M. Philcore,

Thank you for taking the trouble to read my postings. It is always nice to hear from a sympathetic party. I concur with you upon another important point. Not only do the lads here take my too seriously, they take these entire discussion forums too seriously. Perhaps even they take life too seriously?
This problem, and others, quite precludes serious discussion here and I think many of us would be better off learning to laugh at ourselves.

@obi
I chose to refrain from calling myself a feminist due to lack of familiarity. I posted as someone who needs to follow a well thought out and reasoned argument.
I do support the plight of all disenfranchised peoples, and have found the arguments strongly in favor of women being such a people in more ways than one. Call me a feminist if you wish, I take no issue with the term. In my experience, those who do can not look past certain views put forth by the louder fringe elements. I just avoid it due to my lack of acquaintance with the works of self-ascribed feminists, and lack any depth of knowledge pertaining to feminism specifically.

What does it take to be a feminist anyways? I mean, is just supporting equal rights when you vote enough? Do you have to get all militant like Putin? What do I have to do to tell the world I'm a feminist? I suppose refraining from fat lady jokes would be a start....

Short answer:

No, you don't (ever) have to be a militant extremist like Putin.

Long(er) answer:

Just speaking from my own standpoint, I'd say support of equality, the empowerment of women, equal pay for equal work, more (and better) representation of women in the media, shattering the Glass Ceiling...I think it's safe to assume most (key word MOST) self-professed feminists will support most or all of those.

(I intentionally left out the abortion issue, as I've heard feminists sound off on both sides of the matter, and it often comes down to whether the person is a theist or atheist and, if a theist, when they believe life begins and so on, and that's really more in the court of atheism than feminism, though it's easy to see how the two do overlap here.)

I think there's a difference between what feminism was and what feminism is NOW--

Putin may hate to be styled as such, but I'd style him as being in line with an older, 1970s-era feminista guard, and that brand of more firebrand, often anti-establishment feminism is more and more being replaced rejected for a very, very important reason--

Women (finally!) ARE becoming part of the establishment, I mean, we have women in Congress, on the Supreme Court, female billionaires, and our Secretary of State is a female (until John Kerry takes over, anyway) and Hillary Clinton WAS the most serious female contender for the White House, and some think she might even try again in 2016 (though perhaps less so now.)

When you're disfranchised the way women were in the 1970s and before, it's easy to understand why a radical, wholesale anti-establishment course might be palatable, where every little thing is a big thing and a talking point and an opportunity for you to grow the movement through firebrand, hardcore, radicalized, attention-getting tactics.

That's no longer the case; that's no longer feminism, at least not as I agree with it and as my female friends agree with it...

They're all political, religious, and movement-oriented to different degrees, but I can't think of ANY of them that would agree with that sort of 1970s radicalism applied to this day and age, and I think most would agree with me equality, empowerment, and MORE women in the establishment is, loosely, what's needed more than destroying the establishment.

There's of course the idea of the Patriarchy, that we live in a male-dominated, male-centric, male-oriented world built on (Putin's about to get excited) the sort of ideological superstructure Marx talked about, and it's an ideological superstructure built around the ideas of men, by men, for men.

That concept is both true and untrue--again, it's somewhere in the middle now, in transition.

Do we live in a male-dominated society?
Oh, yes!
Are there no women in any considerable positions of power?
Oh, of course not! Australia's PM is a woman...England had Thatcher...Hillary...
Is the world (we'll keep to the West and leave the East/the Middle East alone) male-centric?
Yes, it still is?
Is it less so than what it was in 1970?
By a large margin!
Are things generally male-oriented?
It'd honestly depend on the thing/ideal/field you're talking about, some yes, some, not really.
Is the ideological superstructure of the West built around the ideas of men, by men, for men?
Yes and no...I mean, obviously, if you go back much further than, say, the 1830s at the earliest, you're going to have predominantly all-male authors, writers, etc., and while that's most of our ideological background, that also can't be undone...we can't know, as Virginia Woolf hypothesized, what a "Judith Shakespeare" might have written, and at the same time, we really can't get rid of Shakespeare...for that matter, as much as I don't believe it to be true and in many cases I find it immoral, we can't get rid of the Bible, either, not should we, that IS the West and IS part of the Western Tradition, and we should BUILD UPON and UPDATE that Tradition, not burn it all down or throw it all away...

On that note, then, take a look at the slew of great female authors SINCE the 1830s:
Austen came before then; not a huge fan, but she was undoubtedly talented and important...
To be fair, Charlotte Smith came before then as well, but didn't get attention until recently...
The Brontes, Emily, Anne, and Charlotte...
Emily Dickinson...
George Eliot, aka, Mary Ann Evans...
Virginia Woolf...
Edith Wharton, first woman to win a Pulitzer Prize...
Dorothy Parker...
Joyce Carol Oates...
Zora Neal Hurston...
Maya Angelou...
Angela Lansberry...
The 2011 Pulitzer Prize Winner was Jennifer Egan...

And let's not forget all the women with powerful positions in the film and magazine industries.

So the ideological superstructure IS still slanted towards men, no question, but also make no question in the fact that women have made considerable headway in the last 200 years, and that I don't think we really can say the ideological superstructure of the West is wholly a male one any more, it's not quite equal, but it's far more level and more diverse than it once was, and it's getting more friendly for feminists and minorities all the time.

There are A LOT of problems with the way women are depicted in TV and film--but not only has their been progress, but progress on top of progress.

Take a simple, easy-to-see example that everyone here should know...

The Original Star Trek. :)

Uhura was NOT the strongest female character in TOS at first , let's be honest...
It's a bit hard to do that while working the radio.
But she got better over time, and Nichelle Nichols actually kept playing the role because Martin Luther King, Jr. himself suggested she keep it up, citing her as a positive role model and the chance to create a better image of women and blacks on TV.
To that end, I think the character succeeded for her time.

And like the 2009 alternate universe movie or not...make no mistake:

Zoe Saldana's Uhura no longer is a passive person in the background wearing a short skirt and taking orders.

She was actively going around, doing things, berating Kirk and Spock...

She still had the short skirt, so that's not exactly progressive (to be fair, Chekov still had a silly over-the-top Russian accent, so some things are just part of the kitsch of the characters) but she was still far more active than 1960s Uhura ever was.

To continue on the pop culture kick, Hermione Granger is yet another intelligent, active female character we possibly wouldn't have gotten pre-1960s...and she's not just active, but saves the MEN, Harry and Ron, quite a few times in those movies and books...so that's a nice move away from the "damsel in distress" stereotype.

And so on.

So it's not yet totally a level playing field, but it IS getting better, there ARE positive depictions of women in the ideological superstructure that informs our cultural Western identity now and there ARE women in power, so the notion we should rail against the establishment seems ludicrous when, well, women are now, happily, PART OF IT FINALLY.

:)

As a coda:

YJ...

I think most of my female friends would be OK with a fat lady joke provided 1. You knew them well enough to make that joke and 2. You were prepared for a small dick joke yourself. ;)

There is a certain give and take with joking. We certainly make jokes all around at my Starbucks, but everyone knows which people (co-workers) to do it in front of and which not to.

^Exactly, discretion and (gonna say it AGAIN) moderation...

I'm not sure a small dick joke and a fat lady joke are comparable.

Al,

My mother was/is no real parent towards me so I'm afraid your point loses some force. And what you want sources that some women are stronger than some men? That there have been retarded men and very clever women? That society promotes men to be stronger than women? That women are naturally as smart as men? Or that in a state of nature the difference in strength between women and men decreases?

I feel the first three questions need no sources unless you disagree? The fourth question, although I hate to justify it by even going through the motions, is look at performances in primary schools/secondary schools/elementary school/high school/whatever. The fifth question naturally follows as a conclusion of accepting that society encourages men to be stronger than women.

"I'm not sure a small dick joke and a fat lady joke are comparable."

Pardon the ignorance, but why not...both make fun of an area of the body the gender in question is often sensitive about...I think both are relatively cheap jokes, but...?

Alright. Maybe I'm wrong. Tell a slightly overweight woman a fat lady joke and then compensate with a small penis joke. See what happens. :D

@fasces read the second sex or something you idiot.

feminism is supporting women's rights, that's all you can really say by it. From there it offshoots into many different catergories - purely legal feminists (I would say liberal feminists as that is what the term was when I was taught it, but perhaps some people wre taught a different term), who believe that the key to equality is equal legal standing, right to vote etc. These shits only focus on the public sphere. Then you get socialist and radical feminists. These greats identify that the system is a patriarchy, and that this is ethically wrong. Socialist ones will also point to the role capitalism plays in this. Some radical feminists are great, they say fuck patriarchy, and believe we should have an androgynous society, like indeed we should. Others are what I would call sexist and believe that women are naturally better than men, these, I believe, are batshit crazy.

As a socialist/radical feminist I don't really view obi as a true feminist (no offense intended), but this is in the same sense that as a hardcore communist I don't view most left-leaning people socialist in any sense (those that think of themselves as soft socialists), and really in the normally accepable usage of the term he, and hopefully most people, are feminists.

P.S. obi's seems to me to be the kind of guy that would be like ooo oprah, obama, racism is dead. Or look at a few anecdotal evidences of social mobility, anyone from the bottom has a good chance at climbing the social ladder. Again, no offense intended.

One of the great tragedies of the modern age is that of millions of women feeling pressured into fighting their way up a career ladder when they'd have led perfectly full and contented lives running their household. Women should have the opportunity to strive for any role they wish, obviously, but I see no virtue in pushing people to live lives according to someone else's values. Things like unequal numbers of men and women working in different sectors of the economy and in different roles is an inevitable consequence of freedom of choice and nothing whatsoever to get excited about.

Ow please don't be so British Octavious. Let's not miss this oppurtunity to get excited about this, we hardly get anything these days to get worked up about anymore! Fire up that rage!

Feminism got quite exciting around the bra-burning period, from what I understand, but it's gone down hill in the eyebrow raising stakes since.

I agree. What I'm getting excited about is that after 76 posts I still don't have the faintest clue what exactly it is we're debating here, but I've given up and will enjoy myself trolling obitroll's post.

I'm not entirely sure, myself. It seems that feminism is splitting up into little cliques that are bitching about each other...

Typical women...

Well, I've never dated, but I'm still not (that) stupid, redhouse...

*I* wouldn't make a fat lady joke to a woman. ;)

Just saying, I think the two kinds of jokes seem equally silly to me, and if a guy did want to make a joke like that to a good friend who was a woman, well, it would seem in the spirit of being open and equal, it should be allowable so long as he himself was ready for a verbal smackdown right back...

"It should be allowable"
You see, here's the part that I don't get. You should say whatever you d*** please right? It's just that making jokes about fat women will simply isolate you and make you a hated person, nobody wants that...

I don't see many femi-boys taking Mr Pimp seriously here but then he doesn't indulge in our favorite mode of communication, sarcasm, so his ability to accurately assess the nature of our responses is socially retarded.

I'm with redhouse. I'm not sure what this thread is about - I can't argue with obi that saying shitty things should be allowable, but if they are shitty things to say, then people will probably call you out for saying them and other people will listen to your detractors. And I can't begin to care about the sexist drivel Al is spewing, whether it is genuine or not.

[Haven't been following this,; just chanced on it.]
I've discovered a true story of mine really upsets feminists:
My Irish grandmother went out to the nearby cinema with her daughter one night.
She told her Scottish blacksmith husband, hard as nails, that she'd left his dinner on the table. Grunt.
When they returned, they saw the dishes on the bunker by the sink (on the kitchen-top beside the washbasin), covered by old newspapers.
Grandmother said the equivalent, in Irish/Scots, of "WTF?"
Grandfather stated calmly, "I couldn't stand to look at them any more."

*Actually, "I couldn't stand to look at the sight of them any more."

To each their own, but why should women be forced into staying at home and taking care of the household. I for one would be very unhappy forced into that kind of lifestyle. But, I do support women who choose to do so. I see the Women's Right movement more about giving every women the right to choose their own path in life.

Mlle. Celticfox,

I did want to address one point - that I don't hold you in low esteem or in any disregard. If you truly are a feminist, you are as charming and well-mannered a feminist as any I have met. Please accept my apology if you feel that anything I have had to say marginalizes you or your participation on this gaming site.

*Mme

M. Socrates,

I apologize for the circumstances of your upbringing. Had I any idea, I would of course never made such an analogy. Even as such I must grant that the scenario that I proposed cannot be true for that very reason in your case.

I seem to have misunderstood what you were attempting to communicate. You were seeking to establish that a minority of women are stronger than men? I can confirm this. Two of my acquaintances have been female bodybuilders, both of whom I must assume to be stronger than me based solely upon their competitive records. And certainly there must be others. Perhaps you seek to relate this to my original point that men are better than women because they are stronger and smarter? I can certainly understand your line of reasoning and see the merits of such an idea.

Here is my response to that, one that I think will bring clarity to some other points under examination. To encourage, recognize or even allow women to make achievements outside of the domestic fields creates several social ills which outweigh any potential benefits. To start, it causes distress to other women who are unable to achieve anything meaningful, as most aren't. Additionally, it distracts women from necessary domestic work. I have no idea about you, but I've no intention of ironing my own shirt for the simple reason that my woman is too busy "achieving" something. And lastly, to recognize female achievement sets a bad example. Women are happier and more productive when they set their rather limited minds to perfecting domestic servitude, and to pleasing men.

Do you disagree with this? Do you not agree that feminism is the chief cause of divorces, venereal disease, child abandonment and related social ills? Feminism was an experiment that failed. Most European women have abandoned feminism.
There can be no higher objective for a woman than to cook, clean a house, needlecraft and otherwise serve her husband or father.

Al,

It is of course not your fault, and despite your views you are, seemingly, a very decent person. You are not crude nor vulgar, nor take your views to do something discriminatory.

That was indeed what I was trying to do Al. I will try to respond to your points one by one in order, and if any clarification is needed please do not hesitate to ask.

I disagree, and I shall state why without even continuing to argue on whether women are of equal intelligence etc., because although I 'know' they are, I think you're argument is still faulty even if we assume them to be inferior.

The first thing is that I would say the benefits outweigh the social ills by a huge margin. I don't think many women are caused distress by seeing others succeed, if they truly enjoy their housewife life they will pity and disdain the working woman. Beyond this I would argue most people (men and women) are unable to achieve anything 'meaningful' in the way you are using the word. Therefore if distress does exist it is unavoidable irrespective of women or not. What about the woman who has no husband or the family with a maid that does all that domestic work? And is this work necessary? Even if it were a woman's job, and necessary, which it is neither in my mind, a man should be able to do it in case 'his' woman is incapacitated, or he hasn't got a woman. (What about the gay man too :O?!). Your example is funny though because I really do hate ironing. With a passion. Do you think all women are that way? Or just most? Because if it is not all then why not let the women who enjoy and are more productive doing other things do that, the other women can still be domestic slaves.

Before going on to your final paragraph I would just like to make a point. What a big part of this comes down to is not looking at sex or a group but looking at the merit of the individual. We lose a lot by painting all people of a group by the same brush (I've said that metaphor incorrectly I fear). By looking at individual merit we can achieve the best things. Also if we put such an importance on groups where would it end? If I found out that people with brown hair tended to be better lawyers than people with black hair, and people with black hair were just about generally happier as plumbers would it mean that only people with brown hair should be lawyers and people with black hair should all be plumbers? If I found that people born in July tended to live longer than people born in April should I as a life insurance company act accordingly? You can think of your own examples too. I'm just trying to say that we lose individual merit by focusing on groups and that also the group distinction itself may not be by a really significant margin.

Onto your final paragraph. I think feminism is a big cause of divorces, but this is not necessarily bad. Many marriages were loveless and the wife was mistreated, and whilst this still exists the situation is improving. Now divorcees can survive in society instead of being branded by a horrble stigma. Venereal disease, although spreading with feminism, takes two parties, to say it's ok for men to be doing things that could spread it but not women is unfair. Also, not to be unfair to men, especially as I dislike this, but if you're having sex you should use a condom (generally speaking) which ultimately the guy is the having on etc. With children there are two parents and do you not think that a father should have some responsibility to his children? If his wife dies and he has no female relations should he not still ensure the child is cared for? Accordingly if his wife 'abandons' the child, then he should still ensure the child is cared for. I think feminism was an experiment that has become in many ways part of our society, not to the level I would like mind you, but the bare minimum has. It has only been abandoned because many of the initial goals have been met - formal equality etc.

Why? Are they not individuals with their own hopes and dreams? Even if they were inferior do they not have the right to pursue things purely for themselves?

Oh my god! You're getting sucked in because he's so well spoken about something that is clearly absurd! That's what makes his posts so damn funny. To reply to them in a serious manner is missing the point ... Which is humor!

It would be like a liberal seriously debating Stephen Colbert when he's in character as a conservative.

+1 again Al, keep hookin em.
And yes, that pun was intended.