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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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245 replies

UpForDiscussi0n · 28/06/2017 13:14

Full transparacy, I am not a mother nor a woman. English is not my first language so exuse any misshap. I only made this account to be able to talk to a feminist first-hand to be able to see their view-points. I am myself not a feminist as i don't belive that the feminism in today's society promotes equality on some levels. I have also read several news outlets such as bussfeed and the huffington post but find them to be (as i said, bad english so don't really know how to put it) downlooking towards myself as a man. Would love to hear people out and debate or discuss feministic issues, have a good day.

OP posts:
QuentinSummers · 28/06/2017 18:16

Going on about the commodification of women into sex industries. You sound like we are dairy cows or something. I've never heard anyone discuss the commodification of men. Because men are seen as individuals with rights and desires of their own. Women are just an amorphous mass of "commodity".
Yuck. I see you.

user1498662042 · 28/06/2017 18:18

Quentin, I'm saying women are commodified by the sex industry.

I'm not saying it's good that women are commodified by the sex industry.

SpaghettiAndMeatballs · 28/06/2017 18:24

I don't think patriarchy is a matter of men as a class going around oppressing women (although some of them do) so much as dynamic, shifting system that defines the relationships between men and women in economic terms.

And it just so happens that women still earn less for the same job, still are more likely to be in poverty after divorce, still do the majority of the housework independent of work outside of the home, and that's across all the various intersectionalities?

user1498662042 · 28/06/2017 18:29

And it just so happens that women still earn less for the same job, still are more likely to be in poverty after divorce, still do the majority of the housework independent of work outside of the home, and that's across all the various intersectionalities?

Sure, because one economic culture doesn't just stop dead and another takes over. But that will change. In the US atm male employment is plummeting as female employment (and entry into higher education) is rising.

Western economies are basically service sector dominated now, and they will increasingly demand 'female skills'. Tech is male dominated, yes, but that will change.

Younger women (under 30) are already out-earning men in the UK. Give it a hundred years and that will be standard.

user1498662042 · 28/06/2017 18:29

What need does capitalism have of men now? They're not profitable.

regrouted · 28/06/2017 18:30

I don't think patriarchy is a matter of men as a class going around oppressing women (although some of them do) so much as dynamic, shifting system that defines the relationships between men and women in economic terms.

A bit of a strange linear explanation from women in the home to women in online sex industries. However, I think you're ignoring the big, very much biological pink(blue) elephant there. You are describing an economic model whereby women are defined by their sex and commodified for it. That is economics within patriarchy.

So what do we do about it? Well that's feminism. You've said that you don't think patriarchy is about systematic oppression, but ask for the strategy in tackling it. I'm not the strategic director for Feminism(TM), but I would suggest that one can look to the types of discussion women have here and the issues that they debate, let alone to the history of the movement and it's achievements.

SpaghettiAndMeatballs · 28/06/2017 18:37

Younger women (under 30) are already out-earning men in the UK. Give it a hundred years and that will be standard.

For part time roles only. Over all, in every age demographic that is not the case:

ONS

Unless you you have a different source?

QuentinSummers · 28/06/2017 18:44

So what do you do about that? Genuine question.
In the uk:
Use it or lose it paternity leave of several months for men. Change the working week to 4 days worked over a 6 day week so childcare can be more easily shared with working parents. Break down taboos so women can discuss menstruation/ pregnancy/lactation/ menopause without being embarrassed or discriminated against. Take proper action against practitioners of FGM. Move to an inquisitive rather than adversarial model for prosecuting rapes. Move to Nordic model for prosecuting prostitution. Ban extreme porn and generally make porn less accessible. Make misogyny prosecutable as a hate crime. Bring in quotas for public sector jobs. Enforce reporting on sex balance and pay for all companies.

Outside the uk: invest in charities providing sanitary protection for girls so they don't drop out of school when they start their periods. Provide access to contraception, clean water, vaccinations for children. Put pressure on governments to outlaw FGM, forced marriage, child marriage and homicide of baby girls. There will be loads more but I've run out of thinking space

QuentinSummers · 28/06/2017 18:45

Might also have been worth copying the summary line below the headline:

"When aged 22-29, women earn an average of £1,111 more than men – but the roles are reversed with a vengeance once 30 is hit"

user1498662042 · 28/06/2017 18:49

Change the working week to 4 days worked over a 6 day week so childcare can be more easily shared with working parents.

Interesting. So by law all workplaces could employ people for no more than four days a week? I'm up for that, but any ideas on how people are going to support themselves and their families on four days work a week? Say if a couple are both doing a £10 an hour job?

user1498662042 · 28/06/2017 18:50

Yes, Quentin - there is a residual disadvantage for older women. Centuries of patriarchy isn't going to collapse overnight. As I say, give it a hundred years.

Popchyck · 28/06/2017 18:52

Younger women (under 30) are already out-earning men in the UK. Give it a hundred years and that will be standard.

I haven't got a hundred years.

jellyfrizz · 28/06/2017 18:52

Yes, Quentin - there is a residual disadvantage for older women. Centuries of patriarchy isn't going to collapse overnight. As I say, give it a hundred years.

No, user. It's the pesky biology, when many women start having babies.

user1498662042 · 28/06/2017 18:59

I agree jellyfrizz - all I'm saying is that things will change. If I was running a Start Up and wanted to hire, say, a marketing manager, I'd employ a woman even if it did mean she might take six months off at some point. What on earth would I want a man for? They're generally more likely to be aggressive, belligerent and completely lacking in the interpersonal skills required in a global capitalist marketplace.

I think a lot of working class women choose to stay at home with the kids because it's the better alternative to doing some horrible, badly paid job. Most people don't have careers, they do jobs.

QuentinSummers · 28/06/2017 19:00

Grin what a plonker you are user
Given all the managers are agreeing pay for 20 and 30 year old women, I think very much that your statement is pure bollocks.

user1498662042 · 28/06/2017 19:03

I haven't got a hundred years.

Neither have I. I'm waiting for the socialist revolution. I'm a man and on a minimum wage and I will probably be on a minimum wage for the rest of life, at the end of which I will probably die in poverty - or demented and abused in a shitty care home run by an investment bank. But i can accept that I will probably be dead long before things like that stop happening - if they ever do.

We'd all like progress to speed up.

SpaghettiAndMeatballs · 28/06/2017 19:03

OK user - that was from data between 2006 and 2013 - the ONS data was from 2016 - it's hard to know if that is still the case without seeing the actual analysis rather than a guardian article (although I would have thought there might have been more guardian articles in the last 2 years if it continued? Who knows)

However, the ONS, the source of the data doesn't agree that that is the case last year.

jellyfrizz · 28/06/2017 19:04

What on earth would I want a man for? They're generally more likely to be aggressive, belligerent and completely lacking in the interpersonal skills required in a global capitalist marketplace.

You would do probably do better in your Start Up by looking at people as individuals rather than relying on spurious gender role stereotypes for information on how people behave.

SpaghettiAndMeatballs · 28/06/2017 19:07

No, user. It's the pesky biology, when many women start having babies

But that's not the case - it doesn't matter if a woman has kids or not - in her 30s she starts earning less..

All the working class women I know work (and of my cousins, 50% of the female ones are foregoing kids. All the men go out to work and have had kids though) - all my aunts, all my cousins and their partners, they all get back to work as soon as they can - be it cleaning, dinner lady, whatever they can do around the fact that their husbands can't or won't take on their share of childcare.

MrsDustyBusty · 28/06/2017 19:09

I'm very surprised that a Swedish youth found mumsnet to spring his silliness on.

So surprised that I'm nearly sure parts of his story are entirely fabricated.

Although I'm sure he is male, not a mother and very young.

user1498662042 · 28/06/2017 19:15

You would do probably do better in your Start Up by looking at people as individuals rather than relying on spurious gender role stereotypes for information on how people behave.

I wouldn't be running a Start Up - but if I was the sort of person who was then I wouldn't be caring about political correctness, I'd be caring about profit. Because that's what businesses are for, to make MONEY. And I'd be employing people purely on the basis on how much profit they would add to the business. People think women are better at communicating, which for reasons that are albeit probably cultural in nature, they often are.

Back in the day men were prized because in powerful nations with state capitalist monopolies that made lots of stuff 'male qualities' were seen as profitable. But they're not now we live in a globalised, digitally based economy predicated on connection and communication.

Stereotypical male and female qualities may be sociocultural but they are perceived to matter regardless. And now women (not unreasonably) are taking advantage of some of those stereotypical notions in order to play catch-up in a new kind of capitalism in which they can be the winners.

user1498662042 · 28/06/2017 19:17

Spaghetti, I can't speak for anyone else but I hate my job. It's fucking horrible. If someone said 'you can stay at home with the kids and I'll sit under strip lights for eight hour shifts doing a spirit crushingly monotonous task' then I would welcome that swap with open arms.

regrouted · 28/06/2017 19:19

Abandon ship.

user1477249785 · 28/06/2017 19:31

Oh I am so surprised the OP hasn't come back again. And there was me thinking he really wanted to learn something.