To clarify what this thread is about, I put "feminist" in quotation marks because I do not identify
with the label. But I favor gender equality as do many mainstream feminists. Heckfire, I even
took a test which classified me as a feminist. (Shocker, eh?)
So why eschew the label?
Tis because I see feminism as a movement embodying some general (with some diversity) traits.
Feminism:
- Focuses on females.
Sure, sure, some feminists also address disadvantages visited upon men.
But by & large, it's about the females. I noticed that they were very
silent about the military draft of men.
- Tends to dismiss the MRM (men's rights movement) as reactionary,
anti-feminism, whiny, or a subset of feminism (since their approach to
gender equality would fix all men's problems too).
- Advocates increased government authority. Affirmative action was a
fine tool for women, but it legalized active discrimination against men.
- Tolerates hostility in its own ranks against males. All gender inequity
is chalked up to "patriarchy", ie, it's the man's fault.
- Sees women as victims, failing to recognize & use the power they already have.
- Polarizes the abortion debate, making anti-abortion advocates out to be
anti-woman. I'm pro-abortion, but see this as a question of when life & attendant
civil rights begin. The whole "war on woman" campaign seems dishonest & divisive.
Is anyone else here a "non" (non-feminist) despite sympathy for the cause?
Why?
Note:
Don't take my generalities too far. I only see them as slight group tendencies.
Moreover, I don't say my perspective is THE TRUTH or any such foolishness.
I merely explain what I see, how I react, & what I believe.
Rules for this thread:
- Be civil to each other. After all, we're just disagreeing about important things.
- Go ahead & generalize, but be careful about over-generalizing.
- It focuses on females.
Sure, sure, some feminists also address disadvantages visited upon men.
But by & large, it's about the females. I noticed that they were very
silent about the military draft of men.
- It tends to dismiss the MRM (men's rights movement) as reactionary...
What's good for the goose has, historically, not been good enough for the gander. That's what feminism is about, to me. To turn feminism, then, also towards the goose's needs would be no longer feminism but simple egalitarianism.
I don't call myself feminist because I'm more egalitarian.
What's good for the goose has, historically, not been good enough for the gander. That's what feminism is about, to me. To turn feminism, then, also towards the goose's needs would be no longer feminism but simple egalitarianism.
I don't call myself feminist because I'm more egalitarian.
That is not true. Feminists where on the front lines protesting the draft during the Vietnam Fiasco
- It tends to dismiss the MRM (men's rights movement) as reactionary,
anti-feminism, whiny, or a subset of feminism (since their approach to
gender equality would fix all men's problems too)
- It polarizes the abortion debate, making anti-abortion advocates out to be
anti-woman. I'm pro-abortion, but see this as a question of when life & attendant
civil rights begin. The whole "war on woman" campaign seems dishonest & divisive.
To clarify what this thread is about, I put "feminist" in quotation marks because I do not identify
with the label. But I favor gender equality as do many mainstream feminists.
OK..... So you're not a feminist, but I couldn't read all that drivvel beneath. Honestly, TLDR.
I can't be a feminist because I'm an egalitarian.
Egalitarians would never want a cliquish separatist thread such as the Fems have, because Eggies would want to include all peoples viewpoints in any discussion or debate.
To clarify what this thread is about, I put "feminist" in quotation marks because I do not identify
with the label. But I favor gender equality as do many mainstream feminists. Heckfire, I even
took a test which classified me as a feminist. (Shocker, eh?)
So why eschew the label?
Tis because I see feminism as a movement embodying some general (with some diversity) traits.
Feminism:
- Focuses on females.
Sure, sure, some feminists also address disadvantages visited upon men.
But by & large, it's about the females. I noticed that they were very
silent about the military draft of men.
- Tends to dismiss the MRM (men's rights movement) as reactionary,
anti-feminism, whiny, or a subset of feminism (since their approach to
gender equality would fix all men's problems too).
- Advocates increased government authority. Affirmative action was a
fine tool for women, but it legalized active discrimination against men.
- Tolerates hostility in its own ranks against males. All gender inequity
is chalked up to "patriarchy", ie, it's the man's fault.
- Sees women as victims, failing to recognize & use the power they already have.
- Polarizes the abortion debate, making anti-abortion advocates out to be
anti-woman. I'm pro-abortion, but see this as a question of when life & attendant
civil rights begin. The whole "war on woman" campaign seems dishonest & divisive.
Is anyone else here a "non" (non-feminist) despite sympathy for the cause?
Why?
Note:
Don't take my generalities too far. I only see them as slight group tendencies.
Moreover, I don't say my perspective is THE TRUTH or any such foolishness.
I merely explain what I see, how I react, & what I believe.
Rules for this thread:
- Be civil to each other. After all, we're just disagreeing about important things.
- Go ahead & generalize, but be careful about over-generalizing.
I remember it differently.
A low draft number (34) had me paying close attention to public discourse on the subject.
Thank heavens that old commie, Nixon, ended the draft just before I moved to Canuckistan!
Because the loudest voices in that movement tend to be....
See my notes. I don't deny diversity in the movement, & even know some libertarian feminists.
But I do see an authoritarian tendency.
And remember....this is not about "true".
I think you have a misunderstanding of the term "patriarchy".
No, I think I grok its use by feminists even better than they.
It's obviously not cuz I'm intelligent or learned, but because I'm an outsider looking in, ie, a teensy bit more impartiality.
Thanx!
How dull would this place be if we didn't dare to bare our illusions, delusions,
mistakes, glitches, misconceptions, fears, faults, values & bone headed beliefs?
OK..... So you're not a feminist, but I couldn't read all that drivvel beneath. Honestly, TLDR.
I can't be a feminist because I'm an egalitarian.
Egalitarians would never want a cliquish separatist thread such as the Fems have, because Eggies would want to include all peoples viewpoints in any discussion or debate.
I'm neither a feminist nor an MRA. I try to stay away from groups that create an "us against them" attitude, especially if those groups' message is supposedly about equality because I think it forces one to choose a side and people just end up defending their "side" instead of advancing equality.
Also, I think both groups, feminism and MRA, have an almost dogmatic approach to their ideologies and even a little bit of a gang mentality. An example of this is the patriarchy from feminists and just feminists from the MRAs. They're almost like the devil or some demon is to Christianity, some unseen evil force that possesses people to do evil. The theme seems to be that all the bad stuff in society happens because the patriarchy or man-hating feminists.
Also relating to the dogma aspect of them, and I've seen this more on the feminist side, is that you are either with them or against them. It's not enough to support their causes, you have to profess loyalty to the brand, so to speak.
The dogma aspect itself is enough for me to know it's not for me. I would rather focus on true equality than defending my "gang's" turf.
I remember it differently.
A low draft number (34) had me paying close attention to public discourse on the subject.
Thank heavens that old commie, Nixon, ended the draft just before I moved to Canuckistan!
And you are probably being very selective in your memory. I have plenty of material by Second-Wave Feminists like Angela Davis and Robin Morgan denouncing the draft.
The squeaky wheels are always defining movements for us all, eh.
They tend to do that in the public consciousness. So why are the "moderate" MRA's so silent?
No, I think I grok its use by feminists even better than they.
It's obviously not cuz I'm intelligent or learned, but because I'm an outsider looking in, ie, a teensy bit more impartiality.
When we are speaking about the patriarchy we are not "blaming men" or saying "it's the man's fault", we are addressing a system of control i.e The Man as in the power elite.
And you are probably being very selective in your memory. I have plenty of material by Second-Wave Feminists like Angela Davis and Robin Morgan denouncing the draft.
I notice from your age that memory of the era isn't even possible. So now that I've mocked your youth....I never said that no feminist opposed the draft. I only claim that they were largely silent. I don't fault them for this...after all, men are not their focus. But this singularly male plight meant that I looked elsewhere for anti-draft advocacy.
They tend to do that in the public consciousness. So why are the "moderate" MRA's so silent?
I don't know. I don't identify with that movement.
When we are speaking about the patriarchy we are not "blaming men" or saying "it's the man's fault", we are addressing a system of control i.e The Man as in the power elite.
I acknowledge your intent in using the word. But I still dislike the term because of anti-male connotations. However, I use "The Man" to describe governmental oppressors too. Inconsistent? Could be. But "The Man" has a jocular quality.
I notice from your age that memory of the era isn't even possible. So now that I've mocked your youth....I never said that no feminist opposed the draft. I only claim that they were largely silent. I don't fault them for this...after all, men are not their focus. But this singularly male plight meant that I looked elsewhere for anti-draft advocacy.
Just because I am young does not mean I have not studied that period of history (most of the feminists I admire were active then), it might even give me a more objective view of it. Angela Davis and Robin Morgan were two of loudest voices in the anti-draft movement as well as in feminism. I can list hundreds of prominent feminists that worked tirelessly to end the draft.
I acknowledge your intent in using the word. But I still dislike the term because of anti-male connotations. However, I use "The Man" to describe governmental oppressors too. Inconsistent? Could be. But "The Man" has a jocular quality.
Similar in that I'm an atheist as a result of being a rationalist, I'm a feminist as a result of being a humanist. However, for the same reason I don't call myself an atheist in regular conversation, I also wouldn't call myself a feminist; the reason being that the terms "atheist" and "feminist" are so weighted with historical baggage, and have such widely varied interpretations and connotations, that they are essentially useless as labels.
Fundamentally, I'm for equality and egalitarianism. Also, fundamentally, I'm for personal responsiblity, unbiased fairness and empathy, and an absence of hypocrisy. The combination of these attributes often renders popular labels as useless and inapplicable.
Just because I am young does not mean I have not studied that period of history (most of the feminists I admire were active then), it might even give me a more objective view of it. Angela Davis and Robin Morgan were two of loudest voices in the anti-draft movement as well as in feminism. I can list hundreds of prominent feminists that worked tirelessly to end the draft.
My take on this history is what I saw.
Yours is what you read about it.
They're equally valid, with advantages & disadvantages.
It occurs to me that you're reading works of the period, but those might not be prominent in the media or public discourse, which is what I experienced. I've no doubt that you can find feminist writings which are anti-draft, but if they were relatively obscure, does that define the movement? I saw the public face of feminism, & that defines the movement far more for me than arcane literature.
Well it is rooted in the ancient patriarchal system of male dominance and female subservience and it continues to be based on that model.
Okay, here's the rest of my response to that post from the other thread, with some redundant aspects removed because they're addressed here. I've put it in a spoiler-box so if can be ignored if we just want to move on. There's also a response to the OP.
The patriarchy in the US may not be as bad as it is in Japan, but it's still patriarchy. After all, as bad as it is in Japan, it's still not as bad as in Saudi Arabia.
Maybe not in your area, but clearly you haven't seen what I've seen.
Slights due to language can offend, but hardly rise to the level of oppression. But if you do give them this weight, then consider that "patriarchy" is about how male dominance is the problem. There are also plenty of specifically male oriented insults in the language.
And all of them, or at least all the ones I've ever heard, are about the feminine being weak. ...okay, in the hour it took to write this response, I've managed to think of one male-oriented insult that's not about the feminine being weak: the use of slang terms for penis as synonyms for inconsiderate and/or rude people. That's still using penis to refer to something undesirable, but that's what we call "sex-negative", which is an issue that has LOTS of overlap with feminism, but not inherently tied to the movement.
And, as always, it's just one thing of many. That's how cultural oppression works: it's NEVER just one thing doing all the work; it's an aggregate of lots of subtle things that, on their own, have no power, but when brought together, bring about problems.
A culture is made up of many elements working together, with varying degrees of influence and visibility; cultural problems are likewise sourced from many elements working together, which would have no power on their own.
Now you're mixing in the "white privilege" discussion. The existence of problems does not mean that the term "patriarchy" is appropriate.
A term only becomes meaningless when it takes on dozens of contradictory meanings. Being used a lot does not inherently make it meaningless, especially when new definitions are not inherently contradictory to the old ones.
As for the stuff in the OP:
Feminism:
- Focuses on females.
Sure, sure, some feminists also address disadvantages visited upon men.
But by & large, it's about the females. I noticed that they were very
silent about the military draft of men.
The draft hasn't been an issue in decades, so that doesn't surprise me. (Unless it got reinstated without my knowledge.)
The focus is on females, because the gender-based problems that women have to face far exceed the gender-based problems that men have to face. But two feminists I follow (Anita Sarkeesian and Laci Green) frequently address the gender-based problems men have to deal with.
As a personal example: when I was about 9, I discovered Sailor Moon, and became an instant fan. Not because of scantily-clad girls and the occasional panty-shot, but because I relate to those characters on a deeply personal level. IOW, I didn't want to bang them, I wanted to be them. But I had to pretend I hated the show while on the schoolyard, because of the harassment I was afraid of getting (and absolutely would have gotten).
I see a similar situation today in the Brony community(for those who don't know, a Brony is an adult male who is a fan of the new My Little Pony... no, while I think it's a quality show, in fact one of a few diamonds in a sea of festering garbage that is US television, I'm not a Brony myself): a lot of the time, they're stressing that they should be able to enjoy a show primarily marketed and designed for little girls without fear.
- Tends to dismiss the MRM (men's rights movement) as reactionary,
anti-feminism, whiny, or a subset of feminism (since their approach to
gender equality would fix all men's problems too).
The MRM is still young. Perhaps it will someday change to be something worth taking seriously.
I'm not against the idea of such a movement, but my observations of the MRM is that it's just that: anti-feminist and whiny at best, and outright misogynistic in its worse forms (that is, from the group who founded the term and concept of "Men's Rights' Movement": they engage in blatant pedestal sexism).
Sure, that might not reflect the majority of MRAs, but the thing is, nobody's ever directed me to an MRA or MRM group that doesn't primarily whine about feminism instead of actually focusing on real issues. (...heck, nobody's ever directed me to an MRA period.)
- Advocates increased government authority. Affirmative action was a
fine tool for women, but it legalized active discrimination against men.
Well I know that you, as a libertarian, are against high governmental authority, so I'd call that political bias. ^_^ (I kid. Having political bias is no bad thing.)
I've never seen such an advocacy, but it does make sense that it would be common, since many feminists are also socially, economically, and politically modern liberals, or at least leaning in that direction. (However, I should point out that one of the self-identified feminists I follow, Lewis "Linkara" Lovhaug, is also a fiscal conservative-capitalist who's very much against higher governmental authority).
Thing is, the points where men are discriminated against in law situations generally have to do with child custody and care. If earlier forms of feminism advocated for that discrimination, then that would have been a serious ball-drop, since it only reinforces the very thing feminists are trying to fight against. (To be honest, I haven't actively studied the detailed history of the movement, since I was under the impression that the details aren't particularly relevant to contemporary issues... and apparently I was mistaken.)
But I don't think I can name a single movement that was absolutely consistent in its activism, where everything it did perfectly reinforced its goals.
- Tolerates hostility in its own ranks against males. All gender inequity
is chalked up to "patriarchy", ie, it's the man's fault.
I've explained how that's wrong, in detail, over and over again...
It's you who says calling it patriarchy is the same as calling it man's fault. When feminists use the term, that's not AT ALL what we mean. I'll allow that it has certain connotations for you, personally, so I'll try to avoid using the term when talking to you, specifically (as I've tried in my response to this OP), but don't make my mistake of thinking that your personal connotations for a word represent the accepted connotations of the group using it.
Any observant feminist would fully understand that patriarchy, whether we in the US live in one or not, is supported and reinforced by both men and women, and so cannot be placed solely at the fault of either gender.
- Sees women as victims, failing to recognize & use the power they already have.
Hardly. The feminist movement is inherently using the power women have. We're fully aware that things have been improving over time, and even now I believe we're ultimately winning despite some recent heavy losses.
But we also recognize that we still have work to do. Having power in some areas doesn't mean there's no victimization at all. Don't forget that in highly sexist time periods of recent history, there were Queens, and that the extremely misogynistic Greeks and Romans still revered Goddesses.
Besides, "power" is useless if nobody's recipient to it. What good is the power to speak freely if nobody's listening? What good is the law if nobody's enforcing it?
- Polarizes the abortion debate, making anti-abortion advocates out to be
anti-woman. I'm pro-abortion, but see this as a question of when life & attendant
civil rights begin. The whole "war on woman" campaign seems dishonest & divisive.
The idea is that women should have a choice with what to do with their own bodies, and that it shouldn't be the business of men or the law. (Considering that only biological women can get pregnant, I think this is one issue where being 99.9% female-centric is appropriate; but it's an exception.)
I don't think all anti-abortion activists are inherently "anti-woman" (especially since a lot of them are women themselves), but the sentiment that women shouldn't be able to have a legal choice in what to do with their bodies (which can be distinguished from the question of when life begins) IS anti-woman.
However, I will admit that this is one topic that I don't have a lot of knowledge or experience about. I'm also in favor of legalizing abortion, even if I personally believe its ethically wrong after the first trimester (which is roughly when I believe the life has its own autonomy), but I don't think much on that subject; my active feminism is directed elsewhere, primarily in gamer culture where it's badly needed. The fact that someone took the time to make a flash game (not an easy task) about beating up Anita Sarkeesian, who chose to challenge the casual sexism in games, is proof of that IMO. (Though the game was removed.)
Don't take my generalities too far. I only see them as slight group tendencies.
Moreover, I don't say my perspective is THE TRUTH or any such foolishness.
I merely explain what I see, how I react, & what I believe.
Yeah, that reminds me of my friend's definition. I used to share some of the misconceptions we see in this thread because I grew up in a conservative city in Canada. That was of course before I knew anything at all about it - I was basing my opinion on a vague notion of the prefixes "fem" and "patri-", as well as a cultural backdrop that was very hostile to the movement. I'd been exposed to all the typical hairy armpit angry man hater stereotypes, but never learned a single thing about feminism in school, except the names of the famous five Canadian suffragetes. (Although that particular history lesson - the only one in twelve years that addressed any history of particular significance to women at all - was not associated with feminism in class)
So anyway, my feminist friend invited me to the feminist book store and I told her I wasn't into that man hating stuff. Then she said "look, if you're a woman and you think that's probably a good thing, then you're a feminist".
Then POOF, I was corrected, just like that. I got some great books from that store - not easy books to find anywhere else. When God Was a Woman, Daughters of Copper Woman, a book about historical female rebels that were never mentioned in school, a couple wicked erotica compilations... All sorts.
Of course after learning a bit about feminism and women's history, my ignorant former opinions were rather embarrassing. But at least I was willing to be educated, unlike many who maintain those views without ever having read a single feminist essay, book or blog post.
