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I thought feminism pushed us beyond such gross stereotyping. But as Neil suggests, stereotyping that implies "men=bad/women=good" seems to be accepted as profoundly insightful.
Men don't communicate, eh? Well, has the Dallas Morning News ever invited a man to talk about institutionalized sexism in child custody, cultural, social, and legal biases against stay-at-home fathers, the crime-and-punishment regulation of male sexuality under the Orwellian term "child support", etc.
Males shamed and oppressed into silence are not necessarily dumb. They're just weak and docile, at least for now.
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I quickly recognized that joke about the Three Wise Women alluded to at the top of the column. At my place of work this Friday, a female co-worker read it aloud to another female co-worker (she was probably reading that very same column, printed in the paper). All the women got a big kick out of it. I finally got up and walked away - then felt crappy for the next three hours. Sure, standing on its own, it may just be a harmless joke - but, not in the context of the society we live in today.
The implications of the joke and the column itself are as "inarguable" as the theories presented by the joke - that men are bull-headed, impractical, war-happy, unreasonable, and (worst of all) snobbish in spite of all our obvious inferiorities (as evidenced by our failure to help clean up after parties).
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Hawth, the fact is: The woman who told this joke and the women who laughed should all be fired or at least severely disciplined for the action. That is what would have (or at the very least, could have) been done immediately to a man.
Unfortunately, if you had tried to take action, most if not all of the men, with whom you work, would have been too spineless or stupid to stick up for you. Realize that you felt crappy for hours at least as much because of the cowardice and stupidity of the men with whom you work as because of the petty nastiness and sexist viciousness of the women with whom you work.
One of the dumbest things we do in the men's/egalitarian movement is continue to excuse men for their willful ignorance and short-sighted, self-serving cowardice.
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Realize that you felt crappy for hours at least as much because of the cowardice and stupidity of the men with whom you work as because of the petty nastiness and sexist viciousness of the women with whom you work.
Actually, that's just it - I don't consider the women in question to be nasty and sexist, and yet they found it funny anyway. That's what depressed me about it.
If only the women whom I consider nasty and sexist laughed at the joke, then I would have been unsurprised and not thought much of it.
As for cowardousness and stupidity on the men's part - well, of course, that goes for me, too. It was one of those moments where you think: "Okay, this is not a worthwhile battle, because it's just a joke, and all they're doing is reading it - not writing it - and I can understand where they wouldn't appreciate the full implication of the joke because it isn't directed at their sex, and I have a good working relationship with these women and I don't want to fight with them, and this is probably a once-in-a-blue-moon occurrence, and I just have to keep my sense of humor." But, it turned out that I couldn't.
Another reason I was depressed was just because the joke was written and published at all. Men's activists have often characterized what we're fighting against as being a war, and this is an example of enemy fire. I see enemy fire every single day when I come to this site (in the article submissions), but because I don't watch a lot of TV and I only selectively read the paper, I'm not aware of as much away from the computer (I used to be, though - and that's exactly the reason why I started avoiding most media). And, it's like you go for days or weeks with no enemy fire in one of the zones you consider more or less misandry-free, and you actually get lulled. And then it starts again - striking in an unaccustomed place, with people you would not have suspected - and you're just completely shattered.
And by the way - there were two other men working in my proximity. One of them was shown the joke by one of the women, and he dismissed the ladies as having "a weird sense of humor" (which, because I know this guy, was most likely his way of avoiding discussion of the joke itself). Another man made a blithe comment about "female chauvanists", though of course he wasn't serious.
In retrospect, I think it was I who was guilty of not supporting them.
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One more thing - I wouldn't accurately refer to those male co-workers as spineless. They're both veterans (one, I think, Korea and the other Vietnam). Maybe they're just tired of fighting battles.
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I wouldn't accurately refer to those male co-workers as spineless. They're both veterans (one, I think, Korea and the other Vietnam). Maybe they're just tired of fighting battles.
Good point, Hawth. I must remember to add "worn out" to the list of reasons why men don't fight the hatred known as feminism. Nevertheless, I think that my point is generally valid and worth stating. Quite often, men don't fight feminist hatred and lies because they feel going along with that evil will serve them personally. It's a very short-sighted, foolish and, ultimately, self-defeating belief.
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First off, don't you mean utter, or is this an intentional pun?
1. Women communicating and likening that to a wife "communicating" with a husband. The prolbem is that communication is by definition a (2) two way process. One party sends information, the other party receives and process and then sends it own. This process is repeated until something is acheived. Communiticating is NOT broadcasting. I think too many individuals think that by running their mouth they believe that they are somehow communicating. They are forgetting the most important half, receiving and processing.
2. Woman not being aggressive or warmongers. What a crock. There are many aggressive women out there. Look at the impatient and agressive drivers out there. I bet half are women. I had a WOMAN run a red light and nearly T-bone my car (on the side my toddler was on), and flip me off! Get real, being an asshole or a warmonger is likely the most equal opportunity trait amongst humans. The human species is a violent animal, and that includes women as well.
3. Women only give practical gifts. Tell me then what the hell is practical about the beanie babies my wife and mother-in-law give to each other all the time. My mother-in-law deludes (maybe on purpose) herself into thinking they are an investment, but at least my wife say she wants them because they are cute. I wonder what the author would do if her husband gave her only practical gifts like a vacuum, clothes washer, or a nice set of cleaning supplies. No need for jewelery or other things, because there is no practicality in luxury items!
4. In response to her sterotype (and the jokes) the reason the female wisemen didn't show is simple. They loaded down the caravan with practical gifts, started early, asked directions all the right stuff. But then the camel broke down and they didn't have a man around to fix it!
PS, only an idiot doen't ask direction when they are lost or in question. Did anyone catch the show The Great Race on tv? When stuck in foriegn lands, EVERYONE was asking for directions. But is suppose the producers only picked the execptions to the rules.
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I wonder what the author would do if her husband gave her only practical gifts like a vacuum, clothes washer, or a nice set of cleaning supplies.
Well, I can tell you what one particular woman would do. A few years ago, my uncle bought my aunt a new set of pots and pans for Christmas. I won't go into detail as to how she reacted - but, suffice it to say, by the following day, he had hauled his rear end back to the store to return the pots and pans!
Thomas: Your points are well taken, as well. My reason for pursuing the argument was simply to explain that it's not always so easy to be a masculinist terminator when certain variable factors come into play. Also, too, you alluded to how men would never gotten away with the same behavior. Well, the reason for that is because of feminist paranoia. Do I want to imitate that paranoia? No. Do I want to further feed into that paranoia by sending the message to women that men are "touchy", in which case they will keep quiet only because it is incumbent on them to be superior, because men are cry-babies? Hell, no!
But, maybe that's their problem if they'd feel that way. Again - your points are well-taken, and I agree.
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...feminist paranoia. Do I want to imitate that paranoia? No. Do I want to further feed into that paranoia by sending the message to women that men are "touchy", in which case they will keep quiet only because it is incumbent on them to be superior, because men are cry-babies? Hell, no!
I heartily agree with this point, Hawth. It puts us in a difficult position. We have to play each situation individually. The problem is, the anti-male crap may never go away unless we start applying the same standards to women that this feminist society applies to men. Unfortunately, there's no way to act in general.
Thanks for the feedback. I like the points that you've made.
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A little additional point: About a year or so ago, USA Today published the results of a study that showed that men ask for directions more than women. (Note: I have no idea how scientific or reliable this study was. It just struck me as a fun point to bring up now.)
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I have rarely seen women willing to compromise. They always seem to want their way.
And about men don't communicate? What the hell? If men don't communicate, then explain ALL the forms of communication in the internet, TV, radio, printing press, and a plethora of other technologies. And all for the perpose of communicating.
This kind of BS just really get pevees me off.
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These people should really read Zubatys "What men know that women donīt". His answer is that men communicate in a silent way. We (as he puts it) have no need telling others how we feel about everything. We reserve our speech for when we really need it.
The other thing Zubaty writes about is how women cause wars which men then have to die in...
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Yes let's combat stereotyping with more stereotyping.
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And what stereotyping would that be, Lorianne? I'm not speaking against women, I'm speaking against feminism. They are as different as German's and Nazis.
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Perhaps you were replying to someone else's post.
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I will have to disagree with you Thomas: feminism is not evil. Ideally it's just women's rights movement just as there is a men's rights movement.
The problem is that feminist theory has gone from a theory to a system of belief. To the degree that someone, man or woman, buys into the belief of feminist theory they become more misandic.
Tony H
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Your idea, Tony, of feminist theory is interesting. I hope you do someday write a book about it. Nevertheless, I don't accept your analysis.
Saying that feminist theory is so different from feminism is like saying theoretical physics is that different from experimental physics. The fact is, in both cases the former is the system of analysis and beliefs used to explain, and to a large extent justify according to general principles, the latter. The latter is a system for testing, verifying or debunking, and ultimately applying the former. In addition, the latter adds new ideas to the former in response to discoveries made in the field. The two work hand in hand.
We are told that feminism is a women's rights movement. That is what feminists claim feminism is. But, of course, claiming that something is a rights movement doesn't make it a rights movement.
You can go ahead and make your next statement about this and I might not respond. The significant difference that you believe exists between feminism and feminist theory seems to be very important to you. I will just finish by repeating that feminist theory is the belief in female goodness and superiority and male evil and inferiority. Feminism (as we know it -- in other words, mainstream feminism) is the application of that system of hateful beliefs.
In addition, in a broad sense feminism comprises both theory and practice.
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The reason I make the separation if for my own personal sanity. As a student at a liberal arts college I have frequent run-ins with feminists and feminism. The confusing point for me was that they covered a wide spectrum of ideologies.
Some women are definitely blinded by the popular male-bashing feminism and take the stance similar to NOW, AAUW and other male bashing organizations. While other women avoid any association with these groups like they were the plague and defended male bashing openly in classes more than I would. (I tend to have to pick my battles or get dismissed outright as just another unhappy male.)There philosophies where similar to feminist groups such as ifeminists, the gender issues research center and others.
Men's groups also cover a wide range of ideologies from the Promise Keepers to MAVEN. Feminism and masculinism are not at opposite ends of the spectrum but the current popular ideologies are. ( www.politicalcompass.com covers this idea of a political spectrum more clearly than I do here.)
Feminism is just a social movement for women's rights. Just because one type of (femin)ism is popular does not mean it is the only one on the spectrum. There are radicals in every social movement but to lump them together, while easy to do, is not fair to them. just as lumping all men involved in the men's movement into one group is not fair to us. The is the similar to saying all Muslims are terrorists just because the only ones we hear about are. Just because someone is vocal about a belief does not mean that it is right or the most popular.
I very simplistic way of looking at it is that feminism has been ursurped by a radical terrorist group that use social terror in an attempt to create a world they see as ideal.
In my experience there are many women that recognize society on an instinctive level but cannot put a finger on the problem.
Sociological and psychological theories are not all alike. Some are better in examining people some situations but not in others. The trick is finding the right lens (or theory) for the right situation. Currently, feminist theory is the default lens when it comes to gender relations.
Popular misandric feminism has at its core a hard-core adherence to feminist theory in its pure form. Feminist theory is a conflict theory and has the same inherent problems most conflict theories do; making the complex social interactions of human society into a simplistic pyramidal structure.
NOW and AAUW examine all social issues with this lens "in hand." The advantages are that it does highlight the areas that women have problems with in a given situation. The disadvantage is that men are considered in power so any problems they have are because of the refusal to relinquish power to women. It also under emphasizes the power structure women have in society.
While this is a very powerful and effective tool but also easily misused when the inherent biases are not recognized. This does not mean that the theory is useless. All theories have a bias and are not useful in all situations.
Tony H
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I have frequent run-ins with feminists and feminism. The confusing point for me was that they covered a wide spectrum of ideologies.
This is an interesting point about feminism. About the only thing that can be said about all feminists is that they call themselves feminists. (Actually, there may be many feminists who won't admit that they are feminists, so you're left with nothing that is the same for all feminists.) One thing we can be sure of is that feminism is not a movement for rights for women, since many feminists don't want what is their rights, they want absolute power so they can oppress males. The word, feminist, is absurd because, as a generality, it has no meaning, and many of the particular branches have nothing in common.
It's important to point out to people that mainstream feminism, the branch that has industrialized societies nearly in a stranglehold, is a hate movement. This will lead many people to drop the name, and that is a very good thing. We should be "egalitarians." Getting people to be wary of calling themselves feminists will help get them and others to question the movement. This questioning will lead many people to realize that the overwhelmingly dominant form of feminism is a hate movement.
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Never forget that the very word, "feminism," has one-sidedness -- sexism -- built into it. "Egalitarian" does not.
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I agree that egalitarian is probably a more accurate term.
The terms feminist and masculinst are just what determines the focus of the attention. This site is definitely from a masculinist prespective, meaning we are conserned about male rightsor masculinism. This does not mean we don't care about women or women's rights, its just not our focus. The same is true with feminists and feminism.
"One thing we can be sure of is that feminism is not a movement for rights for women, since many feminists don't want what is their rights, they want absolute power so they can oppress males."
Yes the current radical feminism does do that but the same is also true for the abuses that have been done in the name of a religion. Because some, or even the majority of followers want to gather all the power into thier hands does not negate the whole theory/religion. Believe it or not there are men's movements that are rather archaic in their beliefs about female and male roles who are still part of the larger movement. It is very easy to group everyone in the same category and label them all as men haters, racists, radicals or a similar label. The trick is to seperate those who want to gain more power rather than share it.
Tony H
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they are just indicating thier focus. I only take offense when they refuse to acknowledge that feminism is NOT gender neutral and the problems men have in society are a result of not joining the women's movement. ( I told a woman that said this too me she was wrong and that belief is part of the problem.) RADICAL (not all) feminists refuse to acknowledge that women's rights and men's rights involve different conserns.
Tony H
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Then letīs run this world till itīs dead. It seams to be better that way for the women so why not Lorianne.
Or letīs just use something that works. It seams to be the one sencible alternative of all availiable.
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Lorianne may have been talking about this:
>women cause wars which men then have to die in
So if there were no women in the world, if a plauge wiped out all females and the world were all male, there would be no more war? Everything would be peace, love and rainbows?
The truth is that *politicians* cause wars which their *citizens* then have to die in. Notice that Bin Laden wasn't stupid enough to be on those planes.
Here's a sure-fire way to end war forever: Force the politicians that declare war to be the first ones on the front lines. If we did that, war would end tomorrow.
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Here's a sure-fire way to end war forever: Force the politicians that declare war to be the first ones on the front lines. If we did that, war would end tomorrow.
Amen and Hallelujah to that, Claire! :-)
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But in my experience, it does seem that women are more likely than men to be peacemakers. Maybe it is the competitiveness found in men or the tendency toward nurturing and sharing found in women. Whatever the cause, I think a warring world filled with men wanting to increase their power or territory might need a grand dose of sisterhood right about now.
What I wonder is why any man, any longer, submits to such clear and unequivocal misandrist hatred and lies. The thing called feminism is pure evil. It has western culture in a stranglehold. The women who push it are utterly vile. The men who submit to it are utterly contemptible fools. It must be eliminated.
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Granted, there is no one venue that monopolises misinformation, but I suspect that TV out shines the others by more than just a few lumens.
I have a TV but no reception (living in a valley can do that) and have not bothered with cable for several years (14+ ?). When I do happen on commercial television I feel buffeted by its force and have to brace myself.
I also have not engaged hard copy newspaper since discovering the internet, and that has been close to 6 years now. I was deprived of access for a couple months a little while back and read three newspapers daily as I had the time. It was an upsetting experience to say the least. I was surprised by the poor quality of the journalism in general. It felt like my world had shrunk dramatically, and well it had obviously, but it was the sense of cloistered spoonfeeding that bothered me the most.
side bar here
We have a Ministery of Culture here that controls the amount of media content of purely Canadian origin that must reside in any instrument of mass media within Canadian borders.
end of side bar
I felt trivialised by the editorials and parochialised by news content.
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I posted this to the editor. (I don't know if they'll consider it for publishing)
About Opinion: Renee Schafer Horton: Peacemaker role seems more natural for women (2/16/2001)
It's a sexist simplistic feminist notion to pick an attribute and then claim women have it as if all women have and no man has it.
"The first six identifiers are inarguable "
All completely arguable.
Some men do ask directions, some women don't, to take just one example.
Women peacemakers and compromisers? Obviously Renee has never been in a row or a divorce with a woman. Never found an uncompromising woman. Never found a woman who demands to get her way no matter who she hurts.
As for talking out a problem, women can also talk all around a problem and achieve nothing, they can also evade a subject like no man when it suits them. Lots of verbal output doesn't always mean lots of real communcation.
You want to see women peacemakers? (I'm from England) Check Queen Elizabeth I who ordered the attack on the Spanish Armada. Check Margaret Thatcher who ordered the conflict at the Falkland Islands. There was even a point in the India/Pakistan border dispute over Kashmir when there were women prime ministers on both sides, but it still wasn't solved. While you at it check if the Israeli women and the Palestine women are planning peace. Check if American women want to talk peace with Usama Bin Laden.
And check the rising level of female violence, still less than men's but rising much faster. And also check the level of women's child abuse. Women's violence is often hidden.
As for men, I can give you Churchill who said "better to jaw-jaw than war-war"; his predecessor Neville Chamberlain who got the useless "Peace in our Time" agreement with Hitler (and gave away Czechoslovakia to do it) or how about Einstein who wrote to the President trying to stop the use of the atomic bomb on Japan, and by the way, I hadn't heard that Jesus Christ had had a sex change operation.
And I don't think you get round this by claiming these and other men are exceptions to the rule. The real rule is that people can be war-like and people can be peacemakers. The first phase of any kind of war is to claim the other group are at fault and bad, the Nazis started with that with the Jews, you are doing it with men, you just haven't declared war yet.
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Good letter, Raymond. Renee Schafer Horton might benefit from reading Patricia Pearson's book "When She Was Bad - Violent Women and the Myth of Innocence."
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Don't forget the Dali Lama
Tony H
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or ghandi. we can't forget ghandi. wow, now there's a war-monger.
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Well, yes, there may indeed by that many, somewhere in the world. But none of them is in evidence anywhere near this writer's empty head.
What's most indicative about this crock of feminist cowshit is that it appeared in print at all. Certainly there's nothing new about it. Women have been saying stuff like this about men since language was invented (by women, perhaps, for exactly this purpose). That it is deemed worthy of expending paper and ink only indicates that women (a) apparently buy (or insist that their men buy, or buy with money extorted from men) newspapers, and (b) haven't had a new thought in multimillennia.
The fact that a similar article with gender-names reversed would not have a snowball's chance in hell of being published - or if it were, would be condemned in tones of vicious hysteria (hint: check the eytmology of this word) - in itself gives the lie to this article's "thesis" - as well as to feminism in general.
Feminism is a lie because it is based on a single ridiculous fallacy: that women and men - unlike females and males of all other life forms - are not the two sexual forms of one species but instead members two separate, unrelated species whose interests are diametrically opposed and who therefore must be perpetually at war.
That this idea is garbage must be obvious to anyone who has ever attended or knows anything about the circumstances of a human birth. All human beings, whether female or male, are born of woman. Without exception.
Thus my question for feminists, including the ditz-head who wrote this drivel: If it is true, as you endlessly proclaim, that all that is evil in the world comes from men, then where do men come from?
Hmmm?
As for women's famous ability to "compromise," I pose the following scenario: You, a typical communicating, gentle, kind, nurturing, compromising woman, are walking down a street when a man accosts you with an invitation: "Hey, baby, let's have sex!" You say, "No way, dickhead." He says, "Okay, let's compromise - I'll just put it in half way."
Hmmm?
Sure, men can compromise. (Check out, for example, the American system of republican government outlined in the United States Constitution, written entirely by men - and understood, apparently, by very few women, given that American women are doing their best to destroy it.) But, in my experience, men are more able to understand that there are some things that cannot be compromised. Women, I've found, don't understand matters of principle until/unless they're personalized; this seems to have something to do with the female mind operating more in the realm of feeling and impulse than of abstract thought.
Pour a thimble-full of urine into a gallon of fresh water, and what do you have? A "compromise." Would this writer drink it? Somehow I doubt it.
Some years ago I happened to hear a radio interview of Frederic LeBoyer, the famous advocate of gentle birthing practices (a man, by the way). I called in to the program and asked him about the practice of circumcision. His answer, sadly but unsurprisingly, was that it was a "religious matter" (which of course it is in France, where only Jews do this to their children - and G-d knows we mustn't say anything critical about the Jews). A woman friend happened to hear me on the radio, and later expressed puzzlement at my concern over the issue. "Well," I said, "you know, they do it to girls in Africa." "Oh," she said. I could almost see the light bulb go on over her head: now she understood, now it was personal.
Note that practically any American male is horrified and outraged by the practice of female circumcision, while only a handful of women think that doing the same thing to boys is anything other than perfectly normal.
Like most modern American males, I was brought up to believe in feminist dogma, and so I did until, in early middle age, the obvious irrational insanity of the feminist movement finally forced me to start thinking. All in all, the final result of my half-century and more of experience with feminism (beginning at least the day I was born, when the feminist Final Solution to the "Male Problem" was applied to my genitalia with a knife) has been to convince me of the essential truth of all the ancient stereotypes about women.
In my mid-30s I recall reading a biography of Gandhi, wherein was quoted a remark he made regarding what a relief it was to finally get to middle age and start to lose interest in sex. At the time, of course, I was not positively impressed by this idea. Now, nearing age 60, I can see his point. I really don't know if it's possible for a man under 50 - ruled by his body's constant hormonal output and thus by the overwhelming need for the approval of those - i.e. females - who possess the only supply of the one thing males of all species desperately crave more than survival itself - to see females clearly.
(By the way, that's how his name is spelled: Gandhi, not "ghandi." And "Mahatma" is not a personal name, but a title of respect and affection given him by the Indian people, meaning "Great Soul." His personal name was Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. And, further by the way, it's the Dalai Lama, not "dali.")
Nor do I mean to criticize or put down men by such characterization. We are desperate for what females provide (or don't provide, depending on their whim) because that's how we've been designed. That's the way the play is set up. If males were indifferent to females, life itself would stop (at least for sexual species; bacteria would get along fine, thank you very much).
And while I'm as disgusted as anyone at the "spineless" behavior of the average modern American male, I also keep in mind that the overwhelming majority of us were subjected at birth by our mothers to an experience of overwhelming pain and terror, which cannot but have had grave consequences on the foundational level of psychological structure. I don't think it's an accident that there is hardly a "man" in American today who knows how (or why) to say "No" to a woman - nor that all the women "leaders" - from Dr Laura through Ann Landers to NOW - are firmly in favor of infant male circumcision.
If men were really a separate species, independent of women, able to plan our own existence free of female power, do you really think we'd set things up so a million young men would die in a single battle "in Flander's fields," ca. 1916?
Notwithstanding Joan Baez' shortlived "Women Say Yes to Men Who Say No" campaign during the Vietnam War (and her equally shortlived marriage to a famous war resister), the truth is that losers (especially dead losers) very seldom Get the Girl. It just ain't the way the show is written. I mean, there's a reason why White House interns line up to kneel for Presidents - the same reason why the biggest gorillas have the biggest harems.
Nor have I heard of very many women who've insisted on giving back the territory and goods their men have won and brought home to them.
The real truth is this: Whatever men are, we are what women have made us; whatever we do, one way or another we do it all for them. Front men, fall guys, and whipping boys. If men love war, it's only because, after a couple million years of being bred for nothing else, we've learned to glorify what we cannot avoid. How many young men have been lured into war by dreams of glory (and their sweethearts' adulation - "He's so cute in his uniform!") and then learned too late on the battlefield what war really is?
Woman the Peacemaker? My moment of epiphany on this point came some 40 years ago, while watching the movie Lawrence of Arabia: a bunch of Arabs on camels are riding off to war, and the women of the tribe line up to cheer them on. I thought, "Wait a minute: I thought Woman was the Peacemaker. How come they're cheering for war?" How come? Because they always have; because men go to war to please women.
Sure men go to war to "increase their power or territory." (Or, as this idiot somehow fails to note, to defend their homes and families.) But why? As usual, this feminist "analysis" goes no further than the most superficial picture. Why do males of any species strive to "increase their power or territory"? Sole reason: because successful males have more access to females.
Note that unlike most "war-mongering" male leaders (until recently anyway, now that we have draft-dodging presidents), Elizabeth I, Margaret Thatcher and Indira Gandhi never had to actually fight in the wars they promoted. Nothing new here, either. Indira, at least, got what she deserved.
"... you alluded to how men would never gotten away with the same behavior. Well, the reason for that is because of feminist paranoia. Do I want to imitate that paranoia?" An interesting point. We have all been told all our lives that women are morally superior to men. It would make sense, then, that to improve ourselves we should imitate female behavior, no? Yet men seem to feel an inner obligation to restrain themselves even in the face of gross provocation, such as you experienced in the office setting you describe. The plain fact is that the culture gives permission to women to act like children, but expects men to act like adults. Does something not add up here?
"The truth is that *politicians* cause wars which their *citizens* then have to die in." And who gives those politicians their power? I understand that nowadays in America more women vote than men.
A parting thought, from one of the few men ever to completely liberate himself from female domination: "For as long as the least bit of desire of a man for women is not cleared away, his heart is fixated like a suckling calf on its mother." (Dhammapada verse 284)
Andrew
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I don't accept this writer as representing projecting feminist thought. Too, I don't think she speaks for women.
You're right about it being mindless claptrap though.
I believe she thinks she's witty. Do you think Dave Barry speaks for masculinists or men? He often uses humor to overgeneralize and stereotype and poke fun at gender roles in society. The difference is only the fact that he's actually witty.
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I had a discussion with someone about humor onetime. When can you make a joke about a stereotype and the group being sterotyped not be offended or claim ______ism?
Tony H
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Good question Tony. I think the term "offensive" is in the eye of the beholder.
For example, I think Dave Barry is extremely funny and witty and often insightful. Almost all of his "jokes" hinge on gender stereotyping and mocking of the genders. I find his stereotping "sexist" but am paradoxically NOT offended by it. However, if people took his stereotyping of women and applied to me in real situations and treated me according to the stereotypes (which I call pre-judging me) I would be offended. Subtle difference. When is the line crossed?
I think many could rightfully be offended at Dave Barry's humor. I grant them their own POV.
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