Is there another word for oppression ?

[Blistory]

In the context of the patriarchy oppresses women ? I know what I mean by it, I know that most posters in this section understand what is meant by it but it seems to be a term that causes some women to automatically rebel against feminism.

Most the of the circular arguments on MN seem to go along the lines of
'but it's my choice therefore I'm a feminist exercising my choice'
'no you're not, you have no choice'
'I am a strong indepedent woman, feminisim has achieved its aims and I can do what I want'
'no, you think you have choice but you don't really because you are oppressed'
'I am not oppressed, sod off, you nutcase feminist'

Obviously that's not a serious example.....

How the hell do we get around this everyday thinking without attacking, without patronising ? There must be a better way to have these discussions but damned if I can think of it.

Is oppression as a word too emotive and if so, how better could this be phrased ?

Subjugate, maybe.

Constrain? Limit?

Not a word, but a beautiful description, from which you might find a word or phrase. Perhaps 'every choice has a negative consequence' or similar.

From Marylin Frye's 'The politics of reality':

"The experience of oppressed people is that the living of one?s life is confined and shaped by forces and barriers which are not accidental or occasional and hence avoidable, but are systematically related to each other in such a way as to catch one between and among them and restrict or penalize motion in any direction. It is the experience of being caged in: all avenues, in every direction, are blocked or booby trapped.

Cages. Consider a birdcage. If you look very closely at just one wire in the cage, you cannot see the other wires. If your conception of what is before you is determined by this myopic focus, you could look at that one wire, up and down the length of it, and be unable to see why a bird would not just fly around the wire any time it wanted to go somewhere. Furthermore, even if, one day at a time, you myopically inspected each wire, you still could not see why a bird would gave trouble going past the wires to get anywhere. There is no physical property of any one wire, nothing that the closest scrutiny could discover, that will reveal how a bird could be inhibited or harmed by it except in the most accidental way. It is only when you step back, stop looking at the wires one by one, microscopically, and take a macroscopic view of the whole cage, that you can see why the bird does not go anywhere; and then you will see it in a moment. It will require no great subtlety of mental powers. It is perfectly obvious that the bird is surrounded by a network of systematically related barriers, no one of which would be the least hindrance to its flight, but which, by their relations to each other, are as confining as the solid walls of a dungeon."

From here: www.terry.uga.edu/~dawndba/4500Oppression.html

I don't think it's the term "oppression" that gets people's backs up. I think it's the term "patriarchy" sometimes. I prefer kyriarchy.

Whenever I've had discussions about kyriarchy, any analysis of male-domination was discouraged. It seemed to me yet another derail. A bit like trans-activism.

Not to say that there are not interlocking oppressions. But often women get pushed to the back of the queue again.

Fair enough, I guess it depends on your perspective. I personally think intersectionality has merit.

Nobody outside of Arcane Feminism knows WTF Patriarchy is, and "Oppression" may have been correct in the 1960s but is out of date now, the methods of manipulation are more subtle and it just sounds OTT, like "Nazi" or "Stalin" etc.

Of course intersectionality has merit. It's just that very often it is used to minimalise the fact that women as a group are discriminated against for their very femaleness.

Most discussions that focus on intersectionality put women at the bottom of their concerns. Which is concerning.

"influenced by" maybe. It is a fairly neutral term and while not accurate it is not as loaded and not as scary for many people.

People get really mad if you suggest shaving etc has anything to do with oppression because they very much want to believe that they have free choice.

Personally I find it quite odd that anyone thinks they have anything like free choice.

Of course not. The last time I went on a beach holiday abroad (bloody yonks ago) I did notice that all the women had hairless legs. It's not like beards which would carry on growing. Leg hair is like arm hair: it stops. No need to remove it, yet all women had removed it. Choice my arse.

I teach kids from other countries at the moment.

I noticed that the 15 year old Russian girl I was teaching didn't shave her legs. I wonder what the norm is there.

I'd say pretty soon Kyriarchy as a term would start getting loaded and - what a surprise - you're a professionally offended nutcase for even bringing it up.

love the birdcage analogy.

was going to share my brand new greenhouse analogy which I invented only moments ago while watering the limp basil pot on windowsill herb garden

...but am oppressed by societies' expectation that analogies not be shit

Agree totally the term kyriarchy, if it were to become well-known, would get the same level of shit that patriarchy currently gets.

If people aren't willing to admit that male oppression exists, why would they want to admit that it exists alongside homophobia, racism etc.

Ooh don't overwater the basil, it takes away the flavour.

Apparently.

Agree totally the term kyriarchy, if it were to become well-known, would get the same level of shit that patriarchy currently gets

Yup, its called the euphemism treadmill.

But I don't think "Patriarchy" or Oppression are accurate terms any more, which is why they don't resonate.

The "patriarchy" is shafting non-alpha males as much if not harder than women in many respects, and I think most women sense this. It is more of an Oligarchy IMO

"Oppression" also doesn't - IMO - describe the situation in the OECD now - it is much more subtle, more invisible. You are not "barred" any more, but it is a world of invisible glass ceilings and softly closed doors. I don't know what the best word is, but IMO a lot of it is now within the mind, enchained by celebrity culture and a dumbing down of mass media rather than outside bars.

i wouldn't dream of eating the damn thing, the state its in at the moment Yellow. Looks like a clogged storm drain.

That'd probably be the overwatering

I'd go with constrain.

I know everyone is constrained in some way, but still you can think about ways in which women's choices are particularly constrained.

I would read the whole book before dismissing the birdcage analogy as 'shit'.

I don't think she was....it was about her own greenhouse analogy (?)

I use constrained and shaped a lot. I don't think I am oppressed - not when I put it in the context of women who can't get an education, birth control, abortions etc etc. that's maybe me kidding myself a little bit, but I do think I am constrained, not oppressed. Now, you could argue, in my personal context, that's just as bad. And I would agree. But I do have fundamentally more choice than many women in the world today.

I like the sense of "shaped" - I think there is a lot of shaping - diverting, seductive whispering, financial bribery - going on, rather than hard visible barriers.

yes it was my own greenhouse analogy that's shit - I did say I really liked the birdcage one.

Yy what and also in the sense that we are shaping a lot of this ourselves, IYSWIM. I don't oppress myself, but I do shape my own choices, opportunities, actions, etc.

shape is good.