The word is "feminism."
ADDED: The problem on display is:
1. There are widely shared equality goals but these have been met, leaving nothing more to do under the banner "feminism."
2. Some people want other things, and the term is useful to them, so they use it actively, demanding things that are off-putting to a lot of people.
3. Those who were fine with the widely shared goals become conflicted about the term, but not enough to successfully take the definition back.
4. A small group of those who are put off want to make a thing out of disowning the term.
5. Most people don't bother one way or another. They move on, following their individual lives, which is good feminism. Or that's what I'd say if I had to have an argument about it, but I don't.
July 28, 2014
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questions that must be addressed if we are to continue making progress toward real gender equality
The progress of the women's movement has always been marching in place. The marching motion is the point.
Something is wrong and men have to change to fix it.
That's quest-sending, what a woman does with her man, that in the normal case is followed by the man screwing up or not, and the woman showing her man that she's satisfied with him.
There's no particular man here, so it's just a ritual reenactment of the first step. Women send men on quests, repeatedly. It's the marching in place movement.
Time "magazine".
I try not to use that word anymore. If there's debate about whether or not it would apply to me*, then it has absolutely no meaning, and is useless.
* Wife, mother, family's sole breadwinner, self-made, anti-abortion, pro-birth control but bought it herself, often votes R.
Thanks for the link. Of course, Cathy Young is at Reason magazine. Good reasoning on the subject.
The lack of zest for due process in college "rape" incidents is proof enough that the movement has an influential and quite damaging component.
If all feminists were like Phoebe Cates in 1985 we'd be in a much better place.
It's frustrating when they use things like Hobby Lobby to lie and distort to forward their narrative.
I am speaking with my sister and she tells me that companies are now stopping women from getting birth control and they are on the way to outlawing it. What? I said stop watching MSNBC (or whatever it is she half listens too).
I saw the video that Cathy Young refers to when it was all over the internet last year. The woman obviously was enjoying it, but I thought, she will regret this in the morning. Regretting making a spectacle of yourself is not rape.
Drinks His Own Urine Man says:
Women are as free to drink their own urine as any man can. This is equality.
Drinks His Own Urine Man says:
In equal amounts, in identical bottles, a man's urine and a woman's urine should cost the same. This, too, is equality.
"Who wins in an argument over the meaning of a word?"
How about: Nobody, since such arguments function as a distraction, leading people away from substantive problems to academic equivalents of "Angels dancing on the head of a pin".
Drinks His Own Urine Man says:
I would gladly trade my urine for that of a woman, if the amount is equal. I have no fear in this: I refuse to hold women back.
Drinks His Own Urine Man says:
Sometimes I dream of a world of unisex bathrooms where I can be beside a woman and we can both urinate in synchronicity, unashamed. It matters not who finishes first, for this is about equality, not competition. Urine should never be used for competitive purposes: that destroys the organic purity.
Drinks His Own Urine Man says:
To the woman who would gladly drink my urine may I say I would gratefully drink yours in kind. I know you are out there, and I drink great quantities of Britta water in anticipation of our chance meeting.
Drinks His Own Urine Man says:
We will be equals, Urine Angel, and I shall only put you on a pedestal to help you urinate. I'm not sure the pedestal would actually help, but I would gladly do so if you so desired.
Drinks His Own Urine Man says:
I must remind you: it is only urine that makes us healthy and equal. To the women and men who have responded to my ad: no, I do not want you to defecate on me, nor do I wish to defecate on you. I am not some kind of freak
Drinks His Own Urine Man says:
Did you know the Journey song "Lovin', Touchin', Squeezin'" was originally titled "Lovin', Touchin', Peeing"? It was a more sheltered time back then. Maybe this had something to do with Steve Perry leaving the band: I don't know.
Drinks His Own Urine Man says:
Surely there is a celebrity, somewhere, that drinks his or her own urine. I think the time is ready for them to step forward, and bring us urine-drinkers into the light. Matt Damon, I am looking at you.
Drinks His Own Urine Man says:
Cindy Crawford, it is time for you to come clean about the secret fluid in your 'fountain of youth.' Let a thousand streams flow.
Drinks His Own Urine Man says:
Meryl Streep, you do not have to explain the significance of your 'special goblet': we understand. Drinking one's urine may not directly lead to Oscars, but then, who is to say that it doesn't?
Feminism should inspire our most sublime values. If there was one movement that petered out too soon, it would have to be the #slutwalk. This phenomenon should be sweeping college campuses by now. Because nothing says 'don't look at me like a piece of meat,' than promenading like a piece of meat.
"Who wins in an argument over the meaning of a word? The word is 'feminism.'"
It's an odd question, since a word's meaning is a function of its usage. One of the pleasures of the OED is the long list of uses that it typically gives when providing a definition of a word. So it could well be an argument where both sides are right.
Contrast this situation with the tussle over the meaning of the word 'marriage,' which a few decades ago, would have been misused if applied to a same-sex couple -- misused in the sense that there would have been a high likelihood of confusion if the word had been used in that context. The usage has changed, and people today talk about a same-sex 'marriage' without the slightest concern that they will be misunderstood.
The tussle here about the word "feminism" isn't an argument over the meaning of a word, but rather a dispute about the scope of an idea and the competing values embedded in it. Everyone involved in that dispute knows perfectly well what the other side means in using the word.
It's not an argument worth having. In principle, feminism represented something positive. An effort to address real and manufactured disparities. In practice, it is needlessly divisive and does not promote the general welfare.
But it musssszt be defined exactly and precisely as the most extreme supporters need it to be!
The question the "left feminists" should be asking isn't "how come so many women are unappreciative of the strides feminism has made over the years?" but "why has feminism become such a partisan, loaded term that women now equate it with extremist partisanship?"
To reply to these "women against feminism" by saying "I guess you don't care about equality!" or "I guess you don't understand what feminism actually is!" is to completely miss the point. By adopting the cloak of "feminism" to push the causes of the left (government subsidized birth control, campus vigilance against "microaggressions", the "war on women" theme) this has understandably turned off a lot of women who might otherwise have called themselves "feminists" because they still believe in equality.
Drinks His Own Urine Man picked up a little there at the end, with the celebrity name-checking.
Not bad, but not great. Maybe a 65 on the b3k character-o-meter.
Feminism can best be defined as communism in panties.
Brando:
Real women, as real men, have both sons and daughters. Real mothers and fathers want their sons and daughters to equally enjoy success, happiness, and fulfillment.
Feminism lost its allure and legitimacy in much the same way other civil rights movements did when they adopted doctrines of collective and inherited sin. So, not only did they incorporate for profit, but they also practiced selective discrimination. Unfortunately, for them, those degenerate doctrines have, without exception, a universal scope, and so their arguments became self-refuting. Since then, no one takes them seriously unless under threat of coercion.
@mikeski said...
Not bad, but not great. Maybe a 65 on the b3k character-o-meter.
Sounds about right.
-b3k
@ mikeski:
You kinda opened a can or worms. For awhile I have wanted to take a character and explain the connection of the seemingly random dots.
Is Urine Drinking Man simply recognizing a fellow fetish in feminism? Is it down to high-heeled shoes and organic lunches?
Is he pointing out that equality means sharing base things without judgment? The lowest common denominator allows for a greater range of compassion?
Or was it an overlong set-up for a purile Matt Damon joke?
At 65% you are kind: I could taste the fizzle from the keyboard. 350 in baseball is a star who fails 65% of the time. I think I just bunted; it happens.
I might take a better example to dissect in the future.
Digital frog. Good nite,
-b3k
"Feminism lost its allure and legitimacy in much the same way other civil rights movements did when they adopted doctrines of collective and inherited sin."
An apt comparison. Most people can get on board the idea of judging others as individuals and ending discrimination based on race or sex. Where such movements become frustrated with a perceived lack of progress and aim towards collective reward and punishment, they lose the middle and tarnish what labels they once stood for.
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