Feminist theory is bogus

Great Debates
101

Nice poem.

Now. Why aren’t the organized feminists of the United States railing against the inhumane treatment of women by the Saddamic Regime and loudly supporting the War of Liberation.

Well they either…

*Don’t believe that that their Arab sisters are being mistreated.

Or,

*They are to busy liberating themselves.

Or,

  • They, being women, hate war, so best of luck Arabsisters, liberate youselves.

Or,

  • They represent women only in the abstract and only as a cause. First, let the men wardogs liberate Iraq and then, down the road when the coast is clear, they’ll chant and march and liberate the Iraqi women from the capitalistic democratic wardogs.

Or,

*…something like that.

102

There are also some Afro-centric professors who claim that Africans invented everything, and made all of science’s discoveries before having them stolen by white scholars.

Just because there are some bad professors out there should not taint an entire discipline. Every academic subject has its “kooks.” Unfortunately, those who are opposed to the subject at hand out of idealogical differences single those “bad apples” out and use them as examples as if those professors are representitive of all those who teach in that field. (It’s much like the stereotypical “welfare queen” who, in some people’s mind, has come to represent all poor folks.)

Equally sad is the fact that usually those who condemn the loudest are often the most ignorant about the subject at hand. How can a person seriously condemn any academic study or theory without being fully educated in it? Those people are not worth the time it takes to debunk their statements.

I know this board is ostensibly about erradicating ignorance, but it’s an excersize in futility to debate when someone announces that they’ve already made their mind up. People like this refuse to be swayed by logic. Comfortable and smug in their ignorance, they will not bother to listen, but will only search for tiny flaws, which, to them, indicate that the whole is unreliable. Frankly, they have no interest in real debate and open thought, but only to make themselves feel better that they have withstood the onslaughts of intelligent argument with their beliefs unscathed.

103

Perhaps, because they are aware (as others appear to be unaware) that women are not specifically abused or oppressed in Iraq. The Ba’ath party is pretty much equal opportunity oppressors. Thus, groups supporting the rights of women need to evaluate the war on Iraq using the same standards that everyone else does–and may arrive at conflicting decisions regarding that choice, just as everyone else has.

104

For years, women have been condemning the practices of some Arabic cultures, such as ritualized rape and female genital mutillation. Unfortunately, these practices will not necessarily end because of regime change in one country. They are culturally ingrained. In fact, some countries actually condemn the practices in high levels of government. (There may even be a few countries which have laws forbidding them.) This makes little difference to the cultures which practice them.

Feminists are quite aware of the plight of their Arab sisters, but realize the difficulties in changing it. For FGM and ritualized rape to end, there would have to be a fundamental cultural shift. (FGM is practiced to eliminate women’s pleasure in sex so she won’t be tempted to have illicit relations. Ritualized rape is a punishment which renders a woman unmarriagable.) Women would need to achieve a new status in culture, which, in some cases, religious beliefs forbid. There would need to be a new level of “trust” in women that they can remain chaste while still enjoying sexual pleasure. Men would need to be able to accept a bride who is not a virgin because she was raped on a widescale basis for the practice of ritualized rape to be nullified.

Ridding the world of Saddam will not change the plight of women in the Middle East. Saddly, it would take a miricle. I honestly doubt that I’ll live to see a time when all Muslim women enjoy the same rights as I do.

105

I do believe that some feminists are obsessive. BUT I do not think that, just because people (or women) call themselves “feminists,” they are of this stripe. There are two sides to women avoiding the term feminists, and there’s a possibility that it has less to do with the few obssessive feminists, and rather with the work being done to roll back all that has already been accomplished, and this roll back included a general atmosphere in which anyone who calls themself a feminist is branded as an extremist. The suffragettes who first worked for women’s voting rights were certainly seen as “Pain-in-the-ass feminists”!

I do not agree that equality in pay has been reached, nor that women enjoy the same status. As I said before, things are much better, BUT, this does not mean mean that parity has been acheived. When it is suggested (by someone else, not you) that everything has been accomplished and that there is nothing real for feminists to do and so threfore they come up with kooky theories to teach in schools, an important fact is being glossed over: not only has parity not been reached, but the gains that have been made (which are admitted by all here, apparently) are being attacked as we speak. For example, people are working right now to pass a vague “partial-birth” law so that it will be easier to prevent a woman from being able to decide whether she will have an abortion or not. Furthermore, people are still working to prevent public school students from learning about and receiving contraception – and knowledge of an easy access to contraception are also part of a woman’s autonomy (not to mention that it usually prevents the question of abortion from even being raised). Given that there still are many who are working to roll back the advances that women have made, to claim that nothing real needs to be done, and that, for that reason, feminism is dead, is simply false.

Given that people are always working to take away what has been accomplished, the more young women hear about what has occurred before and what can be done now, the better – so women’s study programs are important! Also, we need not assume that only young women can take these courses. The more young people in general are informed ont his issue, the better can the forces who want to take it away can be combatted. Given that it is recognized (by most or all who have posted in this thread) that the advances made for women were good, it is prima facie the case that removing those same advances are bad.

If you’d like some support for these contentions, go look at this site and see that these feminists are not going on and on about “Lacanian phallusses” or “herstory,” but are talking about plain, matter-of-fact questions which center on women’s freedom, equality, and autonomy – women’s rights in Afghanistan, rape in the miltary, funding for girl’s sports, the status of women in the Catholic church, AIDS funding, beast cancer, humanitarian aid for Iraqui women, the Estrada filibuster, the nomination of Carolyn Kuhl – none of these issues involves Derrida or “ovulars” – all of them are easy to understand, and all of them (there are many, many more) make it obvious that the claim that there’s nothing for people to do to improve the situation of women and keep it from sliding back is simply false. In the case of the filibuster against Estrada (et al.) we have obvious examples of political forces that are a threat not just to women’s rights, but those of all Americans, male or female.

If people are “incessantly” discussing outrages, it’s probably because injustices are incessantly occurring – see the link above, or for lots more, see the aptly named Daily Outrage. That everything’s perfect and that there’s nothing to fight against is, whether an illusion or decepetion, in either case false.

106

Setting aside the heavily loaded nature of the distinction as it’s set out above, ther is the problem that it is then used the deny the distinction again. For you, “good feminists” “promote” equality, but (I am guessing) keep their mouths shut. You see, that’s the problem, you’ve defined “good” feminists as “nice” – and the minute women start complaining about injustice, they’re “incessantly declaring their outrage,” or in other words, not “nice.” In the end, the distinction as set out above encourages women to shut up or be branded as self-aggrandising whiners. Again, see this to confirm that there’s plenty to be (justifiably!) complaining about and working against. I imagine that women in academia who do not do high theory but who discuss these issues are open to being attacked for “distorting history” or “politicizing the classroom.” Either way – high theory or practical issues – the academic feminist is attacked.

107

Actually FGM is a tribal custom, not a precept of any religion (except insofar as tribal custom could be seen as religious)

108

For me, a guy, feminism should mean the high regard and honor that mankind, specially menfolk, should render to women; because all mankind comes from the woman’s womb and is brought up by women.

Name one man who is not brought up by women.

Thus all physical violence and moral insolence to women in whatever form is absolutely abominable if we would consider ourselves civilized.

Susma Rio Sep

109

This post makes me realize that there are three types of femininsm.[ol][li]Academic or theoretical feminism.[]Political feminism.[]Practical feminism.[/ol]Type 1 underlies university courses popular books. The OP contended that the various theories are bogus. This sort of feminism has great appeal to those professors and writers whose career depends upon it.[/li]
Type 2 represents the effort to pass laws that treat women fairly as well as the selection of judges, election of candidates, etc. IMHO this type of feminism was very important when discrimination was legally possible. In some cases, the law itself discriminated. E.g., women couldn’t own real property in some state IIRC. Today, political feminism is less important for ordinary women IMHO. However, it has great value to certain politicians and political groups, since it helps them get votes and donations.

Type 3 is where most of the progress is being made today. I believe that many of the Type 1 and Type 2 feminists tend to ignore what’s going on. E.g., many of the feminists who complain about the glass ceiling do not know and admire the work of Carly Fiorina.

In summary, IMHO:[ol][]Political feminism had great succees. It laid the groundwork for the current feminist revolution.[]Practical feminsts have now taken off, thanks to the current freedom to succeed and their own individual efforts.Theoretical feminism is a disease - a parasite, which sucks the blood from the first two types.[/ol]

110

I agree that “It’s better to break the glass ceiling than to complain about it,” though they’re by no means mutually exclusive, and usually reinforce each other.

[QUOTE]
Originally posted by december *
**This post makes me realize that there are three types of femininsm.[ol][li]Academic or theoretical feminism.[]Political feminism.Practical feminism.[/ol]Type 1 underlies university courses popular books. The OP contended that the various theories are bogus. This sort of feminism has great appeal to those professors and writers whose career depends upon it.[/li]
Type 2 represents the effort to pass laws that treat women fairly as well as the selection of judges, election of candidates, etc. IMHO this type of feminism was very important when discrimination was legally possible. In some cases, the law itself discriminated. E.g., women couldn’t own real property in some state IIRC. Today, political feminism is less important for ordinary women IMHO. However, it has great value to certain politicians and political groups, since it helps them get votes and donations.

Type 3 is where most of the progress is being made today. I believe that many of the Type 1 and Type 2 feminists tend to ignore what’s going on. E.g., many of the feminists who complain about the glass ceiling do not know and admire the work of Carly Fiorina.

In summary, IMHO:[ol][li]Political feminism had great succees. It laid the groundwork for the current feminist revolution.[]Practical feminsts have now taken off, thanks to the current freedom to succeed and their own individual efforts.[]Theoretical feminism is a disease - a parasite, which sucks the blood from the first two types.[/ol] **[/li][/QUOTE]

What I originally wrote was, “For you {chappachula}, “good feminists” “promote” equality, but (I am guessing) keep their mouths shut.” When I wrote this, I really couldn’t see what this “promoting” of equality could amount to under the conditions set by chappachula (that’s why I placed it in quotation marks). My impression was that chappachula’s “good” feminists were said to “promote” feminism, but couldn’t in fact even do that – since, in chappachula’s scheme, actively working to promote equality (accompanied by complaining or not) will still get you branded as a “bad” feminist, because, again, then you aren’t “nice” (you’re rocking the boat). (In addition, simply pointing out injustice is seen as complaining in the bad sense – whining – as opposed to complaining in the good sense – reporting an injustice with rightful displeasure, which is what I had meant when I wrote the word “complaining,” though another term would have been, I see now, more clear.)

So, what I was discussing included the supposedly distinct “practical” feminsts mentioned above. As was written earlier by chappachula, “The ‘good’ feminists don’t call themselves feminists, they just go to work in responsible positions, treat people nicely and show their competence in everthing they do” – which means that even the “practical feminists” mentioned by december above would be labelled “bad” feminists, even if they do nothing more than go to work and call themselves feminists.

As far as academic feminists are concerned, the assumption above seems to be that no academic feminists are “political” feminists. But, given the great ignorance of women’s history and of the work being done to roll their advances back, there’s plenty of material to cover in women’s study courses before even getting to any real 'theory" – and such material is no more illegitimate than regular history classes are, since the idea of such women’s study courses is to simply inform people who are uninformed.

Secondly, it also seems to be assumed above that “theory” is always bad. I agree that there’s bad theory out there (that’s undeniable, though not peculiar to women’s studies), but for a classroom discussion to be at all philosophical, some technical terms and precision are going to be unavoidable, and therefore truck in “theory,” though of a useful variety. Indeed, any philosophical discussion is going to question (criticially examine) what’s taken for granted, since that’s what philosophy usually does in order to be philosophy in the first place, namely examine the unexamined – in a women’s studies course, such ideas to be examined might be such “common sense” ideas as the ideas that women are inherently stupid, can’t think logically, must always behave so as be seen as “nice,” can’t be surgeons, are really only meant to get pregnant and raise children, etc. (etc. etc.)

“Today, political feminism is less important for ordinary women IMHO.” The millions of women who have no health care coverage or whose jobs (if they can find one) don’t pay enough to feed their families might beg to differ.

111

Yes, I know. I’m sorry if I gave the wrong impression.

Actually, high clerics of Islam have issued statements that the Prophet never mentioned, nor specifically endorsed FGM, thus it is not necessary to practice it to be in good standing with the faith. However, it’s so deeply imbedded in the culture that the statement made little difference.

According to some stories I have read, young girls often tease girls who have not been “cut” yet. In one story, a mother who did not wish to do this to her daughter was distraught when the child begged her in tears to let her “become a woman.” To appease her daughter, the mother pretended to comply.

Recently, there has been a bit of a backlash. I read an article recently where a bride wore a sign on her wedding dress announcing that she had not been mutilated. Her groom wore one as well, stating that he was proud to marry an un-cut woman. The article then went on to say that the couple has gotten a few “converts” to this way of thinking, but it’s a long road ahead.

112

But, don’t law codes typically have a gender disclaimer, to the effect that “he”, “him”, and “his” should be construed as referring equally to females?