So 3 years ago I made a video on feminism which received a lot of support from most of my viewers. I filmed it virtually “in the heat of the moment”, after reading Warren Farrel’s “The Myth of Male Power”, also some online articles and blog posts expressing similar views while providing bogus statistics which I didn’t even bother to verify. Shame on me for that.
In the above embedded video I mentioned how those views hit close to home because (at the time) I felt they reflected my personal experience. I want to elaborate on that a little bit, because I think my attitude in that video was absolutely counter-productive.
I’ve been working in a variety of fields ever since I was 16 years old. At first I did some waitressing and bartending, then I worked for a little bit in retail, then in shipping, banks and insurance. In all that time I personally never FELT discriminated by my employers, who for the most part treated me and paid me equally to my male co-workers who were hired on the same position.
In a previous post I talked about the sexual harassment I experienced while working as a waitress. If you haven’t read that post yet, please do so for the sake of context. I have never seen or heard of male waiters/bartenders being subjected to the same type of treatment from their customers. In the interest of fairness, I must also mention that I and the other female waitresses/bartenders also made bigger tips. Again, this reflects only my personal experience, which I know is not much evidence of anything, but might be interesting to some of my readers.
My first “real job in a real office” was as a secretary for a small shipbroking agency. The only other employees besides my boss were 2 agents (both males) and an accountant (female). I worked there for some 3 years and my job description entailed doing all the paperwork for when one of our vessels entered or left the port, which included the Bill of Lading , Commercial Invoice, Certificate of Origin + the lists with the ship’s complete crew (name, position, etc), the merchandise, personal possessions on board and so on.
After 2 years or so when one of our agents quit his job, I asked my boss if I could be promoted as an agent, since I was familiar with all the procedures for when a vessel enters/leaves the port. On many occasions I had accompanied the agents when they were performing the arrival/departure procedures, so I pretty much knew all there was to know. I didn’t get the job. Instead, my boss hired a new agent who had no experience and had to go through one month of training in order to familiarize himself with all the things I already knew by heart. My boss never said I wasn’t qualified enough for the position, in fact he specifically said he would personally “love” to promote me. But he simply couldn’t, because – being a girl – I would lack authority and I would not be taken seriously by the other agents, ship owners and charterers – who were almost exclusively men.
At that point and for many years after, I didn’t see this as discrimination. I just saw it as “the way things are”. Sure, it may be unfair, but there’s nothing I can do about it so I may as well go ahead and settle for a “female job”, such as a secretary.
On the other hand, the secretary position at all companies I ever worked for, was specifically asking for women. No man could apply for the job, even if they were qualified for it and they wanted the post.
Many years later, when I started working in insurance, I was at first hired as a secretary as well. After almost a year I was promoted as an insurance agent, then later on promoted to be a leasing agent, then later I became a leasing manager. I was always paid the same monthly salary as my male co-workers who had the same positions.
However, most of them made bigger commissions than I did. Whenever a “big deal” was in talks (for instance the insurance of a big property, like a villa or a yacht or a chain of stores, etc), my company would send a male to handle the transaction. Every single time. And I never even saw this as a problem. Again, I saw it as “the way things are”, and I rationalized that this happened because most property owners were men and they would rather do business with another man. And no, there were no “written rules” about it, but everybody thought the same and everybody accepted this *reality*.
To be completely honest, I never stepped in and asked to be assigned on a deal like that. Neither did any other of the female agents, even if they were just as qualified as the men. Maybe if we did, our boss would have considered it. I will never know. He was (still is I presume) a very open minded guy who believed in giving his employees opportunities to prove themselves.
All this says something about the society I live in. Whether it’s the men who prefer to deal with other men rather than with women, or whether it’s the women who don’t feel confident enough to take on bigger tasks, we must accept that there IS still a problem, that our culture still promotes the idea that men are generally more capable and/or more qualified.
Just like the same culture is still promoting the idea that being a nurse, or a day carer, or a babysitter and so on is not a “man’s job” and women are preferred almost exclusively for these positions.
In my removed video I also talked about how in a family with children, the men are expected to be the primary money-makers, while the women are expected to be the child carers. I asked my audience how many women would be willing to have a stay-at-home husband while they are making all the money, how many would be willing to pay all the bills and also all their husband’s expenses (from his clothes and aftershave, to his get-togethers with his friends) – while still respecting him. I assumed the answer would be “not many”. And from what I’ve been witnessing (in my country anyway) for over 30 years, I would still say “not many”.
But this doesn’t mean that we should throw our hands in the air and say “this is just the way things are”. These gender-role models we are still holding on to are oppressive to EVERYBODY. And once we are able to see this truth and recognize it, we almost have a “civic duty” to make the rest of the world recognize it as well. Because awareness is the first and probably most important step towards change.
I already posted this comment on your YouTube video:
Here’s a couple of sources for you that support some of the points you originally made:
http://goo.gl/eq0cc
http://goo.gl/cNYFM
I got them via the Bogosity Podcast that hit on a similar point recently. I encourage you to listen to that episode:
http://goo.gl/UJor1
your citations don’t give any useful information and are incredibly misleading. They don’t do anything but present the situation except in a slightly more palatable light.
“Women mostly work part time.”
No shit. Thank you for telling me something I know.
“Men put more time into their work than women.”
Bullshit. We don’t.
“Women leave the work force for preganacy.”
Because they’re often not given a choice. Women are expected, encouraged and presumed to give up their careers for the family. No such expectation exists for men.
But whatever.
Wait, I provided scientific papers and your response is “Bullshit”? I suppose you have better data then, disproving the papers I linked to?
[quote]Women are expected, encouraged and presumed to give up their careers for the family. No such expectation exists for men.[/quote]
Hmmm…I think it’s quite safe to turn this around: Men are expected, encouraged and presumed to NOT give up their careers for the family.
So such expectation do indeed exist for men.
Now I don’t have any data on this, this is only my personal experience, so I won’t claim it to be “The Truth”, but in my experience, women expect their husbands to be the “provider” much more than men expect their wives to stay at home.
What I do know however is that there are studies showing that statistically, women want to marry “upwards”, meaning that they want a husband of greater social standing than they are, usually one who earns more, which leads to many highly skilled women being single, because there just aren’t enough men to fulfill that requirement.
Does that mean that men are oppressed? That they’re forced to go the career way by women?
Maybe PZ can give his opinion on this, given that he’s an evolutionary biologist. Could it be that sexual selection led to these kinds of behaviors? Women preferring a “provider” and men more heavily competing in order to be that “provider”? How does it work in other primate species?
Do you throw your poop? Just wondering. I mean, you’re a primate, right?
If women don’t breast feed their children for five years and are perpetually pregnant; it makes sense for men to be the primary providers to some degree. Only if we’re talking before agriculture, before civilization, and only if hunting (not gathering) was the primary food source. So what?
There are many reasons for the pay gap. Some of those reasons have to do with flat-out discrimination, job opportunity, social pressure, the “danger gap”, “women’s” fields being compensated less than “men’s” fields, etc.
Some of these reasons absolutely have to do with the stress that is placed on men to provide for their families – a stress that is placed on them even when it is not placed on them by their wives. One of the other FtB bloggers just talked about this: http://freethoughtblogs.com/lousycanuck/2012/07/29/rigid-gender-roles-hurt-men-in-the-workplace/
And if some women choose not to marry, what the F business is it of yours? Why should you care?
And to answer your question – YES, it does mean that men are harmed by sexism and the societal enforcement of rigid gender-roles. How did you not get the memo on this?
This has already been discussed on a recent previous post here: http://freethoughtblogs.com/cristinarad/2012/07/11/gender-differences-skepchickconconvergence-panel/#comment-1233
I asked about the evolutionary background to get a descriptive not a prescriptive overview. And that might indeed be very helpful and this is exactly where the unmarried women issue plays in. Individually, of course it’s none of my business. Collectively, it points to part of the “problem” though, namely that women do enforce gender roles, particularly when it comes to family roles.
I’ve put the word problem in quotation marks, because I’m not yet convinced that gender roles are a bad thing.
Gender roles are not necessarily a bad thing. However, some of the aspects of traditional gender roles (as in 1950’s style) are extremely problematic. The biggest issue is the devaluation of women’s work, which gives her less autonomy and presents a toxic power difference in marriages. She essentially has less freedom to leave. This is also bad for men, because they are seen as an income source and not a partner.
Some people think that gender roles in general need to be wiped out – I think that’s unrealistic and it is bad for choice. Some men and women are very keen on strict gender roles and they shouldn’t be actively shamed into anything different. If a woman prefers a man with more socioeconomic power than her for a mate, who am I to tell her different?
The problem arises when the gender roles are strict, extreme, or strongly enforced. In other words, if the gender role you have chosen is so strict that it hampers your personal power and well-being – that’s not so good. If the gender role you have chosen is so extreme that it is psychological damaging and fosters co-dependence – that’s not so good. Choosing that for yourself should not be illegal, but it should be far from socially or legally enforced.
Strict gender roles force specialization and limit the skills we develop, pigeon hole individuals into primary activities and duties they are not suited for which wastes human potential, and leave those who do not fit the binary into default social out-cast status.
That’s not good.
Yes what M.A. Melby said.
I don’t mind gender roles if “you” want to fallow them but I am all about the personal freedom for everyone to go there own way in life without crippling judgment.
Great, then where’s the problem with women choosing family over career?
No problem.
My Wife is going to take a year off for our first kid.
That you keep pretending this explains wage gap/disparity. Among other things, of course, but that’s what immediately jumps out at me.
I don’t pretend anything, I presented two studies that show just that! You on the other hand seem to think that you can pretend to ignore the facts and go with your gut…truthieness simply feels so much better, doesn’t it?
Hmmm…
Women in the Quiverfull movement choose to be stay at home moms. No problem here! I have studies to show it!
Read it and weep. The data is all there. Would you like to point out any specific problems with the numbers? Or will you just dismiss it because you can’t stand the thought of it being true? Perhaps try being rational. I know its hard.
OMG – I’m crying so hard!! My world-view is shattered.
Oh wait – not so much.
The first citation you gave is a working paper (read: NOT peer reviewed), and it was funded by the conservative think-tank Olin foundation, which has previously been caught faking a study on how concealed carry reduces crime.
And honestly, I think the all the second study does is break down all of the different ways that working women get screwed, (ex. more education, but fewer FT and management positions.) One of the tables even shows that men in the study had more children on average than the women, but the women are the ones that are always expected to give up career and other opportunities to raise children.
I used to listen to the Bogosity podcast bc I like to hear arguments from people with different views; but I found so much of his information to be cherry picked, misrepresented and misused (and when I wrote an to correct him on one point he was dismissive and rude). I still spend a good amount of time in the libertarian blogosphere, but not on Bogosity.
I wish I could find it the citation now but I remember reading in Delusions of Gender that, in mock situations, having children wasn’t viewed as negatively impacting men’s work even if they were a single parent. It was in the chapter where she was examining how often our standards shift when evaluating men and women for the same job.
Steinpreis, Anders & Ritzke (1999) The impact of gender on the review of the curricula vitae of job applicants and tenure candidates: A national empirical study.
Showed that the CV of a “Dr. Brian Miller” was rated by members of tenure boards as having better qualifications than a “Dr. Karen Miller”. The CVs were exactly the same except for the first name, yet twice as many people said they would hire the male candidate.
Not sure if that’s the one you were talking about, but I highly recommend Delusions of Gender for anyone that hasn’t read it. Lots of good studies.
Steinpreis, Anders & Ritzke?
Uhm…actually it showed that the CV of a “Dr. Karen Miller” was rated by members of tenure boards as having BETTER qualifications than a “Dr. Brian Miller”. The female candidate was MORE likely to get hired for tenure than the male candidate. It also showed that, when rated as worthy of hire, each candidate was offered the same salary regardless of gender.
Maybe Cordelia Fine didn’t mention these results in her feminist handbook, and that’s why you weren’t aware of them?
The actual study is here, tbyte is wrong.
http://advance.cornell.edu/documents/ImpactofGender.pdf
Fig. 2 indicates that a higher proportion of female candidates were offered a tenure position than the male candidates.
“The results indicated that there were no main effects for participant gender or applicant gender for salary
selection.”
Things is the vast majority of feminists really do not care about the way men are affected negatively it is almost exclusively about women. An example would be the male friendly vibe from the early National Organization of Women’s releases but around the 70s that all disappeared. Apparently they realized that women enjoying many options in life meant men enjoying few. Now this is solely an American phenomenon but I can’t help but thinking feminism has solely lead to society progressing in the opposite direction. Examples: thousands of female DV shelters and just one for men (despite women initiating violence 50% of the time), preferential treatment in divorce court, the ability to make false accusations against men and get off scot-free, feminist jurisprudence in the courts, “special” disciplinary committees in colleges made up of individuals with “special” training to spot abusers/rapists (basically you are guilty if you do defend yourself and guilty if you don’t), social workers who help make decisions in divorce courts going thru feminist theoretical training in the guise of soc. classes, etc. No surprise now that very few men these days want to marry and the birth rate is dropping like a rock in the US…..
I only posting this to give you some perspective other than what you heard at the conference on sexism. I won’t be back to post here as I imagine tons of said feminists will flame-bait, troll, and use red herrings to get me to respond in the way they want.
Lots of citations needed. Besides, even if feminists are concentrated on women’s problems, that doesn’t mean they don’t care about men. For instance, Ed on this site mainly writes about racism and homophobia and anti-atheist rabble-rousing, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t care about sexism. He just leaves that topic to people more knowledgeable about it.
Besides, men’s problems are women’s problems are mostly based on the same root cultural issues. No-fault divorce helps men in bad marriages just as it helps women. Letting women be firemen and cops means that men aren’t expected to do all the high-risk jobs anymore, etc.
Feminism – being a movement that seeks to elevate women to the same social, econominc and political privilege that men enjoy – is exclusively about women. Male problems are of little more than academic interest to a feminist thinker. That’s the way it should be, because at the moment women have a raw deal to varying degrees in every society all over the world, so them having a movement solely dedicated to fixing their problems is absolutely fine.
Thing about prevailing feminist theory is that it envisions the elevation of female status in society via the abolition of things like the gender binary, heteronormativity and the “traditional” socially constructed gender roles. While that isn’t directly about helping men out, it will in the long run make the world a better place for everyone – including men – to live in, which is why this negative male reaction against feminism is so baffling to me.
Feminism is exclusively about women, but if it comes off, it’ll make the world better for everyone. Support it.
I’m a male feminist and I’ve never felt anything other than welcome amongst feminist circles – not because I am a self-loathing mangina, or because I am prepared to abase myself before the kind of quasi-fascist buffoons that Cris describes in her video, but simply because feminists are human beings and therefore the overwhelming majority of them are decent folk. Even the radical ones.
No; it means men and women enjoying equal options and the abolition of male privilege. Currently men’s “options” in life are limited only by their ambition and reach, whereas women’s are actively inhibited by expectations placed upon them because of their gender.
That’s your privilege talking. Society is not becoming “anti-man” simply because we are increasingly recognising the right of women to have issues which affect them addressed.
Are women and men both equally affected by domestic violence? No, is the answer. Some men are affected by domestic violence – including some men engaged in homosexual relationships – and that needs to be acknowledged, but even a cursory study into the victimology of DV reveals that women are overwhelmingly the victims.
Where did you pull this figure from – a sociological study? Collation of crime figures from across the USA? I’m guessing the answer is neither, but rather another hole far danker and mustier.
Some women do indeed initiate violent incidents with their domestic partners. The vast majority don’t, and are simply victims of abusive relationships, but some women do.
Even those that do are victims of domestic violence – as are the partners they instigate violence against.
This is something I have yet to see figures for, although there is a large body of anecdotal evidence to suggest this point is true.
If scientifically researched figures bear this out, then it’s even more reason for men to support feminism; with the end of gender binary and socially constructed gender roles, the “mother” ceases to be considered the only parent whose presence truly matters in a child’s life, and thus fathers gain equal access to favourable custody judgements.
I know of precisely two women that have made false rape accusations – and when I say “false”, I don’t just mean “defendant found not guilty” because we all know that judiciaries are not the ultimate arbiters of scientific fact. Rather, I mean the accusations made by these women were absolutely, categorically proven by forensic science to have been utterly untrue, and in one case completely impossible because the man accused was in Istanbul while the woman he raped was in Birmingham.
Both of these women were convicted of something, perjury in the former case, since she had demonstrably fabricated the entire story as a means to exact revenge on a lover who refused to leave his wife for her. The latter woman was charged with wasting police time. Turns out she had actually been raped by someone, but mistook her rapist for someone else. The man who actually raped her has never been caught.
Kinda sad, but it does demonstrate that a) your assertion is completely false, and b) law enforcement systems are not equipped to deal with cases of sexual violence, which often actively prevents victims of rape form obtaining justice.
Men and women are equal before the law. There is a school of thought that says equality before the law for men and women passively discriminates against women in some cases and men in others, and is therefore bunk, which is a theory I subscribe to. That’s what I’d call “feminist jurisprudence”, and it’s not the system currently in operation.
Citation needed.
Sounds like society’s view of rape victims to me.
So, they learn feminist theory for a short while and this affects the outcome of a case how, exactly?
Most of the men I know are married or engaged in relationships that have lasted 18 months or longer. Except me, and my failure in this regard has nothing to do with an unwillingness on my part; I suck at relationships, and my suckiness is exacerbated by being a full-time student with little time for anything else besides work and classes.
That’s nothing to do with feminism. The structure of society, which demands we commit so much of our time to work while also asking us to raise families whilst simultaneously being unwilling to help provide care and resources to those who want to work AND raise kids, has a lot more to do with it than the idea that women have reproductive rights.
Alternatively, answer your points and ask for clarification on those issues you raise for which no corroborating evidence exists.
Then again, senstivie little flowers on the right wing have appropriated the term “troll” to mean “someone who disagrees with me”.
So I suppose I’m a troll, then. Good.
Thank you! I was hoping to do a similar post, but you hit all the high points, and better than I had planned.
You made some good points there. Some aspects that I had never thought of before. Well done.
The troll thing does work both ways though and isn’t limited to one side of the warzone. Disagreement on any freethought blog is labelled as trolling same as anywhere else.
That is true; no matter who does it, it’s always irritating.
Fred Salvador,
Welcome to our world!
Excellent example of reasoned arguments. You engaged with most complaints levied against feminists in Matthew’s post. His gripes are very familiar to me from my interactions with people on a Croatian forum. They (more than one) showed great fear of the Swedish legal model of protection for women. Although not exclusive to the right-wingers,, nevertheless they tend to show more anxiety about egalitarianism not only between genders but also between other social stratas. Such men adamantly claim that – if not more, women are just as violent as men. The “feminazi” courts are biased in favour of women, etc. There is hardly anything that reasoning with such people won’t aggravate. Two men in the group challenged their prejudices. Guess what? They became abusive calling them “mangina”, for carrying their balls in a woman’s handbag, etc.etc. It never occured to them that challenging the straight jackets of gender roles takes more courage than succumbing to the imperatives imposed by patriarchy. Sexism hurts men, too. They fear the loss of something precious, rathen than view the social changes as the psychological gain of fuller ranges of human experiences. Trying to reassure them didn’t work. It made them even more defensive-aggressive.
If only MRAs would put as much effort into building male domestic violence shelters, as they do into whining piteously about how the absence of such shelters is due to feminism.
This pretty much sums up why I don’t take the MRA groups I’ve encountered even remotely seriously. They seem to spend a lot of time harping on and on about how terrible feminists are but I never seem them doing anything productive. Where are the organizations providing scholarships to men who want to go into child care? As you pointed out, where are the groups building men’s domestic violence centres? What about sexual assault counselling for men?
I have to call you out on BS here.
Not everyone has the resources to carry out this sort of thing, and I am quite unsure that many people wouldn’t consider a male-only shelter to be sexist.
Not everyone has the resources, but some must do. Furthermore, many of the high traffic MRA sites have the potential to raise large amounts of money by soliciting small donations.
I don’t think there would be any legal issue with a men only shelter, just as there no legal issues with women only shelters. I’m not sure about US law, but in the UK, there is an explicit exemption in equality legislation for this kind of thing. If you can make a reasonable case that abused men would benefit from being in a male only environment, then it would be permitted.
Not sure what more argument needs to be made to that regard than the same argument as made for women.
Hyperdeath, are you seriously going to claim that the group Fathers And Families has not accomplished anything substantive?
Are you going to point at all the women’s shelters funded with public money, and then hold MRA groups accountable that they can’t fund equal facilities for men with private money?
Kind of like Romney blaming for the Palestinians for having a lower standard of living than the Israelis, isn’t it?
You know what?
Even if you did decide to stick around, I expect that any conversation with you about your hypocritically flame-baiting hit-n-run post would be just as pointless as it is now that you’ve gone.
That’s the card you are going to play? That feminism doesn’t focus enough on men and how hard men have it? Really?
I can make a whole list of things about “how hard men have it” if you want me to.
I don’t think anyone denies that patriarchy causes men lots of problems. The issue is that at their root, they are the same problems that feminists are working on. GO ahead and post the list and I can explain.
1) Demonization of male sexuality, celebration of female sexuality – “Male gaze” and “objectification” is demonized while sites like Jezebel say that when women do it it’s completely different.
Like the Rose St. Clair video I linked says (Sorry again about the direct link), people seem to be completely unable to think that a man might be attracted to a woman both on a physically and an emotional and intellectual level. Apparently, the moment that I thought my girlfriend was smoking hot, I stopped respecting her thoughts on anything.
Furthermore, as per the QANTAS thing- society thinks a woman around children is a nurturing sweet thing. A man around children is probably a pedophile on the prowl.
Meanwhile, the Oregon pedophile woman who had sex with a 14 year old boy got… 30 days in prison.
2) College attendance has dropped below women for men. Feminists are completely happy about this… oh, except in the fields where men still dominate, being the mathematical fields, engineering and the hard sciences.
There, feminists are -still- complaining about under-representation- Because the way to equality is obviously domination of all fields, right?
Even though this problem doesn’t exist in other countries that have achieved equality, feminists in America seem willing to take the statistics and run with the “Well, guess men are just inferior!” shtick.
3) Women get less punishment for equal crime in Criminal Courts.
http://ftp.iza.org/dp2870.pdf
4) Missing White Woman Syndrome
5) Trivialization, if not outright humorization of male rape, especially prison rape, as well as the same for domestic violence where the man is a victim. In fact, ALL violence towards women, no matter the context (even self-defense), is vilified, while all violence against men by a woman is brushed off as “probably justified”.
As I said elsewhere, TvTropes has an entire entry called “DoubleStandard Rape: Female on Male”. Look it up.
When ‘rape culture’ is brought up as a sign of misogyny, I find it absolutely ridiculous for that reason.
6) Higher male deaths in the workplace. Now, are feminists interested in having women enter those more dangerous fields, or do they just want to get the cushy, safe jobs?
7) Family courts. Custody rights and divorce favoring women.
8) Women having lower standards for certain physically demanding jobs than men (police, firefighters, etc) , valuing equality over performance – If woman who’s less strong than the male requirement can do a job, why can’t a man? It’s setting equality by sledgehammer just because it’s not “politically correct” for women to be underrepresented, without realizing how ridiculous it is that you’re saying that a woman of certain physical abilities can do the job, while a man of equal physical characteristics can’t.
9) “It’s only sexist when men do it”. The Amazing Atheist, much as you may disagree with him and much as he’s said pretty horrid things, was spot on with the examples he gave in that video(the Talk ladies laughing at the castration, the refusal to accept the woman raping the burglar for days as rape, and the lionization of the rapist woman).
10) And what is probably the show-stopper… Feminists calling them privileged despite 1 through 9, portraying them as the oppressor even while they’re getting mistreated in so many ways, spinning it so men are doing it to themselves, and therefore it isn’t important.
—
Of course, then you have the fact that feminists were partially responsible for such gems are the prohibition.
1. The idea that men’s sexuality is demonized and women’s is celebrated is either comparing elements from radically different parts of the culture or wrong. It’s more accurate to say that men’s and women’s sexualities are both demonized, but in different ways. Men need to have a lot of sex to prove their manly mettle whereas a woman’s virtue is dependant on her being very selective in partners. It sets up a predator/prey scenario which is bad for everyone. It means that sex is a precious commodity that men have to try to get from women through various means, not an activity two or more people do together.
2. Again, citation. You keep talking about this theoretical feminist. I think you are presenting a gross oversimplification at best. This situation is due to a couple factors. One is the idea that being too educated is effete and unmanly (see: keeping it real and other forms of masculinist posturing). This is exactly the sort of gender stereotyping that feminists have been fighting since the second wave. The other is that men are less likely to need college to get a job where they can make a living wage. You might as well argue it’s sexist against women that they are being pressured into college.
3. This is really the same thing as 1. Being thought of as an aggressive go-getter who doesn’t let the rules stand in the way of getting things done is great when you are trying to get a job. It’s not so great when you are up on criminal charges. Similarly, being seen as a passive person who deals with things as they come to her works out better in court than it does in job interviews. Again, these are the stereotypes feminists have been fighting all along.
4. This is another consequence of the idea that women’s sexuality is a precious commodity which must be guarded discussed in 1. The idea that men are supposed to protect the women and provide for them while women raise the kids means that threats to women are seen as threats to society and threats to men are to be expected. This is bad for women if they want to get taken seriously and bad for men if they don’t want to put themselves in danger all the time.
5. Same thing as 4.
6. Also same thing as 4.
7. Do you have a citation on this? My understanding is that it used to be true, but not longer is. This is another example of the whole conqueror/nurturer dichotomy that underlies almost all these problems at any rate.
8. Feminists have been trying to push to get women access to jobs in police and fire departments? Doesn’t that contradict what you said in six about feminists not trying to get women access to the dangerous jobs? See also, women in combat.
9. Another consequence of women not being taken seriously. Again, this is the core issue of feminism.
10. It doesn’t work that way. Yes, sexism affects both men and women. The quick version is that there are stereotypical male activities and stereotypical female activities and both groups face considerable social pressure not to cross the line into the other’s territory. However, this is not an equal situation. The men’s roles tend to pay better, get higher social status and have more power. I would argue that female privilege exists, but in practice, it’s far more limited than male privilege and has a much smaller social impact.
“The idea that men’s sexuality is demonized and women’s is celebrated is either comparing elements from radically different parts of the culture or wrong….
It means that sex is a precious commodity that men have to try to get from women through various means, not an activity two or more people do together.”
Promiscuous women get labeled as sluts. Meanwhile, ALL men are labeled as potential rapists and pedophiles. It is hardly an equal sum here. Did I mention that you have never, in any way, explained how “men are pedophiles” has anything to do with it?
Also can you explain why Jezebel has an article defending the double standard if feminism is about destroying them?
“2. Again, citation. You keep talking about this theoretical feminist. I think you are presenting a gross oversimplification at best. This situation is due to a couple factors. One is the idea that being too educated is effete and unmanly (see: keeping it real and other forms of masculinist posturing). This is exactly the sort of gender stereotyping that feminists have been fighting since the second wave. The other is that men are less likely to need college to get a job where they can make a living wage. You might as well argue it’s sexist against women that they are being pressured into college.”
That last sentence blew my mind. Good job, you just applied more spin to this situation than a gangsta rapper’s rims.
Yes, it’s totally sexist against women to give them power and prestige over men. If you want to make the assertion that men dont’t need to go to college? Prove it.
As for quotes: http://fabiusmaximus.com/2009/07/07/women/
Here’s some celebratory statements re: Women doing better in college.
“3. This is really the same thing as 1. Being thought of as an aggressive go-getter who doesn’t let the rules stand in the way of getting things done is great when you are trying to get a job. ….
Again, these are the stereotypes feminists have been fighting all along.”
Evidence of men being favored for jobs, all things being equal, please.
“4. This is another consequence of the idea that women’s sexuality is a precious commodity which must be guarded discussed in 1… This is bad for women if they want to get taken seriously and bad for men if they don’t want to put themselves in danger all the time.”
“This is bad for women if they want to get taken seriously” – Non-sequitur. Protecting a woman’s sexuality =/= woman not being taken seriously. Please explain otherwise.
“5. Same thing as 4.”
Not even close. We’re talking about physical violence here. Men are considered to always be wrong. You can’t explain that with ‘we must protect women’s sexuality’. I brought up -life and health-.
And again you don’t address as to how portraying rape culture as a women’s issue addresses this, rather than exacerbate it. Feminism portraying rape culture as a women’s problem, in fact, contributes to the trivializing of male rape.
“6. Also same thing as 4.”
Not sexuality. Life. -Life-.
“7. Do you have a citation on this? My understanding is that it used to be true, but not longer is. This is another example of the whole conqueror/nurturer dichotomy that underlies almost all these problems at any rate.”
I would say yes, but the example I have is from the early 2000s, so you may be right.
“8. Feminists have been trying to push to get women access to jobs in police and fire departments? Doesn’t that contradict what you said in six about feminists not trying to get women access to the dangerous jobs? See also, women in combat.”
Okay, fair enough, I accept the contradiction. Also, I don’t know if women in combat have lesser requirements than men in the military. If they do, there won’t be equality – Because if the women don’t have to be as physically capable as the men to be on the front lines, they WILL slow the men down. That’s kind of why equal requirements are needed.
Again, you dodged the point on lesser requirements.
“9. Another consequence of women not being taken seriously. Again, this is the core issue of feminism.”
I never saw this level of spin on ANYTHING. The fact it’s okay to castrate a man to some people is a sign of -women not being taken seriously-? I’m sorry, this is why feminism isn’t taken seriously. There’s such a damn persecution complex that men getting raped and castrated and the woman getting away with it gets turned into misogyny.
“10. It doesn’t work that way. Yes, sexism affects both men and women. The quick version is that there are stereotypical male activities and stereotypical female activities and both groups face considerable social pressure not to cross the line into the other’s territory. However, this is not an equal situation. The men’s roles tend to pay better, get higher social status and have more power. I would argue that female privilege exists, but in practice, it’s far more limited than male privilege and has a much smaller social impact.”
I can mention a few certain speakers with -zero- qualifications that get to speak on panels just because they’re women. I see women who get put on panels just to fill a politically correct quota.
Furthermore, we’re living in a place where it’s far more okay for females to cross into the stereotypical male areas, than for males to cross into the stereotypical female areas. THIS is what requires specific MRA attention rather than relying on the other gender’s rights movement to also help ours.
As far as it being a two-way street? Tell your fellow FTBers that. They don’t seem to have gotten the memo. Or at least they conveniently forget when they start playing the “mansplaining male privilege” vs “oppressed females” game.
1. Men being labeled pedophiles is the same thing. They are stereotyped as pursuing sex at any cost. Can you link to the Jezebel article you keep referring to?
2. Where are the celebratory remarks? This seems to be an economics blog. If the author is making what he considers to be a feminist argument, I don’t see it. The links are to scientific studies and to some editorials saying that women out-performing men is a problem. Are you referring to soemthing in the comments? What?
As far as men not needing to go to college, there’s the issue that despite the education gap, men still make more than women. Do you have any evidence that women’s degrees are actually giving them more power and prestige than men or is that speculative?
3. Men having an advantage in the job market is the very issue that started this discussion. There are links all over this thread.
4. If women need to be protected, that lowers their credibility as independent actors, which is necessary for all prestige positions. I’m not really clear on how missing white woman syndrome is an example of how men have it bad, anyway. Have there been any cases where this has actually been beneficial to women rather than turning them into a media circus?
5. Men are expected to be able to take care of themselves when it comes to violence and women aren’t. This can be a disadvantage for either depending on the situation. Do you have any examples of feminism trivializing male rape? I know there are some feminist-identified people who use exclusionary language when talking about the issue, which is wrong (there are also plenty of examples of them getting called on it by other feminists), but were men better protected from rape in the pre-feminism days?
6. Sexual stereotypes affect all of life. If the idea is that men are the conquerors/protectors and women are the nurturers/protectees, then people won’t won’t think them qualified for dangerous jobs and won’t allow them to do dangerous things.
7. Links to your early 2000s example?
8. Women, until recently, weren’t allowed in combat at all in the US military and aren’t on equal footing now. I suspect the requirements in many cases are more about reducing the applicant pool to manageable numbers than the actual bare minimum to perform at the job. I leave designing such things to the experts.
9. My point is that women can joke about castrating a man because no one thinks of them as a serious physical threat. They can get away with this for the same reason there’s resistance to giving them a gun and sending them on patrol as a cop. Stereotypes have advantages and disadvantages.
10. Please do mention these women with zero qualifications who get put on panels to be politically correct. Who on FTB says sexism never hurts men?
Greta wrote about how sexism limits men’s fashion option.
Stephanie Zvan responded to another Greta article on the topic.
Edwin wrote about the unfair expectations placed on men on Crommunist’s blog.
Who exactly are you talking about>
Okay, I didn’t go through all the points that were being made here, just skimmed through them. However, I have some insight into this that others might not.
I’ve taught intro-level physics in various programs including 1) traditionally male dominated and still male dominated, 2) traditionally female dominated and still female dominated and 3) traditionally male dominated and now female dominated.
In each case, there was active recruitment and discussion about how to make our programs inviting for the gender that did not dominate – regardless. This is not controversial at all. Everyone, self-proclaimed feminists or not, agrees that extreme domination of one gender in a field is bad for the field. Few think 50% is a reasonable goal, but the abatement of extreme gaps is considered a win – both in terms of gender as well as ethnic and cultural background.
I don’t know if many feminist organizations focus on the female-dominated fields – the most noise seems to be about the traditionally male-dominated ones, such as STEM. I don’t think that focus is a problem here.
“I don’t know if many feminist organizations focus on the female-dominated fields – the most noise seems to be about the traditionally male-dominated ones, such as STEM. I don’t think that focus is a problem here.”
You… realize that that’s exactly my point about how feminist organizations don’t care for equality, just dominating the fields that haven’t been dominated yet, right?
(Note: i have an extensive reply in moderation because of links)
This is like saying that the NAACP is racist because they don’t try to help white people become blues musicians. There’s nothing wrong with fighting for equality by focusing on improving opportunities for one disadvantaged group so long as you don’t try to deny the problems that other groups have or obstruct efforts to help them.
Replied to the wrong message:
Exactly. And what they’re doing is trying to destroy the only field where men are still a majority, making it so that women have a majority in everything.
They already HAVE the advantage, they just want to destroy any form of male advantage in any field. If they succeed, well, men will be disadvantaged in every field. And you think that’s acceptable?
To follow your example, the analogy would be better suited if you said it would be like a pro-white group trying to make whites take over blues and rap music.
So Ace of Sevens, to prove your point that FTB supports mens issues your linked to three posts.
The first deals with men’s fashion. Please….
The article by zvan just linked to a post by Greta Cristina where she listed the top five things women would change about men if they could.
The post be Edwin was actually anti-male, and poked fun at the Men’s Rights movment.
That’s the best you can do? Totally embarrasing for you.
1. You keep forgetting that what you’re failing to do, is tell me exactly how feminism helps. Feminists are usually on the forefront of this:
Like here: http://evebitfirst.wordpress.com/2011/05/18/a-man-is-a-rape-supporter-if/
See? All men are rapists. Let’s see how many you fall under. So don’t come in and tell me that a good number of feminists aren’t on the forefront of the demonization of male sexuality.
Another great read:
http://just-smith.tumblr.com/post/15578475273/a-new-definition-of-rape
Also, the Jezebel article:
http://jezebel.com/5572097/why-shameless-objectification-can-be-a-good-thing
To counter a point she makes there: Men are not the ones letting the women starve themselves. Ask most men, you’ll find that curvy women are considered more attractive than the toothpicks you’ll find in the media. In fact, I recall a TYT video about large curves and darker skin being considered more attractive than pale skinny girls.
So it seems it’s not the men who are
2. I should’ve been clearer. The editorials are assuming that men are just inferior to women. So when women are less, it’s men being sexist. But after female-only colleges, female scholarships, female-friendly teaching methods, women are getting more degrees and, well… Guess it’s the just male gender being dumber.
Also: The tests done for pay include an assumption of equal education levels. Please prove otherwise.
3. And yet the numbers keep contradicting each other when it comes to whether or not there’s any pay difference for EQUAL work, and whether it’s 77, 81, or 91 percent.
4. The President is protected by the Secret Service. The King is protected by the Royal Guard. Does that mean he’s not credible as an independent actor? Don’t be silly.
MWWS is less a cause of discrimination than a symptom of women’s lives being worth more than men’s.
5. “Men are expected to be able to take care of themselves when it comes to violence and women aren’t. This can be a disadvantage for either depending on the situation.”
Name me one disadvantage. Also… Yes, exclusionary language is trivialization. Feminists speak of rape as “something that happens to women” despite the statistics speaking otherwise if you include prison rape.
Whether men were better protected is not an argument. I’m not saying feminism caused the problem, I’m saying it is happy with maintaining and even encouraging the anti-male status quo by posing “rape culture” as a woman’s issue alone.
6. Irrelevant. As I keep saying, it is entirely possible to get all the benefits with none of the disadvantages, which is why feminism needs a check and balance.
7. Links to your early 2000s example?
8. I’m talking about having equal requirements, not anything else. PLEASE stop dodging my point.
9. What the hell? You don’t get it do you? The Talk ladies were laughing at a man who actually -was- castrated. There isn’t any ‘Lol she isn’t able to’. And same for the woman raping the burglar. There isn’t any of that.
Stereotypes do have advantages and disadvantages. Feminists want all the former (please be extra-careful around women, we’re weaker than you and intimidated by men, Schroedinger’s Rapist stuff) without any of the latter (we can do everything you can, just as good as you!).
10. You know exactly who I mean, certain women who don’t have any qualifications but come to speak about how sexist everyone else is? Ring a bell?
… TByte’s assessment is correct. Only one of them is pro-male and rather low on the ladder of men’s issues, one is downright anti-male (Edwin’s), and one is… Huh? Furthermore, Greta, in my opinion, has changed a lot from the Greta of 2010. And not for the better.
Good job proving my point.
No. This is like a pro-white group trying to get more benefits for whites in fields where they don’t dominate yet.
Women in college are already overrepresented.
I’m very sorry, but being in the field – I mean in the HEART of this field, working at a university that is literally founded on the basis of doing college-level educational research, and being imbedded in THE most male dominated academic field there is – there is SO much wrong there.
I have some insights there and some theories – but you are SO not going to like them.
In extreme summary – NO, it’s not about disadvantaging men. It’s most likely a product of emerging adulthood and active learning techniques; at least in part.
I’ll collect my thoughts and perhaps do a blog post some time.
(By the way, if you blog – link it please, I would love to “follow” you.)
You miss my point.
Speaking in general terms, AVfM, like them or not, makes a good point about this. The government saw the dwindling number of men in college and the rising amount of women, and called it a “Great Success”…?
I have no personal stake in what other men do. I am, in fact, educated enough.
What I am pointing out is how feminism, in some instances, is something that men need to stand in competition to. It sees that women are dominating college in practically every field, and then it focuses on the one field they’re not to make sure they dominate that too.
And no, feminist groups don’t provide “equality”. They have the money to give women scholarships, et cetera that give them an advantage over men.
And yet men are told “feminism is the answer to all your problems”, and we’re meant to accept that?
MatthewF @ 2 —
Really? Either the vast majority of my (mostly-feminist) social circle consists of outliers, or there’s something else going on here.
Going by the rest of your comment, it sounds like quite a bit of “tens of thousands of women worked their asses off for X, so men should be given X (or Y, if X is something primarily faced by women)”. The whole pile of strawmen and fake statistics tends to support that…
I also have many feminist friends and I find that they don’t care or acknowledge any discrimination or unfair treatment to men. They wont admit it’s easier for women to get service jobs, that women get better tips, or get preferential treatment in custody hearings. I think a major problem with feminism is the name. It’s supposed to be about equality between genders but names itself for only one. I can appreciate the historical reasons for doing so but it is outdated now. Plus if a new name were chosen, people who are for equality can distance themselves from radicals and man haters.
Sounds like you have crappy friends.
You do realize that it is not a fair playing field, that the balance has always been in favour of men and what men value and want?
Methinks you need to start here.
You do realize that there are actual laws that discriminate against men? That is, by definition, “institutionalized discrimination”, isn’t it?
Show me some laws that discriminate against women. Go ahead. They can’t serve in combat roles in the military. That’s the only one I know of, and its not high on the Feminist’s agenda.
You know this how?
IIRC women are somewhat more likely to be granted primary custody…because men often don’t request it. In cases where fathers do request primary custody, they get it (again, IIRC) something like 70% of the time. The MRAs want it both ways.
men usually don’t ask because they know they won’t get custody, it’s a fruitless battle. The reason why when they do ask they often get is because they only request when the mother is clearly unfit to take care of the children
Yes – look at my comment about this issue I posted earlier please.
In my admittedly limited experience (read – every single custody case or arrangement I am aware of among my acquaintances and friends), the only man who was completely denied his rights and essentially denied watching his own child grow up – allows his ex-wife to essentially supervise visits with his own daughter, whose ex-wife puts restrictions on how and when he can see her…for no good reason what-so-ever.
DID NOT GO TO COURT.
Why?
Because he believes the lies that you just told.
Lies have consequences.
Please quit lying.
We are on the same side. When men are denied parental rights by virtue of being men, or by virtue of internalizing a devaluation of their own role as fathers – it’s a travesty. When unfit mothers are given custody of children because they are women – it’s completely unacceptable and a failure of society in protecting children. State laws that give mothers preferential treatment in these cases should be struck down – but MOST states do not have those laws. Sometimes judges do not follow the law – but that means they are bad judges.
We need to fight these problems – not give into self-fulfilling prophesies like this:
Sure, Kyle L, a 70% success rate is “fruitless”…
Of course, coming from the MRA types, I guess it makes sense; after all, men aren’t given a 100% guarantee that their interests and whims will be held as more important than everyone else’s, therefore ZOMGMISANDRY!
Melby:
“We need to fight these problems – not give into self-fulfilling prophesies like this:
‘…men usually don’t ask because they know they won’t get custody, it’s a fruitless battle.'”
Really? At my divorce hearing my attorney had a “private” conversation with the magistrate in which the magistrate yelled, loud enough that I could hear it outside in the hallway, “If he brings this case to trial I GUARANTEE he is not getting custody!”
Mind you, this was before any evidence or testimony had been presented.
So Melby, if you want to argue personal anecdotes rather than actual statistics, well I have a crapload for you.
Groesbeck:
“In cases where fathers do request primary custody, they get it (again, IIRC) something like 70% of the time.”
This is an absolute feminist lie. Please show me some statistics to support it. The only reason a man ever is awared custody if when the mother is absolutely incompetent, to the point of being a physical danger to her children. And sadly, many times even this is not enough.
Oh – I get it – you blame your lack of custody on being male (which may or may not be true), blame modern feminists for the laws in your state (even though the ERA would have struck them down decades ago if it passed), and you don’t believe the feminists who say they are on your side.
For goodness sakes, did you even file with the friend of the court? My friend’s husband filed for full custody as a frickin’ negotiating tactic.
There are problems – serious problems with society’s view of fathers. The laws in most states do not discriminate against men. None of them should. Some judges and courts are going to act in accordance to internalized sexist attitudes – you know, the attitudes that every feminist who has contributed to this thread is speaking against.
Your case may not be unique, but it is LITERALLY not the rule in the majority of states. It would be good to see exactly where the 70% number comes from. It said “request” – not GO TO COURT. So, if the request was filed with the friend of the court, it should be included in that number – right? So, we’re talking about bio-dads who didn’t want to be fathers being the ONLY ones not included in that. It would also be interesting to see what they mean by “custody” – do they mean full custody or joint? If only 70% of men who requested custody were granted joint custody, that would be a LOW number and illuminate the problem that we know exists, but is NOT equivalent to a custody request being “fruitless” for a man to file.
EVEN if the father just puts on record that he requested custody, that’s going to be used as evidence of his desire for parental involvement in subsequent cases. It is superbly short-sighted for any parent who wants custody or visitation of their children not to request. If they aren’t requesting because they either rightly or wrongly thinks they don’t have a chance – they are getting shit for legal advice.
For example: An ex-wife got primary custody of her children, she became involved with a boyfriend who abused the children, the ex-husband now has full custody. How do you think that would have gone down if he never requested custody during the divorce hearing or (worse yet) completely gave up his parental rights?
I have no idea – not a lawyer. Do you?
Instead of insulting feminists – perhaps you should be contacting feminist groups who have the same goals as you do, and working on joint projects? I know – radical idea.
Or – you can obsess about how feminists a century or so ago, fought against MEN always getting custody of children because children were once considered his property, and fought to give preferential custody treatment to mothers only when the children were very young and still primarily bonded with their mothers through breastfeeding. (Just waiting for you to bring THAT up as evidence of how feminists are evil.)
Melby, you don’t get anything.
I eventually got custody. I raised my four children, while working full-time.
I spent ten years litigating my case and made two trips to the court of appeals to get the local courts ruling overturned. The second time I wrote my own brief and argued my case myself. Please don’t lecture me on how our family courts work. In the course of my life I’ve held the roles of unmarried parent, married parent, non-custodial parent, non-residential parent, residential parent, and full custodial parent. You don’t know jack about our court system.
Yes, the reason that custody was given to a parent who never finished college, who was unemployable, and who was having an affair with a bartender in preference to a parent with a BA in Developmental Psychology, an MBA in Finance, and a good career, was solely due their respective genders.
What I also blame on my being male is the fact that the family court ordered ME to pay child support to HER.
And I know several other fathers who raised their children in the same circumstances.
If you know of ANY court cases where a fully employed mother with primary custody of her childen was required to pay child support to a father who refused to get a job then please, trot them out right now.
And don’t hand me any crap about feminists speaking against our family court’s bias towards women. Feminist groups are at the front of efforts to block laws presuming equal shared custody, and are actively petitioning the to prevent Parental Alienation being recognized as a psychological syndrome.
Your claiming to be a feminist associates you with these issues, whether you like it or not.
In any case, stop presuming to know things about me. You’ll only make yourself look more foolish.
@Tbyte
I applaud you as a father. Thank goodness nobody told you that it was a “fruitless” battle in the courts to gain custody of your children.
You yet again are refusing to explain which feminist groups are fighting against custody gender-equity so that I can simply say that I disagree with those groups on that point.
OR – you can keep railing against feminists in general.
Did you know there was a feminist pro-life group? Yeah, I don’t agree with them on every point either.
Did you know that MRA just hang out and talk about how they hate women and want to beat them up for making them feel bad?
I suppose I should go on-and-on about that and pretend that every MRA agrees with them on every point too?
Women are are sometimes given more consideration in custody hearings because 1) women are more often stay-at-home mothers or spend more time with the children, even if they also work, and thus the court figures that parent will be a better fit for the children’s sake, and 2) most people think women are naturally better with kids and that men just can’t handle them.
Something about feminism, though; it’s just as interested in changing why these things are true because those stereotypes hurt men at the same time as they hurt women. Women are often assumed or pressured into being stay-at-home mothers; change that, give women more chances and more acceptance at the higher-paying or more prestigious jobs, and they’ll go take them. This means men can be stay-at-home parents, for instance, or can spend time with their children without being breadwinners all the time, and they’ll be able to claim more consideration in turn. As for the second point, feminism is about women and their choices, yes, but it also wants women not to be typecast as ‘mother’, ‘nurturer’, just because of their genitalia. Help feminism increase awareness that women can be career-driven and just as varied as men, push the idea that people are people with all sorts of capabilities, and you further feminism’s goals and your own.
In the (very few) cases that I know about with my friends that have actually gone to court, the women did not have the advantage. In fact, in one case her ex retains joint custody despite the fact that he doesn’t bother actually seeing his daughter, nor does he bother to pay any support, nor is he a fit parent. In the other case, the mother thought (going in) that she would have the advantage and was very surprised and upset that she didn’t (despite me telling her that she wouldn’t).
The only case, in my experience, that the man was completely taken advantage of is when my friend decided to essentially do his own divorce and not take it to court. He lives far from me, so I didn’t know the specifics of their arrangement until much much later. I was horrified. She lies to him about what it *would* be like in court all the time, and he believes her.
I think the area of the country probably matters a lot, but the fear of the woman having all the advantage in custody is sometimes worse than the reality.
Ah, thank you for that. I did say ‘sometimes’ in my post but even then it might have been overreaching, it’s good to have a different perspective.
Maybe it’s because I deal mostly with actual feminist activists instead of straw feminists. Because the feminists I’m used to interacting with (i.e. real-world feminists) are quite explicit about how socially-enforced gender stereotypes hurt men (especially non-gender-hyperconformist men, i.e. not the MRAs). A bit “unconcerned about men’s problems” when the “problems” involved are mostly men complaining about how they don’t feel as secure in their patriarchal supremacy as they used to…but, hell, why should any of us care particularly about the poor, poor persecuted hegemon? If anything, feminism elevates my moral status as a man — when it’s just who I am, and something that can be expressed in a way that suits me rather than a pile of cis-heterosexist stereotypes, I’ll be in a better social place as a human.
Strawmen piled on top of strawmen with a bit of ad hominem to add spice.
Oh. And don’t forget the claiming of moral high ground.
Let me just explain how utterly absurd your post just was.
1) You just said that MRAs are “non-gender hyperconformist”. When MRAs are the ones asking why the hell women aren’t on the front lines more often, why men aren’t allowed to be care-givers. How -skewed- does your perspective have to be, when the people who are arguing for abolishing gender roles from the male side are seen as gender-hyperconformist by you?
Or is equality, for you, only talking about one side’s problems? Just like the feminists don’t have to deny that gender roles hurt everyone, neither do reasonable MRAs, and the more reasonable ones would be willing to work with you if you weren’t so eager to tear them down.
2)…” men complaining about how they don’t feel as secure in their patriarchal supremacy as they used to”… Is a complete and utter lie.
I mean, sure, there are some like that, but as you commented in a generalized tone, I might as well reply by pointing out that you’re pointing to the extreme. Why is it that when feminists say that gender roles hurt everyone it’s true, but when non-feminist men say the exact same thing, only from a male perspective and giving examples, they’re monsters who just want to oppress women?
If, in a theoretical scenario where my son and daughter both get raped, I am a tyrant for wishing that both of them get their rape treated with equal seriousness, then Godwin me all day, sir.
3) If you see the world in black and white camps, then no wonder you think you have the moral high ground without actually having earned it.
Bullshit. I’ve had a number of people support me as a male who’s much more interested in being a caring, nurturing type who sees things like politically-motivated war as horrifying — most are feminists. All I get from the MRAs is accusations of being a “mangina” (because being associated with anything female, especially female genitalia, is the worst insult ever!) for not putting my membership in the Brotherhood of the Penis ahead of my concern for social ethics and the people in my community.
And “challenging gender roles from the male side”? The MRAs do all of jack shit on that count. There are men who challenge gender roles; we’re called “feminists”. We’re the ones who recognize that patriarchy is almost as fucked-up for men as for women; we just don’t demand that the collateral damage against men is surgically removed from the patriarchal system before we deign to address the bulk of the problem. And we certainly don’t treat gender liberation as a fucking zero-sum game where any step towards gender equity for women is treated as a horrifying loss for men.
Fuck that noise.
“Bullshit. I’ve had a number of people support me as a male who’s much more interested in being a caring, nurturing type who sees things like politically-motivated war as horrifying — most are feminists. All I get from the MRAs is accusations of being a “mangina” (because being associated with anything female, especially female genitalia, is the worst insult ever!) for not putting my membership in the Brotherhood of the Penis ahead of my concern for social ethics and the people in my community.”
Then you’ve been meeting the wrong type of MRA. Maybe because you open with such hostility, but maybe they gave you that impression before you were so hostile. I cannot tell.
I do not think feminism and MRA are mutually exclusive, but as two sides of the same coin. I am honestly saddened that this war is going on, and a bit skeptical of both sides’ interest in the other’s wellbeing because of it.
“And “challenging gender roles from the male side”? The MRAs do all of jack shit on that count. There are men who challenge gender roles; we’re called “feminists”. We’re the ones who recognize that patriarchy is almost as fucked-up for men as for women; we just don’t demand that the collateral damage against men is surgically removed from the patriarchal system before we deign to address the bulk of the problem.”
How is the movement for the empowerment of one gender the answer for the problem for both of them? This has baffled me all this time. Isn’t feminism doing the exact same “surgical strike” requests?
“And we certainly don’t treat gender liberation as a fucking zero-sum game where any step towards gender equity for women is treated as a horrifying loss for men.”
Strawman. Again, not saying it doesn’t happen, but saying all non-feminists who care about male rights are like this is absolutely ridiculous.
Feminism isn’t some magic bullet word that makes you an angel, and not being one isn’t a condemnation to hell. The world isn’t as black and white as you try to make it.
When I was married my husband was going to college and would sometimes get a part time job to help the bills. I was the one with the full time job, however. I was the one that also had to take care of the shopping, the childcare and the money management. My ex would say that he would care for our child while he was still up at night (he stayed up late), but most of the time our child wouldn’t wake up until it was my turn to care for zir. So not only did I do all of the cooking, cleaning and childcare, but I also did all the work in order to pay the bills.
That is an example of households that are lopsided because while it’s okay for women to work, they still are expected to take care of the household as well. It’s an expectation that both partners can have and it takes both partners to agree that things need to be split more evenly. It’s needs to be acceptable that a father isn’t just babysitting when he watches his own child. It needs to be acceptable that a father can be a stay at home and still be a valued partner.
We’re moving toward that, but until it’s seen as acceptable and not abnormal, we still have to keep working toward that.
As for @MatthewF’s assertion that feminists don’t care about men, that’s simply untrue. If feminists didn’t care about men there would be no male feminists and all other feminists would not marry men or have male friends or give birth to male children.
While I’m at it, I’ll address the Domestic Violence Claim.
Men are abused and they are raped and it needs to be stopped. It also needs to be taken seriously. However, it is not feminists who don’t take this seriously, it’s other men and women who don’t believe that a man can be abused or raped. Once that thought is debunked, and completely, then we can move forward and ensure help is there for all victims of any gender.
Here’s a quote from Web MD’s article about Battered Men:
Men are abused at about half the rate of women. But this shouldn’t be a contest. And yes, there are fewer shelters for men. But not because of feminists. It’s because men aren’t believed when they say they’ve been abused and it’s usually by other men that they’re told this. Though some women have this problematic view as well.
“As for @MatthewF’s assertion that feminists don’t care about men, that’s simply untrue. If feminists didn’t care about men there would be no male feminists and all other feminists would not marry men or have male friends or give birth to male children.”
I agree with most your points, but this one is just plain terrible.
1) There were black people who accepted their inferiority complex. I’ve heard men say things like “Men are the worst thing that ever happened to the world”. These people do exist, and I will refuse to use the word the trolls apply to them because charged terms only poison the well.
2) Saying that there are no married misandrists is like saying that there are no married misogynists, it’s just silly and quite visibly not the way the world works. This goes the same for having male friends.
3) Are you saying that misandry only happens if you actively want to abort male children? That’s a bit ridiculous isn’t it? Are you saying every misogynist would want their partner to abort a female one?
I’m not sure what the point of this point is. Men who say men are the worst thing to ever happen are doing what’s called male-guilt. It’s something like white-guilt in that they’re trying way too hard to make up for their privilege.
Misandry is not a thing. It never has been and it never will be a thing. Misandry is like reverse racism, it doesn’t exist. It’s a term men created in order to claim that they are oppressed for their sex and that isn’t true.
I will concede that there are some out there who hate men, so the term can be used for those who actively hate all men. It is not, however, near the problem that misogyny is. And there is probably very good reasons for those people to hate all men. Such as being a rape victim of one or more men. Just like Black people can hate white people, but it’s not reverse racism.
I’m going simply say that I am not ridiculous and leave that accusation at that.
As I said, Misandry isn’t a thing.
Where are you getting that misogynists want female fetuses aborted? You can be a misogynist and still want a daughter.
As for aborting male fetuses, I’ve never once heard of this being done unless it was in the case of having a hard limit on how many children a couple can have and then the fetus is aborted regardless of sex. If you have evidence of this happening, I’d love to see the links.
“I’m not sure what the point of this point is. Men who say men are the worst thing to ever happen are doing what’s called male-guilt. It’s something like white-guilt in that they’re trying way too hard to make up for their privilege.”
Yes. And there you have your answer as to why there could still be male feminists even if feminists were anti-men.
“Misandry is not a thing. It never has been and it never will be a thing. Misandry is like reverse racism, it doesn’t exist. It’s a term men created in order to claim that they are oppressed for their sex and that isn’t true.
I will concede that there are some out there who hate men, so the term can be used for those who actively hate all men. It is not, however, near the problem that misogyny is. And there is probably very good reasons for those people to hate all men. Such as being a rape victim of one or more men. Just like Black people can hate white people, but it’s not reverse racism.”
If you’re defining misandry as some sort of overarching societal thing… Well, I still think it manifests in certain things, such as the airline thing mentioned below is a sign of society’s thinking that men are inherently sexual predators. How is that not a societal oppression? It just seems to me that once you’ve decide that one side is “oppressed” and the other is “privileged” you’ve stopped to consider the facts of each case and how men can be treated unfairly re: one issue, but not another. Which is yet another criticism I have of feminism, in a situation where both genders have -real- problems, it portrays the world as one-sided.
We’ve gotten past that stage, now both genders have equality issues to deal with (See: How prison rape is a humor topic and male rape is taken far less seriously than female rape is. If tasteless rape jokes are a sign of women’s oppression, then how much more oppressed are men in this sense?)
But I digress. Misandry is defined as “hatred of men” by dictionary.com and that’s the definition we use. It doesn’t need to be societal. But the part where you justify misandrists by saying they “probably have very good reasons” for it is just emblematic of the criticism received by feminists.
Please, view what you said again, and tell me how that isn’t offensive- You made the point that men’s problems aren’t serious, and that hatred of men is “probably” justified via an over the top excuse you just cooked up. It’s an obvious sign of bias where you think hatred towards women is a societal problem, but all hate towards men is “probably justified”.
3) “I’m going simply say that I am not ridiculous and leave that accusation at that.
….
is aborted regardless of sex. If you have evidence of this happening, I’d love to see the links.”
That was in reply to you saying that if feminists hated men they would not bear male children. Being as you don’t choose what gender the child is in most circumstances, I guessed you implied abortion of male fetuses.
And why is this society’s thinking? Women didn’t start this. At least it wasn’t just women. And I don’t agree that all men are pedophiles until prove otherwise. There are some women predators, which is why pedophilia as a whole needs to be addressed and stopped.
Assuming that woman can’t molest a child is also a result of gender roles. Women are suppose to be the nurturing ones, not men. And it’s patently false. Who enforces these gender roles? Society. Once we stop this we stop pigeon holing men and women. And that includes assuming all men are sexual predators.
Which brings me back to my original assertion that men can and are good parents and can be excellent stay at home parents, but they are pressure by society to be the “breadwinner”, not the nurturing parent. Once we get rid of these gender roles, things will be better for men and women.
As for misandry and women having a good reason to hate men. Can you honestly tell me a rape victim can’t hate whomever they want? This applies to men too. They simply have a better reason than most misogynists, who simply find women inferior.
And then there are radfems, whom I don’t agree with, their hate is counter productive and not in line with humanism as a whole anyway because they also hate transgender people and anyone who doesn’t toe the line.
“And why is this society’s thinking? …
Once we get rid of these gender roles, things will be better for men and women.”
That is exactly what Criss has said about gender roles being oppressive to everybody. And it goes -exactly- counter to what you said earlier, that only women are ever oppressed by it because misandry doesn’t exist.
“As for misandry and women having a good reason to hate men…
and anyone who doesn’t toe the line.”
When there’s a rape victim, there’s a difference between understanding how someone could come to feeling that way, and thinking that that feeling is justified and encouraging/promoting it. While I empathize, I still think they should be helped get over such a hatred, like anyone who goes through a traumatic experience should be.
Kind of reminds me of that Clint Eastwood movie, “Gran Torino”, only it’s a racist Vietnam vet portrayed in that story, instead of a sexist rape victim. Still, that’s my point about empathy and helping them come out of their prejudices…
Also, I have to point out you changed your stance again. You went from saying “Hatred of men can be probably explained with good reason” to “Some people have emotional traumas to explain their hate while others are just hateful”.
Misandry is not something that hurts all men, it is not widespread and it is not insidious like misogyny. Enforcing gender roles does hurt men and those roles are a result of misogynistic thinking. If you think women are suppose to be house wives then what do you think men are suppose to be. You can’t have one without the other. It hurts everyone.
It’s not counter. You just don’t seem to think that because people treat women a certain way they’re also doing the same thing to men.
So rape victims are justified but they really should just get help to get over those feelings. I don’t agree. I think they’re allowed and justified and while they may need help or therapy, who are you to decide who should get helped for what?
How is misandry promoted in this country. I’d love to see your examples because I don’t see it. I see lots of enforcing of gender roles, which hurts both sexes. But it’s not misandry.
How is that changing? I clarified, big difference.
I’m sorry, but I just don’t agree with you. Men are not hated on the level of women and when they are treated poorly it’s because of the enforced gender rolls that our misogynistic society has enforced for years.
Yes some people hate men. Some people hate women. But the treatment is so far apart it’s like another world. Men are not oppressed because they are men.
“Misandry is not something that hurts all men, it is not widespread and it is not insidious like misogyny…
It’s not counter. You just don’t seem to think that because people treat women a certain way they’re also doing the same thing to men.”
Please explain to me how your one-sided view is fair and accurate: “Yes, it hurts both, but it’s really all about women’s oppression” is inherently contradictory, isn’t it?
How is a woman’s obstacles in being main provider any “more” a problem than a man’s obstacles in being primary carer?
“So rape victims are justified but they really should just get help to get over those feelings. I don’t agree….
I see lots of enforcing of gender roles, which hurts both sexes. But it’s not misandry.”
Why exactly are you promoting people not being helped get over their PTSD-caused prejudicial hate? No, I’m sorry, hating an entire gender based on it is no better than hating all members of the race of the person who did it to you.
It is more than mildly disturbing to think that you’re actually promoting complacency towards issues caused by PTSD just to make a point. This isn’t even related to gender. I’d say the same about the Gran Torino case – Essentially that’s exactly what the movie is about, helping a Vietnam vet get over his racism. And I’d say the same about a misogynist male victim, mind you. The LAST thing we should be doing is en
“How is misandry promoted in this country. I’d love to see your examples because I don’t see it. I see lots of enforcing of gender roles, which hurts both sexes. But it’s not misandry.”
How about the fact that men get higher prison sentences for equal crime? Tell me how that’s misogyny rather than misandry (thinking that women are innocent, while all aggressors are men)?
“How is that changing? I clarified, big difference.”
You completely ignored the “some people are just hateful” part. You made a flat assertion that women who hate men probably have good justification.
“I’m sorry, but I just don’t agree with you. Men are not hated on the level of women and when they are treated poorly it’s because of the enforced gender rolls that our misogynistic society has enforced for years.
Yes some people hate men. Some people hate women. But the treatment is so far apart it’s like another world. Men are not oppressed because they are men.”
Men aren’t hated? How about the idea that any man who hurts a woman, no matter the circumstance, is a vile monster, while any woman who hurts a man is usually let go with a “Oh well, he probably deserved it”?
How about how objectification of women is not okay, but objectification of men is considered to be fine? How about how male rape is a humor topic, especially prison rape? (TVTropes even has a section on this called DoubleStandard Rape: Female on Male or something to that effect, on examples of how the media treats male rape as absolutely hilarious).
This is why feminism is only one side of the coin for me. They seem to be so hung up on “privilege” that it ignores that the other side has problems too. Feminism (well, the non-male hating variety) is a good thing but it needs the other side of the coin to bring true equality.
“Misandry is not a thing. It never has been and it never will be a thing. ”
lol, really? I have someone named “yourself” who admits it exists”
“I will concede that there are some out there who hate men, so the term can be used for those who actively hate all men. ”
And as to whether or not it is as bad as misogyny, etc. I’m guessing you have scientific data to measure that one subjective type of oppression is more prevalent than another subjective type of oppression? Misogyny and Misandry are not concrete things you can measure, but opinions on the actions of others.
Firstly, I want to say that it was awesome meeting you at CONvergence and I’m glad you made it back home safe/in one piece/etc. Thanks for posting videos of some of the panels as well.
On topic, it really takes guts to reexamine one’s opinions and take a different perspective on them. In this case, it does really go to show how prevalent gender roles are in society that you assumed being denied opportunities in your previous jobs due to being a woman were just “how things are”. Realizing that in my own life was a wake up call for me too. Society is hard to change unless more people realize there is something wrong.
Matthew, in case you’re lurking (as most people who post and run do), most of the issues you bring up are more the issues of a sexist society than solely the fault of “men-hating” feminists. The same sexist society that believes women aren’t capable of taking on serious work or are the better caretakers or unable to do harm to men is the same society that believes that men cannot be “a nurse, or a day carer, or a babysitter”, cannot actually care for their own children and thus be awarded custody, or cannot be victims of DV or sexual assault.
Sure, anyone could search and find feminists who really, really hate men (just like finding atheists who believe in ghosts), but the jist of the movement has always been equality.
Regarding the comment you made in your video about receiving articles from radical feminists who hate men, can you give some examples if they aren’t too private? I’ve definitely heard of feminists who hate the sex industry and feminists who are transphobic, but I’ve only heard of the existence of feminists who really have a grudge against men from men who feel personally under attack when they aren’t.
And I think the examples you give here show that perfectly. Society’s expectations that women are better suited to be babysitters and secretaries is just as harmful to men who would like to have those jobs and are qualified for them.
They rarely come right out and say they hate men, but that’s sometimes the only conclusion you can draw unless you want to be absurdly generous in your interpretation. Goo Examples include Ire Myth Purr on YouTube and her friend Allecto.
http://youtu.be/Mk6wbAB2ZZU
http://users.livejournal.com/_allecto_/34718.html
Extreme anti-sex work views often are anti-male by any reasonable interpretation. For instance, if you say that any man who views pornography for pleasure is a rapist, you’ve said that basically all men who aren’t asexual are rapists. (This line of argument tends to forget that women also view porn and plenty of porn doesn’t feature women.)
Ugh, I’d forgotten about Allecto, she is horrid. Her callous dismissals of rape victims in the comments made me ill.
Well, to be fair if someone feels like they’re under personal attack then they are under personal attack. Intent isn’t magic, after all. That said, sometimes it’s deserved of course.
It’s not so much about women hating men, at least to me, it’s more that there’s a minority of feminists who simply want to rearrange the boxes and gender roles. Maybe to get women equality, or even ahead, but those boxes and gender roles would still exist. I think the majority of modern feminists realize that the problem is the gender roles and the hierarchical thinking itself and that’s what needs to go.
That’s where (the minority) you get things like arguing against transsexuals and sex work as they don’t fit their ideal for what their gender should be.
Personal attack does require some degree of intent, though. Some people feel like they are under attack when no one is even talkign about them. The radfems Cristina is referring to tend to be such people. For instance, if you think other people’s sexual choice are a personal attack on yours or somehow legitimatize yours, you are wrong.
“Well, to be fair if someone feels like they’re under personal attack then they are under personal attack.”
I don’t think so. When you talk about a lot of issues around sexism, some men will point themselves as outliers to try and discredit the whole argument. I’m a woman and I’ve never been raped, that doesn’t make rape a non-issue.
“That’s where (the minority) you get things like arguing against transsexuals and sex work as they don’t fit their ideal for what their gender should be.”
My point was just that I’ve never seen arguments from feminists indicating a blanket hatred of men as a gender. I’ve seen the transphobic arguments and the anti-sex arguments.
That’s another good point: all those guys who think that they are being accused of rapists whenever someone discusses rape culture. “Intent isn’t magic” doesn’t mean that all accusations are true.
A big problem I have with feminists in general, is usually they keep conflating issues of being stared at/propositioned/etc with actual rape.
I’m not saying that people are right to dismiss the former, but when I constantly see those who do, say that they’re somehow downplaying the seriousness of sexual assault and/or rape, it ticks me off.
“My point was just that I’ve never seen arguments from feminists indicating a blanket hatred of men as a gender. I’ve seen the transphobic arguments and the anti-sex arguments.”
See my experience has been the exact opposite of this
I see them all the time. Hell who here is not familiar with the SCUM manifesto? Hell tell me if this dose not sound familiar?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnPkWNC7UD8&feature=related
Ring any bells?
Hell I got into a minor argument with one crazy on FTB who said “punching up” is ok… There are ok targets for bigotry I guess?
anyway here you go
http://thefemitheist.blogspot.com/
http://radicalhub.com/
http://www.facebook.com/agirlsguidetotakingovertheworld
See here is the the thing however. For the most part it is just a few crazy angry people making noise and they do not make up the majority of us.
Allecto sometimes writes for Radical Hub. It’s about as pure an example as you can find.
My Experience has been that many rad feminists have a tendency to be resentful towards men in general, I havent experienced any fems that have an issue with trans gender or homosexuality but I would imagine that all of these would be in the minority, the vocal minority
I think it was a very honorable thing that you took the video down after realizing that there were factual errors in it. Most people would not have been able to do that. My respect for you has gone up due to this (although it was pretty high already)
I don´t know enough facts about feminism to comment on the topic itself so i follow the rule: if you dont´t know, just say “i don´t know”.
My personal experience (for whatever that’s worth):
working in the United States, my entire life, at virtually every single job I’ve ever had there were women who were paid more than me for doing less work. I’ve had a lot of jobs. When I was a front office secretary and 19 years old, I got paid $10/hour. The only other secretary in the office was female, she had one year more experience than me, and she got $15/hour. She routinely came in late, spent most of the day outside smoking or talking on the phone or reading magazines, and had far fewer responsibilities than me. When I worked as a registrar at a hospital ER I consistently had the 2nd-best productivity scores of anyone in the entire department of around 30 employees. There were many females in my department who didn’t work nearly as hard and were getting paid the same or more than me. At at least half of my jobs in the States, my direct supervisors were female. At many of them, the general managers or directors that my direct supervisors answered to were also female. I’ve never in my life in the United States seen anything like a pattern of female employees receiving fewer opportunities, less money, or anything like that. In fact I’ve seen the opposite.
I know, like Cristina, that personal experience isn’t the best way to judge something with broad implications like sexual inequality in society. But my personal experience has led me to believe that statistics (in the United States) that show a wage gap, or more men in high positions of authority, have to do with things much more nuanced than outright sexism. I’m not aware of any reliable data demonstrating that this position is wrong.
Elsewhere, yes, sexism is still a big problem. I have lived outside of the United States in South Korea and Saudi Arabia, and spent a lot of time many other places including Romania. Saudi Arabia would of course be the most extreme case. There, women are property. Period. If they have a job at all then it’s only because their owner allows them to and they can expect to earn about 1/3 or 1/2 of what their male coworkers earn. That’s for Saudi girls, though. For expatriate women, women working at the same kind of jobs that I have, they actually are able to earn more than I do since it’s harder to find expat women to work in Saudi. So, my personal experience has continued to be true, even here in the most sexist and misogynistic place on Earth. There are still women doing the same work as I am getting paid more.
I don’t know what all your jobs have been, but the two you cited were secretarial, and as Cristina pointed out, this is typically seen as “women’s work.”
When I was a cashier and a big-box hardware store, typically female cashiers were paid more and more likely to be promoted through the cashiering ranks (to head cashier and front-end manager) than men. However, cashiers were generally not promoted beyond the front end and it was assumed that the male cashiers would quit if a better opportunity in another department came up (especially the departments that got contracts that paid commission.)
I’m just citing personal experience too, but these underlying expectations of what men and women are capable of hurt men as well as women.
In a female-dominated field, men are more likely to be discriminated against. There are also market pressures that makes things odd – such as the ex-patriot female workers you mentioned.
The statistics never give a clear picture of what is really happening. I think sometimes we get so wound up in the ideal that every opinion we have has to be backed up by some sort of study that “normalizes” and aggregates everything that we forget that those numbers are trying to desperately quantify our collective experiences.
Where I used to live, there were employers that would not hire white people, and if you were hired you would be made to feel uncomfortable. That doesn’t mean that racism does not exist – quite the opposite really. It just means that the problem of racism and sexism are more complicated than a few numbers on a chart.
The truth concerning the pay-gap is just as complicated; and the individual experiences of people should be respected and treated with concern; even if they are a-typical. Those experience are somehow negated by the experiences of others.
I’ve encountered some pretty serious sexism in my career that caused me to turn away from my original plans. If I made all the perfect choices or powered through, I could have avoided it, but that doesn’t mean that sexism didn’t exist. Not everyone has had the same experiences as I have had, but that doesn’t mean that sexism didn’t exist either.
typo oops:
I mean that those experiences are NOT negated by the experiences of others. I was pretty sure, in context, that would be clear, but thought I’d mention it.
Glass Escalator for white men in female-dominated fields.
Discrimination against female doctors, even when you account for specializations, time off, etc.
Early wage gap because women grads get lower salaries for same jobs
Most of the gendered pay gap has to do with child-bearing/child-care and pink-collar professions receiving lower wages, but women are discriminated against in other ways as well, and as the last article mentions, women who think the playing field is equal are more likely to unknowingly accept the results of discrimination.
Regarding men being discriminated against when taking on non-traditional, it’s not that apparent that they face discrimination in any way the same way as women do if they take on a non-traditional job workplace. A lot of it would be to do with social attitudes about what is women’s work. It is, as you say, complex and there are nuances there that simple stats just don’t get across.
“The interviews suggest that unlike “nontraditional” women workers, most of the discrimination and prejudice facing men in the “female professions” emanates from outside those professions. The men and women interviewed for the most part believed that men are given fair—if not preferential—treatment in hiring and promotion decisions, are accepted by supervisors and colleagues, and are well-integrated into the workplace subculture. Indeed, subtle mechanisms seem to enhance men’s position in these professions—a phenomenon I refer to as the “glass escalator effect.”
The Glass Escalator: Hidden Advantages for
Men in the “Female” Professions – http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/hdh9/e-reserves/Williams_-_The_glass_escalator_PDF-1.pdf
Kay S. Hymowitz (2011), Why the Gender Gap Won’t Go Away. Ever. References many peer-reviewed studies.
Interesting article. Thanks for linking it. I like how it made sure to point out the limitations of the studies and was pretty clear about what they did show and how they were conducted.
I’m however, not so keen on how it characterized the arguments it purported to be debunking. I’ve read other similar articles, and they had that problem as well. I mean, do people who write seriously about the pay gap have to spatter the “suck-it straw feminists!” in with all the interesting stuff?
It also didn’t examine the issue of why female-dominated fields tend to pay less than male-dominated ones (unless I missed it), which is sort of a big deal.
I agree there is an issue in our society with regard to gender equality. However, we must also acknowledge the fact that there are actual differences between men and women, differences that MAY (with the emphasis on may) be relevant (an obvious example: if you’re looking for an actress for a female part in your play, obviously males are disqualified).
Average differences between men and women may cause females being favored over males, or the other way around, even though the specific individuals are just as qualified. I am not saying this is ok, but I am saying it is almost unavoidable. What can be avoided is making mistakes on what (and how relevant to anything) (average) differences between the genders actually are.
There are physical differences, sure. And women generally don’t have the upper body strength to do a lot of jobs, for example. But there aren’t intellectual differences in terms of capability, which is what Cristina is talking about. Women are not inherently more “nurturing,” men are not inherently more “assertive”, etc.
I honestly think the “physical strength/ conditioning” thing is a red herring. Most of the jobs I’ve done – which, so far, have included deep sea fishing, grounds maintenance, couriering animal carcasses and working in a bakery (sounds easy, until you factor in all the 50kg bags of flour and 20kg bags of bread mix you need to haul around, not to mention the 100+kg machinery that needs to be moved on a regular basis for deep cleaning) – are often perceived to be “physically demanding”, but are in fact not so at all. Moreover, the more you do something the easier it becomes – most of the lads I know who do construction, demolition or civil engieering jobs could barely carry a hod or heft a pneumatic drill when they started out, yet a few months in and it’s like second nature.
To say that women lack the upper body strength to do some traditionally “male” jobs is to negate the fact that women’s bodies are just as adaptable as men’s. It also ignores the relatively small number of women who DO actually do these jobs.
Basically, women can do more or less anything they want to do; the only thing stopping them is their perceived need to conform to gender norms and the misogyny inherent in a society willing to tell women their gender bars them from taking jobs they might enjoy and be good at.
I call bullshit. Can you please explain to me why men and females are separated in sports?
Because the long right tail of male strength and speed is longer than the female one. The median is also shifted. But you don’t have to be Usain Bolt to work construction, now do you? Nor do you have to exceed the job expectations. It doesn’t matter if Billy Bob can lift 150 pounds if the job never requires him to lift more than 75 and if Sally Ann can lift 75, then there’s no (good) reason to hire Billy Bob over her. We’re not talking about superhero stuff here.
Most women can do the types of jobs that men generally do that are physically demanding. Very few jobs ask you to lift more than 50 lbs. even though OSHA does not have specific guidelines for this. It take time to condition your body for any job, however.
Many women simply do not do strength training or are asked to do physically demanding jobs as they grow up, which enhances the strength gap between the “averages”. This is a distortion of the inherent differences. However, even after physical conditioning, the gap narrows, but it does not go away: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18849869
Simply put though – I would put my bets on a woman who picks rock all day and not the average male store clerk.
When I did farm work, I was incredibly tough. Now, not so much. However, I don’t have this stupid idea that I couldn’t do many of the jobs that are generally reserved for men if I were to be better physically conditioned; because I’ve been around those jobs and I know what they do. I’ve done many of the same tasks. Not everyone is suited for those jobs, but to categorically think of them as off-limits to women isn’t reasonable.
Women do tend to have increased rates of certain types of injury. http://www.bordeninstitute.army.mil/other_pub/QPMonographwebedition.pdf One reason may be because the ergonomics of tasks/equipment have been designed for men, however, I highly doubt that accounts for the entire difference. Any move to improve the safety of physically demanding jobs, benefits both men and women.
If endurance is an issue, women have some biological advantages. http://running.competitor.com/2011/05/injuries/running-doc-are-women-more-suited-for-endurance-than-men_28063
I could dig up a bunch of information about “typical” gender differences. Better eye-sight! Better hearing! Better visual attention to detail and memory (a lot better)! (That would be women.)
However, we all know that there is usually more variation among people of a particular gender than between them in the general population – and very few jobs are just dead lifting stuff all day.
I had the bad habit of allowing men to do “male typical” jobs, because I would assume they knew what they were doing. I now know better. My husband was once shamed for “allowing” me to change a car tire in the parking lot while he was at work. The young man who insisted on assisting me didn’t have a clue. (I walked him through it, and thanked him nicely.) My former male roommate is now disallowed to put together RTA furniture. I hung a door while I was 7 months pregnant, he kept wanting to help me. I wanted it done right, so I did it myself.
Because most people are such massive fools they don’t understand most athletic ability comes from training. Innate talent is nonsensical gibberish. The only major difference between men and women comes in height and even that’s varied. Running, agility, hand eye coordination aren’t male exclusive abilities.
Julian, please look at what has been said just before you.
Physical differences do exist, but there’s a difference between a soft differentiation and a hard limit.
The point is not that women can’t do a physically demanding job. It’s that less women would be able to do it than men. And if you think that there isn’t any real difference, then you’re just plain scientifically wrong.
Can you explain
?
Just to be clear – it almost never matters. It matters a heck of a lot less than most people think it does.
Construction, especially (if you want to be real here) the “average” advantage for many of the jobs is squarely with women (get it, “squarely” – that was a pun).
Women tend to have better social awareness and therefore increase the quality of output from working groups (so most foremen should be forewomen).
Women tend to have more visual attention to detail and memory (so most finishers/tilers/flooring/electrical/plumbing) should be women right?
Guys can frame and roof – do dry-wall too, I hate doing dry-wall. 🙂 I guess they can put in the doors too because of that whole well-publicized 3D rotational spatial reasoning thing. That “right hand door”/”left hand door” crap gives me a head-ache.
Just saying, if women weren’t shut out of traditionally male-dominated jobs, there would be a lot more women in these jobs. Would I expect 50% of roofers to be women in an egalitarian paradise? Probably not. However, in seriousness, I would expect more than 50% of many other jobs in these physically demanding male-dominated fields to be women in that same paradise.
Oh, don’t get me wrong, I couldn’t care less who’s “on average” better than who at what.
I’m just saying that such difference could account for a non-50%/50% job spread in everything, but at the end of the day, anyone able to do any job should be allowed to do it.
@Othersider
That’s reasonable. I don’t expect 50% (exactly) of men and women in every field imaginable. However, if we are going to use inherent gender-typical traits to explain or worse yet, excuse, lack of gender parity in various fields; we should do this across the board.
Why aren’t almost all fighter pilots female – well – outside of anime? There are several female-typical traits that are advantageous for that particular career. Many of those traits have very little overlap between men and women – and include both physiological and cognitive traits.
I’m willing to avoid setting goals of gender parity in various fields based on a handful of studies on gender-typicality. I’m content to frame the conversation within the assumption that almost all gaps in gender-typical attributes are small enough that large gender disparities within a field can most likely be attributed to gaps in opportunity, disparities in encouragement and confidence, and good old fashioned sexism more so than inherent gender differences.
OR – we can look at the data and create gender percentile goals based on peaks and standard deviations and meta-analyses.
However, it’s dishonest to do use one of those approaches for some things and not for others.
Well, we find ourselves fully in agreement. No arguments here.
Do you feel that is demonstrated conclusively? Or is that just your opinion? Are you saying the differences between men and femalse are solely caused by society (and physical differences)?
I don’t know that it’s been demonstrated conclusively, but it’s not really the point, the point was that the physical differences are a red herring for the supposed “intellectual differences.” And yes, a lot of those differences are based on long-held societal assumptions without any basis in fact.
I’m so glad you took down the video and posted this. I saw that a long time ago when PZ linked to one of your other videos and it came up in the suggestions. I didn’t bring it up, but it did make me less inclined to read your blog here. Now I can do so happily.
Have you heard of lacigreen on YouTube? She talks about sex, gender, sexual orientation, beauty, etc. I think you’d love her channel and learn a lot considering your post on sexual harassment. Feminist Frequency is also a really great channel where we learn how woman are portrayed in the media and she even has a video on ” straw feminists” which is what most people think feminists are like. Just making some recommendations :).
I enthusiastically second both of those!!
And Sarah Haskins is also great at showing so many of the little mundane things we take for granted about our society (her main focus is advertising), and how they’re sexist/demeaning/limiting to women. (And, she’s also totally hilarious!)
Thank you for clarifying your position. It’s easy to want to just throw our hands up and walk away from inequalities instead of making the difficult investments toward a better future, knowing the risk that changes won’t come soon enough and our investments will be lost. The more who are able and willing to help out, the better chance we all have to reap the benefits.
FFS
Think about that for two seconds and ask yourself if you really believe that.
Let’s just look at one life in through the lens of traditional roles:
1) I wouldn’t have gone into a STEM field. (It was surprising to at least one older woman who said, “Well, if you think you can do it.” when she found out I was going into physics.)
2) I wouldn’t have married my husband when I did because he didn’t have a good income at the time. (His father actually expressed concern about this to me.)
3) I would have dropped out of college when I married because it was my husband’s job to support me. (Several older people asked at our wedding if I was going to continue college.)
4) I would have had to follow my husband where-ever his career took him. (A friend of my thesis adviser expressed his concern that it wasn’t proper for a man to follow a woman’s career, even though my husband was not a college graduate and had no career prospects to follow at the time.)
5) I would not have gotten paid for work because it’s not important for women to support their families. (My thesis adviser accused me of being money-hungry for asking about support over the summer because I had a husband so, to him, I didn’t have to worry about that.)
6) Once I had children, I would quit my job and stay at home. (A few people asked if I was going to keep working after I had children.)
So, how did this affect my husband’s choices in life? Of course it did. However, he had the choice to get married, not financially support his wife, be financially supported by his wife, work part-time in retail and still life a middle-class life style, spend time with his children instead of work 50-60 hrs a week trying to support us, etc. If we had to make the choice to either move for his career advancement or mine, we could weigh our options and take the best one. Otherwise, we would only have one option. In addition, I am not well-suited to be a house wife and would probably constantly be an emotional wreck. My husband would also be an emotional wreck because all he would do is work all day and come home to a dirty house and terrible food, and his good-for-nothing wife possibly drinking booze in her pajamas in front of the TV while children in dirty diapers destroyed his stuff. Just sayin’
I’m not clear why you took the video down – you only give factual errors as the reason. You could easily have added an addendum to the comments on the video saying this and your view point has evolved? I’m not a youtuber so I don’t know…
I’m not in agreement with the overall principle – you think you were wrong about some aspects of that video therefore it needs to be removed from your CV. I’d say the opposite – your opinion and professionalism has increased since then and the video lays testament to that fact. There is often a tendency to denigrate and dismiss people and their ideas because they have not demonstrated a continuous ‘purity of thought’. This is especially prevalent in UK politics, to use a different subject by way of analogy, you are ridiculed and undermined if you make a ‘u-turn’ or more british a ‘reverse-ferret’. In my opinion this is not a very admirable quality – what I look for in anyone with a reasoned opinion is the quality of continuous self examination and doubt. I really like the way you present your arguments in a questioning manner as one example of this.
Anyway I’d like to see you be proud that your ideas have not stayed static and your methods have improved – it will keep you honest and less likely to make the same mistakes in the future. Then again I suppose this article accomplishes that to a degree anyway 😉
You claimed the video was “demonstrably factually incorrect”. I’m still waiting for that demonstration…
You have the right to demand more because…why?
Because unfounded assertions are wrong, and he wants to see how she came to the new conclusion?
That’s true, but really the reason he has the right to demand more is because this is Cristina’s blog not Echidna’s, and she has chosen to allow him to post that, and chosen not to delete it. He doesn’t have the right to make her respond to his demand, but he’s got as much right to post his request as you do to criticise it.
Why Echidna seems to feel that it’s hir job to gatekeep on someone else’s blog, I just don’t know.
This is the situation I’m in, and I love it. I’m an engineer, and my husband is an artist who has virtually no income. I love my job, and I would do it even if my husband were a millionaire. We don’t need any more money than we already have, and I’m so happy we’re both able to do what we love.
My husband, however, often feels guilty about this and gets stressed out. He feels the societal pressures to be the breadwinner, and they’re hard for him to completely ignore. He hates when he puts any extra financial burden on us, and i often have to reassure him that its OK to take that extra trip to the doctor, or buy him an expensive bithday present. My family hates that I’ve married someone who makes less money than me, and has tried many times to get him “a real job” or convince me to leave him. When we were in college, he worked full time at a crappy place and supported me so I could focus on grad school. He completely paid off his school debt two years before I graduated, and could afford my engagement ring, all while working nearly full time on his art too. Apparently that doesn’t make him less of a lazy failure to my family.
It is difficult to ignore trolls especially when become a target by going online with your strongly held (and often brilliantly argued) views in the way you do Christina. I take my hat off to you: you are clearly highly intelligent and your critical thinking skills are abundant.
The fact that you appear to be a ‘babe’ works in your favour for most observers – be they male or female (but not feminist thugs). Beautiful people have always had a real advantage in life (not opinion, scientifically verified fact, often described as the ‘beauty premium’ which I am sure you will research if you have not yet!) and now, something we all knew ‘intuitively’ has been confirmed: women who flirt effectively, thereby manipulating their sexuality to take advantage of the weaker sex(!) are the real winners – http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/women-who-flirt-get-better-deal-7985212.html
Maybe your bosses were wrong keeping you in the office while the ‘alpha males’ were sent to deal with other ‘alpha’ males!
The French have always had the right attitude about the realities of ‘sexism’: “Vive la différence!”
Good luck and keep on with your campaign against systemic and codified ignorance based on Iron Age superstitions. The latest idiocy from the US led creationist propagandists is that Darwinism is a cult!!! You couldn’t make this stuff up!
Best wishes and keep up the good work.
I’m not going with you there completely.
Some men (and some women) simply will not accept a woman in a male-dominated profession. My husband works at a home improvement store and the women who work there get disrespected all the time.
It is not uncommon for a customer to ask, point blank, “Is there a man I can talk to about this?”
What generally happens is that the female worker will grab the nearest man and tell that guy, “This customer was asking if a man could help him with this.”
So the male employee then asked the customer what his questions are, the customer asks his questions, and then the male employee says that he isn’t the expert about that or doesn’t know the answer to that, and asked the female employee what the answers are IN FRONT OF THE CUSTOMER.
Brilliant.
I have to deal with that occasionally too, and I tell you it wears on you like few things do. It’s so frustrating.
@ M A Melby – I agree that asking the female to share her elevated expertise in front of the sexist male is a fantastic way to shatter the male illusion of dominance.
Please do not misunderstand. I merely point out the facts: in any society there are unequal principles that apply to us all when any transaction occurs (be it M-M, M-F, F-F, F-M), that sexism is one aspect that is unfortunately inherent (though thankfully changing through exactly the behaviour you describe above), and that attractiveness has an unreasonably over-weighted effect in any human dealings.
Civilization is the mark of how far we have come from the ape-like reactions we would expect from our simian inferiors: sadly, we are a long way from perfection.
Well said ! Are legs now taboo?
Thanks for reevaluating, Cristina. I remember being so disappointed with your original video. I didn’t really feel like arguing and I refrained from unsubbing, but I did lose some of the esteem I had held for you. Now I’m looking forward to seeing you fighting systemic sexism and misogyny with the same wit and passion as you do religion.
Little known fact, back when sports were segregated by race there were demonstrable differences between whites and blacks. True story./snark
I see a lot of irritatingly ignorant comments here, so I just wanted to weigh in with my support.
I admit the only video of yours I ever watched before now was the anti-feminism video. I was attempting to explain to somebody that the pay gap creates a very real social gap between men and women, a dependency of women on men that hurts women, and that for all the hemming and hawing people do about this being because women have babies, there’s in fact quite a bit more to it than that. I was linked to your video by way of rebuttal.
Since then, I’d seen your name on a lot of lists my partner Zinnia was on, like youtube charity fundraisers and most recently your addition to FTB. Every time, it would ruffle my feathers a bit. Recently, ZJ linked me to this post and I was really happy to read it.
There are no feminists who are born that way. Some of us come to it more easily than others, but most of us have to swallow some jagged pills and recognize that, however well-intended those around us seemed to be, we were harmed by people who couldn’t see competence, intelligence, or worthiness because we’re women. We were taught to disregard our own opinions and feelings on matters, that a man who expresses radical opinions is demonstrating ambition and bravery while a woman who expresses the same is an attention whore. We’re taught that feminism is outdated and that if we just tried harder (as if men got it all by trying extra hard), everything would be equal. It’s not easy to shake off everything you’ve learned and see things the way they are. So good for you. Pay no mind to the haters.
*waves at Heather*
Completely off-topic: You probably don’t remember but I kept mentioning you were loud once during a live video cast (because I thought you were being loud because of drinking) and now that I know you are hard-of-hearing I feel like an ass. My father is hard-of-hearing too, so I suppose I should have known better. Sorry about that!
Cheers to you and ZJ, I was very excited to see her here, as well as Cris and AronRa.
I don’t have the energy to wade into the argument. I’m just here to cheer you on for willingness to reconsider your views on something and announce that you’ve changed your mind due to more evidence. Good for you!
I certainly wouldn’t castigate you for your previous video, because we’ve all been wrong about things in the past. We’ve all been REALLY wrong in the past. We’ve all vociferously argued one side only to later learn we were wrong. Most of us bluster and try to cover it up.
Thank you for being honest, it sets an example for others.
Hello.
I just wanted to brag about how I happen to know exactly how everyone in the opposite group to me think. And how, very conveniently, it is exactly what I would like them to think so I can disagree with them without feeling like a jerk.
you wrote
“Whether it’s the men who prefer to deal with other men rather than with women, or whether it’s the women who don’t feel confident enough to take on bigger tasks, we must accept that there IS still a problem, that our culture still promotes the idea that men are generally more capable and/or more qualified.”
i dont believe anything in your piece suggests this exclusively …
there are many possible explanations…
and i would prefer
“men are aware (consciously or not) of the prejudices of others (actual or imagined) and reflex to avoid them…and will write this to themselves as ‘wise business practice'”
there are many other observations i could make…
i am not a feminist …though many might imagine me one from my persuasions..
You’re not actually saying anything different than Christina did.
As a woman who worked to support my family while my husband stayed home with the kids, it’s hard for me to imagine anyone asking if I would “still respect” my husband if he stayed home. Of course I would – and I do. My respect for him is for *him*, not for his job. He is a fully-realized human being, not a walking resume. I love him and I love the wonderful people our children are, specifically because of his influence in their lives.
The “just the way it is” mindset has done so much to limit the roles people feel they can play in our society. Because we didn’t shrug and accept “the way it is,” we are both happier. Without a doubt, we have happier children than we would likely have had, since being a stay at home mom leaves me too depressed to be a good parent, as was the case with my own mother.
I am glad you have decided to reassess your opinion of feminism. When society artificially limits roles, it damages us all by squelching the best talents of those who don’t fit the prescribed mold.
P.S.: The not-so-subtle pay disparity disproportionately harms the women and children in single-parent households, while still harming dual-income families, if to a lesser extent.
Christina, when I first saw your videos, I ran into the one on feminism on the related vids. I barely read through your description of it and the amount of eyerolls it caused me was giving me a headache so I didn’t even bother with the video–I had kind of mentally put you on my list of people-I’ll-listen-to-for-entertainment-when-I-have-independently-verified-their-opinion, and I still watched most of your vids, albeit with some reservations. HOWEVER, since your arrival at FtB I have been nothing but impressed! The way you’ve gone about asking very intelligent questions about issues on which other people have different experiences/philosophies, the very thoughtful way you’ve presented your attitudes and the way you acknowledge that your way of navigating these issues is not universal, has been truly excellent. You are genuinely a skeptic and a model of thorough, insightful, intellectually honest thinking.
Childcare should be paid work, no matter who does it.
Ethically I agree. The only problem is where the money comes from to pay for it.
Socialism!!!!!!
🙂
No seriously – socialism.
Excellent idea!
By the way, how much money is in Socialism’s bank account right now? Do you suppose Socialism could loan me some money for a car? I mean, I’d pay it back and everything, and Socialism has so much money that I’m sure Socialism wouldn’t even miss it.
I’m going to suggest that Socialism pay our local taxes too. That would certainly give a big boost to our regional economy, and I’m sure Socialism would be happy to help out like that.
And do you suppose that after I sell my house, Socialism would come by on a Saturday and help me move my stuff? Socialism is such a cool buddy. Brewskis on me, Socialism. I owe you a big one. No seriously, a real big one.
LeftSidePositive in Comment #29 gets it right.
I’ve been greatly impressed with your evolution on this topic, and as a feminist I can say I went down a very similar route. It is an all-too-scarce virtue nowadays to be able to reevaluate one’s opinion and admit error. Especially if you’ve been bogged down by internet assaults, which have a way of solidifying positions, weaving them more into your identity as a person, and making them harder to let go of. No one wants to admit mistakes when there’s a horde of bullies waiting to scream “I told you so!”.
Anyway, to cut it short, you’re doing wonderfully dear and I enjoy reading your blog and hearing your thoughts and insights. I’ve been following you for a while and I expect I will continue to do so in the future. Oh! And you’re a laugh, too! 😉 Keep up the good work!
Awwww. I just found your videos about a month ago and I’ve been working my way through them. I’ve absolutely loved most of them, and I think you’re brilliant, but that video did give me pause, and I put it on my list of “future blog posts” (yeah, I have a list, because I forget everything) to go through and do a point-by-point analysis on how wrong (some of) it was. I was even collecting, like, numbers and studies and stuff! Sigh. Now I’ll have to find something else to write about. 🙂
PS: I’m so sorry you got such hurtful comments from self-identified feminists. I started calling myself a “radical feminist” in high school, after reading a lot of different feminist theory and realizing that I most closely identified and agreed with radical feminist ideas (basically, that the root of oppression is the patriarchy, and we aren’t go to change much by the liberal feminist goals of legislative changes and getting more women in male fields; we need to completely dismantle the system). I still agree with a lot of that, and I’ve seen a lot of modern evidence that these old theories still hold true…look at all the female CEOs or politicians who refuse to acknowledge sexism or that they have benefited from feminism, and actively work against their fellow women.
But I’ve also seen a lot of ugliness from self-identified radical feminists (and other feminists) and it gets harder and harder to keep that label for myself. I don’t want to be associated with women who are so cruel to other woemn who don’t share their views, who are transphobic, who don’t listen to what women of color or poor women have to say. And maybe it’s mostly just “internet feminists” who, like a lot of assholes on the internet, take the relative annoynimity provided and use it to hurt other people, even people who should be their natural allies. But it’s something I’m thinking a lot about, and I don’t know that I’ll continue to identify as a “radical feminist” in the future.
Anyway, it sucks that people were so mean, and I think it’s awesome that you were able to look past both your own personal bias and the popularity of your argument, especially when women on the other side were being awful, and admit you were wrong when you saw evidence. That to me is such a good example of what we should all strive to do, and I hope that I have as much grace and willingness to change when my personal beliefs are threatened.
“Economic Facts and Fallacies” by Thomas Sowell has an entire chapter (chapter 3) that supports your original video. All references are listed so you can follow the information back to the source.
Very well said.
The next step, beyond becoming aware of the problem, is to practice living with the new paradigm. Alcoholics and drug addicts, once they’ve admitted they have a problem, then must practice sober living, one day at a time, with all of life’s temptations, emotions, betrayals, ambiguities, and poor role models.
Reading biographical stories in the AA Big Book doesn’t even come close to constituting effective practice for sober living in the real world.
The same exact thing can be said for social interactions with women.
Just a point of information:
I have a stay at home husband. He’s been home with the kids full-time since they were 2 and 3 years old, and he loves it. He also does all the cooking, all the laundry, and almost all the cleaning. And he’s amazing. Lest anyone get a stereotyped picture in their heads of a laid-back liberal hippie, he’s a devout fundamentalist Baptist and a Republican. Just because the media still push the “idiot incompetent dad” ideal on us doesn’t mean that it’s how everyone actually is.
I have a stay at home husband. He always gets asked what else he does, because the assumption is that he must have an at-home business. Men are far more defined by their careers than women, and that must make it hard for them to choose to be home with their kids. It’s an excellent example of how sexist hurts men. He still gets asked what he used to do, further diminishing his value as the world’s greatest dad. 🙁
I also heard that QANTAS and Air New Zealand do not let unaccompanied minors to be seated next to adult males on their planes. This is because, they say, paedophiles and child molesters and rapists almost always come in one gender — MALE.
I guess this attitude towards men and women (aka gender roles) adequately explains, from another viewpoint, why most parents would want their children to be with females instead of males, and why “being a nurse, or a day carer, or a babysitter and so on is not a “man’s job” and women are preferred almost exclusively for these positions”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airline_sex_discrimination_policy_controversy
But I was wondering, how feminists would respond to this news item? Discrimination against men?
Or, more precisely, how would one of feminism’s male standard-bearer would respond if he was on a QANTAS plane and was told he was not allowed to sit next to a certain unaccompanied minor only because he was an adult male?
Would he respond saying the following (with a huge smile plastered on his face): Sure. Because I am a feminist, I fully understand your point. I know every man is a potential rapist and a paedophile, and this includes me, too. I thereby vacate my seat and surrender it to an angel of a female with a joyful and happy heart????
No, you fucking idiot, he would say that is unacceptable and an indication of how patriarchal attitudes hurt men too. The attitude our culture has about men being unacceptable caregivers or unable to relate positively with children is unacceptable, and I say that as a female feminist. A statement about how one should be understanding of an INDIVIDUAL feeling uncomfortable around someone for various social reasons is in absolutely no way the same thing as having a set policy discriminating against any demographic (not the least because you don’t have the right to a private person’s time or attention, but you do have the right to sit in the seat you paid for on an airline…this is not a difficult distinction).
By the way, this can cut both ways…there’s some who can’t comprehend men being kind to children, but there are others who inordinately praise men who are good with children, while women with the same skills are taken for granted. As a counterexample, my Dad was on a flight some years ago (not QANTAS) next to an unaccompanied minor–he helped the kid with zir math homework, chatted, etc., and at the end of the flight the crew gave him a full bottle of wine to say thanks. In my experience, I have not seen women being so noticed and rewarded for being kind to children…it’s just taken as a matter of course.
LOL. See everybody, it’s totally not a problem when males are automatically assumed to be paedophillic rapists, because actually, that’s a problem men just made for themselves. And anyway, women don’t get free bottles of Champagne when they help kids with their math homework on long distance flights so it’s really the women who are suffering most here, clearly. Haha, I hope if Criss decides to stick around this place she notices and calls out the difference between the reasonable, levelheaded commenters and the batshit, dogmatic lunatics like this.
Um…what? The above post said it was definitely a problem, and utterly unacceptable. As a feminist I’d say the same thing, and most feminists I know would agree.
It’s an example of how patriarchy hurts men, too, that children are ‘women’s work’ and men can’t possibly care about them except in predatory terms. Help feminism expand the idea that people are people, with all sorts of capabilities and frailties irrespective of gender, and you help fix the problem that you cited above. Take women out of the sole position and expectation of nurturer, and you open up the role for men as well. Shockingly, third wave feminism totally supports this idea! So why, again, are you more interested in scoring (imaginary) points instead of figuring out how to actually fix the root of the problem?
You need to read the post again.
No feminist on this thread has claimed that the airline policy is a good thing, and some have stated that their feminist ideals are what cause them to think it’s a bad thing.
As far as protecting minors, men should not be automatically considered predatory nor should women automatically be considered benign. Professional caregivers should not be given access to children without another adult being present. This is something that, unfortunately, many organizations have learned the hard way. It is a gender-neutral rule, and it is a good one that protects children as well as protects adults from undo suspicion.
The airline policy is horrible. It pretends that women are incapable of causing harm (which is not true) and that all men should be met with suspicion (which is not fair).
If the child, for whatever reason, is uncomfortable with the choice of person zie is seated by – that request can be taken on a case-by-case basis. A blanket policy is repugnant.
If there is someone who is a self-described feminist who would agree with this policy, show hir to me so I can voice my disagreement. You do realize that feminists don’t ACTUALLY have a hive mind, right? We don’t get marching orders from our Borg Queen.
Are you so invested in the idea that feminists are your enemy and invariably fall into anti-male stereotyping that you can look at someone’s post that says one thing and actually read the opposite?
Great fucking job castigating me for saying THE EXACT OPPOSITE of what I actually said, all so you can hate Teh Eeebil Femmnistz…really–could you make it any more clear that you are a dishonest, willfully obtuse hack shoring up your intellectually bankrupt worldview at any cost?!
And, yes, it IS a problem when men are rewarded for doing things for which women wouldn’t be rewarded…it’s a blatant failure of equality, and that should be concerning to any decent person!
Check it out – I’m going to do a really impressive math proof.
Fuck you!! 1 + 1 = 2
****
I resorted to profanity!!! I just proved that 1 + 1 =/= 2 !!
Where’s my tenure?
Just sayin’.
I’m not keen on some of the tone of things sometimes either, but tone PROVES nothing.
It just makes what you are saying a better sounding punk lyric.
Hey Left Side Positive, great post but maybe ease up on calling people stupid, maybe not, just a suggestion
Stop tone trolling. It’s rude, it’s vapid, it contributes nothing to the conversation, and it wastes people’s time. Moreover, I’ve dealt with Kahfre before, and I have ample experience that he is a dishonest, sexist, trolling, intellectually lazy piece of shit, and I’m not going to let his disingenuous bullshit off the hook here, and I’m not going to pretend he’s a legitimate player in any debate when he is worth no better than scorn and ostracism. Furthermore, for you to come in here and comment on how I should react to issues that directly affect my life, when they do not directly affect yours, and dictate what tone you think is acceptable (no matter how passive-aggressively you phrase it), is kind of a douchebag attitude to take.
LeftSidePositive is the type of poster who considers calling someone a douchebag to be a valid contribution to an argument and a worthwhile expenditure of time.
But hey, you can always tell one someone’s arguments have been thoroughly debunked when they resort to such profanity.
Yeah I know. It hurts when they do things like these, doesn’t it? Imagine this happened to PZ Myers while he was on his way to Australia on a QANTAS plane to give a lecture on feminism in Sydney? The plane crew may let him express his feelings on this matter, up to a certain point, mind you, but they will not let him sit next to an unaccompanied minor. No matter what. He gets turned into a potential child molester and a potential pedophile for merely being an adult male, ironically enough, precisly because of over-zealous feminists like himself.
Lucky guy I guess. By the way, what year was in occurance when this event happend? Pre 1960s??? These days, I would imagine they would have harassed and threatened the poor guy with a couple of heavily armed professionals.
It seems that,(judging by the comments below) feminists somewhat discount or invalidate any discrimination being laid upon men in this particular case.
…and yet, judging from the comments only one or two above this, at least some of them are perfectly willing to advocate and agitate against bad ideas that hurt men; that policy of men not being able to sit next to unattended minors, for instance, is being soundly derided by several self-identified feminists. Way to ignore the hits and count the misses there, I guess it helps your worldview when you don’t let facts get in the way.
the fact that “rational” and “skeptical” people are arguing over something that as patently obvious as how women (and minorities) reap fewer benefits from, while giving more to, society is truly despairing. in particular, judging from the comments, it seems to be a mostly male/female divide. rationalizing the differences with statistics does nothing to address the fact that women do more for less.
no wonder people accuse the atheist community of being just another religion. too many still hold on to their feel good dogmas in spite of the reality staring them in the face.
“rationalizing the differences with statistics does nothing to address the fact that women do more for less.”
That’s simply not true. Read the papers I linked to in my first post:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/cristinarad/2012/07/29/why-i-removed-my-video-on-feminism/#comment-1660
Here’s a quote from the first paper:
Instead the gender gap is attributable to choices made by women concerning the amount of time and energy to devote to a career as reflected in years of work experience, utilization of part-time work, and workplace and job characteristics. There is no gender gap in wages among men and women with similar family roles. Comparing the wage gap between women and men ages 35-43 who have never married and never had a child, we find a small observed gap in favor of women, which becomes insignificant after accounting for differences in skills and job and workplace characteristics. What the average woman sacrifices in earnings from choosing jobs that allow for part-time work and flexible work conditions is presumably offset by a gain in the utility of time spent with children and family.
Thomas Sowell talks about this too in Chapter 3 of “Economic Facts and Fallacies” in a much easier-to-read fashion. If you can’t find the book you can easily hear him talk about it on YouTube.
I’m sorry, but I don’t see how that rebuts fellow traveller’s point that women do more and get less back.
If your argument is that women leave the workplace to look after their kids (why? why the women and not the men?) then it is important to realize that once the woman leaves said workplace to look after the kids, she doesn’t stop working, she just stops getting paid. And most of society is a-ok with the stay at home parent (whichever parent it is) not receiving any form of remuneration, although they are doing the single most vital job without which any society would fall apart.
If homemakers are to be paid a salary who is going to pay it and how?
Even if we don’t start actually paying a salary – SOCIALISM!!! – it is possible to monetize the household contributions when doing analysis of economic contribution. For example, if a wife is a stay-at-home wife to her husband, and go through a divorce. You can either say she contributed no money, or you can monetize the contribution and compare that to her husbands salary and other contributions. Many spouses to professionals care for children, clean the home, cook the meals, take care of household finances including buying and coordinating services, make travel plans and preparations, do yard work, transport children and routinely entertain business related visitors. If you were to hire someone to do all of these things, it would be a demanding full-time job. In fact, really, it would probably violate labor-law for one person to do it all especially when the children are young. 🙂 One estimate I’ve heard for a house wife’s annual contribution was around $100,000 for a professional in a high-cost of living area in the U.S. I’m sure it varies a lot depending on where you are and what you do, but it is NOT insignificant when factored in, and when that contribution is given a NUMBER it becomes more real in people’s minds.
For a while, even when women worked out of the home, it was routinely unpaid. I’m actually against many types of volunteerism for that reason. Like libraries? Nursing assistants? That’s all about “house wives not working” back in the day. Now they are paid positions, which is a very good thing.
Thanks for the clarification.
Thank you Thank you Thank you sooo much for stating that this is a problem that opresses everyone and not blaming males, specifically white males for something they had no involvement in creating and no chance to change.
I agree, its a problem for everyone and that we all need to work towards change
I hope this is proof exactly of how much of a strawman the accusations levied against Christina Rad’s followers, that they are a bunch of misogynist MRA haters, etc etc etc.
*points at the ratings on the linked video*
Perhaps it will be an eye-opener, people in general aren’t as unreasonable as they’re being portrayed.
I doubt it mate, from the comments above where the resounding theme is
“I used to think less of you until you started to agree with us on FTB’s…..”
or
“Now that you are on FTB i can really see the change….”
my guess, is that these people, not everyone here, but these types will always try to portray themselves as the enlightened ones and everyone else as “Others” who “unfortunately” for them are less enlightened but can be helped…
They are as bad as the fuckers who keep commenting that Criss has been brainwashed by femmenists, both claims are equally childish
I think the phrasing of the statements you selected there is a bit patronizing too. However, how are you supposed to look at someone who has a different opinion than you that you strongly believe is demonstrably false or the product of bad reasoning?
As
1) someone who has an indefensible opinion, but might be convinced in the future if shown evidence or if you provide them a persuasive argument or
2) someone who has been brainwashed by some guy, or organization, you don’t like that has a similar opinion.
I do see one of those choices as more obnoxious than the other one.
Yeah, I see what your saying and I appreciate the response, thanks
That’s not a “straw man” it’s just an accusation, just like insults are not “ad hominems”, crying isn’t an “appeal to sympathy/emotion”, etc.
That’s just going to be my pet peeve from now on.
Here is a good example of a straw man:
The assertion:
Your, more easily refuted, characterization of the assertion framed as an accusation:
Then you used evidence to make your point that seeks to refute your characterization of the assertion, but wouldn’t be adequate to refute the actual assertion.
THAT is a straw man.
An assertion or an accusation is JUST an assertion or an accusation. It might be false or unfair, but unless it is part of an argument where someone is mischaracterizing a stance in order to more easily refute it – it’s NOT a straw man.
I do not understand.
If, as you said, there are assertions that MRAs have found zomgitscriss’ videos, which is why there are the massive dislikes on those two videos, how is that not a misrepresentation of the stance held by Cristina Rad’s following?
I do not see how the assertion isn’t also an implied accusation that those who downvoted those videos are, in fact, an MRA crowd. And therefore, a strawman of the stance held by these people for why they downvoted it.
The quoted assertion that MRA “found” the video actually implies that the down-votes were from people who were not Cris’s normal viewership. So, the implication is opposite to the accusation that Cris’s normal viewership are MRA.
Now, if you want to think of the assertion as an argument against the people who voted down the video, it’s an ad hominem argument not a straw man. They are not giving evidence to why voting down the video is the wrong choice, but using “MRA” as a slur toward those that vote it down – discounting their opinion because they are “MRA”.
I am unaware of any accusation by anyone that Cris’s regular viewership are “MRA” or that they are significantly anti-feminist.
There was a commenter on that same blog post that self-identified as a regular viewer of Cris’s videos on YouTube and pretended that zie should be considered representative of Cris’s regular viewership (Whether or not zie was a-typical or not isn’t the issue, acting like you are a representative without consultation of those you “represent” is bogus.) and that “they” were disgusted that Cris would be associated (in any way) with Skepchick.
There are a lot of words for that sort of silliness. 🙂
I’m not saying that up-votes on this vid doesn’t mean anything. I’ve just heard the term “straw man” too many times in contexts that don’t seem correct.
Alright, fair enough.
Well, either way, it should disprove that pet theory anyway. It’s not some evulz MRA crowd come to ruin Criss’ videos because they hate women, the reality is far more reasonable than that.
Unfortunately, I have to disagree with you on what they mean when they say MRA. I’ve seen MRA used enough times as a slur implying the meaning “evil misogynist scum”, as well as feminists saying it outright, to not buy that no such implication was made here.
Sorry, misread your message. You’re well aware of the use of MRA as a slur.
Right – and I’m really not keen on “MRA” being used as a slur. Even prefacing it with some sort of adjective to put it aside isn’t sufficient not to insult those who really don’t deserve being insulted.
“anti-feminists” – seems reasonable for those who simply HATE feminism in an unreasonable blanket way
“male supremacist” – seems like a good description for the hyper-gender role crowd who sometimes call themselves “MRA” and deserve their hate-group status, they tend to be extremely anti-gay and fixated on feminism supposedly contributing to the “pussification” of male-ness or some such garbage. They even LABEL each-other according to their status in the male hierarchy (which I find just frickin’ creepy frankly). I’m an “omega male” or a “alpha male” or “beta”, etc. Self-awareness perhaps? Still sounds like crazy cult shit – got to be honest.
“Feminists” who see men as inherently violent beyond the reasonable discussions of toxic masculinity should not be called “feminazi” but perhaps “female exceptionalists” because “feminazi” has been used as a slur toward reasonable feminists, and they generally think that females are inherent more peaceful, better human beings, who would magically bring about world peace if placed in power. (Apparently they haven’t read up on Catherine the Great or Queen Margaret.)
I always respect someone willing to change their mind. It’s a sometimes unpleasant but mostly helpful attribute.
However, what exactly did W. Farrel have wrong? What is now right?
Also, what is a rad feminist vs. a non-rad feminist? Does believing in the patriarchy make you a rad feminist? How about the idea of rape culture? Is the National Organization of Women rad or non-rad?
You may have stepped into a larger issue than you realize.
I would also like to know which of the statistics in Farrel’s book she found were not true, or well founded.
Why wouldn’t she not mention details in her article, or in the comments?
So umm is it safe to say that 73 cents to the dollar is not a fair claim? would a better argument be 90 cents to the dollar of unaccounted wage gap?
I see a lot of links but fuck me if I know how to make heads or tails of it.
Using the source that’s been mentioned by others: http://www.city-journal.org/2011/21_3_gender-gap.html
Even when you account for about as much as you can possibly account for, the gap is still about 9 cents on the dollar of women making less than men. It doesn’t sound as impressive, but it is significant. Of course, to get to that smaller number, you need to discount many sexist norms – including the very significant difference in pay between traditionally female-dominated professions and male-dominated professions. You also have to discount all career forks along the way.
The columnist makes a good job of pointing out repeatedly that the numbers cannot discount discrimination. However, the focus is on the role of women’s career choices – these are considered free choices. These numbers do not, and cannot, reflect the types of difficulties that women tend to have in their careers – such as lack of advancement, being pigeon-holed, etc. They don’t show the types of difficulties that men tend to have in their lives – such as being expected to have an unhealthy and unfulfilling balance between work and family life.
If aggregated, all of the blatant discrimination that Cris recounted in her post would not be reflected, in fact it would show that women have an advantage in the workplace because she got more tips when she worked at the bar. When she was unable to advance in her job, even being more qualified, because the boss wanted to hire men for the higher-paying position, it would not be reflected in the numbers and be written-off as her job “choice” to be a secretary. When large contracts were granted to men instead of women, and therefore the men received higher commissions, this would not be reflected in their salary or wage.
The argument being raised in her old video was essentially that, compensating for women’s choices make the wage gap disappear instead of narrow and that if the wage gap can be accounted for that discrimination doesn’t happen more often to women than men and that women are not being oppressed by internalized or external patriarchical norms.
That’s all bull.
Having said that, it is extremely appropriate that the reasons for the pay-gap are seriously looked into. The 75 cents per dollar figure that is quoted often is not ALL due to discrimination or unfair treatment of women. It is also due to unfair treatment and expectations of men. In an egalitarian society, the pay-gap would probably not disappear and men would still, most likely make more money than women because women are usually uniquely anatomically suited for certain tasks such as child-baring and breast-feeding. (Barring the radical notion of women and men getting paid for work in their own household. As anyone who has lost a house-spouse and has children will tell you, this is not insignificant AT ALL.)
That’s a real conversation to have. Is simply quoting the 75 cents per dollar statistic misleading or not?
However, to imply that being able to adjust for this-and-that and end up with a smaller or even (hypothetically) an insignificant gap discounts the existence of career-related sexism in it’s many forms.
The article I linked is a good example of that. Want to take a family-friendly career track? That would be the “mommy track”!! Less was expected of you? Weren’t groomed for that promotion? Didn’t get that promotion? Decided to fuck-all and stop working so much? MOMMY TRACK!
Want to have kids? – You already “chose” the MOMMY TRACK!
And you boys, you know you don’t want to be like the girls – how demeaning is that? It’s the “mommy track” not the “daddy track”.
I mentioned that I wanted to have children to someone in the cafeteria of Argonne National Lab and he didn’t just tell me it would make my career more difficult or be balancing act – he looked at me like I just told him I wanted to pull monkey’s out of my butt.
MOMMY TRACK!
In a nutshell, using the 75/100 number is not telling the whole story.
Playing with the aggregated number that defines the “pay-gap” and using that to discount the collective experience of a very large number of women who have had to deal with serious career hurdles because of sexism is unreasonable.
That approach is not only classic confirmation bias – it’s a great example of completely white-washing and discounting the lives and experiences of an entire class of people. To many of them, women who dare make an issue of or discuss the workplace sexism they have faced and others face are just whiny victims who should quit hitting themselves. It’s sort of obscene really.
Sorry about the sentence fragment.
Add, “…is very bad reasoning” to the end of that.
Not to sound insensitive or like I am ignoring your very important and truthful point, but matters of mommy tracking are murky as hell as is. I am more interested in honest to goodness “you have tits so less money on your check” argument.
However when the pay gap is brought up it tends to be in a sort of “Jack moved 100 boxes and got one dollar for his work, and Jill also moved 100 boxes but only got 73 cents for doing the same work”. Is is safe to say that this happens but its not 73 it is more like 91 cents? Not that 91 is good by any stretch of the mind. IF this is true then using the smaller number will help the argument for closing this section of the pay gap imo.
If you say 73 cents it will be argued that is not true it is 91 cents. if you argue 91 cents, any argument they make sounds like pure sexism imo. I say its better to head the argument off at the pass and attack the very heart of it at the same time.
Now this addresses nothing about the fact that how this Jack and Jill story really plays out is more along the lines of “Jack moves 100 boxes and gets one dollar, Jill is only offered the customer serves job that pays 73 cents and is never considered for the job of moving boxes.”
That make any sense? or did I fail at communicating my post?
Also sorry for the rushed rambling of this post.
Well Andre, the best one can say is that 91 cents on the dollar is “closer” to the truth than 73 cents on the dollar.
Now please tell me why I, as an employer, would ever hire a man to move 100 boxes for a dollar if I could hire a woman to move them for only 91 cents?
If the feminist’s myth of the equal pay gap were true, there would be enormous economic incentives against it.
I businesses were rational actors, all kinds of things would be easier. Besides, the difference isn’t at entry-level wages for the same job. It’s wage growth and steering people toward certain jobs.
Is it wage growth and steering people?
Or is it the fact that men, on average, work longer hours and take fewer career breaks, and the fact that women, on average, choose less stressful jobs and opt for benefits over higher salary?
Which of these two options makes more sense, in light of the economic incentives I pointed out above and which you still have not addressed? Because again, if I was paying a woman 91% the rate of a man, for the same job and the same work, then another employer could seize that economic disparity and hire her away for, say, 95%, right?
The 91 cents is what’s left after you account for that.
Sez who?
Feminists claimed that a 27% disparity was the result of institutionalized patriarchy. But now that almost all of that has been explained away, you want to claim the the remaining 9% is due to institutionalized patriarchy?
“Unexplained” does not equate to “patriarchy” any more than “we don’t know” equates to “God did it”.
You are using the argument from ignorance, plain and simple. Show evidence that the 9% difference is due to discrimination, rather than other factors we just don’t know about or can’t statistically measure. Given how absolutely wrong feminists were before, their credibility on the current figures is pretty damn low.
Because you’re sexist?
That’s what the deal was when I worked for someone who did that. In fact, at some point they seemed to have started hiring all men. They also turned a well-established business with many under-paid yet happy and competent employees into a complete f-ing disaster and went out of business.
You’re working with many false dichotomies here.
1)It has to be one issue OR another; the problem cannot be a variety of issues all at once, but pointing at one issue somehow makes the others disappear.
2)Narrowing the gap by compensating for various factors MEANS pay disparity and gender discrimination doesn’t exist OR showing a gap after compensating for various factors MEANS we can’t make any conclusions based on what the pay gap is.
Yes, saying that the pay gap for the same job and job situation is 75/100 is misleading. Saying that the pay gap is 75/100 is not misleading.
Who has said otherwise? …and we come to yet another false dichotomy.
3)All feminists are right about everything and no feminist or feminist group has ever used a potentially misleading statistic OR all feminists are full of crap and make shit up
And why not, another one you are fond of…
4)Men are never discriminated against in custody cases OR it is completely worthless for any man to try to gain custody of their children unless the bio-mom is unfit
I suspect that because your own views lack nuance, you think that others lack nuance as well? I’m not sure.
However, at some point discussing an issue with someone who insists on discussing it with a hypothetical other person who is not present is, indeed, a “fruitless” battle.
“Now please tell me why I, as an employer, would ever hire a man to move 100 boxes for a dollar if I could hire a woman to move them for only 91 cents?”
Because you don’t think women can move the boxes, or that women should not move boxes, or that women are not turning in applications to move boxes because they also think that is “mans work”?
However I think the best and right answer is another question.
Why would my boss pass up someone with more experience and qualification were life’s can hang on the line to give his golfing buddy the promotion?
Melby sez: “That’s what the deal was when I worked for someone who did that. In fact, at some point they seemed to have started hiring all men…”
…and, wait for it…
“They also turned a well-established business with many under-paid yet happy and competent employees into a complete f-ing disaster and went out of business.”
Ta-da!
Thank you so much, Melby, for providing an excellent example of how our market economy works towards efficiency regardless of gender.
@Andre
Here is a quote from the White House, “Women earn only 77 cents for every dollar men earn, with women of color at an even greater disadvantage with 64 cents on the dollar for African American women and 56 cents for Hispanic women.”
Depending on which study/year you are going off of or how you calculate things, you get something between that and about 81 cents.
It is not a lie. It’s true. It’s not saying “for the same work”. It’s not making clear that all those numbers are being compared to an average white man’s wage/salary. However, it’s not false or inherently misleading.
However, in the framing, “for the same work” is implied since he was discussing the Fair Wage Act. I absolutely think that it opened his arguments up for criticism since the Fair Wage Act cannot possibly address some of the very significant reasons for this gap 1) the “mommy track” and 2) “women’s work” being compensated less than “men’s work” as far as different jobs paying different amounts.
He should have clarified and used a more accurate number for *the same work* – or that amounts to X-millions of dollars a year, or give an average difference per year for a typical full-time position – to give his point more punch without looking dishonest. He could still make a strong argument for the necessity of the legislation.
Here is my source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/the-white-houses-use-of-data-on-the-gender-wage-gap/2012/06/04/gJQAYH6nEV_blog.html
I am going to go ahead and pick on you here mostly because your so damn thoughtful about what you say that it empresses the hell out of me.
The wage gap is true. The math is simple and honest, 77/100 is correct from a big picture prospective.
But lets look at the “mommy track” my wife is going to be on.
Her and I talked about it and she is going to take the full 9 months off from work before she has the kid and then 1 year minimum after. She is rushing arms open into the mommy track. What she is doing is directly adding to the wage gap yes? But that is ok yes?
I get into this argument a lot about sex workers rights and agency over there choices. The women who puts on the slinky outfit is making a choice, or submitting to pressure from society to be sexy, or all of the above or non of the above?
Would I be wrong in thinking that you can’t separate agency from sexism in the pay gap? You just sort of know they are all a factor?
What she is doing is not bad. It’s wonderful that you are in an economic position that allows you to do that. (I’ve actually had students come back to class under a week after giving birth, after coming to class up to the actual labor. I actually gave birth to one of my children three days after moving my lab – actually pretty funny, since the young men helping me move the lab were so awkward around the pregnant lady.)
What is bad is that society is not set up in such a way that YOU can do that WITH her (at least not easily).
It is a bad thing that society expects her mother (or other female relative) to come and help her with the baby after zie is born, but does not expect you to take off anything more than the day zie is born.
Having two children, and having postpartum neurosis after one of them, I can tell you with conviction that it is harmful, and sometimes dangerous, for a new mother and child to not have personal support at home. Yet, this is what is expected of her much of the time. I had that support (thank goodness) but not everyone does.
It is a bad thing that so many men, unlike you, do not even fill the roll of father – to the point where “baby’s daddy” has been shortened to one word and I used to routinely over-hear men referring to taking care of their own children as “baby sitting”.
THAT is some of the reality that is intermixed into that singular number. I think it’s terrible for mothers, for children, for fathers…for the value of fatherhood to be diminished to such extremes. That is part of the wage gap number.
Now, do I think that the wage gap completely disappearing is a huge win – well, maybe – but I care more about the details that the number covers than the number itself.
No, Melby, the wage gap is NOT true.
Inevitably bound in with all feminist discussions of the wage gap is the implication that it is due to patriarchal attitudes.
It is not. It is due to women’s career preferences.
Women receive equal pay for equal work, skills, and experience.
You seem willing to change your mind based on evidence (within the article I re-posted: http://www.city-journal.org/2011/21_3_gender-gap.html) or clarification (such as the definition of patriarchy you are constantly mangling).
So, have a nice day.
You linked to an article that totally supports my position already. Why would that change my mind?
The “mommy track” as opposed to the “parent track” explanation for the majority of the pay-gap is completely in-line with the idea that patriarchal attitudes (that include the devaluation of men in the parenting role) – but you insist on a narrow view of the concept of “patriarchy” that allows your stance to be more easily argued.
That article is where I got the 9 cents less per dollar figure. The article was written in a “debunk the feminists” sort of angle, so I assumed that would make you more inclined to accept the evidence presented.
I took the evidence presented there, as well as coinciding, arguably representative and non a-typical, multiple personal experiences, to make conclusions similar to and not falsified by, the evidence in the article.
I explained some of the limitations of the evidence presented (such as gender and sex discrimination that would not be reflected there – such as Cris’ experiences). Every time you aggregate data, you LOSE information, and making inferences and conclusions based on the data should be tempered by what that data actually represents and not what you THINK it means. When you control and account for variables or choose a particular group to focus on in your study of a particular subject; you limit the applicability and generalizability of that information.
Data cannot negate other data – observations are observations. We KNOW that discrimination on the basis of sex and gender exists, as documented cases of discrimination exist. You can’t throw out a singular aggregated meta-number of doom and pretend like that falsifies observations (that’s silly) – it’s EVEN sillier when that meta-number actually IS EVIDENCE to the contrary of your opinion.
You, my respected opponent, are intellectually dishonest or simply don’t understand how these things work.
I’m sorry, but I get the feeling I’m talking to a brick wall – so –
Good day, sir or madam (whatever the case may be).
Good post and mirrors my changing thoughts too, from bizarrely inflexible teenage and early twenties to more thoughtful late 20s and early 30s. I’ve realised now that society is always changing and things will not remain they way are for long; why not try to make them better for everyone? I’ve just moved from Sweden to rural Poland, and it’s sad how rigid the gender roles are. Men don’t look after their kids or take on an active role at home, women rarely make a ‘senior’ career. It’s just more fun when people share the burdens and fun of life equally.
Why do all the “war on men” comments sound just like the “war on christmas” comments from christians?
“These gender-role models we are still holding on to are oppressive to EVERYBODY.”
Are you sure your fellow feminists understand this part? …because in my experience they do not.
Meh, correction: What i meant to say is that => most of them <= do not understand that, especially most of the ones expressing themselves by using the so-called "atheist community" as a vehicle to express their opinions.
That hasn’t been my experience thus far in being active on FtB. I am not active on Skepchick or other forums, but I haven’t heard it from them either.
I think that occasionally the language gets in the way and there is a failure to communicate. The terms “patriarchy” and “rape culture” are interpreted as “it’s all men’s fault” and “all men should be treated as potential rapists”, etc.
Look at the conversation on this thread where someone mentioned a problematic policy on an airline and ALL the feminists on the thread said – YEAH, that’s a shit policy – and that reality was ignored and another one was substituted for it.
Greg Laden and his rhetorical use of extremely anti-masculine phrases just enhances those problems – not a fan of his tactics.
Those problems in communication are not an excuse for blanket anti-feminist rhetoric or attack, obviously, but I don’t think it helps.
Ok, i understand what you mean, and you might be right.
I appreciate that – immensely.
I am a librarian – I work in a female-dominated profession, which should make me immune to sexism, but it doesn’t. There’s less of it in this profession, but there is still subtle favoritism toward men at times.
the video resonated with me, much was correct, enough that an edit or remake would be appropriate.
The culture does not promote this idea if you look at the whole picture. For instance, when couples get divorced or when they get separated, the task of raising the children in most cases is given to the mother, and the task of financially supporting the children in most cases is given to the father. The woman, the mother, is generally considered more capable in the area of raising children; and the man, the father, is generally considered more capable in the area of making money.
Why? Because it happens everywhere in the natural world.
“In the natural world, a majority of dad critters are programmed to follow the familiar “dude meets lady; dude impregnates lady; dude leaves lady (if he hasn’t already) and their new offspring to go meet and impregnate new ladies” mating ritual. It’s all about the act of producing as many heirs as possible and not about sticking around.
However, there are some exceptions to the father non grata theme that dominate the animal kingdom parenting scene. In fact, in some species, the proud father plays an integral role in raising the young along with — or sometimes in place of — the mother.”
http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/animals/photos/natures-10-best-animal-dads/heres-to-you-pops
See what I mean?
I think men would be considered more capable only if a person gives certain roles more points than some certain other roles. For example, if someone scores the task of raising children higher than the task of making money for them… then YES. Yes, men will be considered more capable than women in this area by that person. However, if he/she gives equal scores to both the tasks of raising children, and financially supporting children, he/she would have both men and women on equal grounds. Better still, if that person gives more points to the task of raising the children, and less points to the task of financially supporting them, he/she would have women more capable than men.
In the end, I think the world is how we personally interpret the world. The world, as such, holds no such objective values. So, change the way you see the world, and the world should change accordingly.
@ 49 Kahfre
Have you heard of the naturalistic fallacy? It is the unwarranted assumption that what occurs “in nature” is necessarily good.
I’ve no doubt that traditional gender roles have their roots in biology and what was effective in pre-agricultural societies. I’ve also no doubt that our opposable thumbs originate in an adaptation to life in the trees. But no one draws from this the conclusion that we should still be living in the trees, do they?
But we are not talking about arbitrary “scores”. We are talking about very real advantages and disadvantages.
An argument could be made that the traditional “male” role of protector/provider, and the traditional “female” role of child-carer was a fairly equitable and sensible division of labour in a hunter-gatherer society. But that is no longer the world in which we live. In a civilised nation-state society, protector/provider has translated into leader/money-maker. As a result, government is dominated my men, and commerce, wealth and property are overwhelmingly in the hands of men. Since we are, to a greater or lesser extent, controlled by our government; since we live in a society where “money talks”; this creates an enormous, inequitable discrepancy in power between the sexes. Can you not see this? Can you not see that it is grossly unfair that in the modern world one should be granted or denied access to power, wealth and the concomitant freedom simply on the basis of one’s biological sex?
You can’t be serious. The vast inequalities I have described cannot be wished away by a change of perspective.
I agree. But I guess there are some facts which we simply cannot change. For example, the fact that only the females of humans have been evolved to naturally give birth to children and then feed them with their own milk. This means the mother first develops a unique bond with the child from the time of conception to the time of birth. This unique bond **does not** exist between the father and the child. In fact, the father simply cannot understand the process of conceiving and giving birth to a child. Only a mother can. Then we have mothers who feed their children their own milk. These days this practice is optional, but still highly recommended, so a lot of women still do it. Another unique bond develops between the child and the mother during the process of breastfeeding….
So, in a nutshell, mothers **should always be** more suitable candidates for raising children as long as we have mothers:
1) giving birth to children.
2) having the ability to feed them their own milk
True, evolution can change all of that in the course of the next few million years… but I was actually postulating some near future scenarios.
And, there is another aspect to this argument. Women, or mothers, are more suitable candidates for raising children precisely because men are less suitable for the same task. The reason? There are many, and amongst them, because fathers do not develop bonds with children that mothers do, fathers **should be** less attached and attracted to them as compared to mothers. Therefore, mothers **should have** more difficulty leaving their children alone and concentrating on work as compared to fathers, which makes fathers more suitable for making money and less suitable for raising children.
I don’t know about that, because literally every civilized nation these days offers equal rights and opportunities to both men and women. In fact, only mothers can get paid maternity leave in Australia. In the end, nobody forces anyone to get married or have children. But if someone chooses to have children, have a family, then I guess all things should be considered. It doesn’t make sense to first have kids, and then a few years later try to change the traditional roles of mother and dad simply because the mother had a sudden awakening to some feminist truths. If the feminist urge is very strong, then why not change the traditional roles of mother and dad before having any children? See if it is possible for the father-to-be to conceive and give birth to a child? See also if the mother-to-be can make the father-to-be a recipient of her sperm?
I am serious. Equality, inequality, greatness, smallness, and the like, are all mental constructs. These are not objective facts, but merely subjective opinions. For example, if you believe Newton was a great scientist, then surely this ‘greatness’ of Newton does not exist out somewhere, like a tree does, does it? The greatness of Newton exists only in your mind, doesn’t it? So, regardless of what the world tells you about Newton and his greatness, can you not turn him into a ordinary everyday person in your mind, should you wish so???
Similarly, if the world tells us that raising children is a lesser task than financially supporting them, where does this inequality exist? Right in our minds, doesn’t it? So, how could you change something out in the world, that doesn’t even exist out in the world in the first place, and is just a mental construct?
Having said this, the point is, inequalities and injustices do exist, but maybe we are looking at the wrong place to find them and fix them….
Opps! sorry. A mistake
“For example, if someone scores the task of raising children higher than the task of making money for them… then YES. Yes, men will be considered more capable than women in this area by that person. “
Should read
“For example, if someone scores the task of raising children lower than the task of making money for them… then YES. Yes, men will be considered more capable than women in this area by that person.”
You seem to be under the impression that this is a zero sum game. You fix the worst you then in turn fix the less worse. You don’t get to claim oppression when women are the one’s most hurt by these standards.
If women were not assumed to be unable to do anything but primary care it would then stand to reason that it would open up the idea that if women can do more than just primary care then men can do everything else AND primary care. Making the assumption that a woman is the ideal half of the couple to give up their career to raise the child is as hurtful to the man as it is to the woman, but the woman is the main focus. Thus the one who is most oppressed.
I’m not promoting complacency. I’m telling you that you don’t get to determine how a victim obtains help. Your view seems to be that victims are terrible for hating because of what happened to them. If their hate hurts others that’s one thing, but I honestly don’t see any of that except from Radfems and groups like the KKK. I don’t endorse the Radfems and the KKK is just ridiculous. I see a great deal of hate and violence, but it’s rarely from the oppressed groups. So I’m going to say this is simply a red herring that you’re using to detract from the main issue that women are oppressed and so are men as a result of the ways that the oppression against women is manifest.
And who enforces that thinking? Not women who believe in equality of the sexes, there aren’t enough women in power to make that happen. It comes back to gender roles yet again.
Again, this is not a zero sum game. Drop the gender roles and you’ll find that when women are treated like people then men will not be treated poorly either.
Indeed. Probably. The operative word in that sentence. Just like black people probably have a very good reason to hate white people, even the white people they don’t know. And yes, that includes white women. Intersectionality at work.
And again we come back to gender roles and the whole idea that it has to be a zero sum game.
Abuse is never okay. I don’t ever condone violence or rape against anyone. Feminists don’t think that men being abused or raped is funny. That would be the RadFems, if anyone.
Feminists don’t control the mainstream media. If they did there’d be no objectification of either sex.
Being hung up on the face that privilege doesn’t exist means that you fail to see why hurting women also hurts men.
I’ve not once said that I don’t believe Masculism is a good thing. But you cannot claim to be an oppressed group because you aren’t.
I think I’ve said all I’m willing to say on this matter. It comes down to you saying men have it just as bad as women and me saying that’s not true, both sexes get hurt, but women are hurt worse and men getting hurt is the splash affect.
This is conversation has also been very white, cis, straight and western centric. There are so many intersections that simply aren’t addressed and it’s a shame really because everyone deserves to be treated fairly and with dignity. But until people check their privilege there’s only going to be a slow creep forward.
I understand you’re tired of the conversation, but you made a few misrepresentations of my position.
1) I never implied a zero sum game. I am the one saying that gender issues should be handled together rather than separately, and that you shouldn’t fix one “first”, but fix them both at once, which incidentally might be easier too, because you’d not get gender clashes where there don’t need to be any, only because it becomes an oppression tug-of-war instead of moving forward.
2) You’ve still not explained why gender roles focus on the woman instead of the man. When you say the female is the primary carer in traditional gender roles and the male is the provider, how can you justify claiming a focus on either?
3) I am NOT blaming the victims or saying they’re horrible for anything. I’m saying that empathy shouldn’t preclude helping them get over their PTSD-caused hatred.
4) This whole “it is okay to be a bigot towards the majority” attitude is harmful to social movements.
5) Please, stop shifting the goalposts. You asked how society is sexist towards men, I gave you examples, and you said “Well, -feminists- aren’t like that.” I never said they are. You asked me for example of societal misandry and I gave you them, I didn’t blame feminists for them.
6) Privilege is circumstantial. A gay man can have male privilege while not having straight privilege. A female can be mistreated in some places (say, certain workplaces) while being privileged elsewhere (in the courtroom, or in the media via Missing White Woman Syndrome).
7) I never said “men have it as bad as women”. I said we should stop comparing oppression sizes and start working together instead. This is the core of the rising “egalitarian” or “humanist” philosophy. Feminism refuses to do that in today’s world, and that’s why it’s finding so much resistance.
8) Rather than explain why the examples I gave are actually splash affect for misogyny, you just said that feminists aren’t in favor of these things, which keeps the question open of you please explaining why.
9) Well, yes, it is centered around that. There are many more variables indeed.
So’s accommodating the feelings of oppressive/privileged groups when trying to empower the oppressed/underprivileged group.
It must cause you physical pain to say woman, doesn’t it?
(1)This is gibberish. The slut, the vindictive wife, there’s a million and one stereotypes that hurt women in the courtroom (stereotypes given more weight than their male counterparts). Do you mean to say she’d enjoy middle class privilege or white privilege? Because that makes your two examples make more sense.
Julian:
1) So it’s okay to be a bigot if the target is white and male? Good to know what I can call you then.
2) I admit, that when it comes to privilege, it took ischemgeek on Greta Christina’s blog to set me straight on that (so Kudos). On the other hand, It was not hard for me to also figure out from there that privilege isn’t something you either have in all circumstances or don’t have in all circumstances, in particular when it comes to gender roles.
Also: I can say “woman”. But a female can be a woman, or a little girl. In particular when it comes to Missing White Woman Syndrome.
Also, the courtroom example was, in particular, referring to criminal cases, where there are actual studies proving that women get less punishment for equal crime, even accounting for all other differences.
See: http://ftp.iza.org/dp2870.pdf
So feminism is invalid because it does not give an individual the magical powers to change a corporation’s policy just on one activist’s say-so?! Can you provide any example of any philosophy or social justice movement so powerful that just by articulating it you can get a corporation to change its policies just for you in real time?!
I know you’ve had a lot of trouble with this in the past…but this is a claim, and you’ll need to provide evidence for it. How exactly are you arriving at the conclusion that this policy was the result of “over-zealous feminists,” especially when every feminist on this thread has said this policy is contrary to their values?! Furthermore, I did a not-very-scientific google search of “qantas unaccompanied feminism” and I found that the VAST majority of hits were MRAs insisting that The Feminists perpetrated this policy, a few random posts about Qantas that seemed entirely unrelated to the whole unaccompanied minor thing, and three feminist posts that staunchly opposed the policy. So, WHERE the fuck are these overzealous feminists “like [PZ Myers]” that perpetrated this policy? Can you find anyone advocating for this type of policy on airlines BEFORE it came into effect? Can you show who is actually supporting this policy, and what the scope of their readership/influence is like?
Here’s a much more parsimonious explanation: some boneheaded bureaucrats who were obsessed with the risk of litigation boneheadedly made a bureaucratic policy after hearing a lot of news stories/public brouhaha over abductions/pedophiles/general sensationalism, and set it into place purely to cover their ass without a thought to the well-being of their customers, and without consulting anyone genuinely knowledgeable about the matter or giving the policy any kind of rigorous review or field-testing, just like the vast majority of corporate policies come into being.
Your confirmation bias is showing…I love how a one-off policy of one airline that inconvenienced one man seven+ years ago (and that was roundly condemned) is indicative of “ZOMG teh poor menz are oppressed!!!” and yet a clear example of privilege is written off as “”lucky guy.” You’ve basically already chosen a priori what data points you will accept and what you will ignore.
Your motivated reasoning is just plain HILARIOUS! Pre 1960s my Dad wasn’t even old enough to BE the unaccompanied minor himself! No, this was circa 1999, at the height of highly public sexual harassment cases, daycare scares, pedophile priest complaints, etc., etc. But still, men were not universally persecuted as you seem to be implying. Rather, instead of Teh Eebil Femmnizt Cabal, we have men who are congratulated for being good caregivers and decent people, just like the vast majority of feminists advocate (full disclaimer, I of course have no way of knowing whether or not any of the flight crew identified as feminist), we just wish men didn’t get cookies when our equal contributions were being taken for granted.
But it really is fun watching you writhe trying to squeeze uncomfortable facts into your myopic little worldview!
Nope, sorry, dumbshit…this did actually happen “these days.” But nice try, thanks for playing.
What you imagine is only the result of your fevered persecution complex and your futile desire to ascribe false equivalence in order to silence women seeking political and social equality. What actually happened to “the poor guy” was that they gave him a bottle of wine, just like I told you.
What I said before now looks like a gross over-simplification of the whole process. The truth, whatever it might be, must be a hell lot more than what I said before about ‘over-zealous feminists’.
This is what I should have said instead: That the feminist movement in general must have played a very significant role in that policy, and other policies similar to such policy. Why else, do you think, would they come to this utterly ridiculous assumption that young children’s sexual integrities are more safer and secure around females as compared to males? Why else would they believe that most females can completely rid themselves of their sexual urges when they are around young boys — which is a task that most men find impossible to even comprehend when they are around young girls? So, don’t blame me if feminism, and some ‘over-zealous feminists’ come to mind…
By the way, if you ask me, I don’t really blame feminism or feminists for policies like this. Feminism is like Prozac to me; it can be very helpful to a depressed mind, but also can be very harmful at the same time due to its long list of side-effects. The good things that feminism has achieved for women are all very useful and helpful in giving women equal rights and freedom, but at the same time, the many side effects of feminism, polices that openly discriminate men and favour women, are the unpleasant side-effects of feminism that are proving to be quite unpleasant and unacceptable to men now.
PS: All of this is just my opinion. Disagree all you want, but I still have no citations … as usual.
“…. the feminist movement in general *must have* played a very significant role in that policy….”
Well, of course, it couldn’t have been all those rumors coming out of the Catholic Church about priests who like little kids way too much, now, could it? But don’t you find it a little weird that those evil feminists only targeted Quantas?
Unless you have some actual evidence that feminists had anything to do with the policy, you are simply name-calling. Instead of wasting everyone’s time with such nonsense, why aren’t you focused on, for instance, industrial accidents, where men really do suffer disproportionately? Try doing something about that issue, and see how much flak you get from feminists. (My guess is, you’ll get more support from the feminists than you will from the men’s rights advocates.)
Correction. I am not saying anyone did anything intentionally here. Some people here are defending feminists by saying that no feminist has or will ever support such policies. Well, of course, no one would, unless he or she was out of his mind. But that’s not the point.
My point is, while there may be countless and unique to situations factors that influence such polices, it would be quite accurate to say that such policies come about largely because of how the feminist movement have shaped our world during the last few decades. The feminist movement is like a background and these polices are like the foreground — they both need each other. In other words, without the feminist movement and the tireless efforts of some outspoken, over-zealous feminists, these polices couldn’t have come about.
And no, I am not against feminism. I have already said that it achieved, it is still achieving, a lot of good things for women. But this doesn’t mean this movement did not produce negative effects, because it did, and it continues to do so. I am more focused here on how a positive movement like this one can also create unwanted side-effects, because it seems to me, most feminists here are completely ignorant of the fact that something like this can happens during the lifespan of a movement. To most of them, it seems, this movement is ALL GOOD. COMPLETELY GOOD, and nothing else. Like a religion is to its devout followers. I hope that explains.
And no, no evidence as usual. Sorry!
How about centuries of patriarchal cultural expectations that men are the beings with sexual desire, and women are the passive receptacles?
How about centuries of patriarchal cultural expectations that women are the nurturers and caregivers who are naturally suited (and obligated) to be around children?
How about centuries of patriarchal cultural expectations that women are required to be more virtuous and are held responsible for “inspiring” pro-social behavior in men, and only become sexual if a man “corrupts” them?
How about centuries of patriarchal expectations that men cannot be expected to restrain themselves around sexually arousing images/behavior, and it is therefore the potential victim’s (usually the woman’s) responsibility to curtail zir behavior in order to be safe?
How about centuries of patriarchal expectations that the “attractive” male is one that is mature and financially powerful, whereas the “attractive” female is virginal, young, dependent, innocent, inexperienced, and powerless?
There, see–that wasn’t so hard, was it?!
“Can you provide any example of any philosophy or social justice movement so powerful that just by articulating it you can get a corporation to change its policies just for you in real time?!”
Feminism.
“Here’s a much more parsimonious explanation: some boneheaded bureaucrats who were obsessed with the risk of litigation boneheadedly made a bureaucratic policy after hearing a lot of news stories/public brouhaha over abductions/pedophiles/general sensationalism”
Feminism has popularized the idea that men are inately violent simmering sexual perverts. I don’t know if feminists were directly behind this airline’s anti-male policy (there was a recent story by a feminist about how she would not let her child attend a pre-school where volunteer fathers would be allowed to assist children in the bathroom, but she had no problem with volunteer mothers performing the duty), but feminism has perpetuated the “men bad, women good” dichotomy.
Personally, I don’t give a crap about what feminists say their goals and ideals are. Their actual actions and their attempts to set public policy and cultural norms are what condemn them.
Holy crap. I hate religion, but I don’t twist myself in knots like this to to blame religion for everything.
Try applying some friggin’ logic. What’s more likely to cause people to be wary of strange men being alone with children – feminism or – and bear with me on this as it’s a pretty fantastical hypothesis – media-caused hyper-vigilance concerning the welfare of children? Would it be more likely caused by Ms. Magazine or, say, To Catch a Predator?
Despite violent crime actually decreasing, people are more concerned about it and believe it’s on the rise thanks to media scare stories. Whether there are more pedophiles now than there were 100 years ago is pretty damned hard to determine, but the FEAR of them is way beyond anything that existed early last century.
The only way you can blame feminism for this would be by feminism helping people to open up in talking about being the victims of rape, by working to take away the stigma.
In several other blogs here that will go unnamed, “Schroedinger’s Rapist” is actually believed and promoted.
Please don’t tell me that that doesn’t go past raising awareness and goes right into the “promoting fear” thing you spoke of.
Coudl you please explain what Schroedinger’s Rapist is and why it’s unreasonable? My understanding is that it’s descriptive, not prescriptive.
Crommunist made a post about it and made it absolutely ridiculous.
It blames the innocent for not bending over backwards enough to be nice to women, and encourages women to be scared, because, as I seem to understand it, fear is a tool used by feminists to get what they want. (Call me paranoid here, but this is how I see it- Ensure the women are scared and you have them on your side.)
Why should men have to prove they’re not rapists to anyone? Crommunist actually deals with his own racism by saying he adapts to it and acts in a way as to make people feel more comfortable.
What the hell? I don’t ask my black friends to act extra nice just in case I decide to be racist. It’s up to the people with the fear that’s unfair to get over it, not the ones being unfairly characterized to prove otherwise.
It is, essentially, a “guilty until proven innocent” verdict, no matter how you slice it.
You seemed to have missed the point, then. Of course it isn’t fair. Unfair facts about life don’t go away because we point this out. The point isn’t that every man deserves to be suspected of being a rapist. The point is that it happens and ignoring it only makes things worse.
But nobody asks anyone to do anything about it.
We are the same people who tell others not to treat Muslims like extremists just because there’s a higher proportion of extremism in Islam.
Would you advocate Muslims walking on eggshells to allay people’s fears?
Reading the point further:
SaintGasoline in Crommunist’s “Shuffling feet” article makes the point I made, including the same Muslim extremist example, only he words it better.
You know that thing feminists are always talking about where they want to eliminate rape culture? That’s doing something about it. Schroedinger’s Rapist is an excellent illustration fo why the status quo is bad for men as well as women.
That is absolutely silly.
The difference is you are PROMOTING Schroedinger’s Rapist. You’re saying that it is fair and reasonable for women to treat all men as rapists.
Again, is it reasonable to treat all muslims as extremists and terrorists too, while we’re waiting for Islam to lower its level of extremism?
Am I saying that? It’s definitely not fair. It may be reasonable from the point of view of the woman involved in the sense that it gives the best expected outcome, but it’s certainly not an ideal way for society to operate. What do you think it means to promote Schroedinger’s rapist? Do you think feminists are going around telling women that every man that they meet may be a rapist and they need to avert their eyes walk faster, cross the street, etc? The point of the meme isn’t to promote this behavior but to explain to men why women behave this way.
Because rather than empathize with women in that situation but understand that it’s not the men’s fault, it seeks to impose more and more limitations on what men can do – Cross the road is an example – so that women aren’t scared.
Again, would you tell a Muslim to do the same things, until Islam stops having so many dangerous extremists?
So what do you propose? I can try to address cultural problems, but I can’t directly change what other people think. What do you propose? Again, pointing out that things are unfair doesn’t fix the problem. Should men just tell women to deal with it and we can’t be arsed to care about their problem?
Actually, to address something in that post better, nothing about Schroedinger’s Rapist even implies it is the men’s fault. You can say you empathize, but since it isn’t your fault, you aren’t going to do anything about it, even though the cost is near-zero or you can say that because you empathize, you will try to be considerate of this fact.
For one, feminists can stop promoting paranoia. Other than being incredibly insulting, it is also not a “zero cost” issue.
It is, in fact, part of the smear campaign played by feminists on men’s trustworthiness as anything but rapists and pedophiles. This is the mentality that makes it so that a man can barely even talk to a child, and some comments on the aforementioned thread even have people say that it’s something they’ve come to accept – That they, as men, cannot talk to children without being seen as pedophiles.
Feminists aren’t promoting paranoia. The broader culture is. Feminists are just pointing this out. The whole thing is a consequence of telling women it’s their job to protect themselves from getting raped. Who’s is promoting that idea? Can you find any examples of feminists actually saying that all men should be treated as rapists and pedophiles?
Do you think that when black parents tell their sons to keep their hands visible and maintain eye contact when talking to the police and to not protest about unfair stops to the officer making said stop they are promoting racism? Or are they just dealing with the fact the world is racist and you have to live with it for now?
You entirely miss my point, again.
If a black person complained about bad treatment by the police because he was unfairly pulled over and complained about it and this got him arrested, these guys would flip, and rightfully so.
But if a man does something completely and utterly blaise, and the woman overreacts because she was raped in the past or was afraid of being raped, who here will complain that- “Hey, I understand her fear but the guy didn’t really do anything to deserve it”?
My guess? Absolutely nobody.
I don’t put much stock in your guesses about what feminists would do in a hypothetical situation. Do you have examples? Something where a woman flipped out and maced a guy because he brushed past her and Jezebel or Ms or Feministing published an article about how he was asking for it, for instance?
How about the “character analysis” that people did on Elevator Guy, rather than give him the benefit of the doubt, hm?
So I take it you don’t buy Rebecca Watson’s characterization of the guy as pushy, not awkward? How much benefit of the doubt are we obligated to give? If Rebecca Watson had just freaked out that he had gotten on the same elevator as her in the middle of the night, and people were speculating that he was probably a rapist based on that and callign for him to be arrested or saying Rebecca should have punched him in the throat or maced him or something, you would have a point. That would be unreasonable. However, he did more than fail to give her a wide berth and he faced no consequences beyond possibly a brief social awkwardness.
Can you give specific examples of things people said? The main thrust of the criticism of EG was that this was an inappropriate and inconsiderate way for him to behave, not that he was a rapist.
Just watch this:
Crap…
I didn’t know it’d do that, sorry. -.-
I have heard of feminist groups being really terrible about discussing rape culture. For example, some college group decided to post NAMES from a directory and call those people essentially “potential rapists”. That didn’t go over well, and rightly so, they took down the signs and apologized.
I’m not going to pretend like no feminist group has ever made things worse (as opposed to better) with their approach to the issue. However, unfortunately, we also have a VERY prominent contingent of people who have the “don’t talk about it” approach, which is MUCH worse than simply talking about it in a problematic way.
Feminism did NOT start the fear of rape. It helped make it a crime. Before, it wasn’t. If the rape offended a husband or a father, especially if it made her “damaged goods”, I suppose their might be a problem. However, if your husband raped you, it wasn’t rape. Being married to him was consent, even if the marriage wasn’t your idea.
I’m not exaggerating.
I used to have a debilitating fear of rape. This fear did not come from feminism. It came from religion. Pure and simple. If I were raped, that means I was worthless. If I couldn’t give my virginity to my husband, that precious gift, I had less value, I was damaged. When I grew up, rape victims on TV had their faces fuzzed out. BEING raped was shameful. I used to contemplate what would be worse – being raped or killing myself.
That attitude did NOT come from my parents, but simply taking the messages in the bible to there logical extremes and internalizing the way in which virginity is treated in the bible.
I calmed down a little bit, as I grew older, but I still essentially made daily plans with the fear of rape constantly in mind. Walk alone? – craziness. Be alone at a party or a show without backup – out of the question. Personal experience backs up by fear. I’ve had a very large boy corner me on a bus at school shove his hands down my pants. I’ve had a group of boys run me down in the hallway and try to pull off my shorts. I’ve had two different men that I consider friends, grab me by the hips in a sexual way and refuse to let go until I protested loudly. …and on and on. EVERY woman and girl I know has several friends who have been raped, the vast majority of those people who have been raped are women and the vast majority of the rapists were men.
Even now, when I’m alone with a man (such as when a coworker I just met carpooled with me to a seminar), it’s in the back of my mind.
Feminists did NONE of those things.
The idea that feminists have created the fear of rape is absolutely absurd. Are they above criticism in how they approach the subject? Of course not. Are they somehow creating a problem in order to control other women – absolutely preposterous.
I actively try to treat men fairly and not to think of them as potential rapists. However, that doesn’t mean I’m not uneasy at times.
I try to direct this uneasiness in a gender-neutral way, which I think is completely appropriate.
If someone is physically imposing compared to another person, they should be mindful of this. I know men that I could probably bend into a pretzel if I was so inclined. It would be very rude of me to make a pass at them, or women who are also less physically imposing as me for that matter, in a way that would make them uncomfortable with the power-difference of the situation. Even without the sexual nature of the violence, it would be rude of me to intimidate someone physically when they are no match for me.
That is the framing that I would prefer.
I just watched the U.S. win the gold in Woman’s Judo – just saying.
I’m not sure I explained myself properly.
First off, you seem to have been born in a conservative christian household. I can’t say I know how that is, mine is a very liberal christian household. I’m sorry you had to go through that nonsense. I’m no more in favor of the Christian Right’s treatment of women than anyone else, I assure you I’m 100% on your side in THAT debate.
However. I didn’t say feminists -created- the fear. I’m saying that they use it to blame men as a whole, as a tool. To that end, fear of rape is a tool in the feminist arsenal.
TheTruePooka made a video just yesterday called “Anti-Male Pedophilia Hysteria”. I think feminists contributed a lot to this way of thinking.
I don’t think it is healthy for any woman or man to be completely dependent financially on someone else if they can help it.
We’re coming out of a system where a woman had a much decreased possibility of being financially independent. All the jobs that were traditionally considered “women’s work” were poorly compensated.
If the pervasive cultural norm is that a woman depends on her husband for financial support, that lessens her choices in life, makes him a wallet, and (in the worst case) diminishes marriage to a socially acceptable type of prostitution.
It’s not that bad anymore (at least in most places in the U.S.). However, I have witnessed women staying in abusive horrible relationships because she cannot be financially independent without her boyfriend. While her boyfriend is content to abandon the children she is raising, she is not. She cannot possibly support her children on an entry-level income; so she stays with an abuser.
In both cases that I am thinking of, it got bad enough that she finally left – but I’m still haunted by them. I highly doubt those are isolated cases.
If a woman decides to stay home or work part-time so she can devote more time to her children – that is absolutely a choice of her and her family and not ME. It’s none of my business really.
However, there is still much stronger social pressure for a woman to be the one who sacrifices career for family and for a man to be the one who sacrifices family for career. There is more social pressure on a mother to be a mother, than a father to be a father.
I don’t think that’s a good thing.
Both misogyny and misandry are “things” and they both exist on the personal and societal levels.
I think it is counter productive to spend too much energy trying to debunk either or minimize either.
The fact that women have been treated as property and continue to be treated as property, raped, killed, beaten in the streets, etc does not and should not 1) vilify all men or 2) negate or even lessen the problems that primarily effect men in a negative way.
The patriarchy exists and rape-culture exists. Those don’t magically disappear the moment that a man gets a raw deal because he is a man (quite the opposite much of the time).
To put this whole issue in a nutshell – consider our language. What comes to mind when you read these two words?
1) pussy
2) dick
Why do you think that is?
Fear is understandable – it’s an emotion we don’t have control over. Hatred: we have control over. Unfair treatment and stereotyping: we have control over.
I actually knew a vet who couldn’t be around Asians. He explained, I cannot help how I feel – I do not hate them.
It is understandable if a woman is uncomfortable alone with a male stranger who is physically imposing. Acknowledging that is not painting all men as rapists. (For F sake already.)
Also, when a female teacher has sex with her 13 year old student – she is not a “hot teacher” she a goddamn piece of shit rapist.
When a man takes his own child away from a mother he believes might hurt his child due to postpartum depression, he is NOT a kidnapper. http://www.woodtv.com/dpp/news/local/kalamazoo_and_battle_creek/luqman-bari-nahla-johnson-albion-kidnapping-072712
And if he were a woman – we would give her shelter and support.
A man? We assume he means to cause the baby harm and hold our breath until the baby is returned to his mother.
This is real, and it’s not cool. I hope that most feminists would agree with me on this.
It is not fair to demonize anyone who would use the term “MRA” to describe themselves. When we insist that critics of feminism clarifying their targets, we need to do the same.
The MRA v feminist thing is self-defeating. The high road is the only way out of this mess.
Before anyone points it out – I do realize that taking a child away from a legal guardian regardless of gender is still “kidnapping”. I really wish the official channels were sufficient in this case and he didn’t feel as though he needed to take this course of action, this is assuming his stated motivation was honest (no reason to believe otherwise). Both the reality and the perception of those official channels being bias toward mothers, is (at least given what has been reported) a part of the problem here.
The court of public opinion, however, is what struck me in this case – as an entire community (it seemed) assumed that the child would be safer with her mother than her father.
“Both misogyny and misandry are “things” and they both exist on the personal and societal levels.
I think it is counter productive to spend too much energy trying to debunk either or minimize either.”
This. So much. I never minimized misogyny. In fact, I sarcastically said we should stop comparing oppression sizes. That’s a problem I have with feminism in general, it engages in what is essentially:
“Woe is me females are the poor gender always oppressed by the male, silly male doesn’t know what it’s like to be discriminated against, privileged people they are.”
“The fact that women have been treated as property and continue to be treated as property, raped, killed, beaten in the streets, etc does not and should not 1) vilify all men or 2) negate or even lessen the problems that primarily effect men in a negative way.”
Also this.
“The patriarchy exists and rape-culture exists. Those don’t magically disappear the moment that a man gets a raw deal because he is a man (quite the opposite much of the time).
To put this whole issue in a nutshell – consider our language. What comes to mind when you read these two words?
1) pussy
2) dick
Why do you think that is?”
I’m surprised you didn’t see the point you made in the thing. First you use anti-male charged words like ‘patiarchy’, then you wonder why men don’t all jump in the feminism bandwagon.
Not to mention the ridiculousness of saying that men are creating a system that also oppresses men…?
“Fear is understandable – it’s an emotion we don’t have control over. Hatred: we have control over. Unfair treatment and stereotyping: we have control over.
I actually knew a vet who couldn’t be around Asians. He explained, I cannot help how I feel – I do not hate them.
It is understandable if a woman is uncomfortable alone with a male stranger who is physically imposing. Acknowledging that is not painting all men as rapists. (For F sake already.)”
As I said, there’s empathy and then there’s accepting that they’re right for hating all people of X. And, well, your example isn’t the same one as the Gran Torino case, in that case he was out and out hateful.
It is not acknowledging that a woman would be uncomfortable in that situation that paints all men as rapists. It is somehow blaming the man for saying something without any bad intention, like her subjective emotion changes his intention.
“Also, when a female teacher has sex with her 13 year old student – she is not a “hot teacher” she a goddamn piece of shit rapist.
….
This is real, and it’s not cool. I hope that most feminists would agree with me on this.”
This, so much. On the other hand, I keep seeing the exact opposite. Whenever there was a lack of women in college, this was due to sexism. Now that there are MORE women in college than men, at least in the states, it’s “LOL SEE WOMEN ARE SUPERIOR”, which seems to be the feminist response.
This, of course, flies in the face of the facts – The male to female ratio of college attendees depends on the style of learning- In a lot of European countries it’s equal where they don’t focus on one gender over the other.
And, again, this is why feminism is toxic in some areas.
“It is not fair to demonize anyone who would use the term “MRA” to describe themselves. When we insist that critics of feminism clarifying their targets, we need to do the same.
The MRA v feminist thing is self-defeating. The high road is the only way out of this mess.”
Yes. Very much yes. MRAs are seen as reactionary, sometimes justifiably seen as too much so. But when the “status quo” is feminism, obviously anything MRAs do will be reactionary.
Of course, there are good MRAs and bad MRAs, and the bad ones make more noise. What’s new?
No, I know why men don’t all jump in the feminism bandwagon. Feminism does tend to focus on issues from a female perspective, absolutely. Feminism varies a great deal in its approach and some groups or individuals are going to be very different than others (goes without saying) and some are going to be more keen on working with men’s issues directly and others are much more keen on focusing on the problems that women face, and may feel that men should be content simply reaping the dividends of that work.
However, there is no problem with the term “patriarchy”. If we are dealing with the past and the present; if we acknowledge that our mainstream culture here in the U.S. still contains routines, attitudes and value judgments – loads of baggage from times when women were literally treated as property (given away from fathers to husbands), who were not given a right to their own bodies, and had very little socio-economic power – the term “patriarchy” is useful.
My mother stopped using my fathers name as her entire name (for example, Mrs. John Smith), when, because of this practice someone hadn’t noticed that my Dad’s sister-in-law had died and my uncle remarried. This person didn’t notice that someone died – he just thought that she changed her hair color because she was going by the SAME NAME – the name of her husband and not her own.
My mother couldn’t find her friends from high school either, because their names were changed completely and she couldn’t look them up. They disappeared.
This happened. Letting women vote was controversial, in part, because women were considered so much an extension of their husbands that allowing women to vote was thought to give married men TWO votes instead of one.
I’m ALL for attempting to frame discussions about the way things SHOULD be and the way we SHOULD think about things – in gender-neutral terms.
The patriarchy is not how things should be, it is how they are and have been. Also, if we extend out gaze just a LITTLE STINKING IOTA – there are currently extreme examples of patriarchy in the world.
What else do you want to call treating women as non-people or even as something that is bought and sold? What’s more palatable, less accusatory, term would you prefer?
Both men and women can contribute to patriarchy. Some men benefit from these arrangements a lot more than others, and it hurts everyone immensely – but it still boils down to hetero-normative men having more power than others. Having power does not mean you are happy or fulfilled – it just means you have power. It doesn’t mean you haven’t been abused and indoctrinated into being a sub-human brute since you were 2 years old – some of the most powerful people in the world are sad pieces of shit, who were once children worthy of our pity for the evils of the culture and home life they have since internalized.
I grew up on cartoons where the only female characters were love interests of the males. Where grabbing a woman and kissing her while she struggled against the main-character of the movie/TV show was “romantic” and inevitably the struggling woman melted in his strong arms, slapping her across the face was manly. In one instance, on Days of our Lives, the man rapes her and then she marries him. THIS WAS NORMAL – in my lifetime. It wasn’t questioned, and if you complained, you were a whiny bitch. This hasn’t changed much. See what Feminist Frequency puts up with? That’s the same shit.
My uncle’s first wife’s death not being noticed – that’s all about woman being considered an extension of her husband or boyfriend – which is all about women once being property for the taking.
It’s a heck of a lot better than it was, and in some ways having young people think that feminists are a bunch of howling hysterical ladies, is a frickin’ WIN – but let’s not pretend the patriarchy isn’t relevant – because whenever anyone says, “I’ll make him my bitch” or “See how he likes being someone’s girlfriend in prison” – you can see it’s face shining out just a little bit, just enough to know it is still there and rape is it’s weapon.
1) Yes. And you see then why there’s resistance to feminism, even from women who call themselves humanist or egalitarian. Feminism is a movement that includes people who say they want equality, but then push female superiority, like the aforementioned college example where feminists are just trying to make sure that women are the majority in -every- course, even while they’re the majority in general. Or sites like Jezebel that condemn “objectification of women” while saying that somehow it’s okay when they do it to men.
2) No. The word “patriarchy” is absolutely poisoning the well. It’s not “white men” who are ruling. It is a small minority of predominantly, but not exclusively, rich white guys who are ruling. The feminist point of view somehow thinks that just because the ones on top are rich white men, then white men must be their own privileged class.
Which they -were-, but I posit not anymore in a general sense. The fact that those on the top are white and male is of no consequence, unless you also think that Middle-Eastern Men were privileged in Ghaddafi’s Libya, or Black Men were privileged under Mugabe.
3) The only places where women are treated as property now in the west is in cults. We’ve gone past that as a whole. And of course in other parts of the world. You don’t need to be a feminist to see that.
In fact, I’m going to bring in the Dawkins/Watson issue when it comes to awareness of third world problems for women. As “male privileged” as Dawkins might be, and as much as he doesn’t “understand the plight of women”… Want to guess who, between those two, did the most to help women in third world countries with the real patriarchies? I assure you, non-feminists are probably more aware of that goal than modern feminists.
Are you seriously calling the practice of changing your surname to the husband’s – Which isn’t even obligatory, it’s a -choice- – oppression? What’s your option then? Take away the woman’s choice to change her surname or not?
Are you -seriously- saying that just because a guy, who obviously didn’t know your uncle’s first wife’s name or remembered her face very well, made a mistake, somehow this is emblematic of society at large? Are you kidding me?
4) Somehow I think you haven’t watched Feminist Frequency. I’m sorry- The way she was treated is terrible and nobody deserved that. But I bet that most of the people who donated money to her hasn’t seen her channel, either.
I suggest you go through her things. She IS exactly the sort of person that she’s been accused of being, the sort who’ll find misogyny in every video game ever, the sort who’ll ignore how strong a woman is as a character, because she’s showing cleavage.
5) Yes, and that was wrong, and is recently changing. Although now I’ll point out that in some places – namely sitcoms the trend is reversed, and we’ve got the Homer Simpson effect, where the men are all bumbling incompetent buffoons that need to be saved from the situations caused by their sheer idiocy by the obviously smart and superior women.
And your portrayal of a forced kiss, or rape, then them falling in love is something that seems to be mostly in old movies. It’s not acceptable, but I doubt you’ll find it in modern media.
As opposed to the still very much active trend of male rape being used as a joke. Again, look it up on TvTropes, there’s an entire entry on female on male rape being played for laughs, or actually considered morally good.
6) Funny you use the word “hysterical”, even to refer to someone else. In a world where black people are trying to normalize the N-word so it stops being offensive, and gay people are trying to normalize the F-word in the same manner, feminists are trying to take words that have lost their sexist meaning (hysterical) or which were never intended as sexist (“girl” as used as the female of “guy”, rather than the female of “boy”) and make them sexist again.
Really – changing your surname is a choice in my mother’s time?! – AND for goodness sakes, I’m talking about changing THE ENTIRE name.
This was the accepted and expected practice.
Mrs. JOHN smith – not Mrs. JANE smith.
My mother’s generation were not referred to by their own names once they got married – they were referred to by their husband’s name.
JUST – their husband’s name.
Please don’t do that “feminists” do this and that thing – I’m JUST talking about the term “patriarchy” and that it absolutely makes sense to use that term for patriarchal societies and the remnants of those attitudes that remain as a society transitions away from it.
No, those men are not privileged in a broad sense (as compared to those living in societies less oppressive) in oppressive regimes – we call them “oppressive regimes” for a reason. However, MEN RULE WOMEN – point blank because they are MEN and the WOMEN are women. Are you seriously saying that men who have the right to drive, have jobs, are able to be educated, go out without an escort, show their face in public, NOT be sold, NOT be given away as “gifts” to older men as “wives” who have no say in how many times they are raped a day or how many babies they have, etc are not the ones in POWER in those societies?
I agree with you on MANY things, but wtf?
Also, please don’t do the thing where you say – YEAH it’s terrible what harassment X-feminist is getting, it’s terrible – BUT – I disagree with her about some of her conclusions and somehow that is relevant to the discussion. Then, you talk about how stuff sucks for men too.
YEAH – male tropes suck. Happy? Now, can you just simply agree that it’s FUCKING disgusting to harass and demean women because they criticize (real or imagined) sexist attitudes. Can you please acknowledge that the type of treatment she receives is a systemic problem that has the effect of silencing “uppity” women?
It was once acceptable to essentially send “uppity women” off to mental institutions and PTSD was so common it was considered a women’s illness. I know you know that. That attitude doesn’t just disappear from a culture in a generation or two – the remnants remain.
A few who disagree with FF don’t just not listen to her vids – they feel inclined to virtually relentlessly beat her down. That is messed up. Reasonable: make a vid in response that criticizes her ideas. Unreasonable: make a computer game where you get to beat the shit out of her.
YES – I used “hysterical” on purpose – as I was characterizing what some young people think of feminism and that they show their lack of knowledge of just how f-ing bad it has been by using words that, if taken in that historical context, just make you want to scream. It’s a win that things have changed so much, that they don’t even get it anymore. Their experiences are so far removed from my mother’s, or even mine (I’m not even 40 yet), that they are honestly confused as to what the problem is.
Even a slap in the face is a win – in that frame.
And yes, before you say it, some men’s rights groups get the same treatment – which is also NOT cool, as I’ve pointed out several times.
Acknowledging that some feminists are targeted in ways that reflect ingrained toxic cultural norms that seek to silence dissent of a patriarchal system; does not diminish that fact.
1) Okay, but why are you bringing 40 years ago as an argument for the necessity of feminism today?
2) You’re right, in that sense they are advantaged. I didn’t make my point properly – Just because white men are in power, doesn’t mean that the rest of the white men reap dividends.
3) Well… No, it’s not acceptable, but I’m going to tell you that it may not be just sheer misogyny that makes it happen. I think that the misogyny is starting to come from being in a society which thinks male sexuality is disgusting and any portrayal of attractive women is objectification and wrong, which constantly criticises them as the only gender able to hurt people and a gender which does nothing but hurt people, and they see women who are empowered by feminism still have the pre-feminist expectations of them.
I’m in no way justifying their actions, but I think “lol they just wanna oppress women” might be naive.
4) My point was that that word no longer has the sexist connotations and yet feminists want to make it a taboo word again. How is it empowering, rather than a guilt trip for men, to do that?
Okay: I should do this properly.
Yes, you’re right. No more bullshit. It is wrong to try to silence a woman for having an opinion. To do so with gendered slurs or even threats of rape is disgusting.
The game goes beyond disgusting and just goes into pathetic.
Thanks for that.
I mention those things because they are ONLY 40 years or so ago, and the idea that a society can change so quickly in less than a generation is simply an extraordinary claim. Some changes are real, some are cosmetic, some are lip-service and others are profound…but the patriarchy hasn’t completely left us.
There are active forces that want patriarchy to return – many of those are based on religion or male-supremacy (or both).
Seeing men “as the only gender able to hurt people and a gender which does nothing but hurt people” is the problem and IS a by-product of patriarchy. Why do you think women can’t go outside without a male relative in some patriarchal societies? – because they think the WOMEN are going to start mayhem?
I know that feminism (summing it all up) is not completely blameless in this as it does contain – and the feminist movement has gone through some pretty spectacular fracturing and permutations, and this includes a contingent of female exceptionalists (as I like to term them).
However, I think some of the criticism of feminism is based on the availability heuristic – something Carrier explained in one of his recent blog posts. Women have started to talk about the amount of harassment, unwanted touching, and rape that they have encountered. This doesn’t mean that it happens more often, in fact I am quite certainly it happens LESS often than it once did. However, talking about it makes it SEEM as though it happens more often – this is also the case with child molestation and abuse (which absolutely happens less often, and is treated much more seriously between children as if once was).
That’s not a problem with the speaker, but the listener. It is not reasonable to blame someone for speaking about their own experiences or those of others if the listener concludes that hearing about it makes the problem more prevalent.
Feminism is not the big bad.
People have been saying “it’s not like that anymore, feminism is dead” to shut up uppity women for my entire lifetime, yet I have seen so many positive changes during that time that I now know it wasn’t true, and when I was younger I didn’t even recognize the problems until they started to get better.
I do not agree with other feminists all the time, and I absolutely think that it’s high time to put effort into comprehensive gender studies (including transgender issues, etc). “Gender studies” should not be “women’s studies” – that’s just false advertising.
Focusing on women in STEM makes sense to me, as well as focusing on men in elementary education and nursing – simply because those are the places where the need is great.
If it makes you happy, while I was teaching education majors, for the first couple years my classes were nearly entirely composed of white suburban women. Routinely there would be no men in my classes or just one. By the time I left, almost a third of my class was usually male and there was a much larger diversity of students as far as background and ethnicity. At least in my old neck of the woods, there has been positive change on that front.
The educational field sees lack of male involvement as a problem to be solved.
I have yet to see many posts that concern men’s issues on FtB in a substantial way. A few attempt, but the moment someone uses a “z” in “men’s”, it is no longer serious.
Nobody on FtB is somehow obligated, but focusing on feminism is not also simultaneously focusing on men’s issues. They coincide a lot, but they are not exactly the same.
If we can reach agreement on the term “patriarchy” perhaps I should clarify that I do not think that the U.S. has a patriarchal society on the balance; sexism exists and there are significant remnants of patriarchy that are still mainstream (such as the “pussy” and “dick” thing) and segments of society who believe that patriarchy is what God wants. However, do we (in the U.S.) live in a patriarchy – no. Does that mean “Mission Accomplished” and we can all go home – not a chance.
“I mention those things because they are ONLY 40 years or so ago, …
a male relative in some patriarchal societies? – because they think the WOMEN are going to start mayhem?”
As I said earlier. Feminists didn’t cause the fear. They just encourage it and use it to their own ends. They were very good to get pro-female gender-biased legislation using that fear.
If feminism was about equality, they’d be all against gender-bias in language. But instead they push for, and cheer every time a “protecting women” bill passes with gendered, exclusionary language. Again, this is the movement that men are supposed to consider their savior from abuse? Again, feminism has proven itself men’s enemy in the field of having their rape and assault taken seriously.
Recently there was a victory in the clause in VAWA that applies its protections to men, but it’s hardly enough for real equality under that act.
“Focusing on women in STEM makes sense to me, as well as focusing on men in elementary education and nursing – simply because those are the places where the need is great.
…
The educational field sees lack of male involvement as a problem to be solved.”
I’m not talking about the educational field, I’m talking about feminists. People with money and political influence.
“I have yet to see many posts that concern men’s issues on FtB in a substantial way. A few attempt, but the moment someone uses a “z” in “men’s”, it is no longer serious.
Nobody on FtB is somehow obligated, but focusing on feminism is not also simultaneously focusing on men’s issues. They coincide a lot, but they are not exactly the same.”
And then you see why men constantly butt in feminist issues with “Yeah, well we have the same problems too!”. It’s not because they don’t care. It’s because -their problems are ignored-. In fact, even here in FtB, men are portrayed as living in this sort of utopia eating hors d’euvres on their goose down sofas.
A Godless Bitches podcast compared men to “kings”, and said that their fighting in war is similar to the King being expected to lead his troops. I vomited a little in my mouth when I heard that.
And yet, we’re the privileged ones.
Finally- The only thing feminism has to fight anymore is gendered -ideas- in people’s heads. What it left behind for men, is many many gendered laws that indirectly downplay the seriousness of their abuse AS WELL as ideas in people’s heads.
I can’t really assess whether or not various groups have used fear in an inappropriate way (it is an extremely powerful political tool) without doing some pretty hefty research on how those campaigns were conducted.
I know there is a discussion amongst feminists between a strictly gender-neutral approach and a proactive “correcting” approach. Neither of these, in their extreme, is reasonable to me. However, especially when it comes to law, I usually lean more toward the gender neutral side.
I was actually legally barred from working with others on a potential project that would bring girls and their mothers in for physics workshops due to anti-discrimination legislation. I have pretty mixed feelings about that, you can imagine. (I didn’t initiate the project, but I was on board, so I was a little irked when it had to be scrapped – if, for no other reason, not liking other people to tell me what I can’t do.)
There is pretty solid research supporting gender-segregated education. Though I absolutely am not advocating for wide-spread gender-segregated education for various reasons, the thought of the possibility being legislated away regardless of the possible benefits to some children doesn’t sit so well.
That’s simply an example I have the most personal experience with, where I see the issue as more gray than some might.
We’ve hijacked this thread quite a bit. Send me a private message if you want. I might have an idea. http://www.facebook.com/pages/Sinmantyx/149848621739265 (I hope that link works.)
Sorry, I don’t use Facebook. Maybe use Youtube PMs?
Oh sure!
http://www.youtube.com/user/sinmantyx
I am down for the night – but I will catch you later.
I fail to see why MRA and feminists can’t work tpgether towards a common stated goal, equality.
For the most part I think they can work together but you got to understand that they are going to fight over some issues. My best advice is to try and understand WHY they fight.
Take the wage gap for example, why would MRA’s get upset over this?
Most because it’s a rare MRA who doesn’t blame feminism, rather than patriarchy, for the difficulties we all face when we bump up against the limits of restrictive gender roles. It also has something to do with the prevalence of anti-feminist and anti-woman propaganda in MRA circles.
Men who do struggle for equality tend to avoid the MRA label, especially since the Southern Poverty Law Center put MRA groups on their listing of hate groups.
Does that answer your question?
I won’t deny that there’s a lot of BS on the MRA perspective.
However, you don’t get away with lying.
http://www.splcenter.org/blog/2012/05/15/intelligence-report-article-provokes-outrage-among-mens-rights-activists/
OK, I give up. What the fuck does that have to do with anything?
Am I right in interpreting that as meaning they put specific MRA groups on the list and not “MRA” – I just skimmed it and that’s the impression I got.
It is also particularly ironic that she’s calling people a hate group, while quoting a site that was being banned from their convention hall for espousing transgender hate. 🙂
Actually, I pay all the bills for my male partner, and have zero problem respecting him and the awesome amount of work which goes into maintaining a house. He’s much better at maintenance and at taking care of people than I am, and I’m considerably more happy at work than at home.
Why not allocate duties based on the abilities and desires of partners (in addition to the material constraints society gives us), rather than some stupid, archaic idea of who gets to be ‘the man’ in the relationship?
Men’s rights activists and the usual more outspoken/activist feminists/radical feminists are all whinny nuts who live in parallel but opposite bizarro-worlds, and they deserve each other.
Both are probably often traumatized by some bad (or even comprehensibly traumatic) personal experience with the other sex, and their discourse is all full of conspiracy theories that can easily be transformed into nazi discourse if we change “men” or “women” by “jews”. And there’s also the pseudoscience of subliminal mind-control messages on the liberal-feminist/male-chauvinist media, even though they avoid the label of “subliminal mind control”.
You also haven’t seen men getting approached, asked out, flirted with or kissed by women either.
We live in a society that forces the pursuer role on men, and conveniently many people focus on when that role goes wrong (men pushing too hard or too fast)…
You talk about the 5% of male-pursuing that goes perverse (i.e. sexual harassment), but you conveniently leave out the 95% of male-pursuing that benefits women in the form of female privilege (i.e. being able to have a love life, sex life and romance without having to take any risks and blame, while waiting for the other gender to take all blame and risks).
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“These gender-role models we are still holding on to are oppressive to EVERYBODY” Thanks to help recognize it, but let me be honest, Im very happy with these oppressive models, in deed there is nothing that I d hate more that be out of them.
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Hi there, Cristina.
First place, excuse me – you, if you take a time to read this enormous comment, and your blog readers – about any grammar error, i’m brazilian and my English is poor.
Well, i am one of people who liked your first video but my point is: i don’t understand right where your mind changed.
What do i mean? I’d never saw you as a anti-feminist, or a sexist against your own gender (I read when you said you are “a feminist, on your way” at the deleted video, and I sincerely believe I understood what you was saying”), i’d never saw you as a woman who don’t recognize possibility of prejudice against woman in some cases and situations.
I always saw you, at the several times when i saw your old video as a girl who (correctly) assumed that men and women are eventually and equally victims of sexism and that the speech of contemporary feminism and hegemonic view at society and media/press/government promotes a overstatement about female issues and a understatement about male issues when both are equally important. And this is done methodically, sometimes ignoring variables directly related to the points raised, sometimes pointing as examples of female victimization events that affect both men and women so identical or very similar.
I just read you explanation above, and well, on point about boss chair to woman, for exemple: I am public worker at Rio de Janeiro, I have worked at 7 different jobs during my life (some public and some private): 2 public hospitals (my two current jobs), 2 governmental agencies of statistic, 1 post office agency, 1 journal and 1 university office (two last as trainee, i was journalism student). I NEVER (is true!!!!) had a man as direct boss. Each of the 12 boss right away over me at all my jobs still today were women (however, i had men and women as superior boss, example: at one of the hospitals i work nowaday the director is a man, at the other, a woman)… but a can’t create a view as “men are victims of prejudice ever and woman never” based on that experience.
It’s quite possible that some of my women boss has gained her places based on female friendly views as “woman are more organized” or even “we need raise women as boss as she are opressed”, actually the director of one of my current jobs are a woman and since she was elected she named 6 sub-bosses, none man, all the six was women, it’s possible that facts are just unimportant coincidence as well, but isn’t reasonable to suppose sexism?
At this new video you say that the data presented at the first videos were not supported by peer-reviewed papers or statistics.
I strongly disagree, the official statistics at my country for example support strongly your abandoned point that claimed that if women receive less it’s could be strongly related with what kind of jobs you, women, assume, how time by day you work, et cetera: PNAD, the major official sociodemographic research at my country says a lot of obvious things that support your old speech: men are often occupied at industries and exploration when women at service and commerce, men work an average of 43,7 hour/week front 36 from women, men spent two hours more than women (in average, of course) home to work to home.
Of course that the datas above could readed for a contemporary feminist as “well, woman work less because is still FORCED to dedicate itself to their children, it’s still a gender opression” Same deal to men: men still are “forced” to submit itself to unhealthier jobs, wake up at dawn to go to factories miles away, mading a lot of extra-hours, leaving aside their academic plans (as they have less free time), because the same gender role division.
Contemporary feminists use to answer: “this is not our subject, were MEN who created a patriarcal society!” It’s false! The values that devide female and male roles were created by men an women as well, in societies where that made sense, when didn’t, for exemple, exist contraceptives and women generally had 20 pregnancies a life.
Same way, I’d never (and I never will) blame WOMEN by exaggerations of contemporary feminism because I know that if unequalo laws have been created against men or misunderstand on male-female issues are being spread by press there are a lot of men senators or media professionals supporting that; and, by the another hand, are still woman with a another view about all those things.
Still about wage (and women who can not be blamed), I could indicate an article from a woman who, as you was before, considers herself as feminist and made a lot of critical about contemporary and hegemonic feminism, you problably know her, is yours american professor namesake Christina Hoff Sommers. The text was wrote to the Huff Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christina-hoff-sommers/wage-gap_b_2073804.html and one of the comments on page is mine.
About violence against woman, I could mentionate a research at my country, made by Unifesp, one of the mostly recognized academic institutions from Brazil who claims that cases of woman violence against man related with alcool is more common that the inverse.
Another, made by researchers from Fiocruz, another respectable academic institution on health issues, the results were that in a amostral universe of 300 boys and girls the male vitimization was about twice the female victimization http://www.abeneventos.com.br/16senpe/senpe-trabalhos/files/0513.pdf :
Discussing just on adolescent violence with sexual partners we have a lot of other studies mentionated at the same study quoted above (peer rewiening, all right?): some of results (percentual of girls victm of violence by their boyfriends/percentual of boys victms of violence by their girlfriends): FOSHEE, V. A.; 1996 36,5/39,4; MALIK et al, 1997 60/40; MOLIDOR, C; TOLMAN, R, 2000, HALPERN, et al, 2001 10/9; SWART, L. A., 2002 42/38.
What it means? That domestic violence is a male issue? Not!!!
The papers claims that domestic violence is a HUMAN issue, and that it’s variable by many conditions, since in some city or country appears to be most common against men, at others against women, at others similar to both groups. But it isn’t what we still read at media, media still explain domestic violence as woman issue and it is a sexist point of view. (interesting transversal point here: i am writing this with Google Translator “aid”, Google Translator translate “sexism” as “machismo” – male sexism in portuguese – and not as “sexismo”, the neutral word, isn’t delicious?).
Datas on male victimization are frequentelly discharged, viewed as a unnimportant issue besides the really great point: the WOMEN VITIMIZATION, even when and where the datas claims another reality. Here, at Brazil, was recently approved a law whereby a man who beats his wife using a club putting she at coma receives a treatment different of a woman who beats his husband on head using a club putting he at coma (the law is named “Maria da Penha” in tribute at a woman who was fired by her husband and determines differences as men accused of domestic violence don’t have a right to await trial on liberty by bail payment (women at same case have that right), when the accused is a man there no more requirement of flagrant to prision before trial, penalties established are harder at the first case.
Well, there isn’t any law “Mauro Machado” tributing the man who was hammered by his wife at Sao Paulo, for example.
What Maria da Penha’s law and other many similar cases say? That the overstatment about women issues creates inequalities and injustices as well.
It’s about that seems you change your mind, unfortunatelly.
Sorry, i linked wrong adress to that paper about gender violence on teenagers, see the right research here http://www.cpqam.fiocruz.br/bibpdf/2010almeida-amlg.pdf .
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