Thursday, January 22, 2015

You Don't Say

When Lean In launched their Ban Bossy campaign nearly a year ago, my heart sunk.  As this NY Mag article points out, "the campaign is an heir to that earlier type of activism, which sought to restrict bad stuff rather than create a compelling alternative."  Empowering women - empowering anyone - is about giving them more options, not taking them away.  If a girl wants to be the boss, we should teach her that being assertive can be a strength, not that her confidence is overbearing and needs to be contained.  Beyond that, though, it's important to remember that a word like "bossy" isn't gender-specific.  Anyone can be bossy, and it's condescending to try to protect girls and women from an imposed victimhood that they don't want or need.

However, there are plenty of gender-specific words and phrases we do use that marginalize, disparage, and invalidate girls and women in particular.  I know I'm guilty of using some without thinking; we probably all are.  And, just like women were divided on the merits of Ban Bossy, not everyone is offended by gender-specific insults.  (Jon mentioned that he thought "don't be a pussy" originally came from "pussy cat," so it's equivalent to saying "don't be a scaredy-cat."  I looked up the phrase, and some also claim it may have come from "pusillanimous," which means "showing a lack of determination or courage."  I doubt that many people who taunt their friends with "don't be a pussy" think of that, but okay.  Point taken.  Language changes.)  That being said, I find the Duke You Don't Say campaign incredibly powerful.  It's really making me consider how easily we throw around words and phrases that come from deeply gendered attitudes - and what we can do to change that.

What do you think?









25 comments:

  1. LOVE!


    I've always felt a little weird about the "throw like a girl" thing. It's like.. I see so many of our female athletes saying it with PRIDE because to them, it's like saying, "Yes, I'm female AND a damn good athlete." But to me, it's as if you're saying, "I'm a good athlete for a girl, but I'm not at the same level as the boys." Ugh.


    We also had a recent incident at school over a yearbook student calling one of our editors a "femi-nazi" on social media. It was not a good day..

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  2. I remember when I first heard pussilanimous, it is a great word and I do think that is where 'pussy' came from myself. I get that language has changed - to me it is all about the intent behind the words. Ie what is that person inferring in their word choice? This is a really great post.

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  3. I thought the same as Jon… "pussy" is a more crude form of "scaredy-cat". Huh. Hadn't ever heard "pusillanimous", although that also doesn't seem to have misogynistic undertones. (Not saying you think it does. Just saying.)
    I agree with you on 'bossy', though. And I don't necessarily think 'bossy' is a bad thing- it's in context, to me. I call my oldest sister 'bossy' because she is remarkably good at taking charge of a situation and directing people's tasks in a firm but not rude manner.
    As for the campaign, it's brilliant. I think there are words that have been hyper-sensitized (unfortunately my brain is failing me for examples but Paul and I had a conversation about it recently), but there are others that have become used so derisively that even their original, non-cruel (even if misguided) meanings have been tainted ('retarded' is what comes to mind here). Then you run into words that had cruel origin of which most people are currently unaware (gyp), but I personally think should still be removed from our lexicon.
    Anyway… I personally don't say "tough as balls", but I do say "cold as balls" for weather, because balls are tragic little things when it comes to cold weather. ;)

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  4. I'm honestly torn. I love what Duke is doing with this campaign and where they're going with it, but I feel like a lot of campaigns that seek to ban words just give those words more power. As much as I would love to punch some of the troglodytes who fling around words like the ones listed, I also don't want to perpetuate the impression that I am too delicate to hear them. Or respond with a few words of my own.

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  5. I really like the campaign and it really made me think. And honestly made me feel a bit like a hypocrite. Because I say "don't be a dick" or something similar fairly regularly, which is perpetuating genderised words of disparagement.

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  6. My problem with "bossy" is that it is almost exclusively used in connection with women, and used to suggest a certain "type" of woman or "female" behaviour. Men "order" people around all the time and it's considered "manly" and "strong". To be honest, I don't really care about the words, but I do care when certain loaded words/phrases are used to suggest weakness or craziness, and always in a female context.

    This is why I love reading your blog!

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  7. I was not a fan of the ban bossy campaign either it was as if I should suddenly deny myself a large character trait while my male siblings could just carry on with it.This is my first introduction to the Duke campaign and I think I would have been really intrigued if I would have seen these around my own college campus. It is hard at times to think beyond a common phrase to convey our meanings or think what using the phrase will imply to people. On the very few occasions I have been told that I throw like girl I have always responded that it would be apt seeing as I am a female instead of getting upset or saying no I do not which always frustrates the person saying it.

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  8. I often think about how in our everyday language women are used to represent 'weakness' in our slang usage and I try to make little efforts to change that. Not to be crude but that great Betty White quote, "If you wanna be tough, grow a vagina, those things can take a pounding" in response to 'grow some balls', comes out of my mouth way more than it should.

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  9. I liked the Ban Bossy campaign because of the conversation that followed, not because of the campaign itself. While "bossy" is technically a gender-neutral word, my experience, and that of many other women (hence the campaign), is that it used in a very gendered way. While I think we should encourage all children to develop their interpersonal skills, "bossy" behavior in boys is often described differently than the exact same behavior in girls. For boys, they're demonstrating leadership, they're taking action, they're making decisions. For girls, they're overbearing, they're rude, they're controlling, they're bossy. A more insidious example (with data and not anecdotes!) is a study of performance reviews. Women were far more likely to receive criticism, and their criticism was personal, not constructive. http://www.fastcompany.com/3034895/strong-female-lead/the-one-word-men-never-see-in-their-performance-reviews


    I love this Duke campaign you've shared. Gendered language is absolutely harmful. It perpetuates stereotypes about men and women. Quite frankly, I don't trust men who use certain words after I've explained why they're problematic. Yes, this includes a lot of family members. You can claim to be as egalitarian as you want, but if you continue to use gendered slurs in everyday conversation in my presence, when I've specifically requested otherwise, you're a sexist jerk.

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  10. Thanks for this post. This is the first I've seen of the Duke campaign, and while I think there are merits to it, I can't say that I "like" it. I very strongly believe that words have power and that the language we use and the way we speak about things are hugely important. That said, I wish that there were men included in this. I'd want to hear why a man doesn't use the word "cunt" or "slut". Also, as some others have said, I'm not really for banning words or phrases. Why not use these words or phrases in a way that is empowering to women? Thanks again for putting some critical thinking into my Friday afternoon!

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  11. check out the campaign - their Facebook page has many more photos, and they're about 50/50 men/women! I didn't intentionally only use women, but I should have included some men, too.

    so here's a question: CAN all of these words/phrases be reappropriated? I don't understand how, historically, some horrible words (the n-word, for instance) have been. I need to read up on this!

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  12. ugh, I've read some of those studies (and the resulting articles) before. it's SO frustrating - and offensive! and yet SO deeply ingrained.

    I totally get people using these words/phrases without thinking (in part because I definitely do it!) but to do so after specifically being asked to stop is rude and disrespectful on an entirely different level, I think. I'm sorry.

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  13. CRAZINESS! omg. read this - it gets me allll riled up. (ironic? ha.) http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yashar-hedayat/a-message-to-women-from-a_1_b_958859.html

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  14. there were some thinks on the You Don't Say campaign page about Student Athletes - they were like, "yes, I am both, 100% of both, not half of each." check out the FB page to find it!


    (and oooooh boy I hope that student got a talking-to!)

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  15. yeah, I highly doubt most people who call others pussies when trying to get them to man up (see what I did there? ha) think of pussilanimous, so... intent all the way. (thank you!)

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  16. Not sure why, but for me bossy is a kid thing. Like, little girls and little boys can be bossy. I'm sure I've been referred to as bossy, but I don't actually hear it that often from adults. Maybe I'm just lucky?


    and YES I remember when I realized where "gypped" came from and I felt really gullty because I've totally used it without thinking but if someone said "jewed" I'd have gotten really upset.

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  17. I do too - I don't necessarily think we have to stop saying all these things (as other commenters have said, we can reclaim or redefine words) but it's important to think about what we're saying and why!

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  18. yeah, that's true - I was more struck by the "damn straight I'm bossy, I'm the BOSS" backlash to the "ban bossy" campaign than the campaign itself!

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  19. YES! have you seen this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjJQBjWYDTs ? love it :)

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  20. Wow, I haven't seen this campaign yet, but I really like it. I only hope that people can start thinking about what they say before they say it. (myself included! We all slip up sometimes.)

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  21. Oh! That article is boiling my blood!

    And on the topic of strong women, here's Björk's take on feminism.
    http://pitchfork.com/features/interviews/9582-the-invisible-woman-a-conversation-with-bjork/

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  22. Can I just say that I'm loving this post and these comments. So interesting to me. I've been thinking a lot about language and how we use it recently. I think maybe because I re-read The Giver recently and the theme of precision of language. I've been thinking about it in my own life even with such words as awesome. I throw that around like it's nothing for things that are NOT awesome. ANYWAY...moving on. I like this campaign. Mostly because I think a lot of people use throw away words without thinking. It's important to understand what using certain words CAN convey to people. I really like Gesci's comment. In general I'm not a huge fan of banning words. I just think you need to be educated and think about how to use words and how meanings can change over time. Being sensitive to context. Sometimes a word or phrase is perfectly fine, but it's how you use it. I think the rape example above is huge. Rape as a word doesn't need to be banned, but we have to think about what we remove from the meaning of the word or add to the meaning of the word with the way we use it. (I do HATE the C word though).

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