Background: 29/m. I attended an undergraduate institution that is widely thought of as one of the "most feminist" universities in the U.S., in terms of housing noted feminist and LGBT academics, being on the leading edge in terms of curriculum, having a very strong student activist culture, and so on. As a result, my social circle is dominated by Blue Pill thinkers.

Several of my male friends coupled up with women from college (marriage or LTR), who generally fit the same demographic: identify as feminist, White, come from a privileged background (ranging from middle-class suburbia to 1%ers), huge focus on LGBT and gender issues politically, liberal arts education, snarky attitude. I could probably go on. If you've been to a liberal arts college in the Northeast or Midwest in the past decade or if you are a young professional, you probably know the type.

These women are hugely disrespectful to my (White) friend and his Chinese-born wife. I've been "privileged" to behind-their-back conversations where they snark about how she just wants a Green Card, how he married a "little girl" he can control, how she is a "mail order bride", how he "can't handle a real woman", and generally portraying him as a predatory creep and her as a victim preyed upon because of her submissiveness. Thing is, she's not a little girl, she's 25, she's educated, comes from a middle-class family in her home country, and she is gainfully employed here in the U.S. in the IT sector. There is nothing that I've seen that indicates that she is using him financially or for immigration purposes, or that their relationship isn't real. They seem quite happy. In reality, I think much of the scorn comes from the fact that she presents herself in a way that is traditionally feminine and rubs these other women the wrong way. She's very domestic and loves to cook, especially when having people over. Maybe comes off as more "girly". It is not over the top, though.

I'm encountering similar attitudes now that I'm dating a Colombian woman. As I mentioned, I come from a fairly academically-oriented, somewhat nerdy social circle. "Swallowing TRP" opened me up to new social groups and social scenes, and my GF is a lot more conventionally attractive than anyone I've dated in the past and a lot different in terms of cultural tastes and attitudes than most of the people I went to school with. She loves dancing, which I don't believe a single woman in the rest of my social circle enjoys. She's somewhat traditional in her views towards family. She's very much not-snarky and very earnest in her words. I was "warned" that she might be "using me", that it won't last, etc. It was transparent to me that people were trying to get me to leave her. When that didn't work, the social ostracism came into play. Now it's a given that we won't be invited to certain social events. No one has outright labeled me a predator (to my knowledge), but that's probably only because I'm Latino myself (U.S. born though) and these women feel uncomfortable about attacking me for dating someone of my own ethnicity. It's clear that there is animosity though.

It's mind-blowing to me how a group of self-identified "progressive" feminist women are so obsessed with status, whether it be socioeconomic status or social status. I hear all of the positive rhetoric about upsetting hierarchies and challenging systems of dominance, but in practice I see feminists who are very uncomfortable with the notion of men "dating down" (by dating women perceived to be from lower socioeconomic strata) and "dating up" (by dating women who are "out of their league" in terms of physical attractiveness). I don't see the opposite attitudes in men as much. I think most men would be fine with a woman "dating down" by dating a guy from a lower socioeconomic situation. That even strikes me as romantic. We hardly see it in real life though. Most of these women won't even consider dating, let alone marrying, someone without a degree, or who makes considerably less money, etc.

Is there any justification for the view that women from developing countries are somehow "weaker" or more vulnerable to the predations of Western men? My girlfriend helped raise her younger siblings, had to work part-time while attending high school to help her family financially, fought like hell to build a small business in the U.S. She's tough. She's resilient. She's lived through a lot and is wiser as a result. I know "empowered" feminists who still live off of their parents financially, have their parents do their taxes, and generally live without the fear of any negative repercussions for their actions, etc. in their late 20s and early 30s. I just don't see it. Reading feminist literature doesn't make you wiser, tougher, or more of a "real woman" that is "harder to handle", believe me.

If you look back at the history of feminism, you'll find that the Suffragettes and the First Wave of feminism in the U.S. were tied to Protestant social reform movements like the Women's Christian Temperance Union and the movement to legalize abortion. Much of the rhetoric in those movements contrasted the "sober" culture of Protestant America with the drunk, licentious culture of Catholic and Orthodox immigrants (and African-Americans). Margaret Sanger (and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, today) was overt about abortion serving the important social purpose of limiting the birth rates of the lower classes. Many scholars have pointed out the racism and classism inherent to these movements. These attitudes were justified, in part, by pointing at the relatively egalitarian gender relations of the Anglo upper classes (when compared to immigrant subcultures). Going forward, the Second Wave emphasized the universalism of its ideology and allowed no room for cultural relativism or diversity in the realm of gender relations. We see similar attitudes today with FEMEN "liberating" Third World women from the supposed tyranny they're under. Third Wave feminism is dominated by privileged White women. Despite the repeated calls for more intersectional analyses, publications like Salon, Jezebel, and Slate are dominated by White women from wealthy backgrounds (in some cases, very wealthy) living in NYC and SF who attended elite, prestigious colleges.

Today, many "empowered" career women in the U.S. are only able to follow that career path because they've in-sourced "gendered labor" (that is, child care, domestic work and the like) to low-wage Latina, Asian, and African immigrant domestic workers. Think back to the French noblewomen, who paid lower-class women to breastfeed. Feminist academics will rise up against campus "micro-aggressions" but the regular wage exploitation of poor women by the likes of female academics, female lawyers, etc., goes on daily with impunity.

What I'm getting at is: despite its pretensions, feminism is not an ideology for all women. It's a movement built by a particular slice of (generally elite) Western women, for a particular slice of (generally elite) Western women. It's about protecting the privileges of women who take on a more masculine social role. Women who consciously, voluntarily choose to adhere to more traditional feminine social roles are seen as being below them. This may be too sweeping of a statement, but I see feminism as something of an internalization of attitudes that look down on femininity and extol masculinity. Feminist pretensions to progressive politics are bogus, unless your definition of progressive politics is limited to "LGBT and gender issues". Notice how the internet "Social Justice Warriors" hardly speak out on economic issues, foreign policy issues, hardly seem charitable or civic-minded at all, but are loud as hell on sexual identity issues? The progressive label is just a cloak. So, TL;DR ... Feminism is an elitist ideology. Anyone care to challenge my view?