Feminist Movement Discussion Con't

"suggest that maybe rape isn't that bad, and maybe women deserve it because sometimes they're bitches, and maybe rape doesn't even happen as much as those feminazis would have us think" I suggested that rape doesn't have to be as bad as it is now. And I never said anything about deserving it, no one here did. I never suggested there was any justification for it. And the statistics about false rape accusations may not be as high as 50% but they are high, and they are climbing as people realize just how much damage they can cause with a rape accusation. Truely I think this is worse for women who are actually raped then it is for men who are accused, either way it's bad news and It's sickening. It's a product of a society that places almost all evil squarely on the shoulders of it's male population.

And I don't give a **** about all these statistics about incomes and stuff. If women continue to choose to be mothers and raise their kids at home etc.. the numbers will be low. Why do feminists thing that women should be out working unhealthy hours greedily gobbling up money just so they can balance out the income statistics? Someone has to raise the kids and it's up to every couple to decide.

It seems volition isn't part of many feminists agendas.

On the other side of the coin how many cases of women beating men do you think go unreported? I know several people some of them in my family who were assaulted by women and wouldn't fight back because either they didn't believe in hitting women or they knew the moment they laid a finger on them they would loose any court battle over it, even though it was self defense. They also didn't report it because of the shit they would go through for being beat up by a girl, and the fact that all that would result is a restraining order anyways.

Also I hate statistics about violent crime. It saddens me how much it happens. I think it's time to stop Looking at the gender, ethnic background, creed, region, income etc.. of violent offenders and really try to figure out what's causing violent crime. I see no diffrence in blameing everything on some intangible patrichal heiarhy of evil doing men then blameing
crime on blacks and hispanics because they are blacks and hispanics. It completly ignores why people attack main and kill people. And your approach to preventing it doesn't allow for people being people.

Also did you ever think that viagra receives more financial assistance because of the way drug companies are pushing new drugs?

[ 07. November 2003, 10:27: Message edited by: Astar ]

Let me change the direction of the discussion:

How do you suppose that women ever got into the mess that they were in come, say, 1800? Completely subjugated to men, barred from any profession except for a very few (nursing, etc.), practically not allowed to leave the house, etc.

And the thing is that in Western civilization, it had been that way for 2,000 years. Even Ancient Greek women were expected to stay in the home and weren't allowed to participate in public life. Why is it that the world over, in almost every culture, the patriarchy is the way of doing thing? How did women manage to get so subjugated like this?

I'd argue more on the rape thing but Astar pretty much covered it - it's a crime. It's perpetrated by someone who's wrong in the head, maybe some of them use "patriarchal privelage" as a justification to themselves, but if it's not that it'll be something else. Have to fix the person to stop it happening, convincing them to re-label their twisted impulses doesn't achieve anything.

Actually, many indigenous cultures are / were matriarchal. Celts are the most obvious and many Australian Aboriginal cultures feature a women's council which has power of veto over the men's council, and most hunter / gatherer societies had a matriarchal structure centered around fertility goddess worship. Somehow the move to agrarian societies seems to have been accompanied by monotheism and patriarchy. Anyone know anything more about that?

This discussion is already out of hand...

Divi, you came in with a defensive attitude in your first post:

quote:

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PLEASE do not send me any ignorant responses (ie. asking why my fireshow has to be feminist, or telling me to get over it, or telling me to check out the sex and poi discussion below).

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I think that if that line were deleted, and if you had simply asked how you could add a feminist message to your fire shows, no one would have had any cause to politicize the discussion. YOU came in bristling, and when people naturally bristled back things got heated on both sides (not saying the issue here is your fault, but bringing it up in the first place caused people to immediately consider it was part of your discussion). I'm not trying to fight, and from that same earlier thread you can see that I offerred a response to hopefully help you enhance your show the way you would like to, but I refuse to believe that the opposing viewpoints here have been made without any initial provocation on your part.

Moving on...

The Wage Gap discussion had me do some searching on ifeminists.com (a wonderful site) and I found this interesting article on it:
http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba/ba392/

Here's another HIGHLY interesting article (with many scholarly references) that has many things to say about feminist movements in the legal systems of Canada and the US, with evidence and sources to back them up. It's incredibly long, but you can scroll around to whatever issue interests you and see what the author had to say... the "conclusion" I would definitely recommend to everyone if it's the only thing you read:
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-256.html

I'm not trying to fight with anyone, but I'm SICK of all the hate being slung around over this type of stuff (by BOTH sides). We have to learn to get along if we're ever going to have success in equality for the genders.

Alleykat, Well I guess you read one statistic and I read another, but of course yours must be correct without shadow of a doubt cuz you read it.

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Men can claim more back for using Viagra than women for the pill

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...hello?!...Viagra is pescribed for BOTH sexes as it works the same way on each sex, by re-establishing lost connections with the right parts and the brain, it doesn't cure impotence it gives the brain back the lost ability to tell the (male or female) genitals to become aroused, it's as simple as that. So what does this have to do with taking Birth Control? Since when was taking BC a medical condition??? Can I presume that by this point (being the equlitarian you are) you must think that all men who buy condoms to act as BC barrier should be able to claim their money back from their health cover?! Hardly a comparable statistic really now is it.

quote:

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249 000 vistins of rape/assault

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. You do realise this is talking of ALL people not just women of course. Men are raped/abused too, the statistic doesn't discriminate on sex.
Generally less men are abused/raped because generally they are physically bigger/stronger, Some one who is weaker will always have more potential to be a victim to some ass hole commiting a crime against them. Be they male or female.

quote:

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In 1997, 68.3% of rapes were perpetrated by someone who knew the victim"

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Again this is rapes of both sexes isn't it?!
But most murder vistims knew their killer, in fact almost all personal crimes are commited by people who know each other, it doesn't mean it's sex oppression, IT MEANS THE WORLD IS FULL OF ASS HOLES OF BOTH SEX. Not that they are all because of male negative attitudes towards women but negative attitudes by various people towards everyone they consider weaker...men, women, kids, elderly commiting crimes agains men, women, kids, elderly because they think they can get away with it.

The point that needs making is that all crime should stop, be it theft, rape, assault, murder, burlary etc etc and that the angry feminist view (well in this thread anyway) seems to be that men are the cause who deliberately commit their crimes against women.
We should fight for Equality, for equal rights in society, the home and the workplace. Not looking to tag one sex for any crime that happens to be commited against the other as sexist. But work to educate all people so they don't want to commit crimes in the first place.

And yes their are countries where women are oppressed, and it's incredibly dissapointing that this happens but it's their culture that hasn't developed as far as popular western cultures have. They education to continue to develop into an equlity based society, not punishment for their 2000+ year old beliefs and the methods used by their elders to raise them into adulthood.

"If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem" You sound like G Bush before the Iraq invasion, unfortunately life isn't that straight cut but if it were wouldn't it be "If you're not part of the problem, you're already part of the solution"?!

I believe in equlity, abuse of power no matter what it is or how you come about it, shouldn't happen. I guess I'm just an old hippie who believes we're all just people, living in a world full of other people who should get along and not fight each other. I wish there were less angst and pain but there isn't...that's life.
We need to unite as a whole not divide 50/50. Look at all the posts in this thread, nobody here agrees with oppression, nobody seemingly wants to promote oppression either be it deliberate or not. The divide isn't sex based, it's personal attitude towards fellow humans.

Now lets have a big kiss....come on.....smooch up.....guys and girls all give me a big wet one on the cheek.... Now isn't that better

now it's time for a I think, I'm exhausted after all that typing!!

TTFN!!

In terms of the statistic about how much women earn, there's a real problem in this. If a couple decide to have a child, then it seems obvious to me that just from anatomical and a biological point of view, this is going to impact on the woman more than the man. There is, unfortunately, no obvious way of getting round this, and the feminists can be as political as they like about it, but it isn't going to help the underlying biology.

Given that the original statistics posted to this thread were on how much men earn as compared to women in the US, it is worth pointing out that the US earnings are heavily skewed by a very few people at the top earning absolutely vast amounts of money. (this is why the Bush tax cut statistics work, but the reality is that it mainly helps his cronies).

Now, to get back to my original point. Any length of time away from a job impinges on your ability to do that job properly when you return, and given the impact of having to take maternity leave (because there are things in the pre-natal, and early post-natal stages that the father just cannot do, biologically), then you'll never be able to rise to the top if you're a woman who has a child in the middle of all of this, because you need to keep pushing and pushing all the time, and the time lost to the maternity leave is vital.

There are an extremely small number of women (though probably rising) who resist the urge to have children, and, as a result, at a vital point in their careers, they have to choose. Thus they never get to the outlier payscale jobs that were mentioned above, and as a result, on taking the average salary, they appear to earn less.

I'm not arguing on the goodness or badness of this effect, but merely pointing out that statistics are only useful if you understand what the underlying data looks like, and that such a statistic on its own doesn't help anyone.

I do suspect that for equivalent jobs, women may on average be paid less than men, and that is definitely something that has to be sorted out. It's worth noting, though, that a lot of salaries in companies are confidential, and workers (regardless of sex) don't necessarily get the same pay, more so as roles diverge.

Divi, I wanted to say to you that you've not made an enemy of me, but that I think that your cause is, at best, misguided. If you're not after equality, then you're just proposing a different problem, and the intentional misspellings don't help anyone, they merely impedes communication.

As to everyone who's talked about violent crimes, they are just that. And entirely tangential to the discussion. I am concerned about a situation, however, where someone could use an accusation of rape as a method of revenge (and there has been at least one case of someone who did just that), in order to completely ruin the accused. Since it often comes down to one person's word against another, we must also be careful not to be punishing the innocent.

alrighty...

first i would like to address the workplace issue... i said in an earlier post that i wasn't over the gender equality/ gender difference debate. this specifically refers to the workplace.
(liberal) wymyn who fight for equal pay and benefits do not fight (necessarily) for maternaty leave. wymyn who believe that there is a natural sex divide believe that there is a natural maternal instinct and will fight for maternaty leave. i, as a (very) young womyn, do not know how i feel about the equality vs. difference debate. i simpy do not know! i believe that there should be paternaty leave and that the people (person) involved in the parenting should have the abilty to choose for themselves what is right for them (i recently witnessed a birth at my university where there was only ONE WEEK allowable for paternaty leave. this, i think, is unacceptable).
keep in mind that it is generally the wymyn who take on the initial parental burden (and thus the economical backlash) for children.

second, in terms of sexual assault... i see sexualized violence everywhere (think.. house of 1000 corpses..), and i also see images of wymyn being made theoretically available for men's sexual pleasure in mass media. if you do not think that this attributes to men's sexual agression, then you are wrong. (sorry i couldn't put that in better terms)
there is definately an expectation of wymyn to be available for their male partners. i was in a relationship for 3.5 years with a guy who refused to believe that sex was anything other than penetration. i suffered the painful (physical and emotional) consequences of my (undiagnosed and still suspected) vulvodynia.
there is definately a patriarchal powerplay happening when a womyn can says that she wants sex but doesn't want penetration (does this ring true to any other wymyn out there? it was an absolute consensus in my female sexualities class).
and, in my experience, wymyn don't lie. i have been accused of it, and have lost many friends because of it... and yes, the shithead had some social backlashes, but i doubt that his were even comparable to mine. it wasn't my choice to make the incident public (or even to have the incident happen at all, obviously), but i wanted this guy out of a performer's party (where he wasn't a performer) and the whole thing erupted. i lost my best friends as well as my partner's best friends. i almost quit my job because some of my co-workers were supportive of him, and would bring the discussion into work. there was no evidence, no (visible) scars... but i would not have put myself though that (very) public scrutiny if it didn't happen. (and believe me; people were much more willing to assume that there was a liar than a sexual assaulter in their midst.) it is not an easy thing to endure. yes, there have been cases based on lies, but current attitudes have made this nearly impossible. (this year, "our" provincial police closed a case on the rape of an aboriginal womyn because "all girls lie" - quotation from an investing officer) 50% of wymyn lie? i sincerely think not, and will actively oppose this assumption (keep in mind that i am an anarchist and my asault thus went unreported- don't bother scrutinizing this fact; i have made up my mind) i cannot and will not believe that wymyn will put themselves in such a vulnerable situation (the one that some wymyn refer to as a "second rape") if they were not being sincere.
otherwise, on the topic of male sexual assault, i do find it to be absolutely trajic that there are no support systems out there for you. however, it is not wymyn who should be fighting for these services. you should organize yourselves (there are others like you and it is possible.. dare to take a leap! all feminists who i have met would support you in such an endeavor).
however, this is NOT up to wymyn. sorry, but we have our own (extensive) shit to deal with.

third, (and i can't believe i have to re-iterate this) i am not an enemy of men, but an enemy of patriarchy. in my experience, men are more willing to combat their privilege than wymyn are willing to combat their patriarchal assumptions of themselves (think: how many wymyn have you known that would rather "the man" make up the decision of where to go out for a date than herself?). i mostly hang out with men.. i mostly work with (and date) wymyn (although not in the same atmosphere)... it's a good balance for me. i love my guy friends to no end. they are my best friends, and deserve every little bit of loyalty and love that i lavish upon them.

guys, come on, quit picking on little phrases that i put up. it's the message that i'm trying to get across, and it's the message that i expect you to read.
otherwise, it's not worth posting in here at all.
and thank you for all the rawking ladies who chose to be so brave as to post in here! you grrrls are awesome! (and i empathize with your frustration that your words get picked apart)

see y'all around

Divi: perhaps, if you want other people to "read your message, and not pick up on little phrases", you ought to read and understand the posts you're trying to pick holes in.

I'm not going to try and re-explain to you about how statistics work, and therefore, why I'm not convinced that your 76% average US earning difference has to be taken with at least some salt. I'm also not going to re-explain why I feel that biology plays a rather large part in the difference in paternity and maternity leave.

I am, however, going to pick up on one thing that you said, which is:

quote:

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and, in my experience, wymyn don't lie.

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Such a ridiculous generalisation undermines your entire argument. My ex-fiancee was, quite frankly, a complete cow. She treated me like dirt, and it took me several years to get over, she played power games and she lied to suit her cause. So, my experience differs. Hugely. And that one sentence undermines everything you're trying to say, because what it's showing is that you don't really understand the people you're claiming to represent. You believe something, and your faith is what is driving you, and you cannot see different from that.

As I said, I don't dislike you (I have no reason to feel either way), so don't take this as a personal attack, because it's not meant as one. But I feel that the cause you're fighting for is one that is fundamentally going to cause a different set of problems. If you're not fighting for equality in rights regardless of gender, then you're only going to create more problems if your cause is ever achieved.

I still want equality in gender. I certainly do not want to end up with as much of a matriarchy as you believe we currently have a patriarchy. That is just a different problem. So you've gone from frying pan to fire.

yo peeps.

first, i think that gender is VERY much a social construct. (note: gender is different than sex. sex is what's between your legs. gender is the behaviour that is formulated between your ears.) yes, there are biological difference that affect behaviour, but these are neither concrete nor absolute. some men are more feminine than some wymyn, and some wymyn are more masculine than men. some men make better parents than some wymyn, and some wymyn are more aggressive than some men. when i crossdress, i instantly develop a tougher persona. this is an example of how we actually (consciously or not) influence our own gendered behaviour.

next, someone argued that wymyn have come a long way. well, yes we have and thank you for noticing. however, i am still sexually harassed almost every time i go out. (in fact, in my first year of university, it took two months before i was accosted by a group of men on campus.) this is unfair, no matter where i go, what i look like or how i dress. men still do not seem to understand that wymyn are not sexual property. this is an example of how present patriarchy is. another example of the current state of patriarchy is the employment situation. in canada, the majority of students graduating from post secondary educational institutions are wymyn, and yet, a disproportionate number of wymyn occupy low paying, entry-level jobs. even in occupations where the majority of workers are female, those who advance quickest are males. take the nursing profession, for example. at our local hospital, almost the entire executive is male. wymyn have a very hard time advancing, even though the majority of the employees are female.
yes. we have come a long way. i didn't get kicked out of high school for not wearing a skirt every day. i have voting rights. i have (albeit limited) access to wymyn who have made huge strides. but there is still SO MUCH to be done.

and in terms of the "wymyn don't lie" comment, i was specifically referring to sexual assault. please do not take my words out of context again.

and my age.. guy... i may be young, but i have more life experience than some people twice my age. i am a critical thinker, and contrary to what you seem to think, i have not just "swallowed" feminism as an idiology. my self-defining as a feminist was a long journey. yes, my ideas are still evolving, but they will continue to evolve until the day i die. there are some topics that i admittedly will never have an opinion on, and others where my opinion may change drastically. i have to accept my fluidity as well as my limitations in order to be able to grasp the critical distance that is so necessary in critical thought.

and in terms of wymyn organizing for men... okay, i admit, i phrased it badly. but still, i adimently oppose the idea that wymyn are done their struggle and should now move on to take care of men. this is patriarchy's view of wymyn in relation to men; she is the silent (and often unrecognized) supporter.
there are some wonder-full male allies in relation to the wymyn's (ongoing) movement. but don't forget that these allies generally play only a supporting role. (the greatest exception to this is the "white ribbon campaign", the men's campaign to put an end to violence against wymyn.)
this type of setup was the one that i was suggesting for male survivors; organize yourselves and i'm sure many feminists would support you as allies. feminists, i'm sure would be willing to play a major allied role, since many feminists recognize that all violence (excluding self-defence which i do not consier to be an act of "violence" per se) is a detrimental phenomenon in today's society. plus, men are accepted for counselling at most wymyn-run sexual assault clinics.
feminism is soo large, and so all encompassing, that it includes men.
keep in mind, however, that 95% of sexual assaults are perpetrated against wymyn, and that 98% of assaulters are male. i REALLY don't want to minimize or trivialize sexual assault perpetrated against men (my heart goes out to you; it really does), but statistics show that there is a specific sort makeup for the crime of sexual assault, and feminists and counselling centres thus recognize that there is an overwhelming pattern of violence against wymyn that must be dealt with.

i hope that i have made my argument air-tight enough so that we can move beyond arguing the semantics into actually debating feminist issues.
for example, gender difference in relationships could be discussed. or maybe we could hash out the equality/difference debate.
this arguing of semantics rather than the subject at hand is a method of argument used in many debates around feminism. it is a way to argue without actually touching on the issues being raised. this has happened in other threads on this board, and this is why i threw in my qualifier in the "feminist fire shows" thread. i did not post for my politics to be debated, but rather to get advice on my fire show. i did not go in with boxing gloves on, but rather put that segment in out of exasperation. (so thank you again, pele, for picking up on this and moving this heated discussion into a different thread)
along the same line, no one has picked on my anarchist values. thank you for this. i was actually fairly nervous that people would criticize my method of going about my assault (i was criticized by people i knew at the time), and i'm glad to see that people are, at worst, willing to keep their views to themselves, and, at best, supportive of my choices and methods of proceeding around it.

so those are some of my clarifications. take them how you want!

till next time

divi: I'm afraid that all of what you've posted so far has shown naivete and ignorance. You're saying I'm missing your message, but your message is confused and unclear. I have been picking holes in what you've said, because this is what debate is about, and because I think you should clarify what you're expressing, so that people can make more sensible decisions on whether to agree with you.

I've now come to the conclusion that you don't know what you're talking about, and that despite the "I have more life experience than people twice my age" type comments, you're not responding to reasoned arguments with anything other than "don't pick my posts apart, read what I meant to write not what I actually wrote". I don't consider that to be "critical thought".

In response to your "wymyn don't lie", I think I mentioned in one of my earlier posts, that even if your words are taken in context, there have been court cases which were turned round from a sexual harassment charge/rape charge towards the male to a perversion of the course of justice charge towards the female. (same pair of people). This doesn't tally with what you said. The way my ex (ab)used me (mentally rather than physically) is, possibly not as bad as physical abuse, but as I've seen, it can be equally perpetrated by both sexes.

Since you don't appear to believe in equality, then I can only say, once more, that I think you are misguided, naive, and that your cause will, rather than solving problems entirely, solve some to cause more. I don't see that as being a good outcome for society.

A final point: if you don't want to argue about semantics, can I suggest that you not rely on semantics to constantly remind us of your various points, eg your deliberate misspellings, your use of the word "guy" in place of putting someone's name. All I can say is good luck in converting other people to your cause, you started off with me feeling relatively indifferent, and now I'm spending time ranting offline about people who claim to be feminists and aren't, and twist things to make their various points. Well done.

Dio, I thought that your post was refreshing to read. I felt like you were getting to the substance of things.

In terms of mis-writing what I meant to say, please acknowledge that I did try to clear things up in later posts. And I want to re-iterate that I'm anti-patriarchy and not anti-man. The only male whom I have shown an animosity towards is the one who perpetrated an assault against me. I love boyz and all their glory!

The "wymyn don't lie", like I said above, I was referring specifically to sexual assault. I drew that conclusion from my experience personally, and was not intending to generalize every case of sexual assault, and was DEFINATELY not trying to imply that wymyn are incapable of lying (believe me, I've had the shit end of the stick with wymyn before). But reporting a sexual assault is an extremely trying process, and I don't think I know a single womyn who would endure that type of public scrutiny if she didn't mean what she was saying. Yes, there have been cases where a womyn was untruthful about sexual assault, but these are few and far between. They are also sensationalized and overblown in the media to make it look like an occurence that is more common than it really is (it is estimated that less than 2% of sexual assault reports are false, and this estimate is based on the number of cases where the police choose not to proceed with the investigation. The vast majority of these cases never even make it to the courtroom to be decided upon). In fact, it was only abolished some 20 years ago in Canada that the judge would instruct the jury to be skeptical of the testimony of an alleged (f@#! I hate that word) survivor. In fact, some judges still do it. There is NO OTHER criminal proceeding in Canada that would allow for this type of degradation of a witness. This goes to show the pervasiveness of the "all women lie" myth. Hence why I was so aggressive in attacking it.

And the "guy" comment was actually a term of endearment. I was smiling when I typed it.

About having personal life experience.. I don't necessarily want to get into it right now, nor build my ego... but just take my word for it that I do have quite a bit (if you're that interested, send me a private message).
I don't know if I've expressed it this way already, but I am anti-oppression. This means that I fight adultism as well (and as I age, it gets admittedly harder to not internalize the discrimination). So Dio, I was basically calling you on your (assumingly) subliminal discrimination.

So, down to the nitty-gritty video game debate. I personally think that if you're going to have a video game which encompasses violence, you should have the representation of wymyn in there (gawd, I know that I'm making people cringe now every time i write that word! ).
I think my major beef is when wymyn are skimpily clothed, and are weaker than the male characters.
I can really appreciate a video game like Tekken Tag 3 (hehe one of my favorites) where the "unknown" character is fierce and empowered by the spirit of a wolf.
Personally, I find it discouraging when I sit down to a video game to find that there are no female characters from which to choose (I'll throw in a qualifier (these are getting exhausting): I don't only choose female characters to play). Having the representation of wymyn in video games simply allows people more choice.

On the perspective of the violence/anti-violence debate, I don't think that any one factor (such as films or video games) has the power to make anyone violent on its own. I see that it's either a larger combination of influences or an inability to distinguish fantasy from reality. I don't think that having female characters in a video game is inherently anti-womyn. She can kick ass back!
Though I identify as being nonviolent, I admit to having urges as well, and video games are definately a good aggression sink.
So are mosh pits... I love the consensual aggression (read:small scale violence) that happens Ya gotta find an outlet somewhere!

Later days, y'all!

I just wanted to throw something in; you may have noticed that the vast majority of my statistics are canadian. I recognize that this is a very western method of going about the discussion, and apologize for the limited scope that I am providing.
Most of my books are canadian-made, and the statistics, being localized, are the most accurate ones that I can use in discussion. (I know that isn't an excuse.)
Challenging my own view of the world constantly (and getting only slightly worn down by it),
divi

be cool matt

1. I am asking everyone to calm down a little, and after typing do not immediately hit send but sit back chill, re-read and check your tone. The disclaimers are doing little to diffuse attitudes here.

Now, I am a single mom, my son was born of a 3 year seriously abusive relationship, that I pulled myself out of. I have been raped a couple times. I am in a career field where men outnumber women roughly 20 to 1, and that is including crew and assistants. Men in the field can be jerks, not all the time but can be. It is a boys club and they are afraid of competition no matter who it comes from, and they know that most of these arts will be better received if a woman does them, based on aesthetic appeal. Fine. It is also full of alot of 70 yo guys and their line of thinking hasn't changed in decades, it isn't going to start now. I can handle that. But you know what I see more commonly?

Women are worse than men. Women will compete and hold each other down. Women will say to me "Good for you for doing that. Serves men right, we women can do anything!" Ummmmm, not even close, I don't see other women out there potentially shoving a dagger through thier hand. Who gave women the right to ride on the coat tails of the successes of other women based on gender alone?

Women catcall me in ways that are far, far worse and more demeaning than men out of jealousy. Men will yell "Hey baby I have something to put in your mouth." It is simple, stupid, easy to turn into a joke and is not offensive at all. He is giving me a compliment of a sort, and usually drunkenly, making it easier for me to deal with. Last week a women called me a witch based on my career choice in performing obscure arts. The men were cool about it, the women were absolute *itches and would look at me and whisper and such as well. Try to do well at something on your own, and see what happens. I don't deserve to get called a whore, a cow, a witch, a *itch, and those are some of the mild ones, while I am working, but I do. I don't deserve to be in the middle of a fire routine and have some girl threaten to kick my arse...but I get that more than a bit (actually, that one makes me laugh). If you will recall, historically speaking, any of the women who rose up did not do so with the support of the "sista's" but then other women were quick to jump in and cry rally when she succeeded (Many of the Female Authors come to mind for this especially, using "George Elliot" as a starting point for the female author movement).

Also while we are speaking historically, Astar the Bless you thing is one of the myths btw, (there are many that surround sneezing) not fact...as are most things with language. There are alot of words that have changed with the times and it was seen as socially acceptible...for example: Virgin is not what it used to mean. Gay has changed drastically in the past 40 years. Hell, read through Shakespeare, Homer and Chaucer and see how meanings and spellings have changed. Or if you want to get into it, look no further in history than to the Victorian Era, Hawthorne, Poe, Dickens and it will become obvious that language changes drastically. So the use of the term Women based on a historic context, or any part of language preservation based on that, really does not add up to the trends in speech at all.
However, I do think that changing popularized spelling does not make people stop and think at all, especially men. It can be irritating, annoying and if a person is going to think anything it is that the user is an over the top feminist or else simply illiterate and spelling as it sounds. For me it is reminiscent of decoding raver-ese. It is also not subtle. If you want evidence of that, then simply look at the feminist fire thread and see how quickly things flared up once that came into strong use. Language is something that is protected even as it grows, and sometimes changing things is concidered just as aggressive as if you had been sitting outside yelling with a picket sign. It is not as subtle an urge to thought as you might think.

And the idea of 3rd wave feminism where women can do what they want and express themselves...first of all, this is not isolated to the female movement at all. ***People*** are doing this, all ages, races, colors, religions. People are standing up for what they believe in and for who they want to be despite persecution. And this trend has been building and going on for centuries. In the last century alone look at the 20's..sexual and artistic freedom for women, the 60's and really, after the 60's it just failed to let up. As far as the whole sexual freedom, we had it and didn't care so the church stepped back in and gained hold yet again. What should be fought there is the religious ideals that took it away. Instead it has become this huge social strike..and with everyone "making a statement" the cacophany is so blinding/deafening that no one is getting heard. People would do better to just live as they want to live and rise to the struggles as they go instead of making such big deals out of everything and blaming someone else for holding them back.

Next is the sexual assault/rape debate. Let me point out that men do not need to have their penis involve to be raped, and it does not need to be a woman doing it. I will not throw out arbitrary statistics however the fact that sexual abuse and physical violence is twice as common and ten times worse in the gay community says alot here. And the fact that women have a more difficult time raping a man does not mean that it can not be done. Sometimes the mental/emotional trauma of real harrassment (not catcalls on the street) can be far worse than of physical rape. Ever see Disclosure? It was a media response to the fact that sexual harrassment charges for men towards women are on the incline. It is very much a two way street, and women can have the power and the upperhand just as easily as men.

I won't even get into objectification because this is where I get really opinionated. I am just going to leave an example here. I went to a huge bellydance convention/gathering, a few weeks ago. Hundreds upon hundreds of lovely female bellydancers got up on the stage in skin tight, revealing, sumptuous costumes and shimmied their way around, some in flirty and suggestive ways. There were tonnes of men in the audience and vending. They cheered, they zagarheeted, they opa-ed, they appreciated the dancers and it showed. And if a single one of them tried to treat us like strippers, he would have had his arse kicked. Now only about 5 male dancers took the stage. One of them was breathtakingly exquisite in dance, form, charisma...he really had me awed. Want to know what happened? Women ran up to the stage trying to get him to come over to put money in his harem pants. They shook their boobs at him. They cat called him worse than any man I have heard. They treated him as if he were in a g-string and not dancing with flawless technique a very artful, difficult dance. He wasn't up there wiggling and flinging it around and yet he was treated by the same female bellydancers who would have outraged if a man did that to them as if he was a stripper. I was enraged and disgusted.

As for the connection between porn and sexual based violence, that is a myth. This applies to the violence and media debate, as well. Studies tend to prove what they want. The few which have been done unbiasedly are still in progress because they need to follow these children until they grow to adults for real proof. So far though, I let my child see limited amounts of violence (hard to avoid really). We discuss it, he plays "army" and in play or artistic presentation helps him work out his personal aggressions. I would rather have him do that than bottle and explode. When he is a teen I would rather he watch porn and have some "ice cream" (old hop-ism, PM me if you do not understand) than take it out on a girl. It's not all about exposure to media but how it is handled at home, the individual psyche..a multitude of elements really. Zero tolerance has gone entirely too far and I say this both as a parent and as a women.

In the end to me feminism is a waste of time and energy, just like any other form of biasedness and bigotry. It had it's place in the 20's and in the 60's...for certain. It had it's place in giving us rights, and so did activism for minorities of all kinds. I think now that it has all gone too far to where it is more habitual than truly about equality. We have the chance at equality, but just like with men, it must be earned. It can be in this day and age, when the laws are changed but some of the ideals are not with certain groups or people, the absolute best statement to make as a woman, as a person (since there are men fighting in the traditional female world as well) is to do what you want. To make an impact by succeeding in what you want to do, regardless of whether it is female or male dominated. It tends to make a more powerful statement to doubters than to stand up on a soapbox. Success in my chosen field is my feminist statement, possibly paving a smoother road if any woman wants to follow. And if not, it doesn't matter, I did what I wanted anyway...

This is all just my opinion btw. It does not reflect the beliefs of anyone else who works here at HoP. My beliefs have developed from my personal experiences and observations over the past 30 years. Thanks.
P~

[ 11. November 2003, 04:20: Message edited by: Pele ]

Wow this thread really grew where I left off.

eh im sort of with pele and sort of with divi and sort of with dio here, I can't be bothered arugeing anymore because everyone has said what I would have said.

Also as far as sexism in the career goes I found out something interesting todaytoday about 6 girls in my school (it's an adult high school aimed at helping people find an alternative and flexible way to get their high school degrees, it's basily like a two room school house with two teachers who are increadibly talented and dedicated who teach "everything" to a handfull of people)

All of them wanted to be LPNS (licensed practical nurses, they are kind of 'bellow' "registered nurses" that you see in hospitals most often, they are somewheres bellow a RN and an orderly in terms of education/qualification. The province here is being cheap and they are changeing the LPN requirements around a bit basicly so the entry requirements as far as completed courses and grades is identical to the entry requirements for the RN program, which is fairly high as far as university entry requirements go. So these 6 girls who don't have chemistry 12, physics 12 and math 12 and the required marks were given a sort of pardon because they changed the entry requirements so quick that it's not far that they get excluded and have to go back and learn heavy high school science courses. I am actually in the exact same boat of them only im a guy. They made no exception for me. So now I need to give up my dream of becoming a nurse, something I was getting into genuinly because I know I can be good at it. Atleast two of these girls were only becoming nurses because they basicly calculated the tuition of becoming certified and compared it to the salary and decided it would be a good career.

Oh yeah and girls do lie about sexual assault. Ive had 3 girls lie to me, two of them did it because they had some serious psychological issues (one was manic depressive, the other one is just increadibly insecure and lives in a world of lies she tells herself and others)

the other one was raped but can hardly remember it and it was comeing back to her in relapses and she produced a fake story about a rape that never occured trying to cope with it.

Generally I really don't think girls will lie about rape unless there is a good reason (be that another rape, or some other very serious problems) and I don't think theres really that many girls out there so evil they would sacrifice and risk so much that they would actually accuse a person 'real' person of a rape that never happened and then tell all kinds of people includeing cops and family. I definatly think there is a lot of people in prison for rapes they didn't do though, and probably a few in prison for rapes that didn't even happen. I don't think they are victims of evil plotting women for the most part but maybe victims of a machine like legal system, political system, educational system and society that's out of control.

I think a lot of things people are seeing as deliberate aren't, but are something much harder to define which really scares me a lot more then deliberate actions, because it's a hell of a lot harder to combat.

Divi: This is purely out of curisosity and not at all meant to be antagonistic - but how do you feel about women exploiting their femininity?
Whether this be wearing a short skirt to an interview, batting their eyelids to get a discount or thrusting their chest out to get faster service at a bar?

Do you think/accept that there are set differences between the two sexes that can never be erased? For example, it is generally accepted, perhaps even proven, that men "on the whole" are physically stronger than women, thus they get the more physical jobs? Or are you of the opinion that a woman could do a builders job equally well as a man?

Again, this is meant in a curious manner, not a challenging one