UN say women are free

[jessmin]

This post online today and this reply. Hopefully the screenshots attach.

Even apart from that obvious point, it sounds glib ... presumably it was meant as a list of freedoms women should all have. Many women do not have those freedoms.

Free from violence? Do they read their own reports? 1 in 3 and they even have a day to recognise the violence against women and girls.

www.unwomen.org/en/what-we-do/ending-violence-against-women/facts-and-figures

Is this a case of if you can't name it you can't change it, or if you pretend it's not real it no longer exists?

Absolutely. It reads as an idealistic list of rights we should have, but it feels like we are so far away from it in so many ways. Just in the UK. So many women across the world have such little freedom in comparison to us.

Yes it does have a pseudo-feminist “you go girl” female empowerment vibe to it.

This rhetoric seems so unhelpful for women on a practical level.

It’s this individualist “tear yourself away from all your social, familial and community obligations and be who you truly are” fantasy. Nobody can “be whoever they want.” Nobody can “love whoever they want” - even if there are no other constraints, consent from the other party is required. Come to that, nobody can “wear whatever they want” - even in secular countries there are some rules about this, for good reason. All of that is fantasy, and narcissistic male fantasy that’s actually injurious to women when men start believing in it, as we’ve all seen on this board.

Practical interventions help women. Airy rhetoric about freedom doesn’t. In fact I’m convinced it’s actually dangerous. For a lot of men their concept of “freedom” includes the freedom to consume women like resources and they position that as freedom for women too. I bet UN Women are all in favour of women’s freedom to choose to be a sex worker, or a surrogate.

Ooh! Cloud Lala Cuckoo Land!

If they believe any of that then they will be colluding in the ongoing abuse of women. They will stop looking, stop fighting, stop interceding for women being abused.

Can we have some realism please?

They needed the the words 'should be'. Otherwise it is really a piss take

You are free

Says to me It's just your fault if it doesn't seem that way

How far women are from their freedom being accepted...probably this should have their own threads (if anyone wants to c&p the link please do) a couple of items from today's Sunday times

Note this one is by the Home Affairs correspondent....

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/ignore-feminism-be-an-obedient-wife-al-qaedas-tips-for-women-g5lz85hr6?shareToken=2f4ef109bfa72ed3a870307ef2fcacb9

I can't get a link for another which is relevant to the UN but the screenshot gives the gist

It reads like a 14 year old's social studies assignment.

'If the facts don't fit my narrative I'll just invent alternatives
cos otherwise my brain will blow up.....'

Tim Minchin

Surely it must mean that women should be free as opposed to that we are?

Otherwise it would just read as if it's shitting on women for complaining.

Do they mean free to any man who wants to make use of one?

Do you think the UN is aware of what just happened in Afghanistan?

It seems obviously aspirational, rather than saying these things are true.

But, I think it's kind of a stupid list anyway. No one is free in every way. No one is free to be whoever we want to be. Etc. And frankly it likely wouldn't be very healthy if we were nor fun for everyone else.

As long as there is a physical reality around us, and other people, and relationships, and society, we have constraints. They can be as meaningful and important as freedoms, and in any case they are real.

Yes... Well, we're free to love whoever we want, I suppose, but that love may not be reciprocated because they're free too.

What on earth is the point of that post?

What is it supposed to achieve? Why is it so... Dunno. Like one of those things some people have written to feel upbeat and etc?

Which are things that I see as feminine - I don't know any men who have things saying be your best you! Live each day with joy! Etc etc.

It's just really twee (is that the right word?) and from the un just bizarre.

Oh it's UN Women.

They brought us.. women are formless.

Who are they and what do they do in UN I wonder.

Very much in the vein of Sturgeon "feminist to my finger tips", Starmer, Sadiq Khan, Jess Phillips etc. So very, very keen to stress how much they support women's rights to distract from the fact that they are simultaneously trashing said rights to benefit themselves. Pass the sick bag.

@CheeseMmmm

Oh it's UN Women.

They brought us.. women are formless.

Who are they and what do they do in UN I wonder.

I really can't read it as anything other than unwomen as on not women.

@ErrolTheDragon

How far women are from their freedom being accepted...probably this should have their own threads (if anyone wants to c&p the link please do) a couple of items from today's Sunday times

Note this one is by the Home Affairs correspondent....

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/ignore-feminism-be-an-obedient-wife-al-qaedas-tips-for-women-g5lz85hr6?shareToken=2f4ef109bfa72ed3a870307ef2fcacb9

I can't get a link for another which is relevant to the UN but the screenshot gives the gist

Nice to see Jess out and about there. Feministing for us all.

What's a woman Jess?

What's most interesting to me is what's NOT on the list, e.g.:

• work rights (equal pay, affordable childcare, etc.)
• political rights (voting, standing for election, etc.)
• reproductive rights (contraception, abortion, etc.)

Apparently women should be concerned with what to wear, who to love, what to study... But not with boring grown up topic like money, jobs, power and body autonomy.
... It's almost as if the person who wrote this had "girls" in mind, not "women"? ... and girls entirely free from female bodily functions, for some odd reason? Wonder why...

@RobotValkyrie

What's most interesting to me is what's NOT on the list, e.g.:

• work rights (equal pay, affordable childcare, etc.)
• political rights (voting, standing for election, etc.)
• reproductive rights (contraception, abortion, etc.)

Apparently women should be concerned with what to wear, who to love, what to study... But not with boring grown up topic like money, jobs, power and body autonomy.
... It's almost as if the person who wrote this had "girls" in mind, not "women"? ... and girls entirely free from female bodily functions, for some odd reason? Wonder why...

I wish there was a like button for this.

Their whole Twitter is essentially a list of positive empowerfulising mantras.

I suppose that's what you get when woman is nothing to do with female and everything to do with identity.