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From: jamcmullan@watmath.UUCP (Judy McMullan)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Male feminists?
Message-ID: <6058@watmath.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 1-Nov-83 17:10:53 EST
Article-I.D.: watmath.6058
Posted: Tue Nov  1 17:10:53 1983
Date-Received: Wed, 2-Nov-83 01:23:29 EST
Organization: U of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 53

The recent submissions about whether a man should/can call himself a
feminist have prompted me to post a portion of a lecture that Margaret 
Atwood gave at the University of Waterloo, last year. I was so impressed
with her definition of feminism that I copied it down. I have reproduced
it here without permission. I can't recall the exact words of the question
that she was answering but I believe it was "Are you a feminist?".

       "Feminist issues are not just for women.  They  are  human  rights
	issues  just  as  war  should  not  concern men alone though it's
	mostly men in the front lines. I find men who  react  to  women's
	issues or women's studies with the standard paranoia, "Why do you
	hate  men?"  and  so  forth,  understandable  but   ignorant.   A
	university is not a place where ignorance should be encouraged. I
	look forward, however, to the time when both feminist groups  and
	wars will no longer be with us, having become obsolete.
	
	
	Here's another answer.
	
	
	Any woman who can read and write is a  feminist.  People  chained
	themselves to fences and starved and were beaten up and killed to
	get you that right.
	Any woman who has  legal  rights  over  her  own  children  is  a
	feminist. Remember the origin of the word "family". It comes from
	Roman "familia" which meant the total group of people  controlled
	by a male householder including women, children and slaves.
	Any woman who is allowed to vote is a feminist.  We've  only  had
	that right here [Ontario] for 52 years.
	Any woman or man who believes in equal pay for equal  work  is  a
	feminist.
	Any man who doesn't believe it's his God-given privilege to  beat
	up  or  kill  his  wife  or  sexually  molest  his  children is a
	feminist.
	Any woman or man who is against rape and violent pornography, who
	isn't  turned on by movies of women being strangled, disemboweled
	and hung up with meat hooks, is a feminist.
	Any one, woman or man, who thinks a man should be  judged  as  to
	his   worthiness   by  qualities  such  as  a  sense  of  humour,
	admirableness of character, helpfulness in a  tight  spot,  moral
	integrity,  inventiveness,  creativity of any kind, courteousness
	and courage, and not just as a money-making robot, is a feminist.
	Because  if  women  are forced to depend on men for food, that is
	how they will tend to evaluate men  and  no  man  I've  ever  met
	really likes to be loved just for his bank account.

	Hands up for the feminists in this room."

			--Margaret Atwood
			(about) February 1982

   --Judy McMullan
   ...!{allegra|decvax}!watmath!jamcmullan