I'm pretty sure we're at least close to the same page - it's partly because Canada has some of those social and legal conditions that I was able to let my daughter's father opt out. (My son's father didn't even get an opt-in; he was... not very stable - but again, Canadian conditions meant I only had to consider that problem in terms of the personal, weighing fairness to him against what it could mean for my baby if he took it into his head to try for custody. Kid won, of course.) Mind you, Canada isn't perfect, by any means; another part of why it was possible for me is because my family was supportive - I'd have been in a much more precarious position if they weren't.
I'm not so sure the KiSA is on your side; he didn't seem to have the slightest interest in the injustices I was trying to talk about - at best, he's convinced they're immutable; at worst, he's got a hidden agenda. I suspect the latter, because of him bringing up "pregnancy is so dangerous" as an argument supporting mandatory support - the only connection I can see between them is that the financial support would mean better health care (assuming the father, or his parents, have or are able to earn enough to make a difference) and an improved, but not risk-free, outcome; otherwise, obligating the father's involvement has no effect on those dangers (or may have a negative effect). What I suspect here is that he has a vested interest in not changing the institutional injustices, because in a just world, women wouldn't need men. (IOW, I think he might be a Nice Guy(tm).)
Making feminist arguments at the expense of actual women's experiences is, IMO, one of the most significant fracture points within feminism, The reverse is also true: the political is personal. It's not just an academic exercise in utopian philosophy; real people, with diverse individual needs, will be living the changes we make.
Oddly, I wasn't talking so much about things that challenge my assumptions (that works too, but it usually doesn't make me nearly so angry) - that wouldn't surprise me as much. What I didn't expect is how educational it can be to confront an absence of intellectual rigor.
I'm glad you prefer to be called on things; I have an unpopular habit of calling people on things. And a confusing habit of wanting to be called on things (doubly confusing, because that doesn't mean I take it meekly; I engage it - or sometimes call people on presenting it manipulatively), so I hope you also have that unpopular habit.
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Re: Nobody likes a paladin.
Date: 2008-04-16 02:48 pm (UTC)I'm not so sure the KiSA is on your side; he didn't seem to have the slightest interest in the injustices I was trying to talk about - at best, he's convinced they're immutable; at worst, he's got a hidden agenda. I suspect the latter, because of him bringing up "pregnancy is so dangerous" as an argument supporting mandatory support - the only connection I can see between them is that the financial support would mean better health care (assuming the father, or his parents, have or are able to earn enough to make a difference) and an improved, but not risk-free, outcome; otherwise, obligating the father's involvement has no effect on those dangers (or may have a negative effect). What I suspect here is that he has a vested interest in not changing the institutional injustices, because in a just world, women wouldn't need men. (IOW, I think he might be a Nice Guy(tm).)
Making feminist arguments at the expense of actual women's experiences is, IMO, one of the most significant fracture points within feminism, The reverse is also true: the political is personal. It's not just an academic exercise in utopian philosophy; real people, with diverse individual needs, will be living the changes we make.
Oddly, I wasn't talking so much about things that challenge my assumptions (that works too, but it usually doesn't make me nearly so angry) - that wouldn't surprise me as much. What I didn't expect is how educational it can be to confront an absence of intellectual rigor.
I'm glad you prefer to be called on things; I have an unpopular habit of calling people on things. And a confusing habit of wanting to be called on things (doubly confusing, because that doesn't mean I take it meekly; I engage it - or sometimes call people on presenting it manipulatively), so I hope you also have that unpopular habit.