>On Thu, 31 May 2001, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
>>
>> I was thinking of the old saying "comparing apples and
>> oranges." Categories like "SUV drivers" (to which Carrol
>> objected) and categories like "women" & "gay men & lesbians"
>> are not of equal status politically, in that the latter have
>> a history of oppression that has created the categories &
>> made them socially painfully meaningful, out of which civil
>> rights & liberation movements have grown, whereas the former
>> don't.
>
>Really? I drive 100 miles round trip each workday and I have at
>least as many reasons to group SUV drivers together as most
>people do "gay men & lesbians" (which I notice you chose not to
>bother defining although my 20 word request of you asked little
>else).
>
>I find SUV drivers to be, in general, more careless, arrogant,
>thoughtless, and dangerous drivers and I have data gathered from
>driving 33,000 miles/year. I also note, with some interest,
>that these oversized, gas-guzzling, dangerous to other people
>vehicles are driven mostly solo. I do not think these
>characteristics are random or meaningless.
One of these days, you & like-minded LBO-talkers might get together & create a movement of "anti-SUV drivers" or something like that. Until then, the category of "SUV drivers" will remain politically vacuous. Once such a movement gets going, the category will become unfortunately meaningful politically (just as such categories as "abortionists," "drug addicts," "pornographers," & "women in fur" have become politically meaningful). This being America, the land of endless political distractions, I probably shouldn't bet that no such movement will ever have a chance.
> > In other words, the former are empirically precise and yet
>> politically vacuous categories, while the latter are
>> empirically imprecise and yet politically necessary
>> categories (i.e., necessary until oppressions that gave
>> birth to them disappear).
>
>Really? Well you have most artfully (and hey -- I don't really
>blame you!) avoided explaining what "gay men & lesbians" are,
>even though you claim they are 'necessary' categories.
Without such categories as gay men and lesbians, it is difficult to get any anti-discrimination clause into a union contract, pass any anti-discrimination law, etc. concerning sexual orientation. SUV drivers, in contrast, are not in need of anti-discrimination anything.
What & who are "gay men & lesbians"? Definitions have never been empirically precise, have been fought for & against, & have therefore been always changing throughout the history of modern sexuality ever since the rise of social practice of creating "sexual identities" of persons based upon the real or perceived sex/gender of their sexual object choice, i.e., ever since the late 19th century. The same goes for any category born of political oppression & resistance against it.
For instance, today, it has become common among many leftists to use the shorthand GLBT, to signify the desire to make up for the exclusion of transsexual, transgendered, & bisexual persons from the gay & lesbian movements.
>Further, you have not explained why I should give them one more ounce of
>attention than I do the SUV drivers.
Should you or shouldn't you? That depends on whether or not you think oppressions of gay men & lesbians are a pressing concern that demands political responses, including mobilizations of gay men & lesbians for their emancipation.
Yoshie