Anyone else hate the word feminity?

[grimbletart]

A hate that word - its very rhythm and cadence irritates the hell out of me.
Go na,na,na,na,na quickly, then do the same with feminity. It's all whimsy mimsy and pathetic sounding. Think Violet Elizabeth Bott for all those who remember reading Just William when we were little.

Now female....that's something else altogether.

I not A - bloody hell, my fingers are like sausages this morning...

Do you mean femininity?

Yes but I also hate 'lady-like'. As in 'oh that's not very lady-like'. FUCK OFF!

I don't mind the word. It has both positive and negative connotations.

Never seen the word before....

I hate it, but only in a pedantic kind of way....

Said my fingers were like sausages today. But hey, what's a syllable between friends...?

Actually my excuse is arthritis. I touch type and sometimes the fingers get sort of stuck when repeating the same keys and I don't notice . But I've typed this with the old two finger prod, so it should be OK

Still hate that bloody word though.....can see nothing positive about it at all.

Agree.

It's a word that is meant to describe what women are supposed to be like. And I dislike anything that tells women how they should be,

And it also has a trilling, girly, fluting kind of quality.

I'd say that it was negative because it is used a way of prescribing what behaviour people should or should not be allowed to have simply because of which biological sex they happen to be.

But it can be positive because it refers to areas where women have been allowed some freedom to develop their own culture. So various activities, patchwork for example, have been developed, led and shaped by women. If we devalue feminine culture we are left with only masculine culture, traditionally shaped by men, because there is little culture that has traditionally been gender neutral.

It would be preferable if there were no gendered activities in the future, but as there and traditionally have been, I don't think we should devalue the feminine activities and praise the traditionally masculine ones. But plenty of people do. Many people will make a big deal out of a girl who wants to be an engineer and plays football, while looking down on the girl who wants to be a primary school teacher and does ballet simply because the latter are stereotypically feminine roles.

I hate it because I sound like Nemo trying to pronounce "anemone" when I try to say it.

But seahouses, accepting that there are 'traditionally masculine' and feminine roles is part of the problem. There is no need for people to happy about girls doing the former and eschewing the latter if they weren't such a powerful archetype, And such a useful one to the status quo. But when it comes to repressing women femininity is much more powerful regarding the way women should act and look than the ways they choose to pass their time.

I really think it is the sound of the word that gets to me - it simply sounds as if it is describing the characteristics of a big wuzz - just feeble and bleugh, whereas female sounds strong and in your face.

Yes, female is much better and less open to interpretation.

But female is biological sex, and feminine describes socio-cultural behaviour (ie gender). Which is a useful distinction, I think.

(I have arthritis in my fingers too, so I do sympathise!)

Feminine is marginally better than femininity but still suffers from sounding utterly wuzzy and feeble. I always picture a woman who would be topple over if someone said 'boo' to her and who stands around fluttering her eyelashes and generally being helpless.

Sorry, can't identify with this type of female at all.

Violet Elizabeth Bott wasn't mimsy and pathetic, she had a will of iron.

I think you're being extremely sexist here, stereotyping women and then dismissing them.

Should have said: which type of female? I feel a bit disgusted to read talk like that in the Feminist section.

Violet Elizabeth Bott wasn't mimsy and pathetic, she had a will of iron.

If you disagree with me I'll scweam and scweam and scweam until I'm sick - ah the wonderful Violet Elizabeth

The type of female who stands around fluttering her eyelashes and generally being helpless of course. Bleugh.

How do you feel about femaleness?

Is the the word femininity that you dislike

Or women who meet the stereotype of femininity?

In the first I think YANBU

In the second I think YABU

I also know this is not AIBU so I accept my answers are U

Well patriarchy tells you to despise women who do those things (which are usually survival techniques or things that women are trained into), so ten out of ten for perpetuating contempt for women on behalf of patriarchy.

This is the feminist section, why are you talking about women in that manner?

Violet Elizabeth was a pretty funny character. She always beat William by using the tools that she had at her disposal. Little girls then weren't allowed the freedom that the Outlaws had. They still don't get it generally. Small girls are oppressed into femininity. Don't despise them for it.

Quite. It's just another damned if you do, damned if you don't. We socialize young girls to be feminine yet when they become so we look down on them for being "girly".

To denigrate that which is considered feminine is to buy into the patriarchy.

Sardine - mostly it's the word - you know how some words just grate. I don't dislike women who meet the stereotype - I just wouldn't choose them as friends I guess.

Nyac - Patriarchy didn't tell me to despise women who do those things because a) I never said I despised them and b) patriarchy doesn't tell me to do anything because I say fuck off to patriarchy and have done so since I was knee high to a grasshopper and that was well within the time frame that Richmal Crompton wrote her books (between the 20s and up to 1970 I believe). So no scweaming and scweaming at the Outlaws from me. I preferred a much more direct approach

As for small girls being oppressed into feminity..it doesn't sound as if you rate it much either if that is how you refer to it. Not all girls were oppressed into it even in Just Wiliam's time. I certainly wasn't, being a feminist since childhood nearly three decades before feminism was, apparently, "discovered" around 1970!

I'm not sure exactly what we're disagreeing on here, but I accept that there are traditionally masculine and feminine activities. I can't not accept it because factually such a distinction has existed in society. I don't understand who it would benefit to pretend that was not the case.