When Mr Charmless says ‘X is not going away’, or ‘X will always exist’, aside from showing his complete lack of imagination, our dear gentleman is also telling us something else; namely, that he does not want X to go away. Once you have conceived that things can be different, you are dangerous to those who benefit from the status quo. You have threatened received wisdom, and those who rely upon it are terrified of the alternatives; they will not thank you, and most likely, they will mock you. To deny that there can be a world without X is to acquiese in X. Acquiesence has never got women anywhere. Mr Charmless will call his attitude ‘realism’. Realism is a weapon to use against those who advocate social change; true progressives seek to understand the reality of X now, in order that they can devise strategies to change it.
Don’t argue on Mr Charmless’ terms. You don’t have to answer his every question, respond to his every sneer, or reply in his own language. ‘There will always be X’ is moral abdication, said with the same reassurance that nineteenth century doctors used to determine females as intrinsically sickly and weak. You can understand why things are as they are today without deciding that they must be that way tomorrow.
WEll– good points!
But I think that what Mr Charmless cannot see with regard to his attitudinal posture that “there will always be X” is that he can be conviently wrapped in his own sickly blanket of limited thought.
If, indeed, there will “always be X” then let Mr Charmless himself deal with the consequences of that. Others need not join him in his pointless emotional and intellectual quarantine. But given that “X” is a pathological social condition that those who can perceive and think about it will act to get rid of, there are quite a few who will not accompany Mister Charmless as he wallows in X.
Finally, Mister Charmless will succumb to his own sickening disease that he had thought he was merely proposing and accepting on another’s behalf.
Comment by Jennifer Cascadia — February 22, 2008 @ 1:03 am
Nice post, Laurelin!
I agree with everything you said here.
It’s annoying that we hear Mr Charmless’ knee-jerk and reactionary arguments so often though.
Anyway, the importance is not to lose hope and keep advocating a radical change!
Comment by Maggie Hays — February 22, 2008 @ 1:31 am
Bravo Laureln! What a sharp little morsel this is!
“You don’t have to answer his every question”
Exactly. They usually come in the form of: “wellll what about condition 8567h$$3B in pamphlet A678shju under paragraph jh943&*??? How does your little plan work then, hmmmm??”
Comment by pisaquaririse — February 22, 2008 @ 3:44 am
[...] draft stage for a while on the computer–needing some sort of catalyst to finish it. I found Laurelin’s latest strikingly similar–my post being more a microcosm as hers. So I have linked in suggesting [...]
Pingback by Sociology 101: Innate vs. “I can’t help it…” « Buried Alive — February 23, 2008 @ 7:14 pm
Fantastic post L.
And what pisaquaririse said too.
Sadly, I don’t have anything astute to offer up on this one. Perhaps only that X is a load of bollocks, and that Mr Charmless should take his head out of his nether regions.
Or my old favourite: Wake up and smell teh Patriarchy.
Comment by stormy — February 24, 2008 @ 3:27 pm