> Beatriz Gimeno, a feminist, writer, activist – and former head of one of Spain’s national equality bodies, the Women’s Institute – attacked the men for creating a female persona in their publicity for Carmen Mola books, over several years
Cross-gender pen names are an common tradition. Have they also condemned the Bronte sisters or George Elliot or George Sand for creating a different gender persona for their writing? Or JK Rowling and Andre Norton literally changing their name for marketing purposes so that their gender would not be apparent on the books cover while they were still unknown as authors?
I would argue that adopting a persona has literally nothing to do with the concepts of "punching up" or "punching down", which refer to cases of e.g. "verbal violence" of aggressive jokes and such; where the "up"/"down" determines the extent of how much "verbal violence" would be considered appropriate in that company.
However, the women I mentioned (like Bronte sisters) were not "punching up", they were not "punching" anyone in any way whatsoever, the choice of persona has no relation to some kind of aggression, they're simply choosing an arbitrary identity and that's it, there's not the slightest moral concern about this act, it's a well-established (and frequently used) writer's right to choose a pen name or persona and there's not the slightest thing wrong about that, no matter which group is adopting which persona - and the same applies for those three writers choosing their pen name. "Punching up" is considered less aggressive than "punching down", but adopting a persona is not even on the same scale, there's zero aggression about that.
On the other hand, attacking writers for their choice of pen name is punching. In this case it is the less-bad version because it is "punching up", but it is a form of bullying; a much more aggressive act than what those three writers have done.
Who were armed by these guys' choice of pen name? Who got punch? What "privilege" was taken from whom?
Either their writing was great and would have been successful regardless, so it doesn't matter. Or they were successful only because their pen name was a woman's name, and then women have more privilege when it comes to publishing.
This line of criticism frames it as if the Carmen Mola public persona is unacceptably dishonest compared to the acceptably dishonest fake public persona called Beatriz Gimeno.
I don't mean to throw shade, it's simply the inescapable nature of cultivating a public image. Mola may be fiction, Gimeno is "based on a true story" fiction. (And interestingly enough, pen names are a time honored literary tradition.)
So when I see statements like the one you quote, my brain immediately interprets it as deflection. After a bit of turning it over in my head, I expect it's not a purposeful deflection but still find it worthwhile to make explicit. It leads us to the question: to whom and for what reason(s) is it important I see the distinction as meaningful?
The Trump administration could do much more to damage Americans’ health than just repeal the Affordable Care Act and leave people without access to hospitals and medications.
"It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest" - Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith
I tend to think of self-interest being equivalent to selfishness. Your point makes me wonder if self-interest is not equivalent to selfishness, at least to Economists.
Well, what you quote is true, but I think a lot of discussion stems from focusing on the wrong question, namely "does selfishness lead to better outcomes" as opposed to when it does, and when it does not.
Too many people seem to approach economy as an ideology rather than a complex system in which a given approach produces good results here and bad results there, and everything should be subject to optimization and careful design.
> Too many people seem to approach economy as an ideology rather than a complex system
Few of these people have any decision-making authority. This mass ignorance of economics does occasionally bubble up on the policy side. But it is generally, at least in the United States, contained by more knowledgeable (and influential) parties.
Nobody thinks that selfish leads to "better" outcome.
They believe that if everyone acts selfishly, the outcome is still pretty darn good (but of course could be improved if nobody committed crimes or something)
Again, saying that "the outcome is pretty darn good, therefore yay capitalism" is missing the crucial question - when do the good parts happen, when do the bad parts happen, and how to preserve the former while getting rid of the latter.
Some companies have used it for language tutoring... What this change will do is chop off those offering free services at the knees and drive the premium services to Twilio, etc.
Google's a business. Why does it have the responsibility to pickup the tab for these businesses?
Aside from the fact that education has second order effects that powerfully benefit humanity as whole, good will is a boon for companies. The cost of running hangouts (which is essentially P2P) is a rounding error for Google. Why shut down those who are literally providing education for free?
Every time Google does something like this, it becomes a bit less beloved by consumers, loses a bit more of that halo it had in the early 2000s and finds itself having a bit harder time with regulators in the future.
In Google's IPO filing:
"We aspire to make Google an institution that makes the world a better place. With our products, Google connects people and information all around the world for free. We are adding other powerful services such as Gmail that provides an efficient one gigabyte Gmail account for free. By releasing services for free, we hope to help bridge the digital divide."
"We believe that our user focus is the foundation of our success to date. We also believe that this focus is critical for the creation of long-term value. We do not intend to compromise our user focus for short-term economic gain."
