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Well this is just amazingly, self-defeatingly dumb! While thoroughly shredding the International Olympic Committee’s determined resistance to letting women ski-jumpers compete (current record-holder on the main ski jump in Vancouver? Lindsey Van) Angry Mouse of Daily Kos unearths the following rationalization from David Whitley at a website called Fanhouse. Here’s Angry Mouse’s quote of Whitley

...once girls start performing as well as boys — or better — it’s not even a sport anymore. Just look at what women have done to bowling!

[Fred] Barnes was beaten by a woman, giving him immediate entry into history’s Male Ridicule Club.

How could a guy lose to a girl in an athletic event?

Simple, really.

Bowling isn’t an athletic event.

Rule No. 1 in determining whether an activity is a sport: If the best female in the world can beat the best male in the world, it doesn’t qualify.

Read Angry Mouse’s post here.

We’ll leave aside the whole daring provocateur trope so common in “journalism” (remember, all publicity = good publicity, thus no direct link to Whitley’s post from here.) Instead let’s examine the question in the context of other, similar “last stand” sort of claims.

If you ever had to read Karl Marx (along with Paul Samuelson and Milton Friedman in a freshman survey course, as I did) then you may dimly recall (as I do) the story of a skilled laborer bragging to an industrialist that while he might be able to invent a machine for turning axe-handles on a lathe he’d never invent one that could turn rifle stocks as quickly or accurately as a skilled human. The industrialist quickly rose to the challenge and the lathe operator lost his job… as did, no doubt, every other lathe operator in the factory. This version of the “man can not be beaten by…” wasn’t very durable.

If you ever had to take a combined computability and cognition in the 1980s, as I did, you may dimly recall (as I do) the informed assertions and alleged proofs that a computer could never beat a human grandmaster at chess. That took a little longer to build Deep Blue, which beat Gary Kasparov in the 20th Century than it took the industrialist to beat the lathe operator in the 19th, but down Kasparov went. This version of the “man can not be beaten by…” was only slightly more durable.

If you had to read a newspaper almost any time in the 19th, 20th, or 21st Centuries you may vividly recall the assertion that not only are humans not a product of evolution but evolution itself never happens and indeed isn’t possible. This latter one seems like a pretty durable argument, but more because it’s pretty passionately held than because the accumulation of evidence hasn’t been drawing the circle of denial tighter, and tighter, and tighter. (Same, by the way, for the even loopier notion that the earth is only 6,000 to 10,000 years old.)

And now this “It’s not a sport of a woman can beat a man at it” business.

The problem with each of these assertions is that they diminish those who resist far more than they do their challengers.

Care to go on? Speaking of the Olympics, Adolph Hitler and his minions were diminished when Cornelius Cooper Johnson one the gold medal for the high jump in Munich. And goodness knows the tobacco companies were diminished (to the tune of half a trillion $!#%!@#% dollars) when their efforts to “prove” cigarettes are harmless finally failed. (Surely a fraction of that money would have been better spent developing a variety that was either not addictive or else not carcinogenic or preferably both.) And don’t forget the loopy, and sometimes still-prevalent notion that women are “naturally nurturing” and therefore ought to be consigned to all child-rearing duties during, and in the event of divorce, after marriage.

As far as I can tell (weather conditions — heat, snow, wind seem to alter where people start their jumps) the actual Olympic contenders this week mostly handily beat Lindsay Van’s earlier record on the hill. But many did not. For instance she finished ahead of most or all the men on the American team. Which, I guess, in David Whitley’s interesting logic means that ski-jumping is a sport for some men… but not the American ones who’s best wasn’t as good as Van’s.

Which is of course stupid. Again, the false premise driving his logic demeans and diminishes everyone.

By the way, you know who I think is going to be more sad about Mary Daly’s passing than anyone in feminism or on the left? Rush Limbaugh. In the last 30 years he’s made on the order of billions of dollars tarring all of feminism with her supremacist, separatist spew. When he said “feminazi” he meant her and a very small handful of people like her.

This is not to say Rush Limbaugh was her responsibility — if it hadn’t been her he’d have picked someone or something else to demonize. But she believed largely what he accused her of believing. Advocated largely what he accused her of advocating. And he called that all of feminism. Nor, since she agreed, would she have disputed it. She, in turn, would have been able to point to Rush Limbaugh and say look how he proves my point about men. And of course Limbaugh would gloatingly agree as well.

Even though both were wrong it’s been in both their interests to maintain the fiction that everyone who disagreed with them were wimps, sellouts, or dupes and agents of their opponents. At the expense of many other kinds of feminism.

When you see a million grown men rolling their eyes and wetting their pants about “teh femininiminists” I think Daly had something to do with that. When you see a million grown women saying “I’m not a feminist but…” or “I’m a feminist but…” or, especially “feminism doesn’t speak for me.” I think Daly was a big part of that too.

And yeah, maybe that’s a little harsh. Fine. She’s the one who, as an individual, thought her would would be a better place if I, and half my children, as a class were “decontaminated” from the Earth. So I, as an individual, am sincerely sorry she’s passed away. As I would have been sincerely sorry had Rush Limbaugh passed away during his recent health crisis. I just as sincerely hope that, having passed away, their particular assumptions, ideas, and dreams of world transformation pass away with them.

Summary: Speculation about the peculiar gaps in application of sexualized slander against highly-visible women. With a quick allusion in a note at the end about the soft underbelly of privilege.

Quote of the day (ok, from sometime last week) from Echidne of the Snakes:

It’s nearly impossible to separate Sarah-Palin-hating from Sarah-Palin-as-female-hating, and that offers a nice opening for any closeted misogynist to exercise his or her inner demons without getting caught doing it. Ultimately the whole topic turns into free-for-all about tits and power and shit, and the only valid conclusion is that we are far from an equal world when it comes to getting and using political power.

She said it here.

She says the no-win-edness of the situation makes it not worth blogging about.

I’ll just say it’s worth pointing out that you could pretty much replace “Sarah Palin” in the line above and replace it with, oh, many but not all highly-visible and/or controversial women politicians and pundits (Hillary Clinton anyone? Ann Coulter? Carrie Prejean? Janet Reno? Even Anita Bryant back in the 1970s.)

Funny thing, by the way, that gets me as I look at the list is it’s not so much the person’s looks (for instance Condoleezza Rice is conventionally attractive but rarely targeted) or their degree of partisanship (For instance “Dr. Laura” and Rachel Maddow tend to be more partisan than average but rarely targeted.)

Instead I think it’s most likely to happen when women step into new domains: homophobia in Prejean or Bryant’s case, law enforcement in Reno’s case. Activist First-Lady in Clinton’s case. Conservative firebrand in Coulter’s case. And, annoyingly, technology in the case of… pretty much every woman who’s ventured into technology. Indicative example: I seem to remember that Ariana Huffington caught quite a lot of sex-baiting when in the Clinton-activist-first-lady role with hapless former husband Michael’s arch-conservative Senatorial bid in California, but since returning to her “proper-role-for-a-woman” location in progressive politics I just haven’t seen that much sex-baiting. Even though she’s conventionally attractive, politically powerful, and reliably highly partisan. And even though her Huffington Post has a huge on-line presence I think she escapes the fate of women in technology by appearing as a media personality rather than appearing to grapple directly with technology.

All of which is poorly-informed speculation offered to support a third alternative to Echidne’s dilemma: it’s not that women are hated per-se, it’s that they’re particularly hated, in highly gendered ways, when they encroach on traditionally male turf.

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Note to self: If I have time I’ll try and post about why this rabid, sexualized reaction by (mostly) men to women’s encroachment demonstrates the freakish self-loathing and insecurity that is the flip side of (intrinsically un-earnable and thus always unearned) male privilege. And if I have time I’ll compare it to the “tough guy” conservative tendency to absolutely wet their pants at the prospect of 9/11 terrorists being tried in New York City or imprisoned on on U.S. soil even in SuperMax-security prisons. I might not have time, though, but I want to note the possibility.

Fran Langum of Blue Gal raises one of those points that frustrate the dickens out of transactional traditional-values types (emphasis mine)

I came across this LA Times article about a plastic made in China gadget which allows a woman to “fake” virginity, presumably on her wedding night. It’s got jockstraps-in-a-twist for the double-standard bearers of the right wing Islamic world.

And no where in the debate is the sense that women are supposed to enjoy themselves sexually either before or after marriage. We don’t hear from the female sex partners, to put the term most generically, of Ensign, Sanford, Vitter, and even Letterman as to whether or not they enjoyed the sex.

She said it here.

Well certainly not! The no-sex class paradigm’s Rule of Desire #1 says it’s simultaneously intolerable and inconceivable for a woman to have sexual desire. In a system where heterosexual sex is supposed to be transactional (i.e. men get sex and women get security, love, support, gifts, money, not getting beaten up, etc in exchange) it would be totally inconvenient if women enjoyed the actual sex part of sex! That would be like a dollar bill suddenly having a say in where it was spent.

(Sheesh, Cosmopolitan writers and editors get the Two Rules of Desire 100% right 100% of the time and they’re morons! So how hard can it be? But I digress…)

Twisting the knife on no-sex class cultural assumptions Blue Gal passes along the following little joke that’s made the rounds.

Q: What did the prostitute do for David Vitter that his wife wouldn’t?
A. Everything.

Ha. Ha-ha-ha! You see… he’d already done the wedding-ring transaction, see, and he’d gotten in trouble with her before about some sort of sexual peccadillos, see, which means that even if she had been interested in sex (which would be intolerable and inconceivable) she’d be off the hook for sex. Get it? See, and even if she was still on the hook she’d still withhold sex to punish him. Got it? No, see, prostitutes do things human women won’t because they’re paid to. Or, even better, because they’re coerced! Because, see, even prostitutes — and you know they’re all women! — wouldn’t do it if they either a) weren’t force into it or b) weren’t so greedy and avaricious they were willing to hold their noses and do it for mon… are you paying attention? This is serious! Because you won’t get that it’s funny!

Sheesh, Maxim writers and editors get jokes like that 100% right 100% of the time and they’re morons! So how hard can it be? But I digress…

Getting back to Fran’s original question, inside the dominant paradigm it’s in incredibly bad taste to ask whether Vitter’s, Letterman’s or anyone else’s partners enjoyed sex with them. Just identifying them as having had sex (marred or not, willingly or not, whether they enjoyed it or not) would rob them of the opportunity to use one of those plastic virginity things from China with male partner so he could at least pretend he was getting something of value. Even to suggest they might have enjoyed it would further reduce the exchange value of their sexuality. Inside the dominant paradigm to identify one of the partners at all could still (literally in some cultures) destroy her.

(Yes, outside the dominant paradigm there are matters of sexual harassment by employers, general and not just sexual rights to privacy, and whether there was choice in the matter. There’s also the little matter of professional stigma where career advancement based on merit can tarnished by assumptions about favoritism and/or compensation for sexual behavior. And outside it there’s even a perfectly non-controversial presumption that, y’know, to the extent they were grownups who decided to have sex then yeah, they probably enjoyed themselves. But inside it that’s just crazy talk.)

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There are a lot of other really good points in Fran’s post. She tackles some disturbing public perceptions about the agency of Britney Spears and her younger sister and of men who feel entitled to have sex with them. She raises the issue of what she calls the orgasm gap — the time, sometimes years, between when women first have intercourse and when they have their first (possibly non-solo) orgasms. Go check it out.