Radfem 2013 and the MRAs

(I am loving that 'swordsmiths' is the example that came to mind. That doesn't suggest a beautifully romanticized medieval world at all, oh no.)

Or something more Freudian

What makes you imagine blacksmiths couldn't or didn't work at home, with the baby in the same room? Those child mortalities you refer to - they happened for a reason you know.

FWIW, women were occasionally blacksmiths.

You imagine wrong about midwives, though - women typically relied on other women, so a woman who'd recently given birth would hardly be out of the job market. They would be right in it.

Men trained at the longbow, yes. It was the law to practice once a week, in fact. But you seem to imagine that this would somehow mean men had to 'work' and women 'stayed at home'. This is simply an inaccurate idea of that period of history.

I would suggest you read up a little more. Replica swords are great fun and a friend of mine much enjoys taking her little boys to those lovely historical recreation days. But real history is better for discussions like this.

LRD,

How about blacksmith? Still romanticised? I wasn't seeking to make it all rather quaint. Just named a trade that has skills to be practiced and honed.

We could probably include net makers, thatchers, leatherworkers, carpenters (esp if we start thinkng about complex structures or ships), stone masons, sailors, various hunters/gamekeepers.

I'd imagine the village healers and mid-wifes (to use a modernish term) wouldn't really be trusted if they'd taken a 'gap year'.

Fighting men of certain times had to be constantly trained or trained from birth in the case of the Longbow (hence why crossbows and guns became very popular even whilst still outclassed by the Longbow)

I used swordsmith because I've just been reading about a bloke who seeks to emulate the skills and methods of the past in making modern replicas of old swords btw. He had made a Roman Sword to the best of his knowledge and ability.

hmmm, perhaps Lazarus would care to explain the long history of female infanticide and now the abortion of female babies and why this doesnt happen to male babies?
And then tell me men have had it as bad.

(I am loving that 'swordsmiths' is the example that came to mind. That doesn't suggest a beautifully romanticized medieval world at all, oh no.)

In an arranged marriage, the boys don't have any say, you're right, but they don't get acid thrown in their face or get petrol thrown over them and set alight if they don't have enough dowry.

HTH.

basil - erm ... well ... they did and they didn't.

I would have to check, but I'm pretty sure there were occasionally women guild members - there are female scribes in France who seem to have been recognised practitioners. I know you are basically right, btw, just we might as well have an interesting conversation! It's not as if the tiny number of women who got into interesting jobs against the odds change the basic picture, after all.

How kind of you to 'forgive' me. For what, I remain unsure.

It is strange that, knowing women have always worked, you asserted that they'd been home while men did ... it's almost as if you're telling a little fib, isn't it?

Huge numbers of women worked in jobs that did not require them to keep up their skills. They still often do, in fact. This is because women are often not given the jobs that are considered to require constant maintenance of skills.

Many other traditionally female-dominated jobs (and men's jobs up until relatively recently) were carried out in and around the babies of the family, btw.

In an arranged marriage, men are not used as chattels on the basis of their gender.

You have yet to explain why you think they were. And I know why - you can't explain something that never happened.

Can I just point out that all the guilds and apprenticeships excluded women, in common with all the institutions where money, power or status was to be had.

Not sure what point you're making there.

LRD you are forgiven.

I know women have always worked, you are merely assuming I didn't. I am aware that in some cases women worked with a babe on their back.

If you are so knowledgeable you'd know that careers based upon skillsets have been around for a little bit longer than you seem to make out.

It is why we had apprentices and masters for as long as we can think back to.

Swordsmiths? Hardly 'extremely recent'. In the mines we had specific trades to explode gas build ups. Many trades over the years required constant attention to keep skills up.

Chattels.

In an arranged marriage do EITHER party (ie the bride and groom) actually have a say in the procedings? Yes, women have been used chattels, but so have men. Thus niether have been used as chattels purely on the basis of their sex.

It isn't that long ago that teh WHOLE family was considered the property of the head of that family (in some places this is still the case). Yes, the heads were usually male, that doesn't transfer down the male lines that they had greater say in how they themselves were treated.

If son number 3 was told to marry the daughter of another family, then off he went. Is that not the same?

Or is it upsetting some cultivated ideals of how beastly men are?

"..actually just organisations taht made descisions as they thought were neccesary at the time, due to pressures and considerations of the time, that are now seen as 'anti-women'. They're seen as anti-women becuase they were anti women. The world was run by men who deliberately instituted structures and processes which excluded women.

"Men/boys HAVE been used as chattels. Just have women have." Not because they were men/ boys though. Women were used as chattels purely because they were women men/ boys were used as chattels not because they were men/ boys, but because they were on the losing side or because they were the wrong caste or race or tribe or whatever - not purely because of their sex, as women have. This seems an incredibly difficult distinction for some people to grasp, although it's really quite basic.

"Basil, The crack comment is that you seem to have put crack cocaine on your corn flakes." I haven't had any cornflakes and it's just a stupid personal insult isn't it? Boring.

"Town planning is town planning, I would imagine the planners of towns have better things to worry about than how to subjugate women through the medium of road layouts. Is there a high street layout that is particulary 'woman freindly'? I haven't seen one particularly 'man friendly'." Actually yes you have, but you simply haven't noticed it. I'm not so stupid as to suggest that town planning, car design, house design etc., is deliberately planned in order to persecute a certain group, I'll leave you to pretend that that's what I'm saying if it amuses you. Most planning and design historically has been done by white, able-bodied men who function very well in their society because society was designed for them. So when they designed stuff, they perpetrated that. Hence vast areas of public space inaccessible to wheelchair-users, buggies etc. This has changed in the last few years as the needs of other groups than white, able-bodied men who live in nice safe areas has been recognised as having been over-prioritised and other public space users - cyclists, disabled people, women etc., have got their needs recognised and integrated into public building projects. Which as one example, is why we've now got those colour-contrasting bobbly pavements near traffic lights, so that partially sighted and blind people can function in public space just as fully-sighted people can. No one designed the space to deliberately persecute blind people in the past - they just didn't think about it, because blind people didn't have a voice in the design and planning of public spaces and buildings. I don't know why referring to such things makes me look like a crack-whore.

"Blame Mother Nature for that one, it isn't some plot to hold women down. Merely the practicality of life." No, it's not, it's the way society has functioned to disadvantage women for having babies in the first place. A sane society wouldn't penalise women for giving birth, feeding and nurturing children, it would integrate them fully into full ownership of social, economic and political resources.

Yes, try and pretend that the man dominating the space means nothing, other people will make their own minds up.

"Can you explain how your MRA examples are MRA centric?" I have no idea what you mean by that. I named those 4 men as examples of how men have fought for a male-supremacist society, which is what LRD was referring to when linking current MRA activity with the centuries-long history of men who are determined to hold on to their illegitimate power over women.

Forgive me, but you are obviously not 'pretty up' on history, are you?

As basil pointed out, you didn't even know that women have always worked. That's history that has been taught at quite a basic level in schools for a very long time, isn't it? Women didn't necessarily stop work to breastfeed, either. That is an ignorant view of modern working conditions generalized to apply to the past - unfortunately, it doesn't quite work like that! The idea of building up a career based on a skillset that needed constant attention is also extremely recent and inaccurately applied to history.

I notice you have no evidence for your claim that men and boys have been used as chattels on the basis of their sex. There is an excellent reason for your omission, of course - it's because there is no evidence. It has never happened.

Oh, the photo. At best you've found a bloke who is a bit of an arse and is taking up too much room. I'd have clanked his knee with mine by now... or given him a dead leg.

LRD, I am pretty up on history. I beleive that the 'MRA through the ages' are actually just organisations taht made descisions as they thought were neccesary at the time, due to pressures and considerations of the time, that are now seen as 'anti-women'.

Men/boys HAVE been used as chattels. Just have women have.

Second, third sons etc (ie the spares, rather than the heirs) were married off just as much as the girls in order to cement agreements or to form alliances.

Basil, The crack comment is that you seem to have put crack cocaine on your corn flakes.

Town planning is town planning, I would imagine the planners of towns have better things to worry about than how to subjugate women through the medium of road layouts. Is there a high street layout that is particulary 'woman freindly'? I haven't seen one particularly 'man friendly'.

Yes, women have often worked. The value placed upon it is a modern construct.

Women have babies, in order to have babies and look after them (esp when breast feeding was the only way to feed a baby) women would have to stop working. If they stop working they lose ther place on the pecking order, or lose vital skills. Hence they drop down the ranking. Go back a few years and due to lots of infant deaths, we needed lots of infants. Women had lots of kids. Thus there work was affected.

Blame Mother Nature for that one, it isn't some plot to hold women down. Merely the practicality of life.

The picture you show is a man with his legs apart, and woman with her legs crossed... Yes, a sure sign of sexism in action. Oh, wait. In between HIS legs appear to e two bags, which he may be protecting with his posture. Bottles from duty free perhaps? Or something he doesn't want to place up against the wall of the seat. Her cramped and angled position appears to be due to a suit case, to large to fit further across the footwell, but pulled enough in to keep the aisle clear...

Oh, I get it. they are trying to get as much baggage as possible in to their seat row rather than the man displaying his manliness and keeping his woman in check.

Can you explain how your MRA examples are MRA centric?

I love being taught history by people who clearly know so much, this is great.

LL women didn't "stay at home while men worked"

Women have always worked, but men defined their work as not work, as only work men did was of value, because only men were of value.

As for your crack comment - what bit do you think is cracked? Are you going to tell me that our public spaces were designed by women with disabilities? Are you going to tell me that women occupy as much space and feel at home in it as men? How often do you see this seating arrangement with the woman pushing the man out of his space so that she can occupy more of it?

Also you want a few MRA types? Try Aristotle, St Augustine, St Paul, John Knox for starters. That's just off the top of my head without even thinking about it. I'm sure there are more.

Go read up on the history, lazarus. There are loads of threads.

Men/boys have never been used as 'mere chattels' because of their gender, have they? This is the issue.

LRD can we have the list of MRAs over the course of history? I'm quite interested, honestly.

But I can't promise I wont debunk them either.

We could also look at how men/boys were also used as mere chattels over the years also.

"BasilBabyEater Fri 26-Apr-13 22:43:56

Public space is not a neutral space, it is overwhelmingly a male space. It was designed in the main by male town planners with male priorities and women are there on tolerance only. That's why men shout obscenities and abuse in the street - to remind us that we have no right to be there without a male owner companion."

Hopefully this morning you put sugar on your cornflakes... and not crack.

LRD, how was computing 'female' dominated before it became lucrative?

I also take issue with beleif MRAs are 'millenia' old. They are not. That is merely the modern term being placed over any past organisation that almost fits the template of 'MRA'. And is quite frankly misleading and likely to be used purely to stir up trouble.

Why do YOU think women were pushed down the rankings in (to use one example) monarchies? Why were men seen as a better bet? Because they were sexist or could their actually have been practical reasons?

Why do you think women stayed at home, whilst men worked? Sexism in action or just a common sense response to the practicalities of life at the time?

Flora, do you know how many 'boys only' schools have now gone co-ed? Not because of some manipulation by behind the scene MRAs or space lizards... but due to market forces. Parents want siblings in one location.

They are just businesses, not some secret part of a masculine dominated military/industrial crypto faciest complex.

Funny, that, yes ....

I agree entirely LRD, I can't think of any meaningful examples.

In fact, the most powerful male spaces (IMO) are thriving - boys' private schools. Oh look, another OE in the government, what a surprise! Our institutions are dominated by men who attended boys' schools.

Oh, I know there are sports and hobbies and professions that used to be male-dominated and are now female-dominated, and vice verse. For example, before computing was lucrative, it was female-dominated. These days, poverty is gendered: it is women who mostly work in the 'three Cs' of low-paid jobs, as cashiers, clerks and carers.

But (IMO) these are neither male nor female 'spaces' - or if they were once, they've ceased to be so. What determines the percentage of men or women in these jobs is market demand and social custom, not law or self-imposed rules. There are still male-only clubs that don't let women in. They are more powerful and historically more long-lived than women's clubs that don't let men in (such as, perhaps, women's colleges at Cambridge?).

I do not know of any man's club that was set up expressly to counter the difficulties men were having in getting into such-and-such a profession that was dominated by women, but perhaps they exist.

FairPhyllis I agree it shouldn't be blamed on radfems. I don't think most MRAs even know or care about the difference between different schools of feminism. There may be a correlation of internet use but it's not the cause. At the same time radfems are blogging, MRAs are finding each other in online communities where they can trade instructions on tin foil hat construction share their views that would make other men down the pub think they're loons

LRD apparently cheerleaders used to be mostly male and now are mostly female. And, ... erm... .

MRAs have existed under one name and another for millenia. I can quote if anyone likes? I should imagine most of us are familiar, though.

flora - yep, true. I'm trying to think of how many spaces that were once male-dominated, that have become female-dominated, as opposed to mixed? Can anyone suggest one?