"Women against feminism" WTF?!!

[Desperate2012]

Really. Just heard about this as a "thing". Honestly, like there aren't enough important issues out there some women feel their biggest battle is AGAINST feminism. Lets just shoot ourselves in the foot then. Gaaaah!!! Had to get that off my chest

True, I take your point just.

my point, which I obviously made badly, is that even women who disagree with the statement and claim that it's offensive do actually apply it (subconsciously) to their own lives in a practical way. But only in relation to strangers.

You see, that's a big, fat assumption right there. But to assume this is a legitimate standpoint because you are free to think what you want. However, I think such assumptions are one of the fundamental sticking points that women have with feminism (and there I go assuming!). Which takes us back to the OP.

Agreed bullets. If I walk into a strange pub, people might not like my accent, or the way I dress, or how I conduct myself. If I walk into a pub on match day with the wrong football top on, and get jumped, some people will say, 'What are you going in there for wearing your Spurs/Arsenal/Utd top? Asking for trouble, dickhead!'

It's a nasty way to think, this victim-blaming. I should be able to dress or speak how I like. You will always get idiots who will condemn you, though.

But if you do walk through the wrong part of time in the wrong football kit on derby day, and get beaten up, the fact that you were wearing the wrong colour top can't be brought up and used against you in court. And historically that isn't the case with rape.

"But I don't know any woman who takes practical steps to manage the potential risk from people they know."

i think many/most women do, though not on a conscious level perhaps, even with men they know very well. when we've had discussions on here about how women occupy space, the verbal language and tone they use, their body language, many find that they are in some ways behaving in certain ways to avoid potential threats to themselves, whether verbal or physical. so they are more likely to avoid taking up too much space, be conciliatory and mollifying in tone etc. it's very ingrained and socialised, and women who don't conform to that may find themselves at personal risk. thinking about it rationally, they are highly unlikely to be actually fearing rape in, say, a business meeting. but the violent behaviour of other men still means that the men around them benefit from the privilege of that ingrained fear

Being wary of strangers at night is a natural reaction. Being alone, in low visibility is being vulnerable. Whilst "all men are potential rapists" covers this scenario, it is often a contextless statement that can sound needlessly antagonistic and shit-stirry, with the above scenario being applied after the fact as a justification, rather than an actual reason for having said it.

Surely women who are against feminism should not voice that belief as they should accept that as women their voices/feeling/opinions are irrelevant within their own belief system?

Are you assuming that just because they don't like feminism, they don't consider themselves to be equal members of society? That sounds as if feminism is the only way, and that makes it sound more religious than political.

Spherical I think that's a bit questionable. And not wanting to identify as a feminist doesn't mean they want to succumb to a partriachy either.

Sometimes, people's beliefs and motivations are so different from our own that they seem beyond belief to us.

I never understand how so many poor Americans are dead set against affordable healthcare. But, for whatever reason, they see it as the wrong thing to do, no matter how beneficial I might think it would be for them. But they have their reasons, and it isn't for me to judge.

If you believe in equality for women, you're a feminist. Whether you like the label or want to line yourself up with the rad fems is something else entirely.

If you really don't need feminism, I'd like to see you try and get by without it.

just but here's the point, the people that are arguing against the sort of feminism I detailed a few posts ago want to make a difference for women elsewhere. They just don't want to subscribe to the feminism they are seeing today.

There's a popular feminist, I can't remember her name now who recently wrote that because of these militant 'radfems' feminism is dying and people are wanting to distance themselves from it. How scary is that?!!

I also believe that women should be able to say 'no' and for that to be respected. If a woman wants to say 'no' to feminism then we should respect that. No means no.