People who are minorities and discriminated against have an obligation to try not to piss off the majority?
I’ve read this stated even more appallingly about black people on this board–one poster even admitted to thinking the “n-word” when he saw Kanye’s interruption at the VMAs. And a scary number of people will talk about racism against blacks as, “Some white people hating ALL black people because of stuff that SOME black people do.” And why do they have to listen to that ghetto music?
Whether it’s about gay people or black people, it’s a messed up attitude that should be called out a lot more often than it is.
Yep, the James Bond car company, is selling guitars - so they match, I guess - like an Hermes purse, belt and shoes…:rolleyes:
…off to start a thread in Cafe Society about it…
Yes, it is wrong for people to assume that all women are girly simply because some are. My point is that it often takes generations for stereotypes to change. I agree that gay men have the same right to be annoying as anyone else, but when highly visible gay men follow existing negative stereotypes it reinforces the stereotype. That delays the change that we both want to see in our lifetimes. Wouldn’t you say that that’s a shame?
That was the reasoning behind this sentiment that you asked about;
It’s not just women and gay men, it can happen with any class of people with an established stereotypes. Take women in red states as an example, they aren’t all gun toting hooligans, but every time Sarah Palin comes out pro-gun the stereotype is reinforced. (Assuming she is and Alaska is a red state, if it isn’t true please play along.)
Because they’re things you do. I get together with friends and play video games, or go to a concert, or watch a ball game, or go hiking together. Clothing and jewelry is just…stuff that exists. Again: my $20 pants from Sears do the exact same thing that your ultra-fancy designer pants. They’re clothing. It makes you not naked, that’s it.
I didn’t mean to accuse anyone in this thread of saying that women necessarily prefer “girly” things and just say otherwise, but I have come across that attitude in real life and am probably a little over-sensitive to it. I think that while it may or may not be present here, there’s absolutely a societal assumption, held by both women and men, that women may be interested in typically ‘masculine’ things, but they are for sure interested in ‘feminine’ things. Someone way upthread mentioned going out with a group of women and discussing nothing but what celebrities are hot - ostensibly educated, cultured women, who buy into some groupthink mentality that since they’re wimminfolk, they’re supposed to gossip about how hot whatever person that they don’t even know is. To whoever posted that, it was fine, but I personally find it downright offensive. There’s a dozen meaningful topics you could talk about, but you’re going to blather on about the physical appearance of people you never met?
Really? No one designs or sews the clothing? It just springs forth wholly created from the shelves?
A lot of people compare high end clothing to art. You can go to a fashion show just as you’d go to a museum or a game. You can dissect it, talk about the influences of a particular piece, or about what makes it innovative. It can run the gamut from finding a cool vintage piece in a thrift store to debating what made Alexander McQueen unique.
I could say the same about things I don’t care for. To me, most sports are boring but I don’t think that people who like it are dumb. Why do you get to decide that putting a ball through a net is something worthwhile but designing an interesting clothing line isn’t?
My friends and I get together and go shopping. We have fun picking out things, trying them on, planning outfits, etc. We have fun, spend time together, and get to take home things that exist and we get to wear them again and again.
Your $20 pants from Sears are fine if you like them but it’s really silly to make that the basis for your argument. A $500 clunker bought at an auction will get you to work and back if it runs so why buy a nicer car? A mobile home with a bed and a bathroom will serve as shelter for you so why get anything more? As you can see this argument can go on and on.
The simple fact is that YOU don’t see the point of fashion and the like so you have decided that it is a foolish thing that is pointless. That’s great. The problem is that you seem to be insinuating that your opinion on the subject is the correct one and anyone who disagrees is somehow less than you whether it makes them vain, frivolous, or just plain stupid.
Why is being “girly” a negative stereotype and why is it annoying for man to behave in a feminine manner? In one paragraph, you’ve helped me make the same argument I was making to Malthus. But you don’t seem conscious of it.
“Girly man” = annoying
“Macho woman”= cool chick
But no one I know of considers that to be a negative stereotype, with respect to gender. Politics is a different story.
In contrast, John Edwards become the horrible girlie man from outer space when it came out that he invests a lot of time and money on his hair.
You’re fighting against one societal assumption by perpetuating another, though. Since you don’t like most (or even any) girly things, you don’t want to be stereotyped as a “typical woman” who does like those things. Fine, nobody likes to be pigeon-holed, especially as something they’re not.
But since you don’t like those things, you have contempt for women who do, since you see these girly things as being inherently WORSE than the things you do like - and for no good reason other than that you like them more.
And sorry, but no, watching sports is absolutely not a more worthy pastime than shopping with your girlfriends. I’d put them into the same category actually - things that are frivilous and fun.
And neither is playing video games. Being hooked up to a machine for hours at time, engaged in imaginary killing sprees, produces what exactly? Think of all the time and money people waste gaming when they could be in a lab concocting the cure for cancer or rebuilding Haiti. Frivilous is not even the word.
I find it mindboggling (and sad) that someone thinks that creating, making and using beautiful things is useless. And how is fashion any more useless than music? They are the same thing, just a different medium.
That’s not what I’m saying. If Kanye acts like an ass then you’re justified in thinking that he’s an asshole. I assume that you’ve never had someone say to your face that they don’t like you because of the way someone else acted, yes? Do you doubt that it does happen?
You’re probably not. But if you were and it affected me negatively I might be annoyed. I might even roll my eyes when your name came up in conversation. It’s severe, I know, but it might get me out of awkward situations that I had no hand in creating.
I didn’t say that it’s annoying for a man to behave in a feminine manner. I, quite consciously, was only referring to the impact of annoying highly visible gay men. If you want me to be more specific, I’d speculate that gay men in Tennessee faced a more hostile reception due to Chris Crocker.
I’m not sure why this is such a controversial point. I think it’s a combination of poor communication on my part and this thread covering some sensitive issues.
Witness also: a woman going to see Transformers alone and a man going to the Sex and the City Movie. Who’s going to get the bigger :dubious:, or any at all (from both men and women in the audience). Male protagonist/interest/language/whatever is still the default. It’s been difficult achieving a balance between the two – despite, as someone mentioned early on, the complete inconsistency of what’s considered ‘masculine’ and ‘feminine’ throughout history and across the world.
I was a ‘tomboy’ growing up but figured out, before I was even a teen, that I disliked the word because the implication was that I was acting like a boy – rather than a girl who wore certain things and had certain interests. Now I know that, depending on the day, my mood and the crowd, I am considered butch and crass by some and a bimbo by others. IME, it’s much more fun to kick someone’s ass in Scrabble or Mortal Kombat after they’ve underestimated you based on the color of your hair or the perceived vapidity of your reading material!
That’s not my point either. Kanye doesn’t stand for all black people. If Kanye does something stupid, you’re allowed to think that he’s dumb, but you can’t generalize that to all black people. Thinking, “Stupid n-word,” makes you a bigot. Not thinking, “Asshole.”
ETA: Cat Fight, I remember disliking the word tomboy even as a kid and people around me saying, “No, it’s just a word for a girl who likes boyish things.” But that attitude does annoy me–that is, the “these are for girls, these are for boys.” I don’t think any two people are ever going to have the exact same combination of likes and dislikes, so lets just please leave gender out of it for once.
No, looking back through the thread I think it looks like I agree with everything NinjaChick said. I don’t, I was only trying to explain the reasoning behind one sentence matt_mcl didn’t understand.
Frankly, NinjaChick’s comments like “I have nothing but contempt for the stereotypically girly things.” look a bit like trolling in this thread. (Or is it threadshitting?) The wording there looks like it was intended to be offensive.
Oh, did you mean non-black people thinking “stupid n-word”? Yep, that would make you a racist asshole. As for black people thinking that, well, it would depend on the context. I can’t make a general statement.
Exactly. Lestrade, you don’t seem to be engaging with the fact that the behaviour you describe is perceived as annoying in that it is feminine/gender-atypical-for-males, which is fucked up, especially in that the criticism is usually framed as a call for the “annoying” person to butch up/stop behaving so femininely.
Sigh, the hatred for “girlie” interests is evident often, but recently in the “Ladies, what’s your best beauty advice” thread here. I never thought I’d hear an explanation for why unibrows are a-okay.
Frankly, a lot of basic “good grooming” practices are looked down upon, when frankly, a 5 minute face of makeup and a basic manicure (your nails aren’t torn, chewed, or with hangnails) are the foundational elements of a professional get-up. I remember a thread from awhile ago - people dying their hair were called out, which is just
insane. Don’t wanna die your hair? Fine. But don’t get pissed when you’re mistaken for a grandmother when your oldest child is 12.
Something I love about the Dope is people aren’t just willing to buy a ton of random products; they want the best products, and since Consumer Reports doesn’t report on everything under the sun, they turn to people who have high standards (for the most part). This includes beauty products and spa treatments et al.
And how is fashion any more useless than music? They are the same thing, just a different medium.