This is perhaps the one statement that often is a precursor to a large number of arguments that I have had in the last two years since I graduated from the degree program at Drexel University with a piece of paper that said I knew something about philosophy. Since then the topic that seems to have trailed after me is the concept of "privilege", social justice, and my "maleness" in relation to these concepts. I have had multiple arguments about this and since then I have never really had the words in order to talk about them so hopefully these are the words that will work.
I believe in a philosophical question; that for each intellectual age that there arises an intellectual statement or ideal (called by philosophers a "thesis") to which in response also arises an anti-thesis. I feel that in our modern time that the thesis "subjective experience is as valid as the objective world" seems to be our particular thesis.
And it is a thesis that has caught the world by storm; where once you were separated, now blogs by similarly minded people are simply a google search away from each other. You are able to cultivate a social network of similarly minded people who agree with you. But I can not and will not perceive of this as being truly a good thing as it is not being used.
I have the ability to look at opposing views on topics of every nature and every sort. But I also have the ability to only look at views that I agree with. Bear with me for a moment as I bring in a few outside elements from academic social psychology. Within the model of social psychology we have a few theories of "social consciousness"; I wish to discuss a few. One of which is referred to as the "Halo Effect". While it can be googled to short hand it.
"A general notion of talent and skill is assumed by the existence of one good quality".
We see this a lot notably in Hollywood in which the popularity of a given actor is assumed to have some sort of moral component...... or as comedian Christopher Titus would say.
"If someone like Tom Hanks were to come up to a Nun and punch them; the first thing you would ask is What did that NUN do to Tom Hanks"
The idea here is that we associate positive qualities to people whom we already "like" and we similarly associate negative qualities to people whom we dislike. I wish to hold this idea here for a second;
Good qualities aren't necessarily associated with simple single characteristics....but also those characteristics are shared by a group. As well or to borrow another term from social psychology.
Another From Simplypsychology.org
"Social identity is a person’s sense of who they are based on their group membership(s).
Tajfel (1979) proposed that the groups (e.g. social class, family, football team etc.) which people belonged to were an important source of pride and self-esteem. Groups give us a sense of social identity: a sense of belonging to the social world.
In order to increase our self-image we enhance the status of the group to which we belong. For example, England is the best country in the world! We can also increase our self-image by discriminating and holding prejudice views against the out group (the group we don’t belong to). For example, the Americans, French etc. are a bunch of losers"
When you look at me; what you see is a series of sexual and physical characteristics ; these are the characteristics of race, religion (if i Flag), social class, gender(cis/trans). In no way do any of these things highlight anything about my internal experiences.
Rape is not a "female" experience. Being sexually assaulted or domestically abused is not an experience limited to just women. But there are no men's shelters, no legal protection in many states for men.(while I disagree with many of her points she does bring up several valid points)
Or to restate " You can't understand what it's like to have that taken away from you; your not a women". We associate this experience in our culture with being female. To people who have undergone it becomes a part of their identity.....people talk about it and discuss it. And it becomes a part of the female social identity that it is something that they have to fear.......
But men don't (at least according to this notion).....
So when you tell me that I can't possibly understand this experience because I am (through the veil that is halo effect and social identity theory) you are stopping this discussion. It doesn't become about how "rape" is bad; but rather how rape is bad for women. It doesn't become about how "sexual harassment" is bad; but rather how it is bad for women.
I believe that the process of the thesis/anti-thesis is in reality a dialogue that takes place in an age. And for cultures to exclude each other means that this dialogue stops and we don't progress as a society.
If you remove me from the dialogue because I can't "walk" in your shoes..... because I am one of "them"....then it doesn't matter anymore what I have experienced...it only matters that a represent a "they".
They is a dirty word. Each time we removed one of "them" from our face page book friends list we kill the dialogue a little more; instead of trying to help each other and continue the dialogue we move a little further towards becoming just a "they".
Saying my argument or experience is invalid because I am one of "them" is unfair and stops this dialogue from ever happening
And so I vow to continue this dialogue....that if I see something wrong instead of ignoring and turning that person into a "they" I will continue the dialogue and see if I can change them or if I myself need to be changed.
