I agree that there is nothing fundamentally about feminism that seeks to give women an unfair advantage. But, in practice, many people and groups calling themselves feminists are pro-women rather than gender equitists.
I agree, but here the issue is just what "disadvantage" means. I don't mean being worse off that you are presently (which equaling the playing field can do), I mean being below the baseline. Making men non-advantaged is fine, disadvantaged is not.
Reading something about a different cause on a feminist blog/website/publication doesn't necessarily mean that feminists have adopted it into their movement too. They just know that it's likely to be of interest to their audience because it's a fair assumption that feminists also support these other liberal movements. Not to say that there isn't disagreements within the movement about what feminism really is about, but I don't think that's what you're talking about. I'm curious about what you and other people keep referring to with feminists wanting to disadvantage men. Except for the radical few who do want to replace The Man's power with women's (which I've already said I don't think should be considered feminists), I can't think of any causes that are concerned with disadvantaging men. Sure, in order to create more equality the people who have had all of the power for all of history have to now share/give some of it up to make room for women and minorities who are no longer supposed to be second-class citizens and you can complain about that even though it's obnoxious to, but to claim that this is now being disadvantageous to men is silly. The reality is that white men still are taken just as seriously and all too often still given the advantage, and it's still a lot harder to be a woman than it is to be a (white) man. Sometimes I think it's hard for men to realize this just because they're not living it everyday, and it's not necessarily a matter of being a misogynist or an asshole, but just being ignorant (which has such a negative connotation, but I don't even mean it that negatively). Again, with the exception of minority groups within feminism, the overwhelming cause is to continue to smooth out the inequalities that are still rampant and making the world just as safe a place for women as it is for men. I'll get off my feminist high horse now (maybe, hopefully), but with all this bullshit about women's health care happening it's an extra-sensitive topic for me and it's hard to just sit back and not rant.
There are schools of feminist thought that believe that these issues are inextricably linked, and in order to be a proper feminist one has to consider all of them simultaneously. It's a bit more radical than say, Jezebel, but it's certainly there.
A lot of violence against women has to do with the perception that the perpetrators of said violence have of women. It is seen as okay. The very fact that Sean Connery can get away and even praised for saying that it's ok to hit 'your' woman just goes to show how much ground is still left to cover. The property-view of women is still very much present in our language and this does influence our view of women. (Not the adjective 'your' itself but how it's read icw woman) Besides, the biggest gender-neutral anti-violence campaign already resulted in the establishment of the monopoly of force and the limits placed upon its exercise. The battle is now having violence against women be the included under the sole responsibility of the state and not of her husband, just as is presently the case with all men. The perception of male to male violence is already fully unacceptable.
The ones who "spend their lives on this" are simply wasting theirs. Most women are getting jobs, becoming CEOs, mathematicians, doctors, scientists, and making a positive impact on society. There's nothing stopping them anymore; there probably are individual sexists here and there, but by and large, no one cares about that shit. The myth that women generally get paid worse than men for the same work is exactly that, a myth, especially considering women do the hiring and payroll at companies just as often as men do. On the other hand, there are the women who teach "feminism" at the university level, which is actually so simple, I can distill much of it into one phrase; "men, especially white ones, are evil sexist, racist, rapists!" Interesting. Did you come across one of my favorite quotes from a feminist professor, who I believe taught at NYU, that went like this; "Newtonian physics is an evil patrarchial theory that teaches men to rape women." In fact, just a quick search on Google showed that MOST feminist blogs and writings consider physics evil and patrarchial, and something that doesn't apply to women and their unique minds. "High-level thought" indeed. Thankfully, these lazy nutjobs speak for no one but themselves. Insanity is always difficult to understand.
Disclaimer: If you honestly, in your heart, believe that misogyny is no longer a problem, not only in this country but in the world over, then the central tenet of feminism is going to elude you. If you have a problem with academia, you have problem with academia. But don't ignore that the fact that it's possible to spend your life doing high level gender research AND being a contributing member of society. That's an unfair false dichotomy. People spend their lives on this shit because when you're a woman, you don't have a choice. The only explanation I can think of for saying that "individual sexists" might be an issue but that there isn't institutional sexism is myopia or willful blindness. So? There are plenty of professors who teach stupid shit. That doesn't reflect on feminists as a whole or feminism as a movement. I've had libertarian professors say stupid shit. I've had liberal ones say stupid shit. I've had conservative ones say stupid shit, but I can recognize that individual biases are a terrible way to judge a movement. You mean Sandra Harding? She teaches at UCLA; she got her PhD from NYU. Again, you're arguing that because one feminist has a radical viewpoint that you (and I, fwiw) disagree with, feminism is somehow not worthwhile. I have no proof of this. Plenty of feminist blogs feel like science is advanced in patriarchal and sometimes misogynistic ways, but that's not a particularly extraordinary claim. Which feminist blogs do you read? If you'd like, I can point you to some much better ones. When somebody spends years researching and an entire lifetime living a subject, I'm not so quick to dismiss them. If I read, and ultimately disagree, that's one thing, but calling it insanity shows me you either didn't read it or didn't understand it. Besides, you're taking a few radical feminists out of context and then using that as a denunciation of the movement as a whole. That's like using a Glenn Beck soundbite to prove that limited government is a sham.
You have this habit of saying quantifiable/demonstrable things, without actually presenting the requisite evidence. I eagerly await your survey of feminist writings which supports the assertion that more than 50% of feminist writings regard physics as evil and inapplicable to women. I'm even more curious how one could derive such a claim from a "quick search on Google." It would appear that what you meant to say is "I saw a few isolated instances of feminist criticism of science, and applied my understanding of these passages to feminism as a whole."
I have no problems with academia, considering I intend to make a career there. That being said, there is research and work that contributes something to society (such as biological or medical research on the university level), and then there is pure bullshit which does nothing to solve any problems, but simply spreads hate and ignorance. (Most feminist classes at colleges) Really? Please link me to any decent economics paper or study that demonstrates this supposed "institutional sexism". Again, one reason why this is so dumb is because women do as much of the hiring and payrolls at major companies as men do! When I was being interviewed for Yahoo!, who interviewed me? A woman. If I had questions about the payroll, who did I talk to? A woman. Are you telling me that these women are purposely giving themselves less money than they are to their male counterparts?! Ah, AWESOME! You put down her name and the fact that she teaches at a major school. Thanks for that. MoreCowbell, are you reading this? You still think this is some extreme, irrelevant portion of modern feminists? During the Middle Ages, many "researchers" spent entire lifetimes studying the subject of demonology. Namely, how many angels could fit inside the head of a needle, and other similarly intriguing questions. According to you, it's totally unfair to dismiss them given what we knew, even then, of science, correct? A strong argument. I'm going purely by what I have been told in real life and what I have read before online. Is it possible that I just so happened to encounter the 10% of modern-day "feminists" who hate men, science, and most everything in Western society? Meanwhile, the other 90% are all enlightened beings who simply want equality and do whatever they can to encourage women to study math, science, or be doctors and business leaders? Yeah, sure. There's about a one in a billion chance. By the way, here are some links from feminist blogs mentioning the evils of science; <a class="postlink" href="http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Maria+Suarez%3a+feminism+should+free+itself+from+patriarchal...-a0213032209" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Maria+Sua ... 0213032209</a> Apparently, Netwonian physics is the evil "paradigm" of men, and a good feminist should get her education from (pseudo)-sciences. Might I suggest...demonology? Oh, and this popular feminist blog <a class="postlink" href="http://en.wordpress.com/tag/patriarchal-science/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://en.wordpress.com/tag/patriarchal-science/</a> even has an entire section devoted to "patriarchal science". In fact, that phrase, which indicates a hatred of science at its very root, is a popular web search result; <a class="postlink" href="http://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=Av.0F2oaNSDATp.mARm4Sw6bvZx4?p=%22patriarchal+science%22&toggle=1&cop=mss&ei=UTF-8&fr=yfp-t-701" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=Av. ... =yfp-t-701</a> An amazing 1.66 MILLION results. I hope I've made my point.
I've opened a new thread, move the discussion over there and return this thread to its original "get off my lawn!" ramblings.
I'm just going to comment I'm happy my first thread suggestion has taken off and involved into a crazy fucking discussion. I'll try to get some more stuff like this where there are some seriously crazy views out there, nothing too inflammatory though.
Thanks so much, man. I've given you access to the TiB high-quality suggestion board. This is like the regular suggestion board, but it's for high-quality posters only. Pretty much every thread suggestion on that board gets run, so post your new ones there instead of on the ordinary suggestion board. Thanks again! --Doc
Can we go back to why jordan_paul wants to impress his dad so much that he's wasting his youth building a static empire that in all likelihood won't fulfill him or his diluted and one dimensional idea of success? Juuuuust kidding. But not really. All of you assholes are going about this the wrong way anyway. Flip the script and become a trophy boyfriend. I like my life so much I don't feel the need to qualify all the cool shit I've done to impress anyone. Minus typing that sentence. Oops. Life your live how you see fit and shut the fuck up about it. No one cares if you're a homeowner at 21, or if you're a vagabond bartender on multiple continents at the age of 40. Rationalize it all you want, and tell yourself whatever lies you need to hear, but no one cares except for the person who's ultimately deciding shit: you and you alone. Jordan_paul still sucks though. Work ethic is awesome, but if that's maturity than just....goddamn. You all might need to learn the difference between "maturity" and "personal accountability".
Sorry to revive this thread but I found this Slate article pretty interesting and inline with the discussion: Sex is Cheap It has the same general theme as the original author's piece but does a lot better in framing their debate. They suggest women should be in control of the relationship, specifically the sexual part, but due to a variety of reasons including women's advancement in society, have lost control of it more than ever. In general women are looking for committed relationships and guys want sex, thus creates a "price for sex." Their "economics of sex" isn't clarified very well but I think they make some very good points. I think it's funny that they think massive amounts of free internet porn is a viable option men have in place of fucking women and somehow women have to compete with it. Though their suggestion that the flood of women in certain areas of society where hooking up occurs a lot, college campuses/big cities and so forth, has them competing with each other more for fewer guys puts the guys wishes ahead of theirs seems reasonable. Certainly more interesting that the original article.
Hey women of today, want to know why you aren't married even though you wanna be? Take it away Tracy McMillian! Read it. I'm clapping right now. I want to give that lady a high five.