anti feminist lesbian

[rainbowtoenails]

I have friends who are and arent feminists and straight and gay friends and i accept peoples right to their own opinion.

BUT for some reason i am frustrated by my anti feminist lesbian friend. It's like i feel that she should be 'on our side' as ridiculous and unreasonable as that sounds. I know that i am effectively discriminating against her compared to straight friends (who i maybe have lower expectations of?).

Most of the men i know are more 'feministy' eg anti-porn, anti-sexist language than her.

I'm confused, im not usually this judgemental, honest!

Basically, PC'ness is shorthand for - 'shut up and say only what we allow you to say'

Or shorthand for "stop saying offensive things''.

Sorry, I realise that's slightly off topic.

Morten - yeah. Off-topic, also....but

'Politically correct/political correctness' is a right-wing term used to attack attempts to challenge racism, anti-disabilty, sexism, homophobia. It was employed by right wing media (i.e. mainstream media) in fictional stories about LAs (those awful public sector institutions) banning nursery rhymes, changing words, etc, cancelling Christmas, etc. At first it was directed against the idea that language is important and can be oppressive (it reflects our attitudes and shapes them), that it might not be okay to call someone a 'spaz' or assume that a chairman was always a 'man'.

The fact that it annoyed the Daily Mail, The Sun, etc. is because it had an impact that ran against their core values of racism, sexism, etc. which must surely be good?

floyjoy - So all Tories say offensive things? - or would do if Labour let them get away with it?

FFP - Maybe you just want to start an argument... but if you re-read my post I don't mention Tories at all. Didn't even imply that all right wing people(not all of whom would call themselves Tories) would/do use racist language, etc.

I'm surprised that anyone these days thinks of Tories as right wing and Labour as not right wing?! If only. Tony Blair's government was left wing?

Language useage/types of language just isn't something that can be discussed in terms of something as relatively minor as political parties. Language is all-encompassing, ever-changing and crucial to our sense of identity and how we perceive and understand the world.

"Feminist" God i hate that word!!

floy - it may be off-topic, but it's interesting isn't it? I agree that the labelling of people as 'pc' is done by people who really want to attack the idea that language has any meaning/importance - do you often find they're also (bizarrely, and with some self-contradiction) people who insist that words have one, un-nuanced 'meaning'? Odd, I reckon.

Does your friend say 'I'm not a feminist'? Or does she simply disagree with you on some topics? Because there is a longstanding variant of lesbian feminism that is in favour of porn as a tool of sexual exploration and promoting diversity, and which also sometimes embraces the use of 'offensive' words as a way of reclaiming them and/or rejoicing in busting the taboos around women using 'bad language'.

FJ; No I didn't want an argument - but I would have been up for a calm reasonable chat -