Wednesday, May 6, 2009

How to Reply to a Feminist . . .

. . . if you must. This is National Offend A Feminist Week, and Allison at The New Gay finds herself angry, mystified and intrigued by the crazy dude in the Speedo:
Why is feminism still a dirty word? Why do people still regard it as a fleeting female term with no historical purpose? . . .
To which I replied in the comments:
If we are in a War of Ideas, it is important to distinguish between ourselves and our ideas. Identity politics, however, convinces some people that an attack on feminism (an idea) is an attack on people (women), just as some people confuse an attack on same-sex marriage (an idea) with an attack on people (gays).
Allison, I believe that I know more about feminism than you know about conservatism, and I certainly believe I know more about conservatism than you do. Either I do know more or I do not. But to assert my own superiority of knowledge is not a personal attack on you. There are many people whom I love and I admire who know less than I do.
What I am trying to say is that there are actual facts in this world. Not everything is a matter of opinion. And the possibility that you might be mistaken as to the facts is something you might want to consider.
Thanks for the link. Like I say, Rule 4: "Hits is hits," and linky-hate is as good as linky-love, when it comes down to increasing blog traffic. That is a fact.
BTW, I'm thinking of an Elvis Costello song:
Oh, it's so funny to be seein' ya after so long, girl,
And with the way you look, I understand
If you are not impressed . . .
My aim is true
.
Which is to say, don't worry your pretty little head about it, sweetheart. Now run along and get me a cup of coffee, hon. Cream only.

(And I think somebody wants to hit the tip jar.)

9 comments:

  1. Women are dumb, I support you and like this blog!!!

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  2. Why is feminism still a dirty word?It's not. What it is, is a misnomer, because they reject their femininity utterly and completely.

    I have met gay men who are more feminine than those hard, angry broads.

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  3. Whenever someone takes offense that you oppose "feminism," a quick read of their rationale shows one consistent point... that word does not mean what they think it means.

    They all tend to have this idealized utopian definition of feminism as a let's-all-hold-hands-and-be-fair and let's-bring-women-up-to-the-level-of-respect-as-men.

    This is as opposed to the real application of modern feminism, which objectifies women by promoting whorism, encourages disrespectful men in the same regard, denigrates women who honestly choose a family as opposed to the orthodoxy's mandated career-woman path, and subjugates the very men who are considerate and respectful as the utopian definition requires by misapplying the definition of chauvenism.

    It's much the same way people don't understand why liberal is a dirty word. It's because we're not talking about live-and-let-live freedom-and-responsibility non-judgemental classical liberalism. We're talking about the modern bastardization of that word which means nanny-state blame-america-first liberalism.

    What's important is the definitions here, and if you don't have consistent definitions between two people, this will always lead to these kinds of disagreements which are really arguing about nothing. And yet, many can't seem to grasp the simple concept that keeping language consistent might be important. For words like, oh, say... "marriage"?

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  4. One interesting point you make brings me to one of the things I dislike most about feminism, and that it confuses what is about people with what is about ideas, always reflexively thinking about whichever one is less important to a given situation. Of course it is not alone there. Pretty much all left-wing ideologies have that problem, but feminism most grotesquely of all. It takes the left-wing problem of thinking ideas are people and people are ideas (which David Brooks and quite a few other neoconservative thinkers these days share, by the way) to its expectedly perverse conclusion.

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  5. What's wrong with feminism?

    Well, aside from being another pseudo-religion in which everything in life is broken down into political considerations, into victims and oppressors, and where morality is substituted for convenience? Why nothing at all.

    (heh, CAPTCHA = 'nishi')

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  6. I feminism is a dirty word because they have a habit of saying things like:

    "I want to see a man beaten to a bloody pulp with a high-heel shoved in his mouth, like an apple in the mouth of a pig." -- Andrea Dworkin

    and:

    "All sex, even consensual sex between a married couple, is an act of violence perpetrated against a woman." -- Catherine Mackinnon


    Of course, there's also the manner in which feminism is so often a license to be disagreeable - that is to say that many of the most disagreeable gravitate to it. I mean, if you're going about trying to turn the world on its ear, couldn't one at least be pleasant?

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  7. Because most of them are frigging nuts.

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  8. Just posted over there. WEEEEE. That was fun.

    A quote:
    No one is saying that women shouldn’t be treated equally, merely that they shouldn’t be treated like men. Because they aren’t. Fairly, yes. THE SAME AS, no.Oh, and hey, Visit my blog! I linked you! (Which rule was that, again?)

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  9. Stacy, speaking of femininity, please post Shelly Roche's new video on the Maoist HR 875 and HR 759 which are expected to be voted on, and passed, by Memorial Day!

    http://bit.ly/N8qsF

    http://bit.ly/yx3a9

    Please don't post this message of mine. Just a heads-up.

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