dualism is a false choice

[novapsyche]

Reposting (and fleshing out) my reply from gwendally's thread re: Austin suicide pilot:

Minimizing people to their own body parts is to dehumanize them. To slur them by utilizing the anatomological term of another sex is to prop up the entire paternalistic hegemony. Using 'vagina' in the original poster's context is to connote all that is weak, emotional, irrational, indeed psychotic with the person who did this terrible deed.

This was the guiding principle in Western society, that men acted while women felt. There was (is) a dualism inherent in its philosophy, that what was rational was masculine while all else was nature, wild, irrational--feminine. This has been observed in the works of Descartes, Aquinas and many other prominent philosophers, stretching back to antiquity. (See Simone Weil for more on this division.)

In the US, the ideal of being seen as a full, rational person (that is, the fight for civil rights) sprang twofold as abolistionism and feminism, during an era of a nation dividing against itself. However, the concepts derive from the same source: natural rights (which is an argument for a different day).

No longer may a person today peruse the classifieds and see "Men only". Women now may own her own property (instead of being seen as property), cast her own vote, seek divorce, and serve on juries. Still, an American woman is paid less for the same work a man does in the corporate world. The sexual double standard still stands. Progress is made incrementally (though at times there may be leaps).

No rational person would fly a plane into a building. The last thing we need to do, at this time, during this discussion, is use semantics to shunt the blame onto a gender that didn't even figure into the perpetrator's worldview. (Read his suicide note. One learns of his first marriage only through mention of divorce; the woman is not named. His heretofore current wife at least warrants mention. His marriages, however--his intimate interactions with the opposite gender--affected his worldview, it would seem, not a whit.)

I see no other way to refute gender insults but to indict Western culture.