Althouse: "This conference aims to honor the institutions and the people who have theorized sex and race in ways that have helped to change the world."

March 13, 2008

"This conference aims to honor the institutions and the people who have theorized sex and race in ways that have helped to change the world."

A University of Wisconsin Law School conference called "Working From the World Up: Equality’s Future" — celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Feminism and Legal Theory Project — takes place this Friday and Saturday in Madison. The program of speakers (and information about the possibility of registering) is here. I'll be there and live-blogging for your reading pleasure.

AND: Look what Eric Muller said about my commenters. I haven't read all the comments, but I have a feeling that Eric is missing some of the humor. I'm mainly seeing a reflexive distaste for leftwing academic theorizing more than any real "misogynist.. [n]auseating ... filth ... spewing."

59 comments:

Original Mike said...: No more race and sex. Please.; 3/13/08, 11:09 AM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: How about racy sex?; 3/13/08, 11:12 AM
Original Mike said...: DBQ: That's different.; 3/13/08, 11:15 AM
Peter V. Bella said...: How about sex races?

Oh, never mind.; 3/13/08, 11:18 AM
paul a'barge said...: They want to honor feminism? Why?

Is this going to be another meeting with a lot of older women wearing shoulder pads?; 3/13/08, 11:20 AM
bill said...: Who hasn't theorized sex after a hypothetical night on the town?; 3/13/08, 11:20 AM
MadisonMan said...: Most of the speakers and attendees women.

The world has not changed much.; 3/13/08, 11:45 AM
TMink said...: "This conference aims to honor the institutions and the people who have theorized sex and race in ways that have helped to change the world"

Academics sure love thems some theories!

Trey; 3/13/08, 12:02 PM
Bissage said...: Twenty-fifth anniversary?

You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby!®; 3/13/08, 12:08 PM
Ann Althouse said...: "Most of the speakers and attendees women. The world has not changed much."

There are some men on the program.; 3/13/08, 12:10 PM
Anonymous said...: "There are some men on the program."

Some guys still use feminism to get laid.

Otherwise, why attend a seminar on a day when there are really good college basketball games on television?

A cold tap beer, a good hamburger, and a good basketball game on a big screen TV beats a conference any day.

Except if there's a opportunity for racy sex.; 3/13/08, 12:24 PM
MadisonMan said...: Yes, there are a few. One is the dean of the Law School, and I imagine his participation is pretty much mandatory, as a Law Conference is in town. Ditto for the director of the Institute of Legal Studies.

Why aren't there more men lawprofs investigating and giving speeches on the topic? How can any of the participants say there's progress if (almost) only women are presenting?

The goals are to forge the future of race and sex equality in the law. Yet only women are working the furnace? Imagine if only white men were doing the forging -- would anyone listen?; 3/13/08, 12:30 PM
Trooper York said...: Will there be cocktails?; 3/13/08, 12:39 PM
Smilin' Jack said...: Will there be a bra-burning? If they want to be taken seriously, they need a bra-burning.; 3/13/08, 12:44 PM
Beth said...: Otherwise, why attend a seminar on a day when there are really good college basketball games on television?

What, no Tivo?; 3/13/08, 2:23 PM
Anonymous said...: Beth-

Nope, no Tivo. Even if I had Tivo, I'd want to watch the playoffs in real time.

No transcript? Perhaps you'd prefer reading the transcript of the conference at a later time so you can watch basketball this weekend.; 3/13/08, 2:29 PM
knox said...: Some guys still use feminism to get laid.

Yes, there are a few. One is the dean of the Law School...

!!; 3/13/08, 2:33 PM
Gahrie said...: Is Geraldine Ferraro giving the keynote?; 3/13/08, 2:37 PM
rhhardin said...: A chance to pick up babes, if it's anything like the NOW meetings in the 70s.; 3/13/08, 2:38 PM
Chip Ahoy said...: A conference to honor.

a. conference. to. honor.

*thinks*

conference to honor

*thinks*

*gives up*

Do, let us know how that goes.; 3/13/08, 2:59 PM
titusstagleap said...: That sounds like an awful way to spend the day.

Unless, they get in the kitchen and make a great meal after all the bitching.

I bet there will be alot of lebanese there with hair under their armpits and with shag haircuts.; 3/13/08, 3:24 PM
Jason said...: Is this a parody? I don't get it.; 3/13/08, 3:36 PM
titusstagleap said...: Fellow republicans, I had an awful day.

I went to the spa to do my monthly cut, color, massage, facial, meditation,peddy/manny, crack/back and sack waxing.

All of that turned out fabulous. I am feeling like an all american girl and I like the life that I lead.

But I digress.

The hair washer and her lesbian lover had a baby and it has downs syndrome. The baby was there today and he was so cute. The lesbian lover was there too and she is usually running around the salon hammering things and screwin things in. She is a major diesel. He has to go to therapy every week indefinitely.

The masseuse's japanese chin bit me. I tried to hold it and it bit me. Thankfully, I hadn't had my manny yet.

My colorist Dug broke up with his lover of 5 years and the ex took his cat Misha. Doug was in tears all during the processing. I said Dug I feel your pain but let's concentrate here. Misha was named after Barishnikov-how gay is that? The other cat Vivian, named after Vivian Leigh has cancer.

And finally my stylist is being stalked by one of her many lovers ex-wive. She knows where she lives and has had tried to beat her up. My stylist had to have her arrested.

All in all in made for a very stressful experience.

I go to the spa to relax and rejuvenate not listen to other people's problems. That time should be all about me. I am spending an arm and a leg. Do I tell them I don't want to hear all their crap? I do feel bad but that was not relaxing. I left their wanting a stiff...drink.

Thankfully, I look gorgeous.; 3/13/08, 3:39 PM
Anonymous said...: Will anyone ask why UW has a Women's Studies Program, and not a Men's Studies Program?

Or why UW has a Campus Women's Center (funded in part by United Way) but not a Campus Men's Center?

Or why there will be a Madison Women's Expo in November, but not a Men's Expo?

Or why there is a UW Center for Women's Health Research, but not a UW Center for Men's Health Research?

Or why there is a Women's Fitness Center in Madison, but not a Men's Fitness Center?

Or why women seldom support fund raising events for prostate cancer even though men are deeply committed to fund raising for breast cancer?

Or why prostate cancer research gets about 1/10th the amount of funding that breast cancer gets, even though as many men die of prostate cancer as women die of breast cancer?

I doubt it.; 3/13/08, 3:54 PM
Richard Dolan said...: One of my partners attended a Bar conference in NY where, among other topics, the speakers were discussing the impact that the changed demographics of law school grads was having on NYC firms. One speaker (a Cravath partner) made the point that, with women now constituting more than half of law school grads, the traditional "culture" of the big NYC firms -- intense sweatshops where young lawyers have always understood that an associate's obligations to the firm and client trumped family or personal commitments, and ten (or more) associates would compete for years against each other to be the one from that "class" picked to ascend to the partnership -- is all but dead and buried. His explanation: as a group, women won't have any of it; they just refuse to live that way.

As he described it, the feminization of the legal profession has changed the way law firms are built and run -- to the point of making the old, steeply pyramidal model obsolete -- even at the largest, most successful and prestigious (and hidebound) firms. I doubt that anyone foresaw that 25-30 years ago, when the percentage of women in law schools moved towards parity with men. Back then, law firm partners viewed women associates as fungible with male associates -- aside from minor differences in plumbing, they were expected to perform in the same way and respond to the same incentives. Wrong.

Alas, it seems unlikely that those "who have theorized sex and race in ways that have helped to change the world" will be all that interested in how places like Cravath have been forced to adapt to the feminization of the Bar. Somehow the real world operations of corporate law firms just doesn't sound like it will have much academic appeal. But I look forward to your live-blog just in case something on the topic does come up.; 3/13/08, 4:17 PM
ricpic said...: Titus' posts are timeless. I'm sure homo society at the courts of Ramses III, Nero and Louis XV, was consumed by the same fabulous grooming issues and catty tales of gossip and intrigue that Titus so generously relates to us.
There really are no other issues in that substratum.
The underworld he inhabits is fixed forever in amber.; 3/13/08, 4:26 PM
Smilin' Jack said...: titusstagleap said...
I left their wanting a stiff...drink.

Once they got rid of you, I'm sure they had one.; 3/13/08, 4:29 PM
Chris said...: Isn't there an "about" missing in the title? Is "theorize" a transitive verb?

Well, I guess it is.; 3/13/08, 5:22 PM
Richard Fagin said...: "It was (and is) a project born of the world, responding to real lives and needs, reflecting the law and society tradition of reasoning-from-the-world-to-law"

Uh huh. Exactly whose real lives are we talking about? Tenured professors have one important degree of insulation from the "real lives" the rest of us have to live. Worse, tenured women professors get a pass on some really ugly behavior in the name of "diversity."

These academics are the assholes that gave us Meritor Savings Bank and other lunacies that make the modern American business entity a really prison-like place to work. The battles against genuine sexual predators (other than President Clinton) were won long ago as they should have been. Now, however, witho nothing better to do, these assholes dream up ever more arcane rules of work conduct that can't be satisfied by obeying your mother's admonition to always use good manners at work. The legal "thinking", if you want to call it that, is based on man hating and a desire for revenge based on real and imagined past wrongs. They remind me so much of the Japanese brutalizing POWs in World War II, and for the same reasons: now that they have to power to shape events, they abuse it thorougly, as has been done by so many other groups of oppressed people in the past.

What really makes me sick is that these women are able to engage in the modern workplace entirely because of technology that for the most part is designed by men.

I have to worry about getting sued for looking the wrong way, while women getting their clitorises mutilated, women being gang raped as a form of control, women in arranged marriages, women who can't leave the house alone, adultersses who are stoned to death get a total pass from these assholes.

Leave us ordinary honest American men alone, assholes, and go fight some of those repressive, bearded, turbaned fellows who really deserve their nuts to be removed.

Not as eloquentas Mark Steyn, but just as pissed off!; 3/13/08, 5:53 PM
knox said...: Isn't there an "about" missing in the title? Is "theorize" a transitive verb?

Yeah I thought "theorized sex and race" sounded weird.; 3/13/08, 6:02 PM
Eli Blake said...: I am surprised and apalled by some of the comments on this board:

Paul a'barge (11:20):

They want to honor feminism? Why?

It's easy to take for granted the things that we have today as a result of feminism, such as the right of women to vote, the right of women to be treated as equal human beings both in the eyes of the law and in public society, the fact that women who are in college now really do have the same range of opportunities available to them as men have. I have twin eleven year old daughters and am thankful for the opportunities they will have.

It was not always this way. Those rights had to be fought for. Often at great personal sacrifice, and with little reward for those who came before and did the fighting. You seem to assume that all this just happened. It didn't. Someone had to make it happen, and feminists did.

I've always taken every opportunity to let my daughters know that they are lucky they were born in America today, when feminism has achieved many of these goals, rather than at a time or in a place before they had done that.

So, Paul, turn it around: why do you feel threatened by someone wanting to honor feminism?

Michael H: Why shouldn't there be a women's health center? Women have health issues that are unique to them, and enough of them go that it is profitable to keep such a center open. Men have unique health issues too-- but are far less likely to go to a doctor about it, and have to do so infrequently, so a 'Men's health center' that focused on issues that only men have would likely not be in business long enough to notice. I know, darn that capitalism, right?

Further, it's a good bet that a significant portion of the business at the Women's health center deals with pre-natal care. Do you consider pre-natal care worth having available?

Or why prostate cancer research gets about 1/10th the amount of funding that breast cancer gets, even though as many men die of prostate cancer as women die of breast cancer?

Your numbers don't add up. Using the combined total of research numbers of CDC, NCI and DOD (which have different areas of cancer research they focus on) the amount spent on research fo the applicable type of cancer per cancer death in 2005 was $23,474 per breast cancer death, and $14,369 per prostate cancer death. Yes, more is spent on breast cancer research, but hardly the 10-1 ratio you suggest (probably someone who only looked at the CDC figures). Incidentally the amount spent on both breast and prostate cancer research per death is far, far more than what is spent on either colon or lung cancer source-- graph at bottom of page despite the fact that more men AND women die from lung cancer (including a lot of non-smokers) than die from breast cancer or prostate cancer.; 3/13/08, 6:11 PM
rhhardin said...: No lectures on mathematics or physics!; 3/13/08, 6:44 PM
Bissage said...: Well, feminism is nice and all that, but personally, I think it’s high time we all got together to throw a kick-ass, happening barn dance for epistemological phenomenology.

And now . . . ladies and gentlemen . . . MR. CONWAY TWITTY . . .

[ * applause * ]; 3/13/08, 6:46 PM
Anonymous said...: Eli Blake said: "Michael H: Why shouldn't there be a women's health center? Women have health issues that are unique to them, and enough of them go that it is profitable to keep such a center open. Men have unique health issues too-- but are far less likely to go to a doctor about it, and have to do so infrequently, so a 'Men's health center' that focused on issues that only men have would likely not be in business long enough to notice. I know, darn that capitalism, right?"

Right, and if feminists were truly concerned with gender equality they would raise a howl that the men are being underserved. Hear that noise? It's the sound of crickets.; 3/13/08, 6:50 PM
Bissage said...: No, no, no!!!

This is the sound of crickets.

(Get it?)

Hey! Spot the dancing lawyer and win a prize!

(He’s very good.); 3/13/08, 7:02 PM
Trooper York said...: Well if there is a bra burning, I know a place where you can get replacements that will actually fit. Especially those hard to fit E, F, and G sizes!; 3/13/08, 7:23 PM
Trooper York said...: And there will definitely be cocktails. And snacks.; 3/13/08, 7:24 PM
Eric Muller said...: Look at the filth in this thread.

My best guess is that this post was Ann's very clever way of baiting her commenters into volunteering fodder for the conference itself.; 3/13/08, 8:28 PM
Peter V. Bella said...: Trooper York said...
And there will definitely be cocktails. And snacks.

I'm not even going there. Nope. Not me. No way in hell. Not a chance.; 3/13/08, 8:43 PM
Peter V. Bella said...: rhhardin said...
No lectures on mathematics or physics!

Physics and mathematics are not the institutions and people who have theorized sex and race in ways that have helped to change the world. They are just physics and mathematics.; 3/13/08, 8:47 PM
nina said...: Wow. One can only hope that it's the last battle cry from a withering and sagging breed of humans. May my daughters (and your daughters) know a better world.; 3/13/08, 9:17 PM
john said...: The obligatory colon: is a title complete without one: can we live without it?; 3/13/08, 10:50 PM
titusstagleap said...: OK the rare clumbers just woke me again and have the shits.

Now I won't get my beauty sleep my workout will be awful today and I will look horrible.

Down the elevator we go.

Bitches.; 3/14/08, 1:32 AM
titusstagleap said...: can i get an award or some prize money for being the most deleted commenter on this site.; 3/14/08, 1:32 AM
titusstagleap said...: OMG-i just called my bank and my federal tax was directly deposited.

19,000 big ones. Party!!!!; 3/14/08, 1:38 AM
titusstagleap said...: Fellow republicans I also have approximately 5000 shares of stock that will be vested on April 1. I got the stock for 10.00 a share and the stock is now 74.00 a share. I am going to exercise a chunk of it within the next month or two. I am think I will exercise somewhere around 1000 shares.

This is what I will be doing with the new cash.

1) cottage in Ptown for the month of June-something in the tony west end off of commercial ave-June is a cheaper month than July and August and it isn't as busy. Also, all of the really serious circuit queens don't get there until the 4th of July and those bitches are major competition.

2) cottage in Oqunguit Maine for the month of July. Something in the center of town near the beach and walking distance to all of the clubs and restaurants.

3)August in Fire Island. I will be looking for something around The Pines.

4)A cycle of roids beginning in April for 12 weeks.

5)a colonic

The only pain about finding a very nice place is the dogs which have to come with me. Sometimes queens can be bitch about the dogs.

I took a LOA from work for small medical stuff but am feeling great, thanks for asking. My company pays my full salary for 12 weeks and then 80% for 5 weeks. This will be up end of June and then I would need to go on long term LOA but I am not going to do that so instead I am taking July and August off, unpaid. But with my taxes, savings, and stock I will be fine. I am going to go back to work in September.

I am so excited.

I love money.

I also think I may get rid of the beamer. My monthly payments are 570.00 a month and to keep it in a garage is over 700.00 a month. I may trade it in. It is a 2007 325xi, black. I think I may get something like a Honda Accord. With the trade in I wouldn't have any car payments, just the garage payment.

Also, I am going to pay off my one and only one credit car I have because it is almost 7000.00-too much.

Thanks so much for listening. Also, the rare clumbers both just took a nice shit. Hopefully, I can sleep.; 3/14/08, 1:59 AM
Joseph said...: This is a very interesting conference. I've attended a few times. Commenters here are displaying some unsavory, kneejerk reactions.; 3/14/08, 7:22 AM
rhhardin said...: Commenters here are displaying some unsavory, kneejerk reactions.

Anne Carson had a nice line somewhere about the unsavory aftermath of the fall of Troy and Helen's whoring around.; 3/14/08, 8:00 AM
Ann Althouse said...: Titus, why isn't making a contribution to your favorite blog on your list? All the rich readers should hit the PayPal button right now. (If you think I'm rich, don't contribute.); 3/14/08, 9:44 AM
titusgrandjete said...: Consider it done Althouse; 3/14/08, 10:36 AM
chuckR said...: Ann, I'd be interested in your take on any presentations of Title IX for math/science/engineering activities.; 3/14/08, 11:33 AM
former law student said...: Will anyone ask why UW has a Women's Studies Program, and not a Men's Studies Program?

There are more that one. They go by such names as "History" and "Political Science."

As immortalized in Peanuts, or maybe it was Family Circus: "There's a Mother's Day and a Father's Day, but no Children's Day -- Why?" "Every day is Children's Day."; 3/14/08, 12:05 PM
TMink said...: "There are more than one. They go by such names as "History" and "Political Science.""

Dude, where did you go to school? I learned about W.E.B. Dubois and Mary McCleod Bethune and Shirley Chisolm and king Shaka and the Egyptian dynasties and the Chinese dynasties and Martin Luther King, Jr. and other folks that were neither white nor male in my History and Political Science classes.

You need a refund from White Supremacist U. They did you wrong.

Trey; 3/14/08, 12:41 PM
Smilin' Jack said...: former law student said...
Will anyone ask why UW has a Women's Studies Program, and not a Men's Studies Program?

There are more that one. They go by such names as "History" and "Political Science."

Are you kidding? Nowadays those are Women's Studies.

Real men major in Physics.; 3/14/08, 2:11 PM
Anonymous said...: Boy, that Eric Muller guy is a real laugh-a-minute dude.; 3/15/08, 4:08 PM
Meade said...: Shhh... he may seriously be trying to get laid.; 3/15/08, 6:02 PM
Mortimer Brezny said...: If this comments section were rife with misogynistic comments, people would be leaving comments like "I want to splurt in Ann Bartow's hair while she spanks Eric Muller," but since no one has left any such comments, Prof. Bartow's and Eric Muller's comments are off-base.; 3/16/08, 1:00 AM
Bissage said...: You know, I can see how someone could take some of these comments as misogynistic. And I guess that Conway Twitty link wasn’t enough to smooth those ruffled feathers.

So . . . tell you what . . . how about I presume to make a peace offering on behalf of all Althousiana?

How about a joke?

How many misogynists does it take to screw in a light bulb?

Give up?

Just one. It’s not like he’s a girl or anything. And then afterwards, his woman serves him dinner and drinks and then begs him to do her doggy-style with a picture of Ashley Alexandra Dupré scotch-taped to the back of her head.

There! Now we can all be friends.

You’re welcome.; 3/16/08, 7:48 AM
Meade said...: "...scotch-taped to the back of her head"

Bissage, that would be misogyny-lite dontcha know? A true misogynist would remove the superfluous head altogether.

O self-styled feminist law professor,
now don't you cry for B.
For he comes from 'thousiana
With jokes that'll bring you to your knees.; 3/16/08, 11:59 AM