Help me explain to my friend why this is really wrong

I'm not interested in personally attacking you. I prefer to patronise you.

If this bikini car wash thing is no biggie, why are you and SGB pulling the old 'you're doing feminism wrong, why aren't you concentrating on something else, you're a humourless prude who wants everyone wearing standard issue dungarees' silencing crap on me?

If it was this question I ignored it because I don't remember saying it. I just couldn't stand all the very serious lecturing about a charity thing that is neither here nor there-lots of men do things equally stupid.

I am not ignoring you now-just going off line.

( I am much happier with personal attack than being patronised)

Interestingly, having a freer society in which are allowed to make those choices is great! You'd have been hard pressed 50 years ago to find that type event occur. I do agree; however, that in any free market society, individuals have the choice as to whether or not to donate to a charity based on how they promote themselves. Boycotts of particular charities for this reason can be a good thing, and sets an example of how the majority of people expect societal morals to work. Fortunately, this becomes regional in effect for smaller charities. It's much harder to have a significant impact on the larger ones.

Exoticfruits you might want to lay off the personal stuff.

You got pretty personal with me, spoke about me in the third person, and quoted me out of context.

In return, I replied (seriously) to your points by expanding on what I think and why I think it. I also asked you a direct question that you have not have the courtesy of answering.

I can't help patronising you whenever I see you Exoticfruits. It's an irresistable temptation.

I would suggest HerBeX, that if you want to persuade anyone to your line of thinking you need to stop being so patronising .
You may want to carry on the debate on line-but this is only if people agree with you and you can have a cosy little chat among like minded people with no one interfering.

You do realise that johns who abuse prostitutes use that argument don't you Davidtennantsgirl? The nasty old trafficked women who exploit poor menz with their sexual power, because the men are unable to stop themselves handing over money so they can use a woman as a wanksock...

Sold you are sounding much less inteliigent than you are. Feminism has never concerned itself with the length of sleeve it has always concerned itself with the social, political and economic context of the sleeve. You know that, I don't know why you're pretending not to.

Well I'm bored with this argument now. I think the bottom line is that showing off your body is not a bad thing if you do it willingly and enjoy it. Nor do I think it's a bad think to look at other people's bodies and think impure thoughts about them. ANd the way forward with this sort of thing, the effective way forward, is always going to be the one that involves more fun, not less. Feminism derailed itself badly when everyone started analysing exactly what length of sleeve or height of collar made you antifeminist.

Really SDTG? Poor old men eh. incapable of putting money in a collection basket without having the horn

"only a bit of fun"

Ah, yes! The ultimate defence of the porn-lite apologist

Is it not possible that the women doing this charity car wash are actually the ones exploiting the men? Raising money for charity by using the fact that they know men will bring their cars to this event - playing on their baser natures?

Ah yes the sauce for the gander argument.

Which ignores context again.

Don't think I would agree that doubling the amount of objectification in the worls will help matters much, to be honest.

The thing is, in terms of lighthearted charity fundraising it is pretty common for men to strip off and display themselves as well. I have heard of 'slave auctions' for charity where people bid on having some bloke come round and clean the house in his pants, there are plenty of kit-off charity calendars featuring naked men, and it is highly likely that if the organisers of the OP's mate's event had suggested getting a team of blokes to wash cars in their Speedos this would have been greeted with equal enthusiasm. For all we know, this event will feature men displaying their bodies to raise money.
Indeed, it would seem to me that the best feminist response to such an event would be to arrange a team of men to do a similar job.

Oh girls just shut up and giggle....

Well said Beachcomber.

We are continuing to debate this here Exoticfruits, because we still have things to say about it. We're debating it here, not in the OP's friend's ear. D'you get the difference?

"the fact that women should 'have' to cover up to be considered to be adhering to feminist principles surely just goes to prove how anti-feminist our society is."

I think you have missed the point. See beachcomber's post - this is not about what women wear, it's about the context in which they wear it. This difference is a difficult one for people to grasp when it's new to them at first, so it's important to really be clear about the difference. Took me years to be able to articulate it coherently.

"If that is going to be an excuse for men to letch and make comments it only proves that our society as a whole needs to take a good look at itself"

Precisely. In a society where men and women were equal, getting your kit off for charity would have absolutely no overtones and no negative connotation and both men and women would do it in equal numbers. Or perhaps nobody would bother to do it, because the fact that men have nice abs and women have nice breasts, would not be such a source of astonishment to people that they'd be prepared to pay for the sight of said abs and breasts.

Exoticfruits, I'm not suggesting that the OP lectures her friend or mentions anything anyone has said on this thread. I'm just chewing the fat on MN discussing the issues brought up by this thread because I find this sort of stuff quite interesting to analyse. I was answering SGB, not giving advice to the OP on what to say to her mate. I happen to think that she has said her piece and now should leave well alone.

It is often in the small (normalized) day to day things that we can tease out useful exploration of male/female dynamics - that is why feminism is predominantly a grass roots movement based on real life experiences and not an academic domain. I think that is one of the cool things about feminist analysis - it is accessible to all and can be explored using small, easily understandable every day events.

(This is, after all, the feminist section so it should hardly be a big surprise to you to come across some feminist analysis.)

Sure there are bigger issues to be discussed - I guess I'm lucky because I manage to care about obvious stuff like equal pay, and the insidious stuff like stereotyping women as the sex class at the same time.

If this bikini car wash thing is no biggie, why are you and SGB pulling the old 'you're doing feminism wrong, why aren't you concentrating on something else, you're a humourless prude who wants everyone wearing standard issue dungarees' silencing crap on me?

SGB I'm a feminist. I live in France, I go to the beach and swimming pools often. I wear a bikini when I engage in these activities. Ok so it is a boards shorts bikini (so that I don't have to do any lady gardening) but it is a bikini all the same.

I also wear strappy dresses when it is hot in the summer (34 degrees today!).

The difference is that I am not wearing my bikini to the beach in exchange for cash with the insinuation that I am there to titillate (I doubt the sight of me in a bikini splashing in the water with my kids is titillating for anyone, but if it is, that is their problem and nowt to do with me).

There is no power dynamic, that reflects the exploitation of female sexuality that exists within our society, when I wear my bikini to the beach (although we could argue that I am performing femininity of course).

This power dynamic is quite clearly present if I wear a bikini to wash cars and get paid by men to do so (otherwise there would be a mixture of normally dressed men, women and children doing the car washing for charity).

I use the word hideous to refer to said power dynamic and the normalization of it by presenting it as fun fun fun for the charidees. In other words I'm looking at the bigger picture rather than glossing over this one (small not terribly important) event - nothing happens in a vacuum in patriarchy and all that.

Overall I think: fix the equal pay issues and reproductive rights, end honour killings and campaign against domestic violence then you can start harassing other women about choices they make that are different from yours.

Of course this is why feminists are so often painted as 'humourless'

Too right! It doesn't help the cause.