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First, I want to express my excitement that this group now exists. Thank you to whomever was behind the push, and thank you to Skinner and gang. I anticipate that this will be a wonderfully safe place to engage in much needed conversations surrounding the important issue of female power and powerlessness in our societies.
As a white, heterosexual male, I have privileged access to the racist, misogynistic, homophobic discussions of my peers. Mind you, not all white, heterosexual males engage in these discussions, and I have been pleasantly surprised on a number of occasions at the high level of critical discussions by some of my fellow WHETEMs. It is fascinating to witness the assumptions of other WHETEMs that I will naturally wish to be a party to discussions that are debasing to women, lesbians, gay men, and non-whites. These assumptions are made by all types of WHETEMs regardless of social caste.
I contend that it is not only important to speak out AGAINST such mutterings, but also that it is important to speak out FOR women's issues when unprovoked. Clearly, one must practice anti-misogyny as one would practice anti-racism and anti-homophobia in the event that another WHETEM (or anyone else) begins negative conversations. Let's call that a no-brainier. I will assume that all of my progressive brothers would agree with that.
It is quite another thing to assume that we engage in proactive pro-feminist discussions with our WHETEM friends. I challenge us to start thinking about doing so. I will confess that I have normally not been proactive, but on the few occasions, the results have been outstanding.
Let me illustrate:
Two of my three daughters are out of school this summer, and as a father with the wonderful position of working out of the house, I have the opportunity to spend some time with them. Yesterday after lunch, I had the idea to take them to Lowe's, purchase various materials, and engage them in a little summertime civil engineering fun.
When we arrived home from Lowe's, the two girls from next door were invited to have fun with us, and their father (who is also an at-home worker) came outside to see what was going on.
I told him that it occurred to me that when I was about the same age as our daughters, I spent the summers building forts and tents and all kinds of things with the neighborhood boys. We never questioned whether we had the ability to build because we were never given the signals that we did not have that skill. So we built (poorly in most cases). I told him that it further occurred to me that my (and his) daughters never seem to feel comfortable building anything and have often asked us to build something for them. Research shows that girls have a lower sense of math self-efficacy and lower self-efficacy when it comes to building things. This would be understandable in light of the fact that our society still tells girls in an indirect manner that they aren't builders. Hence, we have a hard time getting women into engineering majors coming out of high school.
I told him that I thought it would be a great exercise to give materials to our girls and the license to build whatever they desired. I would help where they needed it (such as hammering posts into the ground), but they were responsible for their project and how it was to be built.
When the girls were given this offer, two seconds didn't elapse before all four of them were off and running. My neighbor was clearly stunned and wanted to come watch. He was immediately enlisted as a helper and given the task of holding up posts for the walls of the structure. I noticed that he was really getting into this and started asking questions of the girls that would help them DISCOVER some useful building techniques ("If you want to make a square, what are some of the ways that you can make sure that all of the sides are the same?", etc.)
I excused myself to answer some emails and after I was told by my youngest that, "You can leave now, Daddy!" Later my neighbor met me inside to debrief on the experience. He was clearly excited by the experience and said that he never thought about the fact that the girls never had the permission to build.
It began to rain and we looked outside to find four dry feet sticking out of a pretty good shelter.
The point of this long story is to illustrate how pro-feminist discussions can and should take place with other WHETEMs. Many times, the only discussions about issues surrounding feminist theory they get are when they are on the defensive. I need to realize the opportunities to do this and I challenge others to do the same.
As I end this post, it also occurs to me that this forum is a danger to my productivity! Back to work!
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