Y, OH Y?
because of the gyrls.
[I don't plan to cross-post everything I write for
the brand-new, well-received, Y-chromosome sanctuary over at The Pittsburgh
Men's Blogging Society, but this one seems like a good fit, if only because
I've twice started, but never quite finished, TWM versions on the same
subject...]
Ever wonder why radical gender feminists and other people who obviously have too much time and not enough responsibility on their hands will occasionally suggest that, both to avoid the oppressions of the patriarchy and to strike a blow for self-determined feminine nomenclature, the word woman should be spelled womyn?
The zeal for this idea ebbs and flows with time — it was especially hot in the early 90s, when I was stuck in grad school with a bunch of angry lesbians who were so sure biology was not destiny that they refused to afford me feminist status because of my biology — and, to be fair, may finally have ebbed all the way back to the dark tidal pool of idiotic effluvia where it belongs. But I got to thinking about it again the other day when I saw it on a web site somewhere. (The name and URL escape me, but if you Google pointless political stances I’m sure you’ll find it.)
The idea was based, in part, on a willful misinterpretation of linguistic etymology and derivation: that woman is necessarily a sexist term because it suggests she is a subset of man who is not free to give name to her own kind. Never mind that subsets do not normally add matter to, and indeed possess 67% more linguistic space, than their superior sets. (If anything, you could argue that the word woman, by adding to — and thus improving upon — the lesser word man, signifies an innate female complexity and superiority.) And never mind that early 21st Century man has not exactly been free to give name to his own kind either. (I suggest we replace man with rod. Or maybe with Bob.) And never mind that the actual, Oxford-English-Dictionary-explicated etymologies of the words men and women cite clear, separate, equally gender-specific origins.
Let’s consider, instead, the almost inscrutable notion that anyone possessed of common sense and rational thought — yeah, I know — might think substituting a y for an a (except after c) in the spelling of woman would actually sound a death knell for gender bias. Or help to usher in the post-sexist age. Or even be worthy of any serious equity feminist’s already full attention. It is as stunning as it is stupid. As short-sighted as it is heavy-handed. As trivial as it is nonsensical.
A few days ago, a post popped up on The Society that I considered both sexist and offensive. I shared my feelings with Judge Peckham, he shared, as he so often does, my sensibilities, and we agreed the thing should come down. But now, wondering about the y and remembering what great, palliative power some people place in the possibility of a single spelling change, I’m thinking we could have left it up if we’d just tweaked the contributor’s writing and spelled it bytch.
What do you think, gender fems? Would that have been enough?
Ever wonder why radical gender feminists and other people who obviously have too much time and not enough responsibility on their hands will occasionally suggest that, both to avoid the oppressions of the patriarchy and to strike a blow for self-determined feminine nomenclature, the word woman should be spelled womyn?
The zeal for this idea ebbs and flows with time — it was especially hot in the early 90s, when I was stuck in grad school with a bunch of angry lesbians who were so sure biology was not destiny that they refused to afford me feminist status because of my biology — and, to be fair, may finally have ebbed all the way back to the dark tidal pool of idiotic effluvia where it belongs. But I got to thinking about it again the other day when I saw it on a web site somewhere. (The name and URL escape me, but if you Google pointless political stances I’m sure you’ll find it.)
The idea was based, in part, on a willful misinterpretation of linguistic etymology and derivation: that woman is necessarily a sexist term because it suggests she is a subset of man who is not free to give name to her own kind. Never mind that subsets do not normally add matter to, and indeed possess 67% more linguistic space, than their superior sets. (If anything, you could argue that the word woman, by adding to — and thus improving upon — the lesser word man, signifies an innate female complexity and superiority.) And never mind that early 21st Century man has not exactly been free to give name to his own kind either. (I suggest we replace man with rod. Or maybe with Bob.) And never mind that the actual, Oxford-English-Dictionary-explicated etymologies of the words men and women cite clear, separate, equally gender-specific origins.
Let’s consider, instead, the almost inscrutable notion that anyone possessed of common sense and rational thought — yeah, I know — might think substituting a y for an a (except after c) in the spelling of woman would actually sound a death knell for gender bias. Or help to usher in the post-sexist age. Or even be worthy of any serious equity feminist’s already full attention. It is as stunning as it is stupid. As short-sighted as it is heavy-handed. As trivial as it is nonsensical.
A few days ago, a post popped up on The Society that I considered both sexist and offensive. I shared my feelings with Judge Peckham, he shared, as he so often does, my sensibilities, and we agreed the thing should come down. But now, wondering about the y and remembering what great, palliative power some people place in the possibility of a single spelling change, I’m thinking we could have left it up if we’d just tweaked the contributor’s writing and spelled it bytch.
What do you think, gender fems? Would that have been enough?
Posted: Tue - January 22, 2008 at 04:15 PM
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Published On: Jan 16, 2009 04:50 PM
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