Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Using Social Pressure To Stop Sexist Behavior

From an article by Tracy Clark-Flory at Salon (via Pharyngula)

Overall, this article brought me great joy.  A dude sends an unsolicited nude shot to a woman he met via a dating service (not that sexting with pics is something that is wrong, if consensual).  She let's him know that wasn't cool and sends the pic to his mom.  I want to give her a high five.  After all, making him pay socially for his actions and the publicity this got might actually spare some women from this unwanted exhibition.  But, that not the only angle.  There's also the trope that moms are supposed to raise respectful young men and sending her the pic isn't a fair thing to do to the mom.  So, in the act of using social pressure (the dude said that wasn't cool, so he cared that his mom would find out), another sexist act happened.  While I think parents do bear some responsibility for setting a good example for their kids to follow, I personally don't blame his mother for what he did.  I don't recall ever sending somebody a naked pic of myself in my less thinking years, but there were lots of other things I did that would make my mom (and dad) cringe.  Parents, and specifically moms, are a special category of people in the list of folks where social pressure can be applied to stop rude behavior. But, asking victims of inappropriate sexual behavior, who are willing to do something about it, to avoid all possible side effects (even if a bit sexist in and of themselves) of their actions is something that I won't be doing.

No comments:

Post a Comment