Earlier quoted context omitted.
I never viewed sexism this way. But now that I am taking this perspective I can't help but notice how some to many women play a part in this as well. To put it a bit blunt and simplified: a considerable amount of women want to be treated like a princess. I guess those type of fantasies are an exaggeration of how a woman should've been treated in the early Victorian era. Another variant that I have experienced is the…
One of the basic things to understand in sociology and social psychology is that what people want is often shaped by what they are encouraged to want (and it's very easy to make people want something, as verified in psychology experiments). This is why modern feminism doesn't concentrate on the "want". Not because it's not important (it's very important!), but because it's hard to separate cause and effect, especiall…
So it is indeed hard to separate cause and effect, I'm wondering if we need to, since cause and effect might go both ways here in a feedback loop. I'm very inclined to believe this myself (one of my implicit assumptions, perhaps even a bias). Cultural notions reinforces what people want, which reinforce the culture. So allowing to reframe yourself to want something different is definitely a course of action that one could take. As is changing other people their behavior (although it has some really difficult challenges IMO, it's easier to change yourself in my experience).
'feminism is not concerned with who "contributes" what to sexism' "can they later be said to be contributing to their own subjugation?" A pragmatic form of feminism that I have experienced myself is that feminists need to take care of their own personal development. This also means that people who are aware of sexist actions and view the need to change it, need to change themselves if they have habits conforming to old views. In that sense, feminism is concerned with who contributes (behaviorally) to sexism, because it gives a lense to look within oneself to change behaviour contributing to sexism. Knowing your gender role and in which way you conform to it is a handy tool to have in general for self-reflection.
"and when we say that some action is sexist we mean that it contributes to sexism; the action itself can be completely free of any ill intent." <-- Thanks for the clarification. I do admit that my understanding of sexism is not as laser focused as I'd like it to be.