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A Houston TV station has an abbreviated version of the story on their website along with a poll. Anyone feel like voting?
Larry
ADULT: What you are once you've run out of excuses.
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by Anonymous User on Friday January 30, @06:20PM EST (#3)
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I noted the votes against the shirts were divided into three groups whereas those in favour of the shirts comprise one group. Still, those against were nearly 70%.
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by Anonymous User on Friday January 30, @08:11PM EST (#9)
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I voted then sent the link to all my friends.
Ray
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The same AP story appeared yesterday in the Toronto Sun (at least on the web -- I didn't check the paper edition) under the "Weird News" moniker.
At this point in the battle, however, having the story classified as 'strange' or 'weird' news doesn't bother me all that much. The good news it that's it's being printed at all.
Mind you, in a just, caring, and egalitarian society a story about concerned citizens fighting against someone promoting hatred would be front-page-above-the-fold with banner headline. Hell, in that society the bigots would never have gotten to square one.
Let's face it, with our media so immersed in feminist attitudes and dogma, for any outlet to carry news that's compassionate towards men or boys or that points out the suffering and discrimination they endure is very 'weird' and 'strange,' indeed!
And to the general reader, who is equally immersed in the same feminist attitudes and dogma, a male-friendly bit of news is truly a weird thing.
"...will ya lookit this, Marsha. Says here that little boys feel afraid when girls are told to throw rocks at 'em. Never heard nothin' like it..."
"Well that's just weird, John. Those poor girls... "
So, on that level, the news papers are being accurate in placing the story in the strange/weird/goofy column -- it's something completely alien to what they and the bulk of their readers consider mainstream news.
Man oh man, is that ever going to change!
The media is going to look pretty stupid classifying stories like this as 'weird' when they're getting several a week. Of course, one look at what they do carry is ample proof of how little they care about looking stupid. :-)
Ragtime
The Uppity Wallet
The opinions expressed above are my own,
but you're welcome to adopt them.
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"First they ignore you.
Then they laugh at you.
Then they fight you.
Then you win."
--Gandhi
I've always loved this quote; simple, eloquent, and oh-so true.
There's overlap between the stages, of course, but we are now passing from the "laugh at you" to the "fight you" stage.
That's what I figure, too, Thomas. I've watched it go from 'ignore' to 'laugh at.' While I believe the majority of the populace are still mostly in the 'laugh at' (or even still 'ignore') stage, the first skirmishes of 'fight' have indeed been met.
Now, for totally meaningless numbers that I just pulled out of my head (which gives my stats a firmer scientific basis than pheminist ones), I'd opine that:
- 50% of the population is still unaware of the issue (ignore)
- 25% have heard rumblings and think it's silly (laugh at) eg, the 'weird' news
- and the other 25% split between those who would fight us, and those we've already won over.
( - Oh, and because my opinion would not be as be as credible without including the pheminist perspective, let's not forget the other, other 25%: being the seven out of every three wymyn who is oppressed daily 42 times a month by the cruel patriarchy that took her meal ticket away to get killed defending her oppression, so now she has to get a cheque from the welfare office once a month to feed the five kids, twelve of whom she alleges were 'sexually abused' by the meal ticket.)
As Warble has pointed out on another thread, it's gonna get very ugly.
Bring it on.
Ragtime
The Uppity Wallet
The opinions expressed above are my own,
but you're welcome to adopt them.
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by Anonymous User on Friday January 30, @08:17PM EST (#10)
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" Feminists are stupid -- throw facts at them. "
I love it! That is a stroke of genius. If we get a chance to picket some place selling this stuff do you mind if I use that on a protest sign?
Ray
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by Anonymous User on Friday January 30, @11:19PM EST (#15)
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Ragtime:
Thanks, We're working up some new protest material. We'll document the fun.
Ray
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Maybe this... in homage to Ms. Gloria Steinham..
"A woman needs a man like a fish needs OXYGEN.
Get lubricated ladies!
"It's a terrible thing ... living in fear."
- Roy: hunted replicant, Blade Runner
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I love it! However, how about "Misandrists are stupid -- throw facts at them!"
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""I love it! However, how about "Misandrists are stupid -- throw facts at them!"""
Me, too. If we rip feminism, we'll come off as being against equal rights. Just call them female chauvinists, female sexists, female supremacists, and/or misandrists. Wendy McElroy is a feminist and she's on OUR side here. Smear all feminists, and you'll be smearing some people trying to help us.
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by Anonymous User on Friday January 30, @11:30PM EST (#16)
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"Smear all feminists, and you'll be smearing some people trying to help us."
You're point is well taken. I think it will work well in several permutations, when specifically applying it to valid issues. I think the saying for the issue below can be defended with no sweat.
Considering the shame and blame cycle of domestic violence, that blames everything on men, and insists that men must take responsibility for all violence there is this:
THE DOMESTIC VIOLENCE
INDUSTRY IS STUPID!
THROW FACTS
AT THEM!
Ray
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by Anonymous User on Sunday February 01, @12:04PM EST (#67)
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(("Feminists are stupid -- throw facts at them."))
Ragtime, GEEZE! I LOVE IT!!
First chance I get I'm gonna make one!!!
Thank you!
Thundercloud.
"Hoka hey!"
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by Anonymous User on Friday January 30, @06:56PM EST (#5)
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"...will ya lookit this, Marsha. Says here that little boys feel afraid when girls are told to throw rocks at 'em. Never heard nothin' like it..."
"Well that's just weird, John. Those poor girls... "
Odd. I remember the days when the battle cry of "ROOOCK FIGHT" would go off and all of us little boys would start throwing pea sized rocks. IT WAS GREAT FUN!
Naturally, the fight would stop when somebody’s head started bleeding.
Humm....Wonder where those fem-bots were during those fun times.....
Oh. I forgot. They were out with mom shopping for dolls when they were permitted some free time out of the consecration camp.
Warble
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We've discussed this on this board in the past, but I'd appreciate some feedback on the following, because my mind isn't made up yet about the word "feminism."
If we rip feminism, we'll come off as being against equal rights
I go back and forth on this, because of the miniscule number of truly fair-minded women who call themselves "feminists." I wish to hell that Sommers and McElroy would call themselves something else.
For all practical purposes, the entire package that almost everyone hears from feminists is a bunch of (often sugar-coated) hateful, bald-faced lies. But many men's rights activists say, "Feminism isn't all bad," which gives credence to some of the lies. Until people like Sommers and McElroy came along, feminism was pretty much pure hatred for decades. Now the equity- and i-feminists claim they're trying to turn feminism back into something that it in fact has never been, at least since its reincarnation in the 60s and maybe since its earliest days.
I know some women, who give lip service to opposing "radical feminism," and who then spew out all the false statistics that make it look like women are victims of the patriarchy and all men, especially all white men, have everything handed to them on a silver platter.
I don't call myself a "masculist" or a "masculinist" for the simple reason that those words imply a greater concern for the welfare of men than of women. In fact I refer to what's often called the "men's movement" as the "truth and justice movement," because as far as I'm concerned it ultimately promotes the welfare of females as much as males.
Sommers and McElroy are wrong about what feminism was in the 60s and early 70s. Erin Pizzey tells it like it is, and like it was.
As a mental exercise, I imagine a decent (though misguided) person, who truly believes that Nazism was originally a fair-minded, well-intentioned movement, which was stolen by the likes of Hitler, Himmler, and Goebbels. This person is working for justice, claims to be a Nazi, and says that he's doing what the original Nazis once did. I wouldn't, as a result of this person's beliefs and claims, say that not all Nazis are bad. I'd say that he was misinformed, that he wasn't a Nazi, and that, despite his good intentions, by saying he was a Nazi and by promoting Nazism he was doing harm.
I think that McElroy and Sommers are making an error by calling themselves feminists, and that that error undermines us and continues to trip us up.
I'm not sure. Maybe it would be best for some members of the truth and justice movement not to criticize feminism in general, but I suspect that, if we want to get the full truth out, we have to let people know what the nature of feminism has been for decades at least.
Thanks for any feedback.
Thomas
-- Creating hostile environments for feminazis since the 1970s.
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I understand your points, but we must remember that one of the main things we're trying to do is to get "fence" people and people who "have never really thought about it" on our side (not the side of males over females, but rather the side of egalitarians over sexists of ALL stripes).
Even if you have decided that "feminist" has always meant something bad, you must take into account how OTHER people (these "fence" people) view the word. If millions of people believe "feminist" to mean "someone who supports women being equal to men", and we go and rip apart the word "feminist", then they're going to make the (fallacious) connection that we must somehow be against equality. WE know that's not what they mean, and YOU know how you feel about the word "feminist", but those who have a different personal definition of the word will then come to the false conclusion that we're neanderthal misogynists.
That's really my main point.
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"I understand your points, but we must remember that one of the main things we're trying to do is to get "fence" people and people who "have never really thought about it" on our side (not the side of males over females, but rather the side of egalitarians over sexists of ALL stripes)."
Ok, settle in folks, this is going to be a long one. I think this issue of "where do we stand on feminism" is the most significant issue facing the men's movement today.
When you talk about what "we" are trying to do, BG, you define me out of the mix. It reminds me of the old joke about the Lone Ranger and Tonto -
LR: "Looks like we are surrounded by Indians, Tonto."
Tonto: "What you mean 'we', WHITE MAN?"
I had the same perceptions of feminism that Erin Pizzey did - at about the same time. Virtually all the literature of the women's movement from the 60s onward was about how women were the perpetual victims of men, particularly in the area of sexuality, and showed a distinct hatred of not just men, but of maleness itself.
To me, it is absolutely surrealistic hypocrisy that so much emphasis was put on "gender bias in language", down to the level where some of the hard cores refuse to use a term with the letters "man" in it, yet they have hoodwinked people with a supposed movement for "equality" with a female gendered name.
I remember in the mid 70s, when the burning question for feminists was "can I be a feminist and still like men?"
I do not understand why some women, and even some men, hold on to that label for dear life, but I contend that the excesses of feminism come directly from the conceptual model created by its name.
Without the core concept that "wimmins" was "oppressed", the entire movement falls apart for lack of a purpose. And, it logically follows that if women actually were oppressed, then the only class of beings left to "oppress" them had to be men.
Thus, FEMININE-ISM, cannot be anything other than promoting the female view at all times and in all circumstances, based purely on the belief that it has always been the opposite.
As Warren Farrell went to GREAT lengths to prove in "Myth of Male Power", the idea that men were priviledged was indeed a myth, in fact a lie.
Due to the urgencies of survival, which has by no means been assured any time in history before the 20th century, people were assigned at birth one of two "deals" based on their role in the reproductive process - a male "deal" and a female "deal".
And, they were PACKAGE deals - a bundle of benefits and costs. Women got protected because they were generally weaker and were more valuable in the reproductive process, and men got a certain degree of freedom which came with being expected to take risks.
I often find myself at odds with both sides of the "egalitarian" fence, because I contend that women and men have always been equal in the aggregate - ie. that when you added up all the power that all women had, and all the power that all men had, that they would be equal.
It is perfectly possible for a pound of feathers and a pound of lead to be EXACTLY, PRECISELY, EQUAL IN WEIGHT while being comparable in no other resepct. I wouldn't go fishing with "sinkers" made of feathers (because they wouldn't sink) and would not care to sleep on a pillow filled with lead.
Now that "feminism can mean different things to different people", it actually means nothing to anyone. I once literally had a mindless twit say to me - "Let me tell you about MY feminism." No word which can have a personal definition to anyone and everyone can possibly mean anything at all.
.
What it always boils down to now, is feminism always takes the female side against the male. The "rape shield" laws which make it possible for someone like Kobe to be stripped of his rights to confront his accuser (unless some newspaper outs her and risks prosecution) are based on how "tender and fragile" women are, which is a conservative concept if I have ever heard one. I cannot imagine any "feminist" who even understands the issues of "equality" to take such a position.
If we look at the assertion "Women don't lie...", is that something we would expect to be said by a feminist, or a non-feminist? How much proof has to be posted on this site, MND, Angry Harry's, and all the other men's sites out there, before people wake up to the fact that "women don't lie..." IS A LIE IN AND OF ITSELF.
I am in a very radical position in this entire debate. Having seen what I saw back in the 60s and 70s, I have gone through life with a deep distrust of women and an awareness that I had little if any legal protections against a truly foul women. My generation of women has largely gone through life with what Fred Reed calls "the chip" and it has always become pretty apparent pretty quickly that they had been indoctrinated in the belief that men had always had it better so, by god, coming out of the gate I owed them something that they were in no way obligated to reciprocate.
In this way, I have managed to avoid divorce court, child custody battles, lawyers fees, false accusations, and being trapped in a relationship with a violent woman that I could not get out of and was ridiculed for even trying to talk about.
I've passed through the mid-life change and women no longer appeal to me - simply as women. Once the urge to merge is taken out of the picture and I evaluate a relationship with a woman purely on the merits of how much I enjoy her company, my cats are much better companions.
I have a theory that, like radiation, people have a lifetime tolerance dosage for bitching, whining, and complaining, and I think I have reached mine. It is a rare woman who does not begin to annoy me within 10 minutes of meeting her, because the inevitable "horrible current or ex husband, boyfriend, whatever" stories will begin to come out.
My situation puts me completely at odds with the Dad's Rights guys, and those still trying to find a way to make a relationship with a woman work. I view the DR guys as begging the culture to decriminalize fatherhood and make it safe for them to go back into families.
As long as I treat women like they likely have the plague, I have most of the rights I, personally, need. So, softening my language and putting up with lies and falsehoods so I don't "offend" or alienate creatures that I myself am already completely alienated from, makes no sense at all to me.
As long as I never express interest in a woman, and never allow one to live in a house I pay for, and sure as hell never indicate that I find one sexually attractive or (god forbid) have sex with her, aside from purely made up and false accusations, I can pretty much go about my life as I see fit.
My fundamental position WRT women in all this, is that they sat silently by letting the feminists speak for them, while they enjoyed the extra degree of power that feminist accomplishments gave them. And, a lot of these women are completely pathological and will be as abusive toward men as the law allows them to - which essentially right now means free license.
I don't see it as being men's "job" to keep placating such women and keep tip-toeing around their oh-so-sensitive feeee-yuhl-ings, when it is women who benefit the most from it being legal for men to have relationships with them.
Thus, I will begin to take issues such as "wage parity" seriously when feminists begin pushing for "body bag" parity. And, I will go back to thinking that "rape really is a terrible" crime when feminists begin demanding a clear legal distinction between rape and normal sex. I used to think it was a pretty bad crime, but I now have it on the authority of no less an august body than the judicial system of California that "rape" is really no worse than taking a few extra seconds to stop when the woman says "I really should be going."
I do not believe that it is possible to take an ideology which has been consistently against men and maleness for 40 years, and turn it around.
I seldom say anything in public against ANYONE who speaks out on behalf of men, but I am not nearly as impressed by Wendy McElroy as a lot of guys are. While she and Hoff-Sommers have said some positive things about men, having them cling to a label I believe gives legitimacy to a movement which has given more than enough evidence to convince anyone with a brain that it has no legitimacy at all.
When a man gets hauled into court in opposition to a woman, "feminine-ism" is going to take the position against the male, against maleness and the male perspective. It simply is not possible for "FEMININE-ISM" to be otherwise. How it acts arises from its nature, in the same way that hardness arises from the nature of being a rock.
Thus, I cannot see the reason for the attempts to make a movement for the rights of men be "acceptable" and in no way offend the political movement whose entire purpose has been to oppose men and maleness itself.
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"When you talk about what "we" are trying to do, BG, you define me out of the mix."
What I meant is that "we" are trying to bring light to these issues and instances in which men and boys are discriminated against and/or abused in some way. "We" want people to listen to us and "we" want to gain sympathy for our position. The David & Goliath case is just the tip of the iceberg.
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I agree entirely. The media is largely feminist-controlled, and it follows that most people aren't exposed to its evils, so they sympathise with (what they believe to be) feminism. If you show them your hatred of "feminism" without coupling it up with a pretty thorough explanation, they're going to take the feminists' side over yours.
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The thing that finally turned me into a staunch anti-feminist is the movement's treatment of Sommers when she wrote "Who Stole Feminism?". Here was a woman who was trying to be fair, and they virtually drummed her out of the movement. Personally I appreciate what Sommers and McElroy have done, but they have taken on an impossible task - rehabilitating feminism.
Refraining from attacking feminism because of a minority of women in the movement makes it impossible to say anything about feminism because there will always be some woman who will say "Well, I am a feminist but I am not like that."
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In wars, strange alliances are often necessary (i.e. free nations and the Stalinist Soviet Union in WWII), but not necessarily a good idea in the long run.
Setting aside the few women who have written books which were male-positive and actually critical of the majority of feminism, could you point to one issue where feminism has either acknowledged that women had an unfair advantage, or in any way worked to accomplish something positive for men?
It is a very serious question. In order for there to be any basis at all for an "alliance" there has to be some common purpose or "enemy". Off the top of my head, I can't think of anything which "feminists" have worked for which has not been to give greater advantage to women at the detriment of men.
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by Anonymous User on Saturday January 31, @04:38PM EST (#25)
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Apparently, NOW actually did something of the sort back in 1980:
http://www.now.org/issues/military/policies/draft2 .html
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anything more recent? Shall we give the entire movement a bye based on 1 paragraph?
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by Anonymous User on Saturday January 31, @06:09PM EST (#36)
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I've not taken a stand on the issue- merely shared what I've found.
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"Apparently, NOW actually did something of the sort back in 1980"
1980 was the year that the Equal Rights Amendment was defeated. Prior to that there was some reciprocity from feminists. Afterwards the dark side of feminism asserted itself with a vengeance.
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(Can someone define the word "feminism" in such a way that it can include both the radical feminists and fair-minded people?)
I'm not following you, Thomas. Isn't that the way it is currently defined - as nothing but a fair-minded movement for "equality"?
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The reason I am asking, Thomas, is because I really don't understand what you are saying and I am asking for clarification.
Can someone define the word "feminism" in such a way that it can include both the radical feminists and fair-minded people?
Sorry, dude, I really do not see what you are getting at. McElroy and Hoff-Sommers both still call what they believe by the name "feminism", they just add a qualifier to it. What I have gotten as the thrust of this discussion is how we avoid alienating "fair-minded" people who for some reason still value the label of feminist and believe that it stands for fairness.
So far I have never heard of people out there labeling themselves "iDemocrats" or "iRepublicans", or "equity" either one. Someone can be left, right, or middle, and still believe what the core philosophy or identity of the party signifies.
Thus, if someone labels themself either one, I assume that they believe more in the core principles of that party than in the other one. Likewise, whatever the flavor of "feminism", I assume that the people who choose that label believe more like other members of their party than those who choose not to wear it.
"Democrat" can encompass both the farthest reaches of the radical left, as well as the middle of the road. "Republican" can encompass both the farthest reaches of the radical right, as well as the middle of the road.
So, I'm still not sure what you are getting at. To me, "feminist" covers the whole spectrum, already. I personally do not believe that feminism ever had squat to do with "equality", but then I do believe in equality and have never applied that label to myself.
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What I'm getting at is that I don't see how this can be done. If it can't be done, people like Hoff-Sommers and McElroy have to say either that the gender feminists or PC feminists aren't feminists, or that they (Hoff-Sommers and McElroy) aren't feminists.
Ok, I see where you are coming from now. And both Hoff-Sommers and McElroy have come under vicious attacks from their own party and told that they aren't really "feminists", as has Camille Paglia who I think is probably the brightest of the whole lot.
I don't think it can be done either. I cannot for the life of me understand why some people hold on to that label so dearly, but they do.
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Can someone define the word "feminism" in such a way that it can include both the radical feminists and fair-minded people?
I've chewed at this a bit and think I've come close. Zenpriest described it in another post in this thread.
Feminism is the belief that society gives women the shitty end of the stick.
It works pretty well when I look at the definitions feminists give and find they can be restated as variations on this statement:
"Feminism is about equality for women."
Translation: Feminism is the belief that women aren't equal in society."
"Feminism is the radical concept that women are human beings."
Translation: Feminism is the belief that society conventionally views women as non-human."
There really are no such things as feminist principles, or at least none that feminists can agree on. The only thing they have in common is this one belief. Anything else is whatever the particular feminist tacks on to it and calls "her" feminism.
Larry
ADULT: What you are once you've run out of excuses.
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by Anonymous User on Saturday January 31, @06:17PM EST (#39)
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Or one can recognize that different people use the same word to mean different things. Aren't there plenty of words that have different nuances as well as altogether different meanings?
Of course, if we're going to take the "feminism means only one thing" stance, then shouldn't we also demand that "conservatives" and "liberals" decide who counts as persons of those groups as well? The Religious Right, for example, hardly fits in with the original idea of conservatism, right?
BTW, what "party" is it that you think Hoff-Sommers and McElroy belong to? What's up with all the collectivist rhetoric? Can't we recognize individuals without lumping them into groups?
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I believe that they both have a profound problem reconciling their feminist belief with what they actually see going on around them.
From Wendy's iFeminist FAQ:
Why call yourself a 'feminist?' Why not just call yourself an individualist?
Being a feminist is a form of specialization. In fighting for individual rights, some people focus upon injustice to women just as others focus upon injustice to gays or children.
For all her intention to focus on injustices to women, the vast majority of her activity that I see is addressing injustices to men, because that is what jumps out at her. According to her own definition of feminism, she isn't practicing it.
I haven't read much of Hoff-Summers, so I can't address her specifically.
The thing is, society does give women the shitty end of the stick. It also gives men the shitty end of the stick. McElroy and Hoff-Summers have been able to move beyond that first truth to accept and emrace the second, too. In doing so, they've moved beyond feminism, but for their own reasons, still want to call it feminism.
Larry
ADULT: What you are once you've run out of excuses.
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The thing is, society does give women the shitty end of the stick. It also gives men the shitty end of the stick.
This is one of those "but the emperor has no clothes" issues for me. If both ends of the stick are equally "shitty", then that is just the nature of sticks - or at least the one that comes with being alive.
I'm a member of Wendy's "iFeminist" discussion list on Yahoo, although I haven't posted there in years. When she set it up, there were 4 female moderators and one male. One of the first posts I saw was by one of the modertors who made the definitive statement "Gender is a social construct." Boom! That was it, that was the dogma that was going to rule that board, no dissent was to be tolerated.
I left then and pretty much haven't been back, because I believe the opposite dogma - that SEX is a biological reality and fact.
While it may not be "fair" that women have menstrual cramps and men don't - it just goes with the territory. It isn't some vast "patriarchal" conspiracy to deprive women of a completely comfortable life - it just is.
Women had every bit as much influence in shaping the gender roles as men did - more, if you factor in their dominance in child-rearing. So, the male role was developed with the full cooperation of women because women in general benefitted from it.
The idea that the roles were less fair to women has to go back to a belief that women were somehow more stupid or less strong than men - which I actively dis-believe.
Now, another radical statement - I believe that the balance of power between the sexes is equal, even today. For every bit of power and freedom that women have gained, they have given up something. Men in general no longer feel as compelled to protect them. The society as a whole no longer puts the same kind of social pressure on men to be providers that it did when I was a boy.
It used to be that any woman who was not absolutely physically and spiritually repulsive could be guaranteed that some man would take her on to support her - not so any more. There was a post here just a few days ago about "the new wives" and about women wishing for the days when they could stay home in the "prison" that Friedan described the suburban home as being.
Marriage as we knew it is dead. Young men and women have no choice but to figure out how to reshuffle the deck. I have a lot of faith in men. I think they will individually and collectively find ways to rebalance the scales.
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despite the hardships and even horrors that many men suffer at the hands of unjust laws, I think this is a wonderful time to be a man. The once well-ordered (despite its problems) deck has been thrown into the air...
This is why I favor a progressive "men's movement" rather than a reactive or regressive one. I am not without sympathy for the plight of many fathers today, but I also bear in mind things like the battle of Gallipoli where I believe in one day something like 100,000 young men were fed to the garbage disposer of the Turks' machine guns.
When I was growing up, the only possible socially accepted role for men was "husbandandfather" - any man who was not in the harness of a specialized beast of burden dragging around an emotionally and financially dependent wife and family was automatically suspect. In my lifetime I have seen that change to the point where I get nothing but positive social reinforcement for my choice never to marry - even from women.
I think men are free today as they never have been before. And, I think in many ways, women are more trapped than they ever were. High School girls are nearly melting down from the pressures they are feeling to succeed, while many high school boys take the Alfred E. Neumann stance of "What, ME worry?"
Women are more than welcome to the prison of my old role, and old job.
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Thanks for the discussion, guys.
Awww. And I was just getting warmed up. Have a good night. I'm going to babble on for a while.
I'm curious in what way contemporary society gives women the shitty end of the stick.
Now that's a really bad idea! :-)
I had in mind a certain quote, but now I can't find the book. It went something like "He thought they were having an argument and she thought they were negotiating."
For the longest time I didn't realize, and I think most men don't, that women are always negotiating. A large part of the reason that women who don't call themselves feminist will take up feminist ideas is because feminism is an extremely strong negotiating position. Like any skilled negotiator, they maximize their own arguments and minimize or deny the oppositions points, such as men's pain, suffering or injustice.
I now know I'm in a negotiation... ALL THE TIME. It's plain bad tactics to unilaterally concede any point without getting a concession in return.
Larry
ADULT: What you are once you've run out of excuses.
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Thanks for the discussion, guys. I think that I've learned something valuable. At the very least, I now prefer to reject "female supremacism," since in one phrase that takes in both anti-male feminism and anti-male one-sided chauvinism.
Again. Thanks. It was an educational pleasure.
Second that. I think discussions like this are really valuable to clarify the issues for ourselves and in the language we use. I share your perception that traditional chivalry toward women is every bit as much of a problem as the new female supremacists.
Another phrase which I think describes the real phenomenon that men are objecting to is:
"women-firsters".
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This is one of those "but the emperor has no clothes" issues for me. If both ends of the stick are equally "shitty", then that is just the nature of sticks - or at least the one that comes with being alive.
I agree. I would call the way I stated it here the Warren Farrell version. If you think no further, you end up with the conviction that the self-sacrifices society requires are a con job.
The last time I brought this up I added "Society also gives men unique privileges and women unique privileges." Add in the fact that people are generally selfish, horny and stupid and you realize that any society that doesn't provide some form of social roles with sensible constraints and satisfactory rewards won't be a society much longer.
Today the constraints and rewards are all out of whack and we are (painfully) inventing new roles to fit the situation.
Now, another radical statement - I believe that the balance of power between the sexes is equal, even today.
I pretty much agree. We're very close to being on the same page. If I ever get Integral Sexism into a coherent form, you're one of the first people I'll run it by. :-)
Larry
ADULT: What you are once you've run out of excuses.
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Rod Van Mechelen, creator of the Yahoo group "Backlash," has also created an adjunct group called "equalitarians." Equalitarianism advocates for equality of opportunity, as opposed to egalitarianism, which demands equality of outcomes.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/equalitarians
Steve
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If I ever get Integral Sexism into a coherent form, you're one of the first people I'll run it by. :-)
Would that be like "§ sec x tan x dx = sec x + C"?
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you realize that any society that doesn't provide some form of social roles with sensible constraints and satisfactory rewards won't be a society much longer.
And, this is why I see that the current situation is going to hurt women and society itself in the long run a whole lot more than it is going to hurt men. Make no mistake, a lot of guys have been fucked over in the past 40 years. But, life has never been particularly kind for men, so the male ethic and belief system prepares the majority of men to survive it.
Not so for women. Since progressive society got them out of the mines and the mills in the mid-19th century, they have become accustomed to environments that were "woman friendly". As more and more of them go to work for female bosses, I think they will find women far more ruthless on the average than men were.
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More like:
masculine/feminine
atomistic/holistic
separate/connected
agency/communality
Power/Value
respect/esteem
exile/prisoner
strength/beauty
integrity/compassion
principle/caring
justice/mercy
freedom/love
no/yes
shame/guilt
Package deal. Everything on the left-hand side goes together. No amount of social engineering will change that. Same for the right-hand side.
Larry
ADULT: What you are once you've run out of excuses.
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Ok - good summary. Yang and Yin. I agree.
I guess you didn't find my little joke about calculus integrals all that funny, eh?
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I got a grin out of it. I was just too wrapped in my own ideas to spare the energy. (And feeling just a tinge inadequate. I pull out my old Calc texts every once in a while and find I can't understand a goddamned thing!)
Here it is now - :-)
Larry
ADULT: What you are once you've run out of excuses.
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Thanks, non-troll. I'm pretty tickled with myself about it. :-)
Larry
ADULT: What you are once you've run out of excuses.
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....that if you make "feminism" the enemy, you're still leaving the door open from staunch "conservative anti-feminists" who cling to the belief that their lives are worth more than those of men, who expect the door held for them and for men to die willingly should danger surface. I'll take a fair feminist over one of those old-school man-haters any day...
bg
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by Anonymous User on Sunday February 01, @01:59AM EST (#65)
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"Can someone define the word "feminism" in such a way that it can include both the radical feminists and fair-minded people?"
I think Warren frames the issue very well in this quote from The Myth of Male Power:
"I am a men's liberatinist (or 'masculist') when men's liberation is defined as equal opportunity and equal responsibility for both sexes. I am a feminist when feminism favors equal opportunities and responsibilities for both sexes. I oppose both movements when either says our sex is *the* oppressed sex, therfore, 'we deserve rights.' That's not gender liberation but gender entitlement. Ultimately I am in favor of neither a women's movement nor a men's movement but a gender transition movement. However, I oppose skipping past a men's movement until men have equally articulated their perspective. Then we will be ready for a synthesis."
The Myth of Male Power, p. 19.
Marc
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by Anonymous User on Sunday February 01, @01:54AM EST (#64)
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"could you point to one issue where feminism has either acknowledged that women had an unfair advantage, or in any way worked to accomplish something positive for men?"
Without necessarily taking a side on this issue, I can think of at least some examples. Long ago NOW actually gave an award to NCFM but they later covered that up. Their former president, Karen DeCrow, has spoken out for Choice for Men and for fathers rights and has endorsed Warren Farrell's books. Glenn Sacks quoted her on Choice for Men. In her opinion, it was NOW that changed, not people like herself or Warren Farrell. NOW once even alligned with those who wanted women to have to register for the draft, even though their reasoning was totally different (they said that not doing so makes women 2nd class citizens).
I think this debate is a very interesting (and never-ending) one, but I also think it is essentially one of semantics and activism style, and sometimes it divides us alot more than it should.
Marc
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I meant to put this link in the previous post. Here is an extremely interesting site from the black male perspective. This guy has no fantasies about striking an alliance with feminism.
http://blacktown.net/ANGELA_DAVIS.html
The whole site is extremely interesting, and over-the-top for even a radical like me, but I think that white men need to look at what has happened to black men over the past 40 years to see what is in store for us unless some pretty serious work gets done very soon.
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If we rip feminism, we'll come off as being against equal rights
There is a lot to this, from a tactical point of view. I see it as counterproductive to point out the parrallels/connections between feminism and Marxism. Much better to simply find the most effective, devastating arguments against Marxism and use them against feminism where they apply, without mentioning Marxism at all.
In the same vein, I can see arguing against positions with a basis in feminism without mentioning feminism at all.
Or as an alternative, defusing much of the defensiveness of the feminist-sympathetic listener with "Some who call themselves feminists maintain that..." and proceeding to attack a particular theory/myth/lie. It gives the listener a chance to say to themself "He's not attacking MY feminism" and not tune you out.
(Not to say that they won't tune you out anyway, but it's certainly worth experimenting with.)
I wish to hell that Sommers and McElroy would call themselves something else (besides feminists)
I see them as in the same position as people in the American South who want to reclaim the Confederate flag, because they want to celebrate certain good principles they think that flag stands for. They are doomed to failure because that flag has become permanently and irrevocably associated in the popular mind with the institution of slavery.
I don't call myself a "masculist" or a "masculinist" for the simple reason that those words imply a greater concern for the welfare of men than of women.
I've decided to call myself an Integral Sexist, a term I thought up about a year ago. I can accept myself as a 'masculist' if it is considered to mean "men helping each other to grow up." However, I don't have much control over what masculism will come to mean, any more than Wendy and Christina do over 'feminism.'
Larry
ADULT: What you are once you've run out of excuses.
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I got a letter from Clairs today about how they are "in the process of identifying" the items they carry from D&G and how it was never their intention to carry offensive items.
This really doesn't sound like they are getting rid of the D&G items, maybe no more socks with "boys are stupid" on them, but as that chick from the other thread stated, a lot of their stuff isn't that offensive - but I'd rather not be giving them money to sell that over their website, ya know?
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