[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

tours of the larger social world in which moral theories evolve. Without at-
tending to the differences among human interests, temperaments, lifestyles,
and commitments, as well as to how those interests may be malformed as a
result of gender or power inequities, the egoism and group bias that the
male theorist s focus on common humanity was designed to eliminate may
slip in. So long as we avoid incorporating gender categories among the
tools for theorizing or analyzing, Calhoun has argued in various places, we
will continue running the risks of importing gender bias into our various
theories and of creating an ideology of masculinity and femininity.
That ideology informs the work of the thinkers on whom I rely princi-
pally in this book. Claudia Card has noted that both Kant and Schopen-
hauer found virtues (and presumably vices as well) gender-related.19  The
very thought of seeing women administer justice raises a laugh, says
Schopenhauer in On the Basis of Morality.  They are far less capable
than men of understanding and sticking to universal principles, although
 they surpass men in the virtues of philanthropy and lovingkindness
190 When Bad Things Happen to Other People
[Menschenliebe], for the origin of this is . . . intuitive (p. 151). Card ob-
serves that, at least with respect to women and principles, Schopenhauer
followed Kant, who had exclaimed,  I hardly believe the fair sex is
capable of principles, speculating that instead  Providence has put in
their breast kind and benevolent sensations, a fine feeling for propriety,
and a complaisant soul. 20 Within the terms of Kant s own moral theory,
the implication was that women s virtues are not moral. This appears to
have been his ideal for women, and, Card is correct in concluding, not
something he saw as a problem.
Schopenhauer s vitriolic essay  On Women mocks sexist ideals of fe-
male beauty:  Only the male intellect, clouded by the sexual impulse,
could call the undersized, narrow-shouldered, broad-hipped, and short-
legged sex the fair sex. 21 Despite the explicitly physical reference in this
passage, we can generally read Schopenhauer s attacks on women as an
indictment of femininity rather than of women, if we distinguish between
gender concepts (femininity and masculinity) as social constructions and
sex concepts (femaleness and maleness) as biological categories. Wanting
to be masculine is understandable in a world such as Schopenhauer s: one
wonders how he viewed masculine women. Men who exhibit feminine
qualities might well be doubly despised by Schopenhauer, in part for hav-
ing those qualities and in part for having betrayed their masculine gender
privilege to do so. This supposition sits well with Bryan Magee s assess-
ment of Schopenhauer s own erotic life, specifically the struggle to come
to terms with his homosexual impulses.22 Further, Schopenhauer s revul-
sion to men who have sex with one another may have something to do
with his contempt for femininity.
Kant s misogyny, it should be pointed out in fairness to Schopenhauer,
was no less pointed. At the age of forty, Kant took up the topic of women
in a work seldom read by moral philosophers and in a chapter announc-
ing itself as on  the interrelations of the sexes.  Women will avoid the
wicked not because it is unright, but because it is ugly, he observes, after
remarking that  the virtue of a woman is a beautiful virtue and  that of
the male sex should be a noble virtue (OFBS, p. 81). Traits identified
here as women s virtues were identified in the previous chapter of the
same work as merely  adoptive virtues and contrasted there with gen-
uine virtues.  Adoptive virtues are not based on principle, although they
Outlaw Emotions 191
can lead to (outwardly) right actions. Kant s view was that someone with
 adoptive virtues, such as sympathy and complaisance, is goodhearted,
but that only someone who is virtuous on principle  is a righteous per-
son (OFBS, p. 61). Card asserts that Kant s ideals for women are those
we might expect for domestic pets.
The misogyny of Nietzsche and Freud has received a great deal more
attention than Kant s. The sad irony that emerges here is that the thinkers
I credit for having been marvelously sensitive to the moral significance of
human suffering were committed in some real sense to perpetuating the
suffering of roughly half the human race. In the course of examining how
women have learned to respond to powerlessness, recent scholarship has
highlighted the conceptual similarity of women, Jews, and gay men  for
example, Susan Sontag s classic essay on camp (linking the social status of
gay men and Jews)23 and Marjorie Garber s account of this conceptual
identification in Vested Interests.24 If there is, in fact, something danger-
ous or diabolical about outlaw emotions, it follows that we should watch
women and Jews carefully, and gay men as well.
How bad are outlaw emotions? Not very, perhaps. Claudia Card asks,
 Feminist thinkers are understandably reluctant to address publicly
women s reputation for lying, cunning, deceit, and manipulation. But are
these vices, one may ask, if they are needed for self-defense? (The Unnat-
ural Lottery, p. 53) Card, Calhoun, Jaggar, and others working in the field
of feminist ethics challenge how and by whom the good gets defined.
Their work can be seen as an illumination of the ressentiment at work in
setting orthodox emotions off from outlaw ones. Women might reason-
ably find themselves bitter at a moral theory or system that describes de-
ceitfulness and gossip in distaff terms. Lynne McFall has emphasized the
rationality of bitterness, another outlaw emotion. McFall has argued that
bitterness may be a justified response to harms and losses caused by hu-
man failings (wickedness, moral stupidity, weakness, or indifference) 
what we think of as avoidable harms and losses, ones which are more bit-
ter and therefore harder to bear. McFall s provocative essay makes the
most sense in the context of a patriarchal system of domination of women
(though she does not specify this context). McFall contends that one can-
not  come to terms with unrepentant brutality when there is no remorse.
Acceptance of one s fate as a subjugated person is more than we can ask,
192 When Bad Things Happen to Other People
and forgiveness is inappropriate and self-destructive. As responses to un-
deserved suffering, forgiveness and active bitterness occupy opposite ends
of the continuum. Claiming that bitterness is a morally appropriate atti-
tude is just as reasonable as claiming that it can be morally acceptable to
take pleasure in the injuries of other people.
What thinkers such as Jaggar, Card, and McFall help us to understand
is that the philosophical canon underlying our moral lives amounts to a
system of domination. This is not the sort of domination I referred to in my
discussion of suffering under rules; this is a kind of domination that denies
women their identities as full moral agents. Within a hierarchical society,
those norms and values which are taken to define what is characteristically
human tend to serve the interest of the dominant group. These dominant
values are implicit in responses taken to be precultural or so-called gut
responses. But people do not always experience conventionally acceptable
emotions: they may feel satisfaction rather than embarrassment when their
leaders make foolish mistakes; they may feel revulsion toward socially
sanctioned ways of privileging men. They may feel outlaw emotions.
Claiming or simply noting that an emotion is immoral can mislead us
into unreflective agreement. Male moralists have condemned Schaden-
freude without commenting on the extent to which such condemnation is
supported or generally approved. Feminist ethicists have usefully re- [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]