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Bakker and Women 3 (merged topic)


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[quote name='JoannaL' post='1691091' date='Feb 18 2009, 13.40']The point is that woman in Earwa are not only 'spiritually inferior' but generally inferior.[b] The are intellectually and emotionally inferior to normal human beings.[/b] Now don't start the 'but Esme is soo smart argument'. She is an exemption n Earwa and besides she is still no match to any of the male lead characters intelligent-wise.[/quote]

Where is this stated again?

And Esme appears to be smarter then anyone but Kellhus or the Dunyain.
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[quote]Well, if I understand what you're saying here, this seems to me to be very different than asking "what if the fundamentalists are right?" For fundamentalists, there is no distinction between god and truth. [b]If Earwa is truly a world of "moral certainty and solidarity - a world where everything and everyone finds themselves ranked in order of value" then there is no "outside" (pardon the term) to that.[/b]

If, on the other hand, we just have a deity or deities who just happen to be fundamentalist asshats and aren't necessarily right about how things *really are*, then we're back to modern skepticism and uncertainty - just at one remove. This is certainly interesting and fine with me, but I don't see how a world with a fundamentalist deity who has no more claim to truth than anyone else is different than the so-called conventional fantasy you seem to object to.[/quote]

How does this follow at all?
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[quote name='Shryke' post='1691069' date='Feb 18 2009, 10.31']This is kinda the point I've been thinking about. (Which I figured you'd get, from your posts in any of the religion threads in Gen Chat.)

AFAIK people from way back when didn't really think of the world as orderly. Not the same way we do.

It rains because the sky felt like, because God is taking a piss, or just because. Shit was random in some fashion. That A follows from B is not something they would consider. Causality not exactly big on their list of ideas.

Hence the power of the Logos.[/quote]

IMHO, this is just not accurate when it comes to premodern societies. It seems as if we've drifted from premodern to prehistoric. Augustine, for instance, wouldn't know what you were talking about.

And, in fact, the discussion of "scriptural" societies really muddies the waters because the scriptural religions we all know and love (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) are all fundamentally iconoclastic. This means that one of their primary missions is to eradicate and police so-called "superstition." These religions may invoke more "meaning-rich" worlds than modernity does (or they may not, depending on one's "modernity"), but they work explicitly against "easy anthropomorphism."
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[quote name='Shryke' post='1691100' date='Feb 18 2009, 10.45']How does this follow at all?[/quote]

Well, the part you've bolded is mostly a quotation from the Bakker post to which I was responding. So you'll have to clarify for me which part of that you're not following.
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[quote]Or, if you were really concerned with the "Archie Bunker effect," you might intervene with those readers who shrug off the gender issues of Earwa as incidental and not that big a deal. Clearly, they do seem to be a big deal to you.[/quote]

As you've posted this thought a few times, in the context I get the sense it's directed at me. (I did use the word "incidental" alot)

I think your completely misinterpreting the use of "incidental" here.

If you said "Bakker sat down to create a sexist world" I'd completely disagree with that. I'd say he sat down to create an objective world and then though "Ok, what can I use to show this" and Sexism pretty much flew to the forefront as the most obvious example that would integrate well with the story.

Basically, you sit down to make a world that exists as pre-modern people saw it. The problem you run into right off the bat is the one Kalbear has pointed out: They didn't all think the same things. They believed in different stuff and contradicted each other all over the place. So you've got to pick and choose.

I mean, think of Scot sitting at his desk:
[quote]Let's see, options, options:

Eat pig, you go to hell? Nah, that's dumb.

Black people are inferior to white people? :sick: Yeah, I'm never getting THAT published.

People who use magic go to hell? Hmm, that's a good one. That would work well. Put that one on the list.

Women are inferior to men? Hey, that's a pretty good one. Fits well with the story and the themes and shit and it's disconcerting enough to get people to really think about what their reading. I like it. That ones in.[/quote]
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[quote name='Finn' post='1691118' date='Feb 18 2009, 13.57']Well, the part you've bolded is mostly a quotation from the Bakker post to which I was responding. So you'll have to clarify for me which part of that you're not following.[/quote]

How does the existence of an objective ordering and ranking to reality preclude the existence of The Outside?
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[quote name='Finn' post='1691113' date='Feb 18 2009, 13.53']IMHO, this is just not accurate when it comes to premodern societies. It seems as if we've drifted from premodern to prehistoric. Augustine, for instance, wouldn't know what you were talking about.

And, in fact, the discussion of "scriptural" societies really muddies the waters because the scriptural religions we all know and love (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) are all fundamentally iconoclastic. This means that one of their primary missions is to eradicate and police so-called "superstition." These religions may invoke more "meaning-rich" worlds than modernity does (or they may not, depending on one's "modernity"), but they work explicitly against "easy anthropomorphism."[/quote]

I think it's fairly obvious the world (and the religions therein) are built to some degree off a judeo-christian framework. So I'd think the Old Testament and such would be VERY relavent.
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[quote]But the scenes of rape and abuse would still be there, the unflattering portrayal of women would still be there, regardless of whether Kellhus kicks god's ass for allowing it. So you would still have a problem with it, right? That would just clear up the spiritually inferior thing.

I don't think it needs a B5 style confrontation. All it needs is for the relevant characters to deal with it somehow (specifically Esme since Kellhus and Akka are going to be more concerned with the sorcerors damnation). That's ineveitable, it's demanded by the story so I don't see why you would doubt it for a second.[/quote]Agreed, John. This would answer for me that aspect of the story, and it's one that really hadn't occurred to me until talking on this thread. I didn't expect a kind of Preacher tale where God is called to answer for his crimes when presented with the notion that God is both real and a kind of dick. If that's the direction the story is going (or goes) it'll make me slightly more satisfied, but possibly not. It'll make me happier since it's a reason for having that in the story, but it'll be a little bit less satisfying than something else. See below.

But it doesn't solve the unpleasantness of the other parts. It does give me more hope than what I thought before, which was that Bakker was just heaping it on with sexist hammer blow after hammer blow.

Finn, really awesome post. Kudos.

[quote][quote]If Earwa is truly a world of "moral certainty and solidarity - a world where everything and everyone finds themselves ranked in order of value" then there is no "outside" (pardon the term) to that.[/quote]
How does this follow at all? [/quote]Because if God is just an entity - a malignant, uninformed entity - then it's simply a tale about someone being wrong who also happens to have a lot of spiritual power in the world. If instead God believes this because that's the rules of the universe, and there's no one to hold accountable or rally against - and God is simply just biding with the rules of the universe, then it's a much murkier question. It's different to say 'God hates you' because God's just another thing with their own opinions. They can be wrong. If on the other hand it's the actual physical nature of the universe that says you are less...well, how do you fight against that? Do you simply say 'fuck you, world' and try and live the world as you think it should be, not as it actually exists? Do you artificially shape it in spite of this because that's not the world you want to live in? Do you out-tech the world so that that disability (if 'spiritually inferior' could be considered that) is no longer a pressing concern?

Those, to me, are more interesting questions to ask and answer than having a deity decree that women are worse and having that deity have anthropological meaning. And honestly, I think that's what Bakker's going for as well. A fallible, humanized God that is wrong is a cop out by comparison to that. And as mackaxx points out, what does it actually matter whether the universe says women are spiritually inferior to the people living in it? Does it stop Kellhus from promoting Esmi? Does it make women less intelligent or capable?

That's the real trick - how do you fight the Outside from influencing the world (as the Inchoroi want to) without destroying humanity in the process? That should be an interesting question.
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[quote]AFAIK people from way back when didn't really think of the world as orderly. Not the same way we do.

It rains because the sky felt like, because God is taking a piss, or just because. Shit was random in some fashion. That A follows from B is not something they would consider. Causality not exactly big on their list of ideas.[/quote]No, I think they very much thought the world was ordered. Humans have wanted to rationalize the world for a long, long time. It's part of our brains (as Bakker would happily agree with). Human myth is all about explanation. How did the world come about? Where does lightning come from? What does the rumbling of that mountain mean? Humans desired an ordered world at almost every turn, and this is a pancultural phenomenon everywhere in the world. Even if that order is 'because a god wanted it' that was a cause, a reason. And that was really a big deal.

[quote]Agreed, but I don't see how that leads to "there is no outside".[/quote]I think it's not so much as there's no outside as there's no entities in the Outside. There's no conscious mind saying sorcerers are damned or women are inferior; that's just the rules of the world, just as much as what temperature water boils at. But I could be wrong and misinterpreting what Finn said.
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[quote name='Kalbear' post='1691137' date='Feb 18 2009, 14.04']No, I think they very much thought the world was ordered. Humans have wanted to rationalize the world for a long, long time. It's part of our brains (as Bakker would happily agree with). Human myth is all about explanation. How did the world come about? Where does lightning come from? What does the rumbling of that mountain mean? Humans desired an ordered world at almost every turn, and this is a pancultural phenomenon everywhere in the world. Even if that order is 'because a god wanted it' that was a cause, a reason. And that was really a big deal.[/quote]

Yes, they ordered it. But not in a causal way.

The books make very explicit the very idea of the logos, the simple statement that "What comes before determines what comes after", is incredibly powerful and unique within the setting. Which is very in tune from what I've read on the mondset of ancient peoples.

To use an example, you or I see lightning and thunder happen together all the time and think "Ok, either one causes the other, or something else causes both to happen.". They would see it and think "Lightning and thunder go together. One happens when the other happens" and not make that leap to conclude that one must cause the other.
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[quote name='Finn' post='1691095' date='Feb 18 2009, 13.43']Well, if I understand what you're saying here, this seems to me to be very different than asking "what if the fundamentalists are right?" For fundamentalists, there is no distinction between god and truth. If Earwa is truly a world of "moral certainty and solidarity - a world where everything and everyone finds themselves ranked in order of value" then there is no "outside" (pardon the term) to that.

If, on the other hand, we just have a deity or deities who just happen to be fundamentalist asshats and aren't necessarily right about how things *really are*, then we're back to modern skepticism and uncertainty - just at one remove. This is certainly interesting and fine with me, but I don't see how a world with a fundamentalist deity who has no more claim to truth than anyone else is different than the so-called conventional fantasy you seem to object to.[/quote]

But who are you, man, to answer God thus? Will what is made say to him who made it - Why have you made me this way? Does the potter not have power over his clay, to make, from the same mass, one vessel for honor, and another for dishonor?
-Romans

Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind and said,
Who is this that darkens counsel By words without knowledge?
Now gird up your loins like a man,
And I will ask you, and you instruct Me!
[b] Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? [/b]

God does not do things because they are just. Things are just because God does them.
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Hehehe. I read the first quote and KNEW the next one would be from The Book of Job. The whole thing is basically God telling Job "Fuck you, I'm God, I don't have to explain myself to some pissant human".
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[quote name='Shryke' post='1691119' date='Feb 18 2009, 10.57']As you've posted this thought a few times, in the context I get the sense it's directed at me. (I did use the word "incidental" alot)[/quote]
No, I don't think the "Archie Bunker effect" really applies to you.

[quote name='Shryke' post='1691119' date='Feb 18 2009, 10.57'][Bakker at his desk:] Women are inferior to men? Hey, that's a pretty good one. Fits well with the story and the themes and shit and it's disconcerting enough to get people to really think about what their reading. I like it. That ones in.[/quote]
Right. And what is it precisely that people are supposed to think about when disconcerted by this theme: gender politics, yes? Or are they supposed to say - "meh, just worldbuilding." The latter doesn't seem much like "getting people to really think about what their reading."

[quote name='Shryke' post='1691121' date='Feb 18 2009, 10.58']How does the existence of an objective ordering and ranking to reality preclude the existence of The Outside?[/quote]

Gotcha. I didn't mean "The Outside," which is is why I said "pardon the term." I meant that if you really have a world that literalizes fundamentalist belief, you can't also suggest that that there's a potential wider frame in which that literalized belief isn't necessarily "true." Or you can, but then you're just back to a modern perspective.

[quote name='Shryke' post='1691124' date='Feb 18 2009, 10.59']I think it's fairly obvious the world (and the religions therein) are built to some degree off a judeo-christian framework. So I'd think the Old Testament and such would be VERY relavent.[/quote]

Of course. But I don't know how that addresses what I'm saying.

Look, Shryke, I'm no Kalbear :bow: . I don't have that kind of stamina for these kinds of back and forth discussions. I'll check back in later to see where the conversation is and if I can clarify my position within it.
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And right after he asks that question of Job, he goes on and on about how awesome he is :)

Where is the place of darkness, that you may take it to its territory and that you may discern the paths to its home? Surely you know

Surely you know indeed...what an ass :)

That's why I've always felt that the Mandate had the most courage of anyone in the books. They strive to save a world that will damn them. Where were the gods during the first apocalypse?
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[quote name='TheValyrianDragonlord' post='1691143' date='Feb 18 2009, 11.09']God does not do things because they are just. Things are just because God does them.[/quote]

On the contrary, justice does not apply to God.
Things are true because God does them.
There is no truth beyond [outside of] God. There is no frame of reference beyond God.
/fundamentalist
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[quote]I got a bit curious of your comment on the Banpo culture (or archeological site near Xian, in China) being matriarchal. As far as I know, there is a not so many findings truly supporting the theory of this culture being a matriarchy. And during all my years (not as many as it may sound, only a Masters Degree, and a fieldwork in China) studying anthropolgy at a Swedish university, I've never stumbled across an actual matriarchal society - it's simply a myth (so far, at least). The closest thing of a real matriarchal culture is - ironically also located in China - the Mosu (or Mosuo) in the southwestern parts of the country, but it's never been established as a fact. The Mosu is indeed a matrilineal culture where women are heads of the family (but that alone doesn't qualify for the society as such being matriarchal). Due to the lack of historical evidence, I guess we'll never know for sure.[/quote]Yeah, I was basing it off of an old essay I read a while back, which was likely based on even older research. Thanks for replying to it and correcting it though.
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[quote name='Finn' post='1691153' date='Feb 18 2009, 14.15']Gotcha. I didn't mean "The Outside," which is is why I said "pardon the term." I meant that if you really have a world that literalizes fundamentalist belief, you can't also suggest that that there's a potential wider frame in which that literalized belief isn't necessarily "true." Or you can, but then you're just back to a modern perspective.[/quote]

Ahh, I get you now.

I guess the question is: Can the world change?

And judging by the Consult and their plans, I'd say "Yes. If your crazy enough"

Maybe Kellhus CAN change the fabric of reality. He's certainly crazy enough.
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[quote name='Finn' post='1691153' date='Feb 18 2009, 14.15']Right. And what is it precisely that people are supposed to think about when disconcerted by this theme: gender politics, yes? Or are they supposed to say - "meh, just worldbuilding." The latter doesn't seem much like "getting people to really think about what their reading."[/quote]

I think "Just worldbuilding" does not preclude people thinking about what their reading. Interesting world building MAKES people think about what their reading. I think this series is evidence of that.

It's at the root of what makes fantasy/sci-fi, imo, such a powerful literary form. The ability to chuck out the rules of our universe if you don't like them, in order to better tell the story you want to.

[quote]Of course. But I don't know how that addresses what I'm saying.[/quote]

You said bringing in Abrahamic religions "muddies the waters" because all these religions are iconoclastic.

I think, given the way the world is constructed, it's silly NOT to bring these in. I mean, the very thing you complain about (the fact that "one of their primary missions is to eradicate and police so-called 'superstition'") is what makes them relevant. All 3 of these religions, but Chrsitanity and Islam especially, seek to tear down the old superstitions, not to get rid of them, but to put one ultimate truth in their place.

And if they'd suceeded and they were right, I think we'd get something like Earwa out of it.
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