Feminism only took off because we already are under the effect of women are wonderful

ParanoidAgnostic · 2020-08-20T01:45:53+00:00

The early stages of feminism were controversial and had a real fight on their hands, not just to convince the men in power but to convince women to get on board with the ideas too.

Later, feminism became co-opted by business. Getting women to participate more in the workforce increased the supply of labour.

Now feminism is popular because it is perfectly compatible with traditionalist ideas about gender. Women are pure and innocent. They need to be protected. Men are dangerous and must be controlled. Their desires, individuality, safety and comfort must be sacrificed for the benefit of women.

IntactBroadSword · 2020-08-20T06:23:45+00:00

Yes. Society is gynocentric as a whole. Feminism is just chivalry in politics.

LacklustreFriend · 2020-08-20T11:29:07+00:00

It's something I've about for a while now. To be slightly more nuanced, I believe that feminism is the result of changing attitudes to gender (women in particular, and not the cause.

A strong piece of evidence is that the Equal Pay Act of 1963 in the USA was signed into law the same year Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique was published, which is often cited as the beginning of "second wave" feminism.

On a side note, I wonder if the Equal Pay Act actually achieved anything, though not in the way you might think. It seems many arguments about the "pay gap" then were the same as they are now. Indeed, the fact the EPA exists has not stopped the myth of a wage gap existing today. I wonder if the real issue was women being unable to enter higher paying and more labour intensive professions, rather than actually being paid less. Maybe someone who knows more can answer that.

An argument about industralisation leading to women's suffrage can also be made. That women's suffrage was the result of the extreme social and environmental change of industralisation, creation of the modern state etc. rather than from activism (though this is admittedly a reasonably strong historical materalist view).

Additionally I find the idea of the "waves" of feminism misleading at best. First wave feminism (who are perhaps more accurately called the suffragette movement as 'feminism' was not widely used at the time) have essentially no continuity with second wave feminism, and many of the ideas of the "first wave" directly conflict with the "second wave" perhaps most importantly the first wave not sharing the second's near complete social constructivist view of gender, but also on other issues such as the ERA.

Similar the distinction between second wave and third wave (and even fourth wave) are completely arbitrary, and have strong continuity with each other. The defining feature of the third wave is apparently "intersectionality" though in many ways this is just a refining and constant expansion of the ideas already present in the second wave.

The "wave" narrative is probably constructed to give historic legitimacy to the later forms of feminism (even though the first wave too has a lot of issues)

Blarty97 · 2020-08-20T05:47:45+00:00

~~effect of~~ impression that

Blauwpetje · 2020-08-20T09:42:11+00:00

The problem (or maybe not the problem) is that women are wonderful. Men are hardwired to admire feminine traits. This is not just about sex, though of course it overlaps. We love their charm and coquettish humor. When I listen to (and look at) Françoise Hardy-songs, they certainly give me a different feeling than Bob Dylan-songs. Even two little girls cycling past my house with a big rabbit in a basket have a splendid, very feminine allure. (Two boys sword-fighting, or cycling as fast as possible, also have allure, but it's different.)

The problem is that in a society fucked up by gender wars it is hard to enjoy and admire femininity without either be called sexist or become the victim of a power trip, or both. The problem is that women want equality of outcome in fields concerning masculine qualities, while retaining their feminine qualities. And yeah, then our admiration of women makes us give in to feminist demands.

2020-08-20T14:57:21+00:00

Feminism works by a politicization of means of influence that women have always had in the private sphere: women are wonderful, damsels in distress, nagging, queen bee/mean girl bullying, etc.

These means of influence skip past verbalization and rational debate, which makes sense in the original domestic contexts of managing children (two year olds are barracks lawyers, you have to trick and manoeuvre them into bed/bath before they can start a debate), and of managing grown-ups whose insistence on doing the wrong thing will only get dug in further the more they're allowed to talk about the principle of the thing (for example a young man who's determined to marry an unsuitable girl).

The debate is short-circuited, and the target gets the full emotional voltage of "you've hurt your mother, no I don't even want to hear your excuses", or nagging until he loses the will to live and doesn't care any more that he's theoretically right.

Title	Feminism only took off because we already are under the effect of women are wonderful
Author	defo18
Upvotes	90
Comments	17
Date	August 19, 2020 11:11 PM UTC (5 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/comments/icyqs3/feminism_only_took_off_because_we_already_are/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/feminism-only-took-off-because-we-already-are.1062936 https://theredarchive.com/post/1062936

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