Am I offended when "a man" says "My Dear"? No... not strictly speaking.
Am I offended when that man uses it in a way that comes off as condescending...absolutely.
Listen... I'm not a shrinking violet. And as such, I feel that I deserve at least the amount of respect one peer lends to another. You might have said "It isn't Sexism, it's Science" and left it at that. You felt compelled to throw in "My Dear" as a way of saying "I'm far smarter than you are, and you ought to go back into the kitchen and find something worthwhile to spend your energy on in there".
THAT is why Misogyny continues in the world... because some Men (and I do stress SOME) are either completely unaware of how they come off when they do this sort of thing, or they reckon we (as Women) are too dull to grasp the subtlety of what they are implying.
You ought to have stated it without the "My Dear" thrown in. That is a term of endearment... which is a privilege handed from one to the other when BOTH feel that a sufficient rapport exists between them that such is warranted. Not so, in this case.
In my opinion, you're being hypersensitive. Having said that, I think your position is very well articulated in your post. You're obviously an intelligent girl, and I appreciate you taking the time to respond.
I say "my dear" to plenty of girls with whom I have no relationship or rapport--total strangers: "Let me hold that door for you, my dear.". And it's always greeted with a huge smile and thank you. Sometimes they'll even affect a southern belle accent and reply, "Why thank you, kind gentleman.". I don't know what kind of local norms and mores exist in Flint, MI, where you reside, but here in Whale's Vagina, CA, it is not necessary to already have a rapport with a girl to call her, "My dear.".
I probably would've called you "my dear" earlier in this thread, if I was 100% sure you were female. You see, I made the mistake once previously with a member here, thinking the member was a girl. The member's handle is Lynn TXP, and eventually he corrected me regarding his gender and we laughed about it. So, I've tried to be conscientious since then to not make assumptions about members' genders. And so even though I assumed you, Kristen, were the pretty girl in your avatar, I wanted to keep that assumption private, by not using a term like "my dear", until I was certain of your gender.
Listen, I don't go around calling every girl I see in the physical world or encounter online "my dear". But I thought if I had just written, "It's not sexism, it's science.", that would've come off as cold. So I threw in a term of endearment to soften it.
I hope some day we'll have a sufficient rapport in your mind, that my soft attempts to endear myself to you won't have the opposite effect.
The Wook
