@brodehouse said:
@nictel: "if a lot of women say something is sexist then it is"
No. This is an appeal to the majority. Things are what they are based on the evidence observed, not based on popular opinion. We say the sky is blue because it has the properties that we call 'blue', not because a lot of people agree it is blue. The sky will remain blue independent of what people think, until either the sky or the definition of blue changes.
Now you transfer this into the idea that in order to understand what racism or sexism is, and to be able to identify it, it is necessary to have experienced racism or sexism first hand. This is not true for a number of reasons. First of all is humanity has empathy; we can understand something through imagination of experience. You are capable of recognizing racism or sexism even without being victimized by it, independent of your own 'experience'. You are also capable of recognizing when things are not sexism, or not racism, independent of your own experience, by looking at the evidence. You are wrong in thinking that because enough people agree, or enough people of the proper gender, that therefore it must be true. Things are true based on their evidence, not people's opinion. This is the core principle of rationalism. Sexism exists where one gender is treated differently, not where women (or men) say it does.
Your example of "when talking about nuclear fission we should talk to scientists rather than plumbers". This says that knowledge and understanding is preferable, and this is true (though don't fall into the fallacy of believing the scientist is right in her argument because the plumber is not a scientist, this is an appeal to authority). However, when we're talking about gender equality, women do not have a monopoly on knowledge and understanding as you so believe. That you are willing to throw away critical thinking in favor of taking whatever a woman says as truth is fine for you, but do not place that on other men, or other whites, or other straights. I will judge sexism by the definition of sexism and the evidence presented in any situation, not by the gospel of one gender. And I do not appreciate being ignored because of my gender, race or orientation. It does not become okay because society says it is.
It is a very different thing to say 'we should get a female opinion on this' than to say 'opinions from those other than female do not matter.' The reason we might want to have a scientist in a argument or a woman in a discussion on gender equality is twofold. One is that they are more likely to give a fuller argument in their particular field - the scientist on fission and the woman on female inequality - due to more experience on the topic, which would hopefully touch on more facets of the issue and this give a fuller examination of the problem. The other is that any assertions made by those people are more credible due to their experience, as after all not every statement can be backed up with perfect and complete evidence, especially on a topic so nebulous and wide-reaching as gender equality.
None of this is absolute in any way - at no point have I said that a woman or a scientist would definitely be better in the debate than a man or a layperson, and crucially at no point have I said that the arguments put forward are lessened or invalidated by their gender or experience as this would, of course, be an ad hominem attack. And also, the experience of the debaters should be well-rounded - while the nuclear fission debate would be enriched by a scientist present, this would only enrich discussion of matters relating to the actual science of the issue. Other facets of the debate, such as the logistics of mining and enrichment of the uranium needed for the reactors or the storage of potentially hazardous long half-life nuclear waste may well be outside of the scientists area of expertise. Similarly, while I think that having a woman present in a debate on gender, I think the exact same of having a man present, and if there were a debate where the debaters where overwhelmingly female, I would think that highlighting the male opinions would be of value to the debate. But this is the internet, and it's video games, so such discussions are inevitably few and far-between.
While yes, arguments should be judged entirely independently of the arguer, this is only possible with idealised, perfect debaters on either side who can cover every facet of a topic and verify everything with solid evidence. When this is not possible - which of course it never is - the imperfections in the debater unfortunately become part of the debate. This does not the make the debate any less valid, but it does mean that the debate is not necessarily complete.
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