Not ready for what... and who exactly isn't ready...
Ok, so I overheard a fascinating conversation this afternoon that pertains directly to where, exactly, patriarchy is located.
A conversation at a nearby picnic table in a busy urban park, just a few hundred feet from where next evening a large peace rally complete with floating candles and Tibetan monks would take place.
The topic was the politics of the middle-east, this absurdly violent war in Lebanon, and the implications for upcoming elections in the U.S. with special emphasis put on the Leiberman/Lamont race in Connecticut, the spillover effect of that race on Hillary Clinton, and the extent to which the whole debacle over there affects Republican Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
But get this, when they started talking about who might run for President in 2008 there was general agreement that
- If not for the recent Lebanon debacle "Condi" would have been a formidable bellicose/big-oil Republican candidate
- "Hillary's" support for the Iraq war have probably doomed her candidacy given the way Leiberman's getting pasted in the polls.
- And besides, "Hillary" couldn't win anyway because the country isn't ready for a woman President.
While I neither agree nor disagree with any single one of points as political analysis, I have some pretty severe problems overall.
First, and most trivially, it pisses me off when progressives, who *really* ought to know better, refer to powerful women by their first names and men by their last names. I mean, I believe a perfectly wonderful reason for doing so might be that all last names in English are patronymic (by definition) and even women who keep their own last names are really just perpetuating their father's last names (e.g. "Rodham.") Except I've never heard anyone advance that argument. But I digress because...
More importantly, how do you get to where you can worry that Rice might have won because the country isn't ready for a woman President?
The answer, I think, is relevant to a great deal of what I fret about in this blog and lately I've been thinking it all boils down to the word "posturing." And it's going to be the death of us.
Posturing, I hereby claim, is the practice of acting based not what you think is true but instead on what you think *everybody else* thinks is true! Here are a couple of simple examples:
- Even though men and women have roughly the same number of lifetime partners but we tend to lie about it because our *postural* beliefs say that "too many" partners make women sluts. (No, of course that's not *our* personal experience with the issue, but I mean since it's *everyone else's* what are we going to do!?!?! That's posture for you!)
- We're reluctant to post half-nekkid photos of ourselves because we have *postural* belief that anything less than Brad Pitt or Angelina Jolie is below-average. (No, of course that's not *our* personal experience with the issue, but I mean since it's *everyone else's* what are we going to do!?!?! That's posture for you!)
- Proponents and opponents of abortion have a remarkably uniform *posture* that women who seek abortions are underage, uneducated, members of minorities, casually promiscuous, and generally irresponsible. (No, of course that's not *our* personal experience with the issue, but I mean since it's *everyone else's* what are we going to do!?!?! That's posture for you!)
- Fellatio is just *posturally* submissive. There's simply no way to do it that isn't. Nope, gotta be on your knees, in fact. Oh yeah, and it's all about power like there's no power like that power where you have that power and it's just... (No, of course that's not *our* personal experience with the issue, but I mean since it's *everyone else's* what are we going to do!?!?! That's posture for you!)
Starting to get the picture? It's not what *is,* and it's not what *anyone believes in secret,* but it's what we all pretend is true and therefore pretend to be upset when the boat is rocked.
Which gets us to...
- Yes, Rice and Clinton are both women but Clinton is perceived as a feminist and Rice is perceived as a neoconservative so *posturally* it would be meaningless if Rice were nominated because, of course, them thar neocon and crony captialists'll vote for just about anybody who doesn't just follow the party line but leads it as well, but while *posturally* it would be significant if Clinton wasn't because the country's just not ready, etc., etc. (No, of course that's not *our* personal experience with the issue, but I mean since it's *everyone else's* what are we going to do!?!?! That's posture for you!)
The point being that just as stereotypes artificially and often incorrectly affect our opinions about people, *postures* artificially and often incorrectly influence our reactions to situations.
[Anyway, in the likely event this post has totally baffled you, consider the possibility that it's because I've just started thinking about this new-to-me idea about posturing. And, as with a lot of new ideas, consider that I haven't much chance to articulate it yet and you're getting in on the ground floor. The alternative, of course, would be that I either don't know what I'm talking about or I'm explaining it very poorly. But I'm feeling optimistic. :-) One way or another I suspect I'll continue to refine it. I appreciate your patience. Also any feedback, advice, and/or cross-links since I can't be the first or only person to have considered this. --fl]
I'm not baffled, but you explained so well, I almost forgot about the photo. almost!
[Thank you, 5! --fl]
So why exactly is your country not ready for a woman President ?
[My point is it's completely ready (no less than, say, India, Israel, England, Nicaragua, Germany, the Phillipines, or Pakistan were.) And if we could just stop Posturing about it for a moment we'd realize it's only a matter of who and not whether. (A problem that, I was trying to argue, doesn't occupy the knuckledraggers nearly as much it occupies progressives.) Thanks, Astra. --fl]
Sorry, I know that YOU were saying that, I didn't put it very well, but the people, real Americans, knuckleheads, progressives, whatever, I've heard it from a range, often seem to be saying that 'America' isn't ready, ie not them, but the rest of the country, which kind of implies that they consider that more than fifty per cent of their countryfolk are bigots. I was wondering whether the picnickers had some enlightenment...
[Picknickers? Is that a nickname for Americans? If so it's fascinating. (If not then perhaps it should be.) Anyway, no, you're right, my whole point is that we're doing this "posturing" thing where we keep saying "the country" isn't ready without ever considering that while the country itself has changed considerably (enough that most conservatives would vote for a woman of color who shared their common goals) our mental constructions of the country aren't keeping up. And, consequently, people's postures, while once progressive, might now be inhibiting progressivity. As I say it's just a thought, and I'm not sure I'm articulating it well, but the underlying phenomenon I'm pointing at is real as yellow-jacket wasps at a, well, at a picnic. Thanks, Astra. --fl]
Read Erving Goffman; try "The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life".
[Great, thanks. And here's an Amazon link to the book. Thanks again, R. --fl]
You write: "Posturing, I hereby claim, is the practice of acting based not what you think is true but instead on what you think *everybody else* thinks is true!"
I disagree, to this extent; I think that the "posturing" that goes on MOST often is that of saying and/or acting the way you think you _OUGHT_ to say, or do, about a topic.
This is a subtle distinction, but an important one.
[I like the word in part because what I'm talking about is so close to what your meaning. I agree there's a distinction but the end result is similar enough that I feel the word fits either way. Thanks, TR. --fl]