Am I being dramatic to consider ending things over DP’s view on feminism?

[Ubadl]

I feel really shit about this and don’t know if I’m blowing it out of proportion.

DP is 43 and I’m 37. We’ve been together 5 years and have a two year old DS. DP has a highly respected career and is on the face of it very educated and likes a debate, can usually see two sides to something etc. In recent years my feminist views have been more vocalised, I guess as a result of getting older and seeing the realities more and more as to how women were and are treated.

We were playing with DS today and the topic of feminism came up. I said I hope DS is a feminist as he grows up … this was said in the middle of play and DP suddenly said I hope he’s not. I obviously questioned what he meant and he said he ‘didn’t want DS to ‘be’ anything’ as long as he wasn’t misogynistic, racist or homophonic etc. I felt immediately offended about this and couldn’t even bring myself to explain to him that feminism is part of combating misogyny, for example. He knows I’m upset but hasn’t spoken about it since and this happened several hours ago.

He is otherwise a decent man. He’s a good parent to DS. I feel so upset about this I am genuinely considering whether we have a future. Not sure if this is a dramatic reaction… I’m not an ‘extreme’ feminist and rarely talk about such matters with DP as they don’t come up, but I am of course a feminist and his comments have made me feel shit.

Many years ago, I posted on here because I'd been talking to DH about a thread where it became obvious that so so so many mumsnetters had been sexually assaulted: we were talking about the statistics and how women don't talk about it much, and DH said he found it hard to believe that among the men he knew, it was statistically likely that at least one of them was a rapist. I got angry with him, posted on here, and someone said "How does it feel to be married to a rape apologist?"

Well, that wasn't the case, and DH pulled his socks up, took it all on board. He works in a job where he needs to be aware that young women and female colleagues go through this, and that men perpetrate it, and so when it became relevant he didn't question a man's behaviour as he would have done before, he got on with holding him to account. (I have to be vague here of course.)

I mention this because I think women who are interested in feminism are so used to the language, and 'being a feminist' is part of our identities. And it just isn't presented to men that way, until it is, and it's a bit of a shock. Being normal decent men, they get used to how to think more accurately of the experience of women. It is not something they grow up with as a rule, they do need to be made aware.

I would guess, OP that your DP is at the point my DH was about 16 years ago? I think what you mean is, you want your son to be brought up in a world where men don't ignore the lifelong experiences of women, and that definitely takes two parents, so good luck with further discussion!

Is this a definition problem? Does he understand what being a feminist is? It doesnt sound like he is anti women's rights. It just sounds like he has an understanding of what feminism is and that he thinks it's perhaps something extreme? Have a conversation with him about it

Sounds like he has a cartoonish stereotyped view as to what it means to be a feminist. I would not dump him immediately but would need to probe further.

I would far prefer a feminist man who did not see themselves as a feminist to a self-proclaimed feminist man who is actually a bit of a misogynist / sexist.

Sounds like he has a cartoonish stereotyped view as to what it means to be a feminist

If he was to read any of the posts in the feminism topic on MN it would only reinforce his view TBH.

the problem with pay gap is the following. often we are comparing different jobs when comparing the wages such as comparing someone at the checkout till or stacking shelves to a person in the warehouse at the supermarket. not taking into account full time and part time work. also some positions in different industries pay can vary etc. you are literally not allowed to pay someone less for the same job or companies would just hire mostly women if they are so much cheaper.

But this ignores jobs requiring similar levels of study attract different average pay depending on gender.

It ignores that men in female dominated fields earn more than women in those fields.

It also ignores that as fields become feminised average pay falls and the opposite is true as more men enter a previously female field.

the wage a job is literally determined by the market. a) how easy is it for someone to do the job. b) how many people want to do the job. that is literally how a wage is determined

Not in my industry we’re not. All the jobs are office jobs of varying kinds. It’s dominated by women (possibly because it’s not that well paid). But at senior level female domination ends (ask yourself why that might be) and also most part time jobs in the industry will be done by women (again, why?).

But it’s interesting that you’ve completely dismissed this. Your concern for men and egalitarianism seems to have blinded you to the realities that women are indeed directly or indirectly discriminated against due to their perceived reproductive capacity.

Can you explain this further?

the second point about gender ideology i agree with you 1000% by the way so maybe i am a feminist in that sense but i just saw it as the side of common sense and what is right rather than it being a feminist thing so maybe i am more feminist then i think

well the reason why women work part time is up to them and their family in the end and and no ones business but theirs. nothing is stopping women from applying for these higher paying jobs or working the hours required to get to these more higher positions. for women who do want to be the higher wage earner there is nothing stopping from applying for those jobs

Well apart from the fact that for many women their employment prospects are limited by societal structures and expectations around birth and childcare.

women are free to marry men that want to be more hands on or would not mind being the part time worker primary care giver or sahp. i would suggest anyone to marry only someone that also compliments the career and family structure they want to achieve

Is feminism simply believing that women are equal to men? What if you believe women are equal to men, but you don’t support abortion rights and you think there’s no such thing as “the patriarchy”?

You can't really reduce it to something so simple as they don't have to go part time and could just apply for well paying jobs. A lot of women go part time because they're already the lower earner. To unpick that is a huge piece of work that involves looking at why women are disproportionately employed in less well paid sectors (and indeed why women dominated sectors are poorly paid). You'd need to look at outcomes for women who do apply for top jobs and their success rate compared with men, and what influences that, from their behaviour at interview (less likely to self promote, and why) to recruiter bias, concious and unconcious, to old boy networks and so on.

Your responses to this are dismissive at best and ignorant at worst.

please tell me what law or rule there is that bans women from applying for these jobs

what is your solution? tell women they are not allowed to date men that are the higher earners? ban women from working part time? force everyone to have to work part time by having a working hours cap?

What could you have possibly read into my post to make you think I was suggesting any of those things?

This is spot on. When I was younger I didn't get it at all. I worked in retail and there was a pay scale so wages were equal. It took me a long time to realise that my male colleagues received promotions even though they were in the minority and there were usually several women who were better qualified and more experienced. Things have improved a bit, but it's still mostly men at tue top.

Completely agree. I’d never call myself a feminist. Especially a Mumsnet one. It’s toxic

As @Never2many failed to enlighten us one what’s toxic about FWR, perhaps you could do the honours as you’ve just repeated this accusation?

Well it's not simply that, but that's the general idea unless I've got it very wrong! I always seem to say the wrong thing on these threads but to try and answer your points:

Abortion rights - everyone should have the right to decide whether a pregnancy continues to grow in their own body or not. It won't need to be a decision for biological men as they can't be pregnant.

Women are equal (good) but believe "there's no patriarchy" (deluded/requires better information). My son once told me earnestly that there is no gender pay gap due to the Equal Pay Act. Let's just say his A level Sociology tutor took pains to address that misapprehension and it has not remained his view.

You do realise that applying for a job isn't the same as securing it?

and if proven that the only reason a candidate did not get their job after the interview though they are the best candidate was their gender the interviewer would be in a lot of legal trouble