The Plight of the Bitter Nerd
Jan. 14th, 2015 11:38 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
davidgillonI clearly missed out on the first round of the Scott Aaronson debate - an MIT professor who argued in an online discussion of the position of women in STEM that as a shy, nerdy guy he was not privileged, and that feminism made him feel like a monster, and did this in response to a woman talking about her experience of being raped by a shy, nerdy guy *headdesk* *headdesk* *headdesk* - but a friend just pointed me at a good analysis of what Aaronson was trying to say, and how he went so wrong, that may interest people here: The plight of the bitter nerd: Why so many awkward, shy guys end up hating feminism
Laurie Penny (who has already written about this general issue when she pointed out the need for male nerds to make the uncomfortable recognition that their position in society isn't as their fondly imagined parallel to the Star Wars Rebel Alliance, but that they're actually an arm of the Empire) also has a good analysis of this in her article On Nerd Entitlement, in fact she pretty much nails the argument with her sub-title: 'White male nerds need to recognise that other people had traumatic upbringings, too - and that's different from structural oppression'. She examines where Aaronson is coming from (white male nerd who had an appalling time at school), compares it to her own lived experience (white female nerd who had an appalling time at school), and then rips him to shreds for trying to claim male nerds aren't part of the structural problem, particularly for women in STEM, by showing that yes, in fact we clearly are. And I love the fact that she goes on to tear apart his bewailing the fact that boys/men like him would do better if marriages were still being arranged by elders within the shtetl as happened for earlier generations of men in his family, by pointing out that his ancestral 'better' was only achieved by the ancestral subjugation of earlier generations of women in her family and others, within the demands of seeing the young men had the best chances, enabled at the cost of the hopes, and even ultimately lives, of young women like her.
It's this kind of *headdesk* -worthy idiocy from male nerds that makes me so glad I became disabled, as that transition/revelation/Damascene conversion gave me a much better appreciation of how, even as the proverbial shy, nerdy guy, my life had been privileged until that point (and still is) by the fact I'm also a straight white, middle-class male. While I wouldn't wish disability on Aaronson, it sounds like he needs a similarly revelatory experience if he truly thinks his experiences as a nerd equate to a woman's experience of being raped
Laurie Penny (who has already written about this general issue when she pointed out the need for male nerds to make the uncomfortable recognition that their position in society isn't as their fondly imagined parallel to the Star Wars Rebel Alliance, but that they're actually an arm of the Empire) also has a good analysis of this in her article On Nerd Entitlement, in fact she pretty much nails the argument with her sub-title: 'White male nerds need to recognise that other people had traumatic upbringings, too - and that's different from structural oppression'. She examines where Aaronson is coming from (white male nerd who had an appalling time at school), compares it to her own lived experience (white female nerd who had an appalling time at school), and then rips him to shreds for trying to claim male nerds aren't part of the structural problem, particularly for women in STEM, by showing that yes, in fact we clearly are. And I love the fact that she goes on to tear apart his bewailing the fact that boys/men like him would do better if marriages were still being arranged by elders within the shtetl as happened for earlier generations of men in his family, by pointing out that his ancestral 'better' was only achieved by the ancestral subjugation of earlier generations of women in her family and others, within the demands of seeing the young men had the best chances, enabled at the cost of the hopes, and even ultimately lives, of young women like her.
It's this kind of *headdesk* -worthy idiocy from male nerds that makes me so glad I became disabled, as that transition/revelation/Damascene conversion gave me a much better appreciation of how, even as the proverbial shy, nerdy guy, my life had been privileged until that point (and still is) by the fact I'm also a straight white, middle-class male. While I wouldn't wish disability on Aaronson, it sounds like he needs a similarly revelatory experience if he truly thinks his experiences as a nerd equate to a woman's experience of being raped
no subject
Date: 2015-01-14 08:19 pm (UTC)Microaggressions are hard to spot - that's part of why it's often hard to spot why one doesn't fit in in a particular environment until someone points out what microaggressions can look like. I got one a few months ago when a coworker was complaining about Doctor Who having a lesbian kiss in it. (Frankly, I'd think interspecies was far more controversial, but who am I to judge?) The person was suggesting that there was no need to put that sort of thing in our faces during prime-time TV (though having no personal objection to lesbians etc). I didn't feel confident enough to speak up (and I pass as straight there), so goodness knows what any gay people there thought (there were at least ten of us, so odds were good that there was at least one). But these things are all over the bloody place, in situations where you don't necessarily expect them :(
I too was surprised by the sheer blatant disregard for disability legislation - I think that employers kind of rely on the fact that you're almost certainly too ill to try suing the fuck out of them. And that if you're in a pretty tight-knit environment, that you don't want to piss people off so much that you can't get another job, should this ever be possible. It feels very much where maternity discrimination was at in white-collar environments around 20 years ago to me - there was legislation in place, but it took a few high-profile, expensive, cases to kick HR practice up a few gears. (Not that it's perfect yet, but there are definitely some big differences between now, 5yrs ago and 20 years ago.)
no subject
Date: 2015-01-15 12:28 am (UTC)*headdesk* For god's sake, it's 20 years - effectively a generation - since the Beth Jordache (Anna Friel) lesbian kiss on Brookside. And doubtless there were complaints back when Star Trek had the first interracial kiss on US TV (Kirk/Uhura IIRC), but this is how we make progress, by making these things normal and a regular part of prime-time. If people are still complaining 20 years on, clearly we need more lesbian kissing, not less!
At Evil Aerospace the blatant disregard extended to even reading the legislation. I had to explain to the then newly appointed head of Occupational Health what the Disability Discrimination Act actually said. I mean, you would have thought being up to date on the relevant laws and regulations was the kind of thing they would have checked before offering her the job!
What particularly peed me off was that they regularly claimed to be national leaders on diversity and equality. Not if you actually worked for them....
no subject
Date: 2015-01-15 06:27 pm (UTC)