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Why I won't speak at women-only events

guardian.co.uk

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Re: Why I won't speak at women-only events

#81

Post by hacker789 »

overgard wrote: post #38
arrrg wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm just guessing, but I would say maybe completely bonkers bullshit like "feminist status quo"?!

If we accept that there's such a thing as feminism, it would make sense that it would have a current status quo. The argument would be if you agree with their definition of the status quo or not.

Modern western feminism certainly has widely accepted dogma, but there are exist bitter battles between competing factions.

That being said, the largest factions don't exactly cover all sides of an issue, to put it mildly, so the existence of factions doesn't make anything better.

For example, the argument over transsexuals (mentioned by @rmc) has two main factions within modern western feminism:

1. "Transsexual women aren't real women; they're just men who are co-opting the brutal oppression real western women face, drowning out real women's voices."

2. "If you feel that you are a woman, then you are a woman. You do not need to present yourself as a woman, you do not need to be a woman every day, and you do not need to chose between being a man and being a woman at any given moment—you can be both. Anyone who questions your womanhood is a misogynist, because they are oppressively forcing their definition of womanhood onto a woman."

Re: Why I won't speak at women-only events

#82

Post by king_jester »

papsosouid wrote: post #78
king_jester wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Conspiracy usually means a deliberate attempt of a group to do something rather than something that occurs for systemic or institutional reasons. Ultimately patriarchy as a social force and concept is totally provable has statistical and philosophical evidence that shows it exists. Every basic women's studies or feminist book goes over this to some extent.

Institutions do not form spontaneously, and the "systems" you refer to were also created by humans. The notion that men created systems and institutions which oppress women, but it is totally not a conspiracy because they did it by accident is not well represented in feminist academia. >totally provable has statistical and philosophical evidence that shows it exists. Except that alternative explanations are dismissed…

> Institutions do not form spontaneously, and the "systems" you refer to were also created by humans. The notion that men created systems and institutions which oppress women, but it is totally not a conspiracy because they did it by accident is not well represented in feminist academia.

It seems like you are saying that is there is indeed a real conspiracy of institutions created and/or controlled by men, in which case I totally agree. We have well documented cases, historically and in the present, of institutions and systems that are dominated by men.

> Except that alternative explanations are dismissed. If the "evidence" supports many possible conclusions, then it is not proof of a single specific conclusion like "patriarchy".

I've yet to see convincing alternative explanations. All of the evidence points to existence of patriarchy as a social institution.

Re: Why I won't speak at women-only events

#83

Post by newnewnew »

Zikes wrote: post #59
epsylon wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1. I'm basically not allowed to voice an opinion that isn't completely aligned with the feminist status quo (I believe in equality, fuck me right). Yes, because there is actually a single, unified, globally agreed upon feminist status quo who tries to silence the voices of brave dissenters...

There doesn't need to be a single, unified, globally agreed upon feminist status quo, because as soon as a dissenting opinion is voiced the extremist groups are the ones that speak the loudest and the rest of the feminist movement just stands back and watches.

And they wield a ton of power. Ask the programmer that was fired for saying "dongle" within earshot of Adria Richards. Chances are your HR bureaucracy is radically feminist.

Re: Why I won't speak at women-only events

#84

Post by hacker789 »

rmc wrote: post #51
beachstartup wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is standard anti-male shaming language. it ALWAYS shows up in gender discussions because it's a great way to instantly discredit anyone without actually using an argument. notice how there isn't any actual content in the rebuttal and how it is completely infalsifiable and indefensible. it's the equivalent of dropping the c-word in an argument against a woman. shaming language against males: * grow up, be a man,…

you must be gay (not sure why people use this one) People use that because they think a man acting like a woman (by having sex with men, by being the receptive partner in sex, by being penetrated, etc.) is a terrible thing for a man to do. Some homophobia is a form of misogyny, hating men who act woman-like.

I've seen feminists publicly accuse men of being closeted gays to explain "an otherwise inexplicable hatred of women".

Re: Why I won't speak at women-only events

#85

Post by ebfe »

rmc wrote: post #51
beachstartup wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is standard anti-male shaming language. it ALWAYS shows up in gender discussions because it's a great way to instantly discredit anyone without actually using an argument. notice how there isn't any actual content in the rebuttal and how it is completely infalsifiable and indefensible. it's the equivalent of dropping the c-word in an argument against a woman. shaming language against males: * grow up, be a man,…

you must be gay (not sure why people use this one) People use that because they think a man acting like a woman (by having sex with men, by being the receptive partner in sex, by being penetrated, etc.) is a terrible thing for a man to do. Some homophobia is a form of misogyny, hating men who act woman-like.

Would you agree that shaming lesbians is a form of misandry, hating women who act man-like?

Re: Why I won't speak at women-only events

#86

Post by hacker789 »

jb17 wrote: post #70
papsosouid wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't mean there isn't a significant amount of mythology that is widely agreed upon in feminist circles. If you expect insane conspiracy theory nonsense like "patriarchy" to actually be supported by evidence rather than accepted on faith, then you are not welcome in feminist discourse, plain and simple.

Do you really think societal structures that privilege men are a myth? Apart from being quite obvious to anyone who is not extremely biased, there are whole academic branches that study this. I'd say calling that "mythology" puts you into conspiracy theory territory.

> Do you really think societal structures that privilege men are a myth?

Nope. And neither are the societal structures that privilege women.

Western women have always been among the safest, most privileged human beings on the planet. Predictably, and unfortunately, modern western feminists never compare the plight of the average man with the plight of the average woman when determining who wins the Oppression Olympics; instead, they look jealously toward men at the top of society and declare that because women aren't a part of that, they're more oppressed.

And sadly, it gets more ridiculous than that. I've seen people on this forum actually say, with similar words:

Institutionalized misandry cannot exist, because most people at the top of society are men. Women don't have the institutional power to oppress men. Any oppression men face is a result of The Patriarchy.

Ignoring the fact that oppression can come from outside of congress (university policies, for example), those people are defining patriarchy to simply mean "Oppressive policies written by people with penises, even if feminists support those policies".

And that's what makes it dogma.

Re: Why I won't speak at women-only events

#87

Post by rmc »

ebfe wrote: post #85
rmc wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you must be gay (not sure why people use this one) People use that because they think a man acting like a woman (by having sex with men, by being the receptive partner in sex, by being penetrated, etc.) is a terrible thing for a man to do. Some homophobia is a form of misogyny, hating men who act woman-like.

Would you agree that shaming lesbians is a form of misandry, hating women who act man-like?

Or it could be seen as hating women who don't act feminine?

"misandry" as an institutualised hatred against men for being men and hatred and degeration of masculine things and activity doesn't really exist in the same was people view feminine as weak & not as good exists.

There is also a lot of gender roles that people break, which feminism is attempting to break down.

Re: Why I won't speak at women-only events

#88

Post by zem »

theorique wrote: post #68
epsylon wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1. I'm basically not allowed to voice an opinion that isn't completely aligned with the feminist status quo (I believe in equality, fuck me right). Yes, because there is actually a single, unified, globally agreed upon feminist status quo who tries to silence the voices of brave dissenters...

There isn't a 'single' status quo, but if you question and/or debate the existence or definition of certain articles of feminist faith such as 'patriarchy' or 'rape culture' or various statistics about the relative status of women versus men, watch out.

that's like going to a scientific conference and "debating" climate change. there are lots of things that sound questionable and/or debatable simply because you don't know enough about them.

Re: Why I won't speak at women-only events

#89

Post by rmc »

icebraining wrote: post #69
papsosouid wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't mean there isn't a significant amount of mythology that is widely agreed upon in feminist circles. If you expect insane conspiracy theory nonsense like "patriarchy" to actually be supported by evidence rather than accepted on faith, then you are not welcome in feminist discourse, plain and simple.

I'm rather confused by your post. I've never seen the patriarchy described as a "conspiracy", or a willful choice by men to control women, but has a social structure - perpetuated by certain social institutions - that ensure that men as a gender (not every individual, of course) maintain oppressive power over women. Regardless of the existence of the patriarchy as a phenomena - and there are many critics of the theor…

I've never seen the patriarchy described as a "conspiracy"

Anti-feminists would tend to view it as a conspiracy, or no longer existing ("women can vote, so it's all OK now, right?"). Sadly this sort of attitude/meme does exist....

Re: Why I won't speak at women-only events

#90

Post by theorique »

king_jester wrote: post #75
theorique wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There isn't a 'single' status quo, but if you question and/or debate the existence or definition of certain articles of feminist faith such as 'patriarchy' or 'rape culture' or various statistics about the relative status of women versus men, watch out.

> debate the existence or definition of certain articles of feminist faith such as 'patriarchy' or 'rape culture' This is not a debate in good faith. If you come to the table with no previous knowledge about anything and demand to be heard, why should people waste time with bringing you up to speed? The vast majority of the times this happens it ends up in moving the goal posts.

I'm certainly not suggesting that a person go in completely uninformed, nor that he use misguided or misogynist arguments. But it's completely suitable to refute statistics or conclusions if one has done the appropriate reading - both feminist texts and texts criticizing feminism - and come to different conclusions.
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