Is my understanding of feminism wrong??

[SilverHoney]

I find the statement "I'm not a feminist" very confusing...

My understanding of feminism is social equality for men and women (wages, laws, education, opportunities). So for someone to say they are not a feminist would mean they DON'T think men and women should be equal?

Am I confused? To me, openly admitting you're not a feminist is like admitting you're homophobic or racist. Would be interesting to hear from people with differing points of view!

Yes, we'll put chunkypickle I was trying to get at something like that! they are relative terms.

As in the examples I used earlier, the thing I notice is boys and girls doing the same thing and being given a different kind of descriptive praise for it.

There is emotional strength, but I do think the physical side of things is important for girls to gain confidence in; I've seen that if my dd does something strong or physically challenging it is spoken about in terms of her 'having a try' and 'mind you don't drop that/fall' whereas my ds just gets 'well done/isn't he strong/brave/he's a proper boy' etc

I used to see on here a definition of feminism as 'freeing women from male violence', rather than it being a movement merely for equality. It doesn't appear to have cropped up on this thread so far though. I don't know if that is because it's one of those 'common sense' statements, or because those who espoused it no longer post on here.

Laurie, I'm sorry that Lass is misrepresenting that thread and that the phrase has been dragged up again when I think the other thread had agreed to move on.

Lass, please just stop misrepresenting. Even when you are caught at it, you try and defend it without rhyme or reason instead of apologising. I wouldn't be surprised if you now don't post further on this thread, but merrily pop up elsewhere. Just as you did on the thread where you doggedly misrepresented the post of a mother whose children have SN...to be prejudiced against those with MH issues, of all things.

It's really a very unkind way to behave. There are real people on the other side of the screen, not debating society constructs.

And before you interpret this comment as mean folks trying to exclude you from FWR or whatever, I would respond the same whichever board this is on.

I think some people bring up their girls and boys differently, but it isn't inevitable. I have never done it but it depends what their Mum is like usually.

Puffin, no matter your intent towards your own kids, they still live in a society that often segregates toys, parties, compliments etc by sex. Random small example - all the dinosaurs in Dinosaurs Love Underpants are "he" - it's otherwise an ungendered book.

My children haven't really noticed and I just let them have things as they want them. We have mixed parties, mixed toys and everything else.

That's really great, puffin. How old are they? I think mine started being more "that's for girls" when they went to school.

Eldest is 7. We probably live in a household different to most.

Have all dds and they don't see any difference. They chose an all blue room. The eldest 2 are obsessed with minecraft and mario. Middle one is doing football training will her Dad. Dh is joining her in to a team as she is good and committed to it. They do other stuff as well but it isn't along girl or boy lines.

We have complete role reversal at home. Eldest dd bought a toy iron and said Yay an iron. The woman said just like mummy. Dd scoffed 'Don't be silly Mummies can't iron' That was in a toy shop when she was 4.

Soot you said Well I agree, but I think where people don't identify as such is not where they feel there shouldn't be equality, but more that it has already been achieved to their satisfaction and don't feel strongly enough that women are discriminated against or that the issues debated by feminists affect them

I think that is spot on and I (and a lot of women I know) feel exactly like this.

I can't get worked up about a lot of the low level stuff because it honestly doesn't seem like such a big deal to me. I have seen a lot of changes in my lifetime from earlier feminism but it almost feels like it's redundant now. And it seems like anyone who doesn't get worked up about it is accused of being a handmaiden or being brainwashed by the patriarchy (which is patronising!).

This post isn't intended to earn me a flaming, but it's my reason for not identifying with a feminist label.

I should clarify that I know not all feminists are man hating etc etc

yonic the post which caught my attention was this one

"I've asked my friend, who's H has also recently blindsided her with pretty much similar language if we can use the way people, including her h have described the OW. She's ok with it. No "sisterhood" problems there.

Have at it"

Lass I've read the thread and I have no idea how you came away with the impression that feminists in general think that referring to other women as "wank fodder" as per your earlier post at all.

You said "I think the use of words like slut etc and the horrible one being discussed on the other thread are unacceptable. I would never call any woman (or man for that matter) such names. (I've always been puzzled why words relating to consensual sexual behaviour and/or genitalia are used as insults ) However I feel no sense of "sisterhood " but apparently calling another woman "wank fodder" is for some , not unsisterly. How "feminists " square that intrigues me."

And to say that is what the consensus is on that thread is a total and utter misrepresentation.

For a start you don't know the politics of the women posting (whether they are feminists or not)
For a second this is MN not every feminist in the world is rallied here, there's not a hive mind that is represented by the posts on here as the final and definitive word of the feminist collective mind
For a third most of the posters said it was a disgusting thing to say about another woman anyway

So why on earth did you come on here and say what you did? I don't get it. You were trying to make a point by exaggerating? Or did it really come across to you like that - did the posts that said other things not impinge? If you re-read it can you see that there were posters that were saying that's a disgusting thing to say?

I honestly don't understand.

"However I feel no sense of "sisterhood " but apparently calling another woman "wank fodder" is for some , not unsisterly. How "feminists " square that intrigues me."

So, I'm a feminist, I think. I don't "square that" I think it is extraordinarily objectifying.

Does that help at all.

What Whirlpool said. All of it.

Again and again you do this, Lass.

Did anyone called out the post I quoted.? Don't think so.

So what? Plenty of people had already said they disagreed with the phrase and one of the posters who'd been on the thread about the OW in question came on and said that a thread that was supposed to be general was getting too specific, so we'd moved on.

Are you on that thread right now, calling out JAPAB, who sees nothing sexist in the words slut, whore, gash etc? No, you aren't. From that, do I conclude you agree with his position and condone it? Of course I don't, I assume you're busy doing something else. Mostly condemning feminists and turning this thread into a TAAT, it would seem.

Personally I took the post that you were "calling out" as saying "we are ok to discuss this" because I thought it was pretty crap to start using a very specific woman's thread in Relationships in Feminist Chat without her consent, not least when the woman in question had been blindsided in the worst way and is in crisis and the conversation was inevitably going to do down the route of discussing what the OW did or did not deserve.

It was clear that MN women who identify as feminists think the term is disgusting. Clearly some other non-MN feminists (e.g. Vagenda authors) do use the term.

OP, sorry for participating in the derail.

I do think lots of people who, say, believe in global warming, wouldn't describe themselves as environmentalists (me included!) because they expect -Ists to be activist in some way -? Rather than just believing a set of principles.

I personally think that labelling or not as a feminist is neither here nor there. For those who want to identify others with certain views it is useful to organise under, or as a shorthand to say "I have these beliefs". However whether a person self-identifies as a feminist or not is really unimportant next to how they behave in day to day life.

So for eg OP who doesn't identify as a feminist well that's up to her obv and it's fine whether she says she is or not, there's not a set of rules and you're "in" or "out" whether you want to be or not IYSWIM. I hope though that OP has had an interesting conversation here over the last couple of days, I have found it interesting.

Anyway there have been some threads in chat recently that I have felt very uncomfortable with around are you a feminist or not / if not why not / what's wrong with you type stuff. I say live and let live, the label is useful for those who want to use it, but fine if people don't, especially if actually they espouse ideas around a better situation for women and girls (amongst whatever other things they may believe in!).

So say someone says "I'm not a feminist but I will donate some money to this charity for educating girls in X because I think it needs doing" is, you know, great.

Someone says "well I'm not donating to that charity because bad stuff happens to boys to and really have you thought about that maybe your money would be better spent elsewhere, say on a charity that supports all children" is, you know, not so great.

So OP in response if someone says they're not a feminist but their approach and ideas are compatible, or at least not incompatible, with the furtherance of females then it doesn't really bother me.

Yes also meant to say in terms of labelling, giving someone a label they don't want / identify with is not something that lots of "us" like, so to do it to someone else about something else "I'm not a feminist" "Oh yes you are!!!" is somehow, doesn't feel right to me.

Agree with that as well, Whirlpool!

I am quite happy to be called a feminist but wouldn't take huge offence if someone labelled me "non-feminist" (I would argue my case if someone called me an anti-feminist and explained why).

As this thread shows, for some interpretations of the word I suppose my beliefs and behaviours 'hit the mark' and for others they don't. I have a friend who features in the media as a "feminist journalist". I found some of her opinions a bit 'extreme' at times in the past, so I don't tend to follow the content of her work too much now because I want to maintain a personal friendship that doesn't involve political debate.

I am only now reading and thinking about how transgender issues impact on feminism. There is a poster here who makes some amazing and thought-provoking posts on the topic but who said something recently that I felt uncomfortable with (i.e. wanting to support female-born transgender people because they are female but not feeling any inclination to help male-born transgender people any more than they would 'ordinary men'). I understand the point. I'm still thinking about it. It made me uncomfortable.

I don't care when people who have feminist / egalitarian ideals refuse to wear the label of feminism because that is up to them, but I do care when people redefine feminism to be what it isn't because I don't like to be told I am what I'm not.

And it's pretty insulting to be told that you hate men or that you think women are superior.