tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1638916042737526171.post6014996097929061995..comments2024-03-28T07:16:39.621+00:00Comments on Lallands Peat Worrier: Women & the SNP (Volume II).Lallands Peat Worrierhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18276270498204697708noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1638916042737526171.post-62396828081798530162010-08-16T12:41:03.720+01:002010-08-16T12:41:03.720+01:00For what it is worth I think Alex Massie is both r...For what it is worth I think Alex Massie is both right and wrong. I think women are more sceptical – that is a generalisation I can’t substantiate but it’s what I think. <br /><br />However I think that there is little difference between men and women when it comes to the intellectual, cost-benefit analysis type of analysis that Alex Massie cites – the retail politics. As a general rule I believe this is a kind of politics will only appeal to a minority of voters of either gender. <br /><br />Most voters – men and women – vote because of a range of factors and emotion plays as big a part as reason in deciding which political party they identify with. They vote for a party’s values as well as its policies. It is how ideas are communicated as much as the ideas that are being communicated.<br /><br />I’m not saying it is style not substance that wins votes but I would say that striking the right tone is key.<br /><br />And it’s the tone that we need to work at. It’s not that women are more or less likely to support independence than men are, it’s about how we communicate.Indyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04383904151475839441noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1638916042737526171.post-14595571373615756512010-08-14T13:17:26.832+01:002010-08-14T13:17:26.832+01:00For reference, the section of the Official Report ...For reference, the section of the <i>Official Report</i> recording Holyrood's domestic violence against men debate, mentioned above by Am Firinn, <a href="http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/business/officialReports/meetingsParliament/or-10/sor0610-02.htm#Col27236" rel="nofollow">can be read here.</a>Lallands Peat Worrierhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07238432265194046726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1638916042737526171.post-87351531032217738012010-08-13T10:52:03.642+01:002010-08-13T10:52:03.642+01:00You get to the nub of my problem with the piece, A...You get to the nub of my problem with the piece, Am Firinn. A treacherous weapon is ever a danger to the hand. A treacherously broad argument, deployed against a foe, is all too disposed to boomerang and knock out your own supports. In particular, if generalisation is impossible and immoral - and universalism presumably also rejected - just what is <i>gender</i> anyway? What is left to understand? We lapse into incoherence. It seems to me that generalisation - as such - can't be the problem here. <br /><br />I only dimly recall the Holyrood debate you mention, but am not familiar offhand with the specific remarks you describe. I'll have to take a look.Lallands Peat Worrierhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07238432265194046726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1638916042737526171.post-32576482081703645852010-08-12T20:16:30.832+01:002010-08-12T20:16:30.832+01:00Of all the generalisations about women and men, I ...Of all the generalisations about women and men, I had thought that which holds that women are, by and large, inherently more cautious than men, was one of the most respectable and widely-accepted. It is certainly an assumption on which insurance companies construct their pricing policies. No doubt Ms Watson has complained in print about this outrageous discriminatory blanket approach, though I can’t seem to lay my hands on it. So yes, I think it is fair that women may, generally, take more convincing to make the leap into restored independence than men might.<br /><br />However, for sheer rancour, one should look at Labour’s monstrous regiment and its fellow-travellers, like the normally-sensible Malcolm Chisholm. Take a look, for example, at the Official Report of the debate on domestic violence against males on 10 June; a phenomenon of which they could scarcely permit the public assertion that it might exist, let alone that anything should be done about it. If the SNP wants to outbid or outflank this kind of pitch for the female vote, it can do without my support.<br /><br />Fortunately it shows no signs of doing so, and it doesn’t need to. It is not the SNP which has jeopardised the security of women and their families by bankrupting the UK, to which this country is chained. Nor is it the SNP which sent women’s sons (and even some few of their daughters) to die as mercenaries in assorted dustbowls. The truth will out, eventually. As Mary Wollstonecraft asserted, you can’t keep women (or men) numpties forever.Am Firinnnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1638916042737526171.post-59438843121670112502010-08-12T11:59:32.585+01:002010-08-12T11:59:32.585+01:00Personally, I think Watson jumped the gun and let ...Personally, I think Watson jumped the gun and let fly. In particular, as I tried to tease out in this piece, I don't see how one could discern Mr Massie had "essentialist" attitudes towards gender from his relatively brief analysis. And what's more, as I tried to suggest here, in sections of feminist scholarship you can find parallel arguments made about men's affinities towards the airy and abstruse, contrasting with claims that women respond relationally, in a more spatially oriented manner. I'm not saying there is nothing in Alex' piece that I have my reservations about - quite the reverse. However, these are debates to be had - not ready certainties to be set against obvious error. At least, not in Massie's case. I'd much rather we were able to talk and think about these things with minimal rancour. I can't say that I find Watson's piece to contribute in that spirit.Lallands Peat Worrierhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07238432265194046726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1638916042737526171.post-30723638768775869612010-08-12T11:49:53.153+01:002010-08-12T11:49:53.153+01:00I scrupulously avoided saying anything substantive...I scrupulously avoided saying anything substantive, Conan - just took me all those words to do so! I find the absence of more evidence on this issue rather paralysing. So I'll echo Francis Urquhart and avoid answering: <br /><br /><i>"You might very well think that, I couldn't possibly comment."</i>Lallands Peat Worrierhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07238432265194046726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1638916042737526171.post-78065686850064408372010-08-11T21:58:58.477+01:002010-08-11T21:58:58.477+01:00In a way I can understand why Amy Watson was so an...In a way I can understand why Amy Watson was so annoyed by Alex Massie's piece, because it's not based on any hard evidence, but all the same my guess is he's not that far off the mark. If they can afford it, the SNP should be doing some detailed private polling to answer these questions.<br /><br />If we'd been having this discussion twenty years ago there'd be no mystery at all about the gender gap. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the "can't pay, won't pay" campaign, effectively telling people "we don't just want your vote, we want your soul" was a bit of a macho message! But time has moved on. I wish every household in the land could be sent a "Greatest Hits of Iain 'the Snarl' Grey" DVD, and women would quickly realise which is the pointlessly belligerent party in Scottish politics these days.James Kellyhttp://scotgoespop.blogspot.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1638916042737526171.post-51404326696692376572010-08-11T18:03:37.233+01:002010-08-11T18:03:37.233+01:00Boys make forts.
Girls make nests.
Is that what ...Boys make forts.<br /><br />Girls make nests.<br /><br />Is that what you were trying to say?<br /><br /><br />HeHe.Conan the Librarian™https://www.blogger.com/profile/01904339261121451779noreply@blogger.com