Case (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
case) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomsecrets2009-08-01 04:17 pm
case) wrote in fandomsecrets2009-08-01 04:17 pm
[ SECRET POST #939 ]
⌈ Secret Post #939 ⌋
Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.
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Notes:
Secrets Left to Post: 17 pages, 403 secrets from Secret Submission Post #135.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 1 2 - not!secrets ], [ 1 2 - not!fandom ], [ 1 2 3 4 5 6 - too big ], [ 1 2 3 4 - repeat ], [
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
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I mean, don't get me wrong, fandom is usually really adept at picking up on these themes, but it's not like fandom introduced any of these ideas about gender, race, class and privilege to me.
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I admit it may be due to my having grown up in an unusually diverse environment, but I have rarely, if ever, personally witnessed firsthand any significant amount of discrimination from anyone, against anyone. I went to grade school in a place where there was no majority race or color -- there were as many white kids as black, plus Hispanic, Philippino, native African and American, and a significant representation of Russians, because my school was in the same area as the Russian embassy so all the kids who didn't go to private school came to mine. There were at least 2 or 3 Russian kids per grade, per year, though they, along with the Hispanic and other non-English-speaking kids spent half the day in the ESL program. There were also representatives of multiple religions -- Christians were the majority, but four of my best friends were Jewish, one was Pagan, and two were Muslim. Three of my best friends had severe physical disabilities -- one deaf, one epileptic with a learning disorder, and one with Lupus. My church also encouraged diversity and the idea that all members of a society should help and be helped so that everyone is able to be in the place that is best for them. Youth Group teens volunteered to assist and look after disabled children for an hour and a half so their parents could attend adult-oriented services, and they had a summer camp for kids from underprivileged parts of the city, which my sister and I both volunteered at as counselors. I live in a city OBSESSED with pushing equality for men and women and persons of all races. My parents never espoused any political views to me or my siblings, but my father was a registered Independent, my mother was registered Democrat but only, she told us, so she could vote in primaries. My mother always had a job and by the time I was 11, she was the owner and President of her own business.
And yes, I HAVE absolutely seen people of all of these groups display bigotry against others, but only on an individual basis. The only time I have ever seen a GROUP of people practicing and preaching discrimination against another group was when I went to a school run by Opus Dei... which, if you've ever read the DaVinci Code, should come as no surprise whatsoever. And even THEN, while I could understand the children mimicking their parents, by senior year none of them were so sheltered that they couldn't understand the problems with their own teachings. To continue to follow them was a choice most of them made with full knowledge of what they were doing. Even as a sexuality-minority, I've never felt persecuted -- I've only understood, as I have since I was a child, that there is a time and a place to tell people that or anything else about yourself. No one needs to know your salary, your mother's maiden name, your hobbies, the size of your pants, the kind of computer you use, how often you shower, the name of the god you worship (or don't), or who you're sleeping with.
So all the issues I've ever been made aware of were purely on a theoretical basis, and I certainly never heard any of the jargon for it. I STILL can't quite figure out why it is NECESSARY to use difficult-to-define words like "privilege" when more people could understand and contribute to discussions about inequality if the issues were presented clearly and directly, without all these subtleties in meaning which you apparently need to have taken a sociology class to figure out. Refusing to use the simplest language possible and then refusing to explain to people what they cannot understand without help is in itself a form of discrimination which I see almost DAILY spread over El Jay as if there's some kind of special brand of sympathetic humanity that is a Secret Clubhouse you can't get into unless you figure out the passwords for yourself.
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Your icon fucking ROCKS.
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The whole "prejudice + power" thing? Yeah, when someone mentioned it to him, he barely seemed to have heard of it. Thinks "honky" is on par with other racial slurs. Doesn't seem to understand what I'd consider basic anti-oppression theory.
I'm sort of like, "So what do they teach you in 8 years (or whatever) of sociology?" I mean, I get that oppression is not his specialty interest, but you'd think he'd be able to say something about it beyond whatever Joe Schmoe off the street could say.
Every time I get depressed about how well he's doing in school, and how my life has basically gone down the tubes so far (not that I don't keep picking myself up and trying, but it's been more a case of trial-and-nothing-but-error), I remember that his degree is going to be...a really fancy piece of paper. But he still won't be able to hold an intelligent conversation about intersectionality.
Actually, I don't know if that should be less depressing. But it sure makes me feel better!
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My university wasn't the greatest, either -- but I do feel like I discussed these kinds of issues enough to where I can recognize them when I see them. I mean, I took an entire history course called "America: Race, Class and Gender" (though it wasn't a required course, and you'd think that something like that would be)
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(Anonymous) 2009-08-02 07:20 pm (UTC)(link)This is in no way to discount the great meta I've read online, or anything: I value the fandoms I've observed, but I don't expect them to crossover with academia even when the lingo occasionally lines up. An academic article is NOT the same thing as long post regarding Martha's race in DW (those essays are a really cool hybrid genre: personal observation, some theorizing, lots of immediate dialogue in the comments, a little old-skool/newcrit close reading, lots of really self-aware rhetoric). That post is fascinating and valuable, but it's got a different audience and does different cultural work than the article. Even when we invite our lit-crit terminology into our discussions, the context is not an MLA publication or an academic conference, not least because publication is generally instant and often not-peer-reviewed in fandom. And (here's my lit-crit-iness coming through) that context kind of matters. A lot.
So I guess that's why I don't think I learn the same things from Fandom that I've learned from my degrees. And (I feel the need to add) that's great-- why would I want grad school and fandom to be the same thing even if they share a few interests and epistemes?
OP
(Anonymous) 2009-08-05 07:36 am (UTC)(link)