Gah! I went back and read the May 2003 post that Kevin linked to and was depressed to realize how much real discussion happened in the comment section in those days.
I suppose the snarky response would be, "Imminent Death Of The Net Predicted!", "Film at 11"
I don't know if this comment is more appropriate here or on the thread about atrios and Kos, it applies equally in both cases.
This isn't new, but it is depressing, and it's depressing to watch it happen.
Perhaps this is how the blogosphere "self-corrects" by gradually self destructing.
Yeah, we women are all about the sweetness and light and couldn't say something nasty to save our souls. And gosh, women's lack of representation in ____ just never appears to be primarily the fault of gatekeepers of any kind, because we all know that liberal men aren't ever clueless sexist jerks.
Not too long ago Drum said that he "could live with" restrictions in abortion rights. On Summers, he said that Nancy Hopkins's walking out of the talk was "Victorian" (or that mighta been him citing someone else, who he agreed with, and then went on to say that she was vaporish or some shit like that).
But you know, being a lady and all, I'm not really comfortable with the food fight nature of political writing, so I would never say that Kevin Drum is a stupid fuckwad.
I myself was grieved by the way Kevin used "beg the question." (Not those words in that order.)
Kevin is definitely one of the good guys. I don't happen to agree with him that abortion is where the Democrats should make a compromise, and I'm aware of the "ladies first" tendency, but casting people out because of this or that issue is one of the problems with the lefty tent.
Right. Just like with Summers. It would be wrong for us ladies to actually get sick and tired of sexist bullshit from the so-called "good guys."
I'll just have a seat in the back of the bus, shall I? Thanks.
What the fuck, actually? Women are just "this or that issue"? And wasn't Drums so-called point that the problem with women is that we don't know how to call a spade a motherfucking spade?
Put me in the offended column again, ogged. Let me offer a preemptive apology, just in case I end up being "rude" about it.
His post wasn't about "women," it was about the dearth of female political bloggers and his (wholly inoffensive) speculation as to the reason for the dearth.
Wholly inoffensive to you, yes.
But gosh, all those women who left comments on his thread... oh, that's right, they're all just being rude.
Kevin wrote:
So what's up? There aren't any institutional barriers in the traditional sense of the word, which means either (a) there are fewer female political bloggers and thus fewer in the top 30, or (b) there are plenty of women who blog about politics but they don't get a lot of traffic or links from high-traffic male bloggers.
My guess is that it's a bit of both, and the proximate reason is that men are more comfortable with the food fight nature of opinion writing — both writing it and reading it. Since I don't wish to suffer the fate of Larry Summers I'll refrain from speculating on deep causes — it might be social, cultural, genetic, or Martian mind rays for all I know — but I imagine that the fundamental viciousness and self aggrandizement inherent in opinion writing turns off a lot of women.
Where's the offensive part?
So, BPhD, what do you think the reason is? I'm more and more inclined to think Weiner was right, and that part of it is simply the diarist form. Do women more often use the diarist form than men, d'ya think? I note that you might consider your site and PG's site diary-like, while Majikthise and Galt (two female bloggers I read consistently) more subject oriented.
Oh god, once again the burden is on the ladies to prove that something is sexist? Jesus. Ok. Just in the passage you cite (there's more bullshit in the rest of the post, but it would take all damn day to cite every instance of it):
1. The utter cluelessness of it. "What's up?"
2. The fact that he says a little above these passages that gosh, it certainly can't be sexism in journalistic circles that keeps women off the political op-ed page.
3. Define "political blogger." Oh, right, that means, "just like me." Not to get all personal on you, ogged, but in what sense is your blog more "political" than mine? But I betcha you're blogrolled on more (men's) political blogs than I am.
3. "men are more comfortable with the food fight nature of opinion writing."
4. "I don't wish to suffer the fate of Larry Summers." Yeah, poor fucking Larry Summers. Drum doesn't want the women who are uncomfortable with "viciousness and self-aggrandizement" to yell at him. Can you spell D-U-H?
Now, as long as I'm at it, I'm also offended by a couple of things over here at one of my favorite blogs.
1. Why do you point to the link if you think Drum's being "wholly inoffensive"? Just to go "look at all the hysterical women making a mountain out of a molehill"? Ha ha ha. It's funny to laugh at the righteously indignant when they get pissed off, yet again, at being rendered invisible.
2. "Kevin is definitely one of the good guys." Right. I'll just swallow my fucking bile and keep my goddamn mouth shut to preserve some abstract "lefty tent." Let's all follow the leaders, ladies, and bake the cookies for the next lefty fundraiser.
Like I said, bending over is getting awfully fucking old.
B, in defense of the Nancy Hopkins critics, as I remember it, the criticism wasn't that she walked out, it was that "I was going to faint or throw up" line (or something along those lines). Drum's post here, the Ruth Marcus article he's referring to is here. Marcus:
"I felt I was going to be sick," said MIT biology professor Nancy Hopkins, who had led an investigation into hiring practices there. She walked out during Summers's remarks. "My heart was pounding and my breath was shallow," she said. "I was extremely upset." Was there a feminist around -- myself included -- who didn't wince at this bring-out-the-smelling-salts statement?
Tim, is unfogged not a diaristic blog? Is devaluing "feminine" forms of writing not a sexist act? Is the circular argument that "women write diaristically, and diaries are not political" not infuriating?
I'm a feminist. I didn't wince at Hopkins's statement. I completely understood it. I, myself, am feeling quite angry right this moment, pounding heart, shallow breath, and extemely upset, check check and check.
It tends to upset people when those who (1) have power over them; (2) are supposed to be their friends and allies, demonstrate that they really just don't get it.
But hey, go on defending the Hopkins critics and poor maligned Larry Summers and good guy Drum. Because they just always get the shitty end of the fucking stick, don't they? Poor, poor boys, having to listen to the shrill shrieking of the women whose toes they keep stomping on.
I'm actually staying out of this one; the point of my comment is just that there's an important difference in this case between criticizing Hopkins for walking out and criticizing her for the physiological description.
The sad thing is that if you read para. 2 of Kevin's post, he gets to the right explanation. Ditto point b, sixth para. But then 7th para and the surrounding tend to emphasize "women don't like political blogging" and ignore "men don't read/link women polibloggers enough." (I also suspect that the blood sport aspects of poliblogging have some role, but it's true and perhaps more significant that the big male lefty bloggers just don't link women polibloggers that much.)
But I humbly suggest that the thing to do is not to cast KD out of the tent but to slap him around a little--"raise his consciousness" maybe. He's aware that sexism plays a big role here (again, para 2, para 6b), it just slips his mind. If he can be got to pay more attention to it, then maybe he'll do something about it. The blogosphere case is a case where he has some power to change things. (Too bad it's so fucking unimportant.)
[b, SCMT is referring to an occasion when I called your blog and a few others diaristic in relation to a different issue--I think I meant that more of your posts are longish ones about what you did today rather than shortish links. For instance, I know that you took PK for a walk the other day, and I don't know much about what Ogged did besides blog. That thought had nothing to do with politics--more with forms of whimsy. I like the diaristic stuff here better than the political stuff.]
OK, I think there's still a problem with the Hopkins critics. Suppose a man in a similarish situation had said, "My blood was pounding in my temples and I was literally seeing red. I was mad as hell." Would that be seen to be as embarrassing?
once again the burden is on the ladies to prove that something is sexist?
If you call something sexist that seems to me inoffensive, then, if you want to discuss it, the next step is to try to explain why it's sexist. If you think I'm hopeless, no one's twisting your arm.
The utter cluelessness of it. "What's up?"
That's just unfair. "What's up" comes after he considers several explanations.
The fact that he says a little above these passages that gosh, it certainly can't be sexism in journalistic circles that keeps women off the political op-ed page.
Where does he say that?
Define "political blogger." Oh, right, that means, "just like me." Not to get all personal on you, ogged, but in what sense is your blog more "political" than mine? But I betcha you're blogrolled on more (men's) political blogs than I am.
Take a look at our archives. This site was just about all politics, all the time, until quite recently. Most of the links from political bloggers are from way back in the day. And we don't have to guess. Take a look at Technorati for Unfogged and for your site. Feel free to try to break it down by category, but you're linked by significantly more folks than we are.
"men are more comfortable with the food fight nature of opinion writing."
That's his guess. If it's wrong, does that make it ipso facto offensive? Generally speaking, it's also been my experience that women have less patience for the chest-puffing kind of dialogue that many guys seem to enjoy. What Kevin writes could be straight out of Carol Gilligan, but to you, in ought-five, it's offensive.
"I don't wish to suffer the fate of Larry Summers." Yeah, poor fucking Larry Summers. Drum doesn't want the women who are uncomfortable with "viciousness and self-aggrandizement" to yell at him. Can you spell D-U-H?
One could also say, "I don't wish to suffer the same fate as Leopold and Loeb," which is to say, "I'm not going to make that mistake." And so he avoids talking about intrinsic qualities.
Why do you point to the link if you think Drum's being "wholly inoffensive"? Just to go "look at all the hysterical women making a mountain out of a molehill"? Ha ha ha. It's funny to laugh at the righteously indignant when they get pissed off, yet again, at being rendered invisible.
Because of our recent contentious disputes on this topic, I thought this other, related contentious dispute would be of interest.
"Kevin is definitely one of the good guys." Right. I'll just swallow my fucking bile and keep my goddamn mouth shut to preserve some abstract "lefty tent." Let's all follow the leaders, ladies, and bake the cookies for the next lefty fundraiser.
He is one of the good guys. And you should swallow your bile. Not because you're a woman, but because bile alienates your potential allies. I'd say (and have said) the same thing to "lefty buddies" here many times. If you're tired of swallowing your bile, ok, no one's going to force you, but when you get a hostile reception, it'll be your fault.
I took him to be making a basically inoffensive point (but, then again, I'm a guy). Remember, he wasn't saying that women (on average) aren't good at blogging, or writing opinion columns. He was speculating about why they are under-represented among the *most popular political blogs* -- blogs which all of us can concede aren't necessarily the best or most interesting ones out there -- and noting that, unlike in the case of opinion columns, this isn't likely to be a gatekeeper problem. His hypothesis was that the blogs that attract the most attention tend to exhibit a kind of self-satisfied, bratty, combativeness which is more likely to be found in men than in women (even though, obviously, plenty of women are self-satsified, bratty and combative). How is that offensive? Isn't it just obvious that our culture is more likely to encourage those qualities in boys than in girls? I honestly don't think it's possible to spend any time in one of our country's elite educational institutions (either at the secondary school, undergraduate or graduate level) and not come to that conclusion. Or am I the only one that attended institutions dominated by bratty boys who were constantly being praised for their flamboyant acts of intellectual hubris?
Ah shit. The knives are out amongst ourselves.
And again I see another reason why we're going to lose this war against the conservative forces of darkness.
Just fucking great!
noting that, unlike in the case of opinion columns, this isn't likely to be a gatekeeper problem
But he does acknowledge a gatekeeper problem: (b) there are plenty of women who blog about politics but they don't get a lot of traffic or links from high-traffic male bloggers.
The rest of his post seems to disregard this possibility, though.
I think the situation is kind of analagous to Summers in a way. (Except, as I said, unimportant.) If KD thinks it's regrettable that women polibloggers don't get many links from high-traffic male bloggers, he perhaps ought to seek out and link more women bloggers. It doesn't even matter whether part of the regrettable situation is due to some dislike women tend to have for the food fight. The other part is the part he should do something about. So isn't it OK to advocate that he focus on that?
So isn't it OK to advocate that he focus on that?
Of course, and this is part of the reason I count Kevin as one of the good guys: he just sent the most traffic to his critics that they'll get all year. Back in the day, he wrote something, I (and a few others) posted saying it was borderline anti-Semitic, and he posted an update with links. He's classy and he's trying to get it right.
I think bitchphd is right about the definition of a "political" blog. Too many posts on abortion and you somehow don't make the cut. Cat pictures are OK for some reason.
The network linking structure of blogs amplifies any slight advantages. The rich get richer. Any small sexist differences in linking behavior is amplified. It's exponential.
he just sent the most traffic to his critics that they'll get all year.
But that won't solve the structural problem. What would be nicer is if he would read women's blogs more regularly (not all his critics are women, BTW, I don't think, and not all women criticized him of course) and link them when they're not criticizing him. Then more women might be seen as prominent bloggers.
Ordinarily I think reading a blog is never anyone's duty but KD gets paid for it :)
What I think makes KD one of the good guys in the relevant sense is not so much that he updates in a classy fashion (so does Volokh--he's still an advocate of scary rightwing policies) as that he is on some level aware that there's a problem here--para 2 and 6b again--and might be worked on a bit.
the thing to do is not to cast KD out of the tent but to slap him around a little--"raise his consciousness" maybe
bile alienates your potential allies. I'd say (and have said) the same thing to "lefty buddies" here many times. If you're tired of swallowing your bile, ok, no one's going to force you, but when you get a hostile reception, it'll be your fault.
Now, I realize that Matt and ogged are not the same person. However, my point is that this is precisely the dilemma we get put in. You have men who find it inoffensive to speculate about the reasons women lack power (tenure, the bully pulpit, high blog traffic, whatever) in ways that, inevitably, lead back to it being about something wrong with women, and that, inevitably, even if they acknowledge the possibility of some kind of systemic bias, fail to really develop the latter. But systemic bias is as plain as the nose on your face if you are the one who is the recipient of it, and it's infuriating to be told that the "reasonable" thing to do is to educate every single person who cluelessly dismisses its power and existence. Moreover, it is unfair: while it is true that those who are disadvantaged are more likely to be interested in changing things, and in understanding precisely how things work, it doesn't necessarily follow that every bile-spewing pissed-off person in the world is any better at analyzing systemic discrimination and how it works than the people who make clueless, "gosh, I don't understand it so I guess it's not there"-type statements. Yes, one can bow out of a discussion, but as we all know what happens then is that either the problem goes completley unremarked or else the bowing-out is taken out as conceding the point.
So. Am I supposed to raise consciousness, or am I supposed to avoid alienating people? And why isn't it reasonable, when faced with anger, to try to understand it rather than to just say, well, if you can't explain your position any better than that it's your fault that I don't take you seriously?
Re: "But that won't solve the structural problem."
It's those 80-hour weeks in the weblogging chair...
Oops, that was me. And I meant to have the second para, which is a quote from something ogged said upthread, also in italics. Am on someone else's computer...
And! Re. more links than you, first off, I was unaware of that: I see you linked on more of the high-profile type political blogs than I do myself. And let's not kid ourselves: part of the popularity of the bitch blog is the sex, not the politics.
Am I supposed to raise consciousness, or am I supposed to avoid alienating people?
But those aren't mutually exclusive.
No, they are not. When I am in teaching mode, I keep my temper in check. Among people with whom I have a track record, or in blogland, where ranty political opinionating is the order of the day (and most people reading are smart enough to distinguish between, say, me asking why men do not get it and me truly thinking that every single person out there with a dick is an idiot), I expect people to see the point behind the rhetoric.
Were I giving a talk at a major conference, or being paid to produce an intelligent, non-ranty political blog, I would also bother to affect a reasonable, balanced tone at all times and provide tons of evidence to support my points. In my own personal diaristic blog, however, I do not think that I am required to do that.
Kevin Drum probably wishes he'd said something uncontroversial, like "Macs suck!!"
Kevin's a smart guy. He knew what kind of reception his post would get, because he had gotten it before. Somebody who self-consciously identifies as a moderate has to do things occasionally to show he holds that status. One of the easiest ways is to say, "I get attacked from both sides", and then do something to ensure it happens.
b, when I said "slap him around" I didn't necessarily mean "be nice to him." Maybe it is infuriating to be told that, if someone is ignorant of systemic bias, you ought to point it out. But if someone shows some awareness of systemic bias, but doesn't seem to understand its importance or what he himself can do about it, and you don't point it out--it's not going to fucking change, is it? Maybe it's not fair that you or someone else has to point out to KD what he should do when he ought to be able to realize it for himself. It is unfair. Is that any reason to not do it, if you care about changing the situation? I don't think so.
So it is reasonable (a word I didn't use. Why is it in quotes?) for the person in a dominant position, faced with anger, to try to understand it. It's also reasonable for the person who is understandably angry to try to do something constructive, eventually. Like, maybe KD doesn't realize that he could solve the problem by making an effort to read more women polibloggers and link to them. (Majikthise has a good post and good list, though I'd leave off JG--I think she's intellectually dishonest.) So maybe it would be constructive to say to KD something like the following:
"Hey, fuckwad! Part of the fucking problem is that big male bloggers don't read and link enough women bloggers--so why don't you fucking do something about it by making an effort to read the bloggers on this fucking list? Maybe that would solve some of the fucking gatekeeper problem? And maybe if you did more of this, you wouldn't be so tempted to speculate on why women don't poliblog?"
y'know, the response to the line about "better to light a single candle than curse the darkeness"--why not both?
OK, I'm going to actually do something fucking constructive about this myself, and link Lindsay's post on my own blog. Not that it matters much, because no one reads my blog (and not that I fucking care about that), but it's the least I can do. And I've had a really FUCKING TERRIBLE day, and the least I can do is all I fucking feel like doing right now. I don't know why I fucking bother.
Mithras: too cynical for me; I don't think that's what Kevin's up to.
I'm leary of (a) adding a stick to a fire that is dimming, (b) jumping in where B may feel she's battling alone against the rest, and (c) adding what is really a digression, but: the blogs (excluding Unfogged as ineffable, and group blogs that are m/f) I read regularly split 24-4 m/f (24-6 after Ogged's new post), but 28-0 (30-0)subject post/diarist post. I just don't particularly care for diarist blogs, male or female; I wouldn't be shocked if this explains some other people's blog lists as well. And I think claiming that not liking the diarist format is sexist is akin to saying that not liking soul food is racist.
Sorry about the crappy day, Matt. Go throw something at Ted H., 'k?
Matt, my rant got slightly off track, as rants do. I intended to contrast your "slap him around" (which is what I did on my own blog, and what I'm doing in the comments here) with ogged saying that I should "educate" which I interpret as "explain in a calm, reasonable, patient tone" (hence the scare quotes on "reasonable"). As I've said elsewhere in other contexts, I'm not Drum's mommy. When PK says something stupid, I am calm about it. When Drum does, it ain't my job to hold his hand. Slapping, however, I am willing to do.
Mithras: I wish I agreed with you, because at least that would make Drum less stupid. But alas, I'm going along with the "stupid" interpretation.
Tim: Assuming that all women's blogs are diaristic, and/or not counting men's blogs as diaristic even when they are, is sexist. I don't know what's up with your blogroll, so that isn't a personal accusation.
Well, it looks like maybe after I threw a tantrum everyone else feels a little better. That's exactly the effect I was trying to create ;-)
Matt Weiner wrote:
"b, when I said "slap him around" I didn't necessarily mean "be nice to him."
And the rest of his post was great as well. This is the issue that seems to get lost in the Summers affair, and now in the, if you will, Drum affair.
The sides get laid out as 'pro Summers' and 'anti-Summers', but that ain't the issue. The issue is that you can be exceedingly anti-Summers without:
a) storming out of his talk
b) making a rather stereotypically wimpy comment like "I almost fainted"
c) consciously helping to raise a media ruckus
which all adds up exactly to:
d) making the entire episode a perfect right wing talking point for wimpy ass liberal academics that can't take controversial discussions.
Instead of handing this whole thing to the right wing on a silver platter, people such as Hopkins could have handed Summer's his ass on a plate with a pointed tirade about the stupidity of his comments (and whatever you think of the biology of gender, Summer's comments were enormously silly and ill informed).
And to get back to the Kevin Drum half of the equation here, while I wouldn't ever expect that people should try and debate calmly with much of the right wing today (Coulter, Limbaugh, etc.), if you can't manage to engage in a civil discussion about a controversial topic with the likes of Kevin freakin' Drum, then I'd have to think that you're just not willing to try very hard to persuade anyone of anything, ever.
This isn't about "being nice", it's about acting in ways that aren't patently unproductive.
since I'm missing my NOW meeting because I'm sick, I might as well weigh in...
b, your answer to the problem of drum's "sexist" post seems odd. It seems to me that you merely want to intimidate him with as many cusswords as you can think of, in the hopes of......what, exactly?
You allude to the fact that the powerful often use the restriction of all discourse to "rational discourse" as a tool for further repressing the repressed. This is, of course, a fact. Is it going on here? "Here" refers to this comment thread, in which people have shown themselves open to the possibility of sexism taking place. In this setting, yes, you have to convince them of it. That's the human weigh of doing things; persuasion and argument. The other option is revolution, which, in this situation, is not a serious option (and that's a statement, coming from someone as lefty as myself). You have to argue here, that's the way it is. You talk about being physiologically pissed off. I understand; I understand because I have a similar reaction when I perceive sexism or racism, and I also understand because your name-calling sets off a similar, very negative physioglogical reaction in me.
For my part, I don't believe Drum's post was intentionally sexist, but it also wasn't fully thought out. But everyone makes mistakes, and to get along, we *have* to cut people some slack. There's no other serious choice.
if you can't manage to engage in a civil discussion about a controversial topic with the likes of Kevin freakin' Drum, then I'd have to think that you're just not willing to try very hard to persuade anyone of anything, ever.
In case that comment turns out not to be sexist, put me down for an "Amen!"
Rufus, I think you're dead wrong about Summers. (a), maybe. (b), see above--the evaluation of that comment is typed by gender, and that's a bad thing. (c), in this case, how is not raising a media ruckus supposed to accomplish anything productive? Raising consciousness requires raising a fuss. I said "slap him around," not "don't slap him around," and in the Summers case I mean it. (Not to say that I think Summers ought to be fired, but I think only a very public ruckus has any hope of reaching him.) As for (d), the right wing is going to trash lefty academics no matter what--the best thing and non-wimpiest thing to do is to do whatever ought to be done without fretting about whether they'll spin it a way we don't like.
In case that comment turns out not to be sexist, put me down for an "Amen!"
While I refuse to either endorse or reject that statement. (WIRTEEORTS?)... that's fucking funny.
Michael, I agree. It's a bit facile, however, to say that just b/c Drum's thing pisses me off--which, put it in the context of how very often this whole "gosh, women don't write about politics on their blogs" thing comes up--that I never patiently explain stuff. Of late, I am not feeling patient. I often feel especially impatient with people who I darn well expect to "get it," especially when it seems to me they are delibertely obtuse. And I truly doubt that Drum (or anyone else) feels intimidated by me. But maybe I underestimate the power of throwing the word "fuck" around when I'm fed up.
I'd be perfectly willing to calmly discuss this with Drum, if he asked--and if I weren't feeling enormously pressed for time and impatient right this moment, and if, as I said, the "where are the women political bloggers??" question didn't come up every freakin' time one turns around. Context counts.
Anyway, my whole persona is "bitch." Defined as, "sick of being patient and understanding about idiocy." And yes, I think that well-meaning lefty men who trip over their own dicks all the time w/r/t feminist issues are being idiots, and that pandering to that just enables them. An occasional slap might just wake things up--if said men actually do care about this stuff. Which, again: why is the burden always on the folks on the shitty end of the stick to do the edumacatin'? If the stick-holders really want to be fair, then they oughta be willing to put up with a little justified impatience. Otherwise, I'm thinking, bad faith.
To be fair to Drum (sigh, goddamnit, why must one always be "fair"?), he may actually learn something from this.
Anyway, as long as I'm ranting and being offensive, let me ask a question: y'all are asking me to be fair to Drum, to be reasonable, to make a stronger case for feminism, whatever. How many of y'all went on over to Drum's post and pointed out to him the fallacy of his reasoning, or directed him to a political blog written by a woman?
Just saying.
You know what really irritated me there? Drum's reaction/non-reaction to Avedon Carol. He's linked to her, she's got a great blog, she's not on his blogroll. She pointed this out, and said how about it, and mentioned that she'd pointed it out in the past. Unless I missed it, he didn't respond at all.
If he's going to stand up and say "Hey, where are all the women, huh?" then goddamn it acknowledge the specific things he's failing to do that perpetuate the problem.
Hopkins is expressing distaste for what she judged to be sexist stereotypes by conforming to them. In a better world, sure, she wouldn't have to be judged as an exemplar, just as black people should be free to live the stereotype if it suits them as individuals. But, knowing that the world is the way it is, she showed bad judgment (our hypothesis continues) by expressing her outrage as she did. If she'd said, "well, he gave a really bad talk and undersupported some dangerous conclusions," she could have made the point more effectively.
Agreed. On the other hand, even though it isn't a perfect world, the question from this end is, "why, among people who claim to be on our side, must we be exemplary? Why can't other lefties give us the benefit of the doubt?"
In other words, it is one thing for the freepers to criticize Hopkins. It is something else entirely for Drum (or you, my dear Labs), to do so.
b, the civility is appreciated, just want to note that.
I didn't reply to Drum's post, but I never comment on Drum's...seems pointless on his site, typically. (anally honest, I comment to correct him only when I'm in the first 10 commenters...very rare)
But I also didn't comment on this because this was actually the first time I'd thought about this issue,and I recognize my ignorance on it. I just don't know that much about the blogosphere as a whole. Except for this blog-neighborhood, I stick basically with a few big blogs, which, Kevin noted, are male-dominated. Towards an explanation, being a Big Blog is a self-feeding cycle. The blogs that started attracting people early on got bigger and stayed on top. Why no women blogs got big early on, I don't know...it's certainly a likely possibility that men have a certain aversion to reading women discuss politics. And if enough men have this aversion, then it could keep a woman blogger from reaching the threshold for attracting even more traffic. This also works well with the observation that some of the more prominent female bloggers have used sex to attract/keep viewers. (I'm thinking of Wonkette and Malkin)
A couple thoughts. I've been mulling over this general issue since desfemmes first received attention.
I think bphd, you've done a great job of communicating (1) why a post like Kevin Drum's is exasperating and (2) why it isn't your job to accommodate. That makes perfect sense. But I think there's a conflict when you say it's particularly annoying when it comes from people who, "(1) have power over them; (2) are supposed to be their friends and allies, demonstrate that they really just don't get it."
This seems like a question that's come up before, "why focus on lefty bloggers when righty bloggers say worse things?" The answer that you're giving is (1) a feeling of betrayal (2) they should know better.
I want to focus on (2) because it strikes me that if part of the reason to respond to idiocy from someone like Kevin Drum is because you think he might be able to change his behavior that creates an obligation to be more patient in the response.
In other words, if part of the reason to respond to Drum is because you think it could make a difference then there is an obligation to try to respond in a way that will make a difference rather than just ranting.
Except that people have corrected him politely, and it hasn't seemed to have had any effect (Cf. the interaction described with Avedon Carol above.) Given that politeness seems useless in this instance, ranting is worth a shot, and at least it's fun.
Another comment about Kevin Drum is that it seems relevent to the discussion that he has a female co-blogger (Amy Sullivan) who, whenever I've looked, seems to attract a great deal of vitriol in the WM comments whenever she posts.
I think matters because it suggests that Kevin is willing to share his platform with a female voice and that she doesn't seem to be getting a lot of support from the blogosphere.
You can decide whether or not you think that Kevin deserves credit for letting Amy post but based on what I've read I would argue that both Kevin and Amy would be justified in beieving that their audience is not interested that voice. How much support have either of them gotten?
I think that it's important to balance criticism (however well justified) with some show of support when people behave in the ways that you want to. Have any of the female bloggers who have expressed impatience with Kevin Drum for these posts expressed support when Amy Sullivan has been posting there?
(you could argue that Amy deserves the vitriol for her opinions. Is that really any different than a male blogger saying, "I link to the bloggers that I do because those are who I read, and I like them?" My impression is that Amy Sullivan has never become an accepted memeber of the Washington Monthly blog community, and that's in part due to her gender)
Just my 2c. I fear that sounds more assertive than I feel. I defend the response of bphd (and desfemmes) to do no more than complain when they're angry and let the blogosphere respond as it will.
LB, my impression is that Kevin rarely responds in comments (he wouldn't have time to blog if he tried to respond to all of the comments). This does seem like an instance in which he could have responded, but I'm not sure that the presumption is that he should.
I also think my point is (to some degree) irrespective of Kevin's particular thinkheadedness or lack their of. The same applies to the presumptive readership of liberal blogs. If you think your addressing a "friendly" audience there should be some way to do so in a friendly way.
Matt, I specifically meant the raising of a ruckus in the context of how everything went down. If the ruckus had been about "Hey man, did you hear about how Larry Summer's got his ass handed to him by a bunch of educated women at a conference" that would have been fantastic. As it was, Summer's was taken on only in the media, rather than at the conference (that isn't actually true, as many people stayed to challenge him, but that's exactly my point - those people didn't get the press).
As to the issue of the "fainting" comment being stereotypically whimpy - that's exactly my point.
To take an example that someone mentioned in a different context above, imagine a man storming out of a conference and saying "God damn it!!! By blood is fuckin boiling I'm so fucking god damn mad!" Now imagine that it was a conference about violence against women, and the comment that spurred his outburst was something along the lines of "all men are violent, cruel bigots and are inherently inferior to women in moral standing".
Not a very useful choice of words.
And lastly, yes the right wing twists everything to fit their needs - but that doesn't mean we have to gift wrap things for them.
BitchPhd wrote:
"y'all are asking me to be fair to Drum, to be reasonable, to make a stronger case for feminism, whatever."
Speaking only for myself, that's not what I'm asking (though I now see that my comment is a bit ambiguous in that regard). I'd love for you to go and have a heated, angry discussion with him and tell him exactly why he's wrong.
It's the abstract complaining to the wind that I don't think is useful. In the context of say, Rush Limbaugh, that's all you can do - a priori we know he's not interested in even examining the possibility of changing his mind. But with someone like Drum, I think one should attempt to engage with the perpetrator directly.
Maybe. Am busy with other things in my real life right this moment, unfortunately, and others are commenting on the subject. Lindsay at Majikthise is better at that than I am, anyway. Right now, anyway. The info's out there if Drum wants to go find it, but Drum is not an education project that I, personally, am going to take on right this second.
It occurs to me that much of this reduces to a squabble over how many women the major male bloggers link to, which is a fairly absurd squabble.
I don't care if Kevin Drum has me on his blogroll or not. Blogging is a hobby - a geeky and fairly antisocial hobby at that (cry cry masturbate cry, like the man said), and if I'm doing it to impress Glenn Reynolds, well, fuck, I am a sad sack of shit, Y chromosome or no, now aren't I?
Now, if we were talking something that mattered - management positions in Fortune 500 companies, tenure slots in universities - then I'd say, hell, let's press those institutions to change, bring on the revolution! But you're talking about hyperlinks on websites, an astonishingly tiny fraction of which actually make any money. There's institutional sexist barriers, yeah, but institutional sexist barriers to what - the right to call yourself a "big mammal" or a "flappy bird"?
I read TalkLeft for a year before I knew it was done by a woman. I only found out today that Jes from ObsidianWings was female. Many, if not most, of the bloggers I read are pseudonomous, and don't necessarily use obviously gendered handles like "BitchPhD" or "ProfGrrl" or "Hindrocket." I don't typically read about their lives because I usually just read political/academic blogs. So I can be lulled into reading, linking, and blogrolling sites without even knowing if I'm linking to men, women, men pretending to be women... Fuck, maybe ogged is a chick and I've been put on this whole time! It's a craaaaazy world out there!
There is such a thing as organized, activist-style linking, blogrolling, and Koufax-voting designed to increase the prominence of women in the blogosphere, which blogs like Feministe and XX have done in the past, and good for them. But I can't muster the energy to do that because for the life of me I cannot see this as anything more than a big bunch of internet crap.
haha-- it would be awesome if, like truth, Hindrocket were a woman. And right after we found out, the sun went supernova.
You can decide whether or not you think that Kevin deserves credit for letting Amy post
I don't think this is an accurate description of the situation--Kevin's blog is the Wash Monthly homepage, and Amy Sullivan is a WM senior editor (or something). So I don't think Kevin has the authority to stop her from posting when she wants to.
Two things:
1. It's my understanding that part of the reason so many people were pissed of at Drum is that he resurrects this question every three months or so. There's obviously some lively debate, but, if the critics are correct, it hasn't exactly been penetrating his consciousness. I don't read the WM blog often enough to know for sure, but if (a) he's raised this before but (b) hasn't actually listened to the responses he's gotten, then he's a less-good guy on that particular issue.
2. Remember the old "the personal is political" statement of the 1970s? I'm disturbed that so many people seem to accept a single definition of what can possibly count as "political." That is, it has to be about the people (mostly men) who are in power in the government and in major institutions. Long analytical posts about other topics somehow don't count. Posts that address "family" issues don't count. Umm, yes, people, they do. And let's remember that HST certainly put the personal into his political--of course, it was Manly detail, not Girly detail, so that made it OK, I suppose.
Yeah, right, like us women don't talk about anything but our kids and tampons, and we don't like to duke it out in the mud in political discussions. The aggravating thing is that this stupid "women bloggers" discussion comes up like clockwork every two or three months. It's always the same. Some A-list clueless guy pulled his head out of his navel and wonders where all the women bloggers are. They descend on him in droves and let him know - again. He feigns innocence and the male commenters tell the women complaining that they need to get laid or that their blogs aren't interesting so that's why they don't get much traffic. Then there are mea culpas and promises to link more. Then the firestorm dies down and the guys go back to examining their navels and the navels of a few other guys they link to. Three months later, again, a head pops out of a navel and the guy asks "where are the women bloggers?"
Rinse and repeat.
Grrrrr!!!!
And Macs don't suck. They're all I use. ;)
Yeah, I've been reading blogs long enough to count at least five times this has come up. This time does seem different to me; I think it's probably the beginning of the integration of what have been two separate blogging communities.
The network linking structure of blogs amplifies any slight advantages. The rich get richer. Any small sexist differences in linking behavior is amplified. It's exponential.
OK, this a personal hobbyhorse of mine. The link structure of blogs is more amenable to rich communities outside of the mainstream than typical media. The links are distributed as a power law, which has fatter tails than a typical normal distribution. See this wired article or this venture blog post.
Yes, it's obnoxious and annoying that this discussion comes up again and again. But at some level, it doesn't matter because there's a rich discussion underway at important interesting blogs written by women. The internet can sustain that better than a bunch of cable tv channels, and that will change how we understand the world eventually. But maybe only after the 50th or 100th discussion about why there are no women political bloggers.
On a related note, I'm naturally inclined to cut Michael Kinsley some slack in the original discussion of LA Times, especially given the nasty digs about parkinsons and brain degeneration that slipped into the rhetoric so quickly. I admit I just like Kinsley's work and his publications a lot. My first political reading was TNR when he was editor in the 80's. I was surprised by Jack Shafer's vehement comments in Slate about Kinsley blocking the progression of women in journalism. It did make me wonder.
This time does seem different to me.
Why? Because it's Drum? If anything changes it'll be not b/c of his (or anyone else's) being a "good guy," but because enough of us women started yelling loudly enough, often enough, that people started to hear the noise and remember they'd heard it before.
cw,
The power law distribution of blog popularity makes it harder for new blogs to break into the mainstream than a flatter distribution would. The exponential function effect I was refering to concerns the multiplier effect of links. Suppose sexism means women's blogs are on average 0.9 times as likely to be linked to than comparable quality men's blogs. Because links lead to new readers and additional links, women's blogs are going to be a lot less that 0.9 times as popular as men's blogs.
This is a Clay Shirky article from a couple years ago that makes good points:
http://www.shirky.com/writings/powerlaw_weblog.html
One interesting thing that Clay mentions is that each subgroup, like stamp collector blogs, will also have the power law distribution.
joe, I'm familiar with clay shirky's work. I think he misinterprets the importance of the power log distribution. A flat distribution isn't a meaningful baseline in any social world I'm familiar with, or for that matter many physical ones. A normal is a much better baseline, and standard media consumption would probably follow a normal distribution. The big difference between a normal and a power law is in the tails.
While bias would propogate with the effect you mention in some spheres, I think the linked world is much more friendly to subcommunities than traditional media. These communities are the seeds for tomorrow's top of the curve.
Regarding Drum (and I did leave a comment - which I virtually never do on his site, the comments there are too busy and combative for my tastes), one thing that bugs is his apparent blithe unawareness that this topic has come up many, many times before. Meanwhile, for those of us whose blogs reside in what might be called the feminist neighborhood of the blogosphere, "where are all the women bloggers?" is a well-known and much-derided cliche, like saying "some of my best friends are jews."
So part of what bugs me about the Kevin Drum affair is that it seems to represent the way that the big, mainstream blogs completely ignore the feminist blogosphere. Which, in turn, seems to represent the way that mainstream democrats ignore and marginalize feminist concerns. (Except when it comes to accepting feminist money at election time, of course).
Another thing that bugs is that there are gatekeepers - the big-name bloggers effectively function as gatekeepers to becoming "A-level" blogs. So for Kevin, who is one of the gatekeepers, to ask "where are all the women" when he really is part of the problem... to me, it seems a bit aggravating.
Regarding Nancy Hopins, she's spoken literally thousands of words to reporters about this affair, most of which are the sort of critique of Summers' statements that some folks here are saying they'd have preferred. Out of thouse thousands of words, reporters have chosen to highlight one particular, short statement, above everything else she said.
So, insofar as I see a problem with her much-quoted statement, I don't blame her for it. Why did the reporters find that statement of hers so much more newsworthy than her detailed analysis of why Summers' statements were nonsense?