Hi to everyone here.
Right. I have now had time to have a brief survey of this forum, and it seems so far that a lot of the posters here have a very different definition of feminism than myself...even more so than I had previously thought! There are a few issues that arise from this, not least ones regarding who gets to decide premises/epistemological definitions, but here is my no.1 concern:
Here's my concern: What is feminism?
In the other thread on "Introductions" I linked to a piece by myself which defined what the M/FRM means to me. It includes also statements of what it is not.
As far as getting that from a feminist - my impression is that you might as well call yourselves "JSUNWTCHDUTISTS." It means nothing. According to just about every feminist in recent memory that has come around here, you can believe whatever you want, and as long as you call yourself a feminist, then, by Gum, you're a feminist.
That's weaselly to me. It's slick, and intellectually dishonest. It avoids having to defend - or even think - about unpalatable positions by saying "Well not all feminists think the same on everything..." While technically true, I can say the same thing about, for instance, Atheists. While all of them don't think alike, if you get one who burns incense and offers up chants to Loki, well, they're not a very good atheist.
So - what is you commonality? Anything? What beliefs must a feminist hold? What can they not hold? Is it possible to be a pro-life feminist? A conservative one? Are Wendy MacElroy and Christina Hoff Summers "Feminists in Good Standing?" Or no?
Does one support "Affirmative Action" for women? If the answer is yes, then it will follow that this will lead to quotas and tokenism. How do you reconcile that? How do you answer the very legitimate question of "So you're saying it's okay to hire someone based on their sex if that sex is female?"
Take a stand. Take a position. Have the courage of your convictions.
And ask yourself why feminism has developed such a bunker mentality; also, why does it seem there is so much effort to hide what it means? Is it a thing which cannot withstand scrutiny? Is it something to be ashamed of?
Some, if not all, of the people here plainly feel that feminism has hurt them. Directly. As a human being, I am concerned about that, since I personally think that political ideology should NEVER trump compassion.
Political ideology? Riddle me this:
Mary and John get married, have a child, and get divorced. As a matter of rote, Mary winds up with custody, is the recipient of child support, gets the house, etc. etc.
All on the sheer basis of her sex. This hurts John, primarily because he goes from "Father who has a daily presence in his child's life" to "Visitor in his Child's Life."
The law gets changed; this prompts a revisiting of the case, which then changes to give John custody, et al. This is on the basis of the facts - but when all is said and done, this hurts Mary, who now becomes the visitor in her child's life.
Someone will wind up hurt no matter what.
Whether I agree or disagree with your take on feminism is not really the issue here. (Well, it kind of is, but bear with me.) I am having some difficulty in deciding how to proceed, and here's why:
I don't want to be the cause of pain and suffering for anyone if I can help it.
Some people have directly stated that feminism hurts them/is still hurting them. For some, this may mean not engaging with feminism or feminists more than they actually *have to* (and I can see why, if you regard feminism as a hate movement).
Depends - you going to cling stubbornly to it?
I could give you a very long litany of the sins that feminists and feminism have committed against me. I was an abused husband - not because I couldn't have snapped the little bitch in two with one hand, but because I got taught never - EVER - to hit a woman. Not even in self-defense. I endured broken fingers, burns, scaldings, ambushes while I slept - all manner of abuse. And the reaction I have gotten from 90% or better of feminists have ranged from "Well, you eventually slammed her against a wall and told her no more, so since you have the greater *potential* to cause harm, this makes you the abusive one" to "What did you do to her to provoke her?" or the classic "Well, that's too bad, and nobody should go through that - but there's not enough of you to be worth helping."
Oh. Also "Build your own shelters." Yep. Tried it. The leader of the local N.O.W. at the time torpedoed me, and campaigned actively against it.
I identify as a feminist. Not by any definitons I've seen here so far, no, but still: I am a feminist, and for some people that means the enemy. If you want to get into why I am a feminist, definitions etc we can do that, but as far as this thread goes, my main priority is going to be listening and asking questions.
What you are getting is people's definitions based not on what feminists SAY, but what they have seen them DO.
However, I can see why even that approach is going to be offensive to some. A KKK member on an anti-racist forum is probably going to be offensive even just asking questions. So here's my problem: even given that I am going to try and consider it from YOUR point of view, I will need to ask questions and clarify as to what that POV is and why. I have a lot of questions and a lot of points of disagreement with what's been said. IF, as some of you might well think, it is not worth your time, or worse, it is going to cause you pain to even talk to me because I am a feminist, then I would be grateful if you could indicate that.* Otherwise, I don't think it's fair on my side to start critiquing anything anyone has said on this forum.
Just remember that taking potshots at someone's POV, while keeping your own hidden will be called out.