Letters to the Editor
J.C. Miller
Published Letters: 322 Editor's Choice: 34
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respect her choice as you would your own
[Read the article: A case for parental notification]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Adrienne, if a woman, no matter what age, makes an informed, considered decision for an abortion, helped by someone neutral and supportive of her, then the only likely “lifelong guilt and regret” would be that imposed on her by, for example, a family or religion. Parents are almost never able to be neutrally supportive because of their unconscious identification with and consequent need to control their offspring. You seem to confuse this harmful need to control with what is in the best interests of a pregnant woman.
Readers are letting you know that your arguments don’t hold up and conflict with each other. I wonder if you offered incongruent and irrelevant arguments so as not to betray the real, underlying concern: “I am afraid of losing control of my offspring’s behavior because of how her choices might affect my esteem and standing.” Your role is to let them go, not to live your life through theirs.
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ditto to War vs. rape?, but ......
[Read the article: Feminism and intervention, Part XXXVIII]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Rape is a horrible and inexcusable act which in itself is not an act of murder, or is it? Pregnancy and STDs can be lethal psychologically if not literally. There is more at stake than “female feelings”.
And yet, feminists or anyone who would “call for airstrikes” (that is, call for the killing of combatants and innocents) in response to acts of rape might ask themselves: could my understandable rage be more adaptively channeled? Are there alternative responses to rape ultimately more productive for victims and perpetrators than killing? Dead men can’t be held accountable.
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"American family" ?
[Read the article: Pelosi’s family values]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]“But she has endorsed raising the minimum wage, cutting interest rates on student loans and making some college tuition tax deductible. As Warner points out, though, these aren't nearly enough. The American family needs quality after-school programs, national standards for childcare, voucher programs and tax subsidies to help pay for that care, universal, voluntary public preschool, paid family leave and incentives for businesses to make part-time and flex-time work financially viable.”
All admirable and worthwhile goals which no doubt would benefit and are deserved by children and their caretakers.
But what is this thing you call “the American family” , and why would the “feminist left”, or anyone else, frame arguments for socially progressive and humanistic measures for children and their caretakers only in terms of this “American family”? Is it something like the “American way”, or the “sacred vow of marriage”, or maybe “American might”?
Do those who fall outside of your constructed “American family” have legitimate needs and rights as well?
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let's stop playing games
[Read the article: The video game bullies]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]“Video games cause violence!”
“No they don’t, because you can’t prove it, and the hero is nice to nerds, and they’re really cool with, like, 80 characters!”
Right. But we all might agree with psychologist Craig Anderson that, “a video game captures attention, maintains attention.” Attention that would otherwise be available for tasks that seem to be required to develop and maintain healthy human functioning. Like interacting in a real social environment, or learning to solve problems in real environments.
A depressed woman avoids activities which would improve her mood; an anxious man displaces constructive thought and attention with unfounded worry. A therapeutic challenge for both is to re-engage in activities and thoughts that improve their functioning and happiness. An at-risk, alienated, withdrawn, and angry teen addicted to Bully avoids real experiences that could be empowering, socially rewarding, and critical for healthy adolescent development. The potential harm isn’t about violent behaviors that are induced or learned, but about potentially empowering growth experiences that are pre-empted by the “enchanting and addictive” game.
Like Ebonius said, these teens are wasting valuable time needed for real experiences critical for healthy development. Instead of vicariously defending nerds while sitting on their asses in front of a video screen, they could be documenting real harassment in their own schools, then getting in the administration’s face with it. That would be empowering. Or training in martial arts, which might be somewhat more empowering than passively viewing simulated offers to learn “some badass fighting moves”.
In any case, video games don’t cause Columbines. Columbines happen when vulnerable kids are humiliated and rejected in a way that feels like a death sentence, enough so to elicit desperately violent acts. Deviant kids are targeted for humiliation by other kids who are insecure about their own status (thus real prospects) in social systems in which winners and losers are identified and tracked for success or failure in life. In high schools the academic achievers are tracked for future success, and the jocks and others with lower status are unconsciously driven by primal impulses to compensate for their lowered status the best they can. Bullying is one consequence.
We create in our schools a microcosm of the social pathologies we tolerate and celebrate in larger society, where winners and losers are identified by access to status and wealth rather than grades and style. But questioning the class-based, ranked-for-success-or-failure structure of schools would be worse than unthinkable – it could lead to questions about the maintenance of class, poverty, and privilege in larger society. Far less discomforting to accept a Columbine per week. We would just require more arguments and studies about video games or drug use or family values to distract us.
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neither
[Read the article: A special Broadsheet farewell ...]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"Do you honestly believe that those of us who do not like Traister (and I'm ignoring the anti-feminist troll here) dislike her for personal reasons, or do you accept that some of us find her writing strident and her analysis purile? I'm not asking you to agree with those poinions, just want to understand whether you see this as personal or the honest critiques of Broadhseet fns."
It comes across as neither, but instead as primarily men threatened by an assertive and intelligent woman.