Men in feminism.

[Jeanhatchet]

They are invariably a distraction at best.

We are taught to accommodate their needs and they are socialised in turn to feel entitled to us feeding them with both food and knowledge.

I have seen too many "nice" ** men .... y'know the "good" kind .... the "my man is different though - he gets it" kind hang around and place themselves at the centre of feminist circles with the end result that women spend time stroking their gigantic egos and falling over ourselves to bash women who won't.

Then.... they begin to offer themselves as goddamn experts. Also - I've seen lots of abusers hoppety skippety around women in this way.

Men who want to be better men can just go away and do it. Women have written enough about how they can do this. In fact I'm sure some man saw a woman blog about it and then rephrased it better. The men could go and find his stuff probs.

Where did I say anything about lecturing?

How will you know what to say? I dunno. Educate yourself.

Mostly I mean men should stand up against men making rape jokes and stuff.

If men wanted to, they could end the need for feminism. They just don’t want to. They could-

1. Stop using porn
2. Stop using prostitutes

3.Take full and equal responsibility for domestic work and child care

1. Always challenge misogynist attitudes and behaviour in their workplaces
2. Always challenge misogynist attitudes, speech and behaviors in their social lives.
3. Stop hitting people
4. Stop killing people
5. Stop raping people.

Some of them many men are doing already. Some of they are really , really tough. But women have had it tough for a very long time - maybe it’s time for men to step up?

In this context, I used explain and lecture as synonyms. I don’t think that is outrageous given the context. I was just surprised that anyone here would want men explaining feminism in any form. It seems to go against most of what I have read on this board.

See millicents list.

You don't have to explain the theory. You just have to live the practical applications.

I've said it on other threads, I'll say it again.

'self labelled male feminist turns out to be creeper sex pest' is the new 'family values politician turns out to be gay/having a secret affair'.

Although I do think the whole 'men aren't 'oppressed' so they should just shut up and let the women talk' attitude probably won't help the cause in the long run.

I mean do you apply that logic to all other areas of your life? i.e if you haven't got direct experience then you can't comment or be involved? I don't think that's a good way to deal with any issue.

JurgenKloppsCat
Rather than showing up in a feminist forum or organization expecting to be given a trollhouse cookie and a leadership role most feminists suggest that the men who declare themselves to be feminists spend their time talking to men about being a decent human beings and treating women like human beings. It isn't as though they don't know how.

MillicentF

1. Stop using porn

Not all feminists think porn is bad. Only certain types of porn that promote abusive behaviour. Wider society certainly doesn't have problem with porn in principle.

2. Stop using prostitutes

Not all feminists think prostitution is bad in principle.

3.Take full and equal responsibility for domestic work and child care

Fair point if said man is a stay at home parent or paid work is split equally. However if the man is the primary wage earner, why should he also have to split domestic labour as well?

4. Always challenge misogynist attitudes and behaviour in their workplaces

Agreed but please define 'misogyny'? It literally means hatred or abuse of women, which is of course completely unacceptable. However when you use the word 'misogyny ' to mean 'anything that goes against my Radical Feminist agenda', then not so much.

5. Always challenge misogynist attitudes, speech and behaviors in their social lives

See point 4.

6. Stop hitting people
7. Stop killing people
8. Stop raping people

Agreed.

So agree with three, disagree with two and give qualified agreement with the other three.

Feminism is about women, by women, for women.

Therefore, I find it best to ignore anything men have to say on the topic.

i think the point is PatriarchyPersonified that no one here gives a fuck what you think. nothing new ever comes out of your mouth. nothing we haven't heard a million times before. with that tone like fingernails down a black board.

you don't want to help, you don't want to make anything better you just love the sound of your own voice droning on and on and on.

bore off.

PermissionToSpeakSir

Nothing sets my teeth on edge quite like a bloke I meet saying he is a feminist - it reeks of male entitlement mixed with cowardice and misogyny. It almost stinks like a feverish sweat

Wow.

Bowlofbabelfish was just telling me on another thread that the reason feminists have a bad rap in society is because of the 'negative PR job' pulled on them by men.

I don't think that men can take all the blame...

1. Stop using porn
2. Stop using prostitutes
3.Take full and equal responsibility for domestic work and child care
4. Always challenge misogynist attitudes and behaviour in their workplaces
5. Always challenge misogynist attitudes, speech and behaviours in their social lives.
6. Stop hitting people
7. Stop killing people
8. Stop raping people.

Perfect list of things men can do as a baseline to show they're allies to feminism.

Also, I think that we as feminists need to stop giving a shit what men think about feminism/feminists/where we're going wrong.

I get that a certain type of man gets very upset at women not focussing completely on men's issues with feminism, but really, so what?

Men who demand that women are doing feminism wrong are analogous to the kinds of "people" who go along telling BLM activists that ALL lives matter.

Agree with the list 100%.

I know my husband challenges people pretty often (not easy as we’re in Asia and it’s madly patriarchal here) and he even told his dad to stop telling me what to do once which is DEFINITELY tricky here.

There’s a disgusting phrase here, “riding a white horse”, it means having sex with a white woman, basically reverse of equally-disgusting “yellow fever”. When we got together, a couple of friends said some shit anout riding the white horse. He hasn’t seen them since and he told them why.

This is the kind of shit men need to do. They need to see that making sexist/racist comments isn’t just blokey banter.

My husband barely understands the meaning of feminism - never read any books or got any clear idea about what it means. He’s just a decent human being who doesn’t tolerate people talking about others like shit. Basically the number one reason why I married him.

I'll freely admit I really don't have time for men in feminism and I do think they are a distraction and want to be centred, I also think a lot of women unconsciously (or sometimes consciously) censor themselves around men and I don't find that helpful.

I love speaking with women, alone with women, just women it always makes me feel better. I love women's company, I enjoy it more than male company (although I love my OH and sons most in the world).

It makes me smile wryly when a man complains that feminism is excluding him and perhaps we should make it more y'know accessible as if all the other spaces and movements that are open to him aren't enough and on here as if the internet isn't the male dominated space that it is. I always want to say well that is your little taster of how it feels to be a woman now go away and think about that instead of forcing us to capitulate to you and maybe work on making those spaces a little less hostile.

So they never do any of these:

(list Millicent helpfully posted)

1. Stop using porn
2. Stop using prostitutes

3.Take full and equal responsibility for domestic work and child care

1. Always challenge misogynist attitudes and behaviour in their workplaces
2. Always challenge misogynist attitudes, speech and behaviors in their social lives.
3. Stop hitting people
4. Stop killing people
5. Stop raping people.

They just bitch about being excluded instead and then tell us that is why feminism is all wrong and feminists are hated.

Ha! PatriarchyPersonified's response to that list, particularly on points of porn and prostitution illustrate perfectly why I can't be arsed engaging with men in feminism.

PatriarchyPersonified ( incidentally, I know your name is supposed to be kinda ironic but maybe it is a little ....off...?)
1.I disagree fundamentally with porn and prostitution apologists-particularly men. And just because another woman says something I don't have to agree with her.

1. You know perfectly well what misogyny means. You've been here long enough.
2. I said "full and equal responsibility. That does not necessarily mean actually physically doing half the work. It means being aware of the work that needs to be done, treating it as important, and sharing in finding solutions to getting it done.

1. Glad you agree with not hitting, raping and killing. That's a good start.There are a lot of men who are not there yet.

My husband barely understands the meaning of feminism - never read any books or got any clear idea about what it means. He’s just a decent human being who doesn’t tolerate people talking about others like shit. Basically the number one reason why I married him.

Yes same here though there been a few arguments about housework along the way

I used to think that men could be feminists but I do now think they can only be allies since I've become more rad fem - we need them to be strong allies and I agree with the list above.

For me, radical feminism applied to how children are brought up helps to create decent male allies and benefits boys and girls (and has to really).

From then on, men need to be responsible for sorting out their own shit - the patriarchy and ingrained misogyny, for them senses and for children.

*themselves

Never met a self-proclaimed feminist man who wasn't an absolute misogynist bell-end

Having chosen to live my adult life with a man who does none of the things on Millicent's rather good list, I have never really spoken to him about feminism, it being none of his business, really.

To my surprise, a couple of weeks ago, he started a discussion about feminism. He told me about a colleague who was 'mansplaining' (yes, my DH used that word about a male colleague ) feminism in the office. Given that only this colleague and DH are male it seemed odd, DH said. And when said colleague walked out, happy to have educated all and sundry, the women in the office looked uncomfortable, so DH, figuring out it was his continued presence they were fidgeting over, got up to leave and said something to the effect of "Yes, we ALL know he is a misogynistic twat".

Someone left a chocolate biscuit by his coffee the morning after

Oh dear! DH does do all the things on Millicent's list - except the ones he has never done in the first place!

Oh... that got a bit convoluted, didn't it [bush]

Hopefully you know what I mean!

And that'll teach me to be smug... pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall, and all that!

@MillicentF

Brilliant list.

When a man tells me he's a feminist I just say, "That's nice, dear."

MillicentF - great checklist - next time a "man" comes on we can give them that when they ask about feminism. And tell them to come back when they have made some concessions. Men rarely give something of value to themselves up for women.

Glad you agree with not hitting, raping and killing. That's a good start.There are a lot of men who are not there yet.

A lotta men kill psychologically so it does come down to definitions sometimes. And many don't think rape is rape. Progress not perfection and I would prefer women do the assessment of men's progress. :)

Finally you gals get it and have dedicated a thread to us. About time.

www.theonion.com/man-finally-put-in-charge-of-struggling-feminist-moveme-1819569515

That's nice dear!