Justin Cascio names five ways feminism helps men.
Can’t think of a single reason why men should support feminism? Here are five.
- Gives us equal partners. For men who have women in their lives as co-parents, lovers, wives, partners, clients, and associates, it means that our partners in these relationships have equal power.
- Provides a model for consciously changing gender roles. Women have changed what it means to be a woman. Even women who don’t call themselves feminists have had their ideas of themselves shaped by feminism. Women who imagine themselves pursuing a career, or even imagine themselves having choices of whether and when to become a wife or a mother, owe their freedom to choose to feminist thought. As men, we have had our lives changed just as helplessly as the women have. We have the same power, as men, to consciously shape what we think a man should be, and how to live up to the standards we create. Feminism taught us it can happen.
- Provokes us to consider the many identities that yoke us, sometimes in competing directions. Through feminist dialogue and consciousness raising, women began to realize that their identities as wives, mothers, daughters, and sisters were colored by their other identities: as human beings, citizens, workers, artisans, people of color, people with disabilities, queer people… the list of identities goes on, and the ways they overlap filter our experiences and to some degree determine who we are. Men are as subject to these double and triple yokes that tell us what we should be doing or caring about.
- Encourages us to speak in our own voices.Betty Friedan identified a problem without a name, and began a conversation that hasn’t stopped. There are problems that men have that don’t have names, because we are not encouraged to talk with one another about our lives in the same ways, and because we want our stories to fit into the patterns that already exist: to make sense of them. By having the courage to talk about our experience, even when it doesn’t match our ideas of what a man does or feels, we can begin to learn what our common experiences are, and to name them.
- Makes us all more free. Unless all of us are free, none of us are free. As long as women still feel the pulls of gender roles, men are forced by the laws of physics into an equal and opposing position. And as long as anyone in our world is subject to limitations because of an identity like those we construct around sex and gender, race and ethnicity, and our deeply held beliefs and loyalties, then any of us is subject to being limited for who and what we are, or for what we believe in.
—Photo credit: cliff1066™/Flickr
About Justin Cascio
I know that I’m coming WAY late to this discussion, but I’m super confused about what’s going on here.
Sure, there are a TON of problems with feminism, but does that mean they have to be brought up every single time that feminism is discussed?
Is it really so hard to accept that feminism served a legitimate purpose and has benefited society?
Maybe this is an offensive comparison (and I apologize if anyone undergoing treatment is offended), but I think that analogizing feminism to chemo therapy is very apt.
There are extreme problems with it, but the pervasive misogynistic attitudes that existed for decades were unquestionably a cancer on human society that needed to be purged. Like real chemo therapy, there were terrible, horrible side effects, many that last to this day. But, like with chemo therapy, the cancer was considerably reduced (perhaps eliminated, but I know that’s far for contentious).
We can discuss the effective use of chemo therapy without bringing up the side effects every single time. We can acknowledge that it is necessary without lauding the experience of treatment.
Why can’t we accomplish the same thing with feminism? Isn’t it possible to acknowledge the successes without pounding the drums about the failures? Why is it so hard to acknowledge the good?
When someone starts describing the beneficial effects like losing ones hair (so they don’t need to shave now) or the constant retching and nausea (great for weight loss), are we allowed to speak up then? What about when they start talking about the good effects, like making your teeth whiter or strengthening the immune system? Because that is precisely what this article did.
Mark,
I respectfully disagree. I honestly believe that this piece falls firmly in the “it cured the cancer” category.
I will happily posit that feminism may not have a place in modern society. I will gladly stipulate that there are myriad problems with feminism. If you look at my other comments on this site, you will see that I genuinely question the continued existence of Gender Studies as a field of academic inquiry, and furthermore condemn their methods.
But “First Wave” feminism also began in the 1800s. Is there serious doubt that it played a part in “creating more equal partners” as the author suggests in the first point?
Similarly, is it really debatable, as mentioned in the second point, that the way women saw themselves changed?
I would stipulate the third point mainly because it gave language to describe a very bad idea. I personally find “privilege” and “intersectionality” to be ill-thought-out and distasteful. But that doesn’t mean we cannot credit feminism with bringing these ideas to the forefront. Nor are we worse off for having heard the ideas out. In the words of Justice Holmes, “The best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition in the market.” We needed to have these ideas enter the discussion so that we could dispose of them. And make no mistake, they have been disposed of: they are not seriously discussed outside of narrow echo-chambers, and have little impact on wider society.
I would argue that point 5 flows from point 1, we are all more free if we have equal partners.
That leaves point 4, and I believe that to be correct. While I do not agree with ideas like “privilege” I have found the vocabulary useful for communicating with people who do. Sometimes we really do need the language just to have the debate.
So there you have it: I personally believe that the 5 points, as brought up, were positive developments for men. And I don’t need to point out the shortcomings of feminism to get there.
Yes, each of those points I have debated.
http://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/five-ways-feminism-helps-men/comment-page-2/#comment-157659
But I suppose the first can sorta be seen from the point of view the author is trying to push… after all, for the supposedly oppressed to transfer to the position of oppressor, one must inevitably get closer to parity. Is this a benefit to men? To believe it is, we must first reject the (gender) feminist notion that men seek to oppress women (I’m ok with this, but to believe feminists will in order to honestly claim this is a benefit for men… for most, that’s hard to believe given how ingrained oppression theory is in the dogma). To believe it is of benefit to men, we must also believe that it will end at parity, and clearly, it has not.
Otherwise, see my linked post for my arguments against his points.
I think it is much more accurate to say that a fair amount of misogyny and oppression rose out of role models that were NOT based in oppression but on biological necessity. Otherwise almost every culture ever developed would not have risen around it. Biology IS destiny. Women’s bodies and therefore brains and drives were based on reproducing and caring for the young. Men’s bodies were built for strength and to protect/provide for women while they carried, bore, and cared for children. That is indisputable and how all societies (minus the 2 or 3 you can quote from Wiki) were formed.
After 1000s of years of progress/civilization women (and to an extent men) were freed from many of the contraints of their biology. Society lagged behind and women in large part forced it to catch up. Doubtless many men along the way did not given ‘woman’s work’ near the credit it deserved or project those skills / abilities as being applicable to traditional male roles. Men figured they fought the wars, built the bridges and invented the planes and women ‘just has the babies’ and so took women’s abilities and contributions for granted.
Thus it was not oppression/misogyny that was the goal rather that oppression and misogyny were just some of the outgrowths of a society thus stratified. Note that in the same way many men do not give women credit for the wars/bridges/cars women do not take any of the blame for them (at least for the war part) and lay that at men’s feet, which is were a lot of misandry comes from i.e. men are stupid brutes they’d be nothing without us.
One could easily look at male/female dynamics from out of space and see women as oppressors; what is this species women have that toils and lays their limb and lives to protect them?
Feminism doesn’t believe that men oppress women, it believes the patriarchy oppressed women (and some would argue, it also oppressed men in some ways too). The system itself placed women in a role with less power than the role it placed men in. Isn’t it best if we can all be free from being placed in pre-decided roles altogether so we can all have the same opportunities?
Feminism doesn’t believe that men oppress women, it believes the patriarchy oppressed women (and some would argue, it also oppressed men in some ways too).
If that’s the case then why do so many feminists blanketly label all men as oppressors and all women as oppressed? And of course there is the very prevalent thought that men cannot be oppressed because of gender and even when they do grudgingly admit that men can be harmed in any (except systemic) way there is still a change they will somehow try to say its a side effect of what’s happening to women. Yeah apparently the bad things that happen to the vast majority of men is not a feature of a system built to mow down anyone for the sake of the few in power, no the bad things that happen to men are just collateral damage of the real goal of keeping women down apparently.
The system itself placed women in a role with less power than the role it placed men in.
Another broad statement. It gets confusing that feminists say they don’t want to make generalizations but then turn around and argue that the system places men over women. And it also doesn’t help that a lot of them will use “overall”, “for the most part”, etc…. as a dodge to avoid talking about specific measurements. Well dodge the measurements where women have advantage over men (that is if they don’t twist and spin it until it looks like women are on the short end).
Isn’t it best if we can all be free from being placed in pre-decided roles altogether so we can all have the same opportunities?
I agree it would be best. But how can you work on freeing everyone from all those predecided roles when you have people who actively deny and downplay which predecided need to be dealt with based on what gender they affect?
I have a hard time believing folks that say they want to see dads be more active parents while at the same time fighting against equal custody measures. I have a hard time believe that folks that say they want to see men and boys improve in the realm of education but then constantly try to say that education discrepencies are all a result of race and class (despite the fact that boys lag behind girls in nearly ever measure). I have a hard time believe folks that say they want male victims of female rapists and abusers taken seriously when they literally can’t talk about male victims without constantly putting in a reminder that “women have it worse” as if they are going to forget the “real victims” by throwing the occasional bone to male victims (funny how folks want the ability to talk about women without having to mention men but are not willing to extend that same courtesy to men).
Very well put. I have thought the same things. I’ll have to think about the “feminism as chemo” analogy. Interesting.
Mike L: I think your analogy is almost perfect, with one possible exception and this coming from a woman, Feminism didn’t cure the cancer , it simply transferred it to men and in some ways children. So while the person who was sick doesn’t have cancer anymore, she simply passed it on to her child OR her husband/brother/father/uncle.
Hello Everyone,
Just letting everyone know that we’re a couple moderators short this week. If your comment ends up in moderation for an extended period chances are that’s the reason. Please have patience. Thanks.
Justin,
Your thoughtful essay dovetails with my analysis of how feminism has distilled in the collective mindset of Baby Boomer men. Here’s an excerpt from my book, “Generation Reinvention: How Boomers Today Are Changing Business, Marketing, Aging and the Future.” (2010)
Boomer men were and are widely supportive of feminism, especially those aspects of the social movement focused on economic equality and full participation in institutional society. Many recall early encounters with feminism during their teen years: perhaps a polite request not to open the door for a young woman passing by, or a more vociferous denunciation by being called a “male chauvinist pig.”
The experiences of feminism often served to confuse Boomer men; they wanted to please their female counterparts but did not necessarily wish to relinquish some of the privileges and territory of maleness as their fathers and grandfathers had defined it. Boomer men sometimes feel caught between opposing values about sexual roles: those celebrating full equality between the sexes, and those that honor the special privileges of manhood such as classic corporate and institutional power. Many privileges under onslaught today spring from ancient religious traditions and time-honored customs when men practiced rituals of initiation, preferred separation from females during specific periods and seasons, and developed their own language nuances and culture.
Patriarchic traditions are under siege today in the cultural narratives expressed through books and movies. For example, an article in The Atlantic described how role reversals are impacting Boomer men, once-upon-a-time large and in-charge of romantic relationships: “Up in the Air, a movie set against the backdrop of recession-era layoffs, hammers home its point about the shattered ego of the American man. A character played by George Clooney is called too old to be attractive by his younger female colleague and is later rejected by an older woman whom he falls in love with after she sleeps with him—and who turns out to be married. George Clooney! If the sexiest man alive can get twice rejected (and sexually played) in a movie, what hope is there for anyone else? The message to American men is summarized by the title of a recent offering from the romantic-comedy mill: She’s Out of My League.”
It seems that Boomer men, out of choice in youth and out of necessity in middle age, have embraced the precepts and implications of feminism. Will women in the future embrace the possibilities of maleness as it finds new expressions in elderhood?
Thanks, Justin for this thought-provoking article. I wanted to share just a few thoughts. The issue of men struggling to find a voice (#4 in your list) is an issue close to my heart and one I frequently see in my therapy work with men—in particular, the struggle to find a voice that is allowed freedom from the grip of our masculine, internalized restrictions.
Sadly, too many men continue to remain estranged from their emotional needs, and these men often appear confused when I suggest that they actually have a rich inner world that is going unnoticed, one that consists of psychological and emotional needs (and these are highly educated men!). These men have been myopically shaped and, as adults, are struggling to create the coherent narratives needed to capture their inner world, a narrative that allows for vulnerability, and one that ultimately can lead to deeper self- and other-intimacy.
In its most extreme form, our narrowed voice (and our limiting perspectives) prevents us from identifying our own abuse histories. I’ve treated men who were significantly abused (either physical or sexual), and all too often these men didn’t or couldn’t name their experiences as such—without the psychological and emotional foundation that would allow this truth to be known, these men didn’t have the thoughts and voices for the unthinkable. I believe the feminist movement (a movement that worked to identify how women’s authenticity was being subjugated), gave men schemata for questioning the male status quo, a movement that modeled how our truest power lies in having the freedom to examine our deepest-held assumptions about who we are, to question what is acceptable and unacceptable, and to recognize the oppressive forces that prevent us from seeing our fullest potentials.
Backwards on the comment thread a really excellent point was made about do we talk about christians and communists and other movements as monolithic or not.
One poster angrily responded that despite her being a christian she was not anti-gay.
The problem is that Christianity has a written set of rules, that states homosexuality is a sin. Even though an individual member may not be anti-gay, they are still in cohoots with orgs that practice anti-gay discrimination in ordaining priests and sisters and other affects.
Which lead me to thinking. Does feminism have a set of rules in general, or in regards to men?
One unofficial rule I have observed is that if you are pro-life you cannot be part of feminism. You can call yourself feminism, you may even be able to go on marches. But, a pro-life member will never successfully or easily climb the ladder within feminist political orgs (just as pro-gay or even gay members of a church will never climb the ladder in christian orgs).
To count as an equality movement (on balance based on aggregate actions not the personal beliefs of all members), personally I would expect to see those at the top of feminist orgs policing to correct behavior that was non egalitarian.
In other words the message (through words *and* actions) would be delivered from the top that members from feminist orgs would be expected to advocate for everybody: men, women, children of all sexes and orientations and colors.
Not only do I not see this within feminism (particularly with regards to advocating for men), but I actually see *the reverse*.
I see hateful and discriminatory laws against men passed at self-identifying feminist orgs insistence and lobbying. Not only is very hateful ideas and misinformation (turned into laws) being pushed under the feminist banner, but there appears to be no *policing* of these actions.
The other rule I have observed as far as what large feminist orgs practice is that advocating for men is *optional* based on the beliefs of it’s members, but not necessary or even encouraged by those at the top.
If advocating for inequities against men is optional and anti-male pressure is not policed, then feminism can’t be egalitarian. What it is is an advocacy group. No different from the NAACP, Anti-Defamation League, Latino organizations. All are expressly only interested in advocating for their own groups.
Did any feminist orgs or feminist duluth wheel entrenched DV centers contact CBS to register disapproval about The Talks Sharon Osbourne mocking Katherine Klue Beckers husband for being a victim of DV? What about the battle cry of feminist orgs “we care about *all* those subjected to violence within the home”?
Have NOW or any other political feminist orgs ever had a march over a mens issue?
Feminism is (largely based upon the aggregate actions of it’s political orgs) a movement *by* women, *for* women, mainly concerned with addressing women’s rights, not mens.
Couple of points: With regards to homosexuality and Christianity and gay men/women rising in Christian organizations, I present to you Gene Robinson. Not to mention all the Christian churches around the world that are pro-lgbt rights, or at the very least not anti-lgbt rights. But Robinson is such a great example because he’s openly gay and a bishop of a rather mainstream denomination. He didn’t have to go create a non-denominational church or something…this is a church with around 2 million members in the U.S. that has been around since the colonial era. So even in an old organization with a written rule book (which feminism does not have), things can change. So there’s that.
Part of the reason feminism doesn’t actually have a written set of rules, or whatever, is that it’s not a belief system. It’s an interpretive framework and a subject of academic study on the one hand, and a political movement on the other. I think that is part of where there seems to be some confusion. The two (academic and political) are not mutually exclusive by any means…but they are somewhat separated. Justin’s points are largely referring to the interpretive and academic aspects of feminism. He’s referencing the various ways in which feminism has redefined and re-imagined gender and he’s pointing out how those re-imaginings have benefited men. And academic feminism, in particular, is much more gender focused rather than just women focused.
Feminist organizations (I’m not talking political or academic, specifically at the moment.) are often reworking themselves so that they’re more equality driven. I mean, not painlessly and it’s not as if everyone is saying ‘oh yes let’s be more equal.’ There’s power struggles and all that nonsense, of course. But whether it’s from outside pressure or internal pressure, feminist organizations (again not political or academic, specifically) change with the times. Heck, there are three ‘official’ waves derived from just that.
As for whether a political feminist organization has ever held a march for a men’s issue…an exclusively men’s issue…I just don’t know. What I do know is that they have advocated for changes that benefit men. My understanding is that the VAWA has largely been updated so that it’s language is gender-neutral as well. How that is put into practice is another issue…but my point is that the political aspects of feminism aren’t quite as one-sided as might first seem. (Not saying it’s perfect, by any means)
Also, as you read the above, please keep in mind everything I’ve said before at GMP about how there are valid criticisms of feminism, that we need more male birth control options, that family court fails men, etc. Because I’d like to discuss this and not have to defend myself and prove (again) that I’m not some man-hating wack-job.
And given how many amazing comments in support of men you’ve made, I’m sad you feel that you have to put that caveat there.
“And given how many amazing comments in support of men you’ve made, I’m sad you feel that you have to put that caveat there.”
Why is that? Men here continually out caveats in their posts, it is part of trying to have a delicate discussion where many people don’t put in caveats because they don’t intend them. I salute her for doing so.
“Because I’d like to discuss this and not have to defend myself and prove (again) that I’m not some man-hating wack-job.
”
That is a much appreciated sentiment. Much of at least my problem with discussing male/female issues with women is that there is often no desire to discuss anything but women’s issues and any issue brought up by men is either quickly countered/nullified with some (often unrelated) issue that women have, justified with ‘well men have done x for years’ or ‘women wouldn’t do A if men didn’t do B’, or simply some version of ‘man up’ (as we’ve discussed in another thread).
When we do find a woman such as yourself is open to discussing issues and can see both sides of the situation (as I believe men have tried verrrrrrrrrrry hard for at least 4 decades now) we are far more open to relaxing our position as well. I believe it is women like you and men like myself and others on here that will affect most of the change that is so dearly needed for both genders.
I suppose it’s because as moderators Heather and I are very familiar with the various voices on the posts. I rarely need to get those caveats from particular people because I feel that i know them. She’s here every day (or nearly) as am I, working for the site, expressing positive sentiment and given that she’s commenting in good faith, it struck me that she might be putting that caveat up not because of openness, but because she’d expect negative response from people who may already have seen her positions.
My take on it. I know that I feel that I need to do that anyway. That 9 months of writing and commenting in good faith still means I need to put up a blanket caveat of my positions with people that I know. And yes, there are new people every day.
My opinion. She can comment on it if she wishes.
Pretty much, yeah.
That make sense if you are a moderator Julie and I can see from that reference point where you would make that point. Not all of us are moderators or have been here for 9 months. I am just getting that Heather is a ‘voice of reason’ after only several days here, so for me her caveat is appreciated and gives me some context about who she is and where she comes from. I’m imagining Heather is not writing to or for the moderators specifically and perhaps not just for ongoing conversations with other long term members but for anyone joining the conversation such as myself.
Heather is a moderator as well. And both of us write to members new and old, purely for the discussion. Context is vital, you are right, but it is still concerning to me (and it’s only my opinion) that so many of the conversations wind up so fraught. All in the interest of moving forward, I do understand that, but often it is tiring to work so hard to be understood, on either side of things.
“I do understand that, but often it is tiring to work so hard to be understood, on either side of things.”
Amem to that Sister
And given how many amazing comments in support of men you’ve made, I’m sad you feel that you have to put that caveat there.
Its the result of backlashing. Despite popular belief the waking up one day and listening to a Rush Limbaugh podcast marathon is not the only way someone can become overly critical of feminism.
We just have to learn how to dial it back.
Julie and Heather (and other contributors and volunteers of tgmp) who count themselves feminists: I don’t have a problem with you. You are doing the good work of fighting for true equality.
I am talking about the aggregate direct affects upon men of feminism. And the grouping of rules around which the “movement” in aggregate seems comfortable.
One of those rules is that fighting for men is not “mandatory” to the movement but optional upon individual members or groups of members.
The second rule seems to be that when a group of self-identifying feminists fight for anti-male change under the banner of feminism, there seems to be very little policing (at least from the top).
The third rule seems to be that when very influential and well-known feminists validly criticize feminism (either for anti-male excess or other extremism) they are disowned from the movement as much as possible.
Look at Christina Hoff-Somers or Camille Paglia, Cathy Young or Kathleen Parker or Warren Farrell (who served as chairman of the NY branch of now for 3 terms) who have published many articles and books critical of feminist excess. They are social pariahs within the movement and are considered enemies of feminism by the leaders of the movement even though all of these authors/editorialists still self-identify as feminist.
Considering that these (what I would call) noble authors/editorialists concerned about true equality self-identify as feminist and so do posters on radical fem web-pages that support theories that 90% of men must be removed from society to save earth *also* self-identify as feminist shows you that the idea that each person can have their own *personal* definition of what feminism means that the movement therefore has no definition whatsoever.
Considering how inconsistent this is and how the definition of feminism has been ridiculously trivialized, you shouldn’t take it so personally when people talk about the harms of feminism, as obviously feminism as defined by outsiders who have been harmed by it, no longer applies to you.
” What I do know is that they have advocated for changes that benefit men.”
The link you point to is about changes that (purportedly and as you can see by the responses have not been experienced by men as doing so) benefit men and only in ways that are ancillary and perhaps unintended, i.e. they changes that were advocated were intended to benefit women (which in and of itself is a perfectly laudable goal).
How often do women’s groups advocate for men’s rights when they might be at odds with or abridge women’s rights when clearly the men’s rights in those cases should be axiomatic based on the very principles women’s groups embrace? If women truly believe men should have an equal responsibility to care for children, wouldn’t one of the very best ways to achieve that be to fight for men’s custody rights to institutionalize that principle not to mention to afford men the rights that go along with that responsibility? If Roe V Wade’s core reasoning is that women should not be subject to ‘indentured servitude’ and should not be forced to have a child by a man they don’t wish to be a parent with and/or when they are not emotionally/financially/situationally ready for it, wouldn’t they fight for men’s rights for the same via ‘financial abortion’? If women themselves believed in their rights to full equality wouldn’t they fight to pay for dinners and eschew relationships with men that provided for them financially?
The question isn’t ‘do the actions of women’s groups benefit men in some ways’ it is ‘do women’s groups believe in full equality even when it means abridging some rights they have come to take for granted along the way just as men are expected to do and in fact have embraced’?
Alright I’ve a problem with the phrase “abridge rights.” No, of course, no equality-based organization is going to try to abridge rights. What they will (and should) be trying to do is abridge privileges. That’s something of a semantics issue, I know…but I think it’s important. Allowing for ‘financial abortion’ doesn’t mean abridging a woman’s rights…neither do any of the other things you’re talking about. They could abridge privileges, though.
Now, as to the meat of your comment…I just don’t know. I’m not a political feminist. My feminism is very academic in nature. I’ve heard all the arguments that point out how (apparently) feminism is working against all the issues you bring up. At the very least I agree that feminism isn’t currently working very publicly for the issues you mentioned. Whether they are doing things behind the scenes in favour of men’s rights, I don’t know. I know that the feminists I know are all for greater recognition of stay-at-home dads, for one thing.
Gloria Steinem, of all people, once said something along the lines of: “Women can’t be equal outside the home until men are equal in it.” Interestingly she doesn’t consider herself an academic feminist (from what I understand). She’s very politically oriented. (Mind, she’s also quite anti-porn, which I disagree with…but that’s neither here nor there). My point is that much of feminist thought is about breaking down traditional gender roles for everyone. There are plenty of ways in which feminism has ended up reinforcing those gender roles, yes. And that is certainly problematic. For example, the language around domestic violence is quite problematic in the way it casts men as aggressors and women as victims.
“If women themselves believed in their rights to full equality wouldn’t they fight to pay for dinners and eschew relationships with men that provided for them financially?”
It’s interesting you ask this question. There have been groups of feminists that do just this, actually. The whole ‘political lesbian’ movement in the 1970s (I think it was the 70s) was in part about this. It was a combination of not entering into the ‘restricting institution of marriage,’ but also wanting to be able to walk the walk, so to speak. There have been feminists throughout history who have refused to get married, not because they were lesbians, but because they wanted to prove that a woman could be financially independent. In my own high-school feminist way, I did the same thing…when I’d go on dates with guys (before I realized I was gay) I never let the guy pay for me. Once I threatened to throw my share of the cost of a movie into the trash if he didn’t take the cash. Immature and silly, but still…the point was that I was trying to do exactly what you asked above.
Alright I’ve a problem with the phrase “abridge rights.” No, of course, no equality-based organization is going to try to abridge rights. What they will (and should) be trying to do is abridge privileges. That’s something of a semantics issue, I know…but I think it’s important.”
Actually I think it is a great point and goes beyond semantics.
“There have been feminists throughout history who have refused to get married, not because they were lesbians, but because they wanted to prove that a woman could be financially independent. In my own high-school feminist way, I did the same thing…when I’d go on dates with guys (before I realized I was gay) I never let the guy pay for me.”
I wasn’t quite advocating doing away with marriage, or even doing away with paying. I just find that as a single man the very women who are so insistent on ‘equality’ wouldn’t dream of paying for a meal and every where I look that paradigm remains whether it is ‘well you’re the man’ or ‘well I spent a lot to look good’ etc. Here is the thing; I LOVE paying. It makes me feel great to make that gesture to a woman and only if/when she is someone who appreicates the gesture for what it is and NOT as some obligation I owe her. If a woman doesn’t want me to pay I have no issues with it though THAT has never happened. If a woman doesn’t say ‘thank you’ (and not the way American Express says it when I pay my *debt*) I won’t ask her out again.
Personally I think there is just a natural and core relationship that men and women have and I think it makes for a really beautiful thing. This whole gender-neutral thing doesn’t work for me in romantic relationships; I just think there needs to be a way to embrace those without demeaning or devaluing anyone and with out forcing anyone into a subservient role whether that is physical or financial. When I take a woman out and she beams and touches my arm and says ‘thank you’ because she appreciates the gesture to her as a woman, I feel 10 feet tall. So sue me
My point was just that there are women out there who are aware that the idea that the man always has to pay is unequal and that they aren’t just letting it go.
Anyway, what you’re saying about actually liking to pay, is all about choice. You want to fulfil a role traditionally held by men. That’s fine. If you’re with a woman who wants to fill a role traditionally held by women, that’s also fine. Past iterations of feminism have had issues demonizing women who chose to be stay-at-home mothers and fill the traditional ‘feminine’ roles. However, that has changed. Yeah, you’ll still find some holdovers from that. But current feminist ideas and debates aren’t about whether stay-at-home mothers are oppressed…because that’s not the framework that we’re using any more. (Or at least, that’s not the framework any of the feminists I know are using any more).
My mother, for example, is a classic stay-at-home Mom. She didn’t graduate from college and she pretty much stopped everything once she got pregnant in order to raise her kids. She’s not a feminist, but I certainly wouldn’t ever call her oppressed. She (and my Dad) made a choice to have children and they changed their lives in order to do so. Again, the key thing here is choice. My mother had the choice of either continuing her career or having kids. My Dad had the choice of either continuing to be a struggling musician or get a ‘straight job’ and raise a family. After being married for 6 years, they chose, together, to raise a family. Now, if that’s not a product of feminism, I don’t know what is.
(Sadly, feminism couldn’t do anything to make my Dad more lucrative as a musician. Hahaha.)
Anyway, this is sort of why I made that comment about how it’s a bit frustrating when a lot of the criticisms of feminism that I see seem to be stuck on second-wave feminism. Some of the criticisms are just inaccurate. But some are just outdated…like the suggestion that feminism is against women (or men) filling traditional roles. That’s just not the case any more.
Interesting. I don’t know if my point is I want to fulfill the traditional role anymore then I want the woman to and anymore then many women I deal with to. The trick I think is to figure out how to embrace less traditional regimented roles (me work and pay and protect you stay at home and have kids and cook and clean) and still maintain some of the very core ways that men relate to each other that make one another feel good and reaffirm their identities as men/women. I just don’t think there is any reason to throw out the baby with the bathwater; we aren’t two asexual androgynous beings that are interchangeable.
I am hardly trying to criticize feminism when I want to embrace the above and I am hardly looking to hold on to old-fashioned notions in the face of it. I just would like to be able to choose when I want to make gestures or accept roles ‘as a man’ just as women would like to do. Not sure where you spent your time as a single woman, I spend my time as a single man in Manhattan and for awhile San Francisco. I’ve slowly been soured on the whole process because it is really not a matter of choice for me in terms of the role I’m expected to perform and God help me if I expect any role in return. I had a friend use a Groupon to afford a nice restaurant he normally would have struggled to afford but wanted to take his girlfriend to. She dumped him for ‘being cheap’. She didn’t lift a finger to pay even for her dinner and he was cheap. There are far more women like that (in my experience) then ones like yourself at the other end of the extreme.
Not trying to digress sorry but the point is you almost need to choose one side or the other so that you aren’t forced into choosing the worst of both sides. I don’t have a problem with feminism, I have a problem with women who call themselves feminists when it suits them. I’d like to choose when and to whom I make the gestures and not forced or guilted into the role when it suits someone else.
I too grew up with a classic ‘stay at home mom’; we never stopped hearing however how our father ‘just had a job’ and ‘she did all the work’. So my sisters ended up devaluing what MEN do. That is a product of feminism too.
Hopefully your second wave is a gentler one, I’d be happy to ride it if so
“Hopefully your second wave is a gentler one, I’d be happy to ride it if so.” – We’re into the third wave, now. And I don’t really agree with everything that’s labelled ‘third wave’ either. But thanks for the sentiment.
The examples you are giving are, I would suggest, about individuals with individual shortcomings. i.e. in the case of a woman who’s ‘independent’ when it suits her but wouldn’t help pay for an expensive dinner…that sounds like a person who is just really selfish. In the case of a mother who slags off the father because he ‘just had a job,’ well that sounds like a relationship that wasn’t very good to start with. (Not that I’m saying your parents didn’t have a great relationship…I don’t know them, obviously. I’m just saying…like, in general). It seems to me that in those cases feminism was used as a justification for some crap behaviour.
People take and use all sorts of political ideologies and academic studies in all sorts of messed up ways. Darwinism, for example, got all sorts of twisted and screwed up as a way to justify viewing hunter-gatherer populations as primitive and less human. Now that’s not because evolutionary theory is wrong or bad itself…it’s because people who didn’t quite understand it used the bits they wanted in order to justify their screwed up actions and beliefs.
“People take and use all sorts of political ideologies and academic studies in all sorts of messed up ways. Darwinism, for example, got all sorts of twisted and screwed up as a way to justify viewing hunter-gatherer populations as primitive and less human. Now that’s not because evolutionary theory is wrong or bad itself…it’s because people who didn’t quite understand it used the bits they wanted in order to justify their screwed up actions and beliefs”
THis.
The examples you are giving are, I would suggest, about individuals with individual shortcomings.
I guess you can call it my misfortune of what feminists I came across but I simply don’t think these things can just be written off as individual shortcomings. That makes it sound like things are fine except for a few renegade idiots, in short damage control meant to dodge implications of a larger problem. Especially when it seems like there is a gendered double standard when it comes to good and bad behavior among a lot of feminists.
When men do something bad or when women do something good its supposedly systemic.
When men do something good or when somen do something bad its supposedly individual.
I’d have thought my comparing it to the use of Darwinism as a justification for systematic oppression based on ethnicity and systematic colonization of non-European regions would have clarified what I meant.
The examples he gave, specifically, seemed more about individuals, but that doesn’t mean that a misuse of feminist ideology can’t become a systematic problem.
Now then, as for your experience with that double standard…I think that applies to feminist narratives surrounding domestic violence and rape. I think it can apply to feminist narratives surrounding parental custody. In general it can apply to feminist narratives surrounding men and violence, versus women and violence. But let’s also remember that the other problem with a lot of feminist narratives surrounding men and violence is that they can fail to break away from traditional gender norms. I, personally, think that the places where feminism runs into the most trouble (and where it is the most hypocritical) is when it fails to break away from ‘the patriarchy,’ or more accurately and less hyperbolically….traditional norms.
One problem with arguments that I see among people about feminism and mens’ rights activism is that people will conflate feminist and woman as identities, and likewise MRA and man, as if all women are feminists, and all men are MRAs. That’s the problem with most arguments that revolve around some individual actor who supposedly represents one of these movements. No one person can represent either of them, and very often in these stories, the supposed representative never identifies him/herself as an MRA/feminist. It’s just presumed based on their behavior, which is interpreted by someone with an ax to grind against one of these movements.
“in the case of a woman who’s ‘independent’ when it suits her but wouldn’t help pay for an expensive dinner…that sounds like a person who is just really selfish”
Well there must be a lottt of selfish women then
That doesn’t begin to do that situation justice; it is a woman (and representative of the majority of single women I come across) that believes in equality when it suits her purposes. That isn’t an aberrant attitude, in my experience it is an epidemic one. I don’t suggest it is a feminist *position* I suggest it is how many women have chosen to implement it.
“In the case of a mother who slags off the father because he ‘just had a job,’ well that sounds like a relationship that wasn’t very good to start with. (Not that I’m saying your parents didn’t have a great relationship…I don’t know them, obviously. I’m just saying…like, in general).” It seems to me that in those cases feminism was used as a justification for some crap behaviour.”
But they had a very loving relationship (yes I did read your disclaimer
), and respected one another enormously; my mother just bought into a prevailing attitude about the inherent superiority of women; whether it was telling me that the valuing of women’s lives on the titanic over men’s was proper and natural, to the dimissal of my father’s ‘contributions’ because it is ‘so much harder to be a woman’ and ‘women hold the world together’. She does the same thing with my brother in law who has provided an astounding lifestyle for my sister and made it possible for their daughter to have everything in the world including a full time mother who had not worked/saved or started a career until the married when she was in her late 30s (note: they both went to the exact same college and courses). She still considers everything he spent 20 years building for them as a ‘contrinutionor’ but my sister the bulwark of ‘their’ success; literally: “He may have paid for the houses but she is the reason it is home and a family, what would he have done without her?”
I dont’ believe this is ‘using’ feminism for crap behavior; if we have to call it Feminism 1.0 fine but Feminism 1.0 is what provided her with all of those premises about men and women. I no more like watching my brother in law be ‘forced’ to acknowlege to everyone on holiday dinners ‘how lucky he is’ to have my sister in his life since God FORBID if my sis was forced to or even voluntarily said the same thing about him, then I did listening to my father agree how the house was my mothers because of ‘all the work she did’. If it sounds like an axe to grind I guess it is but I can’t help thinking that what is is grinding against is a core premise of feminism (1.0, not 3.0)
Perhaps it is the natural ‘swing of the pendulum’; women’s and mother’s roles and contributions were largely devalued and for a period of time men’s are/have been. Perhaps your Feminism V3 will find a happy medium.
I feel pretty certain there are a lot of very selfish self serving people out there. That has nothing to with feminism or anything else I guess, but there are people who justify all kinds of shitty angry behavior on whatever they like.
I think you might be missing the point. You can’t just keep explaining away the kind of behavior on basic human ‘rationalizaiton’; you must see that a good part of the female population has adopted the parts of feminism that works for them and rejected the rest, which goes to the HEART of almost every ‘complaint’ or rebuttal here. Saying that people can use anything (the Bible, Mein Kampf) to justify behavior just becomes too easy a way to dismiss that very critical point.
When (some) men say that women who dress provactively “asked for it” we don’t just reject their behavior as a rationalization, we understand it comes from an underlying premise.
There aren’t men justifying working and being paid for because there is no way to justify it; there is no way to justify mistreatment of women, or denying them rights, and when men do so we don’t just retreat into a ‘oh well allll of us can justify our behavior and it has nothing to do with anything’ Those have something to do clearly with attitudes drawn from pre-feminist society. Brushing them off simply pretends those attitudes don’t exist, just people with rationalization skills and suggests we just move on.
Michael – being an independent woman and being a feminist are not synonymous. Independent women (like independent men) don’t need (or want) to depend on anyone else, man or woman, to take care of them.
Thus, I think that most adult women consider themselves to be independent at some level, yet most of those same women don’t consider themselves to be feminists. Thus, they are likely enjoy/prefer (even expect) men to be the ones to do the asking out, the paying (at least initially), the opening doors, etc. Being independent and preferring/enjoying those things aren’t necessary contradictory, as they are gender-role practices preferences.
However, feminism rejects the gender roles concept; therefore, a feminist would not want/prefer the man to be the one to ask her out (verses her asking), pay for her portion of the date, open her doors, foot the entire bill for an engagement ring (if it were to go that far), etc. – verses her being just as likely/willing to do those things, at least half.
“However, feminism rejects the gender roles concept;”
That would entirely depend on which feminists you speak with. the vast majority of those with political influence very much do NOT reject the gender role concept, they only reject the enforcement of gender roles upon women where they do not wish it to be enforced, and actually encourage gender role enforcement on men, where it best suits women (male as provider in custody/maintenance).
“After being married for 6 years, they chose, together, to raise a family. Now, if that’s not a product of feminism, I don’t know what is.”
There is no connection feminism and a couple making important decisions together.
Nobody could possibly be less influenced by feminism than me yet Mrs. Eric M. have always made important decisions together, as have my parents and their parents. There is no point in being married if you’re not going to discuss important things.
I was talking about that entire paragraph being a product of feminism…as in my mother stopping a career to have a kid. As in, she had a career at all and that’s a product of feminism.
Also, the fact that they both decided to have kids, and weren’t just falling into default societal roles, is most certainly a product of feminism. I’m not saying prior to feminism all women were forced to have kids and none of them made a choice. What I am saying is that feminism made that choice more obvious, and more accessible to average, work-a-day people. My dad wasn’t starting a family because he was expected to…he wasn’t trying to carry on the family name or produce heirs for the family business, or produce more hands to help in the fields. He was starting a family because that is what he wanted. Similarly, my mother wasn’t having kids because that’s what women do, or because she felt like she had no other role in life. She was having kids because that’s what she wanted.
Choice, is the key word in my comment. Feminism provided choices.
I don’t want to make any assumptions about your parents specifically, but I’d point out that while in the situation you mentioned ‘the man’ may not have made his choice to have a family for the reasons you mentioned (family name, heirs, hands in the fields) but his choice to have a family resulted in only one decision for him; to support them. In cases like that the choice the man does not have is ‘Hey, I want kids, you work for the rest of your life supporting me and them and I’ll take care of them and the house”. This scenario only occurs when it is the woman’s choice i.e. she has a career she loves and wants/needs a man to share in or take over her ‘traditional role’. But outside of some injury or pressing financial situation with the man, women do not choose to take on that role for jobs they don’t care for just to support the father and children and men don’t have that option when it is that situation.
The woman in your scenario chose that role as you pointed out. If she had a career she loved she might have made another one and/or the man would have had to accomodate it (balance working with child-rearing). What is doubtful if the woman in that scenario would a) choose to have a family and b) adopt the role of breadwinner unless HER choice was to have a career. In other words there aren’t a lot of UPS driver women or trash collectors or women doing boring-menial-office-job-horrible-boss-until-you-die jobs simply to support men who are staying home to rear the children. Because they would not make that choice in that situation, the onus would be on the man.
“I was talking about that entire paragraph being a product of feminism…as in my mother stopping a career to have a kid. As in, she had a career at all and that’s a product of feminism.”
There is abundant evidence that feminism had nothing to do with women’s choice to work. Women have been working for 100 years and longer. As evidence, my own great-grandmother had a “career” as early as the 1920s, such that she retired with a pension, just like her OLDER sister who started her career during World War I. Women have had the choice to work for a very long time, nothing to do with feminism.
“Also, the fact that they both decided to have kids, and weren’t just falling into default societal roles, is most certainly a product of feminism.”
We have had this discussion, so I know that each and every couple in my family rejects feminism but “chose” to have children, which is evidence that such a choice has positively nothing to do with feminism or its societal influences.
“My dad wasn’t starting a family because he was expected to…he wasn’t trying to carry on the family name or produce heirs for the family business, or produce more hands to help in the fields.”
Since this isn’t an agricultural society (thus, extra farm hands not needed) nor do most people have any royal lineage to preserve (thus, no royal blood-lines to preserve), the vast majority of people have children, and have had children for many, many years simply because they want to, having absolutely positively nothing whatsoever to do with feminism. I really can’t believe you would make such wild claims.
“Choice, is the key word in my comment. Feminism provided choices.”
People had all of those choices and make all of those choices, have zero to do with feminism or its influence.
For the record I’m just picking nits now. Feel free to ignore if you want.
HeatherN:
Now then, as for your experience with that double standard…I think that applies to feminist narratives surrounding domestic violence and rape. I think it can apply to feminist narratives surrounding parental custody. In general it can apply to feminist narratives surrounding men and violence, versus women and violence. But let’s also remember that the other problem with a lot of feminist narratives surrounding men and violence is that they can fail to break away from traditional gender norms. I, personally, think that the places where feminism runs into the most trouble (and where it is the most hypocritical) is when it fails to break away from ‘the patriarchy,’ or more accurately and less hyperbolically….traditional norms.
How interesting that a failing of a movement that frequently touts itself as breaking away from the traditional norms is breaking away from norms that directly harm those who are blanketly labeled as “the oppressor class” or “the privileged class”.
Gee a wonderful track record on challenging women and body image issues but largely being unable to talk about men and body image without reassuring themelves that “women have it worse”.
A great display of helping female vicims of male violence but then having trouble acknowledging any victim that lies outside the realm of male against female violence.
And of course let us not forget how they don’t want men trying to influence their movement on a large scale while at the same time saying that a movement for men must include feminist influence.
(As for your mention of Darwinism the paragraph before it left me with the impression that you were trying to distance feminism from bad behaviors in an attempt to say that the bad behavior didn’t come from feminism but from people who do bad things and then later try to use feminism to justify it. Even though you say otherwise you reminded of the folks who want to paint this illusion of, “Feminism was perfectly fine until bad people came along and started using it to justify their nonsense.”)
I’m actually getting ready to go out…but I’d like to comment on the bit you have in parentheses there. I’m not saying feminism was fine until bad people used it. Feminism (as with all ideologies and ideas) are creations of human beings. Not everyone who created it was a great person. My comparison to Darwinism was more to try to say something like this:
The criticisms of the ideology itself are different than those of individuals who use that ideology to justify their own crap. (Individuals, or governments, for that matter). So with evolution…that is a theory which is still being developed and refined. Darwin didn’t get everything right, and so there are valid criticisms of Darwinism out there. However, one thing Darwin’s evolution didn’t say is that hunter-gatherer populations are primitive. That was a result of specific individuals (and governments) twisting what Darwin did say to justify their crap behaviour.
Same could be said of a lot of academic ideas and political movements. But okay so…feminism was really freaking white-washed until really recently. That’s a general criticism of feminism, and it’s true. Feminism wasn’t perfect from the get-go…it was whitewashed (other criticisms apply too, but this is the one I’m pointing out for my example). What feminism didn’t do is suggest that women should be free to choose their career but men should still be burdened to pay for cost of living. That is a result of specific individuals (or perhaps groups of individuals) twisting feminist ideas to justify their own crap behaviour.
So there are valid criticisms of feminism (in general); there are valid criticisms of different feminist ideas (the different types, if you will), and there are completely invalid criticisms. Sometimes they are invalid because they’re just wrong. Sometimes they’re invalid because they’re out of date. And sometimes they’re invalid because they are placing the ‘blame’ on the ideology when really, the blame is on people using that ideology for their own crap.
Okay, now I’ve got to go, so I’m out. I’m so running late. lol.
And to that effect I need to correct myself in that section of parenthases.
Even though you say otherwise you reminded of the folks who want to paint this illusion…
Should have been:
Even though you say otherwise what you said reminded me of the folks who want to paint this illusion…
I can dig what you are saying. It just grates my nerves because of the times I’ve seen what you say (being critical of the movement, the different types, and/or the people of the movement) used as a moving target so that it becomes next to impossible to be critical of feminism (the movement, the types, the people) without being made to look like a raving loon out to get the poor feminists.
Later.