tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post4320557229967859648..comments2023-08-09T03:21:13.354-05:00Comments on Letters from Gehenna: The World on a Slant: Spoiling FeminismDw3t-Hthrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11584245136407694660noreply@blogger.comBlogger19125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-2629915800279462842007-10-18T18:24:00.000-05:002007-10-18T18:24:00.000-05:00"I am not capable of considering someone who says ..."I am not capable of considering someone who says that someone like me should not exist to be an ally. No matter that they say they're doing it for my own good; dressing Apep up in ruffles and putting makeup on him doesn't make him my friend."<BR/><BR/>Yes.<BR/><BR/>"And I don't believe them when they say it's not me they want to obliterate, just that-thing-I-do, whether that-thing is working at home and doing the housekeeping, or not going back to school, or being kinky, or being nonmonogamous, or following my religion, or any of those things."<BR/><BR/>Yeah, THAT. It's like the social constructionism stuff I'm mentioning at SM-F. I don't think people are actually using social constructionism to argue for anything. I think they're using it as a way to claim "But I wasn't attacking YOU, because there are no such thing as fixed identities!"<BR/><BR/>and well, the first half of that sentence remains untrue regardless of the second. If someone gaybashes a gay guy, they're not attacking the social construction of homosexuality when they hit his head with a fucking pipe, dammit.Trinityhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06846032433424879965noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-50873569713026103232007-10-17T09:41:00.000-05:002007-10-17T09:41:00.000-05:00Dev -- mostly I'm kinda confused by the slightly d...<EM>Dev -- mostly I'm kinda confused by the slightly defensive introductions. ;)</EM><BR/><BR/>It's just because I'm weird and think that if I argue with people they will hate my guts and stuff. And I like you and don't want you to hate me. (See? Crazy, I tell you.)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-25183467766525141002007-10-16T23:31:00.000-05:002007-10-16T23:31:00.000-05:00Dev -- mostly I'm kinda confused by the slightly d...Dev -- mostly I'm kinda confused by the slightly defensive introductions. ;)<BR/><BR/>I'm limited in a particular way: I am not capable of considering someone who says that someone like me should not exist to be an ally. No matter that they say they're doing it for my own good; dressing Apep up in ruffles and putting makeup on him doesn't make him my friend.<BR/><BR/>And I don't believe them when they say it's not <I>me</I> they want to obliterate, just that-thing-I-do, whether that-thing is working at home and doing the housekeeping, or not going back to school, or being kinky, or being nonmonogamous, or following my religion, or any of those things. These people who want to go "Love the sinner, hate the sin" on me over my whatever that doesn't fit their particular dogma (feminist or otherwise) don't seem to grasp that they're not latching onto some trivial hobby or fashion statement that can be discarded if sufficiently politicised.<BR/><BR/>I want other people's political out of my personal, mostly. I'm not their dancing monkey, and I'm not their waif in need of rescuing.<BR/><BR/>And that gets derided, frequently, as "choosing to support patriarchy" or similar stuff like that, because the only space in the theory for people like me is "the traitor".<BR/><BR/>And y'know, I didn't <I>choose</I> that. But I have to live with it.Dw3t-Hthrhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11584245136407694660noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-49914895255666579152007-10-16T18:24:00.000-05:002007-10-16T18:24:00.000-05:00Hopefully it's clear from our interaction elsewher...Hopefully it's clear from our interaction elsewhere that I enjoy and respect you and don't consider you an "enemy" in any context, etc. I mean, this is just me, right? :-)<BR/><BR/>I'm familiar with radical feminism and I think it serves a useful purpose even though I often disagree with its claims. (I am not anti-capitalist. I think ideas like presuming non-consent for sex are crazy. And so on.) I feel I'm able to read it and kind of "get around" the craziest parts to understand the meat of where they're coming from. I find it a useful perspective.<BR/><BR/>I hate gender essentialism of any kind, and when I see it among feminists I hate it as much as I do anywhere else. I don't see it among feminists that much, though.<BR/><BR/>The whole "choice" thing (in general, not referring to abortions) is tricky. I actually don't think feminism is about women doing what they want even if what they want is supporting nasty cultural structures like the patriarchy. ("I took my husband's name because it made me comfortable. Isn't feminism all about choices?" No, it's not.)<BR/><BR/>That's not to say that people shouldn't have the right to make choices, or that they ought to be cast out of polite/feminist/intellectual/any society because of them. But a lot of the choices that we make are culturally constrained, and recognizing that is a good thing.<BR/><BR/>To me, radical feminism is a lens for looking at the world. You shouldn't wear it all the time, but it can be useful to peer through it at least occasionally and see what jumps out. Regular plain jane feminism is kind of a no-brainer (again, to me) if you don't get too caught up in what individual people or groups are saying about it or you.<BR/><BR/>But what's really important is thinking about thriving and living ethically. Gender in the culture is one of the ethical issues modern people should deal with in whatever way is most profitable for them.<BR/><BR/>(God, I sound like a lecturing asshole in this post. I swear I am really not one. Above all I just fucking love people.)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-67253148314755005752007-10-16T17:51:00.000-05:002007-10-16T17:51:00.000-05:00Great post. I've had the same experience with that...Great post. I've had the same experience with that baffled feeling of "well, maybe I *am* a feminist because I believe in X, but then I also think Y and do Z, and all these feminists over here believe in Q, which I think is totally wrong..." <BR/><BR/>I think there will always be feminists trying to exclude certain women (sex workers, kinky people, SAHMs), and there will always be feminists who make me feel icky about claiming the same label (gender essentialists, capitalists, anti-porn/-sex feminists). Which basically has led me to the conclusion that feminism as a label has very little to offer me, and as a movement not a whole lot more. I still describe myself as a feminist, but my reasons for doing so are a lot different, now; it's more of a descriptive term than an identity. I guess I just want to stake out my little corner, to acknowledge that while I probably disagree with the vast majority of feminists out there on several points, and while my "feminist goals" are considerably different than most feminists', I still recognize that sexism infuses our daily lives, and that it needs to be fought.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-3783887628687284152007-10-15T23:32:00.000-05:002007-10-15T23:32:00.000-05:00Dalandra/Chabas -- that sort of thing is one of th...Dalandra/Chabas -- that sort of thing is one of the things that I notice and react to, too, with bafflement on one level and this sort of deepseated memory of guilt on another, because of the whole "Maybe they're right, maybe being a feminist means that I ..." Up until I hit myself with the Clue Fish and go, y'know, someone who's opposed to women like me isn't much of a friend to me, whatever they claim as a label.<BR/><BR/>To all others, thanks for dropping by. (I think this is the post with the most <I>different</I> commenters I've ever had ...)Dw3t-Hthrhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11584245136407694660noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-47243840396492587162007-10-15T19:51:00.000-05:002007-10-15T19:51:00.000-05:00"it's pretty evil, I think, to abuse something tha..."it's pretty evil, I think, to abuse something that could be so useful and helpful and good."<BR/><BR/>YES. that's what's such as shame. feminism is not evil. it's done a lot of good and I believe it will continue to. but it also can get used in scary, icky, nasty ways.Trinityhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06846032433424879965noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-87028188199697007572007-10-15T07:30:00.000-05:002007-10-15T07:30:00.000-05:00I like "the values you're espousing are entirely c...I like "the values you're espousing are entirely compatible with the way I see feminism". <BR/><BR/>I have seen/encountered some of the very negative feminism that you're talking about here. I fully agree that it sucks. <BR/><BR/>I do think that it's a bad thing that women are pushed out of identifying as feminist by this sort of experience. It makes me quite angry - at the people doing the pushing, I mean. <BR/><BR/>woman fed up with haters said:<BR/><I>most men are not oppressors nor are they enablers of the patriarchy anymore than most women</I><BR/><BR/>See, I think this is true inasmuch as I don't think that most men are out there *deliberately* doing these things. I do think that most men are doing this to at least some extent unconsciously. I think that most women are, too. We've all been raised in an unequal society, and that cannot help but have an effect on us. Even if we put significant effort into getting past it. (The same argument holds for racism, of course; and other inequalities.)<BR/><BR/>That doesn't in any way justify the hating. And it doesn't justify "men did X to us, so we'll do X to men". And there are of course a whole stack of ways in which the inequality damages men as well as women. Equality is a thing to be pursued and worked for by everyone. <BR/><BR/>(And that's without even getting into the issues around such binary gender identity, anyway.)Juliet Kemphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09374803596902371714noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-13927100547200638272007-10-15T05:22:00.000-05:002007-10-15T05:22:00.000-05:00Holy God.This post is BRILLIANT and speaks to many...Holy God.<BR/>This post is BRILLIANT and speaks to many parts of me! I'm coming back to read it again in a few hours(just woke up and found you via Trinity).Kimhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08203706993962458853noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-69198305493670483322007-10-14T23:14:00.000-05:002007-10-14T23:14:00.000-05:00I hear you, Trinity. It's very clearly wrong for s...I hear you, Trinity. It's very clearly wrong for so-called feminists (or anyone) to behave that way. It remains, for now, outside of my personal experience, but I believe you and others that it happens, and it's pretty evil, I think, to abuse something that could be so useful and helpful and good.S.L. Bondhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15574823753608510026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-20477312064351706852007-10-14T21:01:00.000-05:002007-10-14T21:01:00.000-05:00Daisy Bond:I think there are all kinds of experien...Daisy Bond:<BR/><BR/>I think there are all kinds of experiences one can have "with feminism." There are a lot of people who use the idea of false consciousness or colluding with patriarchy to cut down other women. That was my experience really from the beginning. My first experience was being told by a college professor that I was an enemy of feminism for saying "I read MacKinnon and I'm not convinced there is a patriarchy. Who are these men controlling everything. What are they doing? What does it mean?"<BR/><BR/>I was told that I was raised by male academics, that I thought Plato wrote better than Susan Bordo because I didn't consider women thinkers as important or as skilled at writing as men. I got told that the movement was sorry to lose me, as I was "bright."<BR/><BR/>It's very alienating. And then there are women like you who are just raised to think women are spiffy, and that's "feminism", without all this policing of what women do and how they feel and if they get too much out of "masculinist" thinking or tradition. It makes it difficult to communicate at all, because the non-feminists are saying "we don't like being treated this way" and the feminists are saying "you just said you like the status quo!"<BR/><BR/>and nothing happens.Trinityhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06846032433424879965noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-64810951262167106642007-10-14T18:44:00.000-05:002007-10-14T18:44:00.000-05:00I'm glad I read the comments before commenting... ...I'm glad I read the comments before commenting... I've revised my original response (But this sounds just like feminism! You're a feminist!) to "the values you're espousing are entirely compatible with the way I see feminism"<BR/><BR/>My experience with feminism has been really, <I>really</I> different from yours. I, too, was raised in a family where higher education was a given, and my mothers' feminism isn't a sensitive as it should be to the realities of people of color and people in poverty and transgender folks. The point, thought, is that my mother, under the influence of her mother (a doctor), went a got a PhD, but realized halfway through she preferred parenting to publishing and became a stay-at-home mom instead of a professor. She taught me that feminism is about treating people like whole, complex, and varied creatures, instead of like pre-programmed robots; your experience of feminism sounds to me to be the perfect opposite of that.S.L. Bondhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15574823753608510026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-55516861374318205132007-10-14T15:05:00.000-05:002007-10-14T15:05:00.000-05:00I remember a discussion on a forum where someone p...I remember a discussion on a forum where someone professed to believing in equality, but choosing to be a SAHM. She got ripped to pieces but a few feminists who were furious at her setting back the cause and betraying feminism, while the rest of us marveled at the fact that apparently "freedom to choose" meant "freedom to choose as we tell you to".<BR/><BR/>I don't actively identify as a feminist, though I strongly identify with goals of equality between men and women. I fully intend to work after I have children, and who knows, my boyfriend might even end up staying home with the kids - ideally, we'd both work 50%, so we can split child care between the two of us. I grew up with the assumption that men and women's roles are not set in stone, and whatever works for the couple in question is great. My mother tried hard to raise a feminist daughter, but if I'm happier as a stay-at-home mom, she'd support that choice.<BR/><BR/>--ChabasGeertehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04011290132239686885noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-42504630241059718612007-10-14T11:01:00.000-05:002007-10-14T11:01:00.000-05:00"[This post + Dev's comment] caused me to consider..."[This post + Dev's comment] caused me to consider: most times I've seen or heard the phrase "you're a feminist whether you know/like it or not", it could have been constructively replaced with something along the lines of "the values you're espousing are entirely compatible with the way I see feminism"."<BR/><BR/>YES. I so wish people would just say THAT instead.Trinityhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06846032433424879965noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-41179282922549664622007-10-14T09:25:00.000-05:002007-10-14T09:25:00.000-05:00[This post + Dev's comment] caused me to consider:...[This post + Dev's comment] caused me to consider: most times I've seen or heard the phrase "you're a feminist whether you know/like it or not", it could have been constructively replaced with something along the lines of "the values you're espousing are entirely compatible with the way I see feminism".<BR/><BR/>When not, it could generally have been more accurately replaced with "You're a woman, so what you do reflects to some extent on women's role in society, and thereby, all women." Which is approximately as true for women as it is for many other groups - gays, straights, african-americans, christians, truck drivers, left-handed folks, people who wear trenchcoats - perhaps more than for some, less than for others. The question of "to what extent should this reflecting-on-a-grouping thing influence one's actions in life?" is a deep one(*) that can spawn respectful debate or (more often, I fear) vicious flame wars.<BR/><BR/>Interestingly, I don't think I've ever seen the phrase used in the sense of "You're a <I>person</I>, and part of a society including women, so your actions and attitudes affect women's role in society and the perceptions thereof". <BR/><BR/>--Darker<BR/><BR/>(*) = Whether I mean 'touching on deep philosophy' or 'a Lovecraftian horror' is left to the judgement of the reader.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-41537092666568897062007-10-14T02:01:00.000-05:002007-10-14T02:01:00.000-05:00Devastating -- the issue for me about those obnoxi...Devastating -- the issue for me about those obnoxious things is that I'm not not using the word because of some of the pissy little petulances that a lot of netfems want to present ("We're not taking away your makeup, honey"), but because <I>trying to live up to that word was destroying me</I>. It tried to eat my heart, and, y'know, I prefer to reserve heart-eating for dead bad people.<BR/><BR/>Alhandra -- check out the post I linked to at the top of the thing, have a look at the comments there. I don't "prefer to think of myself" that way, it's just one of those things that no matter what, some asshole will rant at me about, so at this point I just shrug and say, y'know, fine, you want me to be your enemy? I'm obliging, I'm friendly, I can accomodate your needs in this fashion. It's no big hardship.<BR/><BR/>I can't make it stop. So I may as well just let the folks who think I'm some sort of vile being whose existence should be obliterated (one way or another) mark me up as yet another enemy, because they're sure as sunrise enemies of me and mine. I'd be happier to, y'know, play it mellow, live and let live, work on fixing things rather than annihilating the insufficiently conformist, but I'm the sort of crazy bint who won't out with a tearful story of horrifying abuse to justify being kinky, so what could I possibly have to offer to Teh Movement?<BR/><BR/>Bah. Humbug.Dw3t-Hthrhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11584245136407694660noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-19217203441531997132007-10-14T00:41:00.000-05:002007-10-14T00:41:00.000-05:00There's a reason that the word "Femi-Nazi" was coi...There's a reason that the word "Femi-Nazi" was coined, I think, for just such people as you describe. I've been fortunate and not run into very many of those.<BR/><BR/>My Wellesley experience differed strongly from yours in this regard; Wellesley took care of my first-year roommate when she was very ill and bent over backwards to accomodate her diet issues. They also tried to take care of my other roommate, though I know the Stone Center wasn't fully adequate for it. I'm uncertain as to whether or not she was diagnosed with chemical-imbalance depression while she was there, or over a summer vacation.<BR/><BR/>I believe I know what event you are referring to in this post, but I wasn't as tightly connected to it, so I didn't get any of the reaction from the college itself.<BR/><BR/>I think the many concerns you bring up as being ignored or dismissed by so-called feminists are perfectly valid things to be concerned with as part of feminism. *shrugs* If you prefer to think of yourself as spoiling feminism, that's up to you, but as far as I'm concerned, it sounds to me like you've got a handle on some very pressing issues that affect women as a whole.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-85791713604534647412007-10-13T23:22:00.000-05:002007-10-13T23:22:00.000-05:00Interesting post. The radical gender feminists ve...Interesting post. The radical gender feminists vent blatant man-hating merely want to piss off anyone walking around with a pair of balls and, in their minds, the unthinking female victims who are oppressed by them. It's irrational, it's anti-intellectual and it's immoral. Equal rights are critical, but most men are not oppressors nor are they enablers of the patriarchy anymore than most women, and they don't deserve to be treated like dogs by shrill misandrists (yes, that's a real word -- you radicals have made it well known). You want to know why "feminism" has a bad name? It's because of the radical gender feminists. They've stalled the progress the equity feminists (like me) have made by their hate rhetoric. They could say the same things without hating, and it would have gone over better. No, they've ruined the "f" word and those of us concerned about equal rights need to find a new one.<BR/><BR/>Notice how the marginalized radicals spew anti-intellectualism to legitimize spouting misandry for virtually anything men do. And pay attention the next time a scientific study is reported that claims a biological difference between the sexes influences gender behavior. It is automatically trashed with a vicious knee jerk, limp sarcasm -- not to mention grossly flawed logic. Since when are feminists as ANTI-SCIENCE as the creationists?!!<BR/><BR/>Here's an intellectual thought for these womyn: your stereotyping all men as evil or rapists or clueless or dogs or pigs would not be tolerated by any other class were it directed toward them -- blacks, Jews, Hispanics, you name it. Think about it -- you hate approximately three billion people on the planet, far more than Hitler ever professed to hating. <BR/><BR/>Now the rest of us will need to find a new word because you've defiled ours.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4427538608110635294.post-87836498790896232532007-10-13T22:06:00.000-05:002007-10-13T22:06:00.000-05:00My experiences are really different from yours - d...My experiences are really different from yours - different enough that I'd like to say some of the obnoxious things ("you're a feminist whether you know/like it or not") that you've heard before. But I have enormous respect for you and I'm going to refrain. Humanity trumps ideology for me (nearly) every time.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com