Comic Discussion > QUESTIONABLE CONTENT
WCDT: 2500-2504 (29 July- August 2, 2013) Weekly Comic Discussion Thread
Kugai:
Psychohistory was'nt perfect
After all, it never predicted The Mule.
Valdís:
--- Quote from: wiserd on 07 Aug 2013, 12:36 ---A person who notes that men have, on average, more muscle mass than women is inevitably asserting that all men SHOULD have more muscle mass?
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Y'know, come to think of it.. Is it just me or does Marten really not seem male? I mean, we all know actual men have more muscle mass, so my predictive model suggest that some skinny indie person is probably actually female.
I mean, sure, I guess Marten might be male, but according to my gender constructs it doesn't seem unreasonable to play "One of these things is not like the other!" as far as their gender is concerned! Clearly there has to be some statement involved in choosing to violate what I think is consistently the case for all the males I happen to know!
Thus if we want to "seem female", then we should adhere to your biased personal experience of "How women are".
--- Quote from: wiserd on 07 Aug 2013, 12:36 ---This explains why you find what they said offensive. It does not explain why you believed they were calling you "inadequate." They did not explain away your competence. They clearly recognized that you were competent. You've said that a model should accommodate exceptional results. But I'm skeptical that you would have been much more approving of their comments if they had called you "exceptional" and then added "for a woman." I could be wrong, but I suspect that it is their belief that men are (biologically) better, on average, at some particular task than women, on average, that offends you. If there's some phrasing of this belief that you would find palatable, feel free to put it forward.
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It has nothing to do with denying statistics or anything. The issue lies in reducing her as a person with their sexist nonsense and how her being a woman is supposedly some "handicap", because she was supposed to be dumb. It is inherently insulting, just as how it isn't a compliment to say "you're passable [as cisgender]" as a synonym for being pretty. It shows their fundamental problem with what someone is. But I'm not cis, I'm trans. Akima is not a man, she's a woman. Some white heterosexual cisgender man looking down on other people, but admitting that "I guess you're alright.. for one of them." is insufferable privileged bullshit.
You don't need to tell me I "don't look trans" to tell me I'm pretty.
You don't need to tell Akima that she "doesn't seem female" to tell her she's intelligent.
These things only betray what oppressive, normative attitudes the person already holds which do not take into account that "trans =/= ugly" or "woman =/= stupid". Although I can guarantee that as a predictive model any given trans person someone doesn't find "pretty enough" is certainly a better, more beautiful person than the one saying it will ever be. Same goes for intelligence.
Guess what! You're right! Both immediately attacking her very existence as a woman and condescendingly patting her on the head as their inferior is unacceptable offensive bullshit! So don't do that, then. It's not like it's hard. Even if it might mean not playing your little games pointing at people and making uninformed judgments about who they are based on your preexisting biases. Hm.. I could've sworn there's a word for that..
--- Quote from: wiserd on 07 Aug 2013, 12:36 ---But if the result of this discussion is that I'm supposed to believe that women and men within a given culture are identical in every regard, irrespective of any evidence, then I'm simply not buying in. Call me whatever names you want to associate me with your chosen outgroup. /.../
I object to any social paradigm where male and female differences and their basis cannot be courteously discussed. Because it basically amounts to someone saying "well, these topics, we just aren't allowed to THINK about..."
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Except that statements like these are a derailment from the original thing you said. It isn't "Women" or "Men" as a whole, it is particular women or men that yes, could entirely be the same personality without losing their gender. You said a character "doesn't seem female" and went on to talk about how none of the women you know behave like that, therefore it is nonsensical for there to be a woman who does. That it warrants extra scrutiny for falling outside of your norms (but apparently you're not being normative about it). Seeming "female" is being a woman. That doesn't require adherence to any stereotypes you happen to have about what that entails. It is distinct and separate - and statistical correlations are not determinants.
And stop trying to play the "Those damn marginalized people are trying to censor my opinions and free speech AND EVEN MY VERY THOUGHTS :cry: " card. It's just inane and transparent. Classic diversion tactic to not actually have to consider other points of view. Someone saying they don't agree with you - or even thinking you're saying shitty things - does not equate to censorship. People don't have an unalienable right to be liked.
--- Quote from: wiserd on 07 Aug 2013, 12:36 ---associated with male primary and secondary sexual characteristics.
--- End quote ---
If one presupposes that such traits belong in such categories in the first place. Which I do not. That's just more commonly the case for most of the population. If for instance a trans woman who is comfortable with her genitalia doesn't have genital reassignment surgery... then those are her genitals, consistent with her brain-mapping as a woman, not male ones.
Zebediah:
Asimov was trying to debunk the "Great Man" theory of history, but that caused him to swerve into predestination. The mathematics of chaos theory hadn't been invented when Asimov started writing Foundation, so I'm inclined to forgive him for not taking it into account.
Warning - while you were typing the tides of history washed over you. You may wish to find a flotation device.
wiserd:
--- Quote ---It may not be easy to do, I admit, and it's certainly not easy to umpire!
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I do not envy you your task.
--- Quote from: pwhodges on 07 Aug 2013, 13:16 ---
--- Quote from: Is it cold in here? on 07 Aug 2013, 03:51 ---Reasoning from bell curves is not a good tool for overanalyzing a comic, since entertainment value requires making new characters different from the existing ones.
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Indeed - one of the first things to grasp in statistics is that it is all about populations, and never about individuals (this is where I just can't get along with Asimov's Foundation series in the end).
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What is a good tool for over analyzing a comic? Because apparently that's what I do. :-p
(Fixed the quote. -Method)
Redball:
--- Quote from: pwhodges on 07 Aug 2013, 13:16 ---It may not be easy to do, I admit, and it's certainly not easy to umpire!
--- End quote ---
Maybe all sides could agree to call the game on account of darkness.
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