Feminism

[Carl]

Giving this its own topic instead of letting it overtake a TLG thread.

Real feminism is about equality of the sexes. These vocal women who cry out for female supremacy aren't really feminists, no matter what they may claim. That's just not what feminism is about.

Discuss.

[Nilla]

Thanks for making a thread! I felt weird going off topic, but I'm the type of person who doesn't like to let things go and will keep going as long as the other person keeps replying.

Ya know, I hear a lot about man hating feminists, but i've never met one. I think bringing them up is just way to derail feminist conversations and keep women on the defensive to prove they "aren't like those other feminists".

A good example of this is that in the other thread, we discussed problems with female representation in the show. But somehow, the topic of "man hating feminist" came up, even though we weren't talking about that. And now this new thread dedicated to that conversation is based entirely on the topic of man-hating feminists, instead of the female representation issues we were originally talking about.

Feminists are made to feel like they have to constantly water down their conversations to make sure everyone feels included, and the outcome is that no one is held accountable for anything bad they've done. Feminists aren't able to go on the offensive, tackling problems much more important than the .001% of feminists who hate men.

And even the ones that hate men were probably given a good reason, and they don't have any institutional power over men to send them to concentration camps or anything anyway. Most women who hate men hate them for things they've done to them. (kidnapped, stalked, harassed, worse) Most men who hate women hate them for things they haven't done for them. ("women won't date me!") And the way the sex's display their hate is an important difference. Men who hate women are often violent towards them, and women who hate men just want men to leave them alone.

Obviously, everyone in the broad categories of male or female don't behave the same way, but there are patterns, and it's important to examine why. I'm not overly concerned with the outliers because they aren't a reflection of the society we live in, but a reflection of their unique situation.

[HereWeStand]

Yikes, discussing feminism on the internet? I have a bad feeling about this...

Could anyone provide a link to where this discussion originally began? That'd most likely help with keeping up with what's going on here first before responding.

[Nilla]

I feel you, friend.
viewtopic.php?f=179&t=47874&start=10
It began on the second page of the can't wait to be queen thread, with Tora's comment.

[Squeely]

I'm a proud feminist. Yeah there's a vocal minority of bats**t crazy feminists, but they're a very small percentage and to bring them up without consideration to the rest of what we think is misguided. Most of us want rape culture to be dissolved because women are people who deserve respect, and we also wish to improve areas where men are severely disadvantaged, such as society having huge issues with accepting the fact that men can be raped, and the fact that men who are raped have far less resources available to them. So to the men who are against feminism, the truth is, most of us are on your side.

[Nilla]

[quote="Squeely"]So to the men who are against feminism, the truth is, most of us are on your side.[/quote]
A common misconception among feminists is that if someone is anti-feminist, it's because they don't know what it is. "If they just learned it means equality, they'd be all over it too!"
This isn't true. If everyone is a feminist that just hasn't learned the definition yet, feminism wouldn't be necessary because women would already be treated fairly.
Becoming a feminist took a lot of introspection. I had to unlearn a lot of things, and change a lot of my behavior. It's an ongoing and difficult process. It wasn't as simple as hearing a buzzword and saying "that me!" and not change anything about myself but the label.

Also, a lot of feminists like to talk about how it helps men too. My feminism will help individual men, but not men as a class. Let me explain... It's impossible to bring women up to men's level of social power without bringing men down. For example, every president of the USA has been male. If we brought women up to men's level without lowering it, every president would be female. Obviously, we can't have both every president male and every president female. We have to get rid of some of men's privilege to make room for us.
It will help individual men though. Rape victims and gender non-conforming men would likely be more comfortable in my feminist utopia. But the average male will lose some of his power and that's a sacrifice that needs to be had to achieve equality. Doesn't it make sense that those sorts of men would oppose to feminism to keep their privilege?

[Tora]

[quote="Nilla"]
Ya know, I hear a lot about man hating feminists, but i've never met one. I think bringing them up is just way to derail feminist conversations and keep women on the defensive to prove they "aren't like those other feminists".

A good example of this is that in the other thread, we discussed problems with female representation in the show. But somehow, the topic of "man hating feminist" came up, even though we weren't talking about that. And now this new thread dedicated to that conversation is based entirely on the topic of man-hating feminists, instead of the female representation issues we were originally talking about.

Feminists are made to feel like they have to constantly water down their conversations to make sure everyone feels included, and the outcome is that no one is held accountable for anything bad they've done. Feminists aren't able to go on the offensive, tackling problems much more important than the .001% of feminists who hate men.[/quote]
Oh so including men in a movement that is supposed to be about equality of sexes is apparently not supposed to happen? I'm sorry I missed the point of equality here. From what I just read is that femnism should only be about womens problems. I mean heck forget about the bias court system who just awards custody of kids to the mother simply because she is woman. Lets forget about the males who are abused; cause clearly they had to enjoy it. They are clearly just animals with no thought process and clearly just want something from women. I fail to see where female representation is just thrown away by including the problems of both sexes. So men are just somehow "privileged?"

[quote="Nilla"]
And even the ones that hate men were probably given a good reason, and they don't have any institutional power over men to send them to concentration camps or anything anyway. Most women who hate men hate them for things they've done to them. (kidnapped, stalked, harassed, worse) Most men who hate women hate them for things they haven't done for them. ("women won't date me!") And the way the sex's display their hate is an important difference. Men who hate women are often violent towards them, and women who hate men just want men to leave them alone.[/quote]
Is this a joke? I hope so, because there are so many problems with that statement. Where on earth did that conclusion come from? What evidence pointed to that? Men are the only violent ones? Women aren't violent? Please. Both sexes are violent. But guess what our society sees men who are abused as "pussies," or cowards, or weak. So tell me what man wants to go out and say they were abused? What man wants go and say they're oppressed? The answer not many. Women aren't treated the same way when something happens to them. Oh no it's not their fault.

--

If a movement is only about empowering women yet claims to want to create equality it is not a good movement. I applaud anyone who is out for actually creating equality, but what I don't like is being told that the issues of inequality of males doesn't matter. Also this thread is about feminism, and if man hating women are going to identify as feminists it will hurt the movement period.


[quote="Squeely"]Most of us want rape culture to be dissolved because women are people who deserve respect, [/quote]
Rape culture is a myth. Good god men aren't that stupid. Men don't rape because they aren't taught not to. They rape because they don't care. Any rapist who says they didn't know that raping was bad is lying. Humans aren't stupid. Everyone knows rape is wrong. Rapist know it too. They just don't care. Also if a man said she tried to rape me who would believe him? Probably no one. So what is he supposed to do? If he becomes forceful then its assault. If he just lets her have her way with him then apparently he must have consented.

Again I am all for those who truly want to have equality, but only fixing women's issues isn't moving toward equality. It's just making women have more power, and more advantages over men until the scales are tipped.

And just when I thought I was going to stop typing I read this...
[quote="Nilla"]Also, a lot of feminists like to talk about how it helps men too. My feminism will help individual men, but not men as a class. Let me explain... It's impossible to bring women up to men's level of social power without bringing men down. For example, every president of the USA has been male. If we brought women up to men's level without lowering it, every president would be female. Obviously, we can't have both every president male and every president female. We have to get rid of some of men's privilege to make room for us.
It will help individual men though. Rape victims and gender non-conforming men would likely be more comfortable in my feminist utopia. But the average male will lose some of his power and that's a sacrifice that needs to be had to achieve equality. Doesn't it make sense that those sorts of men would oppose to feminism to keep their privilege?[/quote]
Honestly you're joking right? What kind of utopia says hey we need to remove the rights of men to make the rights of women equal to men? How the can you honestly sit there and say that men need power taken away to make room for women. Thats a joke. Women have the power to do what ever they want. Men can't help it that women decide to take time off from work and don't get that promotion. Men can't help it that women don't run for president.... oh wait Hillary. Men can't help it if women don't get elected for president. Are men just supposed to say hey well there hasn't been a women president so lets just vote for a woman rather than the best person for the job. That is not a utopia that is just affirmative action all over again to the next level. You're going to need a lot more than that to convince me that your utopia is actually a utopia. I am a firm believer that what you put in is what you get out. Women want to be president then run. Don't expect to just be given the job.

[HereWeStand]

[quote="Squeely"] Most of us want rape culture to be dissolved because women are people who deserve respect, and we also wish to improve areas where men are severely disadvantaged, such as society having huge issues with accepting the fact that men can be raped, and the fact that men who are raped have far less resources available to them.[/quote]

You summed up most of my feelings for being a feminist tbh, rape culture/victim blaming/etc is just terrible. This is a pretty huge societal issue in general, sad because I've heard of "feminists" that genuinely think men can't be raped. What?

Another huge gender issue to me personally is ridiculous gender stereotypes towards both males and females in media/marketing. I've given up watching TLG, but for example, Zuri(?) was a pretty big aggressor in the premiere. Her entire "character" in it was literally a terrible sexist stereotype as far as I remember. I find it unbelievable that we're forcing gender norms like that on pre-school children, if you ask me a varied cast of either gender with differing personalities would be best. (MLP:FiM for example does a better job of providing a more varied cast, IMO.)

But yeah generally I'm just a very lowkey feminist. I tend to focus on both genders and their corresponding issues rather than just mainly female ones (at least when it comes to first world issues because third world feminism is completely different) so people tend to not really associate me with the label.

All this said I'm going to nope out of this thread while I still can, feminism is a really sensitive subject on the internet that tends to end up with a lot of hate from both sides and it's never pretty, no minds are ever changed and people just remain bitter and angry.

EDIT: It seems to have started before I even managed to post this response. Eeyup, see ya amigos. Get off the ride while you still can.

[Simbaholikov]

This thread isn't gonna go anywhere good anytime soon holy hell.

[Nilla]

You seem to not understand that men are privileged over women. Women are oppressed under men. Feminism is a female centric movement. It's like if you had two kids, one of them has 1 toy, the other has 5. You have eight toys, and you want to distribute them equally so you give both of them 4. now the one has 5 and the other has 9. The only way to make this fair is to take two away from the kid with extra and give them to the kid with less.

And yes men have problems too! but feminism is about females. No one's stopping you from talking about men's problems, just don't call it feminism, and don't use men's problems as a way of discrediting feminism. I can worry about problems that aren't feminist problems, men's issues being one of them.