On Wed, Feb 8, 2012 at 3:30 AM, Tiffany P. <princeptiffany@xxxxxxxxxx>wrote:
> To
> Nathaniel: I don't get what's wrong with your 3 propositions. I would even
> say
> I agree with all of them, I find these "categorizations" even more
> "natural" (meaning: intuitive) than the homo/hetero one. But maybe
> I'm too queer? Haha.
>
Tiffany,
Okay, so what do we mean by "more in common"? More in common **with respect
to what**? More common with respect to sexual predilections? Yes,
certainly. But if that's all she's saying, she is hardly saying anything at
all. In fact it's a complete tautology.
Look, there are an awful lot of ways for two people to be like and unlike
each other, and I don't see how whether a person licks pussy or not (for
example) should outweigh all the others. Straight men are interpellated in
a vast number of ways that are totally different than the way women are.
Sure, it is possible that one particular straight man who licks pussy may
have more in common with a particular woman who does. But Sedgwick is
saying that the mere fact of licking pussy means they will necessarily have
more in common. And this strikes me as utterly absurd.
So I ask: is her theoretical position simply that the kind of sexual acts a
person likes to perform is categorically more important than any other fact
about them? Is it more important than how they think about themselves? How
they themselves feel about those acts? How their culture categorizes them?
Fine. Let that be her dogma. But I don't think there's any denying that
this is completely reductive. It's practically a paradigm case of
reductiveness. It not only reduces the whole of human existence to
behavior, but unlike the now discredited behaviorism (which at least took
into account the whole range of behaviors) it reduces everything even
further: to one type of behavior (chosen by the theorist herself).
Ryan, your interpretation of what Sedgwick/Butler had in mind sounds much
more plausible to me. I am sure Sedgwick must not have meant the statement
to be taken in a literal manner, but more as a provocation. I just happen
to be one of those people who values clarity and precision of thought and
writing. But to take up the more interesting angle you have suggested,
"because sexual acts cut across conventional sexual identities, they reveal
the arbitrariness of those categories, and that erotic desire is not just
about who you want but also about what you want to do," I would just like
to add that the way we categorize sexual acts is just as arbitrary as the
way we categorize sexual identities. So although I accept that it may be
useful to pose the one against the other and see how they may conflict, let
us not lose track of the fact that both involve arbitrary categories. And
it seems to me that a more fruitful avenue would be to move away from
ethological categories to ones that relevant to the people themselves (i.e.
the people whose identities and acts Sedgwick and those she argue against
are categorizing).
Cordially,
Nate
> To
> Nathaniel: I don't get what's wrong with your 3 propositions. I would even
> say
> I agree with all of them, I find these "categorizations" even more
> "natural" (meaning: intuitive) than the homo/hetero one. But maybe
> I'm too queer? Haha.
>
Tiffany,
Okay, so what do we mean by "more in common"? More in common **with respect
to what**? More common with respect to sexual predilections? Yes,
certainly. But if that's all she's saying, she is hardly saying anything at
all. In fact it's a complete tautology.
Look, there are an awful lot of ways for two people to be like and unlike
each other, and I don't see how whether a person licks pussy or not (for
example) should outweigh all the others. Straight men are interpellated in
a vast number of ways that are totally different than the way women are.
Sure, it is possible that one particular straight man who licks pussy may
have more in common with a particular woman who does. But Sedgwick is
saying that the mere fact of licking pussy means they will necessarily have
more in common. And this strikes me as utterly absurd.
So I ask: is her theoretical position simply that the kind of sexual acts a
person likes to perform is categorically more important than any other fact
about them? Is it more important than how they think about themselves? How
they themselves feel about those acts? How their culture categorizes them?
Fine. Let that be her dogma. But I don't think there's any denying that
this is completely reductive. It's practically a paradigm case of
reductiveness. It not only reduces the whole of human existence to
behavior, but unlike the now discredited behaviorism (which at least took
into account the whole range of behaviors) it reduces everything even
further: to one type of behavior (chosen by the theorist herself).
Ryan, your interpretation of what Sedgwick/Butler had in mind sounds much
more plausible to me. I am sure Sedgwick must not have meant the statement
to be taken in a literal manner, but more as a provocation. I just happen
to be one of those people who values clarity and precision of thought and
writing. But to take up the more interesting angle you have suggested,
"because sexual acts cut across conventional sexual identities, they reveal
the arbitrariness of those categories, and that erotic desire is not just
about who you want but also about what you want to do," I would just like
to add that the way we categorize sexual acts is just as arbitrary as the
way we categorize sexual identities. So although I accept that it may be
useful to pose the one against the other and see how they may conflict, let
us not lose track of the fact that both involve arbitrary categories. And
it seems to me that a more fruitful avenue would be to move away from
ethological categories to ones that relevant to the people themselves (i.e.
the people whose identities and acts Sedgwick and those she argue against
are categorizing).
Cordially,
Nate