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From: djo@PacBell.COM (Dan'l DanehyOakes)
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Re: It's too late (Was Re: umm...silly question, but...)
Message-ID: <11912@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU>
Date: 8 Jun 89 16:57:00 GMT
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Reply-To: djo@PacBell.COM (Dan'l DanehyOakes)
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In article <17048@paris.ics.uci.edu> gazit@cs.duke.edu (Hillel Gazit) writes:
>
>Every revolutionary movement (and feminism was one) has two stages...  
>...Stage 2 is when the movement has some power, and it is willing to lose
>some of its ideology to keep the power.

...

>In that stage the movement is dominated by older (above thirty)
>people.  

My, how agist.  (Though I'm speaking as someone about to turn 31 and so am,
perhaps, a bit hypersensitive to that particular remark.)

>I see several of the stage 2 signs in feminism:
>1) It supports unequal treatment of people by gender (AA and so on).

I'm sure you've heard this before but perhaps it will get through this time:

"Equal" opportunity is not equal if different groups are not given equal oppor-
tunity to prepare to grasp it.

A good analogy would be giving one political party access to four major networks
and giving the other access to a soapbox in Central Park.  Both sides are free
to say whatever they want, via whatever media are available to them.  Is free
speech served?

Similarly, if society is split into two groups, and group "a" is given
significantly greater educational benefits than group "b," then does an "equal 
opportunity" system based purely on educational qualification -- i.e., the 
hiring system for nearly every well-paying job in society -- actually serve the
principle of equal opportunity?

Believe me, this was a difficult pill for me to swallow; I'm a middle-class
white male.  But logic dictates that an imbalance can only be corrected by an
opposing force.

>2) It shuts up about unequal treatment of people as long as women don't hurt
>   (registration to draft, custody battles).

Not the feminists I talk to.

>3) The message to the outside is not clear.  Try for example to ask
>   a feminist a question like "for how long AA will last?"

Try to ask a physicist a question like "for how long will the universe last?"
You ask for prophecy?  Go to a prophet.  I don't know anyone who claims to be
both a prophet and a feminist.

>4) It tries to manipulate men by slogans like "men dominated the world for the
>   last 3,000 years".  The idea is not to help men to grow out of their sexism,
>   but to induce guilt.  Men are always presented as a group, not individuals.

*THIS*, at least, is a frequently-true statement.  But here's where I quibble
seriously with your semantics:  "It supports," "It shuts up about," "It tries."

You are guilty of your own accusation, treating "feminists" as a group rather
than as individuals.  Indeed, not only as a group (which would more properly
be referred to as "they") but as a homogeneous mass ("it").

"Feminism" doesn't say, support, shut up about, or try to do *anything*.
Individual feminists individually say, support, shut up about, or try to do any
number of things, generally all different from one another.

>I don't think that feminism has (even though it had) a chance to have
>a real partnership with men.  Because it did not want to and 1) and 2)
>were around long enough to break the any trust.  We can see it in the
>battle of ERA.  Men did very little for either side, they were in a
>state of apathy.  From one side most of us don't trust feminism, from
>the other side we have the guilt feeling.

Gaaaaaaah.  Now you're making equally sweeping statements about "men" -- just as
you accused "feminism" of making.  Speak fer yerself, boyo.  Me, I find I'm
perfectly happy partnered with feminists; I find that I trust women at least as
much as I do men; I spent a summer in high school stumping for the ERA.  And I
don't have guilt feelings.

Not to say I don't find sexist attitudes in myself; everyone in this culture
contains sexist, racist, etc., attitudes and can deny having them only at the
price of lying to themselves.  But you can defuse them by acknowledging their
existence -- and that's far more productive than "guilt feelings."  I don't
feel guilty about society; I didn't make it.  When *individual* feminists (or
female sexists, or non-white racists) try to lay guilt on me I just smile and
thank them.



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