Huh. It turns out that Women in Secularism isn’t about women. It’s about “women and femmes.” I have no real idea what that’s supposed to mean, since it obviously doesn’t mean femme lesbians, because they are of course women so there’d be no need for an “and.”
At least, it’s about that according to Sincere Kirabo, who attended the one last weekend. It’s not about that according to CFI, which holds the conference, but hey what do they know.
This past weekend, my colleague Jessica Xiao and I had the honor of attending the Center For Inquiry’s Women In Secularism 4(WIS).
The honor? Attending isn’t an honor. That sounds like having the honor to ride the bus or see a movie. Buying a ticket to something doesn’t confer honor.
Anyway – on to the femmes.
This conference brought together a diverse lineup of speakers—including American Humanist Association President Rebecca Hale—to address both the progress and challenges uniquely related to the lives of women and femmes.
Women and femmes. Women and femmes, when it’s always been women until now. Why isn’t “women” good enough? Why does Sincere Kirabo – a man – feel the need to shove women aside so that they don’t hog their own movement? Why can’t it just be women?
Whether people wish to recognize it or not, events like this exist and are made necessary due to a continued lack of balanced representation within secular circles. Bias has a lot to do with it, of course. As writer Soraya Chemaly noted in her talk focused on the marginalization of women/femmes in society, sexism shapes human knowledge and behavior.
Did she? Did she say that? I don’t know, I wasn’t there and I saw only tweets and Paul Fidalgo’s blog post, but I doubt it. I read Soraya regularly and I don’t recall seeing her talk about “women/femmes” as if that were a thing. If she didn’t, I find it pretty obnoxious of Kirabo to put words in her mouth.
And more directly, I am beyond tired of seeing people hell bent on forcing women to be “inclusive” in the sense of ceasing to talk about women and instead talk about women-and. It’s just more All Lives Matter, but somehow when it’s women being made to do it, it becomes right-on and “progressive.”
I say it’s spinach and I say the hell with it.
Comments
9 responses to “Just women”
But…I love spinach! I don’t love this nonsense.
I was wondering why you said you had no idea what the use of the term “femme” was about, since the post you quoted has a link.
And then I read the link:
Ah. Well, then. That’s as clear as mud. I guess I can be a “femme,” too. To me, being a femme is about preferring Yukon Gold potatoes to other varieties and thinking that Picard is a better captain than Kirk.
Usually people deny practicing Humpty Dumptyism rather than celebrating it, but hey, you do you!
What this really reminds me of is the way “philosophically sophisticated” believers use the word “God”. From what I have gathered, the only things that can consistently be said about whatever it is that “philosophically sophisticated” believers call “God” are:
1. It’s called “God”
2. It has nothing to do with anything you’re talking about, therefore anything you say can easily be dismissed as strawmanning.
3. It’s really vitally important that you call it “God” rather than, say, “Ogd”, “Dog”, “Gdo” etc..)
(In fact, I once defined “sophisticated theology” as the art of saying “It doesn’t matter what you believe in as long as you call it ‘God’” using as many words as possible.)
Similarly, the only thing that can be said about “women”/”femmes” in Genderspeak is that they’re called “women”/”femmes”.
Screechy @ 2 – I was too blind with rage to pause to follow the link.
[…] Just women […]
“Usually people deny practicing Humpty Dumptyism rather than celebrating it, but hey, you do you!”
Screechy Monkey, you have just won the Internet.
#3
Goddamn, it truly is at the level of theology now.
Funny…I can’t recall any event for Men/Butches being proposed anyplace, EVER.
No, neither can I. I asked about that in a Facebook post yesterday and no one who responded could either.