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!)

I don't get the idea from feminism that being a woman is terrible, but if you do then I can see why you'd reject it.

The way it's described on here often makes it sound awful,to the point that the antagonism radical feminists have for transom end surprises me.

Why are they giving up being a man for a state which seems to be such a miserable existence?

"transwomen" (bloody phone)

Who said being a woman was a miserable existence? I'd be interested to read the thread or the book that says it.

Well, the thread is about straw men, Cailin...

Callin for me the overriding tone of feminism as depicted on FWR is it's bloody awful being a woman, what with the patriarchy being out to get you; posts like the one above implying women who succeed are colluding with the patriarchy; the need, apparently, to run a feminist analysis on everything you do or wear or watch or read. The constant moaning that no-one values women.

Wellll the nature of MN (and, y'know, humans) is that people tend to post when they have issues and problems. So in Relationships, there's the odd " post something nice your DP did" thread but mostly it's about points of contention.

There's plenty of chilled chat in the pub and the odd "appreciation" thread (which sometimes get criticised as well!) in FWR but yes, mostly people post when they've spotted some sexism and want to discuss it. Not the same as thinking it's awful being a woman!

Being a woman is brilliant.

Being treated as a woman in society less so. As Yonic says, people tend to post about niggling sexist things, or huge sexist thing that they've experienced. This is a feminist discussion board, feminist analysis is par for the course. That you violently disagree with feminism is obvious, Lass, but surely even you can see that if people post here, they will do so from a feminist PoV, in the same way as the Litter tray posters post from a cat loving PoV, or Legal posters post appropriately for that board. It's the nature of the beast.

Feminists don't believe the patriarchy is out to get you. I'm not sure how you've picked up so many odd things Lass. Are you interested to know what feminism actually is or are you convinced it's not for you?

Feminists don't believe the patriarchy is out to get you.

That's an interesting phrase. What would be a more accurate description of Patriarchy's attitude towards women, if we assume it to be untrue?

Similarly, Yops, the class system isn't "out to get" anyone. It's a social hierarchy not a conscious being.

Patriarchy doesn't have an attitude, given that it's not a person. It's a system, created from the fact that for practically the entirety of history men were the only people who had the power to influence society (given that women couldn't vote, hold public office, be a lawyer/judge etc). Hence it is a system built by men for men. It'd not out to get women, but it is structured in a way that disadvantages women. Since women have been allowed to have a say (the last 100 years or so) things have changed hugely, but there is still work to be done.

Ds1 has been learning about suffragists and suffragettes

Apparently neither group was successful and the suffragettes failed because they used violent protest

That's not great Rufus but in the context of kids, do teachers want to teach them that violence in certain circumstances is ok?

But violence in certain circumstances is already OK Mide7. Or are you saying the Allied Forces weren't successful because they used violence?

Or that we shouldn't teach children about various wars because it teaches them violence is acceptable?

It's double standards isn't it?

Hah! another x-post!

I did say in the context of kids scallops.

Yes and I was saying in the context of children too. Children are already taught that violence is acceptable.

So should we teach children violence is not acceptable in all circumstances? Or just those fights that the teacher may not agree with? e.g. terrorism is always looked at terribly unfavourably but retaliation against terrorism (again by countries allied with us) not so much.

Maybe we should teach children that actually men were/are terrorising women and in that context retaliation by women is perfectly understandable and acceptable?

the teacher shouldn't have used the word failed but I wouldn't want my child being taught that violence is ok as long as you really want something. Islamic state really want in what they believe is that ok? People really believed sadam had big bad weapons, was that war ok?