Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site ucla-cs.ARPA Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!whuxlm!harpo!decvax!ittvax!dcdwest!sdcsvax!sdcrdcf!trwrb!trwrba!cepu!ucla-cs!mccolm From: mccolm@ucla-cs.UUCP Newsgroups: net.women Subject: Re: last night Message-ID: <6127@ucla-cs.ARPA> Date: Mon, 24-Jun-85 21:48:13 EDT Article-I.D.: ucla-cs.6127 Posted: Mon Jun 24 21:48:13 1985 Date-Received: Thu, 27-Jun-85 06:19:16 EDT Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department Lines: 120 [ ">>" = I don't remember (male); ">" = Ellen's followup; "" = a pet vole] >> Of course this was ineffective. It didn't do a good job of showing >> your anger. I think you probably did a good job of showing your anger, but not in a way that caused the other person to stop the offensive behavior. >> Besides, the guy probably WANTED to be offensive and degrading. But then, that only reflects on *him*. >>...If you had hit at him the way he hit at you, >> you would probably feel a lot better at this point. Well, a man would have felt smugly satisfied with himself at that point. >I've gotten a lot of mailed responses to my posting, and many of >the men suggest that I respond in this manner; none of the >women. I find this reassuring, to some degree. While my response was intended in jest, I immediately thought in terms of punishing the other person for the offensive behavior he engaged in. I take it the more common female response was that it never should have happened at all. >> ...I really think most women aren't mean >> enough when it comes to protecting themselves. > Jeff may be right that women don't get enough "meanness >training"; however, I disagree with him, and I want to explain >why, while I support aggressiveness in women, meanness is not >what I would want to see us developing. Would it be fair to say you support the development of self-assuredness or self-confidence in women, instead of aggressiveness? I've always associated the words "aggressiveness" and "arrogance". And I for one do not see meanness as a desirable trait. >It's common for many men in our society to play verbal >one-upmanship games with each other, a kind of pecking order. >Occasionally, someone will take offense and turn it into a >physical confrontation, but it usually stays verbal, often even >outwardly kidding, with a lot of "playful" put-downs. Pecking order? Pfui. It's the remaining method of enforcement by which people exert their dominance over each other. Why do you think that superiors, bosses, and thugs hate to be talked back to? Because it embarasses them, and asserts your parity with them in the hierarchy. > ...I do not want to escalate that situation. This is, of course, the primary reason for not being nasty to a person on a dark streetcorner in a city. Anything short of overwhelming (and inappropriate) force will just make him mad, and the use of such force would make things very official very quickly. >Above all else, I want to STOP the action, not make it worse. >I think I succeeded in doing that. Well, I don't know. I think you LEFT the situation instead of making it worse. While this shows wisdom and restraint, it does nothing to prevent other women from being harassed by this same person later. >The other reason is simply that, were I to return his insults at >his level of intelligence, it would say a lot about my lack of maturity. Problem: he will get mad if you return at his level, and won't understand if you don't. So what do you do? I would mutter something about tilting at windmills, and write him off as unworthy of my anger. Then again, if he makes me angry, that's not *my* fault, and *I* (or rather, you) shouldn't have to go around putting up with this. >...However, I would be angry no matter what action I took, This is important, because it shows that no matter what action you took, you would not "win" in the male sense (including that of the other person), because there is no way that you could exert dominance over him. (If you had wanted to, which I doubt.) >because my anger is directed less at this >man as an individual than at the society which bred him and his >kind of jerks, and allows them to flourish. I feel strong about >the action I took, and I feel that I would not change anything I >did. I don't want to fight him like a man, I want to fight him >like a woman: with strong words, not insults, and with >self-confidence, not one-upmanship. > >Ellen Eades I have three sets of feelings about the last sentence: 1) It shows a more constructive attitude than I would expect from a man (including myself), 2) However truthful, the phrasing is insulting to men as a class, 3) I think you would have preferred not fighting him at all, and you are thus angered _because_it_was_a_bad_situation. And one that, by all rights, you should not have been forced to deal with. Unfortunately, there is no easy way to opt out of the male dominance-motivated bickering syndrome. The rules for this bickering are such that to attempt to opt out brings on a feeling of superiority in the other person, and leads to an attempt to exert dominance, not to recognize it's inapplicability. Reiterating my call for the 263rd time for a more holistically oriented social education of our youngsters. However, what do we do to improve the situation for the *current* generation? --fini-- Eric McColm UCLA (oo' - kluh) Funny Farm for the Criminally Harmless UUCP: ...!{ihnp4,trwspp,cepu,ucbvax,sdcrdcf}!ucla-cs!mccolm ARPA: (still) mccolm@UCLA-CS.ARPA (someday) mccolm@LOCUS.UCLA.EDU Quotes on the Nature of Existence: "To be, or not to be..." -Hamlet (Wm. Shakespeare) "I think, therefore I am." -R. Descartes "" -Gleep (Robt. Asprin)