Rebutting the Straw Men/Owning up when "it's a fair cop, guv.

[LurcioAgain]

BertrandRussell has started an interesting thread in Chat asking women who consciously reject the label "feminist" why they do so. One thing that strikes me is a lot of the reasons being given are in fact "straw men", and that maybe a rebutting the straw men thread would be nice.

Aim of the game (of course I can't control the direction the conversation takes, but I hope people will be on board with this) - keep the conversation couched in reasonably accessible terms, keep the posts short enough not to be overwhelming (so probably only one straw man per post!)

Yes your right innocent but who decides when violence is ok if your morally right? Going back to Islamic state, they believe they are morally right

I think you are misunderstanding me Mide7. I don't think any violence is OK and I think that should be taught from birth. But it isn't. And to say a group has failed because of some, relatively speaking, extremely mild violence smacks of hypocrisy and misogyny when compared to the millions and millions of people killed in the wars that men feel obliged to start/join.

The hypocrisy of how violence is depicted depends on which side of the fence you are sitting. And that teacher showed firmly which side of the fence they are sitting.

And you know wanting equal rights and freedom from oppression is not something we 'really want'. It is something we are entitled to.

Just for info. Nobody believed sad am had WMDs. Well nobody with even half a brain anyway.

The suffragettes were primarily violent to themselves - hunger strikes - and the state was violent to them - force feeding via tube, police batons etc.

I don't think the suffragettes killed a single person on the other side, and I'm not even sure they hospitalised anyone in the other side.

How is that similar to Islamic state, please?

I take back saying really want, that's the wrong phrase to use scallops.

I strongly disagree with the language used by the teacher but it's a contridictary message to teacher kids that violence is never the situation. If your constantly telling little Tommy that violence is wrong, he should never resort to using it. Oh but actually Tommy if your morally correct then feel free.

Yes there are countless examples through history innocent but that doesn't make it ok. One mans freedom fighter is another mans terrorist.

callin thank you for explaining the patriarchy is not a person, although I am well aware it is a construct. Given however the oppression of the patriarchy gets a starring role on here it might as well be a scary ogre- hence my phrasing.

I don't call myself a feminist, never have.

I have never said I am not in favour of equal rights;I have been clear I think the porn and sex industry are damaging and have been clear I am pro-choice.

Where I differ is I do not agree when I see the sort of sweeping generalisations I have referred to. I'm a bit surprised you say these don't happen on here.

Reading them makes me think if I were 15 rather than 55 what would I make of this?

All these grown up women telling me for example that to succeed in a career I don't have to be good at it but I must be better than my male contemporaries. Society thinks I only have value if I'm pretty. And on and on. I don't agree with setting up such negative expectations and I also don't agree they are true.

There are issues which affect women. I have commented on. Whether my views make me a "feminist" or not, I don't particularly care. Polly Vernon and Louise Mensch call themselves feminists. I suspect you don't think they are.

Re terrorists there were plenty of leftie idiots in the UK who supported the IRA. Julie Burchill wrote a wonderful demolition piece on them. It stuck in my mind because whilst she is more often wrong she occasionally hits the target brilliantly.

I was responding to Yops, Lass.

And just as you see sweeping generalisations and hyperbole, I do not and neither do many others.

Do you have some specific phrases or posts in mind, Lass?

Yonic The sort of comments which stand out for me are the " Girls are told...." ones. "Women arent allowed to..."

Maybe they don't stand out for you, but they do for me. I think "by whom? " or I must have missed that memo as did my female friends and contemporaries.

The suffragettes were the ones seen as more violent, and the suffragists as more respectable. Teachers are supposed to teach students the GCSE syllabus. That means answering questions such as looking at cartoons from the time, and discussing whether or not people at the time were sympathetic to the suffragettes, whether people thought the suffragettes were a credible threat to law and order, how successful their methods were compared to the Luddites and so on. Because that's the kind of questions that get asked in the exam.

And it is taught within the context (at least for OCR) of modules on protest and reaction, taught alongside other modules on terrorism and life in Nazi Germany (including a lot on attitudes to women). So they're pretty aware of the one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter stuff.

(I'm not a teacher. DD is doing History and we have the papers/ syllabus in the house)

Wrote a huge post and can't be arsed to do it again

Suffice it to say I've just showed ds1 this part of the thread...he still thinks I'm wrong. And I still think he is

In all seriousness I've just said that he is going to struggle at A level if he thinks there is only one way to view history

I interpret those statements as "girls/women are told X considerably more often than boys/men are told X". If you interpret them as "all women/girls are told X" then it's less surprising that you sense negative hyperbole and also less surprising that you so often think women on this board are setting out to contradict your experience.

Tell me, if I post "Kids like Roald Dahl books", do you think I am being hyperbolic or contradictory if you know some kids who don't?

I don't think it makes much difference. I don't agree with it either way.

If you can accept that posters who have repeatedly told you that they don't mean it's shit to be a woman are not lying and that your absolutist interpretation of posts like "women are told..." is far from their intent, I suspect discussions would be more productive.

Fancy giving it a try?

But you honestly don't believe that, say, considerably more women than men receive the message that looks matter?

If the suffragettes were unsuccessful what was the reason that they were given the vote? According to the teacher?

Whether or not they (and various other political movements) were successful is supposed to be explained based on the extent to which the government used force or concessions in their response to demands:

That is answered based on:

Extent to which influential figures considered the cause just.
Extent to which each group was considered a credible threat to law and order.
Evidence of force used against the group by the authorities.
Evidence of concessions given by the authorities.
A general understanding that any success happened through the authorities starting out with a response of force, the number of protestors growing, the authorities giving concessions (in the case of the suffragettes the vote).

According to the model answers given in the mark scheme.

messy

The war

I think the theory was that women did such a good job of ensuring that the country kept running they were rewarded with the vote

Or something like that. He has gone out and I can't ask him

Obviously there has to be more as almond said...but that was the first answer he gave

The First World War helped

Hmmmm I think that is the line that was given so as not to give credit to the suffragettes. 100% the suffragette movement was responsible for securing votes for women.

Do we really believe they were going to give it anyway out of the goodness of their hearts?! France had the same situation in that the women were active during the war but no votes for them until the 40s. The only difference being that France didnt have a fully developed suffrage movement before the war.

Teachers really shouldn't spout nonsense like that really.