RE my last post:
It was crystal clear in MY mind that jacquesm really couldn't fix it.
The BEST he could do was NOT run me off and simply LET me sink or swim. He could NOT vouch for me. He had a conflict of interest and trying to promote my work when he wanted me would be a good means to cut his own throat.
And he could NOT tell people why he was not speaking to me. He was in a relationship. The ONLY means to not sully his reputation and yadda was simply KEEP HIS MOUTH SHUT. FULL STOP.
So I've had a lot of years to contemplate this problem space and it's an AGGRAVATING issue in the extreme. It's such a pain in the butt to try to fix this that I can no longer recall which posts I have written and redacted and which posts I have written and left public and it's exhausting to try to figure it out and look it up.
Not only do I NOT blame him, I'm not really mad at OTHER people EITHER. I mean, most other people SUCK a lot more than he does. A LOT.
BUT the crux of this problem is this: IF a man "vouches" for a woman THAT he is attracted to, NO ONE can be certain WHY -- NOT EVEN HIM.
That's why it's called a conflict of interest and this is as hard or HARDER to talk about than the fact that a lot of WOMEN feel confused as to whether or not they were RAPED.
The definition of rape hinges on the detail of consent and we go out of our way to NOT allow women to sort out what they want in bed and yadda and we expect MEN to initiate, so women frequently are UNSURE if they wanted him, if they led him on, etc. "Rape culture" will NOT be solved until we decide to teach WOMEN how to meet THEIR sexual needs and this is big-time VERBOTEN to even talk about.
So even JACQUES could NOT possibly be certain "I am promoting her work because it's actually GOOD and NOT because I hope to score points with her" WHILE desperately HOPING to score points with me. NOT saying ANYTHING was the only thing that met the test of no appearance of impropriety.
So it's just a hard problem to solve and while this crazy-making CRAP was going on, Theranos was ALSO going on for a large part of it and I could get NO ONE to take me seriously about my hypothesis that it hit TEN BILLION dollars in valuation while being NOTHING but hot air because it was a pretty young woman running it.
Men may put on kid gloves and be too nice and NOT want to give a woman harsh feedback and want to encourage her. If they do give harsh feedback, she may not take it seriously. SHE may decide "He's just a sexist pig, saying that because I'm a woman and NO GIRLS ALLOWED in the old boy's club."
There is an old fashioned saying that a woman in college "Is just there to get her MRS." In other words, to marry well and people tend to prefer to marry folks of similar intelligence and education.
Generally speaking, MEN have no easy way out. MEN are "entitled" to marry and have kids IF they are successful.
Women can MARRY WELL if trying to pursue a real career is too hard.
So I think what often happens is a woman meets an eligible guy who can provide well for her, whether he TRIES to clue her or not about how HARD it is to ACTUALLY succeed and WHY, she just doesn't get the damn memo and in the meantime they do a bunch of emotional bonding, end up in bed, blah blah blah.
I don't know how we fix this at a SOCIETAL level. I know SOME women go into business with their brother or their sons or their husband and THAT fosters real conversation and yadda, but it seems really hard to get UNRELATED men and women to have those conversations and have it go well and have it NOT go sideways because one of them had THE FEELS or one of them erred on the side of not cutting their own throat and ETC.
This ENTIRE blog is posited on the hypothesis that GIRLS are raised FROM BIRTH with messaging that sabotages their ability to establish "a public life" -- a REAL career -- and men get messaging that sabotages their ability to deal with a lot of personal stuff and this kind of works if you shoot for heteronormative arrangements where men with serious careers have wives to fill in all the personal stuff they don't know how to deal with and it goes beyond just physical women's work and in recent years some of that gets discussed under the heading emotional labor.
Like cats raised from birth to ONLY see vertical lines OR horizontal ones, most of us have no idea we even HAVE these blind spots. I have WATCHED men TRY TO explain stuff to women in public spaces and have the woman in question clearly just NOT GET IT at ALL.
So I STILL do NOT know how the hell to:
It was crystal clear in MY mind that jacquesm really couldn't fix it.
The BEST he could do was NOT run me off and simply LET me sink or swim. He could NOT vouch for me. He had a conflict of interest and trying to promote my work when he wanted me would be a good means to cut his own throat.
And he could NOT tell people why he was not speaking to me. He was in a relationship. The ONLY means to not sully his reputation and yadda was simply KEEP HIS MOUTH SHUT. FULL STOP.
So I've had a lot of years to contemplate this problem space and it's an AGGRAVATING issue in the extreme. It's such a pain in the butt to try to fix this that I can no longer recall which posts I have written and redacted and which posts I have written and left public and it's exhausting to try to figure it out and look it up.
Not only do I NOT blame him, I'm not really mad at OTHER people EITHER. I mean, most other people SUCK a lot more than he does. A LOT.
BUT the crux of this problem is this: IF a man "vouches" for a woman THAT he is attracted to, NO ONE can be certain WHY -- NOT EVEN HIM.
That's why it's called a conflict of interest and this is as hard or HARDER to talk about than the fact that a lot of WOMEN feel confused as to whether or not they were RAPED.
The definition of rape hinges on the detail of consent and we go out of our way to NOT allow women to sort out what they want in bed and yadda and we expect MEN to initiate, so women frequently are UNSURE if they wanted him, if they led him on, etc. "Rape culture" will NOT be solved until we decide to teach WOMEN how to meet THEIR sexual needs and this is big-time VERBOTEN to even talk about.
So even JACQUES could NOT possibly be certain "I am promoting her work because it's actually GOOD and NOT because I hope to score points with her" WHILE desperately HOPING to score points with me. NOT saying ANYTHING was the only thing that met the test of no appearance of impropriety.
So it's just a hard problem to solve and while this crazy-making CRAP was going on, Theranos was ALSO going on for a large part of it and I could get NO ONE to take me seriously about my hypothesis that it hit TEN BILLION dollars in valuation while being NOTHING but hot air because it was a pretty young woman running it.
Men may put on kid gloves and be too nice and NOT want to give a woman harsh feedback and want to encourage her. If they do give harsh feedback, she may not take it seriously. SHE may decide "He's just a sexist pig, saying that because I'm a woman and NO GIRLS ALLOWED in the old boy's club."
There is an old fashioned saying that a woman in college "Is just there to get her MRS." In other words, to marry well and people tend to prefer to marry folks of similar intelligence and education.
Generally speaking, MEN have no easy way out. MEN are "entitled" to marry and have kids IF they are successful.
Women can MARRY WELL if trying to pursue a real career is too hard.
So I think what often happens is a woman meets an eligible guy who can provide well for her, whether he TRIES to clue her or not about how HARD it is to ACTUALLY succeed and WHY, she just doesn't get the damn memo and in the meantime they do a bunch of emotional bonding, end up in bed, blah blah blah.
I don't know how we fix this at a SOCIETAL level. I know SOME women go into business with their brother or their sons or their husband and THAT fosters real conversation and yadda, but it seems really hard to get UNRELATED men and women to have those conversations and have it go well and have it NOT go sideways because one of them had THE FEELS or one of them erred on the side of not cutting their own throat and ETC.
This ENTIRE blog is posited on the hypothesis that GIRLS are raised FROM BIRTH with messaging that sabotages their ability to establish "a public life" -- a REAL career -- and men get messaging that sabotages their ability to deal with a lot of personal stuff and this kind of works if you shoot for heteronormative arrangements where men with serious careers have wives to fill in all the personal stuff they don't know how to deal with and it goes beyond just physical women's work and in recent years some of that gets discussed under the heading emotional labor.
Like cats raised from birth to ONLY see vertical lines OR horizontal ones, most of us have no idea we even HAVE these blind spots. I have WATCHED men TRY TO explain stuff to women in public spaces and have the woman in question clearly just NOT GET IT at ALL.
So I STILL do NOT know how the hell to:
- NETWORK successfully.
- PROMOTE my own work.
- Figure out how to get SOMEONE ELSE to promote it.