For me, the heart of today’s conversation about sexual violence and harassment is how these reflect and maintain women’s status generally in our society, and in the world, as second-class citizens. That circle easily widens to include people who don’t confirm to their expected gender, and who by doing so so are traitors to the system.

I believe it is inspired in part by the recent and courageous conversations about how violence against Black people serves to maintain their status, and how the stepping up of racist rhetoric — and ICE raids — keep Muslim and Latinx people “in their place”.

I’m still having trouble embracing the word “intersectionalty”. It feels academic and invented. But I do embrace the idea behind it, that there are connections among oppressions, and that I cannot morally or even practically expect liberation for myself (as a gay person) while continuing to oppress others directly or indirectly, and to benefit from this oppression (in my case, of women, of so many other ethnicities and folks around the world toiling for my comfort, of other social classes and legal statuses, the list is long).

This feels like a moment of potential shift in our society, if we keep our intentions clear, our justified anger focused and disciplined, our minds aware of the connections among us, and our hearts open.

And if we tell our despair and hopelessness that maybe there is a chance, right now, for it to transform into grief and outrage, and that it will be heard by others, acknowledged, and even come to some resolution.

We all have something to lose, some much more than others, from changing the status quo. It could even fundamentally destabilize our society — and we must watch for those who will take advantage of this, those who aspire to rule us from near or afar.

But we also have so much to gain. Let’s do this together. And listen. And learn.

I’m telling myself: “Heave! Shift! Put your back into it. Feel the strength of everyone else around you and try again!”

Caitlin Johnson describes herself as a “utopia prepper”. I’m not sure I share that level of optimism, though maybe I should cultivate it — but I do agree with the basic premises of this article, including the idea that we live in a patriarchal rape culture, and that our lifetimes are presenting us with the perhaps unprecedented (or at least not since a very very long time) opportunity to transform this, or at least to begin to shift it.

But this requires often painful introspection from each of us and a willingness to speak about our experiences. This can be incredibly hard, and the trauma so deep, that just approaching it feels self-annihilating. I still can’t bring myself to do it, even now, in this post. But I can ask:

How are we victims of this system? How have we perpetuated it? How have we victimized ourselves in response to intense trauma, or a lifetime of oppression? How then, in turn, have we traumatized others, or oppressed them? To what degree can we free ourselves of this dynamic, and still participate in mainstream culture? Can we seek happiness for ourselves without oppressing others? When we seek liberation for others how much must our own lives change? Old, old questions.

Another post today about the Irish genocide brought Sinead O’Connor’s album “Universal Mother” to mind. She weaves together so many of these threads in that album. Worth going back for another listen…

Margaret Atwood wrote: “Men are afraid of women laughing at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them.”

And Sister Unity commented on Facebook: “As a gay man, I have held the latter fear all my life as well. Homophobia is rooted in the same misogyny. Maybe mine is:  ‘Homophobic men are afraid gay men will turn them on. Gay men are afraid homophobic men will kill them.'”

Indeed. I’ve been consciously and unconsciously thinking and translating ideas like this one from Margaret Atwood all my life.

Thank you, Sister Unity, for your timely reminder. So much is about policing sex and gender. Many queer people — especially those who are transgender — challenge gender norms by their very being, which in turn undermines male privilege. And that really really really pisses some people off.

As a person who identifies as non-gender-conforming but who spends a lot of time passing for something-like-male, I’ve had a lifetime to reflect on the ways that male privilege has benefited me and the ways I remain attached to it — as well as the ways that it sickens the deepest roots of my soul. And that process never ends.

We’ve got to work on this, people! All of us, with all the consciousness, openness, and non-defensiveness we can muster. And it won’t happen without the majority of male-identified folks taking part, listening, and growing.

I feel blessed to know many guys who are doing this, and who taught me, at a time when every fiber of me believed otherwise, that men can be a good, loving, and necessary part of my life, and that I can love and make positive the parts of me that are masculine as well. May it be so one day for all of us, whatever gender we may be.

Check out this article in The Atlantic: The Coming Software Apocalypse.

It’s a must-read, although I’m not convinced there is a solution here. We keep pushing the boundaries of complexity because one of our society’s fundamental values is not just innovation and iteration but proliferation. We seem to expect software quality to be maintained by a Darwinian survival of the fittest. That said, how would we regulate software, and who would do it? How do we decide, “this software is good for our society, and this software isn’t”?

The article doesn’t attempt to address these ethical questions. Instead, it focuses on the practical, discussing a movement to step away from code that advocates for allowing the developer to work more directly with ideas and requirements — opening the world of development to a wider range of people, such as subject matter experts with a direct understanding of the problems they are trying to solve (i.e. doctors creating medical systems, lawyers creating legal systems, etc).

As it turns out, the platform that I use to create applications, FileMaker, has been part of this movement, and I’ve enjoyed working with it for precisely this reason. Along the way, I’ve seen it wrestle over time with the same contradictions, becoming more code-like and less transparent. Likewise, the applications we’re creating with it have become more complex — or are often used for middleware in connection with traditionally coded systems — with the result that requirements become harder to trace. Nonetheless, it’s worth acknowledging as part of the movement towards more effortless development tools.

I agree with the article that the next generation of these tools will be fundamentally important. However, I’m pessimistic that they will be sufficient to solve the fundamental problem of humans designing systems that are vastly more complex than we can manage. For all of our sakes, I hope that I’m wrong, and I strongly support any effort to address this issue.

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Here’s a lyric I wrote today — this one makes me think of Malvina Reynolds. With thanks to Bev and Gary for the inspiration…

She: “Ole Ernie was right. Different company, same song. Sixteen Tons.”

He: “Before long, the biggest employer EVERYWHERE will be Amazon warehouses.”

She: “Nah. Did you watch David Pogue on CBS Sunday morning? Everything will be robotics.”

—–

Everyone Works for Walmart

Everyone works for Walmart,
but soon the day will come
when Amazon will take their place
to pay our small income.

Everyone works for Walmart,
but soon the day will dawn
when robots build and pack and ship,
and our employment’s done.

Everyone works for Walmart,
but comes the day – I know –
when we will sell our very selves
to earn a little dough.

Everyone works for Walmart,
or else for government,
though lately they’ve been merging,
so is it tax, or rent?

 

In this video, Toni Morrison asks me and other white people: “What are you without racism? Are you any good?”

It’s true — so much of the flexibility and fluidity of my life — back and forth between the arts and tech — has been founded on the privilege I enjoy. People have believed in me and taken chances on me because I have certain gifts, yes, but so do lots of other people in whom they are not always recognized or encouraged. Being a white man has helped me convince the decision-makers (and myself) that of course I’m smart, of course I’ll succeed, that I’m worth the risk, the salary, the arrangement, the accommodations.

And the sense of standing on shaky foundations is part of that experience. Likewise the generational success of my family, all the upwards striving that I’ve benefited from, has also been interpenetrated with advantage. I’m deeply proud of my family and myself, we are all very hard workers, but I’m under no illusions that we have succeeded on a level playing field.

How does that affect me and many other white people unconsciously? It makes us defensive, unwilling to listen, and vulnerable to dangerous politicians who exploit this unease for political gain.

I’m so grateful for being gay, for not being especially masculine or male-identified, for my own experiences of violence and endangerment, because it gives me a glimpse outside my privilege, a way in, a reminder to listen at the very moment when I want to react defensively and protect my cherished sense of self.