2014

More Talk About Talking

Last weeks’ post about men talking over women generated a lot of commentary, so please allow me to clarify and elaborate. The universal relegation of women to second-class status is obviously a huge issue around the world, but here I’m focusing on one particular issue. The phenomenon of men talking over women deserves special attention, I suggest, because it’s ubiquitous and overlooked. That makes it a big opportunity for men to have their consciousnesses raised, and maybe even to make a real difference in how people communicate. What I recommend is that people spend some time observing conversations. There are plenty of gender-related dynamics to look for, but a good place to start is to watch who talks over whom. It can be eye-opening.

As with any social or political movement, feminism includes an us-versus-them element. Our social instincts provide use with adaptations such as pigheadedness and selective hearing so that we can successfully engage in identity-based, us-versus-them struggles. Feminists who try to prove male privilege have limited success because opponents can pigheadedly derail the conversation with straw man arguments, contentious demands for definitions, and other handy devices. If you cite the wage gap, an opponent can question all the details of how you compare one employee’s career to another’s. Any statistic is easy to question and possibly ignore. But what if someone observes a conversation and sees for himself how often men talk over women? Maybe seeing it happen will be like a Zen koan, an experience that circumvents logic to offer enlightenment. It’s hard to argue with something that one has seen oneself.

There are plenty of communication dynamics that one could look for, but the dynamic of men talking over women is easy to see and requires little interpretation. You could look for which participants in a conversation are one-upping each other and which are connecting with each other, but that can be subtle. You could see how much “air time” each participant takes up, but it’s generally OK for some people to talk more and others less. But when you see someone talk over someone else, that’s not a matter degree. No amount of shutting others down is good.

Self-awareness is a hallmark of post-modern society. More than any people before us, post-modern Westerners understand their perspectives as their own personal perspectives. Even so, we’re subject to blind spots and biases. Here’s an opportunity for some men in particular to learn a little more self-awareness. The subtext of this lesson is that the everyday interactions that you take for granted might reveal an underlying bias, if you just know how to look. That’s a big lesson.