The National Forum   Donate   Your Account   On Line Opinion   Forum   Blogs   Polling   About   
The Forum - On Line Opinion's article discussion area



Syndicate
RSS/XML


RSS 2.0

Main Articles General

Sign In      Register

The Forum > Article Comments > What is a feminist? > Comments

What is a feminist? : Comments

By Cireena Simcox, published 25/1/2007

A feminist is not a woman with hairy armpits and a chip on her shoulder.

  1. Pages:
  2. 1
  3. Page 2
  4. 3
  5. 4
  6. 5
  7. ...
  8. 29
  9. 30
  10. 31
  11. All
Simcox adds her political cleavage in the same form as above, through these 3 concluding sentences:

“The right for either a man or a woman to stay at home and raise a family is a feminist imperative. The necessity for every woman, regardless of inclination or aptitude to follow a proscribed direction either as a homemaker or a career person, is not.”

“The right for either a man or a woman to reach their career goals, be it as a florist, nanny or CEO, is also a feminist imperative. The need for every working woman to ape her male counterparts is not.”

“Feminists do not believe that all women are caring, sharing and empathetic. They don’t believe that all men are violent. Neither do they believe that the way to correct the wrongs in a patriarchal society is to turn it into a matriarchal one.”

And then Simcox finishes by telling all us men that we can just P-O:
“So go on, people. Fight your gender wars, vilify each other, stick on labels, generalise and be hateful to your heart’s content. Just leave feminists out of it.”

I argue that the Feminist propaganda has never been more convoluted and obscure, than in the example we see in this article. It is unlikely that it will change anytime in the near future; even though Clinton and Gillard are set to rock the Leftist Feminist political scene in the most profound way history has yet to see in the modern era.
Posted by Gadget, Thursday, 25 January 2007 1:30:35 PM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
I was born in 1940, so experienced many forms of inequality. I saw myself as feminine although I had to work for my father as his head stockman. I saw myself as my husband's equal, when we married and bought a farm, although I devoted a large portion of my time to raising five children, feeding workers, doing all the book-keeping, doing all the housekeeping and cooking, plus assisting with farm work.
So I was horrified during a census in the 1960's when I wasn't allowed to declare my occupation as a 'farmer'. I was told by the collecter of these forms that I must call myself a housewife. Playing the bush lawyer I objected so vociferously that I was finally allowed to claim to be a paid housekeeper and paid piggery attendant.
It was about this period that Merle Thornton and a friend chained themselves to a Brisbane bar and demanded the right to be served lemonade. The Australian Womens'Weekly offered money for similar inequality stories. Other writers received payment of five pounds, but as the best story to be published, I received ten pounds.
I am still, as I approach the age of 67, encountering inequality issues. As women, we can never give up this fight. I despair sometimes when I see young girls take the rights won by their grandmothers for granted.
As a more recent story, I presented to a young female receptionist to register to see a doctor. When asked my occupation, I replied, "I'm a farmer."
She giggled and said, "Will I write farmeress?"
"Not unless I'm going to see the doctoress!" I snapped.
Posted by Country girl, Thursday, 25 January 2007 2:15:40 PM
Find out more about this user Visit this user's webpage Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
Cireena Simcox asks why feminism provokes such negative reactions. She answers that people imagine there was a utopian past and that they need a scapegoat to explain its loss.

Can I provide an alternative explanation? The mainstream of feminism is based on the theory of patriarchy. According to this theory, what makes us human is our power to enact our will. Women, observe the patriarchy theorists, have less formal power in society (political and economic). Therefore, they inhabit a system which makes them less human than men.

Why would this occur? Patriarchy theorists can't answer that different social roles reflect natural differences between men and women as (by the logic of their argument) this would make women naturally inferior to men. Therefore patriarchy theorists are committed to the idea that gender difference is socially constructed.

So why the power differential? The answer given by patriarchy theorists is that men have organised a power grab at the expense of women, and that society is organised to maintain a male dominance. Therefore, marriage, family life, sexuality, domestic violence and romantic love are all equally aspects of an oppressive patriarchy.

The problem is that having accepted this theoretical framework, feminism became highly disruptive to normal relationships between men and women. First, it made feminist women think of men as a hostile oppressor group. Second, it placed emphasis on women competing for economic and political power, and downgraded the importance of family life. Third, it denied the real status of gender difference, seeing masculinity and femininity instead as oppressive social constructs to be overthrown.

There is a whole generation now which has had to cope with the derailment of normal patterns of family formation. There are lots of reluctant bachelors and spinsters and many women saddened by an unnecessary childlessness.

This has undoubtedly placed feminists on the back foot. Whilst I'm glad that Cireena Simcox is arguing for a less radical version of feminism, it would help if women like her would acknowledge the more negative effects of mainstream feminism - effects which flow logically from feminist political theory.
Posted by Mark Richardson, Thursday, 25 January 2007 4:59:16 PM
Find out more about this user Visit this user's webpage Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
White Feather Feminism

"By 1914, sexual issues permeated the literature and propaganda of virtually every suffrage organization. Prostitution and venereal disease were the favored topics employed to illustrate the condition of women in a male-controlled society (Kent 159). As the influence of the Pankhurst’s WSPU (Women’s Social and Political Union) increased, so did the sexualized nature of the feminist struggle play out in the public forum. On the eve of Britain’s war with Germany, the domestic war between the sexes was already in full force."

The author states; " The advantage of choosing feminism as the scapegoat factor is that, to date, no feminists have claimed responsibility for either blowing something up, shooting anyone or taking hostages. They are relatively safe protagonists."

Erin Pizzey writes: "Biba was bombed because the women's movement thought it was a capitalist enterprise devoted to sexualising women's bodies."

Others such as researchers, Gelles, Steinmetz have been subjected to bomb and death threats. Erin Pizzey has even had bullets fired at her premises.

Erin Pizzey, Gelles and Steinmetz have all experienced censorship of their work.

The author writes about inflammatory rhetoric, yet a lot of the dialogue in the past has been inflammatory rhetoric from feminists.
Posted by JamesH, Thursday, 25 January 2007 5:45:51 PM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
Mark Richardson, a nice try, but too glib by far. The claim that different social roles reflect what you call "natural" (magic word) differences and make women naturally inferior to men is illogical. You may prefer it to be the case, but difference need not be synonymous with some notion of merit or a relativity of inferiority/superiority.

Your construction of feminism or feminist political theory then is deeply flawed and the social dislocations that you desribe sounds like masculine sour grapes.
Posted by FrankGol, Thursday, 25 January 2007 5:49:37 PM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
Part I: Learning War No More?

The Context: development of the warrior is an integral part of Human culture -- war as essential human activity

"...the arrival of the Normans represented a quite new force on the scene, the coming of a people distinguished, above all, by military prowess -- ...

"Part of the change was towards a new cruelty, brutality and blood-thirstiness, for savagery was as important a part of the images as vigour and valour."

In this culture, the place of the female is subordinate, being a non-warrior. She, when conquered, is merely plunder, a commodity, rather than a human being (nowadays, trophy girlfriend or wife,i.e. sans mind, sans words):

"...what is 'phallocracy'? Literally meaning 'power of the phallus,'
it is a cultural system symbolized by the image of the male reproductive organ...It is marked by, but is far more particular than, the dominance of men over women in the public sphere...the concept denotes a successful claim by a male elite to general power, buttressed by a display of the phallus less as an organ of union or of mutual pleasure than as a kind of weapon: a spear or war club, and a scepter of sovereignty. In sexual terms, phallocracy takes such forms as rape, disregard of the sexual satisfaction of women, and access to the bodies of prostitutes who are literally enslaved or allowed no other means of support. In the political sphere, it spells imperialism and patriarchal behavior in civil affairs."

Contraculture:the Bible

Gal 3:28:

There is neither Jew nor Greek...bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.

Micah 4:3:

and they shall beat their swords into plowhares...nation shall not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.

Beating up on women physically, psychologically, in the public sphere -- extruding femininine traits from the warrior personality -- is learning war. The question is, when does incorporating the learning of war begin to create a zero-sum game for the entire planet i.e. nuclear, chemical, biological wars which demolish the species?
Posted by Hawaiilawyer, Thursday, 25 January 2007 6:14:41 PM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
  1. Pages:
  2. 1
  3. Page 2
  4. 3
  5. 4
  6. 5
  7. ...
  8. 29
  9. 30
  10. 31
  11. All

About Us :: Search :: Discuss :: Feedback :: Legals :: Privacy