Tokers:

Reading all this in Beijing, I can't help but reflect on how terribly  
"provincial" all this seems.

As the "Taiji" symbol that appears first on my Center's website shows,  
for the Chinese, "male" and "female" are simply "yang" and "ying."  To  
be "sexist," for the Chinese, that would mean "yangist," while to be  
"feminist" would mean "yinist," and that simply makes no sense at all  
. . . <g>

Western concerns over "gender" are simply our reactions to the  
*effects* of our TELEVISION environment -- which "formed" us under  
"post-industrial" conditions during which men no longer could find  
industrial work and women were encouraged to no longer build families  
-- forcibly undermining the "balance" in society.

In 1970, the Labor Force Participation rate (LFP -- percentage of the  
18-65 able-bodied with any form of "employment") was 90% for men and  
30% for women.  Now it is roughly 60% each today -- reflecting a  
radical restructuring of society in which 33% of men lost gainful  
employment along with a 100% increase for women.  From this shift in  
social *structure* comes all the "ideological" dispute that follows --  
largely because people prefer the superficial to the fundamental.

This condition is a psychological defense mechanism -- outlined by  
Gregg's "Justification Hypothesis" (along with many other descriptions  
of this behavior) -- that protects us from reality.  And it continues  
in this discussion, as it must.

Allowing the "ignorant" to frame this discussion -- totally unaware of  
the forces which *formed* the situation -- is normal under the  
circumstances.  Trying to find an "exit" from a malformed framework  
is, of course, impossible.  Once you accept the "premises," the  
results are already determined.

Academics, alas, are trapped in this whirlpool.  As Edgar Alan Poe  
noted in his 1847 "Descent into the Maelstrom," if you accept the  
validity of the "rotation" of the ocean below you, then you are  
doomed.  But, to be an academic today, forces you to follow the stream  
into oblivion.  This is perhaps the biggest problem in the West today  
and at the root of its deepening "decline" (as well as my discussions  
with Chinese academics.)

There is an "escape" but that requires rejecting the "inevitability"  
of the situation.  I encourage ToKers to read Poe's story and to  
ponder why Marshall McLuhan found it so compelling . . . !!

Mark

Quoting Mathew Jamie Dunbaugh <[log in to unmask]>:

> Thank you Frank for your sympathy.
>
> Revealing my true thoughts and feelings on this subject was a tad stressful
> and I had been prepared to defend myself. I've had this debate before with
> certain far-left people who took great efforts to crucify me and take
> offense to everything I said (or pretended to in order to try and win the
> argument). Eventually, it became clear they were evading reason, and that
> their attempts to shame me were merely a likely-unconscious attempt to
> acquire the moral high ground.
> That should be a perfect example of what the "truth" is always up against:
> the struggle for status and power. You say that my statement was far from
> the whole truth, yet I have a terribly hard time imagining a world where
> the struggle for status submits to the sovereignty of reason. It would be a
> world of very careful thinkers who each take maximal, personal
> responsibility to understand the big picture as individuals. That would be
> family to me. But I worry that a world dominated by understanding might
> suck the life out of humanity, because what is life without the struggle
> for power? It seems that the temptation of power is the worst enemy of
> understanding. One thing we could do to change the world would be to
> keenly expose whenever someone puts their own interests before
> understanding.
>
> I have to admit I've grown very weary of being vilified for being honest,
> yet this seems to be the human condition. For most of human history, the
> truth must have been a scary thing to possess. It's called "the burden of
> understanding" for a reason.
>
> Gregg's question only brought me back to where the epistemic gravity always
> takes me. Devoting your life to understanding doesn't make many friends,
> but it makes a few good friends. I appreciate that Gregg brought this up
> even though it was difficult. The reality is difficult whether or not he
> brought it up.
>
> The lifesaver keeping me from drowning in cynicism is that I know that as
> culture evolves, truth and knowledge seem to grow in dominance. And that
> keeps me going in hope and wonder.
>
> Jamie
>
> On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 5:42 AM Frank Ambrosio <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
>
>> Dear Jamie,
>>
>> Could not read your comments without offering some sort of response. I
>> have not been involved in this thread up to now, except as an observer, and
>> I certainly do not want to "grandstand" at the eleventh hour after so many
>> others have thoughtfully and constructively contributed to a very
>> worthwhile series of exchanges. But when I read in your first paragraph
>> that your reaction to the question was as follows, I felt that I wanted to
>> offer some comfort. You say, "Little is more offensive than human
>> sexuality. Nothing makes me as sure that this world is, for all intensive
>> purposes, ruled by Satan. I don't mean that literally. The universe might
>> be indifferent, but that indifference has all the aesthetic of evil."
>>
>> I emphatically agree: that is a huge truth. But it is not the whole truth.
>> Nobody has or ever will have the whole truth, but that does not absolve us
>> from remembering BOTH how hugely true your statement is AND that it is very
>> far from the whole truth.
>>
>> so here's my little bit of comfort, for what it is worth: your comments as
>> whole strike me as a generous though painful way of taking responsibility
>> for the fact that the whole thread started with a sadly and irresponsibly
>> malformed question that outright incited people to seize on partial truths
>> masquerading as just plain "truth." (Of course, the responsibility for the
>> hideously malformed question lies with its parent, in this case Dr. Yancy,
>> not with Gregg who passed it on primarily with the motive, as I understood
>> it, of an invitation to participate in the dynamics of this listerv around
>> the question to which "are all men sexist?" crudely gestures, the question
>> of the mystery of human sexuality, it all its paradoxical ambiguity,
>> immensely awe-inspiring and immensely terrifying) Simply put, it is
>> questions like that that give rise the kinds of mega-hurricanes of sound
>> and fury that we call the "cultural wars" (god save us all).  Someone like
>> Yancy, who should be in a position to know better, has to be held
>> professionally responsible (I say nothing of personal moral responsibility)
>> for prescribing a pill that is going to certainly do a lot of patients much
>> harm before it might perhaps do some good for a few.
>>
>> I regret this particular mistreatment caused you so much pain, Jamie. You
>> are right not to accept the responsibility the question tries to impose,
>> but, as professionals of one sort or another, we all have to be careful to
>> what we open our hearts and how we make ourselves vulnerable. I think that
>> something like this is behind Gregg's most recent contribution to this
>> thread, though I would frame his judgment somewhat differently.
>>
>> we do not know one another, so please don't be offended or feel patronized
>> by my concern. I have no doubt that you can take care of yourself without
>> my sympathy or "advice." This just happened to be the first time this
>> particular discussion moved me to participate.
>>
>> all good wishes,
>> Frank
>>
>>
>>
>> Frank
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Francis J. Ambrosio, PhD
>> Associate Professor of Philosophy
>> Senior Fellow, Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship
>> Georgetown University
>> 202-687-7441
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Oct 29, 2018 at 12:01 AM Mathew Jamie Dunbaugh <
>> [log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>
>>> Well, I really appreciate what Helen has said. I was apprehensive about
>>> sending this because I find it an unhappy subject. And it's stressful how
>>> carefully I have to choose my words. Little is more offensive than human
>>> sexuality. Nothing makes me as sure that this world is, for all intensive
>>> purposes, ruled by Satan. I don't mean that literally. The universe might
>>> be indifferent, but that indifference has all the aesthetic of evil.
>>>
>>> I'm tall, white, and I've been told that I look like an alpha male. Yet
>>> I've been single most of my life largely because I don't fit Steve
>>> Quackenbush's description of "all men". I've devoted my whole life to
>>> thinking carefully and the search for knowledge, so I take painstaking care
>>> when forming judgments of any kind. And I've always been uncomfortable with
>>> objectifying women, a sentiment that has drawn contempt from people of both
>>> genders. But as a white man, I'm both racist and sexist, and nobody gives a
>>> shit how carefully I think. I understand that the male gender is
>>> sexist, but it's because biology demands it. But that doesn't mean all men
>>> are personally sexist. Some of us refuse to participate, and often lose a
>>> great deal of power because of it.
>>>
>>> If the left is going to corner white men into a demonized position, it
>>> had better give them a way out. If you never had any choice not to be
>>> guilty, something's wrong with the whole situation and it's not going to
>>> turn out well. Frankly, I'm worried that identity politics is ruining
>>> western civilization. I'm still shocked at the loss of emphasis on the
>>> individual these days. But anyone with strong opinions has to admit that
>>> this is a challenging moral dilemma. There are statistical differences
>>> between groups, in ways the left can be motivated or loathe to emphasize.
>>> On one hand, it's good to point out the vices of certain groups so we might
>>> change them. On the other, everyone should recognize the injustice of being
>>> considered guilty of something just because you're a member of some group.
>>>
>>> I'm surprised to hear people agree so easily that ALL men are sexist.
>>> Really? Every single one, and all to the same degree? What about a man who
>>> is asexual? Or a man with autism who might not even recognize much of
>>> gender at all? What about a man raised with the highest degree of
>>> conscience, devoted his whole life to resisting any and all bigoted norms,
>>> even to the extent of losing everything and being judged as weak by his
>>> community? There's so much variation in the world so I don't see how the
>>> statement can be justified. Is the *male gender *generally sexist? Yes,
>>> as is the female gender in its own ways. I'd say biology is sexist, ...but
>>> cultural evolution might change that.
>>>
>>> All of us were once children who had no idea what's going on and simply
>>> found ourselves in fortunate or unfortunate circumstances, enjoying
>>> our good luck or suffering our bad luck. We all simply flowed along the
>>> current of incentives, blaming each other and hardly ever realizing that
>>> it's the incentive structures ruling over us making it irresistible to harm
>>> each other. But each of us is responsible for the world; we are responsible
>>> for accepting these incentive structures or not. And because the crowd
>>> doesn't stand up together all at once, and almost everyone is guilty of
>>> simply following the current, those of us who don't accept unjust incentive
>>> structures often lose. The good almost always lose, it seems to me.
>>>
>>> I'll also say that the female gender is not free from responsibility for
>>> the incentive structures that make puppets of us, including making men
>>> sexist. The attached page from Brene Brown's book "Daring Greatly" supports
>>> my view that women have a powerful role in shaping the dominance hierarchy
>>> of men and in driving men to seek power over each other. Also in my
>>> experience, other men tend to be more compassionate and understanding of
>>> male weakness than women. Biologically speaking (something we haven't yet
>>> transcended BTW) ...It's for women that men must be strong most of all.
>>> Also, power is often mysterious but I have some female friends who would
>>> admit that if you can come to understand women's sexual preferences, you
>>> can understand power and vice versa. And the "good" and "power" aren't the
>>> same thing. While the female gender might hold some responsibility, I
>>> hesitate to blame actual women for being this way because doing so would go
>>> against all sense. We're all trapped in the roles that we play and the
>>> incentives they provide, and it sometimes takes a life of almost suicidal
>>> rebellion to really do the right thing, and even then it's probably a waste
>>> unless one can change the norms and change everyone.
>>>
>>> ALL people need to forever be expanding their minds to understand more
>>> what it's like to be others, and to understand our human nature.  We are
>>> always undergoing the evolution of domestication and justification. I see
>>> the problem of identity politics as a consequence of progressives generally
>>> trying to do the right thing, and I see the justice women can get from
>>> approaching the day men will finally understand and respect what they have
>>> to deal with, but it goes both ways... or in all directions. The solution
>>> is for all of us to increase our moral sophistication. We're going to have
>>> to entrust common people with the responsibility of thinking carefully, and
>>> it has to start with intelligent, honest leadership.
>>>
>>> Rather than getting every man to admit that he's a guilty sexist, we
>>> should keep in mind the incentives our roles come with and hold people
>>> accountable to the bigger picture. People should question the priveledges
>>> they get with their roles.
>>>
>>>  As culture evolves we are all continually learning what justice is, and
>>> I would say it is our duty as homo sapiens to continue that struggle. Every
>>> individual is responsible for the world.
>>>
>>> Jamie
>>>
>>> P.S. As an intellectual, of course my position is that justice depends on
>>> people getting better at finding out what's true... so in other words,
>>> yes, being more like me. But to be honest, I'm afraid of what the truth
>>> will do to us. I suspect culture evolves towards truth, so I hope the truth
>>> can one day be compatible with our feelings.
>>>
>>>> [image: Women_Patriarchy.jpg]
>>>>
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