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Re: Virulent, Vituperative, Venomous Virago
James Murphy (jmurphy@MAGNUS.ACS.OHIO-STATE.EDU)
Tue, 3 Jan 1995 11:29:16 -0500
douglass st.christian queries:
> apropos of murphy's complaint about equatinng sexism with racism....
>
> a query...are you suggesting that there is a threshold of abuse or
> exlusion or violence based on qualities below which this abuse is
> acceptable and beyond which it is not?
Certainly not. There was no suggestion that any abuse, exclusion or violence
is acceptable. My concern was the implicit exaggeration that crime and
violence based on gender have rivalled or continue to rival in scope and
magnitude such events as the Inquisition, the Holocaust, etc.
> while analagies never quite parallel, your concern over the accuracy of
> comparing sexism and racism struck this not always gentle reader as
> embedding a truly peculiar implication which your brevity left
> unexplored...are you really suggesting a means test of some sort???
Anthropologists always want to seem to measure things, don't they?
My objection was to the implication that gender-based violence per se has
occurred on a magnitude comparable to that caused by racial and political
differences and, perhaps more to the point, the mistaken perception that
tinkering with spelling and etymology does anything other than trivialize the
gender issue.
Danny Yee has already tried the facile trick of getting me to declare that one
form of violence is worse than another. I must say that your ploy seems just
as much a contretemps.
James L. Murphy
jmurphy@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
> talofa,
> dougl....
>
> <->------<->------<->------<->
> douglass st.christian
> anthropology - mcmaster u.
> hamilton - canada
> stchri@mcmail.cis.mcmaster.ca
> 905 529 4992
> <->------<->------<->------<->
>
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