Without going through 10 pages of this thread to see if this has already been mentioned. Im pretty sure the whole argument of Women screaming rape etc is that you always hear stories about this happening.
Men are just scared of it happening to them, and can you really blame them? Not to mention this kind of thing happens in movies/shows as well where some obsessed ex-girlfriend or something will threaten the notion.
Obviously it isnt a regular thing that happens but it is something that men feel defenseless against. It isn't ridiculous to think it can happen to you when its portrayed so often.
Again, if you want to complain about it, then don't marry her. You are under no obligation to deal with (or marry!) someone who refuses to acknowledge facts and how you feel about the situation.
The dude is saying that marriages shouldn't result in asset splits. Then you say "well, get a prenup!" But it's not that simple. Most women will take it as a personal insult if you ask them to sign one. So you say "well then, dump their ass! Or don't marry them!" But you don't have to marry them, you just have to live with them for a few years, and now you're suddenly in a de-facto relationship and the same rules apply. Then in some countries, prenups aren't even legally enforceable.
His opinion, that marriages shouldn't result in asset splits upon divorce, is not invalid. It's his opinion and shit, yo. Your opinion, that you should just "Deal with it", essentially, does not address his concerns at all. You're not winning the argument, you're just saying that you disagree (and coming off as a bit of an ass with the way you're phrased it).
The dude is saying that marriages shouldn't result in asset splits. Then you say "well, get a prenup!" But it's not that simple. Most women will take it as a personal insult if you ask them to sign one. So you say "well then, dump their ass! Or don't marry them!" But you don't have to marry them, you just have to live with them for a few years, and now you're suddenly in a de-facto relationship and the same rules apply. Then in some countries, prenups aren't even legally enforceable.
His opinion, that marriages shouldn't result in asset splits upon divorce, is not invalid. It's his opinion and shit, yo. Your opinion, that you should just "Deal with it", essentially, does not address his concerns at all. You're not winning the argument, you're just saying that you disagree (and coming off as a bit of an ass with the way you're phrased it).
Except when you enter into living with someone you pretty much buy shit together and if you accumulate funds together you'll just have to reap the consequences of those actions, won't you? It might help to live with someone who's not a spiteful asshole and will take you for all you're worth. Establish accounts they can't touch if you don't trust them. Fact is you're already moving the goal posts. If the complaint is frankly "lots of women don't like pre-nups" then don't marry those women and complain when they take you to the bank.
Except that the poster being questioned was talking specifically about an ideology wherein people self-identify as "equalists". In reality the term "equalist" was coined by the media in order to discredit feminism and paint feminists as anti-male.
Words have meanings and you can't just attribute any egalitarian philosophy to what you think a word means.
The dude is saying that marriages shouldn't result in asset splits. Then you say "well, get a prenup!" But it's not that simple. Most women will take it as a personal insult if you ask them to sign one. So you say "well then, dump their ass! Or don't marry them!" But you don't have to marry them, you just have to live with them for a few years, and now you're suddenly in a de-facto relationship and the same rules apply. Then in some countries, prenups aren't even legally enforceable.
His opinion, that marriages shouldn't result in asset splits upon divorce, is not invalid. It's his opinion and shit, yo. Your opinion, that you should just "Deal with it", essentially, does not address his concerns at all. You're not winning the argument, you're just saying that you disagree (and coming off as a bit of an ass with the way you're phrased it).
Everyone has a right to an opinion, that doesn't change the law by itself. The way the law is set up protects a more vulnerable partner from being taken advantage of and then thrown out without any way to care for themselves. Plus, again, society is making it more difficult to divorce to make it less desirable. Society has a vested interest in curbing the practice because it makes for a more stable, predictable society and it reduces the number of single parent homes.
Except that the poster being questioned was talking specifically about an ideology wherein people self-identify as "equalists". In reality the term "equalist" was coined by the media in order to discredit feminism and paint feminists as anti-male.
Words have meanings and you can't just attribute any egalitarian philosophy to what you think a word means.
never heard of this ever in my life and there's nothing on google about it either (in fact the first thing that comes up after avatar websites is...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egalitarianism)
The dude is saying that marriages shouldn't result in asset splits. Then you say "well, get a prenup!" But it's not that simple. Most women will take it as a personal insult if you ask them to sign one. So you say "well then, dump their ass! Or don't marry them!" But you don't have to marry them, you just have to live with them for a few years, and now you're suddenly in a de-facto relationship and the same rules apply. Then in some countries, prenups aren't even legally enforceable.
His opinion, that marriages shouldn't result in asset splits upon divorce, is not invalid. It's his opinion and shit, yo. Your opinion, that you should just "Deal with it", essentially, does not address his concerns at all. You're not winning the argument, you're just saying that you disagree (and coming off as a bit of an ass with the way you're phrased it).
Anything about de facto relationships was all from you. The "well get a prenup" is a completely valid argument against what he was saying. There's nothing forcing anyone to get married. You get insurance in case a vehicular accident occurs, you can do the same for a marriage. If someone's SO has the completely unreasonable position that the marriage will last forever regardless of future situations, there is no reason to placate that. It's not smart to go into a contract with someone who bases their decisions on the assumption that it's impossible to fail. EVER. So why so with marriage?
As far as the de facto relationship thing, I have never even heard of that. I'm gonna guess most people haven't either, and that the amount of court cases involving de facto relationships and dividing assets is tiny. In any case, it probably wouldn't be insanely hard to avoid such a case if you are aware of the de facto laws before engaging in a relationship.
Well, the only way this would make any sense to me is if by "patriarchy" you guys meant "the way society works in general". But then you should just say that, instead of using a word like patriarchy, which is confusing the hell of this debate.
Sorry I took so long to respond; I was at work before and could not really find what I was looking for. But yes, that's basically it. Patriarchy is basically another name for institutionalized sexism. It privileges males over females in aggregate, but males are also worse off than they would be without patriarchy.
And I realize this is a bit of a text dump and I apologize for that, but I was going through some old bookmarks of mine just now looking for something else and came across two interesting things. The first thing I came across was this mini-interview. The interviewee is Tristan Bridges, a sociologist at The College at Brockport, SUNY. These two questions in particular seemed pertinent to this debate:
1) Your dissertation examines the problematic way that men are divided into two groups: sexist and anti-sexist. Can you talk a bit about your main findings, and how you became interested in the topic?
Early research on the “Men’s Movement” (an umbrella term covering everything from the Promise Keepers, to the Men’s Rights Movement, to Pro-feminist men’s groups) sought to situate groups on a continuum from anti- to pro-feminist (see here and here). This research was extremely important and helped us better understand the various political projects that different groups supported. One thing that was quickly apparent was that while many groups have political goals that are directly opposed to feminist issues and agendas, a smaller number of them willingly adopt the label “anti-feminist.” Increasingly, however, I think larger numbers of men’s groups are willing and happy to accept a “feminist” label. In some ways, this is wonderful news and illustrates a great deal of change in a relatively short period of time. But in other ways, separating groups and individual men into the “feminists” inequality.and the “anti-feminists” conceals a number of features of contemporary gender and sexual inequality.
While this categorization and comparison works well for a discussion of the political motivations and goals of these different groups, the same framework is also used to make sense of individual men—a framework that is much less useful. Separating men into the “feminists” and the “anti-feminists,” the “sexists” and the “anti-sexists” artificially simplifies the complex ways in which gender and sexual inequality structure our lives and are reproduced. It superficially separates men in ways that make us think that the “good guys” can do no wrong and the “bad guys” can do nothing right.
The “good guys vs. bad guys” story is just too simple and doesn’t reflect the ways that gender and sexual inequality actually work. My findings illustrate that while a great deal of gender privilege still works to men’s benefit, something significant has changed: men’s experience of that privilege. The increasing publicity of men’s collective privilege has ushered in new ways of identifying as men. So, men are pushing the boundaries of what is considered “masculine” in all sorts of ways: with their dress, their behavior, their interests, and even their politics. Most of the men I’ve studied say they’re fully aware that men benefit from unfair advantages, but they also have intricate ways of telling me why they are personally different and don’t benefit from some (and sometimes all) of the privileges other men receive—or not in the same ways.
2) Men’s rights and father’s rights movements, both of which have been followed by Feministing.com at various points, seem to address what some would argue is a historic gap in the feminist movement—attention to men and masculinities. Based on your research into both movements, how would you suggest that the contemporary feminist movement address this gap?
The feminist movement, feminist organizations, and feminist theory and research have not actually ignored men or masculinity. Movements like Men’s Rights and the Fathers’ Rights Movement might like to believe that feminism doesn’t consider men (or only considers them as enemies), or that feminists are only out to hurt men, but it’s simply not true. The Men’s Rights Movement first appeared in the 1970’s. It is an anti-feminist group whose basic claim is that feminism has gone too far. They argue that gender inequality still exists, but that it is now men, not women, who are suffering. Fathers’ Rights has arguably been the most successful branch of this movement.
I believe that the contemporary feminist movement ought to continue to address issues of men and masculinities, as well as the ways that feminist change does not only improve women’s lives—it helps men too. The Men’s Rights Movement has a whole list of ways that they use to talk about how men are the ones that deserve our attention—that, compared to men, women are doing just fine. What feminist discussions of men and masculinities seek to illustrate is not that these claims are false—rather, we’re interested in illustrating that blaming women and feminism for these issues misdiagnoses the problem and is unlikely to produce real solutions. While cultural understandings of masculinity harm women, they also harm men. For instance, many of men’s health issues can be traced to ideologies of masculinity. Boys’ misbehaviour and struggles in school have much more to do with culturally situating anti-intellectualism as masculine than with programs and support for girls. Similarly, it’s also not the case that, in the recent recession, employers all randomly chose to fire men over women; rather, men lost their jobs because the kind of jobs that were lost were overwhelmingly composed of men to begin with. Men are tracked into careers that are disproportionately composed of men in a number of ways—just as women are tracked into “feminine” occupations (see here).
It’s cultural ideologies of masculinity that keep boys and men from accessing a full range of emotions, keep some from trying in school, and that physically and psychologically harm boys and men. I believe that the contemporary feminist movement has room for men and that it can continue to support boys and men to understand the ways that feminism absolutely helps girls and women, but it helps men too.
It is some pretty interesting stuff, and I admit that his answer to the first question (which I had forgotten about) does have me thinking. I would like to hear more about the men's rights groups he is talking about that aren't complete nutters.
Philosophy professor Christina Sommers has exposed a disturbing development: how a group of zealots, claiming to speak for all women, are promoting a dangerous new agenda that threatens our most cherished ideals and sets women against men in all spheres of life. In case after case, Sommers shows how these extremists have propped up their arguments with highly questionable but well-funded research, presenting inflammatory and often inaccurate information and stifling any semblance of free and open scrutiny. Trumpeted as orthodoxy, the resulting "findings" on everything from rape to domestic abuse to economic bias to the supposed crisis in girls' self-esteem perpetuate a view of women as victims of the "patriarchy." Moreover, these arguments and the supposed facts on which they are based have had enormous influence beyond the academy, where they have shaken the foundations of our educational, scientific, and legal institutions and have fostered resentment and alienation in our private lives. Despite its current dominance, Sommers maintains, such a breed of feminism is at odds with the real aspirations and values of most American women and undermines the cause of true equality. Who Stole Feminism? is a call to arms that will enrage or inspire, but cannot be ignored.
Speaking of Sommers, I found this after your last time pointing to her:
Christina Hoff Sommers’ chapter, “Where the Boys Are” has nothing to say about feminist epistemology, feminist philosophy of science, or feminist science studies. It engages no philosophical issues. Instead, it is an attack on a few pieces of feminist research that claim to find gender differences in mental health and gender inequity in the schools. Presumably it is intended as a case study in how feminist-inspired research is done, attempting to demonstrate that it is false and politically biased.
Sommers argues that feminist researchers--in particular, Carol Gilligan, Mary Pipher, David and Myra Sadker, and researchers for the American Association of University Women (AAUW)--have “manufactured” a crisis concerning girls (124). The feminist researchers claim that adolescent girls suffer from lower self-esteem and mental health relative to boys, and that schools shortchange girls in a variety of ways. Sommers argues that the truth is the reverse: in fact it is boys who are suffering from neglect by the schools and a crisis in educational achievement. She claims that the feminist education researchers paint a misleading picture by ignoring boys’ difficulties in school. But Sommers’ own work misrepresents the research she criticizes.[1] Let us count the ways.
Misleading suggestions of data suppression.Sommers suggests that the feminist researchers she criticizes have suppressed their data and inconvenient findings. For example, she insinuates that Myra and David Sadker have mysteriously failed to publish or make available their study that found that boys called out unsolicited answers eight times more than girls (107, 126n5). In fact, the Sadkers have acknowledged that the 8-to-1 callout ratio, based on preliminary findings, was erroneous. They have published a more comprehensive study superceding their symposium presentation, which found a lower callout ratio still favoring boys--consistent with the 2-to1 ratio reported by Sommers’ own source (107). This study confirmed the far more important finding of their preliminary report, that teachers tend to reward boys’ callouts with positive interactions, but discourage girls’ callouts by correcting their conduct (Sadker and Sadker 1984, 114). By failing to report that the Sadkers have made public available their final, complete, and corrected study, Sommers misleadingly suggests that they are trying to hide something.
Sommers accuses the AAUW of failing to publish data that show that students perceive that teachers favor girls over boys. Yet, in reporting this data herself, she cites an AAUW publication (124)! Although she falsely labels the data “unpublished,” what she really means is that the AAUW did not report this data in their executive summary of their published study. Sommers thinks this is damning, because she accepts students’ perceptions of antiboy bias at face value. She is mistaken. Although students perceive that teachers compliment, pay more attention to, and call on girls more often than boys, objective measures of teacher interaction, reported in numerous studies, reveal that teachers tend to favor boys on these criteria (Sadker, Sadker, and Klein 1991, 294–304). If even the relatively little attention girls receive from teachers is seen as favoring girls over boys, this is evidence, not of a classroom climate favoring girls, but of sexism on the part of students.[2]
Sommers claims that the AAUW failed to publicize a study it commissioned from Valerie Lee (Lee, Chen, and Smerdon 1996), because it supposedly contradicted their earlier, highly publicized study that found the schools shortchange girls (117). Lee herself has publicly repudiated this charge, observing that she did not authorize the AAUW to publicize her study because she and her fellow researchers retained the copyright, so they could publish their findings in peer-reviewed journals (Lee 1996). Sommers’ contribution to SFE reprints work she published in 2000. Thus, in SFE she makes an unfounded, malicious accusation for the second time, although she had years to correct herself.
Refuting apples with oranges. Sommers tries to discredit claims of school bias against girls by selectively citing certain aggregate statistics on education outcomes in which boys do less well than girls. But she mostly ignores the outcomes that favor boys, which were the focus of the feminist research: for example, the fact that boys tend to do better on most high-stakes standardized tests, that they dominate the physical sciences, engineering, and computer science, and that girls are concentrated in vocational programs, college majors and graduate programs that lead to lower-paying, lower-prestige careers than their male counterparts (AAUW 1992, 24, 27-8, 42-3, Sadker 1996). Furthermore, many complaints about gender bias in schools focus not on the education outcomes Sommers stresses, but on various education inputs and other factors affecting the school experience. The famous AAUW (1992) report, How Schools Shortchange Girls, which is the focus of Sommers’ critique, complains about the paucity of female school principals and superintendents, the failure of many schools to understand or implement Title IX requirements concerning educational programs for pregnant teens and teen mothers and gender equity in the provision of sports opportunities, bias in the curriculum (the invisibility of women, promotion of sex stereotypes, lack of multicultural content, etc.), sex bias in the classroom (e.g., patterns of student-teacher interaction favoring boys), sexual harrassment of girls and homophobic harrassment of students perceived to be gay, and sex education curricula that reinforce girls’ shame about and boys’ ignorance of menstruation (AAUW 1992, 7, 8, 37-41, 45, 61-7, 68-71, 73-4, 77). Sommers mostly ignores these inequities.
These inequities cannot be refuted or dismissed by citing aggregate statistics on education outcomes, such as school grades and graduation rates, that favor girls. Such statistics cannot rule out the possibility that these inequities do depress girls’ academic outcomes. In any event, the importance of these inequities is not limited to their impact on girls’ aggregate academic outcomes. Sexual harassment is bad in itself. Sex bias in the curriculum is objectionable for reinforcing sexist stereotypes. Schools’ failure to provide educational opportunities for pregnant teens and teen mothers cannot be excused by pointing out that girls overall have higher graduation rates than boys. Pace Sommers (107), the bias toward boys in classroom interaction is objectionable even if it doesn’t depress girls’ academic outcomes, because it expresses and reinforces sexist norms that treat boys’ contributions as more important than girls’, and entitle boys to break rules of polite conversational interaction that are enforced against girls.Sommers cannot refute the claim that schools shortchange girls in respects A, B, and C by pointing out that they do not shortchange girls in respects X, Y, and Z.
Falsely claiming that feminist research ignores respects in which boys are disadvantaged. Sommers accuses the AAUW of ignoring and dismissing boys’ problems (123). To support these accusations, Sommers cites research by Lee, Chen, and Smerdon (1996) (sponsored by the AAUW itself!), Kleinfeld (1998) and others on gender differences in educational outcomes that she claims contradicts what she represents as a monolithic picture of antigirl bias in the schools painted by the AAUW in its 1992 report. But the idea that the 1992 AAUW report painted a monolithic picture of antigirl bias is absurd. In fact, the 1992 AAUW report scrupulously noted many of the gender differences in outcomes disfavoring boys that Sommers implies were only revealed later by her favored researchers. (Some of the others were revealed only in research that postdated the 1992 AAUW report.[3]) Check it out the parallel claims for yourself:
The rest can be found at the link above. But if you don't want to read the rest, let me spoil the ending for you: Christina Hoff Sommers is a dishonest hack.
So I've seen these threads go round and round forever with a lot of rhetoric and opinion, no problem with that. But I've yet to see the case to be made with facts and evidence for or against men's rights or feminism, or the theories therein. Do the overarching theories in this day and age adapt to the facts? I'm not as well read as I'd like to be on feminism or whatever men's rights movement, so I'm curious to see someone make a solid case, with facts and a solid ethical argument.
Just to sort of share my genesis and experience with patriarchy. I come from a single mom household, and like most of my friends who grew up in the 90's also came from single parent households. So my experience was I'm born into a world of women, there was my mom, her friends, aunts, my initial experience of authority was almost entirely, can't think of another example, was women. Then I was in a day care where women were in charge and running everything, then I went to school where the women were all teachers. And it was quite a few years before I met a male authority figure. And I remember being told about the patriarchy sort of in my early teens. And all I'd grown up in is this world where women run everything, women are the disciplinarians and women are responsible for when you go to bed, eat, sleep, pee, crap, etc. And somebody said to me "the world is patriarchal", and I'm thinking...what? Are they all in drag, what does that mean? It was women running everything as far as I could see at that age.
And there's no doubt that it's women, by virtue of child care that control the teaching and passing on of cultural attitudes to children towards a lot of things. But since the statistics at least in the US seem to be pretty consistent that upwards of 90% of parents hit their children. Given the fact most of those parents are women, mothers, if you sort of expand the definition of "domestic violence" to include aggression, hitting, spanking or verbal abuse against children... Than it seems indisputable (again, I'm always open to counter arguments and counter evidence) it seems indisputable that if we expand and extend the definition of domestic violence to include not just women dependent on husbands, which I'm sure there are. But children who are far more dependent on parents than women are on husbands. I mean women can leave husbands and get alimony, and child support, and have a pretty positive time of it in the court system relative to men, but children have no such option. So it seems that if we look at that and we want to help to break the cycle of violence, which I think is every just and moral human beings strongest desire to break that cycle. It seems to me, and again I'm glad to hear arguments to the contrary, but it seems we do have to turn the focus, at times, on mothers and the degree which they may be aggressive towards their children, and how that plays into the cycle of violence in society.
Anyhow, sorry if a bit off topic, just my random thoughts.
never heard of this ever in my life and there's nothing on google about it either (in fact the first thing that comes up after avatar websites is...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egalitarianism)
So again, they essentially believe everyone is INHERENTLY equal - but they say nothing about the fact that society is STRUCTURALLY unequal. That is, they essentially act as if society has wiped the slate clean and now we can all be free and equal and far. Ha.
As far as the de facto relationship thing, I have never even heard of that. I'm gonna guess most people haven't either, and that the amount of court cases involving de facto relationships and dividing assets is tiny. In any case, it probably wouldn't be insanely hard to avoid such a case if you are aware of the de facto laws before engaging in a relationship.
never heard of this ever in my life and there's nothing on google about it either (in fact the first thing that comes up after avatar websites is...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egalitarianism)
Did you look to see if "equalist" or "equalism" was on that page? Because it's not. It's a bullshit term created by people who had no intention of ever pushing towards equality. I don't think everyone who uses it has bad intentions, but I think you should know where the term comes from.
Indeed. Another word for "equalism" is majoritarianism. It's an attempt to protect the privilege of being white men.
As demonstrated BEAUTIFULLY from your link:
Equalists are not supportive of such movements as feminism as they see this not as a quest for equality, but simply for women's rights. They believe that legal and social changes occurring through the efforts of such movements only serve those of the group andfurther disrupt the balance of equality. They also argue against the elements of affirmative action, which is the process of making opportunities more easily available to groups that have been discriminated against in the past. Equalists believe that such actions are no less discriminatory, they simply discriminate against a different group. They do not believe that equality can be achieved if changes are the product of accountability for past wrongs. Thus, affirmative action is often referred to as "reverse discrimination."
Equalists are not supportive of such movements as feminism as they see this not as a quest for equality, but simply for women's rights. They believe that legal and social changes occurring through the efforts of such movements only serve those of the group and further disrupt the balance of equality.
There must be a clear agreement, written or oral, by both partners stipulating the extent of financial sharing and/or support in order for palimony to be granted.
Michelle Marvin claimed that actor Lee Marvin, who was still married at the time they began living together, had promised to support her for the rest of her life. In the end, in Marvin v. Marvin, the California Supreme Court ruled that Michelle Triola Marvin had not proven the existence of a contract between herself and Mr. Marvin that gave her an interest in his property.
The problem is, look at their position on feminism.
They believe that legal and social changes occurring through the efforts of such movements only serve those of the group and further disrupt the balance of equality.
Equalists live in a fantasy society where every human being is equal and has the same rights and opportunities as everyone else regardless of race, class, sex, etc. The PROBLEM is the effect of that position is to protect and lock in their own rights at the expense of ridiculing and diminishing the struggle of minority groups to achieve parity. Parity is not the GOAL, it's the ASSUMPTION they operate on.
Except where it says it wants equality then doesn't support a movement that focuses on specific issues in order to get said equality. Are equalists actually championing these issues or just parroting the "I think everyone should be equal" and sitting on their ass?
The problem is, look at their position on feminism.
What equality?
Equalists live in a fantasy society where every human being is equal and has the same rights and opportunities as everyone else regardless of race, class, sex, etc. The PROBLEM is the effect of that position is to protect and lock in their own rights at the expense of ridiculing and diminishing the struggle of minority groups to achieve parity. Parity is not the GOAL, it's the ASSUMPTION they operate on.
I think that there are some stark double standards with men and women, but it's the world that us men have to live with, yknow, being the superior sex and all.
bahahahahahahahaha
But in serious discussion, I think that men and the family have it raw, and it's based on stereotypes that have carried over from the 40's - 70's. Men have an automatic disadvantage in custody battles, and while the connection between mother and child is something that can never be replicated, I don't think that it should be grounds for an automatic advantage in courts. Also, I think that many people turn a blind eye to issues surrounding boys, especially when it comes to education, only because they're boys. The number of boys graduating from high school, doing well on standardized tests, getting into college, etc., has dropped dramatically... at many schools, numbers favor girls some 60-40. When the opposite happens, like say the ratio of females to males at engineering or technical schools, it's always a part of the conversation -- how can we attract more women to the sciences, engineering, or mathematics. Yet, in the liberal arts, which accounts for far more schools, far more programs, and far more students, the numbers are generally the opposite, and you never hear anybody questioning the opposite, asking, "how can we attract more men," or how can the system be weighted in a way to give preference to men.
But, this is the world that we've inherited, a world that has generally been dominated by men for thousands of years... and those are the breaks. The handful of inbalances that favor women are outdone by other vestiges of prior society that favor men.
It's somewhat more than that. They literally believe that everyone is equal. Not "should be" not "is endowed with equality" their position is the equality is already HERE. This is the victory party we're in now. So their portrayal of feminism and black civil rights groups is that they want "special rights" because we're equal NOW and you can't disrupt the balance. They reject the notion of STRUCTURAL inequality because that structural inequality already benefits them.
WTF why is there a topic advocating misogyny on Gaf? What next, a topic about white rights and issues complaining that there's no WET? Are there really no standards of discourse?
Speaking of Sommers, I found this after your last time pointing to her:
The rest can be found at the link above. But if you don't want to read the rest, let me spoil the ending for you: Christina Hoff Sommers is a dishonest hack.
Just finished reading, thank you.
The text says Sommers is dishonest and biased for saying feminist studies are dishonest and biased all while the critic allows that most of Sommers criticism are well founded (studies publishing wrong datas and correcting, poor/biased statistical reading), just that Sommers takes it a step further and is "quick to infer insidious motives behind innocent phenomena" with a "harshly partisan tone and malicious accusations".
The critic loses 'cool points' by being surprised she is using AAUW data to disqualify AAUW studies. That's how statistical analysis review function.
Do we know that it is, or is it just assumed due to the circumstances? Not trying to be a pain in the ass, just genuinely curious if this is their master plan behind the scenes.
Do we know that it is, or is it just assumed due to the circumstances? Not trying to be a pain in the ass, just genuinely curious if this is their master plan behind the scenes.
it's not directly stated because people would be less inclined to support it if they realized this was majoritarianism and white privilege by another name. However, it's not exactly hidden either.
it's not directly stated because people would be less inclined to support it if they realized this was majoritarianism and white privilege by another name. However, it's not exactly hidden either.
Do we know that it is, or is it just assumed due to the circumstances? Not trying to be a pain in the ass, just genuinely curious if this is their master plan behind the scenes.
Gabron can clarify himself further, but (IMO) it's not just that they don't want things to change because it already benefits them, they don't want things to change because either (A) they believe life will be worse (cries of reverse racism) or (B) they don't see the particular problem said minority is claiming exists actually existing.
Example, Black and Brown people are searched more more drugs yet White people will always be more likely to have drugs on them when searched. Blacks and Browns receive harsher penalties when tried in court. When this is brought up as a problem by a Black right activist what you'll often read is "they did the crime, they do the time." The White person doesn't understand why society needs to adjust something when we're still arresting and punishing people who are actual criminals.
What's generally not discussed is how inequality actually hurts us all. Divide and concur, as it were. See the current political climate for an example of this or how rape culture greatly hurts men.
WTF why is there a topic advocating misogyny on Gaf? What next, a topic about white rights and issues complaining that there's no WET? Are there really no standards of discourse?
Great article about a panel of scientists discussing the research on possible differences in the brains of the two sexes. Below, you can see scientists outright admitting they have been pressured (by lobbyists or powerful women's rights groups?) from publishing work that shows differences between male/female brains that directly influence how each learns and behaves from birth. The article makes a strong case that both nature/nurture play important roles in shaping who boys and girls are. They even criticize guys like Leonard Sax of exaggerating the data, but they don't accuse him of actually being wrong. There are ten points in the article altogether.
1. Ideology. All the panelists recognized that sex-difference research could be abused to justify sexism. But Larry Cahill, a behavioral neurobiologist at the University of California-Irvine, raised the opposite concern: His colleagues are so afraid of being called neurosexists that theyve refused to study or acknowledge differences. This anxiety about lending credence to sexism was manifest on the panel, as three of the presenters repeatedly emphasized similarities and downplayed differences. Afterward, they were challenged by two female scientists in the audience who called the aversion to studying innate differences anti-scientific and an impediment to understanding mental illness in women. The exchange, in which one panelist repeatedly portrayed sex-difference research as a waste of time, confirmed the problem: Fear of sexism has produced a bias against conceding sex differences, which gets in the way of frank discussion and investigation.
2. Monocausality. Melissa Hines, a psychologist at the University of Cambridge, proposed a good rule for screening studies and news reports: Beware any explanation that relies on a single factor. Hormones matter, but so does socialization. A study in animals might illuminate the role of genes, but it wont capture the effects of culture on humans. Conversely, anyone who dismisses boy-girl differences as cultural artifacts (the panelists criticized Cordelia Fines Delusions of Gender in particular) isnt accounting for similar patterns in animals, such as research showing that male monkeys prefer to play more with cars and less with dolls than female monkeys do. Hines also mentioned a male-female gap in maze performance among rodents. You cant blame that on society.
Gabron can clarify himself further, but (IMO) it's not just that they don't want things to change because it already benefits them, they don't want things to change because either (A) they believe life will be worse (cries of reverse racism) or (B) they don't see the particular problem said minority is claiming exists actually existing.
Example, Black and Brown people are searched more more drugs yet White people will always be more likely to have drugs on them when searched. Blacks and Browns receive harsher penalties when tried in court. When this is brought up as a problem by a Black right activist what you'll often read is "they did the crime, they do the time." The White person doesn't understand why society needs to adjust something when we're still arresting and punishing people who are actual criminals.
What's generally not discussed is how inequality actually hurts us all. Divide and concur, as it were. See the current political climate for an example of this or how rape culture greatly hurts men.
The divisive approach of classes (sexes, races, economics) entails that every element, that are bound to belong to a triad of sets, will be oppressed and oppressive.
So when you question his ability to perceive the benefits he has (to have), it will conflict with the deficits (or neutralities) he does perceive, which are true knowledges.
Can you define "true knowledges" as you are using it here? My best guess is that you're speaking in terms of the epistemology of his personal experience, but I'm not really sure.
It also seems trivial to state that my question will conflict with his perceptions when what I'm doing is telling him that I'm questioning the accuracy of his perceptions.
I don't see why it's necessary to establish this. I'm not interested in absolutely precluding his claim as a logical impossibility, I'm more than satisfied in applying some heuristic analysis to conclude that the act of contradicting his claim of zero privilege is of small but tangible effect in promoting the social change I would like to see happen.
MRA is fundamentally misogynist. It's no different than an OP talking about what white pride is and advocating for it. I'm glad it's led to good discussion (I assume) but I'm surprised it wasn't deleted right away.
MRA movements as they exist may be misogynistic. The very idea that a man has issues worth discussing? Not sexist at all. Be a little more open-minded.
Equalists live in a fantasy society where every human being is equal and has the same rights and opportunities as everyone else regardless of race, class, sex, etc. The PROBLEM is the effect of that position is to protect and lock in their own rights at the expense of ridiculing and diminishing the struggle of minority groups to achieve parity. Parity is not the GOAL, it's the ASSUMPTION they operate on.
I consider myself a equal rights type of guy. And I'm not operating on the assumption that parity is achieved, it never will be whether in the micro or the macro, I just disagree on the premise of how to achieve said goals as they've been attempted so far. Some might attempt to legislate their way out of problems, or political activism, or use the force of governments to "achieve goals". I don't fundamentally agree with those methods, but that's kind of a branching issue that goes waaaay off topic.
And it's a bit dismissive too, not that I'm erring on the side of whatever said group, but just because a group might disagree with a few ideas of feminism doesn't mean they are automatically full of shit. It sort of broad strokes, what and where precisely do they disagree and why. Just because Equalists might have a difference in means or opinion doesn't mean the goals aren't the same. It's just in a lot of talks like these it's either, you're against feminism (primarily if you support a group that has issues with it), or you're are for feminism and everything else is a crock of shit... Or even more insulting you're for a group who's against feminism, but you're too stupid to realize why you're wrong so here's why...it can't be more nuanced than that. It can't be I understand or respect your opinion, here's my argument so let's try and find some common ground.
I just rarely see a give and take, a pro AND con position, a position that states the inadequacies (whether in perception or empirical) and states the advantages. Is feminism always the correct answer, where nobody else has leg to stand on? Don't mean any disrespect but I'm a person who agrees with the idea of women's rights AND the idea of men's rights AND the idea of children's rights AND the idea of ethical and just behavior. I consider myself a equal rights person, where am I off base? Don't mean to pile on you in particular, I've just seen this paradigm happen on a lot of boards where all the usual members talk shop.
So I've seen these threads go round and round forever with a lot of rhetoric and opinion, no problem with that. But I've yet to see the case to be made with facts and evidence for or against men's rights or feminism, or the theories therein. Do the overarching theories in this day and age adapt to the facts? I'm not as well read as I'd like to be on feminism or whatever men's rights movement, so I'm curious to see someone make a solid case, with facts and a solid ethical argument.
Just to sort of share my genesis and experience with patriarchy. I come from a single mom household, and like most of my friends who grew up in the 90's also came from single parent households. So my experience was I'm born into a world of women, there was my mom, her friends, aunts, my initial experience of authority was almost entirely, can't think of another example, was women. Then I was in a day care where women were in charge and running everything, then I went to school where the women were all teachers. And it was quite a few years before I met a male authority figure. And I remember being told about the patriarchy sort of in my early teens. And all I'd grown up in is this world where women run everything, women are the disciplinarians and women are responsible for when you go to bed, eat, sleep, pee, crap, etc. And somebody said to me "the world is patriarchal", and I'm thinking...what? Are they all in drag, what does that mean? It was women running everything as far as I could see at that age.
And there's no doubt that it's women, by virtue of child care that control the teaching and passing on of cultural attitudes to children towards a lot of things. But since the statistics at least in the US seem to be pretty consistent that upwards of 90% of parents hit their children. Given the fact most of those parents are women, mothers, if you sort of expand the definition of "domestic violence" to include aggression, hitting, spanking or verbal abuse against children... Than it seems indisputable (again, I'm always open to counter arguments and counter evidence) it seems indisputable that if we expand and extend the definition of domestic violence to include not just women dependent on husbands, which I'm sure there are. But children who are far more dependent on parents than women are on husbands. I mean women can leave husbands and get alimony, and child support, and have a pretty positive time of it in the court system relative to men, but children have no such option. So it seems that if we look at that and we want to help to break the cycle of violence, which I think is every just and moral human beings strongest desire to break that cycle. It seems to me, and again I'm glad to hear arguments to the contrary, but it seems we do have to turn the focus, at times, on mothers and the degree which they may be aggressive towards their children, and how that plays into the cycle of violence in society.
Anyhow, sorry if a bit off topic, just my random thoughts.
I am working on a post in another topic, so the best answer I can give you right now is to say that, yes, feminists* are concerned about violence towards children and think of it as being of a kind with other forms of domestic violence, including what you're talking about. A lot of expansions in what feminists include as a part of feminism came from the way that issues of race and class fractured the movement (though it did give rise to feminist awareness of these issues and how they intersect, which provides the impetus for the genesis of one of my favorite feminist concepts and has been a huge influence on how I think about the connectedness of different equality movements).
Feminists oppose this as a way of thinking; as one more form of coercive violence and realize now that women no less than men are susceptible to being influenced by these attitudes that excuse violence towards children, despite some of the naivete at the beginning.
* The ones I read and agree with, anyway. There are feminists who are imperfect in their feminism, to be sure.
I don't know offhand what the MRM perspectives on corporal punishment are; you'd have to ask one of them.
MRA movements as they exist may be misogynistic. The very idea that a man has issues worth discussing? Not sexist at all. Be a little more open-minded.
Feminism exists to resolve legal and social inequalities between the sexes. Divorce from such a goal is motivated by consumption of misogynist propaganda and ideas of male superiority.
Feminism exists to resolve legal and social inequalities between the sexes. Divorce from such a goal is motivated by consumption of misogynist propaganda and ideas of male superiority.
1) Pre-nups are only as legitimate as the discretion of the court provides. Either party can attack the legitimacy of an arrangement after it has been signed and the courts have due discretion to vacate such an agreement if the interpretation of the courts deem the terms unsatisfactory, particularly under British common law (hence the notoriously large settlements in the news).
2) One does not address the underlying antiquated system of current divorce laws by arguing that pre-nups be signed. In fact, all this highlights is a general misunderstanding of how divorce works.
It's the same idea with 'love' or 'sex' contracts. No amount of contract signing allows any individual to overcome any liability of consent. Currently there is no legal method to protect oneself except to never have sex, much in the same way one 'protects' themselves from divorce rules for separation of assets by either having no assets (possibly by establishing a trust or corporation; again depending on the region and laws) or not marrying. These terms are unreasonable for a rational and functioning society.
3) One of the central ideas around relationships and divorce is that people change over time. Saying that one should know who they marry is a juvenile concept when the concept of 'who' changes with life experiences and knowledge.
Would any of these posters willingly blame domestic abuse victims for knowing what they got into? You knew or ought to have known they were an abuser therefore you should take responsibility for your own abuse?
4) Individuals don't have to get legally married to be deemed to be married and thus liable for the separation of assets.
Is it okay for me to say that as a male entering the field of education I am actually somewhat worried about how it's becoming commonplace to start assuming that men who interact with children are creepy/have ulterior motives?
Can you define "true knowledges" as you are using it here? My best guess is that you're speaking in terms of the epistemology of his personal experience, but I'm not really sure.
It also seems trivial to state that my question will conflict with his perceptions when what I'm doing is telling him that I'm questioning the accuracy of his perceptions.
I don't see why it's necessary to establish this. I'm not interested in absolutely precluding his claim as a logical impossibility, I'm more than satisfied in applying some heuristic analysis to conclude that the act of contradicting his claim of zero privilege is of small but tangible effect in promoting the social change I would like to see happen.
And I questioned because this always appear to be posed as an onus by association (and a unintended? slight to his predicaments), utilizing 'ideal' abstracts that do not account the element placement.
You must have been privileged by being white.
You must have been privileged by being male.
As far as I understood, he was not denying class dynamics (subordination). He can perceive his disadvantages after all.
In other words, I responded you by jumping to a conclusion.
I know this thread is probably a minefield and I strongly disagree with a lot what this organization says just by reading the original post describing their positions.
That said, I really want to get this off my chest since I've never spoken of this to anyone and I consider GAF my second family. I am a man who was the victim of female on male domestic violence with a previous partner in a relationship that lasted two years where I was the victim of physical violence on a somewhat regular basis. This is completely anecdotal, but in my personal experience I didn't report it and am inclined to believe it is, in fact, under reported. I have no evidence for that I guess. I'm just speaking from my personal experience.
The reason I didn't report it was because my abuser convinced me no one would believe me if I reported it. She was also fond of whispering in my ear that she would kill me in my sleep if I ever spoke of it. She used the threat of divulging details to my co-workers about an embarassing disease I suffer from to keep me in check if I ever tried to speak up in public. You have to understand that information is shit I keep under lock and key from anyone outside of family.
I really want to stress here that I'm not sticking up for wife batterers or male perpetrators of domestic violence, I'm merely stating I happen to be a male victim of domestic violence and didn't report it for a myriad of reasons that include those threats I previously mentioned.
The thing about an abuser is that it has nothing to do with gender, class, race, religion or income. It's all about the abuser having power and control over you.
Look, in my case, I was a 23-year-old virgin who fell in love with the first person I had an intimate relationship with. I told her I would dream about her the first time I spent the night with her, but that was before I knew she was violent. The first time she beat the shit out of me and burned me with a cigarette was when she caught me watching Great Expectations because she didn't like the fact Gweneth Paltrow was in it. Getting random or repeated haymakers for looking at another woman or simply ordering a drink from a female bartender was common. She once cornered me in her bathroom, locked the door behind her and soccer kicked the fuck out of me for a good five minutes until I started bleeding and was begging her to stop so loudly her roommate intervened. The first time I tried to break up with her she locked me in her bedroom for hours until I convinced her I wasn't breaking up with her.
The night I finally had enough and tried to escape she kicked my door in, ripped the phone cord out of the wall and beat the shit out of me. The only reason I was able to get away from her was because my neighbor called the police and they took her into custody.
I don't know why I'm telling you guys this. I'm not ashamed about getting beaten up by a girl. I just wish it was more socially acceptable for men to report this kind of stuff.
