Masculine of Center -- the term

[Martina]

Originally Posted by Toughy

Us old farts have to remember we are old and the kids speak a language that is hard for us to get..........<grin>

True, and amazing things have happened since I was young. BUT, in some ways the United States is more conservative than it was when I was a kid. And my memory of pre-Reagan days is an asset, something the young do not have.

A good friend of mine is from a different country and culture -- I am not going to specify to avoid squabbling -- and he and his generation are MUCH more conservative than his parents.

The world has forgotten how far to the right it has drifted. There have been huge gains, but within a context, a larger context, of a more conservative ethos. I think it's changing as the demographics change. But it will be a long time before we replace what we have lost -- genuinely radical and liberal movements and institutions. And, of course, they will look and be different. And probably the most creative and powerful will come from outside the United States and Western Europe.

I have a healthy fear of the conventional because I know the real prison that it used to be for women and others. And it still can be. How many states now can we not get an abortion in? State after state is turning back the clock on these and other issues. Is it the last gasp of a dying ideology? Yes. But it still has power. Tremendous power.

It's alarming to me when something conventionally sexist is not seen or defended. I do think that is true of this phrase. As it reads, not as its creators intended it. Masculine of Center. How can its connotations be extracted from the context of policing gender, the context of bullying, the context of gender privilege? Is there any place where policing, bullying and gender privilege do not obtain? So casually invoking them, even when that is the opposite of your intention, should, IMO, send off alarm bells. Perhaps it only does in the old who can recall when gender oppression was the norm and objecting to it got you laughed at or hurt.

Compare that to queer, an umbrella term that came into use when I was already an adult. It was a rehabilitated pejorative. It had the power to appall. To frighten. Its connotations included glory holes and jail cells and bashings. And we took all that power away from our oppressors and turned it back on them.