Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 4.3bsd-beta 6/6/85; site hoptoad.uucp Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!bellcore!decvax!decwrl!sun!hoptoad!laura From: laura@hoptoad.uucp (Laura Creighton) Newsgroups: net.women,net.singles Subject: Re: career vs. relationships Message-ID: <565@hoptoad.uucp> Date: Fri, 28-Feb-86 04:36:55 EST Article-I.D.: hoptoad.565 Posted: Fri Feb 28 04:36:55 1986 Date-Received: Sat, 1-Mar-86 22:35:10 EST References: <545@hoptoad.uucp> <1107@druxo.UUCP> Reply-To: laura@hoptoad.UUCP (Laura Creighton) Organization: Nebula Consultants in San Francisco Lines: 94 Xref: watmath net.women:9423 net.singles:10562 In article <1107@druxo.UUCP> nap@druxo.UUCP (ParsonsNA) writes: >> Remember when you couldn't tell dirty jokes to women because they were >> too delicate to hear such things and bound to be hurt and offended? >> >> Now you can't tell jokes like: >> >> insert unfunny "joke" >> >> because women are too delicate to hear such things and are bound to be hurt >> and offended... >> -- >> Laura Creighton > >Oh, honestly, Laura! No one said anything about anyone being too delicate >or being hurt. Someone pointed out the simple fact that brutality is no >joke for (most) women, it's an unpleasant reality. No. They gave Gregg a thorough chewing out for it. By the way, brutality is *not* an unplesant reality for ``(most)'' women in North America, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and selected other countries around the world -- unless you have a very different definition of brutality than I do. (In which case I hope you find another word. When I say ``brutal'' I don't want people to think ``possibly uncomfortable''. [In other parts of the world it is debatable -- because it is debatable as to whether life is brutal for *all* people in the rest of the world.] >You sound like a woman saying "Hey, look at me, I'm one of the guys." At >least you must be a woman who has never been brutalized. If that is so, I >am glad for you, but do try to be sensitive to others who HAVE suffered. > >Thanks, >Nancy Parsons You are wrong about the brutalized, but that is beside the point. Do you know the difference between compassion and pity? To feel compassion for those individuals who are still hurting from their experiences -- that is a good thing. But to indulge them when they go around hurting other people steps across the thin line between compassion and pity. Clearly some people were offended by Gregg's joke. These people have a problem. As individuals I can feel compassion for them. But the best thing that I could see happen is for them to get over whatever it is that has crippled them so badly that they are that badly effected by a joke. It may not be easy for them -- indeed, it may be the hardest thing that they have ever done -- but it is still the best thing that could happen. Now, if people flat out said ``I was offended'' by something without dumping all over Gregg -- well, then they would have nothgin but my sympathy. But we are back to ``you are responsible for your own feelings'' again. To the extent that people take responsibility for their own feelings, I can feel sympathy for them. But, to the extent that they are trying to blame Gregg for their own feelings, I have to get off the boat. I mean, either they are creatures who are so controlled by their past expereinces, (however rotten) that there is no hope for them -- and I cannot help but pity them ... or they are capable of learning and growing through their experiences (however rotten) and getting beyond them. But let us consider what happened. Gregg (a real live human being, here, don't insert your favourite nasty male stereotype) posted a few lines which were so heavy-handed that I cannot believe that anybody could consider him serious. Now, as far as I know, Gregg has never murdered, raped, or beaten any women. Yet people jump on his case. Astonishing. A simple ``that was tactless'' is about all that is required if you wanted to state that point -- but no ... why waste an opportunity to get high and mighty with him... Have you ever considered that that might hurt him? If it is the hurt you care about, tell him he blew it quietly, and with compassion ... but no, I get the impression that Gregg as a human being just doesn't matter at all. Most men are not boor and assholes. Really they aren't. They are imperfect; they make mistakes; they don't live up to all of your expectations; but they are ``just plain folks'' like the rest of us. Real, live , human being working their hardest to get on in this world, and living and learning like the rest of us -- no different. They laugh and they hurt and they feel proud and embarrassed just like everybody else. The world is a interesting and often tough place. If you aren't tough enough to handle Gregg's posting then -- to use an idiom common where I grew up ``what good are you?'' Seriously. If Gregg's posting bent you that much out of shape, then you probably couldn't have lived through my last week. But I suspect that most women could. I know too many good, capable women to think that most women would be slighted by Gregg's positing. But I keep coming up with the same idea -- it is a slight on all those brave, capable women who got on with it when feminsits imply that women in general would be offended by Gregg's posting. -- Laura Creighton ihnp4!hoptoad!laura utzoo!hoptoad!laura sun!hoptoad!laura toad@lll-crg.arpa