Hi there! You are currently browsing as a guest. Why not create an account? Then you get less ads, can thank creators, post feedback, keep a list of your favourites, and more!
Top Secret Researcher
#26 Old 17th Mar 2015 at 8:10 PM
Quote: Originally posted by AzemOcram
1. Do you want biological evidence or statistical? Both exist. Hormones play a role in making women more prone to nurturing and kindness and men more prone to aggression. Women are statistically more likely to fulfill nurturing roles and are proven to be more social on average than men. Statistically speaking, women are far nicer, kinder (and should I say better) people than men.


... Have you... ever been exposed to women? Like, at all?

And where are your controls? For a scientific study, you need to have controls. In this case, you would have to find women who had no exposure to Western culture, as it encourages the behavior you describe.

And we have pretty much the same hormonal cocktail you guys do. The biggest differences are the amount of estrogens and androgens (not to be confused with androgyns). Estrogens, which women have more of, do NOT cause "nurturing" or "kindness" or less aggression. They mainly cause the appearance of secondary sexual characteristics, like reduced bone growth, the appearance of boobs, and more fat. They also make sure the vagina is working properly. They have no effect on sexual behavior, as 90% of women do not have a change in sexual desire after loss of estrogens, such as after removal of the ovaries.
And both sexes have estrogens and androgens. However, women react much more strongly to the presence of androgens than men do; a tiny amount of testosterone is enough to give a woman a sex drive stronger than a man's. The same holds true for men; small amounts of estrogens will have a magnified effect.

Then there's the fact that humans, in general, do not have a strong correlation between hormones and behavior. A severe shortage of hormones will cause issues, but normal fluctuations do not cause effects as drastic as they would in animals. Even PMS is probably less hormones controlling the body and more an effect similar to alcohol. I've noticed that it seems to magnify my emotions and lower inhibitions, which makes me less likely to care about the consequences of my behavior. Of course, that could also be the crippling pain, but all it really seems to do is make me mildly drunk without the buzz. So, really, the most extreme example of ordinary hormone fluctuation is being less likely to be polite.

Also, if you think women are better people than men, you have clearly never cleaned womens' toilets. I'm serious, people will pee on the seats to prove that the seats are dirty.
Advertisement
Lab Assistant
#27 Old 19th Mar 2015 at 4:24 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Nysha
@steph1417897 In terms of whether it should be allowed? Any reason should be acceptable from a legal and medical perspective. As the incredible Dr Robinson says, I believe that women are able to struggle with complex ethical issues for themselves and their families, and come to the right decision; they don't need anyone else coming in to double-check that decision for them. In terms of whether or not it's a reason I personally would get an abortion, absolutely. Poverty is a horrible thing and having (more) children can make it much harder to deal with and much harder to get out of; and if you don't manage to shield your child from the effects of poverty, then it's horrible for them too. Wanting to avoid that makes perfect sense to me.


That's how I feel about it. In a broader sense I def think that women should choose what's right for them in terms of abortion. Personally, what I would find as acceptable reasons for having an abortion: Rape, Poverty, Health risks, and age. When I say poverty as a reason, I don't mean mom/dad shouldn't have babies because they can't buy xmas gifts and start a college fund, I mean they cant provide fundamental things like food, clothing, and shelter. I do realize there are people who have had kids in a poverty circumstance and their kids grew up and became successful individuals - that's great but for most people in those situations, things don't happen that way and life is a real struggle. In terms of health risks, I do think it's okay for someone to have an abortion if there are high risks to the baby or mother. In respect to age, I think it's okay to have an abortion if you feel you're too young to have a baby. To me, it's okay if a 13 year old has an abortion (please don't confuse this - I would hope 13 year olds would wait to have sex, and if they're going to have sex I would hope protection would at least be used, but that isn't always the case). I have many friends who were only 16 when they had a baby and make great parents and have full support from their families in raising the child, that's great too, but many teens who choose to keep their babies aren't fortunate in that way and don't have the resources necessary to take care of their child/children. Also, many teens face forced homelessness, basically banishment, from their families if they choose to keep their baby.

I do think that if someone were to become pregnant and has the resources and maturity to raise a child, and is healthy enough to have the child in the first place, that they should have the baby. I'm 24, live on my own, but it's very much a struggle, and though I've had baby fantasies lol, I know that right now would not be a great time to have a baby. I would def need public assistance in order to be able to take care of a child in the way that the child deserves. Sure, I could have a baby and be nurturing and loving, and all those awesome things, but keeping my child fed, clothed, and provide care for it when I'm at work would be almost impossible right now seeing as I'm still in school and make pretty close to min. wage at my job. If I were at a point in my life where I could financially take care of myself and a baby, I would follow through with it, even if it wasn't planned/perfect timing, so long as I could provide for a child I would have the baby. Luckily birth control has been invented and unless I'm that like 1% (or whatever the statistic is) who still gets pregnant, I don't have to worry about having a baby until i'm ready to.

All in all, I would hope that people who are in the right position to have a child, even if they weren't planning a pregnancy, they should keep it, but I don't think that opinion I hold is something that should be law. I think that a woman should have the right to choose when, where, why, and how they have a baby or decide to not have a baby. I just wondered how everyone else felt about abortion in a poverty circumstance because (at least to my knowledge) no one had mentioned that yet.
Top Secret Researcher
#28 Old 19th Mar 2015 at 11:32 PM
My opinion on abortion is that we should just make it legal for everyone, for any reason, just so we can get the whole stupid argument over with. I mean, abortion isn't the problem, it's a symptom of a problem, which is that women keep getting pregnant when they can't have a baby, for whatever reason. So, make it completely legal. Then we can focus on stopping it.

By that, I mean that we get rid of the factors that cause women to have unwanted or unsafe pregnancies in the first place. Rape, BC failure (I'd think pregnancies ended due to poverty fall under this), genetic deformities that would result in death or a painful existence, high risk in pregnancies.

Rape is the biggest problem, I think, since it's a traumatic act in the first place. For that, we need widespread social change, since society is far too permissive toward it.

For BC failure, I think we need to start teaching everyone about their options, regardless of "religious objections" or whatever. Sure, abstinence is fine, but it has the major downside of not getting you laid when you want it. Then, when you do want it, you're completely unprepared for prevention. That's why it doesn't work all that well. And teach them about BC and sex as soon as they go through puberty, just so you're not too late for any of them.
For that matter, BC needs to be more available. Letting women have free IUDs is a great step. Personally, I think we should just give everyone birth control and only give them the antidote after they've proven to be responsible people, but that's probably too far.

To get rid of severe genetic deformities (and I mean the type that would be fatal and would probably just make the newborn suffer before dying anyway, not minor stuff like missing a toe at birth), we'd have to do a lot of research in order to detect these things early. I think the easiest way would be to somehow make the mother's body more sensitive, so it takes care of the problem naturally. Like I said, this would take a lot of work.

Same with reducing the risk of pregnancies. I mean, we've already done a lot to reduce the chances of dying in childbirth, but the amount that's left would take more research.

To reduce the number of women aborting due to poverty, specifically, the best options are to A. give the mother more support so she can afford to have it, B. give women better access to birth control so she doesn't get pregnant in the first place, or C. end poverty. Obviously the last is the best, but it'll take the longest, so we need stopgap measures while we work on that.
Or, you know, just make it legal to sell the baby.

And if we just got this debate over with, we'd be able to move on to other issues. Not to mention that we'd be saving a ton of money. Even if the government paid for birth control and abortions for every single person in the US, it would still be cheaper than the foster care system. And it prevents people from, say, rehoming the children they adopt to rapists, and other such abuses.
Née whiterider
retired moderator
#29 Old 20th Mar 2015 at 12:29 AM
I found this gif today and desperately wished I'd had it when I was writing my previous post about nurturing:

What I lack in decorum, I make up for with an absence of tact.
Instructor
#30 Old 20th Mar 2015 at 4:16 AM
I see your gif, and raise you...

Banned
#31 Old 20th Mar 2015 at 2:09 PM
So here's a fun fact - 1 (the headmaster) of my primary school's staff were male. The rest were female. When I was in my last year, a male math teacher came in, bumping the number up to two. Then the headteacher quit. Now I don't know.
Top Secret Researcher
#32 Old 20th Mar 2015 at 9:48 PM
Quote: Originally posted by hugbug993
And if we just got this debate over with, we'd be able to move on to other issues.

I believe there are religious people, including conservatives, who would agree with this, although they may be fearful of saying it out loud within their communities.

The issue is that there is more than one example of sin in the world. There are some very serious things that scripture and our own consciences would tell us that we ought to be addressing -- if we could hear that call over the "wedge issue" political noise.
Lab Assistant
#33 Old 27th Mar 2015 at 5:12 AM
As a woman who spends way too much time on tumblr, I agree with and applaud many aspects of feminism. Yet, I disagree with most feminists about the following points:

1) Men can't or shouldn't be feminists - Of course they can. That's like saying that White people can't be against slavery.
2) Abortion is okay because essentially women can do whatever they want with their bodies - This argument always seemed counter-intuitive to me. Once you're pregnant, it's not just about you and your body. There is another human life/body involved. I've seen "scientific studies" that try to prove that the fetus is not technically alive, and thus abortion does not really kill him/her, but even a single bacteria (which can consist of one cell) is considered a living being. Also, this is just my opinion, but if I was pregnant but sincerely didn't feel ready, I would go through with it and drop the baby off at an orphanage. Then it would go to some loving gay couple or grow up in the orphanage and decide its future for itself.
3) We can achieve equality by "doing whatever we want." Beyonce and Nicki Minaj are actually empowering feminists BECAUSE they sing about sex - Wrong again, ladies. Don't you think women are already sexualized enough? Many of the problems that feminists fight (e.g. intense beauty standards) are actually a result of women being sexualized in every aspect of the media. Decades of feminism won't change the fact that women will probably never be able to jog shirtless or breast-feed in public without being sexualized. It's hard to explain, but I doubt that we can have both. I doubt that we can tell women to go after sex, that it's okay to be prostitutes/strippers, etc. but that men should still respect women when there are whole industries catered to sexualizing them. Until we are viewed as separate from our bodies & our beauty, it's going to be really hard to achieve true equality.
Forum Resident
#34 Old 27th Mar 2015 at 9:46 AM
Quote: Originally posted by Vinathi
2) Abortion is okay because essentially women can do whatever they want with their bodies - This argument always seemed counter-intuitive to me. Once you're pregnant, it's not just about you and your body. There is another human life/body involved. I've seen "scientific studies" that try to prove that the fetus is not technically alive, and thus abortion does not really kill him/her, but even a single bacteria (which can consist of one cell) is considered a living being. Also, this is just my opinion, but if I was pregnant but sincerely didn't feel ready, I would go through with it and drop the baby off at an orphanage. Then it would go to some loving gay couple or grow up in the orphanage and decide its future for itself.


This is the part of your post I really disagree with, so this is the part I'm going to talk about. Sorry for slightly derailing feminism into abortion, but I think abortion availablity is a part of feminism.

Yes, the embryo/ fetus is alive. I don't think I've seen any scientific studies that try to prove otherwise - if you know of any, could you please provide a link? Bacteria are also alive, and in fact a great example. People kill bacteria all the time. Your immune system does it naturally, but if that doesn't work we help it along with antibiotics and other medicines. Billions and billions of bacteria get killed, just to make one human feel better - and sometimes, to save that human's life. Well, the same is true of embryos, if in much smaller numbers. Many get spontaneously aborted by the woman's body, often before she even realises she's pregnant. They didn't quite work out, so pregnancy doesn't get started. This article explains a lot about what is happening in pregnancy, and how important it is that the woman's body can reject embryos that aren't growing properly. Sometimes the pregnancy is inconvenient, and the woman wants to feel better and not have it happen, and sometimes it can be life-threatening. It's always a very big thing that will cause enormous amounts of disruption to the woman's life. Is an embryo's chance at life really worth more than an adult woman's? Who probably has children to look after (most abortions are for woman who are already mothers).

People get worried about what happens to embryos because they see the potential for who it might grow into - and because a wanted embryo is precious, and its parents see it as a baby very quickly. But sperm are also half a potential person, and they get thrown away in their millions all the time. Unfertilised eggs disappear down the toilet without anyone even noticing. In my opinion, what's important is what something is now, and an unwanted embryo is a bundle of cells that can't think or feel and is a lot less intelligent that many animals that get killed all the time without a second thought.

As many people have said before, it would be nice if abortions didn't have to happen at all, and those embryos had never been concieved. But the way to do that is by allowing abortion for those who want it, and work on making sure that contraception is even more reliable and readily available to anyone who needs it.
Theorist
#35 Old 27th Mar 2015 at 4:29 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Vinathi
3) We can achieve equality by "doing whatever we want." Beyonce and Nicki Minaj are actually empowering feminists BECAUSE they sing about sex - Wrong again, ladies. Don't you think women are already sexualized enough? Many of the problems that feminists fight (e.g. intense beauty standards) are actually a result of women being sexualized in every aspect of the media. Decades of feminism won't change the fact that women will probably never be able to jog shirtless or breast-feed in public without being sexualized. It's hard to explain, but I doubt that we can have both. I doubt that we can tell women to go after sex, that it's okay to be prostitutes/strippers, etc. but that men should still respect women when there are whole industries catered to sexualizing them. Until we are viewed as separate from our bodies & our beauty, it's going to be really hard to achieve true equality.


Until we eliminate double standards, it's going to be really hard to achieve true equality. So it's okay for men to express themselves however they want, but women can't express themselves sexually without being judged? That right there is a problem. We, as a society, apply a double standard where it's improper for a woman to express sexuality, but it's completely okay for a man. It's a double standard to believe the actions of one woman reflect poorly on her sex, whereas a man can be free to express himself any way he sees fit, and nobody judges his entire sex because of it. I don't hear anyone complaining that Usher's sexy dancing makes men look bad, or putting down Ron Jeremy for being a porn star. Double standards are the problem, and shaming women for their choices is not part of the solution, but part of the problem. Yes, men should still respect women regardless of what industries are out there, because men should respect women. Period.

I disagree with you on your point #2 as well, but KittyCarey's reply leaves me nothing else to add that she didn't already say much better than I could have.

Resident wet blanket.
Top Secret Researcher
#36 Old 27th Mar 2015 at 7:11 PM
To Vinathi: I agree with your first point, about men being feminists. However...

Quote: Originally posted by Vinathi
2) Abortion is okay because essentially women can do whatever they want with their bodies - This argument always seemed counter-intuitive to me. Once you're pregnant, it's not just about you and your body. There is another human life/body involved. I've seen "scientific studies" that try to prove that the fetus is not technically alive, and thus abortion does not really kill him/her, but even a single bacteria (which can consist of one cell) is considered a living being. Also, this is just my opinion, but if I was pregnant but sincerely didn't feel ready, I would go through with it and drop the baby off at an orphanage. Then it would go to some loving gay couple or grow up in the orphanage and decide its future for itself.


This rests on the idea that the embryo is a living creature. The example you give is this: "but even a single bacteria (which can consist of one cell) is considered a living being."

There is a very big difference between a bacterium and a zygote, embryo, or fetus. A bacterium is a self-sustaining creature. It can respirate, digest, excrete, move around, and fend for itself. At no point before birth can that be said of a pregnancy. It relies entirely on the mother until it comes out, and even then, it might need doctors, incubators, or medical treatment to survive. Bacteria are far more developed than human infants, let alone what comes before that.

Now, let's disregard the fact that you have to do that long list to be considered a living being. If a single cell is a being, regardless of what other features it has, then every single cell is a being. That means that every cell in your body is alive. When you shed skin cells, you kill them. You are killing right now. When you eat, that causes your body to kill the cellular matter you are digesting, and some of your gut flora likely dies, too. Oh, and your oocytes are also alive. If you've got testicles, you're guilty of a mass murder every time you wank. If you've got a uterus, you serially kill ovum once a month.

This is why we have a list of features for living beings. While your cells are technically alive, they are not living beings because they cannot sustain themselves. A zygote or embryo is no more alive than your cells are, and you don't sob if you kill a few skin cells. Or over your oocytes, if you're going to make the stupid "but it can grow into a human!" argument. Yeah, and any cell in your body can become a fully-grown human, if you apply the right science. A fetus is closer to a living being, but still falls short of the criteria until it's born.

And if you want to send a child to an orphanage, that's your choice. Of course, there's a very good chance your kid could end up abused in the system, grow up with emotional health issues, never find anyone who'll adopt or love them - especially if you or the father happen to be a minority or the kid is born with a mutation - but I'm sure your moral superiority is worth more than ruining an innocent's life.

Quote: Originally posted by Vinathi
3) We can achieve equality by "doing whatever we want." Beyonce and Nicki Minaj are actually empowering feminists BECAUSE they sing about sex - Wrong again, ladies. Don't you think women are already sexualized enough? Many of the problems that feminists fight (e.g. intense beauty standards) are actually a result of women being sexualized in every aspect of the media. Decades of feminism won't change the fact that women will probably never be able to jog shirtless or breast-feed in public without being sexualized. It's hard to explain, but I doubt that we can have both. I doubt that we can tell women to go after sex, that it's okay to be prostitutes/strippers, etc. but that men should still respect women when there are whole industries catered to sexualizing them. Until we are viewed as separate from our bodies & our beauty, it's going to be really hard to achieve true equality.


You seem to regard sexuality as disrespect.

Sexualization is not the problem. It's the fact that some men are assholes. The problem is that some men don't respect women in the first place, and when that overlaps with gynophilia, that means that they disrespect women while fetishizing them. I've seen a lot of gay guys who disrespect women in the exact same ways, though they tend to substitute attraction for the female body with repulsion. I have no problem respecting strippers while ogling their bikini (or lack thereof) areas. It is fully possibly to sexualize someone and still respect them. The fact that it's not happening is the fault of the disrespectful men, not the women. Stop blaming women for the mistreatment they get.

And yes, women singing about sex is empowering. You do realize that for a long time, sex was not a choice for women? It was entirely up to the men. Their fathers sold them off when they got old enough, and their husbands got them in bed whether the ladies liked it or not. Ever heard the history of the vibrator? It was originally sold as a home remedy for hysteria, since masturbation was thought to calm the women down. Before that, doctors got the ladies off manually. And this was not considered sex, because it didn't involve penises. And the doctors considered this a tedious chore, which was usually passed off to underlings - hence the reason they created a home remedy in the first place, because the offices were annoyed by dealing with it.
Female sexuality only really blossomed recently. We have total control of our bodies (in theory), and we're not (completely) demonized if we want to express ourselves sexually. The very fact that women can go up on stage and sing about sex without cloaking it in metaphors and nudging the audience means that we're winning the battle against slut-shaming, and we need to keep doing it.

Now, here's a question: what would you have us do in lieu of this? Restrict women from sexual expression? Because feminism is the idea that women have choices in life. If you try to take away a woman's choice to act sexually, then you're really missing the point.

And frankly, I don't want to jog shirtless. Boobs hurt!
The Great AntiJen
retired moderator
#37 Old 27th Mar 2015 at 8:47 PM
Hmmm - you do know that idea about vibrators was recently debunked? Nice story but apparently not true. I'd have to look it up to find the reference.

I no longer come over to MTS very often but if you would like to ask me a question then you can find me on tumblr or my own site tflc. TFLC has an archive of all my CC downloads.
I'm here on tumblr and my site, tflc
Top Secret Researcher
#38 Old 27th Mar 2015 at 9:01 PM
I don't see any indication of controversy regarding the history of the vibrator, and all recent articles are saying the same thing.
The Great AntiJen
retired moderator
#39 Old 27th Mar 2015 at 11:46 PM Last edited by maxon : 27th Mar 2015 at 11:58 PM.
Quote: Originally posted by hugbug993
I don't see any indication of controversy regarding the history of the vibrator, and all recent articles are saying the same thing.

That's likely because they're all using the same source (see below).

OK so I looked it up. The original idea comes from this book by Rachel Maines:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos...eslehallswebp07 published in 1999.

This is an extremely thorough debunking of Dr Maines's claims about the ancient and medieval world part of the vibrator book by a Prof Helen King who is an authority on ancient texts (where Dr Maines is not). The conclusion severely criticises Dr Maines's standards of research (it's perhaps notable that Dr Maines is an 'independent' scholar - not always a good sign though to be fair she does hold a doctorate and has taught at university level. The doctorate is in needlework (and textiles I guess) not social history or the development of technology).
http://eugesta.recherche.univ-lille...f/2011/King.pdf

However, I was looking for an even more recent paper that had a go at the Victorian section of Maines's book which I can't find. I might have read it at work because I have access to academic databases there. I'll have a look on Tuesday when I go in. However, I did find the following which, being non-academic literature, you might find easier going:

http://www.lesleyahall.net/factoids.htm#hysteria
Lesley Hall who runs this site is a 'professional archivist (at the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, now the Wellcome Library)'. In particular, her listing of this conversation on the Histsex list (an old newsnet list)
http://www.lesleyahall.net/Maines99.htm
is interesting in it's identification of problems with Maines's research. Many of the people on that list are academics (if you look them up - which I did with some of them).

You might want to read the first paragraph of this interview with Dr Maines herself.
https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&r....89381419,d.ZWU (I think that url might not work but the paragraph is quoted in Prof Helen King's paper).

I no longer come over to MTS very often but if you would like to ask me a question then you can find me on tumblr or my own site tflc. TFLC has an archive of all my CC downloads.
I'm here on tumblr and my site, tflc
Top Secret Researcher
#40 Old 28th Mar 2015 at 12:06 AM
Okay. I find it strange that 4 years later and after a movie was made, there was no hint of this at all, but your sources look sound.

Sexuality still sucked for women.
Lab Assistant
#41 Old 28th Mar 2015 at 1:25 PM
It's 8:30 in the morning, can't sleep. Here's some quotes I liked pertaining to feminism (to be clear, not all of these quotes reflect my own opinions, but damn, some of them are really funny. Links at the bottom if anyone's interested in looking at the others. I'm rating this post PG-13 lol.

"A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle." - Gloria Steinem

"I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is: I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat." - Rebecca West.

"Why do people say "Grow some balls"? Balls are weak and sensitive. If you wanna be tough, grow a vagina. Those things can take a pounding." - Sheng Wang

"Feminism is the radical notion that women are human beings." - Cheris Kramarae

"He - and if there is a God, I am convinced he is a he, because no woman could or would ever fuck things up this badly." - George Carlin

"Margaret Atwood, the Canadian novelist, once asked a group of women at a university why they felt threatened by men. The women said they were afraid of being beaten, raped, or killed by men. She then asked a group of men why they felt threatened by women. They said they were afraid women would laugh at them." - Molly Ivins

"When God made man she was practicing." - Rita Mae Brown

"Whatever women do they must do twice as well as men to be thought half as good. Luckily, this is not difficult." - Charlotte Witton

"I was the first woman to burn my bra- it took the fire department four days to put it out." -Dolly Parton

"This particular strand of feminism is characterized by two tenets: 1. men are jerks, and 2. women should strive by all means to become like them." - Douglas Wilson

http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/feminism?page=1
Test Subject
#42 Old 28th Mar 2015 at 2:22 PM
There is a lot of discussion that seems to be going on in this thread. Feminism is not so complicated, actually. It just means that you believe in complete equality between men and women. Yes, there are definitions of feminism such as the radical notion that women are people, but it all just fits under the statement of complete equality between men and women. I found a buzzfeed quiz that will that backs up my point.
http://www.buzzfeed.com/kellyoakes/...ffb=#.xwMdOzrL9
Field Researcher
#43 Old 29th Mar 2015 at 1:36 PM
Quote: Originally posted by steph1417897
It's 8:30 in the morning, can't sleep. Here's some quotes I liked pertaining to feminism (to be clear, not all of these quotes reflect my own opinions, but damn, some of them are really funny. Links at the bottom if anyone's interested in looking at the others. I'm rating this post PG-13 lol.

"A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle." - Gloria Steinem

"I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is: I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat." - Rebecca West.

"Why do people say "Grow some balls"? Balls are weak and sensitive. If you wanna be tough, grow a vagina. Those things can take a pounding." - Sheng Wang

"Feminism is the radical notion that women are human beings." - Cheris Kramarae

"He - and if there is a God, I am convinced he is a he, because no woman could or would ever fuck things up this badly." - George Carlin

"Margaret Atwood, the Canadian novelist, once asked a group of women at a university why they felt threatened by men. The women said they were afraid of being beaten, raped, or killed by men. She then asked a group of men why they felt threatened by women. They said they were afraid women would laugh at them." - Molly Ivins

"When God made man she was practicing." - Rita Mae Brown

"Whatever women do they must do twice as well as men to be thought half as good. Luckily, this is not difficult." - Charlotte Witton

"I was the first woman to burn my bra- it took the fire department four days to put it out." -Dolly Parton

"This particular strand of feminism is characterized by two tenets: 1. men are jerks, and 2. women should strive by all means to become like them." - Douglas Wilson

http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/feminism?page=1


If these were about women no one would find them funny. They are sexist.

lemonade
Top Secret Researcher
#44 Old 29th Mar 2015 at 7:27 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Euan
If these were about women no one would find them funny. They are sexist.


But... they are about women.

Yeah, I'll grant you that a couple are kind of rude, but the ones that are mainly poke fun at patriarchal assumptions. God made Adam first because men are superior? Nope! God was practicing. Saying someone has balls means they're tough, calling them a pussy means they're soft? Nope! Balls cave under pressure, vaginas are tough enough to push an entire human out of the body. They're responses to sexism by pointing out how stupid the sexist assumptions sound.
Née whiterider
retired moderator
#45 Old 30th Mar 2015 at 11:06 PM
Not to mention, jokes which make fun of women for being women are backed up by a long, long history of women being seen as stupid, incompetent, weak, inferior, irrational, and generally worth less and less worthy of respect than men. Jokes which make fun of men for being men are backed up by a few decades of feminists getting frustrated at patriarchy. Male tears etc.

What I lack in decorum, I make up for with an absence of tact.
Top Secret Researcher
#46 Old 1st Apr 2015 at 6:28 PM
Mad Poster
#47 Old 9th Apr 2015 at 5:14 AM
I am not a feminist.

“No woman should be authorized to stay at home to raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one.” Simone de Beauvoir.

I can find lots of articles written by women who say they are feminists who support that, from Maureen Dowd, Linda Hirshman, Megan O'Rourke, and so on. I see very, very few women who say they are feminists disavowing that, and they don't have the public visibility of the women who think women should not be allowed to stay at home with children.

In addition to those public faces of feminism, it's inevitably self-declared feminists who think they have business commenting snidely to me or my husband personally on the size of our family or our decision to home school or our decision for me to stay at home. One woman felt free to scold my husband because I prefer to wear long skirts! (He'd generally rather I wear pants or short skirts, so . . . yeah.) She made it very clear that because she was a feminist she had the right to criticize how I dress and to blame my husband for what I wear.

So feminism has no place for me and mine, and I have no use for it. Perhaps if I lived in a place where women couldn't vote, drive, work, go out in public without a man, I would. But I don't.

Pics from my game: Sunbee's Simblr Sunbee's Livejournal
"English is a marvelous edged weapon if you know how to wield it." C.J. Cherryh
Née whiterider
retired moderator
#48 Old 9th Apr 2015 at 9:43 AM
Well - this is kind of what I was talking about in my first post in this thread. Feminism is a hugely diverse movement, lots of different versions of feminism are incompatible with each other, like choice feminism and radical feminism (the "women should not be allowed to..." thing, I mean damn, when you start policing women's autonomy in the name of feminism you've gone astray in my book); black, muslim and intersectional feminism and white feminism; trans exterminatory/sex worker exclusionary radical feminism and mainstream feminism etc. So yeah, all of these criticisms of feminism(s) are legitimate, and most of them I completely agree with.

But it seems really disingenuous, to me, for someone to say they're not any kind of feminist because they find the beliefs of TERFs or radfems or white feminism abhorrent. The various exclusionary feminisms thrive on division - on defining what counts as a "real woman" or what counts as "real women's experiences" (such as, of COURSE no woman could experience hijab as empowering rather than oppressive! Of COURSE no woman could freely choose to engage in sex work! etc.), rather than listening to actual women and accepting that we're not all the same, we have different experiences and understandings of the world, and accepting that feminism should integrate all of those positions rather than picking out the One Twu Hypothetical Woman. I don't think people who want a women's movement which is inclusionary of all women, and all other people who suffer the effects of misogyny and patriarchy, should continue that tradition of splitting us up into separate groups who don't want to work together because we're too different. People are free to define themselves however they choose, but in my view, if you support gender equality and want to end gender-based oppression and violence, then the politically sensible and morally best thing to do is to sign up to a version of feminism which is positive and inclusive and powerful, and continue to be critical of and to denounce flawed feminisms from that position.

Sunbee, if you've not heard of many feminists denouncing de Beauvior's views, I'd suggest you head over to a local feminist group meeting or even just spend some time poking around the feminist bits of tumblr. The attitudes you decsribe are held by a teeny tiny minority of feminists nowadays, and I'm sorry your personal experience has been so skewed.

What I lack in decorum, I make up for with an absence of tact.
The Great AntiJen
retired moderator
#49 Old 9th Apr 2015 at 12:26 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Sunbee
“No woman should be authorized to stay at home to raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one.” Simone de Beauvoir.

I can find lots of articles written by women who say they are feminists who support that, from Maureen Dowd, Linda Hirshman, Megan O'Rourke, and so on. I see very, very few women who say they are feminists disavowing that, and they don't have the public visibility of the women who think women should not be allowed to stay at home with children.

You can't be paying much attention then. There are plenty of feminists who say just that. In fact, plenty of feminists who say feminism is about givng women the choice and power to make the decisions they want for their own lives. As a general definition of feminism, that just about covers it.

I no longer come over to MTS very often but if you would like to ask me a question then you can find me on tumblr or my own site tflc. TFLC has an archive of all my CC downloads.
I'm here on tumblr and my site, tflc
Top Secret Researcher
#50 Old 9th Apr 2015 at 10:37 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Sunbee
So feminism has no place for me and mine, and I have no use for it. Perhaps if I lived in a place where women couldn't vote, drive, work, go out in public without a man, I would. But I don't.


You do realize that feminism is the entire reason you can vote, drive, work, and go out without a man in public, right? If you don't want to be feminist, then you support the idea that women can't have any of them. Guess you can't have them either, 'cause if feminists are such terrible people, you don't want to live with the fruits of their labor, right?

Besides, what you're saying is like saying "I'm a racist because non-racists keep making snide remarks at me for how I act." You're saying you support taking away peoples' rights because someone's being a dick to you.
You don't have a problem with feminism, you have a problem with assholes. They're everywhere. You've even got one on your own butt, no matter how hard it is to see it. Quit blaming them on the movement they're affiliated with.

And if you don't know enough about feminism to know that those people are the minority, that's your own fault for being ignorant. Always research the position before you criticize it, no matter how infuriating you think it will be.
 
Page 2 of 6
Back to top