Answer:
That’s actually the point, though. We asked ourselves. We did the research. We found no satisfactory answers, and indeed the more research we do the worse the picture looks. We’re giving feminists a chance to offer their own on the off chance that ours was inadequate and at the same time posing these questions to others so they can do a bit of internal examination themselves. We would like nothing more that to be proven utterly wrong, because then we wouldn’t have to sit and do this when there are hundreds of other things we’d enjoy much more. However, nobody has yet even come even close to proving us wrong.
The questions we’re asking are based on what we see as fundamental contradictions within the feminist movement, things that are inherently contradictory to the stated goal of equality. As you might have noticed there are many. You can claim that these are “generalizations,” but between us we have decades of experience with the feminist movement, and have dealt with hundreds if not thousands of feminists. Our views on feminism are based not only on hundreds of individual, personal encounters but also on a knowledge of the political movements of feminism as a unit. You yourself might have no clue what “the personal is political” actually means, but we have examined feminism in both personal and political contexts and found it wanting and that particular slogan is just as problematic as the rest.
A large issue is that people misunderstand the common phrase “If feminism is for equality, why do feminists….” This isn’t intended to imply that all feminists engage in this behavior. What it means is it’s either a behavior we’ve seen from a large percentage of the feminist population, or one that’s being perpetrated at the movement and organization level. It’s not a generalization at all, because it’s never intended to speak to an individual feminist. It doesn’t matter if not all feminists, or not even a majority of feminists behave a certain way so long as some (in significant number) do.
Well hey, the person who wrote that is either a feminist or an ex-feminist, talking about it from that perspective. Even if she no longer considers her a feminist, she’s certainly not “co-opting” feminist language simply because she’s using it in a way that makes you uncomfortable by highlighting your own prejudices. You can take it up with her whether or not she understands what slut-shaming is or not, we just provided the link. However we think you’ll be in for a nasty surprise if you decide to have a go at her that way. Have fun. :)
That woman posted that in October. It was you that felt the need to post it now. You were the one who thought you had the “gotcha”, but you don’t, and now you can’t argue the point so you’re telling me to bring up an issue that you had to a woman who (clearly says she no longer IDs as feminist, so yes, it is co-opting the language, and even if she did ID as feminist, if she’s clearly using the language wrong, she’s still co-opting it) wrote a post about said issue months ago.
Just wanted to reblog to highlight the fact that you don’t actually know what the fuck you’re talking about. Is it anti-feminist? Ooh, must be good, right? Post it months after it’s relevant! Misuse terminology to try to prove some backwards ass point! Perfect formula!
It was posted to IFIFE because I either randomly came across it, or someone linked me to it. October wasn’t that long ago, and even if it was, the point is not the time period. There’s no expiry date on bigotry. All we need to do is prove that this happens, and it clearly has.
Regardless of the particular issue, the point being made is a relevant one regarding double-standards. If the genders had been reversed, Watson would have been vilified and described as an asshole. The man was polite, non-threatening and took “no” for an answer. The reaction from a wide variety of feminists was to attack him for….politely displaying interest in someone. What do we call it when women are attacked for displaying sexual interest? Oh, wait, we call it “slut-shaming.” Certainly there are many other components to slut-shaming, but shaming the display of sexual interest is definitely on the list. You can drone on all you like about it, but you can’t change the facts.
It’s not a “gotcha,” it’s just one more example in a long string of feminist hypocrisies. Same as always, I post something, people like you whine, and a few more followers show up who aren’t buying your bullshit. :)
If feminism is for equality, why do many hate slut shaming….except when it’s ElevatorGuy?
I don’t think you know what slut-shaming is, or you’re being deliberately obtuse. However, congratulations on finally including a link with one of your accusations (albeit not a link to any actual slut-shaming or even any examples of things that Rebecca Watson and other feminists have said about “Elevator Guy”).
Elevator Guy wasn’t “slut-shamed”, and if you knew what slut-shaming was you would know that.
This is what was said by Rebecca Watson herself, and what started the entire shitstorm (copied from Manboobz, a site you could really benefit from):
“So I walk to the elevator, and a man got on the elevator with me and said, ‘Don’t take this the wrong way, but I find you very interesting, and I would like to talk more. Would you like to come to my hotel room for coffee?’
Um, just a word to wise here, guys, uh, don’t do that. You know, I don’t really know how else to explain how this makes me incredibly uncomfortable, but I’ll just sort of lay it out that I was a single woman, you know, in a foreign country, at 4:00 am, in a hotel elevator, with you, just you, and–don’t invite me back to your hotel room right after I finish talking about how it creeps me out and makes me uncomfortable when men sexualize me in that manner.”
Would you look at that? Not once did she mention the word slut! Not once did she say “It’s bad when men have sex!”. There was no mention of how disgusting the guy was, or how he deserved to get sexually assaulted because of how he was dressed! You know, the things that actually are slut-shaming.
She said he made her uncomfortable, because she was in a very vulnerable position and she had already said how much that kind of behavior makes her uncomfortable. So elevator guy didn’t respect her wishes as far as sexuality is concerned, which makes him a creep and an asshole, not a slut. So when the blogger you linked said that “she (meaning he) didn’t push [himself] on [her]”, that is not true - he had already disregarded her feelings about being propositioned for sex once, she had no guarantee that he wouldn’t do it again in a more aggressive way, which leads to being creeped out. No one even called him a slut for that (not that anyone seriously calls men sluts anyway, or that it has any social power even if they try). They did call him a creep, though, and rightfully so. That’s what happens when you disregard people’s feelings about sexuality in an elevator alone at 4 am.
So, TL:DR, you can stop using words you don’t understand to try to discredit feminists.
Also, totally on the side, it’s incredibly telling that the only people who are still all hurty feelings about this are mostly men’s rights dudes who think it is their absolute right to be a creep in an elevator without a woman being able to complain about it on the internet. I’m so over elevator gate, and I’m sure you, my followers, are too. But god damn it it gets all over me when people try to co-opt feminist language just to make themselves think they’re more well-informed than they are or as some sort of “gotcha, feminists” when in actuality they’re not using the terms correctly at all (and they usually know it).
Well hey, the person who wrote that is either a feminist or an ex-feminist, talking about it from that perspective. Even if she no longer considers her a feminist, she’s certainly not “co-opting” feminist language simply because she’s using it in a way that makes you uncomfortable by highlighting your own prejudices. You can take it up with her whether or not she understands what slut-shaming is or not, we just provided the link. However we think you’ll be in for a nasty surprise if you decide to have a go at her that way. Have fun. :)
because some men are oppressed but never for being men.
some men are oppressed for being a person of color, for being trans*, for being poor, for being queer.
but never for being a man.
is
is this blog
is OP for…
I agree for the most part with yggdrasil’s response to cuntycuntycunty, but I think there is a lot of confusion between the sociological and popular definitions of terms like “racism”, “misogyny”, and “misandry.” Arguing against a person using the popular definition of these terms by using the sociological definition doesn’t create a compelling argument, because you are both talking about different things. In some sense, the sociological definition is more useful and represents a more nuanced understanding of racism and mis***y, but they were not the subject that cuntycuntycunty was breaching.
Neo, the problem is that the “sociological” definition you’re talking about isn’t actually accepted by the sociological community. PoN discusses the definition and its formation in general here. In fact, the “popular” definition nowadays seems to be the “power + prejudice” one, while the scientific community and those of us that take the time to look it up use what you’re thinking of when you say the “popular one.”
In the popular sense, misandrists and misogynists can exist in any culture, patriarchal or matriarchal. Does the fact that these people are individuals acting without the force of an entire culture behind them limit the amount of damage the can do to a person or group of people’s lives? Sure. But that doesn’t mean that the potential damage to a person or group of people is zero. Even in a misogynist culture in the sociological sense, a lone misandrist in the popular sense couldn’t destroy a man’s life if she wanted. If there is one thing that people do well it’s find new, creative, and ingenious ways of ruining other people’s lives.
This is a problem. Even if we do use your “sociological” (or more correctly “made-up”) definition, you seem to be assuming that misandry is something that can only be perpetrated by women, and since “women aren’t in power” there can be no societal misandry. Anyone can perpetrate misandry, and as is mentioned here there is evidence of men being discriminated against wholesale in law and institution. Even by that “sociological” definition, misandry exists in the U.S. today.
Also, it turns out that if we limit sexism to actual institutional power we find that virtually all sexism against women….doesn’t qualify.
Thank you for your response. It was illuminating. You’re correct that I betrayed an assumption that misandrists would be female, and I will be more careful in the future to not pattern my thinking like that. As to the “sociological” vs “popular”, thank you for pointing out my error. My basic point still stands, namely, Yggdrasil failed to make a compelling response to cuntycuntycunty due to both of them using different definitions of the words under discussion.
I actually disagree with your assessment that “prejudice + power” has become the popular definition. At least in my anecdotal experience the definitions seem to be divided this way: people in meat-space use just “prejudice”, parts of the social justice community online use “prejudice and power”, and based on your assessment sociologists use just “prejudice” as well.
I still stand by what I said to a degree. When I said that the internet social justice (what I previously called the “sociological”) definitions of racism, etc. were more nuanced than the sociological/popular definition (what I previously called “popular”), I meant it. Whether that nuance is useful to discussion, or helpful when it’s being read into words with traditionally broader meanings is another topic entirely, and outside of the scope of what I was and am trying to say in my response to Yggdrasil.
True, when I was talking about it being “popular” I was referring to within tumblr and other internet activist communities. The general public’s still using what I consider to be the correct one. I personally find the SJ definition to be much less nuanced, because it totally ignores individual circumstances in favor of lumping people into classes of “privileged” and “disprivileged” without really considering the individual cases that make all the difference. As I’ve seen, this definition as it is is almost never used to actually highlight discrimination or -ist behavior, but rather is used to excuse -ist behavior from “acceptable” people towards “acceptable” targets.
That’s my problem with it.
Because I do??
Yes, but many feminists do not. Accepting those differing standards is something inherently opposed to equality, and thus should be inherently opposed to the basic principles of feminism. The fact that some, let alone many feminists do not oppose these and many were instrumental in putting them in place is the problem.
One of the issues with IFIFE is that people tend to take these things personally. When we say “why do feminists…?” what we mean is “why are there feminists that…?” not “why does every single feminist…?” When we speak about feminism as a whole, we’re speaking about the actions of the movement as an aggregate. Even if only fifty-one percent, barely more than half are engaging in a problematic behavior then it completely justifies the statement even though almost every second feminist will claim to disagree. You agreeing that this is wrong is great support, but it does nothing to counter the point: you’re just the one in ten, one in five, one in three that isn’t a bigot on this particular issue.
This also has to do with power. Feminism as a movement does have leaders even though it’s very fractured. What this means is that a comparative handful of people hold an awful lot of power. If they’re bigots, the actions of feminism will be bigoted even if all other feminists are well-meaning and the “bad feminists” are a substantial minority. Why? Well, feminists tend to stick together, even when they should be calling each other out. They’re happy to attack ideological differences between groups, but rarely do so when the issue is the group’s effect on the outside world.
You oppose this. Great. Now where were you and all the other feminists who oppose it when feminist lobbyists were pushing for it in the first place?
(Source: iffeminismisforequality)
“If feminism is for equality, why didn’t they see any problem with “boys are stupid, throw rocks at them” being marketed to preteen girls?”
Yep, that’s the one.
(Source: iffeminismisforequality, via )
