For the record:
If I ever find myself in the position to question another person's feminism, another woman's feminism no less, merely because she likes a company, product, or person that I may not like or may have even had a negative sexist experience with or because of, I think that will be a time that I need to seriously reconsider my priorities. Hell, it'd be a time to reconsider who I am as a person.
No one says feminists have to agree on everything. No one says that feminists have to like one another. But we don't have the right to weigh and measure one another's feminism like that. We're better people than that. All of us. And it's a poor person who would try to use that kind of bullying to attempt to shame and quiet another person's honest criticism.
And yes, for the record, this is totally about this.
(For the record, the link URL, and the page it goes to, spoils the ending to Final Crisis #6. Just so you know.)
No one says feminists have to agree on everything. No one says that feminists have to like one another. But we don't have the right to weigh and measure one another's feminism like that. We're better people than that. All of us. And it's a poor person who would try to use that kind of bullying to attempt to shame and quiet another person's honest criticism.
And yes, for the record, this is totally about this.
(For the record, the link URL, and the page it goes to, spoils the ending to Final Crisis #6. Just so you know.)
posted by kalinara @ 6:03 AM
20 Comments:
At January 17, 2009 7:35 AM,
LurkerWithout said…
I only "read" Val when someone else links to her now. Had she been calling for a boycott of DC by feminists? Maybe I misread her comment there. Maybe she wasn't calling someone a bad feminist because they still bought or read comics put out by DC. I don't know, Val's not very clear in her writing a lot of the time...
At January 17, 2009 8:53 AM,
Unknown said…
Yeah I'm in agreement. Frankly I've relaunched hoping to get myself out of the narrow cast (nothing against it I just want my blog to be more reflective of the scope of my interests) but I just had to speak up on this one. http://tinyurl.com/7fmhte
At January 17, 2009 9:41 AM,
Anonymous said…
so Sarah Palin, totally a feminist?
At January 17, 2009 9:58 AM,
Anonymous said…
Wow, it really seems like she's going out of her way to be polemic at the cost of other people! This one just did it for me. I hate when people do that!
WM
At January 17, 2009 10:37 AM,
SallyP said…
Yup. Just finished reading that, and shaking my head in bafflement. If she weren't such a FABULOLOUS FEMINIST, I'd have to say that ol' Val has a giant pair of brass ones.
Am I the only one who is waiting for the other shoe to drop, when she finds out that Marvel is probably just as sexist and piggish as DC? She just loves to use her "insider" status at DC as the answer to any question, but then lashes out at anyone who even mildly mentions that perhaps they like DC.
The constant and total ignoring of Marvel's missteps is getting a little old too.
At January 17, 2009 11:48 AM,
ShellyS said…
Wow. I went and read Val's post, plus all the comments to the one you linked to, then a bit beyond. I knew I had a good reason to stop reading Val's blog and this just reinforced that decision. Her analogy with the coffeeshop is a bit over the top.
I certainly don't think someone's enjoyment or lack of enjoyment of Final Crisis (which I'm enjoying but haven't gotten issue 6 yet, and I didn't mind having it spoiled -- although I hate spoilers -- because the thing with Bats was pretty much telegraphed) has anything to do with feminism or even DC Comics as a whole.
I consider myself a feminist and have since I was in college in the early-'70s, but part of that is the belief that women should have the right of choosing how to live their lives and not have that dictated to them by men. If they want to be stay-at-home wives, fine. If they want to be president, they should go for it. And if they want to read DC Comics, that's between them and their comics supplier.
At January 17, 2009 1:08 PM,
Dane said…
To be fair, Shelly, Val said women can shop at DC.
They just can't be feminists.
But yeah, I'm done with that noise as well.
At January 17, 2009 1:32 PM,
SallyP said…
Because everyone knows that Joe Quesada is so Pro-Women, even though he won't hire any as editors!
At January 17, 2009 2:41 PM,
kalinara said…
newguy: I wasn't aware that Sarah Palin officially identified as a feminist.
But if she has, then I believe she is a feminist.
That doesn't mean I can't think she's said and done a lot of very damaging things to women.
At January 17, 2009 3:52 PM,
Anonymous said…
Kalinara, thank you so much. I was so upset when I read Val's reply. I tried to respond but my Google account messed up. Your post today has restored my faith in the blogosphere!
I've promised myself to quit Val's blog about a dozen times in the past few months but this time it's happening. I've finally realized why everyone says the best way to deal with Val is to ignore her. Good advice!
Thank you again!
At January 17, 2009 5:50 PM,
notintheface said…
What are you talking about, Sally? Marvel under Quesada is an absolute BASTION of feminism, with an entire stable of female editors like Louise Simonson and Ann Nocenti.. oh, wait...
At January 17, 2009 6:12 PM,
Djibril said…
There is a genuine debate to be had here: does a serious grievance with a company (and for lack of time to research the background I'm going to assume that Val's experiences reflects a deep institutionalized sexism as she implies) in some cases damn the whole company and warrant a feminist boycott of their products? One might argue on either side without being unreasonable or irrational.
This is no excuse for being rude or unkind: if someone disagrees with you, and you assume they either (a) are mistaken or (b) have an evil agenda--the rules of good discourse demand that we assume -a- and try to educate them as to the reasons for our opinion.
I guess we're here discussing the tone of the offending comment, not the content of the disagreement (because the proper place to discuss the latter would be over on occasionalsuperheroine)...
At January 17, 2009 8:22 PM,
Evan Waters said…
Yeah, that's a line. Definitely. The extent to which there is sexism at DC (and it exists almost everywhere so it's not a stretch to say it exists there), the best way to respond to it, etc., can be debated among reasonable people without dissenting on the fundamental idea that women are equal to men.
I generally don't read Val's blog myself- there's some stuff in the original essay that is at least worth following up on, but she can't avoid looking like she has an axe to grind.
At January 18, 2009 1:11 AM,
Nick said…
I may not agree with her comment but hey, her blog, she can say whatever she wants. She probably didn't win a lot of fans saying what she said though.
I read both her, your, and ragnell's blog, so I am trying to stay neutral here.
At January 18, 2009 12:31 PM,
SallyP said…
I'm beginning to think that Valerie wants to BE Ragnell in the worst way. And that's exactly how she's doing it...in the very worst way.
Ragnell is quite fearless about expressing her opinion. However, in addition to being fair, she's also a very good writer. She's deft at turning a phrase and in her use of language. If you disagree with her, she will happily argue with you.
Valerie seems to want to be able to throw bombshells and puff off her feminism, but is lacking in the literary skills to do it well. when someone brings up an issue that she disagrees with, she either ignores it completely or launches into invective. She also enjoys being a victim a little more than is healthy. Ragnell is NEVER a victim.
At January 18, 2009 1:55 PM,
notintheface said…
She's become quite the cheap shot artist whenever someone disagrees with her.
The tipping point for me was during the whole series of "Simpsons porn/animated porn" posts she did. There were posters who supported the CBLDF's decision to stand up for the defendants in those cases. She responded by saying that they wouldn't be so quick to defend the First Amendment if it were something THEY disliked or were offended by. As someone who also supported the CBLDF's decision, all I could think was "What the hell do you think they're ALREADY DOING, Genius?"
At January 18, 2009 11:15 PM,
Unknown said…
I attempted to leave a comment on Val's followup post, the first time I've ever tried to post a comment on her blog. I knew the comments were moderated, but I thought that policy was just in place to police trolls. I wrote a calm and non-abusive dissenting remark , and twenty-four hours later it's still not posted (and presumably never will be). Is it her policy to periodically weed out disagreeing posts?
At January 19, 2009 2:10 AM,
notintheface said…
In fairness, maybe she hasn't had a chance to finish moderating because she's been too busy today. She does have a real life just like you and I and the rest of us here do, after all.
At January 19, 2009 5:41 AM,
kalinara said…
I won't pretend that I like Val, but she doesn't seem to have problems with approving comments that disagree with her.
I'd be patient, it might well be up soon.
At January 19, 2009 8:38 PM,
Anonymous said…
Seems to me Val isn't saying "You can't be a feminist and read DC."
She's saying "You can't be a feminist and shop at DC and you are deliberately belittling my pain and insulting me personally in the most unkindest of ways."
Sorry Val, but it isn't all about you. Your bad experience with some individuals at a company does not invalidate everything produced by everyone at that company.
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