R0bert, my personal philosophy is one of individual responsibility. Once anyone "allows" a "reason" to point at anyone else for their problems it releases them from responsibility and as a victim of others demand favoritism. I don't like feminist(today) or the idea of masculinist. Not because there is no social necessity for change in many laws and regulation to improve equality but, because feminist and what would be mansculinist are divisive. To say feminist care about everyone equally is pure BS and propaganda. They don't even care about women equally, or for each other with in their own movement. And a mens movement wouldn't be inclusive either. I encourage my daughters(and son)to read and when I find a teen magazine in the house I question my oldest about what she is reading and what it means to her. I always ask about the individuals responsibility, whether it was an article in the paper on crime or politics, or out of one of her mags on teen relationships. My wife has a much harder time with it and worries that our maturing women will do some terrible harm to themselves in the name of womans sexual freedoms and liberation that is promoted in these magazines. It goes much beyond that though to school and all the nonsense and peer "education" they get there. Just fitting in as a young teen is battle enough these days. Nothing makes me cringe more than hearing my daughters whinge, "So and so's Mom lets her do it.

Ronnie, my comments in no way suggested that men should be excluded from this thread or from any threads that comment on articles about women. It is essential that they contribute, but it would be more helpful if they could do so constructively as for example husbands, partners and fathers.

I agree that a lot of the comments do not display what you call good manners or fair play and what I consider to be an arbitrary dismissal of the issues.

I am also not arguing for men to write their own articles although it may be cathartic for them if they did and I am honestly wondering why they don’t.

The last comment from aqvarvis was telling and I think at the root of the disparity between the concern shown by most women posters and the lack of concern exhibited by some men. That is that “My wife has a much harder time with it and worries that our maturing women will do some terrible harm to themselves in the name of womans sexual freedoms and liberation that is promoted in these magazines”. There is a fundamental difference in how women view the concerns raised in this article compared with how men see it.

It is a very convenient idea to dismiss these types of issues as merely a result of individual reponsibility. Reducing these types of problems this way means that no action is needed by society, governments or business. It also ignores structural issues that influence individual choice.

I must have expressed myself poorly in my previous post. Aqvarivs, I'm actually agreeing with you. To me the tenor of the article was of 'poor girls, victims of sexual liberalism'. That makes me sad, because it implies helplessness, not empowerment and freedom to make choices for oneself that feminism purports to be about. As a human being, who just happens to be a female.

My point about all the sleazy issues that were discussed in the article was that not only women are participants and victims, but men also. So if it is demeaning to women, it is equally demeaning to men. BOTH take equal responsibility. There is a lot of casual, superficial sex going on nowadays. I just refuse to think that it is only harmful to women and girls.

That's why I think this is not about 'feminism', but about our attitudes towards sex and sexuality. Whatever your gender may be. I thought I made clear about adult responsibility towards growing youngster for BOTH sexes. Not just girls.

What I was trying to say was that misogyny does not only come from men, but women also. So a girl with anorexia or some warped image of womanhood, probably did not get that from the important men in her life, but from other women or girls. I think that women are much harder and more critical of women than men are. I have yet to meet a man who likes a stick thin female. It is generally other females who regard this as highly desirable.

We can't blame men for the magazines, whether they own them or not. It is women who buy them. With articles written by women. I wholeheartedly agree with aqvarivs, straight pornography is far easier to discuss than most of these idiotic teen mags.

I agree with you yvonne.

The problem is how do we find a balance.

I am aware of just how critical and judgemental 'some' women can be. One day at work the girls were dissecting Camila Parker to nth degree, me I opened my big mouth and said "But you tell us blokes that beauty is more than skin deep."

Basically it was one of those girls talks where sensible blokes keep their mouth shut and their opinions to themselves.

I might have scored a point but spent the next week paying for it.

I agree Roonie that anecdotal evidence is a good starting point for furhter research. Especially when one hears enough anecdotal evidence which appears to be of a similar nature.

Jordan I. Kosberg wrote in an article titled "Heterosexual Males: A Group Forgotten by the Profession of Social Work."

"Social work literature is biased against heterosexual males, leading to "unfair and untrue" stereotypes about men and hampering social workers' ability to counsel men, an Alabama professor has concluded after reviewing articles in two social work journals from the last decade."

Now some people will see this as an issue whilst others will think it is a load of rubbish.

One enormous difficulty is that the use of language is imprecise, that is thirty people could read the same book and there will thirty different answers as to what the book was about.

"It happens all the time. People only tell one half of the story," says Eugen Lupri, a University of Calgary sociologist whose research shows similar patterns of violence against men.

"Feminists themselves use our studies, but they only publish what they like."

So there are two sides to the coin which can use misinformation, which makes it an extremely difficult, if not impossible task to get a balanced perspective about issues.

Melinda wrote "Women’s freedom was reduced to the freedom to be sexual playthings for male arousal and pleasure"

I dunno as the sentence clashes with itself as part of womans freedom was 'free choice' so why would she do the above.

And as long as women fail to look at all relevant factors, they will fail to achieve sexual satisfaction in all areas which is their right. As a man, I think women control each others behavior with rules and regulations and they are their own enemies here, and in the process fail dismissally at the above even when they try...eg 'slut' is more womans derogatory term on another, a man would used 'betrayer of trust' (but its our fault for seeking fidelity without realizing it is an unrealistically difficult goal to achieve with our natural instincts, urges and behaviour...we will be better off saying 'if relationship and pleasure separate, then keep the friendship of it safe')

To male arousal and pleasure, we have no problems here. From time of becoming sexually mature we have/develop the skill to have ejaculatory orgasms. Girls struggle, usually focus on clitoral orgasm and which more 'release from urge' without ejaculation.

Guys, imagine for a moment of everything that goes with sex but without ejaculation...all the time. Enough to drive us nuts eh...well, that is your average woman.

Why wont she work on this?...that needs books to explain including the evils of sisterhood on itself..., bottom line, it takes a really fit, hard, experienced male...most of us fail on this front. For the woman, to relax and force the mind let the body go with its natural responses...

Once majority of women are able to achieve ejaculatory orgasms, it will be interesting to see what they then write...

Sam

Lizzie4

"I was pleased to see another woman (Yvonne) contributing to this thread as it seems to have been taken over by men pushing their own agenda and making no effort at all to address the problems brought up in the article."

First of all, thanks Lizzie! I always love that invisibility thing!

More importantly, I don't think it matters who contributes, but I do agree the debate has strayed from Melinda's premise that feminism hasn't really advanced far.

RObert

"I'm still trying to make sense of why the choices of some indicate that feminism has failed."

To me, feminism is about women being taken seriously and being able to effect some change for the better in a world that has always been dominated by male values of individuality and competitiveness.

We are all diminished as women when individuals amongst us choose to prostitute themselves to please men, whether it's pole dancing or dressing provocatively, it's all much the same. And no I'm not a prude. I just happen to think we're all being sold short by women who make these choices.

As Melinda said, we haven't come far at all. We're as enslaved to men today as we were when we stayed home full time and kept house for them.