How much you wanna bet the word was coined by the opposition to bigotry against homosexuals, as a pejorative insult? And thus literally meant “you idiots are only persecuting them/us because you’re afraid of us”?
'Cause I can’t imagine any other way for the word-part “phobia” to end up in there. Can you?
I disagree with this. I think that mild phobia are still phobias. Arachnophobia in particular is commonly understood to include any fear of spiders, thanks to the movie of the same name.
If you believe otherwise, that “phobia” only refers to severe clinical cases, I don’t expect to convince you any different. But suffice to say you’re not going to convince me otherwise either.
You excluded a middle there. And above is my guess as to its origin, which seems a great deal more likely than your non-clinical origin speculation. (“Hey we hate gays - lets call ourselves chickens!”)
Near as I can tell, the word is commonly used to describe fear of and/or aversion to homosexuals (of various levels of intensity), and actually I don’t often see it misused to mean “bigotry against homosexuals”, when it doesn’t also imply that that bigotry is based in irrational fear and aversion.
I’m willing to let “misogyny” mean mild hatreds of women too, but there are lots of ways to be bigoted against women that have nothing to do with hating them, so in a lot of cases the use of the term is flat wrong, just like calling an ice cream cone a popsicle is.
Contrast homophobia, where most of the motivations against gays really doseem to be based in an aversion to homosexuals - and the ones that are not, like emotionlessly obeying your preachers, when these reasons are called homophobic it is a descriptor, painting such rules as having been originally based in an emotional aversion to homosexuals feelings, or as being something you would only obey if you are averse to homosexuals too.
I disagree that exactly the same meaning is conveyed. The shade of meaning conveyed by “prejudice” is that the issue has been prejudged on no rational or defensible basis.
In context, it is clear that the issue being prejudged in the case of misogyny is that of the person’s attitude towards women - which is, I submit, not supposed to be positive.
Easy.
The meaning of unreasoning or irrational hostility.
“Hatred or dislike” could be quite rational reactions under some circumstances. For example, “I hate and dislike Nazis”. Hatred and dislike is not an unreasonable or irrational reaction to Nazis; it is not a “prejudice”.
It is to women, and the OED is quite correct to point that out.
In contrast, are you claiming that if I say “women can’t knit at all compared to men” I’m behaving in a misogynist manner? I’ll admit that the statement is prejudiced in that I have no reasonable basis to believe women cannot in fact knit as well as men; but misogynist?
No reasonable person would not find that a bit of a stretch. Yet your interpretation requires that stretch to be made. Therefore, it cannot be correct.
The combining form “-phobia” can mean aversion rather than fear. It has been used this way in English for over 200 years. For instance, “photophobia” does not mean “fear of light” but rather an aversion to light. The earliest cite for “-phobia” given in the OED (1803) is “He is a very laconic personage, and has upon him the penphobia.” This obviously does not mean that the man in question suffers from a fear of pens, it means that he doesn’t like to write.
Okay, let’s say that’s true. Do you think the first person to use the term was scrupulous in only applying it to bigots after he had ascertained that they experienced a visceral aversion to gays? Or do you think he used to it describe anyone who was prejudiced against gays, whether they had that visceral aversion or not? Because if it’s the latter, then you’re arguing that the person who coined the term is also misusing the term.
Sure. And homophobia is commonly understood to include any prejudice against homosexuals. And misogyny is commonly understood to include any prejudice against women. And I don’t have any objection to any three of these usages. You, on the other hand, have objections to two of these uses, but not to the third. Which strikes me as inconsistent, because from where I’m sitting, including any and all aversion to spiders under “arachnophobia” is just as much a misuse of the term as using homophobia to describe any and all aversion to homosexuals.
Actually, more so, because there’s apparently evidence that “homophobia” was never intended to apply only to a phobic reaction to gays.
I don’t believe that. I have no problem using “phobia” to describe all manner of fears, aversions, dislikes, or prejudices. But then, I’m not one of those people who believes in the “degradation” of language. You, on the other hand, have taken the prescriptivist position in this thread, but you don’t apply it evenly. You insist that terms retain their original meaning in some cases, but argue for the “debased” meaning in others.
No - they were using it correctly but unjustly. There’s a difference.
Like, if I were to call Steven Hawking a moron, it’s not because I think the word now means “genius”. It’s because I’m insulting him.
Perhaps it would help if you didn’t misunderstand/misstate my position.
Arachnophobia is fear/irrational aversion of spiders. Arachnophobia is not any prejudice or abuse of spiders unless that prejudice or abuse is based in fear/irrational aversion.
Homophobia is fear/irrational aversion of homosexuals. Homophobia is not any prejudice or abuse of homosexuals unless that prejudice or abuse is based in fear/irrational aversion.
Misogyny is hatred of women. Misogyny is not any prejudice or abuse of women unless that prejudice or abuse is based in hatred.
Whatever, man.
I’m inconsistent about the ‘original meaning’ thing in one way: I do not feel compelled to honor ancient definitions, like greek roots. My baseline is “what I think the word means now.” This contrasts with “whatever crazy thing you think the word means now”. Succinctly, I don’t think that misogyny has lost its original meaning, not quite yet - all “wrong” uses of it are deliberately hyperbolic or slanted (like idiot Hawking), or simply wrong.
Sorry, lost half the post there is a tragic cut and paste accident.
What middle did I exclude? And where did you get the idea that I think homophobia was coined by people who were opposed to gay rights?
Doesn’t bigotry itself imply an irrational fear and/or aversion? Maybe it would help if you could posit an example of someone who is bigoted against homosexuals, but not a homophobe? If all anti-gay bigots are also homophobes, I’m not sure what we’re arguing over any more. If you simply want to reserve the right to call yourself a homophobe without also calling yourself a bigot… well, I can understand the logic behind your argument, but not the reason for it. Wouldn’t it be easier to mark “homophobe” as the exclusive provenance of bigots, and simply consider yourself to be someone who’s uncomfortable around gays?
Which, I suspect, is the source of the disagreement here: is it possible to be bigoted against someone without holding some degree of hatred towards them, and related to that, how mild can a hatred be before it becomes something other than hatred?
And now I’ve totally lost the plot. I thought your objection to using “homophobia” to describe anti-gay bigotry was that some significant portion of anti-gay bigotry was not based in a literal fear of gays.
It’s hard to find an example of nonaversive bigotry with homosexuals. It’s easy to do with women. You can be be quite fond of women, but just not think of them as equals - and, accordingly, you don’t treat them as equals. Painting this as a phobia or hatred is incorrect, and unproductive besides: the people you’re criticizing will think you’re off you’re rocker, and certainly won’t change their ways, and you will block off discussion of what the actual causes of the problem might be.
I don’t understand the difference. If it’s used correctly (i.e. against someone who is opposed to gay rights, as intended by the person who coined the term) how is it unjust to describe him as a homophobe? I don’t get how your Hawking example is relevant, because Hawking is not actually a moron.
I don’t think that I have misstated it, but as I’m increasingly confused as to what your complaint here actually is, it’s entirely possible that I’ve done so.
Agreed - but that’s not the position I ascribed to you. Arachnophobia, properly speaking, is not simply the fear of spiders, but the irrational fear of spiders. Someone one who gets creeped out by spiders is not an arachnophobic. A phobia is a mental illness. It’s something that interferes with a person’s ability to function normally in society. Just being creeped out by something with eight legs is not a phobia. I don’t have an objection to the word being used that way, because I don’t object to the natural flow and evolution of language. But it is a vast broadening of what was originally a very narrow, specific usage.
In this, you are incorrect. Homophobia is the prejudice or abuse of homosexuals. This is at odds with the constructions of the term, which superficially resembles that of arachnophobia, but by your own argument (as well as Malthus’s) was not the original meaning. I think you’re arguing that the original formulation of “homophobe” was unfair because it invoked this parallel, but it doesn’t make sense to complain about people later abusing the term by using it in exactly the sense with which it was originally minted. It’s not an example of language degrading, it’s an example of language maintaining a static meaning.
And this was the original meaning, but it has since evolved to a wider meaning. Which you object to, on the grounds that meanings should remain static. But that’s at odds with your stances on the two previous terms - one of which, you support the evolved meaning, and one of which, you oppose being used in it’s original, unevolved sense.
What’s your cut off for “ancient?” And why is it okay for a word to have changed, but not for a word to be changing?
Perhaps I misunderstood your position. It certainly looked to me like you were claiming that the word “homophobia” was coined not merely so there would be a word to describe people who were prejudiced against homosexuals, but with the intent of insultingly suggesting that this was due to fear. You also said that the word suggested that fear or aversion to homosexuals was irrational.
I don’t know what those who coined the word “homophobia” had in mind, but my examples showed that the ending “-phobia” can be used to indicate a perfectly rational aversion. If someone were photophobic because they thought they were a vampire and sunlight would kill them then that would be irrational, but the term normally describes an aversion that is the result of painful sensitivity to light. It would be irrational to NOT avoid light if it hurts your eyes. The “penphobia” example was apparently intended to be humorous, but there’s nothing irrational about not wanting to write much if you are by nature a man of few words.
Even if “-phobia” did always indicate irrationality, it would be perfectly appropriate in a word used to describe prejudice against homosexuals. Prejudice is, by definition, irrational.
OK, but to return to the OED cite that started this tangent, it was:
“Hatred or dislike of, or prejudice against women.”
…and according to you, it’s using prejudice only as an elaboration of what kind of hatred it is :dubious:
I think you’re on to a loser with that one. Assuming that the OED quote is completely accurate ('tis not on the web, so I can’t check), your interpretation is too much of a stretch.
I have access to the OED online through my job, and I can confirm that Dorothea Book quoted the definition of “misogyny” correctly down to the punctuation. It is “Hatred or dislike of, or prejudice against women.”
She did make a mistake when she said there were citations for the word going back to the seventh century, the earliest cite given is actually from the 17th century.
So sorry about that and thanks for the correction, Lamia! It was a typo and I didn’t notice it even though I thought I had proofread; one of those tricks of the eye thinking seventh was seventeenth.
I didn’t mean to imply that the Anglo-Saxons were running around debating the nuances of misogyny!
Naturally enough, I don’t agree. As I have already stated, my argument is not that prejudice is an elaboration of the preceding words (hatred or dislike), but rather that one of the root meanings of prejudice includes the concept of hatred’.
As previously quoted, there are two relevant meanings of "prejudice’:
and
[emphasis added]
In context it seems to me obvious that the second meaning is meant - that is consistent with the (literally dozens) of other dictionary definitions which state that the meaning of the word is :“hatred of women”.
The proposed extention of the meaning, to cover any “preconceived judgment or opinion” regardless of expressed animus against women, strikes me as counter-intuitive in the extreme and lacking in any support. That would mean that it is correct to label “I think women make lousy knitters” by someone who otherwise has no animus against women as “misogynistic”, which is simply contrary to the way in which the word is commony and currently used.
It seems obvious to you Malthus because you’re determined to dig in your heels on this point.
Let’s say that instead of lousy knitters you thought women were lousy drivers. Your prejudice against their ability to operate moving machinery could, if broadly adopted, translate into a case for excluding them from all sorts of activities–including important economic opportunities.
For centuries women were thought to have biological features that excluded them from any kind of professional work–like being a lawyer, doctor, or politician. The men and sometimes women who argued for those views did not necessarily dislike or hate women at all. They often thought of these arguments as defenses of women; they believed, for example, that education would make women infertile by diverting blood from the reproductive organs to the brain. But these views were clearly misogynistic since they justified entrenched inequalities and exclusions–including excluding women from the right to vote.
I think you’re right that, like many words, misogyny has developed–in this instance from a core focus on hate to a broader focus on positions that undermine women as a group. Prejudice, in other words. Sometimes those prejudices were deeply, deeply rationalized (as in the view that female bodies couldn’t bear the hard study of a professional education or job).
The reason the OED better reflects the multiple meaning of the word than the free dictionaries you found is precisely because it’s not free. The OED pays for research to keep up on the changing face of language.
(A side note: often the OED’s etymology is useful in this kind of debate since they’ll also track the first time a word was used with a slightly different meaning. But in this instance the OED is not as useful as it should be. The different citations of “misogyny,” from the earliest in the mid-17th-c to the latest in the late 20th c., are impossible to interpret because what they actually mean depends on context and the full context isn’t given.)
If I had the time I’m certain I could find other dictionaries picking up on the usage of prejudice–in fact, I already found one that cited “distrust” which is quite similar to prejudice (though I think you entirely ignored that earlier post of mine).
When you provide a label to someone instead of an action, you will be let down every single time.
For example, someone could show misogynistic behavior towards one woman and not to another? I think they could. Could this be a case of women getting what they deserve based upon actions instead of basing the “misogyny” on one action (or even multiple actions on one woman)
Also, there are and always have been differences between the sexes, why would anybody conclude that they are equal in all aspects? They should be granted equal rights but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they are guaranteed equal representation in certain workforces.
You seem to be responding to a different set of issues here, Kearsen. No one here is saying that you need to argue that male and female are identical in all respects in order to avoid misogyny.
The word “equal” is a somewhat loaded term that is probably better avoided, or used carefully, in any discussion of sexual difference. For example, men and women have very different reproductive functions. But although women can actually bear children whereas men can not I wouldn’t say that men are reproductively “unequal” which seems misleading and insufficiently specific at once.
