I think you’re right to call it pseudo-feminism. Consider that the rendition of Paula Loyd as an innocent, helpless victim whose death was avenged by a macho knight in shining armor…escapes notice as a misogynist tale that denigrates and disempowers women. Not to mention that the simple dichotomy required by Phyllis cannot work, because at the very minimum there were three actors here, and two of them are killers, both men, but on opposing sides.

Phyllis was just desperate for any angle, so she took the “yeah I bet you beat your wife” argument, as an attempt to personally discredit, but without any facts to support “her.’

The desperation with which some have searched for a gender angle, like Phyllis who chooses to obsess with genitalia (confusing sex with gender, but what the heck, Phyllis is obviously new at this game). However, not all genitalia interest Phyllis, right? While claiming that I use only the active tense with Salam, that he was murdered…which set of genitals does “she” conveniently overlook? Those of the very murderer himself, Ayala’s. Salam was a man, killed by a man — and now suddenly “her” miserable little thesis falls to ruin.

Also lying in ruin, Phyllis’ notion of the active tense: “she” believes that there is a difference between “was murdered” (Salam) and “was attacked” (Loyd). Perhaps “she,” or “her” legally responsible guardian, would care to elaborate on the phony distinction that is being imagined here?

Ayala, presumably, is gender neutral — he is an American after all, far above problems of gender inequality, such as the rampant rate of sexual harassment and rape in the U.S. armed forces, and even the murder of female US soldiers by male soldiers, that simply do not interest the Phyllises.

No, instead, let’s focus on the Afghan man, that dark, dirty, little woman-hating monster who dared to raise his hand against one of our white women — and remember, he has a cock!

“his brutal attack _mirrors perfectly_ the violence that has been perpetrated upon Afghan women for centuries”

Those are Phyllis’ words, expert on the vast history of Afghan cultures going back centuries. The lovely thing about her statement is its mirroring perfectly the ethnocentrism and nationalist chauvinism of the bigot. Salam now stands for all men in Afghanistan, and we know everything about Salam: he is an Afghan man, hence, he must hate women. The fact that colonialism typically feminizes all of its objects is unknown to Phyllis, this alleged “woman” who thinks she is speaking for women’s rights. Then, of course, I am a right wing left winger — it all makes sense, in some alternate dimension.

Sorry, I have to go now, I have a wife to beat.

That anyone can think I said Loyd “deserved” to die, and deserved to die because she was a woman, speaks volumes of how political motivations can impinge on elementary reading and comprehension skills. No one can deny that I write in some of the most straightforward language that you will find coming from any academic. Any misunderstandings, confusions, and misconstruals, in this case as in most others, tend to be deliberate, studied misunderstandings.

In fact, my comments have been restricted to the colonizer-colonized relationship as a whole, while disputing the mendacious, convenient trope of “women’s rights” that is selectively applied to Afghan women.

Arwen’s point is an excellent one, but unfortunately the likes of the Phyllises of the situation will not learn. Instead, Phyllis motive seems to be to fire up those who might hate the women’s rights movement as a whole, which makes her far more dangerous than any Salam.

As for the women in my department, Phyllis’ commentary is grotesque, vulgar, shameful, baseless and extremely disrespectful towards them. If that is Phyllis’ attempt at feminism, her act is revealed as a shallow ploy. Personally, I doubt whether “Phyllis” is even a woman, but rather someone claiming to write as one.

Your attempt at reading between the lines is somewhere between fantasy and illiteracy. Your one-sided concern for women’s rights, which applies only to Afghan women and not American women, does not entitle you to speak as if you might be a feminist, but it does validate your message as another example of imperialist prose.

Your attempt to personalize the issue by speaking of an ex-wife is another example of your idiocy. I have no ex-wife, and the woman who has been my wife for 15 years is right here and will gladly disabuse you of your willful ignorance on the matter of my stance regarding women’s rights. You had to go personal however, that I understand, because your pathetic vilification is all you have in the absence of credible substantiation or logic.

You are a fool and deserve no further comment.

An impressive rejoinder – especially so because you manage to respond to any number of things that I didn’t say. I did not characterize Ms. Loyd as either “innocent” or “beautiful”. In fact, the only person who has made the implication that Ms. Loyd’s tragedy hinges on her attractiveness is you. Simulatneously, you manage to ignore the central issue – Max’s seeming willingness to crawl over a pile of women’s corpses to, purely by coincidence, decry the (admittedly illegal and wrongful) killing of one predatory, bestial murderer.

The issue I’m raising here is not between the value of Loyd’s and Salem’s lives, but rather Max’s transparent devaluation of women’s lives in general. If this upsets you, take it up with him, not me: his very choice of title for this article (“Teaching Gender Equality…Using Gunshots to the Heada”) invokes the most shameful rhetoric of the right-wing “men’s movement” in the US and Canada. Perhaps Max has an axe to grind against an ex-wife; not my problem, but one would hope that he wouldn’t feel it necessary to take up arms against all Afgan women in solidarity.

His devaluation of women’s bodies is also transparent in his choice of words: Salem was “murdered” by “foreign occupiers.” Max has no problem using active tense when the aggrieved party has male genitalia. But in describing Salem’s act (and, let us be clear, his brutal attack _mirrors perfectly_ the violence that has been perpetrated upon Afghan women for centuries), suddenly Max loses his descriptive powers. Ms. Loyd “was attacked”, and (just happened to be?) “set on fire”, and then “died”, perhaps of a broken heart, “two months later,” as if that somehow ameliorates the brutality of the crime, rather than aggravating it.

I am perfectly fine with Max taking up arms against American imperialism. But if he’s willing to condones violence against women o make his point I’m going to label him appropriately: as a misogynist.

To pretend that the murder of Loyd’s killer was simply a justified act of revenge for the killing of an “innocent, beautiful” woman not only denies her position as a soldier in an occupying military force, but it reduces her to nothing more than an aesthetically pleasing bystander who happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. Wouldn’t you say that is a “typical expression of the misogyny inherent in Western culture?”

Paula Loyd was killed while serving in an occupying army. Her killer, Abdul Salam, was murdered while wearing handcuffs in U.S. military detention. Neither death is acceptable, but there is great gap between these two deaths – and you are choosing not to see it, apparently because Paula was a woman (and possibly because you believe she was an “uppity one,” according to your creepy and unsubstantiated accusation, above).

I fail to see how Max is a misogynist and you are not.

None of this excuses the murder of her murderer, of course. But if Max is going to cry crocodile tears over the oppressed, it’s telling that he (predictably) only has them available for victims with penises.

(1) Who says I need to make an academic mark?
(2) Who says that everything done by someone who works as an academic is meant to be for the purpose of academic advancement? I have known colleagues who volunteered at the SPCA, or did part time support work for Greenpeace. They do not put those things on their CVs as if they were meant as academic achievements. This blog is even specifically anti-academic, so the conclusion drawn by fools such as Bob Bateman above is even less warranted, and more ridiculous.
(3) Who says that one can use a blog for the purposes of academic promotion? If that were true, and if it were so simple, ALL academics would be blogging — more than that, they would ONLY be blogging.

Bateman doesn’t even know the basics of academia, and he wants to come here and make such foolish assertions. Anything for an ad hominem attack, eh Bob?

Some academic he is.

So, everyone, let’s see the teaching awards, research grants, scholarships, fellowships, tenure track positions, service work, number of different courses, summa cum laude honours degree, books and edited volumes published with excellent reviews, awards for merit, early tenure, journal articles, and research networks that Bob the Adjunct wants to boast about. His silence will speak volumes.

And in the meantime Bob, you can feel free to kiss my tenured ass.