Can straight men be feminists (asked by a straight man)

[dontwanttobethatguy]

In youth I (like every other teenage boy) unconsciously assimilated misogynistic ideas that were imprinted on me by our culture. Think a rural background with socially conservative working class people. I was a teenager in the era of lads mags, 1990s, pre internet. Access to porn was nothing like today, but the message coming from the media (FHM etc) was implicitly that women existed to service men one way or the other. The route up for female pop stars/presenters was basically, kids TV, lads mag shoots in bikinis, basically trading on female bodies and the expectation that they were a commodity for heterosexual male consumption (I see it now as promotion of a madonna/whore duality as being the perfect women for a man). I went to Uni, horizons broadened, and over time I saw the issue and attempted to change myself. I've thought about this a lot as things seem worse now with turbo charged access to porn and MRAs with huge international followings on social media.

So on to my question, can straight men be feminists or at best, are we only ever active non-misogynists swimming against the tide because of the culture we live in and the assumptions imprinted on most of us in youth?

I came to the conclusion a while back that I can't be a feminist, and that trying to be is a problem. Different women who consider themselves feminist have different views. It's uncomfortable to be a man, who calls himself a feminist, telling a woman she's wrong. I'm not sure ally is necessarily better, an ally to what view when conflicting ideas exist?

Why not just aim to be a decent man that listens & considers what women say about him and their experiences with other men, and what they expect from men? It's better position to come from, when inevitably there's disagreement sometimes, because arguments are more naturally from the position of I feel/think because

Yes. I can see your point.

I suppose the stronger/faster male bodies used to be mitigated by social conventions like ‘ladies first’, which served to remind men and boys to hold back and not push women and girls out of the way, just because they can.

Its really hard to stop those cultural practices of male restraint, which counteract the male oppression of women, from becoming a bit patronising as though women are feeble and incompetent.

I was struck by this comment and give thanks for it. I will think about the point you make.

No, men can't be feminists.

If that bothers a man, he should have a think why the label matters so much and why it's so important to infiltrate a group for women, about women.

Also @Martin83 it doesnt matter whether women are really pissed off with men and regularly shout that they're murderous, toxic lazy fuckers who don't think women are actually real humans like them. It doesn't matter if you think they're misguided and porn is fine and it's actually the lizard people keeping women down or whatever.
Because - and this is a shocker - even the nastiest, most spiteful, the wringest of the wrong women are STILL worthy of equality in their work and healthcare provision and STILL deserve to live in a community where we don't go out alone at night for fear of rape or being killed.

Women don't have to be 'nice' to you to deserve those things.
Men don't need a feminist label to be decent human beings.

I think I can see why you have that position. I know the views are split, but I'm tending towards the idea for me of non misogyny, the central tenet of this position being to listen to feminist voices, and change personal behaviours.

Ah yes, the "women are so difficult to understand" trope.

Hmm.

I think there's something quite off about a man coming into a female dominated forum to let us know all the great things he's doing for us yet making it all about him. Always a weird vibe. Definitely not feminist.

@dontwanttobethatguy I think if men can really 'change personal behaviours' and realise that women are the 'weaker sex' in only a physical sense, it would help change the way men perceive women.
At the minute, it seems that men perceive women to be the 'weaker sex'
in EVERYTHING.
I, for one, thank you for raising the subject - it's men's thinking and view of the world that we need to change, You are actually thinking! So, you can help the change if you choose

I just don't get why it's so important to claim the label feminist (OK I do, it's because wummin can't have the nice things without a man showing us how to do it but let's just say I don't...)

Millions of men support sports teams. Fat men, unfit men, men with no co-ordination. Teams that they have no chance of every joining, because of the cruel reality of the genetic lottery. But they still support them, cheerlead for them, follow their progress obsessively, give them their time, energy and money.

If like 1% of the time and energy men gave to supporting sport teams could be given to supporting women, then misogyny would be over and done with and the patriarchy swept away. YOU DON'T EVEN NEED TO JOIN THE TEAM! YOU JUST NEED TO TURN UP ON A SATURDAY AND DO A BIT OF CHEERING!

You don't have to be David Beckham to support football. You don't need to be a feminist to support women.

You could do a Charlotte Clymer. When she (as a man) started to lose her doting female audience, she decided she’d try being a woman instead. It seems to have been an effective tactic with lots of new groupies fawning over her.

https://grahamlinehan.substack.com/p/charlottes-rep

No thanks. I'm not trans, nor am I looking for fawning fans given that this is anonymous for all of us. I am gender critical in that I don't believe it is possible to transcend genetics for men to become women through cosmetic surgeries. I do think that trans people generally deserve kindness though.

I want it to change for my sons as well as daughter. I want to teach them in time about consent, power and coercion so they can recognise these things in the environments they inhabit. They are very young at the moment though.

Being gender critical means being critical of gender as a tool used to oppress/supress/repress women in a patriarchal society. Understanding the fact that human beings, as with all mammals, cannot change sex does not make you "gender critical". That phrase has been misused and warped by transactivists to mean nothing like what it should do.

I wasn't aware of that viewpoint, so thank you.

'Gender critical' was originally, afaik, not really about trans people in particular at all. It was a term I first heard around the time 'Let Toys be Toys' was set up - ist about rejecting gender stereotypes and recognising how they're bad for everyone. No such thing as "girls' toys" or "boys' toys", just kids toys. No more 'girls can't be footballers or engineers', no more 'big boys don't cry'. A rejection of all that regressive rot for the everyone.

The result of this is that if you're gender critical there's actually no problem at all with 'feminine' men or 'masculine' women.

The division comes when people pretend that somehow sex isn't real or important, fail to understand that much of the structural sexism experienced by women is wholly because of sex. (Mostly boils down to men are bigger but completely rubbish at having babies).

If you want to be part of the solution instead of part of the problem, then I suggest you read some books by women.
Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez,
Everyday Sexism and Men who hate Women by Laura Bates

Then talk to women, ask them what men do in the workplace/anywhere that annoys them. It may be that you have a handle on it all, or you might find yourself surprised at what you have missed. Talk with them about the above books.

And challenge men on their thinking. Continue to question yourself. The very best thing you can do is to make more men question their behaviour.

Thank you for your insight, but you now have a duty to pass it on.

@Martin83 I’d like to suggest you to read these books too. It will greatly help you understand women (unless you don’t really want to of course).

Any one got other books to recommend? to @dontwanttobethatguy?

I will do this. Sage advice. Thank you.

By the way. Name change deliberate. As I don't want to be that guy anymore. See what I did there. Sorry. Bad joke!

Why would we want to be? We would just be invading another space for women. Just be a decent human being.

I’m also a bloke and whilst I’m sure the question comes from a good place of wanting to do right. It’s also centring you (as a man) in a discussion that really needs to be about women. It’s like a macro wide equivalent of constantly asking a female partner are you doing the dishes/laundry/insert household chore right constantly to the point they just end up doing the majority of it out of frustration.

Thing is you have identified a lot of what needs changing, so set about being the change you wish to see. No one is expecting you to get it right first time or fulfil a magic list of boxes that suddenly make you a feminist. In fact trying to do so is not only counter productive it’s functionally impossible. Take for example the discussion between radical feminists and those who identify as sex positive feminists. There isn’t even a consensus yet on certain issues.

It’s also worth pointing out women themselves don’t have a magic feminism gene that once they identify as such they are suddenly experts in the topic. They are trying to find their way around the ideas and issues as we are. The one fundamental difference which I think is the heart of your question is women have a lived experience as women that we simply don’t. We aren’t going to have that direct experience but we can empathise with it via primarily listening and reading, but also be aware it will never be quite the same as living it.

Your best bet is to forget the nomenclature and stand for the values as best as you currently understand them. Whilst always willing to learn and remain open. I never identify as a feminist or even as an ally necessarily, I will say I am a fellow traveller on a lot of feminist talking points. Yes you are right we are all heirs to our societal conditioning, but where you have arrived at already should be proof enough that things can be moved in the right direction. Where we come from only informs the journey we have to take not where we wish to arrive at.

If you want a current example of a bloke identifying as a feminist that you should not emulate:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4918529-last-minute-tra-attempt-to-get-filia-cancelled-fails?msgid=129978076#129978076

Why don't you start a thread on it? Nothing stopping you

I'm a woman despite having a male UN.

Books - The Authority Gap by Mary Ann Sieghert is great.

I think you should listen to women and when they say something that makes you defensive, try to understand before jumping straight to Not All Men Are Like That. Lots of men seem to find it almost impossible to engage on some topics, especially around sexual violence.

And listen to Dervel. He talks a lot of sense.

When you read almost any thread on here, it becomes patently obvious that there isn't one single definition of a feminist. There isn't a single set of views. Within the first half dozen replies on page one, one poster said a man can be a feminist and another said he couldn't. As Tony Soprano might say, whadayagonna do? Best we stay out of the whole thing. As I said, be a decent human being.