How trashy can the press get? Are headlines like this remotely necessary? Is there any objective basis for the judgementality and scorn? Obviously, Heather Mills McCartney is a bit, erm, eccentric, but isn’t it also the case that having ridden the media wave to promote herself as some sort of post-Diana anti-landmines saint and then getting sucked into the Paul McCartney vortex, she might be forgiven for losing it just a little as the tide turned against her? How ethical is it to shoot, select and publish photos of her looking as kooky as possible?
I’ve never been able to understand the emotion behind the whole “McCartney fans despise anyone he marries, then canonise Linda, then despise anyone he marries” thing. It’s really twisted. It’s the politics of celebrity in hyperdrive, and some sort of postmodern public hate hour.
And where’s the critique of a British family law process which allows an elderly male judge to pronounce on whether someone was a “good wife”?
McCartney’s legal team apparently pressed for the judgement to be made public, while Mills’ lawyers opposed this on the grounds that it might materially affect the life of their daughter. Adjudicate that.
Elderly male judges are required by the legal system to adjudicate on a wide variety of matters; it’s what they do.
Why bother with this topic? And why does the SMH bother with it? “The Age” website is just as poor: trashy celeb ephemera riding high, hard news somewhat drowned in the sludge.
If it’s true that she asked for an annual payment of forty thousand pounds to buy wine with even though she doesn’t drink alcohol, then she is indeed full of shit. One hundred and twenty five thousnd pounds per annum to buy clothes with on the other hand is completely normal, modest and reasonable.
She was a gold digger. She was emotionally distraught. Let’s forget this was Paul McCartney and look at it as if it was just some marital break up between a very rich husband and a not that wealthy wife. Hate to tell you this, but some women do behave like this. Fortunately they are only a minority, but believe me, they are around. And if Heather Mills didn’t want to be portrayed as a little crazy, she shouldn’t have lost it on camera. No sympathy whatever here, I’m afraid. But then again I’m living on $569.65 a fortnight at the moment. Maybe I’ll write to Heather Mills and ask her to give me a thousand a week.
Heather might be a pain in the patoosh, but that doesn’t mean that Paul is a saint. Human beings are so much more complicated than the evil/good thing that has dominated discussion of Heather and Paul.
I do think these things are worth writing about because such media have an incredible amount of influence (as such they help influence the way we look at things like gender).
I seem to have few problems with your observations Kim.The problem is as you state it a sort of media wave of stand-ins. But this stuff goes back longer than Dianne,and it seems the SMH is competing with London based Murdoch stuff in the media waves.I doubt very much an older woman judge would make a different conclusion,because if you imply something about British male judges over a certain age having a problem in making a relevant judgement,you must be by inference suggesting a female judge of similar age wouldnt.I simply dont know,if women judges have difficulties in their system to be chosen for these courtroom showings.Personally Paul McCartney has been pretty boring to me as a musician for sometime.I made up my mind years ago,to find all this celebrity stuff,to not engage my mind to actively,after all,I am not one,dont know any that well at all,and even if their life is interesting,they have had no effect on mine.I couldnt rely on journalism to describe, the she here,acept to say,from what I read,Paul didnt want to hurt her as much as not wanting her to get heaps of money.Wether that was acting or not,I dont know.And that is where the real issue seems to be with these people in the public gaze,when they are not at their best,are they acting or are they really quite down and out!?I have followed the story a bit,and both have seemed to be a bit ragged round the edges.
Claims like personal personal are quite easy to falsify.
Judges love witnesses who are caught lying. It makes their jobs much easier.
Agree on both points, Darlene.
I don’t understand what it is about writing some good songs in the 1960’s that makes a divorce case in the 21st century such a big deal… we should have realized that McCartney was not worth the spotlight after Wings… and especially after “ebony and ivory”! At least we don’t treat Ringo Starr as an important public figure… that would just be too much. The Beatles were a gestalt, the parts of which are actually quite disappointing and not really worth the the huge hoo-haa that they get/got. And yes, I’m ready to say that about John Lennon too!
*ducks and covers*
Er…
That should read:
Claims like those about personal wealth are quite easy to falsify.
Judges love witnesses who are caught lying. It makes their jobs much easier.
Sorry.
If you look not just at this shot, but at all the images that have been taken of her outside the trial, whether emotionally distraught or not, there’s an obvious attempt to photograph her just at the moment when she can be portrayed as crazy. Facial expressions are very movable, and any good photographer knows that. Press photographers are expert in catching someone’s expression precisely when it portrays the desired emotional mood.
The cameras also caught the lawyer who suffered an in-camera dousing from Heather Mills quite unflatteringly as well.
Yes, but that surely adds to the circus/witch hunt framing of the whole proceedings.
It is hard to have a lot of sympathy for her about her media portrayal, when she has been deliberately courting their attention. She would be wiser, to offer nothing more than a ‘no comment’ when out in public – rather than taking swipes at Paul and saying silly things like ‘Beatrice will have to travel 2nd class’ (will the paltry 350000 pounds yearly allowance she will be getting from dad as part of the settlement).
OT why is there no ‘pounds’ symbol on my keyboard, or is it just that I can’t find it?
Darlene,
Couldn’t agree with you more that these things should be written about and discussed. For several reasons – its part of the human condition and we ignore any study of any facet of that, good, evil, or the more usual just so-so, at out peril. Not only that we’re providing a goldmine (not literally) for future cultural historians. Finally, in a weird way, trivia matters – not only for say, the social historian, but for the enjoyment of present everyday life. (Seem to be on a philosophical bent today. Maybe its my new computer, maybe its because I finally joined Facebook.
Dousing = assault. Has anyone called Heather Mills a criminal yets?
Mark,
I was thinking of that morning appesarance on TV where she lost it. I should have been nore specific. (It was eerily horrifying and very sad.)
Raye (14): I don’t like her any more than anyone else in possession of a functioning cerebral cortex, but Paul has 40+ years of experience with the public, never mind the funds available to pay for advisers and publicists, and a longstanding desperate desire to for public adoration. The fact that HM is absolute crap at dealing with the media should have no effect on a private divorce judgment.
I do feel dreadfully sorry for poor old lovable Paul, having his previously very private life dragged out into the public, with only
800mGBP, sorry, 400mGBP to comfort him.Considering this whole thing cost him 6% of his wealth though, I would say he got off pretty easy. I readily agree HM does not need 24.3mGBP, but frankly, neither does Paul. No one does. ‘Outrage’ over her huge award neatly avoids any examination of how we have arrived at a point where a person can have that much money in the first place simply from writing a few dopey love songs.
It’s interesting that Paul’s (now obvious) misjudgment in marrying HM is painted as HM taking advantage of a poor grieving man (over four years since Linda’s death, mind you), and yet HM’s misjudgment in handling the media, the public and the divorce is also HM’s fault. HM brings the crazy, but if Paul could not recognise this despite his age, experience and having a good portion of the public warning him about the crazy, perhaps he bears some responsibility for this? Why is HM given ownership over the whole situation, with Paul merely an innocent bystander?
Raye, in a comments field, you can make a £ with this HTML entity:
££40,000 a year for wine sounds very civilised.
And while I’m at it, Paul’s comment yesterday about the proceedings ‘all will be revealed’ shows some very adept media management. Let someone else do all the dirty work of publicising the judgment, and then let the media tear HM to bits.
It’s a pretty depressing indictment of all parties involved, the media, the court system, and a society still dead-set on vilification no matter the cost.
I’d like to see the whole “gold digger” thing legitimised. Let’s face it, Heather was doing something completely rational with her breeding instincts (her child will never starve). She’s approaching the end of her reasonably fertile years and who wouldn’t grab the opportunity she was presented with to breed with a reasonably healthy genetic specimen who could guarantee material support.
As for “bringing the crazy” – who’s worse? A faded rock star who jumped at the opportunity for another publicity boosting run around the block (clearly he doesn’t need the money), or a fading publicity stuntress who wanted a bit of security? Crazy like a fox she is, and good on her.
Just out of interest – why didn’t she end up with half? Or does the system in the UK work differently?
They do the same with pictures of Hillary Clinton.
My favourite line of Heather’s was when she said the judgement gives her enough for her and her daughter, and all the charities ‘I intend to support’. Well, good on you for intending to support charities.
I don’t care what anyone says, Sir Paul is the real British royalty and he’s been dignified all through this ugly story.
It sells? I wonder to what extent our real social lives have been replaced by this virtual soap opera. Are there people out there who stay up nights worrying about Jen’s anguish at Brad’s snub. How is Ange coping. And what about Katie. Can she resist Tom’s control freakishness?
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Notice the nicknames. Like we know these people. Like the stories are real. The only reason most of the press isn’t sued out of existence is that life is too short.
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Heather Mills? Well I don’t know really. But the scenario of a younger woman who worms her way into the life of an older man (who’s recently lost the love of his life) is a shoe that fits. If it fits, and this is England. Then she has it coming. But I’m sure the paycheck is more than consoling.
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I don’t feel sorry for McCartney either btw. Silly old fool and hasn’t done anything good since Tug of War.
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But all that said. How is Ange coping? Apparently she struggles to keep Brad’s drugs away from her kids and Brad still pines for Jen who’s having a lesbian affair with Paris who is trying to steal Nicole R’s man who is secretly gay and having an affair with Tom that is distracting him long enough for Katie to escape his evil Scientological machinations so that she can sue Nicole Kidman because it’s really her baby!
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Jay-sus. I should move to the States and get a job writing for The Bold and the Beautiful or some shit like that.
Interesting that you disdain “virtual soap opera” but you know all the latest twists and turns, Adrien!
Darlene’s spot on about why this stuff is important. And you can easily see from Heather’s comments exactly what sorts of gender narratives are being very powerfully reinforced through all this pizzazz and mudslinging.
Ambigulous, I chose my words carefully – I’m complaining about the inattention to the process and its implications, not making a personal comment about the judge in the case.
Anyway, I suppose I should be happy the thread is stump joke free.
I knew there was something was missing!
Kim,
I didn’t say you were casting aspersions upon the judge in question, I was merely pointing out that judges have to pass judgement; it’s their job. Elderly female judges likewise, young female magistrates, young male judges, bisexual judges: a panoply of judging going on every day, in a court suystyem near you!
Now divorce cases: they get nasty! Doesn’t mean the judges can stop adjudicating or assessing the likely truthfulness of witnesses…. Family Court in Australia – is that a bed of roses?
“the process and its implications”: do you mean we could rise above snide comments about the antagonists in this case and discuss issues of justice? Aw, c’mon!
No xxxxx jokes: yes, the posters have taken this seriously.
cheerio
I was tempted Kim, but didn’t want to go out on a limb.
Darlene @ [5] said
“I do think these things are worth writing about because such media have an incredible amount of influence (as such they help influence the way we look at things like gender).”
OK, let’s move on from these ageing Poms and discourse upon a topic of current and ephemeral interest: Jennifer Lopez’s bum. I recommend the collection edited by Myra Mendible [2007, University of Texas Press] going by the irresistible title “From Bananas to Buttocks”. Films have an incredible amount of influence on filmgoers, and help influence the way we look at things like gender, and bums. http://www.utexas.edu/utpress/books/menfro.html
FDB wrote:
A c’mon. Pull up a stump and give us one.
Hop to it, FDB.
I’m reminded of an observation about fashion by an 18th century wit whose name escapes me. The remark was something like: to talk of fashion as important is to be relegated to the ranks of Fops; but not to know fashion is to be excluded from society altogether. I’m s/he said it much more eloquently than that.
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I’m required to have a general knowledge of culture from the esoteric to the trashy. I’ve never needed to use my knowledge of who, say, Nicole Ritchie is. But if I didn’t know who she is, people would think I was out of touch. That would cost me.
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Fortunately I gleen the twists and turns entirely from scanning the covers on news-stands. And despite my above rationale I do find it amusing to do so.
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That said this reinforcement of gender narratives you talk about is not entirely the story. There’s an orchestration between a ‘reading’ public and the media. So the narratives are those that perhaps ‘pre-exist’ the media. Perchance they’re already there?
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To what extent stereotypical portrayals of real life events are a matter of, say, the ’social’ policy of media barons (as opposed to ‘commerical’ policy) is an interesting question. I myself get the impression that Rupert Murdoch’s media intentionally reinforce traditional gender notions despite the fact that they are not so relevant anymore. But that’s an impression. I haven’t looked at the issue methodically.
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I do know however that marketing dickheads the world over constantly absord the latest news on brain architecture and chemistry etc with a view to applying this to their manipulative endeavours. Part of the brain’s architecture/chemistry appears to be gendered and the virtual soap-opera I refer to is a way of manipulating our ‘tribal brains’ – which are designed to recognize only a few hundred people – into believing (emotionally not rationally) that we in fact know Jen, Ange, Nicole, Nic, Tom and Katie.
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Rationally many of us are aware that this what is happening and we rebel against this by deploying irony or decrying the stupidity of it all. I did this hence my comment.
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It’s a product of industrial cyncism. You will find no greater hive of anti-Media quasi-revolutionary fervour (placated by money and intoxicants) than in the advertising industry. Raymond Chandler once called chess the greatest waste of human intelligence you’d find anywhere outside an advertising agency. He used to work in one so he knows. Everybody knows. And they resent it. I reckon the people who hate the virtual soap opera the worst are the very same people who edit, write and design the virtual soap opera.
Yep, Adrien, some reasonable points there – the narrative is pre-existing, but that’s how narratives get reinforced – through iteration!
How about stump jokes that are *original*? Believe me I’ve heard them all! But maybe that’s a topic for another thread sometime – should I run a competition?
FDB – Alright. ‘Fess up. How much is Homer paying you?
Ambigulous, you’re a cheeky bum
That book looks interesting. Latina women, like many other women (e.g. Asian women) have to had to contend with some very ingrained stereotypes when it comes to their bodies and their sexuality.
Look I’d give you all the benefit of a pro’s thesis on amputee humour, but for now, this article is a stub.
Is that better Kim?
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: was the attraction narcissistic?
Meet Paul’s brother Mike. Remind you of anyone? http://homepage.mac.com/paul_mccartney/fan_page/MikeLIPA2.jpg
Not really LE.
Maybe that alcoholic ranga detective from The Bill? The one who went out with June?
Oh, and something about giving and arm and a leg to remember his name.
The obsessive repetition of the gender narrative of women and madness is interesting. Women who wont behave. Who wont be contained. Who erupt, who will not disappear. Its Gold diggers. Women who suck men in. Who take their strength. Its a modern preocupation from Anna Nicole to Elizabeth Taylor but stretches back into western history and myth, like Antony and Cleopatra, Samson and Delilah, and the foundational one of course, Adam and Eve.
And Leonard the great even wrote about it:
Your faith was strong but you needed proof
You saw her bathing on the roof
Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew you
She tied you
To a kitchen chair
She broke your throne, and she cut your hair
And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah
And speaking of, here is a nice consideration of Britney and madness
Jason Donovan?
Is it just a myth Casey. I suggest having a conversation with a woman who works in the sex industry. There is a rich complexity of gender relations to be gleened therein.
I don’t think Casey ever said gold-diggers or nutcase women were a myth, merely that there is an interesting narrative in the attitudes we take to perceived cases, running from our earliest moral mythologies right through to trash mags a tabloid websites.
Wait, is there such a thing? I guess unless you’re on a laptop, and literally using it as such.
Yes FDB, and there is a long literary tradition too. Bertha and Rochester and the whole gothic tradition of women and madness which bleeds into these patriarchal narratives, rewrite them and then provide all sorts of readings where madness is often both a resistance and liberation for women.
Is it just a myth? A myth can be defined as a persistent and utter fiction or as a social idea irrespective of its ‘facts’. I’m interested in how myths and reality impact on one another. They are used by the media but the media to a certain extent needs to use ‘em to appeal to its readership. Kim asks this question above:
The question would be moot in the dungeons of the gossip rags because to them ethics are irritants like flies at a picnic. As a matter of course they use various celebrity expressions selcted from millions of papparazzi images in order to construct a narrative (ie to concoct a bullshit story).
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The Heather Mills thing is actually relatively more ethical because it actually involves something real. According to Woman’s Day Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes have broken up about three hundred thousand times since they were married. It’s all nonsense.
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I think when we look at all this stuff however we blame ‘the Media’ as well we might. But ‘we’ ourselves indulge this, we provide a market for it. I think blaming ‘the Media’ entirely is a little spurious. If ‘we’ wanted ethical, objective coverage we’d get it. We don’t. We want gossip and exploitation. Of course because this is what we get, this is what we want: garbage in/garbage out.
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It’s the Motto of Our Civilization.
Sorry I should qualify:
Provided it didn’t conflict with the vested interest of media barons or governments
Sure, women are subject to all sorts of stereotypes and archetypes.
But that fate doesn’t inhere in the female condition.
Viz this lexicon of male stereotypes:
libertine, voluptuary, rake, debauchee, seducer, fornicator, lecher, whoremonger, Lothario, Don Juan, Bluebeard.
And lest you think that such stereotyping is restricted to sexual relations, consider the following:
coward, shirker, poltroon, dastard, milksop, white-liver, cur, craven.
None of those labels can comfortably be applied to what is commonly acceded to typify female character.
Such labels both substitute for thought and amplify expression of sentiment.
Communication would be almost impossible, amd certainly less entertaining, without such labels.
So, my reading of Heather, rather than my reading of the narratives which inform the media representations of Heather, is that she has done a Britney. She has chucked in any pretense and embraced the freedom and liberation of madness and misbehaviour, in preference to the self effacement required from society when fucking up a sainted Beatle’s life good and proper.
(Of course she’s mad as cut snake but you cant help but admire the way she flung herself out of the parameters of the normal into the sheer freedoms of the anti social).
That was beautifully stated, Casey.
Is there a male equivalent of a gold digger? There doesn’t seem to be. Wealthy women like Madonna, Liza Minelli, Liz Taylor etc who partner up with, then divorce less wealthy and well known men get the derisive headlines, rather than their ex-partners, regardless of the terms of settlement
And occasionally provide an accurate and comprehensive description.
So to my mind she reminds me of Jane Eyre’s alter Bertha, who flings herself into oblivion, destroying herself but not without seriously maiming Rochester and burning down his property. Which sums up all my posts really.
Katz all those archetypes of men surrounding the sexual are admired in society rather than condemned and excoriated. Thats the difference – the power relations of sex- power relations which privilege men.
If you called me a slut and a whore, that would not be the same as me calling you a rake and a Don Juan (even though I was thinking that, you libertine you, when you offered yourself to that woman looking for a Ukranian that time)
The coward stereotypes are more applicable I would say.
Male gold-digger = cad.
What society admires Bluebeard? Don Juan was taken bodily to hell.
It was a Latvian she was after.
I never claimed to be a Ukrainian. There are limits, you know.
Frankly, I think we said it all here, a bit more irreverently.
http://larvatusprodeo.net/2006/10/21/linda-v-heather/#more-2892
Now Bluebeard was precisely about the power relations of sex Katz. I know what you are saying but I don’t agree with you on this – there are power relations actively inherent each of those stereotypes you raised which are admired in patriarchal society, rather than condemned.
Yeah but neither cad, bluebeard or don juan have any currency as descriptors. Even when ‘cad’ was considered insulting it was pretty mild and always accompanied with a fair whack of covert admiration. Nothing like the visceral hatred directed at women like Heather and Britney or Anna Nicole. You really sense bloodlust when the press gets on a roll with transgressive women.
Oh pardon, Katz. Of course there are limits. And Lativans rule.
“Nothing like the visceral hatred directed at women like Heather and Britney or Anna Nicole.”
I’m not on terribly sure ground here, but it seems to me that a lot of the visceral hatred comes from women.
Now that I think about it, I don’t even know why I bothered saying that. Maybe interesting, but probably beside the point.
Although… the half-secret admiration of “cads” is also not confined to men or “society” as manifest in the patriarchy. Women’s love of “bad boys” is a pretty recurrent theme in life and art too.
FDB @59. Depends where you see the source? The media is a patriarchal institution and it is doing all of the inciting. Yes some women will buy into that because it is always easier and less painful in the short term to play along with patriarchal expectations. It deflects some of that free ranging contempt away from ourselves even if only temporarily.
Well Su, it doesn’t sound like any of the assumptions behind your thinking are all that subject to challenge, but I’ll bite.
How are women’s magazines, written almost exclusively by women and for women, patriarchal? At what point would you be deign to concede genuine agency to the writers and editors? When they publish something you like?
She came out of the marraige pretty well financially. it’s not as those she’s a wife who supported her husband for years and then got tossed out for a newer model. She’ll live – and very well.
Wait. I hope this gets through in time.
That sounded like a pile of steaming snark due to the last sentence, but what came before was a genuine question.
True. Altho’ I wonder to what extent this is an artefact of patriarchal society and to what extent it is an artefact of the society of women. Girls whop are labelled ’sluts’ in high school are often so by other girls. That’s just a question not a proscription.
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Also there are counternarratives – http://www.amazon.com/Happy-Hooker-My-Own-Story/dp/0060014164
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Old girlfriend’s favourite book. She was the very model of the female Don Juan and used to say: it’s fun being a tramp. Quote/unquote.
Interesting statement. As an ex-journalist who’s bosses were always female I have to say it runs a little contrary to my experience.
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In fact I reckon the notion that we live in a ‘Patriarchal Society’ is bogus. We live in a society that was patriarchal with all the attendant baggage and is transforming into something else. Of course as the French used to say: La lutte continue – as this book I’m reading demonstrates – http://www.amazon.com/Tales-Boom-Boom-Room-Women-Street/dp/1576600785
Reminds me of something someone said: http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/23705.html
A man of course.
@64. No worries I have snark for breakfast lunch and dinner along with those steaming hot cups of STFU.
You are thinking of men vs women, rather than thinking of the kind of power relations which society takes for granted. You have established at @60 that society-wide the cad is considered mildy amusing and if you run foul of him then you are stupid or unlucky. The golddigger gets a far worse wrap. In other words in our society men dominating, taking advantage of or harming women is par for the course, a woman doing the same to a man is a mad thing, she is wild and unnatural.
Su – fair enough. I think the terminology is the tricky bit. “Patriarchal” has pretty unavoidable connotations of being instigated and perpetuated by men, while of course it’s really better described as for men.
Adrien you too seem to be falling foul of the patriarchy = men fallacy, which as we all know is just a short hop, skip and a jump from the “Feminazis just hate men” pitfall. So to save time and mutual distress; the feminism 101 blog where Tigtog explains the term “patriarchy”.
Ok, FDB, check this one then. http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/mol/exhibitions/mccartney/
Look me in the eye and tell me she doesnt uncannily look like Mike Macca.
Hmm… maybe you’re onto something. Is her face all real, BTW?
My reply crossed with yours FDB, but yeah, exactly.
I see where you are coming from Lefty E, if not separated at birth they are definite doppelgangers.
Mmmm. I’m not sure but you seem to think I need some lessons in Feminism. If not I apologize. But I assure you I’m quite familiar with the notion. Questioning whether we live in a patriarchal society or not is not evidence of ignorance. From your link:
And what I said:
Given that many of the political impediment to women living as they choose have been removed and/or actively challenged within the political system, I don’t think it’s accurate to say we live in a patriarchy. It’s not accurate to say we’ve put it entirely behind us either. But overall we are in the process of doing this.
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The book I linked to above is Tales From The Boom-Boom Room which chronicles the experiences of women who’re part of the first generation to enter the finance/trading industries en masse from the late 80s onwards. These women experienced shall we say fierce resistance to their presence: routine sexual harrassment, wage discrimination, exclusion. They fought it in the courts. The basis of their fight was that the firms involved violated their civil rights. In a patriarchal society they wouldn’t have had such rights at least not at work. The book chronicles the struggle of women to ‘cleanse’ the finance industry of its patriarchal vestiges. I haven’t finished it yet but I hope it has a happy ending.
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Nonetheless this is what I mean by ‘transforming’. In publishing vis a vis matters of culture the hierarchies are dominated by women at least in my experience. It is not a patriarchal zone.
I have been having a think about this HM and PMc case and it strikes me there are a few things going on at once. The cult of celebrity, and media spin aside, thses big divorce cases always touch a raw nerve. Now if we are ‘post patriarchal’ and evolving into something new (but with out dated media discourse) then the reason the divorce laws are so controversial are the result of the ad hoc way that the law has tried to redress some of the worse aspects of patriarchy. In the not to distant past, respectable middle class women who were abandoned/deserted/divorced had very few ways of ensuring their and their offspring’s survival. Not so long before that women had no control over their earnings, it all belonged to their father or husband. So enlightened, yet paternalistic legislators brought much needed changes to these laws, with the general rule being that women, upon divorce, are entitled to half.
Now this sort of ruling isn’t so equitable as women have access and ability to secure their own independent incomes. So we have the concept of pre.nup.s
Please forgive the massive generalisations I’m making here, but the women getting half/gold digging thing is quite contentious and it could be argued that is it denying women the autonomy granted to men. That law is paternalistic in orientation, and treats women like perpetual children. And this cheeses off a lot of men. I feel that because marriage originated as an economic transaction between two men, we (society) haven’t ironed out the commercial aspects. Wives are no longer brought and sold but we are still trying to put a price on it when it falls apart.
In publishing vis a vis matters of culture the hierarchies are dominated by ……
See your problem right there? Hierarchical, domination etc etc. Of course you did not read the link because it is so much quicker to just set me straight right off the bat. (leaving aside the question of who owns, edits and publishes all of the major periodicals; women on the middle rungs or a smattering of women in board rooms is not exactly curtains for the patriarchy)
I for one object to the notion that heirarchy or domination per se are patriarchal constructs.
Someone far more learned than myself is most welcome to improve on this but alimony and/or the granting of half a man’s assets on divorce I think stems from the idea that altho’ a woman (generally speaking) has not herself earned the cash to buy the house and the rest she’s been active in building the family upon which the wealth is based. Marriage is seen here as an economically productive unit. Hence she (or, sometimes, he) is entitled to 50% of the assets. Of course when one proceeds from this to a situation where women earn money as well it gets a bit tricky.
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In the case of Heather Mills this rationale doesn’t apply. She and McCartney were only married for 4 years and his wealth was established before she was born. However that is why the law’s an ass.
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‘Tis Nature made it thus. In the insect world where females are (much) larger than males is there a masculinist movement? No. They’re smart enough to bite the boys’ heads off after they’ve outlived their usefulness. And y’know we lads are always thinkin’ with the wrong parts of our anatomy. What does the song say?
Objection noted and dismissed. They arose within the patriarchy wherein they still exist and the system of organisation in which hierarchies and domination are not patriarchal has yet to arise, unless like Adrien you believe that patriarchy has been demolished and we are in the arrivals lounge awaiting the new world order. How do you arrange hierarchies of dominance in which certain classes of people are not preferentially shunted to the top? The majority of the world’s poor are women. We have exported some of the worst excesses of patriarchy to the developing world. This does not mean that patriarchy has ceased to exist.
More to the point I was getting at Su, how do you arrange ANYTHING without heirarchies of dominance? Unless you can point to an alternative arrangement (or lack thereof) that might credibly pertain absent patriarchy, what sense does it make to say that heirarchies are inherently patriarchal?
Is the heirarchy of dominance in angler fish or (most) spiders patriarchal?
Sociobiology is fun. It’s just a bastard to get peer reviewed
Su, I have not said the patriarchy has been demolished. And I have not said that the world as a whole is free of patriarchy. Saudi Arabia is a patriarchy, Pakistan is a patriarchy.
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This country? I’m not so sure. Are there any gendered political distinctions made to the disadvantage of women? Yes, most of the publications of this country are owned by men. Most of the MPs in the House are men. But not so far back women couldn’t own property at all or vote. Do you understand what is meant by transformation?
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Hierarchy, domination? My problem? Hierarchies and domination precede the human race. They precede the genus hominids and primates and monkeys and even mammals. This concept that society invented hierarchy is contradicted by the merest nature documentary. The notion that women operate sans hierarchy or domination is refuted by life experience from around age 2.
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I’d like to hear about how ‘we’ (whoever ‘we’ are) exported patriarchy. I’d like to see how the most simple of human endeavours, say, a meeting, can be organized effectively without some sort of hierarchy. How does one affect laws without ‘domination’ and if one gets rid of laws do we then rid ourselves of ‘domination’?
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Uh-uh. Rousseau was wrong.
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You ask:
It’s called a meritocracy. We have yet to achieve that. We have made progress. The (developed) world is much closer to that than the world of 1800. Or do you think that no progress has been made? If that’s truly your assertion I’d counter that you are ignoring the facts. Progress I would say has been made, is being made and will continue to be made.
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Again: this is what I mean by transformation. Do we live in a gender neutral shang-ri-lah? No. Do we live in a patriarchy: the rule of women by men. No.
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What I’m saying is that the patriarchy is behind us at least in this country, at least in my humble opinion. In front of us may lay a relatively gender neutral society. A society in which sex is not a factor in one’s potential. We are somewhere on the rope from one to the other.
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Could be wrong of course, but I don’t think it’s fair to my points to charicature them or direct me to Feminism 101.
I’m saying that our hierarchies, the ones that acually exist are inherently patriarchal. I can’t point to another system of organisation because I haven’t been to planet xorg where no class of being gets to accrue most of the benefits of their social order while other classes are oppressed. Where the distinctions between classes would not in fact exist. Because I am not a genius, I cannot imagine something for which there is no precedent.
Just wait while I go and interrogate an angler fish. Really, FDB, you can’t be serious.
“Really, FDB, you can’t be serious.”
With all due respect Su, it’s hard to take seriously a feminist (who presumably wants an end to patriarchy) not seriously trying to imagine what might replace it, and whether that too might feature prominent and entrenched (non-patriarchal) heirarchies.
I’m taking a pretty logical position here, but admittedly one at a far remove from the everyday experience of women and men as things stand (hence the animal analogies). I’d suggest your quarrel is better taken to Adrien, who seems to genuinely believe that Australia is no longer patriarchal.
Unless you want to join me in theory-land. The water’s lovely.
Ask yourself who sits at the apex of hierarchies here, in the US, in Europe. There is you answer. An improvement is just that, it is not an overthrow.
Your third para: I think you are confusing predation with domination, which is rather revealing, or perhaps complexity with fitness. A simple organism can be totally apt to its environment. You want to to argue there is a simple hierarchy with the complex at the top; go tell it to the viruses and the proteinaceous infection particles. Your last sentence of the third para: Your problems with you mother are not my concern and I have just been explaining how it is a system of organisation under which we all operate.
Define ‘merit’ in a way that is free of the operations of patriarchy? Explain why a street sweeper is less meritorious than a company exec. Explain how merit can operate in such a way that certain groups of people will not be put in position of power over others.
……..
Man I never knew the angelfish women were so Pissed!
This is way OT now. You will like the Feminism 101 blog; Tigtog explains everything with great clarity and humor.
Last derail: I cannot imagine how it would be organised, FDB in part because, in addition to being sub-genius, I am a science geek not a humanities nerd, I am really not strong on social theory. I know what it would result in though; distribution of resources according to need, the disappearance of vertical and hence lateral violence between and within classes etc. I don’t need you to take me seriously so that is Ok.
Well, I’m an music/audio nerd, so we’re both out of our depth.
You’re right, you don’t need me to take you seriously. You (probably) need to take yourself seriously though, and you need to be aware that others might take you at your word when you blithely sheet such a broad swathe of humanity’s ills home to Teh Patriarchy.
Let me just remark first that for a topic that got caned as irrelevant in some of the first few comments, it’s stimulated some pretty interesting debate.
Secondly, I think there’s something in the hypothesis that the backlash against Heather (and “gold diggers” generally) relates to the fact that divorce law has been reformed. It’s a powerful reinscription of the idea that “property” is what is at issue, and that women – who don’t have it – seek to gain it through an exchange of their person for a man’s.
Thirdly, we’re not all post-feminists now, but I see that su already responded to Adrien’s point about those who are employed in and read magazines.
Lastly – with regard to social theory – hierarchies aren’t the problem. They’re inevitable. It’s what sort of hierarchy and how interests are conceived, perceived and coordinated. There are actually democratic ways of doing that which take the hierarch out of the hierarchy. But perhaps a treatise on libertarian socialism would be straying too far off topic.
Yes, hierarchies are inherently patriarchal.
It’s a truism.
Our societies have featured patriarchal domination for thousands of years. Any authority system that has evolved has evolved out of earlier systems, which were all patriarchal.
But this presents a problem. Anti-patriarchs have grown up and have been socialised and acculturated in this toxic brew of inherited patriarchy.
This unfortunate circumstance imposes enormous problems. How can anti-patriarchs escape the withering touch of patriarchy? Without any other inherited patterns of social relations, how do anti-patriarchs even know if they are being anti-patriarch, or if in fact they are merely exhibiting in their alleged anti-patriarchalism a cleverer metastasis of patriarchy.
On the other hand, a return to a mythical Year Zero (a la Pol Pot) before the alleged advent of patriarchy would appear to entail dangers as well.
It’s all very troubling.
“But perhaps a treatise on libertarian socialism would be straying too far off topic.”
I’m not sure how much mileage is left in the original topic Kim, so I respectfully disagree. Or perhaps a new one is in order?
Katz – that the heirarchies we have are patriachal does not entail that heirarchies are inherently patriarchal.
Or were you being sarcastic? I’m too drunk to tell.
Yes it does.
“Inherit” means to obtain something from what existed before.
Where are the “inherently” anti-patriarchal hierarchies?
You name one and I’ll show you how it inherited its characteristics from a pre-existing patriarchal system.
Well, let’s put it this way, FDB. It’s pretty clear if you look at anthropological history that both co-operation and command are necessary features of any society – along with a division of labour. That goes for hunters and gatherers as well as agricultural peoples, etc. I don’t necessarily hold to the view extrapolated from archaeological and other evidence that patriarchy was coincident in time with a shift to agriculture from transhumance – it’s one big extrapolation from figurines such as the Venus of Willendorf and from contested readings of myth or attempts to find some ur-myth behind textual evidence, and one that has its own ideological content. Rather, I’d argue that patriarchy has tended to coincide with hierarchy emphasised as opposed to co-operative forms of labour, society and politics. You can never escape hierarchy as such insofar as it’s a necessary part of any elaborate division of labour (and arguably of more simple divisions of labour) but it doesn’t need to be the privileged organising principle. It can be something subordinated to democracy. Note that interests don’t need to be identical, just coincident for co-operation to occur – there can still be self-interest in a libertarian and socialist democracy. But interests needn’t be coincidental either with sex – and gender needn’t be binary. The real poison in hierarchy is when it’s (a) anti-democratic and (b) hierarchised according to lines of difference – ie gender.
The Minangkabau?
Just wondering.
The Minangkabau, who practise that famously anti-patriarchal religion — Islam?
Jus’ wonderin’
Katz
Katz
The Minangkabau were a matriarchal society before they adopted Islam, Katz.
So tell us all you know about their pre-existing patriarchal system.
Do try to keep up.
Well, thank you GregM for pouncing upon my tethered goat argument above. (#89)
My actual issue was with the notion that hierarchies were “inherently” patriarchal.
As it takes only one counter-example to disprove the contention, you’ve done all the hard work for me.
That’s the form of division of labour I support whole-heartedly.
Can’t produce the evidence for your argument (again) then, Katz?
Well that goes down with, among others,your propositions on the benign British policies towards the Irish in the 19th and 20th centuries, South Korea’s trade policy vis-a-vis Japan and the political legitimacy of the Castro regime, in which you introduced the gloriously risible interpretive tool of Ideational Flexibility. We thank you for that treasure.
GregM, you have a quasi-monopoly (aka Chaebol) on misconceived fixations.
Please don’t change.
(As if change were possible.)
I remember a forum debate about the Minangkabau which was confusing because their society is outside the patriarchal/matriarchal distinction in some ways. It is matrilineal and matrifocal but power is shared in various ways. On the other hand the gender roles are very strictly defined. On the same forum another people, the Batek, were mentioned whose hierarchies are ungendered.
Remind me again why someone else’s divorce and financial settlement is headline news and our business?
Su, the planet you were wondering about at #83 is called Annares.
Jane #102
It may not be our business per se, but the media exposure it has garnered makes it a good jumping off point for the discussion of a number of topics. The role of the media, the politics involved in carving up ridiculous amounts of wealth, the gender stereo-types/archetypes being portrayed in the media, the adequacy of current alimony/divorce proceedings, etc etc. Their divorce is not our business but this particular case hits upon a lot of political issues, particularly gender ones that are more than worthy of discussion.
Darlene I really enjoyed that link to the Britney story. I like the analysis of the harshness judgements re mums and madness.
Sorry Casey. It was your link that I liked. #40
Yes Su and it shows. It would be nice if you tried to understand what my assertions are in good faith rather than making over-simplistic proclamations re the deployment of power in our society coupled with comments that are both patronising and rude.
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I have not in any way argued that “there is a simple hierarchy with the complex at the top”. I didn’t make any reference to this fallacy re evolution. I simply point out a fact there species apart from ours that organize into hierarchies. I put it to you that, as we are primates and primates tend to form hierarchies, the hierarchies of our society have developed from ‘natural’ hierarchies. Humans tend to contemplate and even resist and modify ‘natural’ circumstance. Feminism, democracy, socialism can be conceieved as movements that do just that. And I’ve read Stephen Jay Gould too. Most stimulating.
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You ask me to define “‘merit’ in a way that is free of the operations of patriarchy?”. This is quite simple. You are a graphic designer. You work at a firm with other graphic designers. The Art Director’s position comes up. You’re the best, the most talented, the hardest working. You get the gig. Oh and you’re a woman. But your gender was irrellevant in the selection process. Ta-dah!
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Your notions about the relative values of a street sweeper and a company executive are questions of class. The relationship between patriarchy – the political rule of men, and class society – the socio-economic stratification of civilization are too complex for a comment but I don’t think one is intrinsically part of the other. So long as society operates along hierarchies and has streets and has company executives there will be this hierarchy. A street sweeper is not, in my view, worth less than a company exec. In fact they are more essential. But we live in a market economy, what can you do?
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My point re patriarchy, do we live in one, was not a declaration that feminism is now irrellevant. Nor was it an observation that women as a group are equal to men. Nor was I saying that sexual discrimination and/or misogyny are not problems. If I were saying so I would be talking nonsense. What I mean is that political rule of men over women is a thing of the past. That our society can no longer be regarded as one that systematically excludes and represses people on the basis of sex. In fact our society has many legal mechanisms that do the opposite. Have women achieved social equality? No. We are, I believe, transforming from one state of affairs to another.
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Now perhaps I’m being too optimistic. I am a man and as such I simply don’t see the shit a lot of women have to put up with. I do see a lot of it. I don’t think it’s all progress. If I had to guess I’d say misogyny has been enjoying a revival in the culture over the last little while. But overall, over the long term there has been progress. Progress to the extent that I don’t believe our society can be regarded as a patriarchy in the strict sense of the word. Is it still sexist? Yes. Is there still a way to go? Yes. Patriarchy? I don’t think so.
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You may disagree but if you do so I’d suggest acquiring a more sophisticated understanding of matters social. Learning to read well enough not make such foolish assumptions about what I’m writing. And refrain from making snide allusions to my mother. That’s simply rude and unnecessary.
We may not be a patriarchy, the way we were incontestably say 200 years ago, but many of the dilemmas we are facing as a society are due to the remaining patriarchal structures, unevenly dismantled over the past 150 years (very roughly speaking). Women are no longer second class citizens, which is not the same thing as saying that they no longer face any difficulties because they are women, and as a culture we are more aware of structural inequalities across different lines such as class, race, sexuality, etc, etc. But many of the institutions put in place to create and sustain a white man’s world still cast long shadows over society. The law one could argue is still very paternalistic in disposition, for example. But I agree Adrien I feel that as a society we are in the midst of creating a post – patriarchal culture, but there is still a lot of culture baggage that needs to be addressed.
Pretty much what I’ve been saying. I tend not to think of society as a structure. Su made some reference to a ‘demolished patriarchy’. To me society is the sum of human relations of various kinds. The skeletal framework (to use a metaphor) is the law. This is not patriarchal. Many sexist practises and attitudes persist. There’s also the question as to how different men and women are and how this will affect a ‘post-feminist’ society. Will such a society feature as many men and women in the military for example?
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Of course there is discourse that suggest that us chaps are on the way out.
If only Linda hadn’t got cancer, then everything would have been all right.
Spiros is right. It was much easier making fun of Linda’s singing than a bit of harmless gold digging.
Best thing Macca did after the Beatles broke up – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anfnA2xJ6ng
That link is broken, Adrien. It doesn’t point at “live and let die”
Funny thing about “Live and Let Die” was that only a few years before James Bond was saying that listeing to the Beatles without earuffs on was in bad taste. And Connery was wearing this baby blue terry towelling jumpsuit when he said it.
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Can’t find a picture in the ‘Net sadly.