Okay, now you are pissing me off. Do you want to compare notes on the dirty, dangerous, back breaking work we’ve done?
Anyway, I agree the “feminists” you describe are appalling. Thank goddess they only exist in your head.
Nope, not anymore.
On the other hand, if all men suddenly disappeared, women would find themselves in a different world from the one they currently live in. One without truckers or farmers or ranchers or miners or plumbers or sanitation workers or garbage men or engineers. Considering that many women get freaked out by the sight of a roach, I think they’d get pretty unhappy pretty soon, once the lights went out, their toilets stopped working, and the stuff at the grocery store disappeared.
It’s true that women don’t need protection from predators anymore: men eliminated (or nearly eliminated) them long ago. But women still need men, and men still need women.
And by the way, the fact that someone’s a woman doesn’t make her harmless. It’s true that women are physically weaker than men, but obtaining a weapon easily overcomes that problem.
Actually, outside of the white collar world (where academic feminist focus their attention and, coincidentally, work) there are plenty of dirty, back-breaking jobs being done by women. I’ve never worked in a factory that didn’t have a fair share of women. Women work in dangerous jobs as cashiers in dumps likely to be robbed. The back injury isn’t just some plot device invented by the writers on Nurse Jackie: healthcare workers literally break their backs. Family farms may be a thing of the past, but rural women still do the same dirty work on factory farms. And though they may not work on high steel or Arctic fishing boats, women who stand at counters and stock shelves all day are tired after their shift and don’t exercise, though their jobs didn’t elevate their heart rates while still wearing them down. As a result they get musculoskeletal disorders and put on unhealthy weight.
I’m sorry I’m such a one-note Charley in threads on race and gender, but race and gender are so much smoke screens in root cause class disparities.
It’s interesting to see how, at least from my reading, this thread has gone from “[straw-man-fictional-versions-of] feminism is bad” to “women aren’t as smart or capable as men” and “women can’t/don’t do hard or dirty work”.
Well, it was all in the OP. Chock full of goodness. So much to unpack.
The OP is not a non-solution in search of a problem: it’s an attempt to debunk modern feminism. Think of it as creative destruction. Sometimes you have to destroy something bad, to make room for something good.
Also, it bugs me when people distort what I’ve said. If you could quote whatever it is you think I said, so I’d know what you’re talking about, I’d appreciate it.
I totally don’t want this to turn into an argument. Both because this thread’s not about some incident between two (probably) drunks at a bar, and because it’s not worth arguing about anyway.
But it is interesting how different people can see the same video differently. For example, here’s what I saw:
[ul]
[li]A blonde woman pushes her way to the bar.[/li][li]A man in a baseball cap follows her, also trying to make his way to the bar.[/li][li]She leans back, looks at him, and possibly(?) says something. (Can’t tell, because her face is partly blocked.)[/li][li]He’s continues to try to make his way to the bar. (There’s an open space immediately to the left of the blonde woman.)[/li][li]She turns again, and definitely says something. (No sound, but you can see her mouth moving.)[/li][li]She then backs up, clenches her right fist, staring straight at him. (There’s still an open space next to her, fwiw.)[/li][li]She continues clinching her right fist, and leans forward.[/li][li]He grabs her right fist.[/li][li]She tries to pull her hand away, and starts yelling.[/li][li]She then punches him with her left fist.[/li][li]He punches her back with his right fist.[/li][/ul]
If the video was the only thing to go on, I’d say:
[ul]
[li]He was justified in grabbing her fist. Clear case of self-defense. He doesn’t know when or if she’s going to strike, it’s a crowded bar, and he can’t easily get away. (Not that he’s necessarily required to retreat.)[/li][li]When she punches him with her left fist, that’s clearly an assault. At that point, at least from what’s in the video, he’d done nothing but try to keep her from hitting him.[/li][li]When he punches her back, that’s probably also an assault, but it’s not clear-cut. The point of self-defense is to prevent an imminent attack, not to “get someone back”. But it’s hard to be sure. After the first punch, it looks like she may be holding onto his left arm, to keep him from getting away. But it’s hard to tell, because it happens so fast. If she’s holding onto him, he could have reasonably felt like punching her was the only way avoid getting punched again.[/li][/ul]
The entire video is at Video shows punch that led to FSU QB De'Andre Johnson's arrest
The relevant part starts at about 1:45.
To the extent the video is related to the thread it’s this: that he got arrested and she didn’t was patriarchy. No way the police come to a bar and see a video where man #1 punches man #2 and man #2 punches him back and they arrest the only the second guy. That she didn’t go to jail that night was because she was a woman.
Two questions.
First, why did you feel the need to point out she was a “blonde woman” but only refer to him as “a man”?
Second, do you think the fact that he was black and she was white might have anything to do with the different ways the public and law enforcement react?
Certainly Florida Law Enforcement is not famous for being lenient towards black suspects.
Also, respectfully, I’m not sure your assessment of the video is the most objective.
The push to label drunk sex as rape is especially enlightening. Because, the thing is, if you’re a woman and you’re drunk it’s rape. If you’re a man and you’re drunk… well let’s not talk about that.
There are two important things to unpack from this:
1.) Feminists are not really interested in empowering women. If they were, they’d be saying “Hey! Don’t get drunk and do stupid shit you’ll regret later!” What they want is for women to be perpetual victims: objects who are not responsible for their own actions.
2.) Feminists are not interested in equality. If they were, they’d be pushing to have women arrested for having sex with drunk men. They’re not.
About a year ago, Amy Schumer gave a speech at the Gloria Awards and Gala, hosted by the Ms. Foundation for Women. During the speech, she related a story where she had sex, totally sober, with a man who was so drunk he literally (according to her) passed out in the middle of it.
According to feminists, this is rape. Or at least, it would have been rape, if she’d been a man, instead of a woman.
You can read the speech here.
Full disclosure: I have nothing against Amy Schumer. I don’t think what she describes is rape. In fact, I feel sympathy for her, based on the story she tells. Having (or trying to have) sex with someone who was totally wasted would be sordid and humiliating, just as she describes it.
But then, I’m not a feminist, and it’s not up to me to pretend to both support equality and “drunk sex is rape” (but only if you’re a man). That’s their position, not mine.
I have not heard of a case where a woman, drunk, pushes a man onto a bed, manually stimulates (or attemptss to manually stimulate) him, attempts to have sex with him, and attempts to go down on him, all while the man in question is lying still and looking for an opportunity to leave with everyone’s dignity intact, wherein any feminist (or really, practically anyone at all, but relevant to your point, any feminist*) acknowledges all these facts yet calls this a case in which the man raped the woman.
Or anything relevantly similar.
You apparently know of such cases? Tell us about them.
If you have nothing to share here, it is required that you change your view on this point.
*Exceptions can be made here for a very small number who believe literally all heterosexual sex is a case of a man raping a woman.
Regarding that video you guys are talking about: Isn’t he grabbing her and pulling her prior to her hitting him? Am I just completely misunderstanding what I’m looking at?
Oh I watched the longer one–he’s grabbed her wrist because she raised a fist at him.
You are correct but our interpretation is different. My current job is a senior consultant to a major plant for mega-pharma. There is no difference between the men and the women there. Either you can do the job or you can’t. Many of the top off-site people everyone has to report to are women. Even non college educated team leads both male and female make more than twice the average of the average household income alone and many of those are women as well. I treat them perfectly equally as does everyone else.
To be clear, these are women that know how to drive forklifts and unload multiple 18 wheelers in the most efficient way possible. The one thing I have never heard is for any one of them to describe themselves as a feminist because they don’t need to. They are fair to everyone and concentrate on their own concerns. The same is true with my mother. She is an internationally renowned speaker and author with three best selling books to date. She doesn’t consider herself a feminist. She is just a Texas girl that does what she wants. Others can choose chronic victimization if that is what makes them happy. It i only a small minority of vocal women women that view themselves as victims. The rest of them just get shit done and often quite well.
I personally am not very concerned about the plight of white, upper-middle-class women in the U.S. without any other context. They seem to have it pretty good all things considered. I know for a fact that my own extremely privileged daughters have no right to complain about anything remotely related to discrimination. I am sympathetic to true women’s rights abuses in the 3rd world but most of the feminist movement in the U.S. seems to be oblivious to that. It is mostly focused on random bitching about stuff some younger and inexperienced white girls get shocked by when they get challenged to enter adulthood.
Shagnasty, you are a feminist, with a particular concern for Intersectionality. You have plenty of compatriots in the feminist movement. Congratulations of finding your place. 
Where we differ is that you see the incoherence of feminism as defense against criticism. I see it as a criticism of feminism.
Given that feminists represent is a real social force that has real consequences in the real world, I think their incoherence is a problem for feminists. But it’s not a reason to give them a free pass.
This doesn’t make even a single lick of sense.
Do I recall correctly that you’re an atheist? There are atheists all over the map, when it comes to political and social issues. And plenty of them, from all these stripes, see their political and social views as tied to, or even a logical extension of, their atheism. Yet it is no valid criticism of atheism that it is in this sense “incoherent.” It’s a bunch of people who have different ideas as to what the fundamental idea of atheism means in different contexts. This happens on the regular, with all the big ideas.
If I’m wrong that you’re an atheist, that’s okay, pick whichever religious tradition you like instead and apply the same criticism.
I’m very glad to hear she’s your ex-wife.
Women are every bit as capable of domestic violence as men. The difference is if a man doesn’t hit back, it’s likely to escalate. If he does, he’s likely to go to jail.
There’s only one solution, which is to get the fuck out.
What’s funny is that you are wrong about this. The idea that women play by different rules is, for lack of a better word, patriarchy. The idea that feminists are fighting for women to be able to punch men all the time is bizarre.
Really? Which feminists are you prepared to quote as saying that we are not seeing enough women arrested, prosecuted and punished for violent crimes, in that case?
I’ve heard feminists offer similar advice, but that’s not all they say. They rightly point out that the predators in most such instances (not all, but most – and they equally condemn female sexual predators and predation) are men. And they rightly point out that there’s not enough emphasis in many places on accurately describing such encounters as rape and educating boys and men that it is as wrong as any other form of rape.
Many in fact are. I’m not sure if you’re interested in hearing from feminists that disagree with your straw-man-fantasy-version of feminism (considering how often they’ve been referred to in this thread and been ignored by you), but they exist. Your characterization of feminism and feminists are, at best, accurate for no more than a fringe of feminism and feminists.