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From: mpmst7@unix.cis.pitt.EDU (Mark P Mccullagh)
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Feminism and simplification
Message-ID: <54498@unix.cis.pitt.edu>
Date: 30 Oct 90 16:55:49 GMT
Organization: Univ. of Pittsburgh, Dept. of Philosophy
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Judy Leedom Tyrer writes:

Your statement seems to boil down to "men have ruined the earth
because they are inherantly competetive and women will save the earth
because they are inherantly cooperative."  This is a prime example of
the "everything evil is caused by men" diatribe which I think is so
detrimental to the feminist movement.  It is sexist, patently false,
and overly simplistic.


Gordon Fitch replies:

The fact remains that until quite recently, historically speaking, the
values of aggression and domination were associated with men and were
highly valued, and the values of cooperation and care were considered
second-rate, if not despised, and were associated with women.  This
system of values obtained for many centuries, and much of the ruin of
the earth, as well as an enormous amount of human suffering, seems to
derive from it.

Feminists...would have to confront this set of facts in working out
their feminism...


I think:

The kind of frustration *I* feel is not about the truth or falsity of
the claims, but rather about how vague and useless they are.  If
feminists have to choose which values to adopt (how this makes them
different from anyone else, I don't know), and all they are offered is
an *extremely* simplistic menu of bad, macho, aggressive stuff vs.
nice, kind, sweet stuff, the choice is clear: pick Curtain No. 2.

But, if we are not to hide under some conceptual rug the existence of
men who have many of the qualities on your "female" list, and women
who have many of the qualities on your "male" list, we must move
beyond this binary outlook altogether.  *All together*, too -- surely
if feminism is the business of rethinking values that have
demonstrably caused misery and environmental damage, it's something
men should want to do too.

One could, of course, say that there are reasons for women to adopt a
certain set of values that are *not* also reasons for men to adopt the
same set.  But in that case, one is coming close to the claim that men
*should* have the set that you characterized them as having (macho,
bad stuff).  And the closer one gets to that, the more one loses any
ground for criticizing men who hold that set of values.  Is this where
feminism is going?  Does the very name "feminism" imply separatism?  I
don't know, but then again I don't know much about feminism.  I hope
it's more than the thought that there is something interesting to be
said about two-column lists of values.

Mark McCullagh