Standing at a bus stop tonight, I had a man walk up to me and mansplain how buses/bus stops work - down to “for example, the 43 doesn’t stop here, because the number ‘43’ isn’t on this sign. And buses run on different time tables on the weekend.”
I was so flabbergasted all I could do was respond “that is correct” like his third grade teacher reviewing an assignment until he finally left.
I have considered myself an anarchist for the past few years and recently joined a reading group to help expand my knowledge of the subject. A recent title was Oppose and Propose: Lessons from Movement for a New Society, a radical pacifist organization. A man on the train asked me what I was reading, and I gave him a brief explanation of Movement for a New Society.
He chuckled. ”An organization? But anarchy is chaos.”
I explained to him that while that yes, anarchy can mean chaos, anarchism is organization without authority.
“But isn’t that communism?”
“Actually, a lot of anarchists are communists. Communism means equal distribution of property, anarchism means equal distribution of power.”
He then told me that anarchists are too violent and should be coming from a more peaceful, spiritual place.
I explained to him that many groups—like the one I was reading about— are nonviolent, and that violent acts are in the minority, but tend to be the only examples that people remember. He asked me the title of the book again and stopped talking to me. It’s unfortunate, because I was hoping to be educated with more stereotypes and assumptions regarding the subject about which I had a book open in my hands.
(Although I’m sure my gender expression influenced his approach, I think conversations like this one may be experienced by anarchists across the gender spectrum. Is statistsplaining a thing?)
While doing my MFA in visual arts I TA’d for a first year visual arts class, where grad students taught all the studio sections and the prof, an old-school dude teaching there since the ’60s, would give the entire class a one-hour lecture/slide presentation once a week.
Most of his ‘lectures’ were anecdotal and pointless, but this presentation in particular stuck in my memory. Going over Abstract Expressionism and showing slides:
“This is work by Willem de Kooning. Oh and this is work, by, er, Willem de Kooning’s wife.”
This was Elaine de Kooning, a well-recognized artist in her own right, and suspected to have ‘helped’ Willem develop his style and approach. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elaine_de_kooning
See also: Lee Krasner
I just finished studying abroad in London. While there I took a sociology course (my major) with a male student who thought he was hot shit (academically speaking). He was giving a presentation on nationalism; here’s an excerpt:
Him: So, basically, nationalism and isolationism are synonyms.
[They’re not. If you need an obvious example, look at German’s nationalist policies in the early 1940’s]
Me: Uh, did you just say that nationalism and isolationism are synonymous?
Him: I said they were synonyms [last word dripping with distain].
I’m not sure which is worse: his grasp of social concepts, his grasp of the English language, his ego, or the fact that the male professor didn’t say a word.
While writing an essay on the refugee crisis in Turkey, I was interrupted by a guy barging in loudly to the study room at my residential college. He then proceeded to ask me numerous questions about my major, my paper, my opinions on Syrian refugees and Turkey, and what my thesis was. I gave brief answers, wanting to get back to my essay ASAP and obviously being polite but firm as I literally cannot write without quiet. He obviously didn’t get the message and expected long, drawn out answers to his questions. I kept getting the feeling that if I wasn’t female and younger than him, he would not have felt the need to interrupt my writing and essentially kick me out of the room. I eventually left and he appeared definitely angry/offended at me for not “adequately” answering his questions. Why is it expected for a young woman to unquestionably respond to a random male stranger, yet being polite, saying “no thanks” and getting back to work is regarded as rude and bitchy?
This scene happened several months ago, and it still irritates me to think about. I’m a classical musician, and I’ve been playing viola in this particular small-time orchestra for about five years now. I started there when I was relatively young (19), but the fact that I’ve kept the job should say something about my abilities and professionalism.
We had a new principal player this season, and during the first concert (which included the very piece that had won me the job), he kept giving the bowings (and all the other information on how to play the piece) to the man on the third stand, skipping me and my (female) stand partner entirely. Now, I usually sit third or fourth chair, which means I’m always second stand—pretty high in the chain of command. And I definitely outrank the guy he was giving the bowings to, who is much older than me, but does not, to my knowledge, have a contract. He’s only a substitute. So, I was already irritated, but when Third Stand Guy miscounted repeatedly and blamed me (by leaning over and whispering, “Don’t rush!”), I was primed to say something.
At the break in the rehearsal, I went up to New Principal Guy and told him, very politely, that he was giving the bowings to the wrong stand and that we weren’t getting the information. He apologized profusely and said it was an honest mistake—we were all sitting in a row behind him, and he just hadn’t realized. But Third Stand Guy overheard our conversation and interjected. “Oh, don’t worry,” he said to New Principal Guy. “I’ve been making sure she’s been getting the bowings. She’s just kidding.”
I gaped at him as he walked away. New Principal Guy, to his credit, asked me if I really was kidding, and I told him no. But thanks, Third Stand Guy, for speaking for me. I needed that.
I am a visiting assistant professor at a small regional college. My department recently hosted a regional conference of scholars in our field - history. The night before the conference I joined two (male) colleagues and one of the conference attendees for dinner. I am young and female. The attendee was middle aged and male. When I noted that I did women’s history, attendee reported that he had recently heard a major female scholar of women’s history give a keynote at another conference. He asked whether I had heard of her. Naturally, I had. “I love her work.” Curious about her keynote, I asked, “How was she?”
“She’s widened.”
Silence. I stare across the table in a stunned deadpan, slowly processing whether I had in fact heard what I thought I had heard. You could have heard a pin drop. The attendee breaks the silence. Apparently, he feels the need to clarify.
“When I first met her 20 years ago she was a tiny little thing who was all hair. But now—well—” he shakes his head, disgusted, “I wouldn’t have known her.”
He pauses, expecting some response. I croak out, “It happens.” What I should have said was, “It happens to all of us.” He was no svelte bombshell either.
Pause.
“BUT HOW WAS HER TALK?” I ask. Perhaps my original meaning had not been clear.
But alas, my interlocutor must have been too distracted by said distinguished female scholar’s size to pay attention to what she had had to say. In her keynote address.
While discussing a topic with my fellow graduate students—a topic in which none present were experts—a fellow grad student (who has the same area of expertise as I do but is behind me in progress through the program; we’ve talked repeatedly about our work and interests) mentioned a particular philosophical viewpoint in relation to the discussion. I jokingly called him the name used for those who espouse the position he mentioned. He chuckled, then he said quite seriously, “but haven’t you read book X by [important person in our field whose writings figure heavily in my dissertation]?” Flabbergasted, I replied flatly, “yes.” “But [author] discusses [named view] in X, where he says [correct but simplistic interprestation of X],” he chirped, ready to offer a continued overview. Again, I flatly reply, “yes.” He pauses, taking a beat to think things over. “Oh,” he says, “you’ve probably read that.” Another flat “yes” from me. “You use it in your dissertation?” “Yes.” “So, you’ve translated X?” “Yes, parts of it.” “Oh,” he says, and he moves on with the conversation as though he did *not* just assume that I was unfamiliar with an important work in my area of expertise that I cover extensively in my dissertation (which we have discussed several times). I suppose that the mere suggestion that he may have realized his attempt to explain book X and its importance to me was condescending should cast the encounter in a positive light, but I’m sick of having people assume I lack a rudimentary knowledge of the major people and works in my specialty (which my interlocutor and I share!).
I am a Ph.D. student in the field of musicology, and I do a fair amount of gender studies research, as it overlaps with my musical research interests.
I was at a seed/garden store buying some plants for my garden. I had browsed the plants outside and decided to head inside. The door to this building was old, heavy, and stubborn. When I initially pushed on it, it didn’t want to budge. Assuming I just hadn’t pushed hard enough, I started to give it another shove when the elderly male clerk on the inside of the store opened the door.
“Oh,” he said, “You have to push the handle all the way down before you push on the door. Because if this [he points to the latch] isn’t all the way inside the door, the door won’t open.”
Yes. He mansplained to me how doors work as if I were an infant.
I was presenting a workshop on polishing your public speaking for a state bar association. I was asked by a man how to handle the blowback when delivering bad news to a group, for example a board of directors. I began by talking about the necessity of having and expressing empathy to the group for what you are about to tell them, recognizing that hostility comes from insecurity and fear of change. Then I talked about how important it is to actively listen to the responses. I gave some examples, and the women in the room were nodding their heads in recognition of what I was saying. Then the man, with a mildly hostile tone in his voice, said “But don’t you really need to have some empathy?” And he bloviated a while on that topic. I jumped back in to steer the conversation back to a productive place. Mansplained, pure and simple.
I’m an American masters’ student at a well-known university in Ireland. I met another postgrad at a school-wide meet and greet and he offered to show me around the city:
“So we’re coming down on the high street, and that’s an alleyway to the side of you. I wouldn’t go in it, since alleys are kind of sketchy places, but I guess you could if you wanted.”
“Gypsy retained her independence within the relationship, and [Billy] Rose found her difficult to handle. Nevertheless, according to [her son] Erik, Rose proposed to Gypsy - but Gypsy refused. … At one of his dinner parties, Gypsy recalled, he had interrupted her continually. He finally told her that, since she was wrong, she need not bother finishing her sentence”.
From Frankel, Noralee 2010 Stripping Gypsy. The Life of Gypsy Rose Lee. New York: Oxford University Press p 226
I’m a second-semester freshman undergraduate student and still getting my general courses out of the way. One of the courses I’m taking is basically a course about how environmental issues interact with our culture. It’s somewhat complicated, but I enjoy it, and the teacher is an older lady with a sense of humor who really loves the subject.
So there was an assignment due a little while ago where we watched a video that delved into the various issues with capitalism and how it contributes to poverty.
One student sitting in front of me, a young man about a year younger than me, also in his freshman year, from an upper middle class background, decided to explain how actually, capitalism really does improve the living situation of poor people. After all, we all have iPhones and laptops now! Look at what poor people have today that they didn’t have 50 years ago! We can’t tax rich people at a higher rate because that will decrease the likelihood that they’ll do all of this wonderful development! We won’t have more stuff to waste our money on!
I felt better when I saw that my teacher was fighting her laughter as much as I was. Yes, 18-year-old undergrad from a privileged background, please mansplain to the minority female professor how wrong she is. He was actually talking over her as she tried to respond to him.
The best moment was when the teacher held up her hand, got him to shut up, and asked the class “Please raise your hand if you feel that your living situation has ever been improved by capitalism”.
There were no hands raised.
Not even the freshman mansplainer.
The check engine light for my VW came on, so I stopped at a local auto shop to get a free diagnostic test with their computer system. I approached a worker at the counter and asked if he was available to do a scan. A male customer, who I’d never met, and who knew nothing about the car I’d owned for nine years, interrupted our conversation and said to me, “You didn’t close your gas cap all the way.” Surprised, I said, “Excuse me?” He responded, “You have to turn it until it clicks. If you don’t, the check engine light comes on.” I was shocked, of course, that he thought I needed gas caps to be mansplained, but I tried to be polite as I responded, “I’m sure that isn’t the problem.” Since I was being unreasonable, he turned to the worker and told him, “Just go out there and tighten her gas cap. I bet anything that’s the problem.” The worker ignored him and came outside and diagnosed my car, on which the oxygen sensor had failed.
In retrospect, I wish I’d taken the guy’s bet instead of ignoring him.
In my Feminist Theory class, we opened with a class discussion of The Feminine Mystique’s strengths and weaknesses. This book was written about the bigotry experienced by 1960’s white, middle-class, suburban housewives, and it assumes that all women experience the same bigotry.
A white guy in the class loathed the book and delivered a lengthy spiel about how the author, Betty Friedan, had zero “real problems” and should have spent her time working on the 1960’s Civil Rights Movement. Another classmate, a woman of color, agreed with him that Friedan lacked perspective but disagreed that her problems weren’t “real”. The classmate explained how she herself had experienced some of the same problems even today, fifty years later.
After the class, the white guy and I were making small talk. He told me that it was “impossible” to have a reasonable discussion with our other classmate because she was “a mother of two” and thus overly identified with the author.
A white guy told a woman of color she was wrong about sexism because racism was more important. He dismissed her position on sexism towards mothers because she herself was a mother and thus couldn’t understand how unimportant it was. Gosh, ‘splain to me some more about how privileged women can’t experience sexism and women of color only experience racism? /sarcasm
