Men, if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.

[curlew]

Fantastic article by Laurie Penny

Gosh -- I agree that every single one of those things on your list is awful. No question. I just don't see any of those things happening on this particular thread, and I guess I kind of resent being lumped in with idiots when that's not what I'm doing.

Your response suggested that you think it is only okay to use this term if it is an individual woman describing her own experience rather than a discussion of women in general in the UK and your follow up response suggests the same thing.

You may think it's valid to discuss this but the OP has tried to have a discussion about men responding to sexism so you're derailing that discussion by policing the severity of the language that might be used to describe the situation women face in the UK.

it isn't an individual thing though - these are part of larger patterns.

women are at great risk of being made redundant once they are pregnant/are on maternity leave. it sucks for the individual woman, and she can feel shitty about it, nonplussed, relieved, whatever. no one can tell her what to feel, nor should they.

when this same experience plays out for many other women, precisely because they are women, well, then, that is opression.

it is such a mistake to paint women's oppression in the UK and other western (!) countries as though it is a bunch of rich white women competing to see who can have the fastest nanny and complaining because they aren't CEOs. this is the teeniest, tiniest tranche of women anywhere

of course, if you think that this is the typical experience of most women in the UK, i am not surprised that it sounds like a cavalcade of first world problems to you

*i am using the editorial 'you' and it is not directed any any particular poster

I'm not policing anything. I personally am ambivalent about using the word oppression without any qualifiers. You disagree, that's fine. I don't know how much more clear I can be about that.

The thread is talking about men responding to sexism, and I'm saying that one major problem that probably impedes men responding more fully to sexism is that not everyone agrees that women are oppressed and hated in the UK. And in part, this is because of comparisons with elsewhere.

Do you disagree that this is a problem -- that not everyone sees it as oppression? I don't see why this is off-topic. I feel like it's more derailing to argue about whether or not we can discuss this or mention other countries or what have you.

I certainly don't think British women face minor first-world problems only. I think it's useful to think about how perceptions of other parts of the world colour perceptions of problems at home in a way that's problematic, and whether there's anything that can be done to change that.

With an emphasis on what can be done to change that

I'm not arguing for the sake of it, I am genuinely interested in whether even slight changes in terms or language would get a lot more people on board.

Not changes that make men more comfortable, but that allow for more differentiation of experience

I agree that it is a problem that people dismiss the oppression of women in the UK because things are not as bad as they are elsewhere. Agreeing with them contributes to the problem.

it is a profoundly narrow view that assumes that if there is no law against something, there are no problems/issues.

i wonder, even in those places, are there actual laws which state things like, 'if you see a woman on her own, it is your duty as a citizen to set her on fire/assault her'

kim that happens a lot. "I don't believe there is a patriarchal society because I love me mum" is another response that often goes along side "you should go and live in Saudi Arabia if you want to see oppression".

I agree with chibi that your view of oppression is very narrow. For example, I understand that prenatal scans to determine sex are prohibited in India as are abortions based on sex but this occurs in high numbers. Female genital mutilation is illegal in many counties where it is commonly inflicted on girls. Are those things not part of the oppression of women?

I used to think that way Kim. I thought if we could just modify the way we talk about feminism, if we could open the debate and make men feel included instead of attacked, then maybe we would get somewhere.

The problem is that it simply doesn't work. Feminism is attacked by people who choose to misunderstand it, by those who have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo. And I say that as a liberal feminist who believes generally that the softly, softly approach works. Yes, we're chipping away but any advances are simply met with increasing resistance and now we're to believe that the problem is how we project feminism.

Screw that. The problem is that privileged people have a huge degree of self interest in ensuring that feminism doesn't achieve it's aims. Could feminism engage a few more women if the language was more flowery and less extreme ? No, not when feminism involves examining the spectrum of the inequality of women from crude jokes to infanticide, from inappropriate groping to rape and murder. There is no nice way of saying that some men do these things therefore all men need to change. There is no way of saying to someone that all of your advantages have come at my cost without them feeling attacked.

The fact that some men and women find the use of the term oppression shocking is entirely correct, because it IS shocking.

women in the UK are systematically disadvantaged on the basis of their sex. how this plays out depends on a variety of factors. i am made redundant. your rape complaint is no crimed. she is passed over for promotion. they are groomed by paedophiles, and this is dismissed/ignored by authorities.

is the phrase 'systematically disadvantaged' more palatable?

we could always go with 'men have a whole shitload of unearned privileges which advantage them over women'

So feminism sort of has a marketing problem. The objective is to convince as many men as possible to speak up, but in order to get them on board, the problem can't be presented as so enormous that it seems to lack credibility. This seems to be the issue with the word 'oppression'. But we must also be careful that the problem isn't trivialised, otherwise why should anyone bother to give it any attention at all.

Buffy, I think you've got it absolutely right. To me this is exactly the conundrum.

I guess I would say it's only a problem to the extent you want to translate theory into activism, but I think most feminists do.

Trouble is, we're allowing the sensitivities of the dominant group to control the terms of the debate.

In a way, I think this is another conundrum. I don't think men should control the terms of the debate. But if the onus is on men to change the system well, that's not going to happen of its own accord. It's going to be women pushing that change and slowly convincing more and more men it's the right thing to do. Does calling it oppression help or hurt this cause? Should we be more flexible on this point if it means getting more men on board after all, it's men who have the power to change things. I don't have an answer to this question but this is something I wrestle with a lot, in my work actually.

Ah Buffy, I so wish we were at a pub right now and could have a tedious academic fascinating discussion about the constructivist implications

That's a very good point, about trivialisation. Like I said, I don't really have an answer.

I do think Martin Luther King thought about how white people would respond to what he said -- not that that determined what he said, but I think for example he was savvy enough to know that nonviolence and civil disobedience would garner more support than violence. You can see that as letting white people control things (as other black activists said) or as being strategic. I can see both arguments (did I mention I'm an academic?)

An example from my own work... being a bit vague... I guess I would say that there are times when you could tell people that their way of doing things amounts to war crimes, but you know that if you say that then they will completely disengage from the discussions you are having, through which you hope to have even a tiny influence on actually reducing war crimes. So you use slightly less incendiary language. It's not ideal, but a "less bad" option. If people stay engaged, you still have hope; if they disengage, you have no hope.

What is the actual goal? Is it getting men to recognise oppression, or getting them to be less oppressive?

Can you end oppression without the oppressors admitting they're wrong? I think perhaps you can, looking at history.

I hate the academic type arguments over terminology. It just derails the argument. I had a huge argument with Dh when he took over the running of the diversity committee at work. He was focussing on why so many Mothers only come back part time, or leave. They were suggesting all kinds of touchy feely crap to make mothers feel more welcome. He thought he was doing a good thing.

I said "what are you doing about the fathers? Are you encouraging them to work part time, or leave earlier to do the school run? How is the diversity policy helping them?"

He just could NOT make the connection that having company policies which aid men to take family responsibilities would actually help women. To this day he does not get it. Men and their jobs are more important than women and their jobs. I haven't left him yet. I am sure half the school run and organising half the holidays might give him a different view.

Portofino -- why do you think he doesn't get it? I mean, even after you've argued the point, what is the obstacle to him getting it?