the trivial issues add up. straw that broke the camel's back and all that just having these discussions on MAP and with other people outside my normal social group has really opened up my perception on stuff and encouraged me to read A LOT. i remember an embarrassing thread when i first joined MAP in which i really believed that in the colonial era of britain, all british folks lived in the lap of luxury while the colonies toiled away. simon and southpaw both told me i was stupid and wrong, and i didnt listen. how wrong i was. very very wrong.
That doesn't categorise the feminist position at all. The "internet's gonna internet" was brought up by Lefty to diminish the rape threats and abuse of the woman involved in "gamergate" (and yet wasn't brought up mitigate the feedback Matt Taylor got). So a "woman gets rape threats" = internet gonna internet. "man gets stick for his poor clothing choice" = Damn those feminazi's! "Internet gonna internet" is an AWFUL reason to use. Shirt gate was utterly ridiculous. Before Taylor got anywhere near the cameras someone should have had a word so it was never even an issue. But I maintain the initial stick he got was fairly mild and within reasonable lines (a few twitter comments and some disappointed blog posts). It became unreasonable when the feminists were told to shut up and let him have his special day because science was happening.
This is on a par with something I saw recently yelling "Depression is not a mental illness!". It fundamentally fails to understand the basic principles. Being opposed to wacky extreme feminist ideas doesn't make you anti-feminist anymore than finding Fred Phelps' views abhorrent makes you anti Christian. What many people in these kinds of discussions do is basically use a caricature of feminism made up of a conglomeration of views from the extreme end of the scale. The opposite of feminist is by definition mysogynist. What people try to express as humanist in these discussions IS moderate feminism.
I didn't say it did. I said those were comments used by feminists on MAP during the discussion. Which they were. I should clarify before I continue, I'm not going to argue about whether or not the shirt was a problem, but my problem is still that people felt justified in reacting that way and that others didn't dismiss it. So tell me, where are the feminist blogs that speak for feminist theory to suggest that the treatment he received wasn't OK? I'm 90% sure it was but I'll look before I continue this further. It is an awful excuse and nothing excuses it. But there is a general consensus that the people who send rape threats, however vile, are usually trolls out to stir trouble on purpose. It doesn't make it OK or reasonable,, but that's the general attitude. The way the feminist community on social media went after Matt wasn't trolling. That was deliberate systemic harassment that brought a man to tears over an article of clothing that could only be suggested was a problem in a wider context and not for what it was itself. Or as one very unfortunate poster put it: Spoiler Where as another shirt that went viral at the time: Spoiler Barely even got a murmur. Again, no great outcry from the feminist community, no outcries about how shirts like the one Jessica wore are hypocritical because of the promoted double standard, nothing. Again, can't judge a group by the extremes, can judge a group of individuals with a common viewpoint by the way they respond to something. He was already brought to tears on camera and felt forced to apologise before that ever happened. It had already taken it too far.
obvious disconnect here. those who made rape threats are "trolls" not "gamers" yet those who attacked matt taylor through social media are not "trolls" they are "the feminist community". on both sides there is the argument we have no true scotsman. this is the point in a spectrum.
Did you feel disadvantaged by the second shirt Sloth? Did it make you feel less valued by society? Did it make you feel that if you went to work in that field you'd never be taken seriously? No? That's why there was no outcry, because they are very different on a fundamental level.
I hate that statement so very much. True. There is a lot more to her reasoning about why she doesn't agree with feminism but you'd have to watch her radio interviews and speeches at different conferences to hear more. As does any group about any other group it does not agree with. Ok. Then what Feminism is by definition is misandric (sp?) because it does nothing to give any concerns for the thoughts, feelings or political standings of men in society, only concerning itself with one view. If feminism was about absolute equality for everyone, it would be called Egalitarianism. :dunno:
For you sloth: Kind of hard to ensure equal cultural rights without involving men (the other 50% of the population) aye?
That's a good point and something I'm going to have to think about. Though I would like to see what tweets Matt got and what articles or blogs written about how the shirt was "sexist and degrading" or similar were considered troll posts. It made me wonder if she genuinely took men seriously, if her brand of feminism would be accessible to men like myself and if I could identify with her and her views.* ^^ Sound familiar in any way, shape or form? *No, it didn't, because I have thicker skin than that. Are you seriously suggesting that a Hawaiian shirt made as a birthday present by a female friend and given to him for his birthday that does not directly depict anything innately degrading behaviour or humiliating poses to the community at large has made women as a group of people suddenly go "Oh well, now I no longer feel important, but I did a moment ago!"...? Your argument is hypocritical. "It's different 'cos MEN ARE IN CHARGE!". It's basic patriarchy theory and along the same lines of insanity that Anita Sarkeesian came out with when she said "Misandry doesn't exist 'cos privilege + sexism".
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-girls-are-responsible-for-rape-10079894.html And this is why feminism needs to exist.
Slothy, you neeeed to read into bell hooks and the men's liberation movements in feminism: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Men%27s_liberation_movement http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_hooks
Movements need an identity. You can dismiss any movement by just saying "I think everyone should be equal". That's fine as an end goal but you need to set out bounds and identities. Egalitarianism is too nebulous. IMHO to promote change you need "isms" and "movements" and "identities". To define terms and rally people to the cause.
Nope, I do not know the context of every quote. Nor do I agree with the quotes in isolation. That's not the point. It is the way she engages with the debate that irks me. She's purely reactionary, often contradictory, and has an annoying habit of taking historical examples of the "power" that women wield out of context. In many ways, she reminds me of how Fox News paint NAACP, or the whole "political correctness gone mad" Daily Mail types. Just because those ideas exist does not mean that all people who identify as feminist agree with them. I must admit, I've not seen or heard tons of her stuff, but I've yet to hear her say anything novel or constructive. She's a reactionary, who has built a career out of publicity through outrage. No, not just white-knighting, she explicitly said that men only come to the aid of women to sleep with more women, that it is part of a biological impulse to attract mates. Which seems highly contradictory for an egalitarian humanitarian, and spouting unfounded nonsense for more youtube hits. I'm not calling her a misogynist per se, but she certainly lends ammunition to misogynists, and I'd be very suprised if she doesn't do this knowingly for publicity. I can't remember the last time I saw an actual academic feminist in the mainstream media. What kind of examples are you thinking about? Of course she can express her opinions, whatever the motivation behind them. Just as I am free to call her ideas reactionary, contradictory and at times plain stupid. So, you can judge a black activist by their views on Malcolm X, or the role of the Nation of Islam or Black Panthers in their historical context? To be honest, I don't see feminism as a movement. It seems far too splintered and fractured for it to be called a "theology" (interesting term you used there - deliberate, or a Freudian slip?).
Yes it is. You can push for women to have the same rights as men, but should men fall behind in any political, legal or social area it doesn't require women to step up and help men either. I'm all for equal rights. But I genuinely believe neo-feminism is more about gender supremacy than equality.
Mainstream feminist thought is that the status quo is bad for society as a whole. It would be, if we were starting from a position of equality. As it is we're starting from a position of disparity where one group enjoys privileges in a social machinery that perpetuates those privileges while another group is materially disadvantaged to sustain those privileges. Therefore the action for egalitarianism is to advance women until they are equal to men.
Jeez...you're still not getting it man. I don't know how many times or ways I can say that it's not just about the shirt.
How do you define "neo-feminism"? I was under the impression that feminism has become very much less extreme on the fringes than it was in the 60's-80's.
No it's not, yours is myopic. I don't see anything wrong with that, and how is it insane? You've already demonstrated that misandric actions don't effect you in the way that mysogyny does women, because you're protected by a society that already works in your favour.
Not just horrific things happening in other countries, although we should be concerned about that as well. I've definitely seen men take a step backward in attitudes to women since the 90's. It's like we're sliding back to the 70's in some ways. We need people who are loud and, at times, annoying or extreme on the fringes to help steer the middle ground back in the direction we were going as a society.
There are people that take the movement against racial inequality too far (black people wanting to be separate from other races for example) and yet racial equality as an ideal isn't abandoned. There are people that take gay rights too far (using pejorative terms for hetero people for example) and yet equal rights as ideals aren't abandoned. It's only really with sexism and feminism where I see people take the worse examples and right off a whole movement because of them.
