Feminism for dummies

[Nigglenaggle]

Hi. I have never really read much about feminism, but I always thought, in its essence, it was about bringing equality for men and women. however reading threads in this section has lead me to believe in fact that is not the case. In fact I've come to wonder if that is even a large part of it. Please explain to me, in plain English, what feminism is. An overview of the different schools of thought within it would be welcome, however please stick to simple terms, for a simple girl

[HullyEastergully]

supermann,

It is a great shame that your posts make you sound like a right wanker when I am sure you are a really lovely little bunny really.

[AnyFuckingDude]

You remind me of someone, Supermann.

[namechangeguy]

'...just that our culture accepts rape, and that surely serves men more than women.'

You see, I just cannot accept that. Firstly, how do we accept rape? In the same way we accept murder, violent assault, knife crime, racial abuse and the like? By accept, do you mean we tolerate it, encourage it, or merely that it exists? Secondly, rape serves rapists. To say that rape serves men is like saying that knife crime serves young black men. I need to understand what you mean.

[HullyEastergully]

Have you been badly treated by a Lady, I wonder?

You sound so ruffled-up and defensive, I fear a Lady must have hurt you very greatly.

[purrpurr]

Superman, I've never listened to Woman's Hour as it sounds to me like all of women's things squished into 60 minutes - presumably that's 48 minutes of knitting and 12 minutes of kittens, eh? But I digress - I believe that equality HAS to be a worldwide issue, and we have to be aware of what you call 'overseas stuff' (charmingly referred to as scraping the barrel). What's the point in making equality a local issue? It's not. We import and export vast amounts of goods. We have relationships with other countries.

Yes, we have to start in our own back yard first, but if we were truly going to do that then we would need to quit things like Children In Need and solve our own poverty and homeless issues here first. That's incredibly selfish.

I wasn't using those two primary examples of inequality to illustrate some sort of whimsical argument about women not having any rights, and that, innit. I was saying, here, look, here are just two examples where we're still getting things horribly wrong. The fact that they are not happening in the UK cannot be relevant. How can we possibly only care about the UK?

[AbigailAdams]

Well OP. There you go. Now you know what Feminism is all about. Out of the mouths of men too. Must be true.

Norty AF. You have upset Supermann with your opinions. How dare you have them. Remember you are a recalcitrant child that needs putting in their place.

It is like feminist bingo here.

The 2nd and third posts on this thread were very aggressive and goading.

HTH

[HullyEastergully]

"acid -tongued"

hahahahahahahahahaha

So unfeminine

[TunipTheVegedude]

OP, The Equality Illusion by Kat Banyard is an excellent book if you're interested.

[WomanlyWoman]

Right I wrote this earlier and it didn't post so I'm posting it now with apologies to all the people I missed out inbetween:

I knew I shouldn't have looked in here.

ncg I liked your post, although I'd disagree that women have a better
deal when it comes to education. Girls outperform boys in some areas, yes, and boys do need encouragement in some areas, in this country, but that's very different from suggesting that women have a better deal. What about getting girls into STEM subjects, for example my dd is brilliant at maths, now I worry that this will be eroded as she grows older and keeps hearing the idea that girls are no good at maths. On the other hand if I had a DS I may well have concerns about his reading and language skill. I think there are issues there for both genders.

Supermann, nice name, the only problem I have with men such as yourself is the incredible amount of time you waste attacking feminists. If you want to see issues for men tackled, start a group, go ahead, discuss the issues reasonably and people will listen. Feminists are certainly interested in the idea of sharing responsibility when it comes to children, you say men are unequal in child custody cases that is precisely because of the gender roles and expectations that feminist challenge. if you really want to see change in this area then attacking feminists isn't the way to go about it.

NiggleNaggle, there are different streams of thought within feminism, it crosses a broad political spectrum, but, the basis is equal opportunites for all. The reason a lot of the focus has been on women's rights is because women are discriminated against purely because of their gender.

[WomanlyWoman]

Also re rape culture, I didn't read the original comment, but I'd say rape culture is certainly accepted, one example being The Daily Sport and their 'upskirt' non consensual shots.

Also, on a different note, but it relates, I discovered today that at my childs primary school, there's a corner it's hard for supervisors to see at playtime, the kids call it 'the rape corner', nice huh?

[purrpurr]

Supermann, repeatedly referring to all feminists as aggressive: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaslighting

Namechangeguy: "'...just that our culture accepts rape, and that surely serves men more than women.'

You see, I just cannot accept that."

The Guardian in 2009:

The government estimates that as many as 95% of rapes are never reported to the police at all. Of the rapes that were reported from 2007 to 2008, only 6.5% resulted in a conviction on the charge of rape.
www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/mar/13/rape-convictions-low

The Guardian in 2012:

The conviction rate for rape is 58%.
www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/mar/19/myths-about-rape-conviction-rates

I find it hard to accept, either. It doesn't even look like we're bothering to tell the truth anymore, we're just spitting out statistics in a lazy, haphazard manner because no one gives a shit about rape, or that rapists should be convicted.

It's only rape, innit?

[TunipTheVegedude]

For me feminism is about (to use an unfashionable expression) women's liberation.

I'm not really very interested in the blokes who go around moaning that we're not worried enough about discrimination against men. I assume they would also have criticised the US Civil Rights movement for not being sufficiently concerned about discrimination against whites. I choose where to focus my political energy and if men think they have a right to tell me where I should put it then that is, er, ironic....

[AbigailAdams]

"For me feminism is about (to use an unfashionable expression) women's liberation."

[purrpurr]

Tunip - 'I assume they would also have criticised the US Civil Rights movement for not being sufficiently concerned about discrimination against whites.' Exactly this

[AbigailAdams]

Aw Supermann has gone pffft. Bye bye.

[HullyEastergully]

dissolved in AF's acid...

[AnyFuckingDude]

dissolved in my acidic spit no less

his mummy called him for lunch

[namechangeguy]

Trisha, I too have an issue with my daughter and mathematics. She seems to switch off, and yet she has just got an A in her GCSE mock physics, and is projected for and A and a B in biology and chemistry. This attitude to maths will hold her back in the sciences, but I really don't know how much of it is down to her. She is at an all-girls school, and all teachers in the aforementioned subjects are women, so it isn't a case of there not being any role-models for her.

James Dyson was on the radio yesterday complaining that the UK does not value engineers and scientists. This is a massive issue for the UK, and we cannot afford to ignore the talents of half of our population when the sector itself is struggling.

I feel very uncomfortable talking about rape in here, so I will drop the subject. I take on board what everyone has written though.

[rosabud]

I'm amazed that girls outperform boys in education. I have professional and personal experience of boys intimidating girls and monopolising attention in our schools (and I don't mean in certain "shock-horror" incidents, I mean in constant, every day situations). Despite this, girls seeem to adapt, find coping strategies and "outperform" boys in many subjects at GCSE level. However, this trend is not continued at higher levels and, as we all know, the advantage all but disappears once we get into the workplace.

Personally, I don't think boys underperfroming at GCSE level is the issue that some make it out to be.

[TunipTheVegedude]

'it isn't a case of there not being any role-models for her.'

It's broader than that though isn't it? She isn't just influenced by what she sees in her school, or at home, but in the whole culture around her.

To give you just one example, a year or two ago one of the major high street shops was selling a mobile phone case with the words 'I'm too pretty to do maths'.

[TheDoctrineOfSnatch]

Niggle

Not all would agree with Sausage's definitions of what falls within liberal feminism, or indeed radical feminism, upthread.

Here's a thread with a few book recommendations:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/1324124-Recommendations-of-good-intro-books-on-feminism

Forkful's questions thread:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/1258668-ask-what-you-think-are-silly-Qs-here-and-forkful-will-try-to-answer-them-in-a-polite-helpful-way-by-directing-you-to-the-resources-she-found-useful-and-try-to-use-persuasive-arguments-and

[TheDoctrineOfSnatch]

Maybe Supermann fell over his double consonants.

[HullyEastergully]

It's a shame, I really fancied him.

[Nigglenaggle]

OK thanks all some food for thought for me here, will read the links when I get chance. Thanks to all those who kept it civil, this was my hope for this thread! Feminism probably is as I thought it was, but I guess I disagree with some over its interpretation. I guess also I have been thinking that equality is sort of redundant because we have it (and who isnt against domestic violence and female genital mutilation?), but have been forgetting that we are talking globally, and certainly in lots of places outside the uk this is not at all true. So all in all I have some thinking material and that is never a bad thing :)