feminism

[Socialmalfunction]

i know some girls that are self proclaimed feminists but it really gets to me because they seem to have missed the point. dont get me wrong or anything, i'm not knocking they fight for equality but i think feminism should be just that. a fight for equality. what they turned it into seems to be a narrow minded fight for female supremacy. these girls are in my lit class and anytime we have discussions that involve other cultures and how they treat their women they blow up at me for defending that culture. they say that the guy is obviously HORRIBLE because he beats his wife. i say by our standards yes, but by the standards of HIS time and culture he is in the right and we can't say that he is evil because he is doing something that is deemed socially necessary.

i'm not saying what he did (in the book) was right, im saying we can't judge him by our standards. this is especially true because the book takes place in the 1940s or 50s. things were entirely different then. not to mention the book was set in africa and their culture remained unchanged for hundreds possibly thousands of years. well anyway, my point is that in me trying to give them a different perspective i get the "evil eye" and more than that sometimes and this is from people who call me friend.

with these girls everything comes down to the supremacy of the girl and the inferiority or badness of the guy. i try to tell them that is wrong, feminists everywhere are fighting for equality and if they started to fight for supremacy not only would their struggle become even harder but if they succeeded the men would be in the same position as the women are in now. what good would that do? NONE! it just gets me soo mad.

[truthaddict11]

most feminists are not "men hating radicals".


beats his wife. i say by our standards yes, but by the standards of HIS time and culture he is in the right and we can't say that he is evil because he is doing something that is deemed socially necessary.
by saying this you are opening up a can of worms, by saying that a man beating his wife in the 50's was "socially nessary" is like saying that slavery, women not voting, segregation were "socially nessary" for its time and that they it was "right" on what was happening in thier time and we shouldnt judge them.
And that people such as abolitionists were "fighting for the superiority of the black race" because they werent like "reformists"
who wanted to "lessen the suffering" under slavery.

[redstar2000]

It seems to me that you have two problems.

The question of how to judge human customs of the past is an academic one; does one use the standards of the past or the standards of the present?

Historians are "supposed" to be "neutral"...but, of course, they aren't really neutral.

Consequently, the best that can be hoped for, in my view, is that the conscientious historian will explain why a given action was considered "acceptable" in that era.

Your other problem with the "girls" is a bit more serious. You didn't explain in exactly what way they are engaging in a "narrow-minded fight for female supremacy". It's hardly a matter of "female supremacy" for young women to point out when men act "badly"...they often do act badly. The historical record is pretty clear on that score.

Without more details, I can't say much.

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[Socialmalfunction]

Hmm, I should clarify… the book took place entirely in a 1950’s African tribe during the time just before the dutch, I believe it was, went in with their people and what not. Anyway, in this time and this society it was more than acceptable for a man to beat his wife. If a man didn’t beat his wife, when she deserved it, than he was looked down upon as less than a man. So I don’t think him beating his wives was right but in that time it was what his society called upon him to do, subdue his wife, in order to be a man. So me saying that beating a wife in the 1950s would be opening a can of worms, but narrowing that statement down to Africa opens something entirely different. Theirs was a different world and their customs might as well have been set in stone for how long they’d been around.
Redstar, as for the girls I refer to, they don’t want to lessen the suffering of females. If women could reproduce without the help of males they would probably be willing to wipe out the men of the world. And if not that, putting men in their own separate village or town away from the girls would be good for them too. For them women seem to be the ultimate sufferers, they don’t see that everyone goes through it too. Homosexuals, cross dressers, sexual deviants in general, girls that have sex that are called sluts while with boys sex is a notch in their belt, girls that don’t have sex are called wholesome while boys that don’t are “fags.” These arguments are all unseen to them. Even when these arguments are brought up they acknowledge them for a bit and then toss them out.
Supposedly what they want is to be treated equal but they can’t even treat their boyfriends with the equality they expect should be shown to themselves. I guess what I mean is it’s a double standard and if what they want is equality I feel they’re going about it the wrong way. Treating their boyfriends (and these are boys that have admitted to loving) like inferiors will not help their problems, it will leave them without boyfriends. These are girls that I care about but they treat me badly anytime I try to show them a different way to look at certain issues. Shouldn’t they try to make allies instead of just frustrating or hurting the people they call “friend”? and yes i think since it is literature we, as the reader, should at least TRY look at it from a neutral standpoint even if the person who wrote wasnt exactly neutral on the subject. the point of an AP lit class is to learn to see things from a deeper, more open point of view, after all.

[sc4r]

not to put too fine a point on it you simply seem annoyed that some girls seem to you to be preferring their own notion of acceptable morality to yours and dont seem to be as nice to you as you think you deserve.

Get used to it. People will never be as ready to accept the obvious correctness of any view you happen to hold as you think they ought to be. All of of them will, amazing as it may sound, think you less perfect than you think yourself.

They are not you. They have their own concerns, and ideas.

AS to the 'failure' by these girls to accept an argument that we should not criticise anyone for acting in accord with their culture and times even if it is very much against ours - Thats a perfectly legitimate position they have. They are saying in effect that NO, they dont regard that particular behaviour as in any way excusable and dont wish to weaken that stance by even seeming to be flexible about it.

Given how recently it was that wife beating was considered totally acceptable I dont blame them.

They probably dont care that it could be said that a man was good by the standards of his time. They are not concerned with that and so ignore it. They are only concerned with saying that the behaviour is considered right now, by them, when it matters, to them, as unacceptable. They are also in effect saying to you that they are more concerned with practicalities today than with your intellectualising about a book.

They sounf like smart people to me. Give em my regards.

[Socialmalfunction]

i see your point, but if they aren't concerned "with [my] intellectualising about a book" then why are they in an AP Lit class? that makes no sense to me. and no beating one's wife isn't excusable, but we are supposed to judge him based on their standards and "realise" that he is a tragic hero... or something to that general effect. that was the assignment in the class. by them zeroing in on only the wife beating they are missing the point of the book. "being so manly that you forget yourself is bad" that was a general point of the book. the wife beating was, in fact, a pretty small part of the book. it added to the fact that he didnt know how to show affection and was easier to violence than show affection. "being so feminist that you can't see the main character fully when you're being graded on seeing him fully" is my general point. i'm a female. i believe violence is generally bad. beating one's wife is bad. suppressing women is bad. but i see suppressing men as bad too. they shouldnt believe everything i believe, then life would be boring, but if you ignore others then it becomes easier to lose track of reality. and i generally see ignore the views of ones friends as being bad. i see them as friends, i agree with them that wife beating is bad, but they shouldnt bite someone's head off in a class discussion because they say the main character is "basically" a good guy.
but it basically all comes back to the fact that it IS an AP LITERATURE CLASS and "intellectualising about books" is very necessary in order to complete the class successfully. if they dont want to do that, why are they in the class?

[sc4r]

No idea.

I cant say I care.

sorry.

I'm a bloke. I dont see women as generally anywhere near as demanding that they be considered right as men. and I certainly have never felt surpressed by one.

Your girls simply have different priorities than you do. Your question is , it seems to me, a variation of 'why dont they think like me'; to which the only honest answer is - Dunno, ask them. If that does not give you the answer it's either your fault, or theirs, or both, or neither. But for sure no-one else is going to be able to tell you which.

sorry again. You'r asking an unanswerable question I think. However, I will give you the benefit of my anscient wisdom and let you into a secret ...... It is very much easier to find out what a person thinks, than why. They often dont know why themselves, and at deep level do any of us know?

If you want my best attempt at rationalising what I see as the exolanation for their stance it is - that they prioritise prevenytion of wife beating very highly. That they are prepared to project this feeling through time (I'd speculate that the further back or forward you project, the stronger your feeling is). and this leads them to place a very strong premium on denouncing the character. In other words they do see it as a central and very important point , even though you do not.

Or they may just not care very much about school. I never did (much to my regret later in life).

[Socialmalfunction]

well there's no need to say sorry for anything really. i have a habit of going off about stuff that doesnt have to do with my question. my question really is: are feminists fight for equality or supremacy? kuz i can only go by the girls i know...

[redstar2000]

If women could reproduce without the help of males they would probably be willing to wipe out the men of the world. And if not that, putting men in their own separate village or town away from the girls would be good for them too.

I think they would enjoy very much the works of James Tiptree and Sheri Tepper. They'd also like Marge Piercy, though maybe not as much.

One thing you should understand about these young women is that, like most people in the present era, they have no plausible vision of equality.

In modern capitalist society, it really is "dog eat dog" and is becoming more so with every passing year. People look for both the chance at "superiority" and for plausible allies in that quest.

It's hard to blame them.

One book that often appeals to young feminists is Engels' Origins of the Family, Private Property, and the State. It situates the oppression of women within the overall rise of class society. Although much of the anthropology has been superseded by subsequent research, it remains a surprisingly "modern" work. You can download it and print it out for free at

Marxist Archives (http://www.marxists.org)


These are girls that I care about but they treat me badly anytime I try to show them a different way to look at certain issues.

I'm afraid that "comes with the territory"...people rarely welcome any attempt to change their minds about things they feel strongly about. There's an English ditty that goes...

A man convinced against his will
is of the same opinion still.

If it's possible, it's better to talk to people who are already open to new ideas and interested in discussing them.

I am a little curious though...what kind of all-female social order these young women envision.

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A site about communist ideas

[Socialmalfunction]

haha, i'd be afraid to ask if i was you. it's probably a male-eating type thing. but i dont think i'll be trying to change their minds on any of these things. hardy har har, i know its pointless to bring up something you have no care to change but it had been bugging me. i asked what one of them was fighting for... equality or supremacy. she said both. so i'll leave it at that and continue being her friend as usual. but i would like to know how other feel on the question of what they're fighting for...

[redstar2000]

Well, a bit of speculation is always fun...

Probably within this century it will be possible for a woman to reproduce in the complete absence of sperm...her child will be a female clone of her mother, have the same genes (barring minor mutations), etc.

More difficult would be arranging matters so that two females each contributed to the child's genes...but I wouldn't be surprised to see that also by the end of this century.

It will be another step towards more female control of their own reproductive system.

I can safely predict that some guys will find this terribly threatening if not morally "outrageous".

Poo.

It is most unlikely that men will become "extinct" and even were that to happen, the remaining females would still form a human society and would still be people...capable of the best and worst that humans are always capable of.

I suspect there have always been a small minority of women who prefer an all-female environment; just as there have always been a small minority of men who prefer an all-male environment.

Most people like a mixture; I don't think that will change.

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A site about communist ideas

[sc4r]

Originally posted by [email protected] 2 2003, 01:13 AM
well there's no need to say sorry for anything really. i have a habit of going off about stuff that doesnt have to do with my question. my question really is: are feminists fight for equality or supremacy? kuz i can only go by the girls i know...
I dont know how to answer that. Some will want supremacy and know this is what they want, Some will want supremacy and say they want equality, some will want equality but assess it wrong and actually demand things that would constitute supremacy, A very few will hit it right on the button.

When you are targetting a complex goal you can be almost totally sure that no matter what you demand you wont get an exact bullseye. So most sensible people aim a little high because they reason that if there HAS to be any injustice they'd rather it was in their favour than the other way around.

The reality is that Women are so far down the equality scale anyway in most walks of life that no matter how high they aim they wont get anywhere near equality any time soon anyway. Aiming for equality practically guarantees they wont end up getting it. Just as if you offer me your best price for a car straightaway the one thing you can be absolutely sure of is that either you will end up with no car or a higher price than you could have had it for.

All the best. Dont forget to say Hi to those smart girls in your class from me (tell I'm a Marxist BTW).

[Hate Is Art]

if they want equal right why not let them go fight on the fronts?

[Umoja]

Are you by any chance reading "Things Fall Apart"?

[Socialmalfunction]

haha i knew someone would figure it out. yeah we read it during summer for our summer reading assignment. i agree with redstar and i get what sc4r is saying. this is helping me to understand my friends perspective without having to get into it with them. :D thanks alot! but i dont know exactly what digital nirvana is asking... sorry

[Urban Rubble]

I didn't read all the posts in the thread, so forgive me if someone said this.

The girls that push for female supremacy generally tend to be stupid, young high school girls that are new to feminism and are usually doing it because it's cool and fun to be a Riot Grrrl. Real feminists strive for equality, nothing more.

[Invader Zim]

The fight for social equality, I support 100% (that happens if you live with a single mother), but I know, and read material from extream feminists who truly hate men, they with to reverse the tables and oppress men, just as they have been oppressed in the past. These are generally the ones who say that all sex is infact rape... well I say if they want to live in thier pathetic and celibate existance then let them.

[redstar2000]

Riot Grrls are not very musically talented but I rather like their attitude.

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A site about communist ideas

[Anti-Fascist]

As a Masculist, I would suggest reading The Fraud of Feminism by the Socialist theoretician (and associate of Karl Marx) Ernest Belfort Bax.

This is how feminist ideology is anti-men (source is Wikipedia):

-Child custody strongly favoring mothers
-Men incarcerated for inability to pay unrealistic child support payments
-Children aborted or given up for adoption without fathers' consent
-Men risking their lives in military service
-High-risk employment, but receiving no special honor for doing so
-Men charged in domestic violence cases, even when victims
-Men charged in rape and sexual harassment cases with no evidence beyond the plaintiff's claim, where the accusation frequently destroys a man's life
Research and free speech repressed unless pro-feminist
-Men fired from their jobs for dissenting with feminist ideology in the workplace
-Hate crimes against men
-Relative lack of funding for men's health
-Lack of advocacy for men's rights and entitlement programs for women only
-Special government agencies for women's affairs with no corresponding agencies for men's affairs

Masculsim is fighting for equity between the sexes - with the equity as close to equality as nature will allow.

Masculism does recognise that there are sex based difference between men and women - however it believes that many of the differences that are claimed today [and in the past] are in fact based on false gender steroetypes.

Masculism believes that both men and women have been victims of their assigned [traditional] gender roles.

Masculism does not blame one sex for the predicament we find ourselves in - as both sexes have contributed the definition of traditional gender roles.

Masculism believes that a patriachy/matriachy existed in the past, with men and women being given power in the spheres of life that impacted their sex the most e.g. women had inordinate power in the areas of sexuality/reproduction/child rearing/family/ and home while men has inordinate powers in areas related to paid work/government/overall decision making concerned with community survival.

Masculism wants to end the patriachy/matriachy by expanding the definition of what it means to be a man or a woman so that both sexes are given equal opportunities and responsibilities in areas that they have been traditionally excluded.

Masculism wants to end all forms of sex-based descrimination against men and women.

[redstar2000]

My, my, never know what you'll find in those old trunks in the attic, do you?

From what I can tell from a Google search, Ernest Belfort Bax was an acquaintance of Marx and Engels, not an "associate".

His book, The Fraud of Feminism, was published in 1913 (long after the deaths of both Marx and Engels) as an argument against giving women the vote.

I didn't hunt long enough to see if there was a copy of this nutball tome on the internet...though I can imagine its contents must be a fascinating example of Victorian "leftism".

Stepping out of the attic now, a word for the "anti-fascist masculist"...

In a world of self-evident male supremacy, to call oneself a "masculist" and at the same time to suggest that "all you want is equality" is disingenuous, to put it mildly.

It is rather like a "businessmen's association" coming out for "equality with the workers".

If your "wish list" of "masculine" grievances were alleviated, the net result would be an increase in male privilege.

I think you know that.

I also think you know that what you are advocating has nothing in common with socialism, communism, anarchism or any of the ideas that generally characterize this board.

If you want to discuss "masculism", the proper place for that is in the Opposing Ideologies forum.

Please confine your views on that subject to the appropriate forum.

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[Anti-Fascist]

From what I can tell from a Google search, Ernest Belfort Bax was an acquaintance of Marx and Engels, not an "associate".

According to Wikipedia, he was an "associate".


In a world of self-evident male supremacy, to call oneself a "masculist" and at the same time to suggest that "all you want is equality" is disingenuous, to put it mildly.

Calling it names won't help.

I do not believe that there is a "self-evident male supremacy". A "self-evident" truth is a truth the veracity of which the consititution of the mind is such that the mind cannot deny. Any statement contrary to a self-evident truth is self-contradictory, inconceivable, impossible to comprehend - that a triangle has three sides is one such self-evident truth, for anything contrary is inconceivable. Male supremacy is not "self-evident" in the proper sense of the word.

Again, scroll up and read how feminist ideology is anti-men.


I also think you know that what you are advocating has nothing in common with socialism, communism, anarchism or any of the ideas that generally characterize this board.

As an Anarchist myself, I do assure you that what I am advocating is perfectly combatible with Socialism, Communism, and Anarchism.

Masculism wants to end all forms of sex-based discrimination against men and women - pefectly compatibe with Marxism. Masculinism acknowledges sex differences - also compatible with Marxism.


Please confine your views on that subject to the appropriate forum.

Okay.

However, in my defence, as a masculist, I merely believe that both of the sexes are 100% equal. This is a belief which feminist ideology implicitly denies.

We can continue this discussion in the Opposing Ideologies forum wherein I started a new topic about Masculism.

[Socialmalfunction]

well i dont know if this justifies anything but since i brought up the question of feminism and whatnot i am pretty happy that anti-fascist posted that here. both sides of the issue should be seen and he helped that along. that and it's pretty interesting. :D