Miscellaneous Chatter > General Misc.

Bakker, Feminism, and Slavery

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What Came Before:

--- Quote from: Bakker User ---Scanning through the boards, I can't find any existing threads to incorporate this into.

Anyway, sorry if you've all had your fill of this elsewhere: some have accused Bakker of sexist and, perhaps worse, unconvincing characterizations of women in his stories. He has been accused of not knowing anything about women.

It strikes me that perhaps these complaints are unreasonable from at least one angle. Namely, that Bakker is writing about particular individuals (and these are well-realized, at least) who are steeped in a cultural (Earwan) milieu totally different from modern Western whatever -so of course they'll behave in ways unexpected to us, and hold beliefs appalling to us. Plus, isn't challenging preconceptions of human psychology what Bakker's all about anyway? And doesn't speaking of "how women act" or "how men act" both beg a certain question and fall right into Bakker's trap/arms? ... Let's just take this hyper-misogynistic universe as it is for a moment (and whether that is intrinsically problematic or not, I can't say...) - how could a given female in this universe be expected to think and act? It's certainly not a universe conducive to warrior-princesses. But I've probably just committed a grave fallacy with the last couple of lines, so let's wrap it up.

Personally, being an ignoramus virtual hermit these days (see intro post), I trust Bakker to be well-acquainted enough with the cog-psych research and personal interactions to create A realistic or plausible or possible characterization, even if it's shocking in many ways.

That's all I really have to say on that front.

***

More serious, however, is this charge from one of the Larry-OF posts:


--- Quote ---Reading the quoted passage with which you begin this post the very first thing that anybody who knows anything the condition of slavery and those who lived it is, "This guy hasn't even bothered to read the myriad slave narratives available, which make up a large part of our significant national literature." He knows nothing about being a slave.

Many slave narratives including the most 'literary' and most studied among our classics of national lit are even free, full text, online.

This guy can't be trusted about anything to do with power, gender and sex.
--- End quote ---

with respect to this passage in WLW -


--- Quote ---A warmth climbs through her as she speaks, an unaccountable assurance, as if out of all her crazed burdens, confession is the only real encumbrance.  Secrecy mars the nature of every former slave, and she is no different.  They hoard knowledge, not for the actual power it affords, but for the taste of that power.  All this time, even before Achamian's captivity, she has been accumulating facts and suspicions.  All this time she has fooled herself the way all men fool themselves, thinking that she alone possessed the highest vantage and that she alone commanded the field.
--- End quote ---

Does Bakker's understanding of slavery seem to be lacking to any of you? She mentions the availability of slave narratives online, but I don't see how that contradicts the notion that slaves hoard secrets from their masters. It certainly sounds plausible to me, at least on the surface. Are there any specific slave-quotes from our epoch that suggest or explicitly state otherwise?

At any rate, perhaps there's a psychological difference between race-slavery and the more old-fashioned slavery depicted in TSA. And again with the cultural-milieu difference, though to repeat it here might be, I fear, a cop-out of some sort.



Anyone got better apologies for Bakker?

On a positive note, I've gotten over my former contempt for the feminist critics of Bakker. On the other hand, perhaps it's simply a sign of decreased cognitive investment in Bakker's work rather than any maturation against the biases he so often contemplates. Which is the least flattering option?  :)
--- End quote ---

What Came Before:

--- Quote from: Meyna ---I can't say anything of the descriptions of slavery from primary sources and how it compares to Bakker's depictions, but the altercation with the feminists followed a script that you see in a lot of arguments. The goal of the critics was never to understand the work; the goal was to make an example of someone in an effort to "rally the troops" against an issue that, to be fair, is a big problem in a lot of ways. Once Bakker did respond, both parties had incentive to continue and were then compelled to escalate.

"But it seems to me that once you begin a gesture it's fatal not to go through with it."
-John Updike

Do not make the mistake of dismissing the actions of the initial instigators as being unintelligent or misguided (insert any Sun Tzu quote concerning deception here). It was manipulation designed to gain followers, and, quite frankly, it worked. Whether it actually ends up helping the original cause is a different issue.
--- End quote ---

What Came Before:

--- Quote from: Curethan ---Indeed. 

The argument lacks any evidence that such depictions reinforce negative attitudes. 
Even the censorship campaigners of the 90's had some kind of case to present when condemning popular art.
--- End quote ---

What Came Before:

--- Quote from: Auriga ---Meyna's post is basically right.

The crowd who criticized Bakker over misogynism never really intended to analyze and pick apart Bakker's work in a serious way - it was more about yelling "misogynist poo-poo head" as loud as possible, and create an Issue of the Day.

The stupidest thing Bakker did was to acknowledge these people at all. They feed off attention, like all other internet-activists.
--- End quote ---

What Came Before:

--- Quote from: bbaztek ---My experience with internet social justice warriors is they are often as venemous and vitriolic as the people they are trying to denounce. It's like the kid who keeps getting swirlies in middle school so he learns karate and puts the bully in the hospital, and then starts attacking anyone who looks at him funny. It's not unheard of for victimized people to lash out but if you're gonna just continue to filter everything in the world through your myopic views and only feed the anger and hatred inside you then you are doing nothing but continuing to perpetuate the cycle of anger/victimization

edit: i want to add that I've learned a lot from feminist posters on different forums and I try to remain as conscious as possible of how I regard women, but sooner or later you need to move past the venom
--- End quote ---

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