An article at The New Agenda makes the case that the Democratic and Republican Parties consider women voters to be “expendable and exploitable,” and argues that women’s interests would be better served through third party activism:
both parties seem to have taken all of their constituencies for granted, but women are the most expendable and exploitable . . . if you want to find a political party that genuinely cares about your needs and interests, I recommend you chose a third party . . .
The vast majority of the Green party’s stances on women’s rights, minority rights, homosexual rights, etc., are identical to the Libertarian’s stances that fit under the guideline of increasing/protecting personal freedoms . . . Modern Whigs are the moderate party. Their attitude toward women and other groups is “Government should refrain from legislating morality.” . . .
The wonderful quality of third parties is that they are founded by people who genuinely care about the issues. Because they are new and small, they understand and appreciate the importance of their voters. They will not take the votes of women for granted. Some people think a vote for a third party is a wasted vote, but if all those people vote in third party, then the third party can easily rise to power. I recommend women select a third party, whichever one suits your personal/individual interests, and help that party rise into the national government. They are small and need to be built up at the ground level. The more elected officials they receive locally, the more ballot access they obtain for state and national elections.
Characterizing Barnes as unrepentant is unfair.
I am not in any way inclined to defend Barnes, don’t get me wrong. As a former officer and one-time friend of Barnes, I knew him very well and worked closely with him in the SBCLP, and I was also one of the handful of people who actually took the initiative and went to look at the court file to be sure the story against him wasn’t fabricated before I formed an opinion. It amazed me at the time how many people publicly expressed opinions, usually defending him but not always, without checking the facts.
I know more than most people about about this situation, and I can say this much: There is absolutely NO evidence that Barnes has molested any children sexually since his conviction in the late 80s. None.
I can’t say that I know for certain he IS repentant since I’ve not talked to him directly since April, but I hear from others who are still in contact with him that he has some remorse. Whether it’s remorse because he’s sorry for his actions or whether it’s remorse for getting caught, only he knows. I prefer to give people the benefit of the doubt and say that remorse over this incident is remorse and leave it at that.
I agree that Barnes, were he still in the party, should not be in a position to have contact with children at party events. Even apart from the obvious ethical reasons, there are liability reasons for the officers of the party at every level if someone were to get the bright idea to bring a lawsuit against them since they’re now aware of his situation.
Your opinion of whether or not he’s repentant, however, doesn’t really matter since his membership has already been suspended by LPCA, subject to a ruling on the appeal by the judicial committee.
What is the evidence that Barnes is “unrepentant”? All the evidence I’ve seen is to the contrary.
Thanks Brian I’ll follow up on it.
MW
@46 >>>Yet nothing is done in that direction, because we don’t have enough families and married couples in the LP active in leadership and activism in a way that engages both spouses and the kids.<<<
So long as engaging the kids doesn’t mean exposing them to unrepentant pedophiles like Matthew Barnes.
Michael, you might be interested in the following blog posting I wrote in 2005:
Social Security Favors Trophy Wives Over Poor Single Moms
My standard reasons for opposing Social Security are of course 1) that it is monumental inter-generational theft from young non-voters by voting seniors, and 2) that it socializes the retirement savings industry and thus reduces the nation’s savings rate and ultimately its standard of living. A recent Cato Institute article reminds us that the Social Security status quo is also unfair to minorities, poor single moms, gays, and couples in which both spouses need to work:
The article is a good summary, but for the full extent of Social Security’s inequities you have to read the entire statement of the Urban Institute’s Eugene Steuerle before the House Ways and Means Committee last month. He details how Social Security is unfairly stingy to
while being unfairly generous to
For more on Social Security, see Cato’s socialsecurity.org.
On a couple of occasions I have posted information on this site regarding midwives and how repealing the laws that restrict the numbers will benefit women.
Well here is something on urban transit from a report, TCRP49, published by the National Academies. While the entire report is something like 100 pages is goes into specifics as to who is harmed by the lack of adequate transit services. Please note that the report mentions women, specifically part-time working mothers and elderly women. I haven’t looked for it on the web recently but it is probably still around.
“The lack of personal mobility has economic, social and human costs, such as higher unemployment, reduced tax revenue, greater welfare and medical costs, and limited social potential.” Source: TCRP report 49, 1999
“Almost half those without an automobile are persons 65 years or older, and of these, 81% are women.” Ibid
“gender: 23% of full-time working mothers and almost 60% of part-time working mothers have non-traditional work hours. This reduces a women’s ability to join carpools or find appropriately-scheduled transit options.” Ibid
Someday maybe the LP will get around to developing brochures designed to appeal to women. This information may help in that case.
BND, the sensible, sensitive thing to be done here is for TP’s critics to do two things.
First, admit (as you have effectively done) that Carolyn was apparently wrong in claiming that 1) our “shame” didn’t admonish the male troll and 2) we called troll-feeders by their first names merely because they are women.
Second, monitor the linguistic practices of the Troll Police for actual gender bias.
There’s nothing sensible or sensitive about demanding a pound of flesh from the Troll Police for a crime you admit the Troll Police didn’t commit.
It’s unfair that you accuse only the Troll Police of “keep hammering” the argument here. If the Troll Police issue N responses here, it’s because our detractors have issued >=N criticisms of us. N is chosen by our critics, not by us. As we said, the critics of the Troll Police can have the first word or the last word, but not both. To say you have a problem with that is to convict yourself of the very crime you accuse us of. You and our other critics could choose to just state your best possible case, let us state our best possible defense, and let the matter rest. If you choose instead to continue the debate, don’t complain that your choice is somehow the fault of the Troll Police.
You seem to have this universe confused with one in which the Troll Police should let themselves be browbeaten, using insults and false charges and flashing one’s gender-victim badge of authority, into changing (what you even admit is) a gender-neutral linguistic practice.
In this universe, we Troll Police are going to continue to refer to our acquaintances by their first names, no matter their sex, wealth, race, color, creed, age, national origin, personal habits, political preference or sexual orientation.
In this universe, sometimes troll-feeders are women, sometimes troll-feeders are our acquaintances, and at least once, troll-feeders were both.
And sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
Good evening, one and all.
@ TP 53 You can lead a horse to water, but you can not make it drink.
You say “Either the Troll Police are lying when we dispute Carolyn’s assertions, or we aren’t.”
But more importantly, what will you win if you keep hammering your side of that argument?
You can easily adjust your policies and procedures as Ms. Marbry suggests even if you are telling the Lord’s own truth – and I fully believe you are being honest when you say you are. Does anyone lose if you do that?
Consider, on the one hand you can (verbally) beat your chest and assert your position until no one else replies to you, and so you “win,” but it seems to me that is just the type thing what Libertarians do which tends to drive off most women – and not a few men.
I’m sure you are familiar with the term “pyrrhic victory.” Libertarians win lots of those in arguments with each other and with other people. (If anyone else reading does not know what a pyrrhic victory is I highly suggest looking it up – it’s a concept that explains a lot about what’s wrong with people in general).
You say,
“In what possible universe is your advice to us not simply addled?”
The one where peace, friendship and cooperation are more important than being the last one standing in an argument. Does that sound like the type universe you live in?
LG @ 54 is right on the money.
55 and 56 make good points as well.
Mary Ruwart’s book Healing Our World makes a good effort at making libertarianism come off as more compassionate. We need that in shorter, more accessible formats, while also being more down to earth and practical at the same time. Loretta Nall down in Alabama does real good at making libertarian views resonate with everyday common working people and those coming towards libertarianism from a left-liberal perspective.
Outreach pieces at 58 and 59 are a good start. We need a lot more in many different formats.
Steve Linnabary makes good points at 60, although as with Michael Seebeck at 46, the gratuitous dig at Troll Police mars an otherwise good comment. I think Troll Police is someone who is fundamentally good, honest and trying to make things better, and is probably not aware off what is bothering all these other folks here about the way the TP is walking the beat.
I don’t think comments which challenge TP or try to put TP on the defensive help things. At that point the fight or flight reflex, sublimated into rationalization and the quest for verbal dominance, kicks in.
But I think we can reasonably ask TP to do the sensible, sensitive thing and adopt the policy changes Ms. Marbry suggests without claiming any police misconduct.
Steven R Linnabary // Jan 12, 2010:
“Our actions have consequences. And the consequences we have brought upon ourselves is that women are not comfortable around us…..
I wish ……… success in her quest to change the neanderthal culture of Libertarian Party members. It’s long overdue.”
Lake: there are strategies! In southern california they threw money at them. A sweet, sharp, intelligent voice on the telephone claimed to be that of the San Diego County Candidate coordinator.
Lib Males: ‘Hey Lake, take it or leave it, it ain’t our fault. Miss Nice Nice: got around to offering to write a check to pay for the chapter’s mistake on a news letter. Night and day ………
I don’t think it’s a fair assessment claiming that all libertarians are computer nerds who only see women through pictures. That might be the stereotype, but it is hardly true. I definetly do not fit the mold you just described.
Regardless, I find this a fascinating topic, and I wish I could contribute to it positively, but I simply do not have any ideas for bringing women into the party. A lot of people here seem to understand WHY women don’t participate in the LP, but can’t seem to figure out HOW to change this. I’m at a loss myself.
How about we make some pamphlets pink?
Seriously though, I think it is important that we look at other trends as well. It is no secret that minorities and young people are also lacking in the LP, yet the Ron Paul faction of the GOP doesn’t seem to have this problem.
Knowledge is power, and perhaps if we could overcome this hurdle of not being able to attract women, minorities, gays, and young people to the LP, then maybe outreach programs and events would be much more active because there would be a much more diverse presence. Not to mention the continued perception of libertarians just being another arm of conservatism would finally end as well. A party of old white men doesn’t sound like a party that people would want to join.
troglodyte n.
1. A person considered to be reclusive, reactionary, out of date, or brutish
2. A person who dares to dispute a woman’s charge of gender bias in word choice by describing a gender-neutral word-choice policy that explains the incident(s) in question
3. A person who dares to dispute the charge that he is a troglodyte
Sorry, Troll Police, but I’m afraid Mr. Linnabary has got you on a technicality. Guilty.
I think most of them HAVE NO CLUE HOW TO ACT AROUND WOMEN.
Correct.
Me, I never see women at work as I am either surveying the side of a mountain or babysitting construction workers. Last summer I had a project on a university campus. I couldn’t help leering the first day or two.
It seems most Libertarians are computer nerds that rarely see women except in pictures.
And none of this is an excuse. Our actions have consequences. And the consequences we have brought upon ourselves is that women are not comfortable around us.
It doesn’t help that people like “Troll Police” think it is an opportunity to be a troglodyte.
At least I recognize my own shortcomings. I wish Ms Marbry success in her quest to change the neanderthal culture of Libertarian Party members. It’s long overdue.
PEACE
Also, the LP’s 24-page New Vision For America brochure is quite good, and costs only $0.20/each when you buy a few hundred:
And the rack card I designed can be printed full-color in quantify for only 5 cents each:
Oh, our team does OK. Here are some videos from our team that women might find more appealing than that one:
We don’t have decent literature but others have things like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=662R2awSwPQ&feature=player_embedded
And our team claims to be computer literate.
true , plus were big on saying no welfare and no government aid , but lacking in ideas and replacements for such . Women are natural caregivers , hungry children and families and single mothers with no income , matter to us.so saying end welfare and giving some socio-economis reason for ending it doesnt resonate in our bleeding hearts . I would like to see more charity w/in the LP .
I don’t have time to go through all of this at the moment but we used to have literature that was titled something like “Whatever happened to the family budget?” and lit on housing, etc. We don’t have much of anything anymore. If we did it might change things a bit and make our appeal broader.
There’s simply a hell of a lot of talk about guns and not enough about issues that are relevant to families.
Being a woman in a group of Libertarian men is like being a hot chick around a bunch of junior high school boys. Most lib men already have social skills deficits and they magnify 10-fold when it comes to women .
I do not believe this is intentional . I think most of them HAVE NO CLUE HOW TO ACT AROUND WOMEN. i mean , lets face it , there is no Rico Suave in the LP .I think most of the men probably rarely dated ,they probably didnt socialize around women too much in school or the workplace and if they did , they never had confidence to approach them .
The “harassment” by men is clumsy at best and a annoyance for sure ,but like I said , it reminds me of kids who dont know how to act as opposed to methodical ,intentionally condenscending harassment.
R.T., Carolyn came to this thread and asserted that 1) the Troll Police’s “shame” was aimed only at the women we named and not the man, and 2) the Troll Police used the women’s first names for no other reason than to patronize them.
Brad immediately pointed out that Carolyn’s assertions may not be true. The Troll Police quickly confirmed that they were false.
Either the Troll Police are lying when we dispute Carolyn’s assertions, or we aren’t.
If we’re lying, then you’re investing screenful after screenful of advice trying to get us to admit we are sexist liars.
If we’re telling the truth, then you’re telling us we should cave in to Carolyn’s false assertions because she is a woman and because Libertarians should get out of the habit of tirelessly insisting that they’re right (as Carolyn herself has been doing).
In what possible universe is your advice to us not simply addled?
P.S. Your toilet-seat epiphany is old news here at our Police Station, where the Troll Police pee sitting down.
One last thing,
I agree that Mr. Seebeck makes many excellent points at #46. Unfortunately, he undermines them just a little with his unfortunate opening one line paragraph, which has not a thing to do with the rest of the essay, near as I can tell:
“OK, enough of this manure from whatever Troll Police is, which appears to be a cross between a trailer-park trash Miss Manners wanna-be and an idiot.”
If anybody is trailer park trash around here it’s me, although many of us upstanding mobile home community residents don’t much like being called “trash” by those with non-mobile homes.
My wife is more the Mrs. Manners in our family, she’s taught me a little bit of manners by a great deal of patience and trial and error, but some folks say having just a little bit of manners, kind of like having only a little bit of knowledge, can be a dangerous thing.
Now as for idiots, that’s just downright insensitive. I have a lot of idiots in my family, idiot friends, idiot neighbors, and I’m often an idiot myself. Just ’cause you’re smarter than us it don’t make it right to look down your nose at us idiots, Mr. Smarty-Pants.
This comment I just made is a good illustration of why sensible folks don’t often stick around the Libertarians, on account I spent several paragraphs expressing disagreement with only one sentence, while only briefly stopping to note that the remainder of the essay was excellent.
Roll Tide and I’ll see y’all after work.
Ms. Marbry said
“I also agree with you that they’re feeding trolls more themselves than they’re stopping it, but I have moderated political discussion groups before, and I know what a fine line it is to walk. I don’t fault them for that. They’re doing what they can to stop abusiveness, and I appreciate it.”
“They” here meaning Mr. Troll Police (or in light of the Pluralis Majestratis, should that be His Royal Highness Troll Police?).
That is a good point and I also appreciate the effort.
I hope my earlier remarks are not taken as being any sort of anti-TP attack, as they were only meant to be helpful as best I can be and for the purpose of furthering understanding, good will, reconciliation and peace.
After all Mark Ingram got the Heisman, and the Alabama Crimson Tide have won another national football championship, so who can be all upset at a time like this?
Well, other than Mr. Root I mean…(http://www.rootforamerica.com/blog/index.php?entry=entry100107-231910).
Reading that one made me squirt coffee out of my nose from laughing, which wasn’t too much fun after I did that.
Anyhow….
Roll Tide!
Good morning ladies and gents (and the rest of y’all too)!
Earlier I said…
“I love to spank on some naughty girls too, and the whole spanking boys thing just does not have the same type of appeal to it.
But on the other hand when a lady catches me acting uncouth, I usually just try to apologize and move on. I don’t know about you, but I always found that once they get upset about something, like leaving the toilet seat up or any old little thing, I never get anywhere by trying to logic my way out of it.”
A little later I said “It looks like this went over your head but trust me, trying to logic your way through ain’t gonna help your case here. ”
TP replied “the few parts of your ramblings that we skimmed indeed went right over our heads. If you’re aiming for troll status, the first thing you need to do is split your long rambling comment into a series of much shorter ones.”
Well, I’m not aimin’ for any kind of status, and my rambling comments (as TP so kindly puts it) are meant for the hopeful edification and entertainment of anyone who might so choose to read them.
Thus, please allow me to elaborate on my earlier point.
Me and my wife used to go around and around bout stuff like that when we first got married.
Let’s just stick with the toilet seat example so as I don’t embarrass myself even further by explaining what other type hare brained ideas I used to have when I was younger.
Now, back then it just seemed real logical to me that the toilet seat should be left up all the time.
Here is sort of how I thought about it at the time.
——————————–
Say it’s the middle of the night and I’m all groggy, I stumble over to the toilet and the seat is been left down. But I’m all wore out so I forget to lift it up, don’t even think about the fact it is down and end up leaving pee on the seat.
Now the whole reason that the seat should be left down when I’m done is so so she don’t accidentally without looking sit down in the bowl and get her butt wet, right?
Well, if I peed on the seat and didn’t realize it, she might do one of two things – either not catch that I did it, sit down and get her butt wet anyway (and not just with water either), or catch it and have to wipe the darn thing off …instead of just lowering the seat as would have been the case had it been up like I wanted to have it back then.
——————————–
Well, it sure seemed to me back then that I was the logical one and we went around and around about it, but believe me when I say it was all for nothing and now a days the seat stays down. Looking back on it it would have been more logical not to argue about it.
I even learnt to pay attention and not leave pee on the seat for lack of noticing it before I fell back asleep. And I even remember to lift the seat before I pee and lower it when I’m done when I’m dead tired from working all day. It’s become pretty much an instinct – I don’t have to be real awake to remember to do it.
Sometimes you just gotta stop trying to out-logic. The right way to go is not always what seems like the logical one.
Sometimes it takes some “horse sense” to get it right, but I don’t know anybody that’s put out a manual on how to get some. You just have to live and learn I guess.
Now my advice for whatever it’s worth (which is every penny you paid for it) is to stop trying to prove you’re right – even though in your head it makes perfect sense that you are – and do that whole listening thing some people talked about further up if you scroll.
It probably wouldn’t hurt you too much to adjust His Royal Majesty’s Troll Police Policies & Directives in the manner Ms. Marbry suggests. And it would put the whole misunderstanding to rest, at least I think it would, even with folks as ornery as y’all.
But I gather Libertarians would rather spend hours trying to establish verbal logical domination over each other rather than do simple things out of friendship and courtesy to make each other’s lives easier so’s they can work together peacefully, or am I just getting the wrong impression?
How do you teach somebody to roll with the tides? Heck if I know. All’s I can do is give my advice – don’t try to outswim against ’em, it ain’t happenin’ (at least not for long). I’m down on the Gulf of Mexico in Bayou La Batre, Alabama so I know a thing or two about that.
Roll Tide!
Mike Seebeck for President!
“[…] a cross between a trailer-park trash Miss Manners wanna-be and an idiot […]
[… a dozen or so paragraphs of penetrating, novel insights about how marriage and parenthood help socialize males…]
That’s the mentality that needs to be brought to the LP–family friendly leads to just plain friendly […]”
Carolyn, we haven’t been introduced to Mr. Holtz.
We’ll keep explaining our practice until you actually listen.
Again: we use first name to refer to civil people whom we’ve met. We use last name and honorific to refer to civil people whom we’ve not met. We use last name with no honorific to refer to uncivil people.
We said this @33. Roll Tide immediately understood it @34. We repeated it @38, and you exhibited at least partial understanding @39, even quoting part of the policy. Now you act like you’ve forgotten all of this, and instead accuse us of “stupidity”.
You don’t have to like our practice. You can even claim it’s insensitive, or patriarchal, or racist, or imperialist, or any other victim card in the identity politics deck. But that won’t make it so.
And if a men’s rights activist complains we only call men trolls, he’ll be just as off-base as you are.
Again, we’re sorry that our comment was not a valid example of a habit that we agree is all too common in LP circles. But it just wasn’t — no matter how badly you need to believe otherwise.
Re: “baiting”, you might want to save that accusation for a comment in which you aren’t throwing around words like “stupidity”. We didn’t ask you to bring false sexism charges against us in this thread. On those charges you can have the first word or the last word, but not both.
OK, enough of this manure from whatever Troll Police is, which appears to be a cross between a trailer-park trash Miss Manners wanna-be and an idiot.
The point that was trying to be made, waaay back up at #3 and #6, that apaprently went well past a lot of heads here, was that women in the LP aren’t treated equitably. That needs to be changed.
The problem is twofold in that A) we have three different types of women to address: the single woman, the married woman, and the parent (Yes, there undoubtedly is overlap.), and B) men really, for the most part, don’t understand how women think, and in single libertarian guys that problem is magnified.
So let’s look at this.
First, something must be made perfectly clear. The libertarian position on equality of the genders and sexual freedom should NOT be taken to mean that women should be “expendable and exploitable”, nor treated with condescension or disrespect, nor that they are men’s playthings, whores, sluts or any of that tripe. They are living breathing human beings who deserve to be treated the same way we would expect oursevles to be treated. Never forget that.
In the LP, it is perceived as a boys club for a couple of reasons. The obvious is demographics. We have a lot of single males, or married males whose spouses aren’t in the Party, but not a lot of married couples in the Party, and not a lot of parents active in the Party. That’s a big problem. The ideological bent of the Party is more rational and logical than emotional, and it’s no secret that most males have a hard time appealing to emotion. For us, it’s hard to do, partly from the stereotypical expectation of being “macho” and not being emotional. Frankly, that’s bullshit. The real measure of a man is not separation from their emotions, but complete contact and understanding of that part of their humanity. Real men *do* cry! Men *are* wired to think differently than women, no doubt, and as a result, we really don’t understand how they think, which is more web-like and non-linear with a focus on connections rather than sequential and process-oriented like men. It would be selfish for me as a guy to say that women need to be more rational like us (are we, really?), yet that’s exactly what we males are doing when they don’t do that and we respond by treating them with disrespect and condescension! (And then we wonder why we get it back from them in kind?).
Guys generally tend to look at women as objects first before they figure out what should be obvious in the first place, that there is a helluva lot more to women than just appearance. This is especially true of single guys. The presence of a wedding ring on a female finger can change some of their attitudes, but not all. Being a married man does have an improving influence in this situation for us guys. Being a father does so even more.
On the other side of the coin, being a married woman does tend to drive off a lot of the jerks. Having the spouse in tow at Party events drives off even more. Having the kids in tow drives off all but the truly desperate or stupid.
But it’s more than that. Far more than that.
A married person, man or woman, brings a completely different vibe to the Party than does a single person. The “dating game” presence with them is gone; they’re taken. The domineering of man over woman (or one spouse over the other) can disappear (not as much as a healthy marriage demands, it seems). They are no longer on the prowl in part, because they are out of that game, having won the hand of their spouse. That lets them focus on the Party politics rather than the sexual politics. Some issues become personalized as well, like marriage penalties, property and estate issues, and so on.
But a parent, mother or father, brings a different vibe still to the Party. Now it’s not just about the married partners. There’s the family and their future to consider. Issues become much more personalized than both single persons or childless married couples have, more concrete than abstract, like homeschooling, vaccines, public schools, etc. Focus changes as the reality of life hits the philosophy of the Party, and to some, they do not complement but oppose–and in the battle of family vs. philosophy, guess which always wins? You got it, the flesh and blood. When that happens, some people do leave the Party.
I’ve seen that trichotomy first-hand. It’s absolutely wonderful to see the Libertarian 18-year plan in action. Infighting drops, cooperation and goal-oriented action increases, and success is realized. But some of the single guys, out of either ignorance, jealousy, or just plain spite, don’t see the obvious–the future of the LP from a growth and membership perspective lies in getting the families to join us!
Yet nothing is done in that direction, because we don’t have enough families and married couples in the LP active in leadership and activism in a way that engages both spouses and the kids.
The benefits of that should be obvious. As families make their way in, the leches make their way out and things snowball on themselves. Parents instinctively like having their kids around nice and kind people and dislike having them around rude and unkind people. Part of that is Parenting 101, and part of it is simple peer pressure. But it does happen. When the Party is seen as family-friendly, that also gets a balance in energy, viewpoints, and action within the Party that projects itself out to new members–including the aforementioned single women who tend to not be creeped out by families the way they do over single nerdy guys. Plus, it makes it a helluvalot easier for the 18-year plan to work, and the ultimate benefit is that the infighting and useless arguments that tend to rise up from nerdy guys trying to prove how correct and manly they are tend to disappear.
To bring this full circle, yes, women are to be treated as equals to men, and it can be done without any sacrifice to either his masculinity or her femininity–in fact it is proper to celebrate the differences as complementary rather than in opposition. My wife and I aren’t called “Team Seebeck” for no reason–we are because that’s how we operate–as complements, not foes.
That’s the mentality that needs to be brought to the LP–family friendly leads to just plain friendly, and when that happens, the whole issue of treating women becomes a moot point, which is where it needs to be in the first place.
I said I wouldn’t answer, but this stupidity needs a reply. You said, TP: “We don’t understand your point about how we allegedly shamed Mr. Holtz differently than you. ”
Apparently you don’t recognize that calling him out as Mr. Holtz (for troll feeding, same “crime” we were scolded for) instead of “Brian” is just a little bit different treatment from calling out Ms. Pyeatt, Ms. Dedmon and myself by our first names. Still. How can you possibly not grasp that concept?
I can only think it’s because a) you’re deliberately refusing to see it or b) you aren’t the same person who posted under that name in that thread and so you’re unaware of that post.
I already said I was not interested in making a big deal out of this, just merely pointing out that this stuff happens and it’s the kind of thing the third parties, particularly the Libertarians like yourself, should watch out for if we would have more women in the party.
By the way, you’re baiting now, and that’s another form of trolling. You really should stop, especially if you would set a good example for others.
Carolyn, your initial accusation @30 said nothing about alleged gender inconsistency in who we accuse of trolling and troll-feeding. The first two trolls we’ve named have been men we’ve never met, and (after “Rorschach”) the first three people we cited for feeding were women who happen to be our acquaintances. It’s not tenable to claim this dataset exhibits evidence of gender selectivity.
Your “little sister” and “schoolgirl” insinuations are simply unfair. The flip side of the LP’s gender problem is that you probably see no problem in dealing the gender victim card from the bottom of the deck in this way, even after we confirmed Brad’s correct (and far more charitable) interpretation of the event. Our use of first names had zero to do with gender, and we’re sorry if that basic historical fact doesn’t fit in with your agenda in this thread.
The goal of the Troll Police will continue to be to maximize the shame of trolling and troll-feeding in the eyes of civil society here. If your own tactics can minimize trolling and troll-feeding even more effectively than ours do, so much the better.
As for “please stop feeding the trolls”, that was precisely our inaugural effort, over on the Seebeck thread. Didn’t work. So we started experimenting. We still are.
We don’t understand your point about how we allegedly shamed Mr. Holtz differently than you. We won’t insult your intelligence by repeating yet again our policy about when we use first name vs. last name. If your agenda here demands that you disbelieve our self-report about our policy, that’s something we’ll just have to get used to.
We don’t understand how you can say we “treat trolls with such deference”. Our policy with Milnes is to react to his trolling with the nuclear option: citing his stalking conviction, his history of mental illness, his homelessness problems, his utter lack of an LP activism resume, and the abject failure of his alleged presidential nomination campaign. Our hope is that knowledge of these facts will dissuade at least LP officers from encouraging Milnes’ delusions of LP prominence.
R.T., the few parts of your ramblings that we skimmed indeed went right over our heads. If you’re aiming for troll status, the first thing you need to do is split your long rambling comment into a series of much shorter ones.
Brad, we hadn’t noticed it until just now, but you’re right: Carolyn apparently thought that “Shame on all of them” only applied to the female troll-feeders, and not also to the male troll. We won’t speculate on what led her to such a wildly tendentious reading, even though she presumes to know why we sometimes use first names. Mind-reading may be her forte, but it’s not ours.
Deb, we’ll have to remember that one about blending a kitten. Perhaps Mr. Holtz is not such an irredeemable troll-feeder after all.
Personally I like Paulies old pics of “dont feed the trolls” , they always reminded me when i was in fact doing that .
But my favorite nudge came from Brian Holtz who sent me an email of a kitten in a blender and told me everytime i fed a troll ( a particular one) he would blend a kitten. ROFL , it worked , I dont believe Ive gotten into a back-n-forth with that particular troll since . Humor works well to make this point
RT, I think your point is pretty obvious there at the end.
But apparently “Mr.” Holtz’s troll feeding that brought shame upon him was not the same as “Carolyn, Jill and Debra/LG’s” troll feeding which not only brought shame on us (oh woe) but brought so much shame on us that “they” dressed us down like schoolgirls.
I had no intention of making a big deal out of this, and so this is my last post on this topic. I mentioned it here as an example of how this kind of thing happens sometimes without even conscious thought. Then you said it was deliberate. Oookay.
You can justify it to yourselves all day, but the bottom line is, you treated us differently than you treated men for the same thing in the other threads, and differently than you treated Holtz in the same thread.
RT, I’d prefer to think that maybe “they” took what I said to heart and have suddenly changed their policy to allow equal treatment for those who most likely accidentally find themselves feeding trolls and the trolls themselves — equal, at least, to the trolls they seem to treat with such deference.
I also agree with you that they’re feeding trolls more themselves than they’re stopping it, but I have moderated political discussion groups before, and I know what a fine line it is to walk. I don’t fault them for that. They’re doing what they can to stop abusiveness, and I appreciate it. To that end, lest I be castigated for trolling myself on this topic and in a good faith belief that what I’ve said may have made a difference in policy, I will stop here.
Dear Mr. T.P.,
It looks like this went over your head but trust me, trying to logic your way through ain’t gonna help your case here.
You say “Other policies of the Troll Police are not (yet) consistent. We don?t always use the first person plural. ”
“We are” not amused.
Over at
https://independentpoliticalreport.com/2009/12/onthewilderside-posts-opinion-piece-and-contest-on-the-subject-of-bipartisanship/
I find,
“Whenever [a politician] uses the word ?we,? I always assume that they?re either pregnant or have a tapeworm.”
and
“United States Navy Admiral Hyman G. Rickover told a subordinate who used the royal we: ?Three groups are permitted that usage: pregnant women, royalty, and schizophrenics. Which one are you??
And finally:
* We (novel), a novel by Yevgeny Zamyatin
* We (rat snake), the albino two-headed snake
You say, “Roll Tide, as we wrote yesterday, not everything that an identified troll writes constitutes trolling.”
That may be true.
However, any response you provide never the less is troll feeding, and tends to result in more trolling.
By way of an alogy, you remember that neighbor of mine I told you about earlier, Miss Ellie Rae?
Sometimes she comes a-knockin’ on the door with her big butt in ripped Daisy Duke shorts, whale tail thong and belly shirt stretched out to be little more than a brassiere, askin’ for something or another – it may be a cup of sugar one time, or let’s say her pipes need to be snaked.
Now, she may very well need those things, and it’s not like I mind. But the trouble is I know that it’s a different kind of sugar she’s really after, and the pipes she really wants snaked aren’t the ones to her septic tank, you catch my drift?
I look at it like this, the more I give her what she thinks she needs, the more she’ll want from me, so I just don’t even give her the time of day.
My wife don’t take no crap, so I learned a long time ago to leave that one alone.
These days she hardly ever even tries knocking on our door any more, matter fact she’ll walk clear across the whole trailer park and knock on just about every door looking for something before she even thinks about trying our place.
You also say,
“The Troll Police have a consistent and gender-neutral policy for how we choose among 1) first name, 2) last name with honorific, and 3) last name without honorific.”
At #156 over on the other thread you say
“Mr. Holtz, shame on you for feeding what you admit is a troll.”
I forgot where I was driving with that but since I already wrote it I’ll leave it in there. Maybe someone else here can help me with that.
Anyway, I hope you fine folks have a blessed evening.
Roll Tide!
LibertarianGirl,
Yep, sure enough, that’s the one I meant.
So what you’re saying is that feeding a troll, even inadvertently, is a far more serious crime than being a troll and deserves a more personal treatment than that given to the troll, and a DIFFERENT treatment from … what, those who feed trolls in other threads? Because that is what you did here.
And your use of our first names “because you have met us” is okay in spite of what I said about it further personalizes the issue is somehow justified, as well? Really?
Yeah, I’d say it would be a good idea for you to revise and refine your policies, all right.
Try this: Anyone you would correct for whatever behavior, whether trolling, troll-feeding, attempts at “citizens’ arrests” etc, you address by their full screen name OR by surname only, and WHATEVER you do, address all parties in an equal manner. What’s so wrong with that, or are you just committed now to defending this inequality of treatment? Creating a policy of equal treatment for (what you apparently consider) equal offenses will help insulate you from situations like this one. Personally, I don’t think that someone responding to personal attacks equates immediately to troll feeding, but I do recognize that I should have been the grown up and stopped sooner.
That said, you really can’t justify treating Jill Pyeatt as a “troll feeder” for posting only once to defend me and the CALP from his attacks, and you ESPECIALLY can’t justify undercutting her credibility the way you did by addressing this member of the CA leadership by her first name and dressing her down as if she were your little sister. You simply can’t.
Maximizing shame for troll feeders really shouldn’t be your goal, and maybe that’s the problem. Your goal should be to encourage people by not adding attacks to them that they further need to defend. That’s basic psychology. A simple “Please stop feeding this troll” would have sufficed. Honest.
Carolyn, please see our message immediately below yours. The Troll Police have a consistent and gender-neutral policy for how we choose among 1) first name, 2) last name with honorific, and 3) last name without honorific. Our policy treats genders equally, but it is absolutely not “about treating everyone equally”. We already expained why.
Other policies of the Troll Police are not (yet) consistent. We don’t always use the first person plural. We are still working out policies for how to maximize shame for troll-feeders, and how to answer police brutality complaints from trolls without feeding them in the process. But none of this has anything to do with gender. Neither you nor we can prove it either way, so this will just have to be a character test of what conclusions people reach when the evidence supports none.
Roll Tide, as we wrote yesterday, not everything that an identified troll writes constitutes trolling. However, the Troll Police welcome good-faith efforts at citizens’ arrests. Indeed, if troll-feeding were properly handled through community self-policing, then the Troll Police would be able to demobilize.
Troll Police, please see my message immediately above yours. It’s not about whether or not you’ve met me. I’ve met almost everyone in the party at some point or another, but if I’m referring to Aaron Starr and Angela Keaton in the same sentence, both of whom I call regularly by their first names, I will say either Aaron and Angela OR Starr and Keaton because that treats them the same way within the context. NEVER Starr and Angela or Aaron and Keaton. Hope that clears up the issue.
One more time: It’s about treating everyone equally, especially in the context of a correction. Using someone’s first name like that makes it much more personal than when you do not, which means your correction of Mr. Slevin was more businesslike and your correction of us was more personal, and that makes it inappropriate. You would have lost nothing by saying “Slevin is a troll. Marbry, Pyeatt and Dedmon/LG are feeding him. Please stop.”
Roll_I heard a song one time about how the women are smarter. You know that one?
me_ yes Ive heard it , it was a Grateful Dead regular
” Send “Women Are Smarter” Ringtones to Cell
Let us put men and women together
See which one is smarter
Some say men, but I say no
Women run the men like a puppet show
It ain’t me
It’s the people that say
Men are leading the women astray
But I say, it’s the women today
Smarter than the man in every way”
Let me see if I got the hang of this.
On that other thread, Brian at comment 131 and again at 142, Bruce at 143 and Steven at 151 are being troll-feeders. Shame on them.
How’d I do? Did I get that right?
Also, since we are on this topic (kind of) and I don’t want to ever talk about it again, I may as well say this this one time (and yes, shame on me for being a troll-feeder – I’ll try not to do it again).
This Slevin fellow sounds nuttier than a fruitcake. Now California is the land of fruits and nuts, like I said before, so none of this should be a big surprise or anything.
He reminds me mostly, of a small dog which barks real loud. Y’all know the type.
If any y’all ever had you a two year old you know how they can throw a tantrum all the time to be at the center of everybody’s attention. Same general idea.
He says that there is nothing to follow or learn here at IPR yet he has been making sure to post the most comments out of everybody, day and night, for several days in a row, so near as I can reckon he is following real close and hoping everybody else learns from him, or else learns to shut up and go away so’s to quit listening to his steady barking and yelping.
Now, I’m a real simple fellow, but when I find me a place where there’s nothing to follow and nothing to learn, and the good Lord knows there’s sure plenty of those on the intertubes, I mosy on along to somewhere else – how ’bout y’all?
I’m not going to keep talking about this though, ’cause the way I look at it, attention seeking of that sort oughtta not be rewarded.
One last example before I go,
It’s sort of like my neighbor Ellie Rae over here at the trailer park in Bayou la Batre.
She weighs about 350 would be my guess, drinks a whole lot of corn whiskey and gets real loud and obnoxious, and wears little negligees and thongs and what have you all over outside in the trailer court. Now I pay her no mind, but I wish some of the other fellows around here would quit flirting with her.
And old preacher man Willie, who always calls her names and yells at her and tells her to go dress decent and watch her mouth, well, near as I can reckon, that just encourages her to do it more, just so she can tick him off even more, and also the ladies around here that tend to give her the evil eye and maybe sometimes some evil lip. She loves ticking them off too.
Truth is, I don’t think she cares too much if she gets a whistle or gets called a bad name so long as people are making her the center of attention.
That’s why I wish folks would pay her no mind, but it seems that a whole lot of ’em just can’t help themselves.
Know what I mean?
Dear Mr. Police,
Let me see if I got this all clear.
If I knew you real good and you was a friend of mine, I’d a called you by your first name, which I gather here is “Troll.”
I also reckon if you was being a big jerk like that california fruitcake, Mr. Slevin, I would just call you “police” without any type of “Mr.” part to it, so as to emphasize my point that you are not a part of civic society. I think that’s about the shape of it, right?
Summing all that up:
Mr. Police is how I call you if I’m being polite, Troll is what I call you if you’re my bud, and “police” is what I call you if you are being uncivil.
I think I got all that now.
Although…
What say you to Ms. Marbry when she says, “I also notice on other threads where the people “feeding” the trolls are men, there is no such “shame on you” spanking given.” …?
Now, don’t get me wrong.
I love to spank on some naughty girls too, and the whole spanking boys thing just does not have the same type of appeal to it.
But on the other hand when a lady catches me acting uncouth, I usually just try to apologize and move on. I don’t know about you, but I always found that once they get upset about something, like leaving the toilet seat up or any old little thing, I never get anywhere by trying to logic my way out of it.
I heard a song one time about how the women are smarter. You know that one?
You say “Another all-too-common dynamic is not giving fellow Libertarians the benefit of the doubt.” and I agree! Sometimes it seems to me that giving ANYONE the benefit of the doubt on anything ever goes against libertarian people’s nature. Maybe it’s that whole orneriness that makes it so unwelcoming to regular folks and new people and what have you.
It was very deliberate. I’ve met each of Carolyn, Jill, and Debra, but I’ve never met Slevin, and if I had, I still would use only his last name, sans honorific, so as to not create an impression that he is part of what I consider civil society.
The dynamic that Carolyn identifies is all too common, but it turns out that this wasn’t an example of it.
Another all-too-common dynamic is not giving fellow Libertarians the benefit of the doubt.
Brad, I don’t believe it was conscious or deliberate. That was kind of my point. It’s this kind of thoughtless (and I use the term literally –without thought) thing that points up the disparity between how men and women are treated by people within the party, which is why I mention it here.
By the way, the women in the party are sometimes guilty of this, too, referring to “Mary” or “Ruth” in the same breath with “Wrights” or “Phillies.” It’s a common problem, not just a “men are doing this to us!” thing. That doesn’t change the fact that we need to change it.
Seriously, I don’t mind being called Carolyn, and you’re welcome to call me that IF you would also call Mr. Slevin by his first name, John when referring to us both in the same post, especially one meant to castigate him or me or both of us for something. See what I mean? I’m not just being a little bitch about someone using my first name here. That’s really not it.
It’s about equal treatment between men and women within the same context, something that I had already brought up as an issue in this thread. It’s ESPECIALLY important when that context is correction because use of someone’s first name has some specific psychological connotations in that context, again contrasted with someone else whose surname was used instead. It makes it much more personal.
Ms. Marbry,
I think that the comment above that you refer to, “shame on them all” also applies to slevin. At least that is the way I read it.
While the general rule about first versus last names is true, there may be mitigating factors.
For example, the person who said that may consider you, Ms. Pyeatt and Ms. Dedmon to be friends, so he is more apt to call you by your first names – rather than someone who just showed up that he does not really know, and he may be calling that person by his last name for that reason.
In other words, if it had been Jane Slavin (new person), Carl Marbry, Joell Pyeatt and Don Dedmon (all regulars), the comment might have referred to Ms. Slevin by last name and the three guys bytheir first names. Of course, that’s just an unproven theory. I could be wrong.
Also, a lot of people nowadays prefer to be called by their first name. I know I do, and I know lots of other people feel the same way.
But if someone tells me they prefer to be called by their last name, I try to keep that in mind.
Where you say,
“I also notice on other threads where the people “feeding” the trolls are men, there is no such “shame on you” spanking given.”
That is a fair criticism. I would imagine though that this discrepancy may be either coincidental or subconscious. But, again, I could be wrong.
“Are you SURE you want women in the party?”
I would say yes, although I no more presume to speak for all men than I presume you to speak for all women.
Here you go. A prime example of EXACTLY what I’m talking about, from right here on IPR.
Quote from another thread from someone using the name Please Don’t Feed the Trolls:
“Slevin is a troll. Carolyn, Jill, and Debra/LG are troll-feeders. Shame on all of them.”
What’s wrong with this picture? Mr. Slevin is a male and is referred to by his last name. Further, he’s merely called a troll and it’s left at that.
But myself, Jill Pyeatt and Debra Dedmon are all women and we’re referred to by our first names and spanked like naughty little girls for replying to his bad behavior.
And you wonder why women leave this party in DROVES…
I’m not complaining here about being asked not to feed a troll — I should have realized he was trolling much sooner and stopped, I get that. No, what I’m showing you here is the difference in treatment. Given that I’m reasonably sure I know who posted that, yes, I will say that this is a problem with Libertarian men and needs to stop if you’re serious about getting more women involved in the party.
Pretending ignorance of our last names would be disingenuous. The names are right there on our posts. I also notice on other threads where the people “feeding” the trolls are men, there is no such “shame on you” spanking given.
All we’re asking for is equal treatment. So what gives, gents? Are you SURE you want women in the party?
I think you’ve all pretty well discovered that it’s not ideology that’s the issue. You aren’t going to want to attract those women who aren’t Libertarians just to fill up our quota of XX chromosomes.
The kinds of women who think female nudity in the form of magazines or pornography is “exploitation,” or who think prostitution will destroy their marriages or who want the government to “protect their babies” for them will never agree with us. There are plenty of actual Libertarian women, though. There just aren’t that many active in the party itself, and that is what needs to be fixed.
Brian, yes, actually, I was being polite, mostly because the kind of men who are interested in this topic aren’t the ones who do those sorts of things, as far as I can tell. No need to browbeat you gentlemen for the boorishness of others. I figure you’re all smart enough to read between the lines, as well.
Mik #9, simply using first names for everyone would solve that problem, if it’s a problem, and might tend to make the whole group seem just a little more welcoming overall. Thing is, I don’t need to DENY my gender in order to be effective. Women in the 80s did that, going around in very mannish suits and looking all severe to try to squeeze the last drop of femininity out of their business image since in our hearts of hearts somehow we still associated masculinity with professionalism. Which meant feminine was inferior. FAIL. Thank goodness we don’t do that anymore. At the same time, it’s rather disingenuous of women to dress as women and then insist that men not notice that they’re female. Both denigrate femininity. One can be feminine and professional at the same time.
Point is, we all need to stop seeing gender differences including GLBTQ as “special needs” and just treat each other as equals. If Mr. and Ms. are equal, there’s no problem.
“Female” is part of who we are, as surely as “male” is part of who you are. “Gender blind” is as stupid and unworkable a concept as “color blind,” and we know that. We only ask that we be treated with the same respect afforded the men when we’re conducting business. Oh yeah, and that we not be oggled, fondled, propositioned, pursued after we’ve politely declined or otherwise treated like sex toys or party favors when we’re trying to do party business…
sho nuf, mo lissenin!
“Libertarians are terrible listeners ……. they ….. plan ……. their rebuttal even as your lips are still moving”
That’s the way San Paper Kings Ed Tesslier and Richard Rider run LP Sandy Ego [Calllifornia]!
@ 23 lg writes: “Most new people are debated to death and nobody wants to listen.
Libertarians are terrible listeners , in fact they rarely listen , instead planning their rebuttal even as your lips are still moving”
BINGO! You hit the nail on the head! You score 1000! TILT!
I think new activist / member retention is our number 1 obstacle , for both women and all newbies.
It has been my experience in Nv , that we had many new people show up , some come back a cpl times and some come back for awhile , but for almost all there is a shelf life.Most new people are debated to death and nobody wants to listen.
True. Also, we don’t really give them much in the way of fun and/or outreach-oriented activities. I think that is probably our biggest problem right there.
Libertarians are terrible listeners , in fact they rarely listen , instead planning their rebuttal even as your lips are still moving.
Also true. I’m so bad that I rarely have the patience to wait until the lips finish moving before I jump in.
But yeah, we do need to learn to listen better, especially me.
women actually skew more “pro-life” than men do
OK, but I don’t think that is why Ron Paul groups get more female participation than the LP. Of course, I could always be wrong. But then again the LP has not made a big issue out of abortion in a long time.
When I said “better at mating”, I meant better at forming breeding pairs, not better at copulating.
LOL, I know.
I suspect this thread will end up demonstrating why the LP doesn’t attract very many women. In my own defense, all I can say is that I’ve brought one in, and we’re raising three more.
It already has.
Just because I can diagnose a problem does not mean I don’t also exhibit it.
BH_Libertarians are too good at sex, rather than not good enough. When I said “better at mating”, I meant better at forming breeding pairs, not better at copulating.
me_ so what your saying is Libertarians are hard to live with??
I think new activist / member retention is our number 1 obstacle , for both women and all newbies.
It has been my experience in Nv , that we had many new people show up , some come back a cpl times and some come back for awhile , but for almost all there is a shelf life.Most new people are debated to death and nobody wants to listen.
Libertarians are terrible listeners , in fact they rarely listen , instead planning their rebuttal even as your lips are still moving.
Price Club, women actually skew more “pro-life” than men do: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_the_United_States#Public_opinion. However, I’m skeptical that this is true of the LP’s target market, the 13%-20% of Americans who want both more economic freedom and more personal freedom.
Paulie @20, for the purposes of this discussion, let’s stipulate that Libertarians are too good at sex, rather than not good enough. 🙂 When I said “better at mating”, I meant better at forming breeding pairs, not better at copulating.
Hmm, I suspect this thread will end up demonstrating why the LP doesn’t attract very many women. In my own defense, all I can say is that I’ve brought one in, and we’re raising three more.
That’s one way to achieve a majority – lots and lots of babies.
Libertarians should get better at mating and breeding.
Kama Sutra classes for LP conventions?
At the risk of sounding sexist (although my source is from females), my understanding is that men and women think differently…the whole left brain/right brain thing. L-ism tends to be highly analytical and atomistic, crowding right brain thinking in L circles. Women tend to be more be more right-brain oriented, so the LP tends to attract more men than women.
Holistic L-ism could be a solution to our gender imbalance.
I don’t think really it’s a hard-and-fast rule that women are more right-brained (I tend to be more right-brained myself) but probably they are more often so than men.
I don’t think it is a problem of libertarianism per se so much as how it is marketed (or not marketed, as the case may be).
It needs a variety of approaches. Active rather than passive marketing is key, and getting new people into outreach-oriented activities before they lose interest.
More fun stuff and fun activities.
More videos, music, art, poetry, and more outreach materials using those methods.
More use of emotional language rather than just dry policy analysis, but less overwhelming angry/pessimistic tone.
BTW in addition to Ron Paul groups, I found Liberty on the Rocks to have a good gender balance (I was going to meetings in Denver).
BH_Libertarians should get better at mating and breeding.
me__ awsome !
ROFLMAO
Some guesses.
Ron Paul groups: outreach and action oriented.
LP groups: typically insular; lots of supper clubs with mainly old(er) white guys sitting around and complaining, Roberts rules wrangling, angels on the head of a pin discussions, big fish/small pond syndromes.
I’m guessing that type of energy/attitude is more male and turns women off.
Maybe some of these libertarian nerds who actually have money should try to get stippers and young blue collar women looking for better off/more educated men into the party as a social thing. There are enough of those that have broadly libertarian views but will not be persuaded by long-winded, analytical/intellectual presentations of libertarianism or won over by passive recruiting methods.
At the risk of sounding sexist (although my source is from females), my understanding is that men and women think differently…the whole left brain/right brain thing. L-ism tends to be highly analytical and atomistic, crowding right brain thinking in L circles. Women tend to be more be more right-brain oriented, so the LP tends to attract more men than women.
Holistic L-ism could be a solution to our gender imbalance.
LOL @ 13
True @ 12
I noticed the Ron Paul groups don’t have so much trouble getting female participation.
I don’t imagine it’s because Ron Paul is more conservative on abortion, immigration or gay issues, but maybe I’m just wrong and that’s what it is?
Dunno.
There’s a women and minorities outreach committee that pretty much got abandoned after Angela quit the LNC…
It still has a couple of yahoo groups but very few members and no activity
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/wamolibertarian/
6 ppl signed up
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/libertarianwamo/
2 ppl
And now I’ll risk whatever credibility I might have on this topic by recommending this music video from HBO’s acclaimed comedy Flight Of The Conchords:
Carolyn is too polite @6 to describe how bad it can be for single female Libertarians. And unless she’s used surveillance equipment, she probably doesn’t even know just how differently many Libertarian men behave around/toward them. But these issues aren’t at the beginning of the lines of causation here. It starts with a culture built around individualism, survivalism, evolutionary psychology, guns, science fiction/fantasy, engineering, computers, technicalities, polemics, one-upsmanship, iconoclasm, conspiracy theories, paranoia, the narcissism of small differences, factionalism, purity-testing, etc. The end result are demographics and norms so skewed that many Libertarian men wouldn’t even understand why our few women aren’t flattered by how solicitous some of our men are toward them.
The dynamic seems very similar to that of the engineering/technical world here in Silicon Valley. It’s surely exacerbated by the fact that Libertarians explicitly question most of the legal and social norms that our patriarchal society uses to protect/repress females. Thus I’m impressed that @3 Carolyn can stand up and Just Say No to identity politics. Still, all of the above shows why it’s very important for Libertarian women to seek each other out, both for support and for outreach. The same is true for Libertarian parents, which reminds me I still need to try to organize a “play date” for other local LP parents of young children.
If (passion for) technology is one of the underlying problems here, perhaps it can help towards a solution, too. After having worked on Yahoo Personals for eight years, I’m confident that Libertarians could improve our gender ratios through more intensive use of online dating. Perhaps this advice is itself symptomatic of the problem here, but it’s hard to dispute that Libertarians should get better at mating and breeding.
fablus feedback for me . . . thanx Carolyn!
to do with
I think a lot of the dearth of women in the LP has to with the LP being seen as a cold-hearted party. Fend for yourself sort of survivalist individualism seems to dominate the thinking. It does not present warm and nurturing ideas of caring and community support, things that generally attract women. I don’t think this is necessarily true of libertarian ideas, but I think that perception is pretty common.
@6 “Put everyone on a first name basis or use Ms. and surnames for women and Mr. and surnames for men. Either one works.”
How about if we just go M. Surname and no one has to worry if Leslie Smith is male or female?
Sincerely, the True Liberator of Women. Over and out.
The only way that women can discover and manifest their true interests is by joining God’s party, the Catholic Trotskyist Party. The principles of ending abortion, ending war, ending poverty and ending nationalism, are growing forth every day for the past two years and are progressing the long march of Catholic Trotskyism under the guideance of our true revolutionary general, Barack H. Obama, and his wife Michelle Obama.
Many of you will be glad to know that I will be taking another long hiatus from IPR for several months; God has ordered me to attend to another mission for the Vatican and Hugo Chavez. Some of my friends may post updates about my progress, but don’t listen to anything that “The Last Conservative” says, because he is no longer my friend. I may also try again to campaign for the Milnes PLAS strategy.
Peace and blessings to you all. God bless the state and God bless the church.
Please pray for the pope and please pray for Barack Obama. And read the Book of Isaiah.
Amen.
No question that the LP could do a better job of attracting women. My point is, we don’t want to patronize women or condescend to get them to join us. So it doesn’t seem that we disagree, really.
Melty… it’s kind of awkward to try to address the reasons why women are not as quickly attracted to the LP, but I’ll try. Bear in mind that I’m using generalizations very broadly in the interest of expediting the discussion. I realize that of 150 million or so women in this country, there are 150 million variations on this theme, but here’s my take on the issue.
One issue of course is that women statistically tend to run more “liberal” in terms of wanting big government and social programs than men, so there is a smaller group we’re drawing from.
Women who are inclined toward libertarian thought will find their way to our websites and our literature, though. So why do they come to one or two meetings and then leave? This is something Angela Keaton and I have discussed at length whenever we’ve gotten together, and it seems that it often comes down to really one thing: Women are treated very differently from men in this party.
No, it’s not a locker room smell, but there is a sense of it being a men’s party where women are tolerated. Understand, I’m not a feminazi, I’m not trying to say the men are being evil. They’re not. I imagine they’re simply unaware that this is going on. You asked the question, and I’m trying to answer it as best I can, as a woman, speaking frankly.
There is a tendency among some of the men to be overly solicitous to the women, particularly to single women. Overly solicitous to the point of being obnoxious in some cases, not to put too fine a point on it. When I worked as Phillies’ press director, I had men hitting on me at virtually every state convention, sometimes right in front of the entire state party, which wasn’t ideal considering I was there in a professional capacity. From what I hear, this is a common experience among women, especially single women, in the party. Some don’t mind it, some of us are tougher skinned. Awesome. We tend to stick around.
But for those women who do, it can be rather off-putting and can chase them away. So how do you fix this? Just separate professional interactions from personal ones. There’s nothing wrong with “That’s a pretty dress.” There IS something wrong with “Can I come over to your hotel and hot tub with you tonight?” especially on the convention floor when she’s trying to make a motion.
There’s a tendency to treat the women differently from the men in another way, as well. At conventions and in meetings, women are often called by their first names while men are referred to by title and surname. I don’t believe it’s intentional; I believe it has more to do with people not wanting to fish around for “Mrs.” or “Miss” and make a mistake, forgetting that “Ms.” has been in usage for quite a while. So knowing her first name, they grab it and run with it. How do you fix this? Equal treatment. Put everyone on a first name basis or use Ms. and surnames for women and Mr. and surnames for men. Either one works.
I mention this because you specifically asked what we can do to help increase our appeal to women, and that’s what I can offer. Don’t treat the women differently than you treat the men. That’s most of it. And remember that our issues are also your issues.
Carolyn I am going to disagree with a part of what you have said. IMHO the LP has been poor at outreach to groups that are harmed by the law. And in some cases the laws have harmed some more than others.
For example:
1.)senior citizens are more likely to need access to family law than others to deal with advance directives, etc. They would benefit if paralegals were more available but many states make paralegals virtually illegal.
2.)Another example. lack of adequate urban transit harms seniors, especially women over 65, part-time working mothers and members of minority groups more than it harms white males.
3.)Another example. Lack of access to midwives because there are laws that make midwifery difficult to practice in some state harms mothers and their children.
I’m not suggesting that women need any special help but the LP in my not so humble opinion has not done a good job of outreach to many groups.
Having a general statement about the conditions is not good enough. We need to personalize the message and make the person reading or hearing our point of view realize that they personally who are going to benefit from opening the marketplace.
So, what is it then? Is there some kind of boys locker room smell about the LP or something?
One of the single best things the LP can do is to stop treating women the way the other parties do, i.e., as a “demographic” or a “special interest group” or a “bloc.” Don’t feel the need to handle us with kid gloves because we’re really not that fragile, and our interests are not that alien.
Sure, there are some issues that may seem on the surface to be of greater interest to women than to men, but I challenge you to come up with political issues that are only of interest to women. Reproductive rights? No, these affect men, too. Equal treatment under the law? Not so much. This also affects men, especially in family law situations to say nothing of GLBT issues.
We’re Libertarians. Just like you. We’re not “Women Libertarians.” For women of my generation and those younger than me, this will be one of the best ways to attract us to the party. We really aren’t that interested in being America’s Little Dumplings.
abused and disabled military veterans ??????
Personally I think the LP could do a better job of outreach to women and others simply by improving the literature we have and developing a flier or two specifically for women, seniors, low income people, etc.