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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Why a lot of women don't come on the feminism threads...

999 replies

Scarletohello · 30/10/2014 22:38

So I posted this question earlier, why don't more women come on these threads ( considering how many women are on MN)

The replies saddened me. Are we doing something wrong? I remember a thread some time ago asking how many women lurk on the feminism threads but never post. I was shocked by how many women read these threads but didn't feel able to join in. I don't think feminism has to be particularly intellectual and I would like to be able to educate more women about feminism, how it affects women in many different areas of their lives, offer support and talk about what we as women can do about it.

Please have a read of this thread and tell me what your thoughts are. I want us to be as inclusive as possible as it affects us all...

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/2222959-To-be-a-bit-dismayed-if-4-million-women-visit-this-site-why-are-there-so-few-posts-on-the-feminism-threads

OP posts:
GarlicNovember · 03/11/2014 14:06

the problem is talking about a singular "feminism." We need to accept feminisms and feminists ... Agreed. Different ways of doing feminism, maybe. Any movement for change needs a multi-point approach.

On a vaguely related note, Chimney, I wanted to pick you up on your remark about 'needing therapy'. While I didn't actually say that, it's important to me that suggesting someone could benefit from therapy isn't an insult. In my opinion, everyone would benefit from it but, even without being evangelistic, 'needing therapy' is no more shameful than needing antibiotics or needing a rest.

Therapy's a tool for self-insight and evaluation of one's social context. Those two aims are shared with feminism; I doubt whether any course of therapy passes without reference to feminist issues. Most properly trained psychotherapists have a good working knowledge of feminism. Many have done specialist training in therapy with a feminist perspective (for some reason, this often surprises people!)

Spero · 03/11/2014 14:10

Again with the minimisation. Dittany was NOT five years ago. She was attacking me at end of 2011. The sex and disabled people post was only last year? Or it seems that recent to me. All the transphobic stuff was early THIS year.

It seems every time I stick my head above the parapet it gets blown off in a way I find profoundly shocking because it is my very person hood that is denied and attacked - I become a 'rape apologist', a 'human trafficker'.

And I am not holding feminists to a higher standard of discourse. Merely pointing out that it is ONLY feminists who have behaved in this way in all 7 of the years I have been posting.

I draw conclusions from that. Those may no longer be valid conclusions. I haven't attemoted to engage wi these threads in at least six months. Time and posters have moved on, I accept that.

But if you continue to minimise and 'femsplain' away my reality, don't expect me to engage happily and respectfully.

BuffytheReasonableFeminist · 03/11/2014 14:19

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Message withdrawn at poster's request.

GarlicNovember · 03/11/2014 14:22

Sorry, Buffy, it was an inappropriate remark. I'm blaming the rum I put in my cocoa!

MyEmpireOfDirt · 03/11/2014 14:25

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

BookABooSue · 03/11/2014 14:33

Being theoretical can be an activist act. But being theoretical can also be an exclusionary and hierarchical act.

Upthe I'm not criticising your post at all. I think it's clear and fair. I think that the issues raised time and time again are about feeling excluded; feeling that feminism as an issue has been appropriated by a certain agenda. It's why I completely agree with your point about feminists and feminisms because it is a developing, growing movement that is neither stagnant nor cohesive.

UptheChimney · 03/11/2014 14:39

Argh, I wish I had more time to chew over all of this! It's fascinating.

But it does remind me of debates & discussions in my consciousness raising group in the late 1970s. And the way our women's group was regularly harangued by a Spartacist who maintained we had no place to even think about women's liberation before the worker's revolution. Interlocking oppressions, as Anna Yeatman called it back in the early 1980s.

Irritating historian cliché: there is nothing new under the sun ... and I'm old.

yackity · 03/11/2014 14:39

This thread actually has me intrigued. I posted a bit earlier, but it's been playing on my mind, and I'm not truly sure I have a complete answer, but here's part of it.

Why didn't I post:

  • ok, yes, there were a few overly aggressive people a few years ago. I didn't want to have much to do with that sort of (what seemed to me) militaristic style of feminism.

Why I don't post now:

  • probably because you make me feel uncomfortable. And that's not actually your fault. It's more to do with me.

I am a SAHM, it's time for me to start doing something to get back into the workforce, I've had loads of encouragement from my DH to do so, but due to the nature of his work any work I do would have to be completely reliant on child care, which is very expensive where I am. I am highly educated, but to work in the area which I am educated in would mean I have to use a nanny, it would unlikely work any other way. And right now, I don't have the drive to become successful enough for me to even consider asking my DH to reduce his hours.

I go to MN to faff around, to sometimes lend a shoulder or an ear to someone in distress, but usually just to lurk on interesting threads.

This isn't a board to faff around on though, is it?! You certainly can't skim the thread without looking like a right idiot, its not one of those where just reading the op's posts will fill you in, you actually have to WORK on these threads.

When I do read, I feel guilty. I feel guilty that I'm not setting a good example, that actually, I have the ability to do more, and should be doing more.

So hopefully, doing some more reading, will be the metaphoric kick up the bum to do something with my life.

Who knows....

dreamingbohemian · 03/11/2014 14:41

I think Spero is right and we shouldn't try to explain away problems as off in the far past. I have read some truly horrible things on some of the trans threads in the last year, and sometimes threads do degenerate into a bit of nastiness.

My personal feeling is that overall the section is more diverse and welcoming in the last year or so, but that doesn't mean individuals can't have bad experiences at the same time, and we should accept that that does happen.

I do like the section overall but even I cringe sometimes, so I can imagine visitors who don't always see the positive bits would find it even worse.

UptheChimney · 03/11/2014 14:46

While I didn't actually say that, it's important to me that suggesting someone could benefit from therapy isn't an insult

Of course not, but I felt (and I'm speaking for myself, not Buffy here of course) that in the context of the exchange upthread between you & Buffy, when you seemed to be rejecting her mode of communication as overly theoretical, and you were being broadly critical of "intellectualizing" that you comment re therapy was undermining and ad feminam (as opposed to hominem). I saw it as a rather low blow, I'm afraid. Well, if it had been addressed to me, that's how I would have taken it. It was not relevant to the actual argument over modes of communication or ways of thinong about feminism/s: it was directed at a specific poster, with a quite personal statement. Well, that's how it came across to me.

And while you were critiquing the "exclusionary" nature of "intellectualizing" feminist issues & debates, you seem to be arguing that only your approach is valid.

PetulaGordino · 03/11/2014 14:46

yackity, you make some really interesting points about what may be required of people to engage fully. and many women don't have the time or energy right now which is understandable (and a feminist issue Wink). you can come and faff on the pub threads though!

i also want to find a way to say that you are doing something with your life already without it coming across as patronising and ignorant (from someone who doesn't have children), but i'm not sure i'm going to succeed, so hopefully you can understand what i'm trying to say there!

YonicScrewdriver · 03/11/2014 14:49

Was also going to suggest coming to faff in the pub!

GarlicNovember · 03/11/2014 14:56

There's something that's repeatedly come up in real-life therapy, which I've only seen one other poster mention here. We - I include myself - sometimes get very angry & fired up about social injustices and/or unfairness to women, without looking closer to home and seeing how our generalised ire is also an expression of what's happening with us personally.

Getting the overview, and the insight into how others feel & behave, is necessary but the understanding's incomplete if we leave ourselves out of the picture. The ways in which generalised outrage can deflect from personal insight are many - the easiest to describe is "compassion fluency" (made-up term.) It can feel a lot more comfortable to be compassionate towards others, particularly others with whom we don't have to engage in real life, than to ourselves. For best emotional health and stability, obviously, we need both. To achieve this we need a clear view of our relationships with the world around us and, if you're a woman or in daily contact with one, this will include feminist considerations.

PP above have spoken about joining up abstract thought and lived experience (vivencia - see, I was listening Wink) and this is a small exploration of that necessity. I'll go off topic if I carry on, though.

NotCitrus · 03/11/2014 14:57

I've only read read the last 100-odd posts on here, but my experience of FWR has been of various groups of women who may well consider themselves feminist, being told they aren't feminist and are not only wrong, but told they are wrong in very dismissive ways. The worst I've seen was horrible transphobic stuff this year and last - dismissing the experiences not only of trans women and people who don't fit in the gender binary, but also of women who live and work with these people and respectfully treat people with the pronouns they request, while simultaneously citing some internet troll as proof that all trans people think anyone with a penis should be able to wang it about in a female changing room. I've got to know over a hundred trans people in the last 25 years, at least as many people who don't fit simple 'male' or 'female' labels, and they just aren't a threat to women any more than anyone else. In fact communities with lots of such people are often also ones where there are particularly high standards of seeking consent before touching, etc.

Similar discussions regarding sex workers. Many of the women doing sex cam work, phone sex, and prostitution are doing that rather than other jobs because it can fit round childcare. In many circs, it can be the more feminist option if there isn't other similarly flexible work and it results in being financially independent. I've seen various debates dismissing this possibility as posters claim no woman would ever choose sex work because men don't - firstly men often do too, but also men in desperate financial circs are much more likely than women to commit suicide. Hardly an improvement.

And porn. Lots of women quite like some porn, and differentiate between porn where a reasonable level of consent has been gained and that where it may well not have been. They'd like to see the industry improved rather than all porn banned (and/or understand that banning may just drive porn and sex work underground, actually making things worse for any women in it). Debates like the recent one about 'good porn' cancelling out abuse just make it look like the participants don't want a debate, because no-one is justifying abuse in porn industries, any more than the existence of Fair Trade chocolate means child slavery on cocoa plantations is OK. Insisting that anyone defending good porn is apologising for the bad porn is a non sequitur and I wasn't going to waste time discussing there. My housemate did a PhD on the commercial factors involved in porn industries and has many tales to tell, but has found various conferences that ostensibly cover porn are only interested in speakers who want it banned, rather than working within the industry to improve it. One stat I recall is that around 98% of porn downloads and purchases are by around 2% of the users - most users like a few particular images but it's the compulsive users, often who are the most misogynistic of men, who hugely influence internet search results.

I'd have to do a lot of research to check facts before getting into discussion on how to improve porn industries, and my perception is that those suggestions wouldn't be welcome in most FWR debates so I don't put in the effort. There's other places online with women-only forums where my trans friends, sex worker friends, and those with real knowledge of porn industries share their views and I tend to go there for a much wider ranging discussion of feminism than I see on FWR.

That said, there's often interesting links and topics on FWR so I tend to lurk, then compare with coverage of the same issue elsewhere. There's many other topics where I agree with experts on FWR, but don't bother saying so.

GarlicNovember · 03/11/2014 14:59

It was not relevant to the actual argument - Correct. I've apologised twice for this.

YonicScrewdriver · 03/11/2014 15:00

That's interesting, garlic, thanks.

Thanks for the thoughtful post, notcitrus. I didn't know this:
One stat I recall is that around 98% of porn downloads and purchases are by around 2% of the users -

YonicScrewdriver · 03/11/2014 15:01

X post garlic - the self care thing was interesting!

GarlicNovember · 03/11/2014 15:05

Love your post, Citrus! I wonder whether the 'new' FWR is now able to debate your points without getting all cross? I didn't know that about 98%/2% but was aware something like that was going on. Thank you. It would, imo, be really interesting to discuss this and have a look at possible implications.

PetulaGordino · 03/11/2014 15:06

garlic i had a v emotional thread on here not long ago, which was rather self-obsessed but everyone was very kind about that, about how to behave in a more feminist way to myself. i might go and dig it out and have another read of that

BuffytheReasonableFeminist · 03/11/2014 15:11

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BuffytheReasonableFeminist · 03/11/2014 15:12

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rosdearg · 03/11/2014 15:14

Spero, I am sorry if this is a difficult question and goes over painful things, but

  • do you object to people holding the belief - and saying so - that paying for sex is always wrong, even if the person doing so is disabled?
  • or, do you object to the way in which such opinions were expressed, that was hurtful and aggressive to you?

This is an important distinction.
Sorry to pick on this one issue but I think lots of things are getting conflated, often, on threads like this.

I think for instance, that upthread, Outs was clear (not using complicated language) and calm as well (not shouty or aggressive) when she said "that was not a feminist choice" and explained why. However I am pretty sure that some posters and lurkers will go away and remember for ever that the exchange above was one of aggression and / or academic posturing? (not sure which, I don't see either, but these are the two things that are usually "wrong" with FWR)

I think there is a massive cognitive dissonance sometimes where people

  • don't like the content of what they are hearing, which calls into question and problematises very familiar things, and suggests evil in all sorts of places close to home
  • experience negative emotion
  • this emotion can hinder your comprehension, so you assume people are being deliberately obfuscatory
  • and it feels horrible, you feel attacked, so you imagine the people talking are being aggressive
  • then when they try to explain that they are not being aggressive, actually, this itself - a strong, logical argument in opposition to you - is experienced as further aggression, so you get a vicious circle
  • all this takes place in good faith of course

but coming back to my question to Spero, it matters whether people are allowed to express the opinion that certain things - certain things which matter more to some people than to others - certain things which are a familiar part of our culture, to some - are wrong, or not. Because if not - what then?

GarlicNovember · 03/11/2014 15:16

That sounds great, Petula! Cheers, Buffy :) You also taught me the word epistemological (I instantly forgot my Plain English translation, so I'll have to look it up again now - damn you!)

UptheChimney · 03/11/2014 15:23

Epistemology: thinking about how we know what we know.

Spero · 03/11/2014 15:41

Rosdearg, I certainly don't object to your question or find it painful but it does seem from your last part that you assume you know the answer, and I am a bit bemused by that.

If I have ever given the impression that people are not allowed opinions because I find them upsetting, then I am profoundly sorry because that, I hope, is the opposite of what I am about. I am guided always by Carl Rogers and his stated principle that 'the facts are always friendly.mthere is nothing dangerous or Unsatisfying about being closer to the truth'.

What I do object to is people who chose to call me a 'rape apologist' and a supporter of human trafficking and who follow me from thread to thread proclaiming I am so awful that no one should listen to a word that is typed by my depraved fingers.

Fair dos, the following about bit was Dittany and it was 3 years ago so I can understand why the response from some is get over yourself already. But the sex and disability thread was pretty fresh. And again it underscores for me some of the nastiness that seems to lurk on the feminism board. That anyone who espresses a contrary view must be a troll or a man or a hideous person. Even the dog house threads never got that bad! (Although I confess they come close at times).

You are welcome, nay encouraged to have whatever opinion you want. But if the only way you can defend that opinion is by vicious personal attacks against another human being, you need to have a word with yourself about your own integrity and what your motives really are.