James Chartrand, Woman Blogger: So What?

When my parents were deliberating over baby names, Alexandra and Samantha emerged as the top two contenders. It wasn't just about how they sounded, or their meaning according to the baby book. It was about the nicknames: Alex and Sam. Notice something in common? Like the fact that both are gender-neutral -- or that, in all honesty, people are more likely to guess someone called Sam or Alex is male?

This is no coincidence. My mother, all too familiar with sex discrimination in the corporate world, was thinking ahead to how potential employers would react to the name splashed across the top of my resume. She wanted to make sure I wouldn't be tossed aside from the outset due to (conscious or unconscious) sexism. So I've always been intrigued by the way the name makes the wo/man -- which drew me to the plight of the writer pen-named James Chartrand, who reveals in a Copyblogger post yesterday that "he" is really a "she" who adopted the pseudonym to get better work and more respect.

Chartrand paints a gray picture: single mother stuck turning to welfare, making a buck-fifty for articles -- with a free side of condescension and disrespect. Then she became James, and all that changed.

Lest you think this was just because her writing and business savvy improved, Chartrand points out that, for a while, she alternated between using her real name and pen name. The disparity in treatment made her decide to join the man's world once and for all.

Early posts in the feminist blogosphere showed mixed feelings toward the ruse, with much of their ire directed toward the societal prejudices that pushed Chartrand to take this step. Today, on The Sexist blog, Amanda Hess has little sympathy for not-James. Admitting Chartrand's choice to take on a male name might have been necessary back when she was in dire straits, Hess bashes her willingness to keep playing up to the "boy's club" once she'd become financially successful -- particularly the decision to found the chauvinistic (and often misogynistic) website "Men With Pens." According to Hess, the big problem is not just using a pseudonym; Chartrand faked an entire male persona.

Here's my take: you're accountable for your words and actions, regardless of your sex. Chartrand presented a misogynistic male persona, and, for all we know, maybe only the "male" part of that is faked. While it's hard to see woman-hating from another woman, it certainly exists; to consider it worse than the same spew coming from a man lets the guys off the hook -- yet we can't progress toward equality, respect, and safety for women without them as full partners. And don't forget, by constructing and promoting a misogynic male persona, Chartrand reinforces a bad example of toxic masculinity for men. Which is unfortunate, since men can be so much more.

Whether people take "Alex" for a female or male name, I expect to be held accountable for my writing in the same way -- I don't think it should matter if I'm known as a feminist woman or mistaken for a feminist man. Men With Pens has been criticized before as demeaning to women; neither James Chartrand nor the woman behind the pen name are anywhere close to feminist characters, obviously. Male or female, Chartrand should be held accountable for sexism and misogyny. (And lets keep some of that ire directed toward a culture that make it so lucrative to blog as a chauvinistic male.) What I take issue with is that this sudden flurry of publicity and condemnation resulted from Chartrand's sex being outed. That's just another double standard.

Photo courtesy of katutaide's Flickr photostream.