Why do feminist have such a bad rep?

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Well, how about we get some statistics of western countries? They would actually support that ordering. And again, you autistic, in all my life, that has been the biggest factor of why I have been discriminated against, especially by people who weren't aware. Now I will say, there is a bit that is gender related, but you don't know what to look for, and that is why you don't see it, it has nothing to do with you being male, even when I was living as a male, I saw it, and I fought it where I could. Most males participate in it without even thinking about it. My point was that if you cannot factor in all the variables and see how each has an effect on the outcome, don't try to. You presented two variables, so I simply showed what the results would be of a study done of specifically those two variables.

No. Any such absence is in regard to people, including but not limited to men. The word “equal” necessitates this.
See:

equal:The same in number, size, degree, merit, etc.
To consider the point of view of women but not men is not equal, so either feminism by the definition you posited, either seeks to equally exclude the point of view of women, or seels to equally include the views of men. Can you explain what it is you imagine equal means such that your comments make sense?

No, it is not. You keep stating this but are unable to produce evidence that it is so.

Or see yourself as one, not necessarily to the consensus of others. You can actively seek to oppress particular groups on the basis of their sex or ethnicity, and call yourself egalitarian. So what? People can call themselves “ol McDonald or a pink unicorn if it pleases them. Whether others will agree with their self assessment/assertion is another matter.

The SCUM manifesto is not feminism in my view, but rather the rantings of a disturbed person with apparent problems in reality checking. The fact that you would cite such an aberrant piece of text as being feminism demonstrates yet again that your view and criticisms are based entirely on associating feminism with extreme and non representative examples.

For goodness sake, if you cannot differentiate feminism from the extreme and incoherent ramblings of a woman who took a shot (quite literally) at Andy Warhol, because she had some paranoid delusion that he was attempting to steal her work, then you are poorly placed to claim any insight or balanced view of the subject you criticizing.


No, but the need to rely on distorting and mischaracterizing feminism is why you cited separatists as an example, ignoring the implications of their inclusion within feminism being widely contested by feminists. In other words, just as I and other posters have stated, and you have repeatedly (and continue to) demonstrate, feminism is maligned because many people choose to mischaracterize it


It is the rantings of a person who was psychiatrically disturbed, suffered paranoid delusions, and in no way represents or was generally representative of feminism. And you picked it and wish to represent it as feminism because attacking the ravings of a mad women and pretending that her rantings represent anything other than her disturbed state of mind, is much easier than criticizing the pursuit of sex/gender equality (otherwise known as feminism).

Nor from a female perspective. It does include that if society looks at things from a female perspective, it equally looks at things from a male perspective.


That is not consistent with the definition you posited. Some feminists being human, might fail to live up to their ideals, but by the very definition you posited feminism is inconsistent with only looking at things from the female point of view. It is ironic that I asked you earlier if you were mischaracterizing feminism according to extreme examples of dubious behavior and that you suggeted I was mislabling myself. Yet the definition you have posited is consistent with my position of feminism as egalitarian and inconsistent with any and every unequal position you have and continue to define feminism with. Go back and read your own definition. By definition of equal, the words female and male can be exchanged and the meaning is equivalent. Think about that.


Not according to the definition you posited.

No you have not. In every instance you have completely ignore this point although I have repeatedly raised-it. Quote for me where you have replied to the point that without dedicated representation, groups within society will have their needs and rights overlooked?


How very short sighted of those this is true of.

Your acusation that I trivialize this issue is utterly unfounded, and contrary to my lengthy comments decrying exactly this issue.


Actually it concerns men women and children and as a feminist it is not something I lack concern for. On the contrary I consider it an important issue socially and for feminism.


Actually there are many feminist who take quite a hard line on parental leave vs maternal leave, and advocate parental rather than maternal leave. Of course this will have escaped your attention if you are too busy trying to make feminism fit the SCUM Manifesto so you can pretend they are the same.


Yes it does. I refer you again to the word “equal”.

Again I call your attention to the meaning of the word equal. It does not mean “at least the same, but possibly better/more”. Equal does not mean “no less than but maybe more”

The problem here appears to be that you lack the insight to differentiate between the meaning of “experiencing discrimination for being female” and “experiencing discrimination”.



Which might be relevant if I had ever made such a claim, rather than making the claim that those who have direct experience of being treated as a male and as a female, report a marked difference with being female attracting worse treatment than being male. If you do not like these reports because you feel that such a statement somehow means no one discriminates against people for being autistic, or only females might understand something or other, that’s probably more about you and your thinking patterns than anyone else.

Actually like is being compared to like, but I guess it’s less self challenging to state “that’s different” rather than admit to yourself that your criticisms of feminism are based on the argument form “X is a Y, therefore all Ys are Xs”.

I'm very sorry for your troubles. But I don't think that the historical women's movement did that to you.

Also I think you miss the fact that while every person may be treated badly or unjustly, some groups of people bear the brunt of much more than others. This is why the word 'discrimination' was invented.
I'm sure you've had hard things happen, but white people were not rounded up, stolen from their homeland and used as slaves. Or if it happened in some cases, it cannot compare to the sheer scope of slavery and blackbirding. With no desire to be rude, some of the historical injustice against certain groups (such as women, blacks and gay people) has been horrific and systematic, and continues at a less obvious level today.
And yes, if you are disabled, you may possibly be discriminated against but that does not relate directly to being black. Not worse than, not better than- just a different issue with a different history. There actually are efforts to redress discrimination against disabled people as well.

Yes, Padium did make a good contribution about seeing the issue from both sides! And pandd again explains well.
I especially agree with her point about the irony of mischaracterisation, and also with bringing up the fact that some feminists agree with parental leave rather than maternity leave. I myself see maternity leave as redress, but it can possibly be considered a step along the way. And it highlights my previous point about the fact that people may see maternity leave in all different ways, rather than it being a feminist ploy to discriminate against men and "take a mile".
And agreeing with pandd doesn't mean either of us are not feminists.

I keep hearing that the reason "feminism is flawed" is because it doesn't consciously include men, listen to them, make sure men have all their rights... why should this be a key concern in the feminist movement, when society has not made sure that women receive that kind of treatment, and feminism came about so that women may be listened to, included, respected, have rights?
Feminism is not about setting women above men and punishing them, it is about leveling the playing field so women may get what and where they need to.

It is not "Do not let him have that!" but rather "Give the same to her!"

Pandd, you should be reading this. This is coming from someone you have nodded at and agreed with. They are doing the exact same thing i am critising about feminism. They are saying feminism is everything i am saying it is. You have not actively decried, attacked or denounced activebutodd's veiw or form of feminism. I have already pointed this out once, you completely ignored it.


You do not seem to have a workable concept of english for me to explain it to you as it has already been explained to you numerous times. Each time you twist and bend the parts you do understand, and completely ignore the parts you do not understand. Surely you can see that the statement made by feminism isn't the same as "all humans are equal and deserve the same rights and opportunities"? Their is a female weighting and bias to the phrase. Perhaps because of your aspergers you are unable to percieve this, it's a pretty common attribute among the aspie population.


People can claim what they like, but in the end it comes down to the base philosophy. Egalitarianism calls for everyone to be equal, in the past there were very few true egalitarianists even though the group was a big one.


It does not matter if other feminists agree with their veiw or not. They make a base assumption that women cannot have equality if they mix with men. Using the base feminist beliefs and their base assumption, the rest of their veiws have been extrapolated with logic.Your acusation that I trivialize this issue is utterly unfounded, and contrary to my lengthy comments decrying exactly this issue.


Yet as soon as the issue was mentioned, you twisted it to have a female-centric veiw. "It is not as bad as the accommodation not existing".


Yet you minimised it, you display female weighting in your veiws.


Yet it's the majority of feminists that caused this, not a minority. Because they were only concerned with a female-centric agenda at the time. They did not mind that men would experience more discrimination, as long as women experienced less. Because of course, it's justified because women have been discriminated against for so long right? This completely ties in with what Zornslemma said about people discriminating against others because they have been discriminated against themselves. No feminist at the time spoke out, to prevent this from happening.


I fully understand the difference, i also fully understand that in the real world there is no functional difference. When a woman says she has been discriminated against when she tried to get a job, i understand exactly what this is like. When a women says her colleagues think it is okay to touch her arse and that she is being discriminated against, i understand fully, because i have at times in my life encountered women who believe it's okay to touch my in sensitive places without asking. There is nothing a female can experience, that a man cannot understand.


The statement you made was incorrect, so i felt no need to reply to it, but seeing as you are so persistant.

Someone who campeigns for gender eqaulity is not neccesarily a feminist, and someone who campeigns for animal rights is not necessarily a member of PETA.

PETA members do not tarnish the image of animal rights activists or the image of PETA they tarnish their individual image. PETA's manifesto and basic belief system is what tarnishes the whole group.

Feminists do not tarnish the image of equal rights activists or feminism, they tarnish their individual image. Feminist manifesto and basic belief system is what tarnishes feminism as a whole group.

So, has anyone seen Vandread? It is an anime where Earth stopped being able to reproduce, and so they sent massive colonies out into space to eventually harvest organs from to keep the human race alive. Of these colonies, many had turned to alternate forms of reproduction that did not require sex. Cloning was common place. There were two notable colonies constantly at war. these colonies, one was entirely male, the other entirely female. The male colony portrayed the female race as being "bloodthirsty women starving for the blood of man, and will eat you alive, so that you suffer while they do so". I don't have much on what the females thought of the males, but both believed that each was a separate species, and they warred because of that... This debate seems an aweful lot like the male side of the discrimination in the Vandread series.

I haven't seen it Padium, but I do get your point.

Michjo, you speak of feminists tarnishing their own separate image but not that of some active gender equality movement that apparently does not include feminists.. but before that, you were generally smearing the entire image of feminists and the movement using Alice Walker. One ambiguous comment that you ascribed meaning to - and one individual woman.

You also tried to do this before with one Valerie Solanas and the SCUM Manifesto, when the woman was merely mad. (Does this mean all feminists are attempted murderers with guns?)

None of this makes sense.

Last edited by activebutodd on 19 Jun 2009, 12:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.

activebutodd:
I am NOT talking about historical injustices, I am talking about contemporary discrimination. The REASON why black men are discriminated against(and quite a bit more so than black women) is because they are viewed by society as being threatening! And its Not just black men! ANY man who is visibly abnormal in a way that people dont understand OR have preconceived notions about s going to face ACTIVE discrimination and exclusion from mainstream society!! Aspie women are NOT more oppressed than aspie men because by virtue of being female they are not viewed as being a threat.
And most of all, if you have the bad luck to be born BOTH male AND visibly disabled, the law does not protect you from FALSE Accusations made against you by women(who feel irrationally frightened) that can have DISASTEROUS Legal Consequences.
NT men often succumb to their white knight complex and will automatically side by default with women if they are in conflict with men, even if the woman is in the wrong.

You think? Even if Aspie women are not considered a "threat", some of them get punished more for anger and misbehaviour because it is more discouraged in women than in men. There is no "boys will be boys" for aspie girls.
And sometimes aspie women are more at risk because they are viewed as easy targets by predators.




Those are sweeping generalisations. And I refuse to comment on your private personal issues because I was not there.

The law does nothing for preop transwomen either, or preop transmen, simply because we are generally viewed by most who know as an abomination, and a distortion of human life that should not exist and thus does not need any form of protection. A male has more protection from the law than any preop transsexual.

Michjo you seem to have trouble with women in general. I'm very sorry to see this but you juging all women to be the same and after you because they seek equal rights to men is... well, silly. I've had some bad run ins with men over my life time particaly in my teen years but I don't not juge hafe the human races based on this and never would. It would be like seeing a black man steal a car on the 6 O'clock news and asume all black men steal cars or something equally as silly. Women or other groups gaining does not take from white men it never has nor will it in the future. We gain as a whole when we enrich a part. No one should ever be discounted because of sex,race ect ,ect, ect.... Michjo you seem to know nothing of the feminists movement now or in the past. Have fun cherry picking to make your point... next time try Hop on Pop or maybe The Cat In The Hat I'm sure if you try hard you can find something to rail agaist.

Not where I live!! ! Pre-op transsexuals ARE protected by local laws from assault and you can BETTER BELIEVE the cops here bust violent gaybashers.The laws regarding Stalking Protective Orders where I WAS living in Portland Oregeon are set up such that a woman need not PROVE that someone is stalking her in order to get such an order placed against a man! Restraining Order legislation has been grossly abused by women divorcing their husbands as a way to get their hands on HIS property.
A man NEED NOT be an ACTUAL threat NOR commit any sort of illegal act for a woman to successfully accuse him of criminal behavior and get legal action in her favor.

Yes, however, it is a lot easier for things involving transsexuals to slip through the cracks, simply because that is what most people would prefer to have happen. If something were to go to trial, all they would have to do would be to convince a jury that they should be transphobic, which in most places isn't hard. Now I am not going to stand up and defend trans rights, simply because I do not want to be publicly known as trans. But rather, I will go on and live my life as I normally would, and just enjoy being who I am.

You mention a book by Dr. Seuss so i'm assuming you have a basic understanding of psycology. Should i ever have any need to explain to someone how displacement works as a pyscological defense mechanism, i shall point them to your post. Thank you for such a perfect example.

A specific example was asked for, and hence a specific example was given. If you are unwilling or unable to read all text involved in the discussion then please avoid making assumptions.

Yes, and like the soldiers who came home from the battles in WW1, these feminists were seasoned by battle, and experienced something along the lines of shell shock. Battle taints all those involved, no matter whether they are right in it or not. They did what was necessary and sacrificed part of themselves to do so, as with any soldier going into battle.

J S Mill was not a feminist, he was a utilitarian. He did support first-wave feminism because it did not conflict with his utilitarian beliefs, infact, it complimented them perfectly. Second wave feminism probably had him turning in his grave, and if he were alive today, third-wave feminism would have him feeling uneasy.