Sans Fig Leaf
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"Johnny One-note"
27 September, 2007
I kept running into her.
It was twenty years ago and I was attending a local science fiction
convention and it seemed that every panel discussion whose description
I found interesting had her as one of the panelists. Since it was a
small convention it wasn't terribly surprising.
What was annoying was that, no matter what the topic of the
panel--whether it was "Writing Realistic Dialogue," "Incorporating the
latest science into your fiction," or "What was the book or story that
first hooked you?"--she found a way to start talking about how women in
general and lesbians in particular were oppressed in our society. I
have to admit that some of the ways she found to work it in were quite
amazing. Unfortunately, once she started talking she would look up at
the ceiling and babble on the topic for ten or more minutes straight,
ignoring any attempts by the other panelists to steer her back to the
topic at hand. It made the experience less than fabulous.
I was not at all unsympathetic to the issue in the abstract. I hadn't
been out of the closet for very long. Having been closetted, I was
quite aware of the extent that prejudice--both subtle and overt--of
many sorts are built into our culture. The problem was that gender
inequality wasn't substantially relevent to most of the topics she was
supposed to be discussing. Even when it was, she wasn't interested in
participating in the give-and-take of a serious discussion.
Late in the convention the moderator of one of the panels tried more
forcefully to get her back on topic, and went so far as to explicitly
say her comments were neither relevent or appropriate. She threw a
hissy fit, loudly proclaiming that anyone who did not understand the
importance of the topic was actively supporting the exploitation,
abuse, and rape of women. When one of the other women on the panel
suggested that the generalization wasn't entirely accurate, she
retorted that if you don't denounce the exploitation of women at every
possible opportunity, you were as bad as the worst abusers.
While her attitude would strike most people as ridiculous, I am
constantly amazed at how many people I hear using that logic day in and
day out. The topic they rant about may be different--it might be the
plight of children in developing nations, it might be the lack of
balance in the media, or it might be the families of those killed in
the 9/11 attacks--but a lot of people insist that if you aren't
denouncing a particular bad thing with your every breath, then you must
secretly be supporting it.
In other words, if you are not outraged by exactly the same things they
are, to the degree they think you should be, then you are an evil
person.
It is particularly funny to hear such rhetoric coming from people who
don't spend their every waking hour denouncing the same thing they
expect you to. It's not enough that you are as outraged about it as
they are, you have to express the outrage even more often than they do.
It's like the old joke: a woman has to work twice as hard and be twice
as good at something to be considered half as skilled at the same job
as a man.
They seem most likely to apply this standard if they perceive you to be
in the same category as the archetypical "abuser." If you are a man you
must constantly denounce chauvinsim, if you are religious you must
constantly denounce religious extremists, et cetera. You're not allowed
to spend your time pursuing your own interests, you must put all of
your energy into atoning for the sins of people they perceive as being
similar to you.
To be fair, all of us do this to some extent. Everyone has their own
pet peeves or hot-button issues. We feel strongly about them and wish
other people felt the same way we do. It's all perfectly natural, but
not entirely reasonable.
As with most things in life, it comes down to a matter of degree. I
choose my battles, and I try to allow those around me to choose battles
of their own.
--Lyndon B. Johnson
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