Feminist pub XIX: The Bluestocking meanders into May

[YonicScrewdriver]

We're running at about six weeks per pub at the moment! So if you want chat with a feminist flavour, or with fellow feminists, or just want to admire our patriarchy blaster cannon and goat - welcome!

Last pub Here

The view point was pretty male - but I guess the voice is from the human who sees male as default. But it was funny how he couldn't answer whether women were a different species.

The other interesting thing was that they didn't invent anything that flew because there wasn't anything that flew. Have we invented anything we couldn't see in nature?

But for another look at patriarchy I like her Earthsea books.

Does the internet count as not something in nature? I guess one way of looking at it is as a natural extension of human conversation /interaction plus libraries (plus cat pictures). But I think the concept of creating a record of something else is quite human in origin.

It sounds very interesting, I'll have to read it. I like a good conceptual novel to make me look at life from a new angle.

Did everyone but me know that "I'm not a feminist because..." is a meme at the moment? Very depressing. We need to get the cannon out for quite a few of the signs I've just read. But I like this response

Christ almighty, that's depressing

Aaaand I got as far as this and had to close tab. I lose.

One of them actually says "I'm not a feminist because not all men are rapists".

Where on earth do these children get their info from about what feminism is?

One of them actually says "I'm not a feminist because not all men are rapists".

Maybe we need a campaign to replace all the signs with "I'm not a feminist because I'm ignorant and I don't know what feminism means".

DD announced this evening that 'proper feminists don't make people go to swimming lessons'

I fear I may not be explaining feminism as persuasively and eruditely as I might.

Gah double post, stupid phone.

Err, what do you think he meant, HLF?

'Proper feminists don't make people go to swimming lessons' I think you will find that they do. It's all part of being independent and being dependable, and not needing to be rescued.

See?

I'm quite curious to see what argumentation she might use to back up her hypothesis. I think she might be too tired to discuss the matter further when she gets back from her swimming lesson (I sent her with DH, because this particular feminist was getting rather tired of her moaning).

Oh I see, it was of the order of "if you were a proper mummy you wouldn't make me go"?

Yeah it's pretty bad. Although, a few of the posts are pretty stunning examples of why feminism is needed. So a silver lining to every cloud, I suppose.

The rebuttal posted above is good too I think.

I've met young women who think feminism is a bad thing, and it boggles my mind. I can only assume that they've heard some wrong stuff and they'll come around eventually. But, then, my definition of feminist is 'gets pissed off about stuff that's shit for women'. Perhaps it's different, for others. I do imagine there's some pretty serious 'privilege' talk going around at a lot of unis these days. And a lot of the more... tumblr style... stuff annoys the shit out of me - so maybe if I was young and thought that was what feminism was, maybe I'd feel it wasn't for me either. But that's worrying in itself.

I managed 3 pictures before I had to close it.

I liked Mark Ruffalo's response Sweet posted (well, until I got to the grammatically tortured sentence at the end: "You know not what you speak of" - but that's just the pedant in me)

I'm also scared my middle sister is one of those people - I've seen similar posts on the internet.. and she's parent to 2 of the female grandchildren in the family so I have a lot of balancing to do!

article in The Telegraph today about manspreading

Also, in the same place. Top Gear continuing without Clarkson - new presenter every week! Yay!

"I don't need feminism . . . because I can vote. . ."

Now there's an irony.

"I don't need feminism . . . because I can vote. . ."

Maybe primary school kids need classes about "the way things used to be". Girls, you sit up the back. No you can't vote in the election we're now going to have for class president-for-the-day. No you can't have any of the interesting jobs. Here, make some sandwiches for lunch and clean the boys' desks.

Or more precisely, the way it used to be here, but still is in other parts of the world if you're lucky enough to even go to school.

I read some of the I don't need feminist posts and many of them had an "I'm alright jack" type feel. Like "feminism isn't needed because I'm ok" without a thought to the many women and girls who are not ok. It is saddening.

Actually we should probably open a thread on this - why do youngsters not understand feminism, why does no one like it.

I can remember back when I were a youth and went to uni and encountered self-described feminists for pretty much the first time. I'm sorry to report that I took the position that I was an equalist, an egalitarian, and a lot of these feminists were man-haters who needed to sort their own heads out. Admittedly one of them standing in the bar shouting 'all your penises are oppressing me' didn't help. Yet I had plenty of experience of sexual harassment already, which I got annoyed about and didn't see why I should have to put up with it, and considered my dad unlikeable for many reasons but including his sexism.

I did have ishoos as a youngster (ha, well, most of them gone) thanks to my parenting and was confused on a number of fronts, but I think the more theoretical dimensions of feminism are difficult to grasp in a predominantly patriarchal society.

I genuinely didn't realise how much women have been written out of history, for example, and why we should therefore study women's history particularly to redress the balance.

But than anything, I think it is simply not understanding that feminism is equalism, not pro-women-anti-men.

To clarify, I don't think it is simply that most youngsters aren't feminist-oriented. I think they are, at least in the main (I have come across a few), but are confused over terminology and theory.

Another aspect is that feminism gets blamed for everything of course. The question of violence is interesting, I have a friend who is intelligent etc but who definitely says she is egalitarian not feminist, and thinks we should pay more attention to the levels of violence men suffer. I keep trying to point out that it is men who overwhelmingly perpetrate violence, but... Also she blames feminism for the house price rises, although feminism and double income households were around long before the prices started doublng and tripling from the 90s on...