regardless of age, gets the smackdown if she doesn't conform to her gender expectations. When I was a little kid, I was loud-mouthed and aggressive. I didn't know it, but I guess I was a boy.

#3. Women's skills are inward and better for home-making, and men are better at engaging the world. However, don't actually say that men need to go kill tigers and women need to stay at home to cook them--just imply it.

The protocols of blogging, cross linking, referencing, commenting all require a degree of outwardness. The ego involved in blogging, namely being confident that your opinions are worth publishing to an audience of 10 or 1000 is huge.

#4. Cough up some tokens.

Can women play? Of course. Wonkette, Virgina Postrel, Kathy Shaidle, Caterina Fake all play and play well.

#5. Bludgeon your opponents with your tokens. See, there's only a few women because most women just aren't good enough. Neglect to mention if your tokens would like to be used against their own.

But there are simply not that many women who are going to take the time to create and run a successful blog. There are better, or, rather, different, things to do.

#6. Flatter your simpering female opponents by suggesting that male-dominated activities are silly, little-boy things anyway, not grown-up important stuff that men can't be bothered with like uteruses and stuff.

Men like doing strange and wonderful things - watching pro sports, surfing porn, playing computer games, building decks - blogging is one of them.

The last strategy is the most offensive to me, for a couple of reasons. For one thing, it's one that was developed and perfected by men who were trying to keep the vote from women. Why would you want to do something silly like vote anyway? You have the important work of raising babies and stuff.

For another, the other "peculiar" stuff that men do is invariably a list of "silly" things that have a history of excluding and degrading women. Let's take his examples.

1) Pro sports--a field that women have been forcefully and systematically excluded from. Female athletes have had to struggle against being called unfeminine and had homophobic slurs flung at them. On the school level, until Title IX, which is under continual attack, girls' athletics were continually devalued compared to boys'. Even today girls are given more social prestige if they elect to cheer boys on as cheerleaders rather than be the athletes themselves.

2) Surfing porn--the reason that men look at more porn than women is there isn't porn for women. Why not? Women's sexuality has traditionally be demonized or ignored, while men's sexuality is treated as a power source.

3) Playing computer games--gosh, this wouldn't have much to do with the fact that most women don't have enough leisure time to pursue time-consuming computer games, would it now?

4) Building decks--girls are routinely denied any encouragement or training in mechanical arts, which most boys get some amount of training in. Women who seek out training and careers in mechanical work are treated like pariahs. If you don't believe me, watch that show "Monster Garage" when a team member is female.

In fact, women are interested in all these "male" activities, but those who are interested in it are so despite the fact that there's practically a "No Girls Allowed" sign hanging on the door. Just try to watch a women's soccer game with sexist men hanging around--you won't be able to hear the announcers over the bleating about how women are inferior athletes.

What kills me is that these guys are hanging onto privileges that amount to nothing. The mechanical stuff is a good example. Men have hoarded that knowledge from women forever, but when a number of women are entered fields like carpentry, car repair, etc., nothing really changed.