Newsgroups: soc.feminism
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From: farmerl@handel.CS.ColoState.Edu (lisa ann farmer)
Subject: Re: Why I Am Not a Feminist
Status: R
Message-ID: <14553@ccncsu.ColoState.EDU>
Originator: nadel@aerospace.aero.org
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Sender: news@ccncsu.ColoState.EDU
Reply-To: handel!farmerl@ccncsu.ColoState.EDU (lisa ann farmer)
Organization: Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO  80523
References: <2805efd1.34d0@petunia.CalPoly.EDU> <1991Apr14.222759.13730@casbah.acns.nwu.edu> <14423@ccncsu.ColoState.EDU> <1991Apr23.120320.17660@cs.cornell.edu>
Date: 27 Apr 91 07:00:41 GMT
Approved: nadel@aerospace.aero.org
Lines: 94


In article <1991Apr23.120320.17660@cs.cornell.edu> murthy@cs.cornell.edu (Chet Murthy) writes:
>
>
>But Lisa, you make the (very large) assumption that women are
>oppressed in our society more than men are.  Now, you can make that
>assumption .  And a lot of people wil support you on it.  But the
>principal tenet upon which Dave Gross' essay is based is the belief
>that men are as equally oppressed as women in this society.

I don't deny that men are oppressed - but I don't think they are oppressed 
_because_ they are male. There are many issues that any individual can be
oppressed in (well any individual excect the white,able,upper-class,"young",
etc. male).  I am not saying that those people don't feel pain but they have the
power to change the system,not me.
I also don't want to get into the issue of "more" oppressed - I cannot tell 
anyone that my pain is greater than theirs - it all hurts.

>
>happened to me I wouldn't be complaining".  The point I am trying to
>make is that until you have walked a mile in my shoes, you cannot
>understand what I have gone thru.  And you can never do more than nod
>your head, either in agreement, or disagreement, when I talk about my
>oppression and anger.
>
But I am walking in "your shoes".  In order for me to "succeed" in this 
world I have to follow the "White male system" rules.  I have had to cover 
up who I am just to get along.  I would like to be able to _not_ shave my legs
and I don't most of the time _but_ when I go out interviewing...I think both
men and womyn are hurt by the system but if I try to change it I am told that
1)I am overreacting to <insert common thing> 2)I am a bitch 3) What is wrong
with the way things are now? etc.  As a male you have more power to change 
the system because males made it in the first place and they won't tell you
that you are a bitch etc.  (I do realize that your ideas may be ignored - but
they aren't ignored _because_ of your gender)

>Let me tell you a little about my anger.  When a man says "I support
>women's rights, but for me, I want a little woman to stay at home and
>be a good wife and mother", we call him a chauvinist.  We call his
>wife (when she hits 40, and realizes what she's been hoodwinked into)
>oppressed.  When a woman sets herself up with an education (or lack
>thereof) which guarantees that she can't support a husband and
>children, and then she marries a man who can support her and her
>children, we call her "traditional", and many women I have met say
>that, even though they might not like her choice, they must "respect"
>it.

Did this woman come up with this idea on her own?  No way - she was taught
to think that way just as the male was.  When your parents, school, religion,
peer group, society etc tell you that you will go to college to find a 
husband what else are you supposed to think?  I have to respect that womyn
because if I try to "change" her she will rebel against anything anyone says
that is contradictory to the way she was brought up.  If I don't respect her,
and ignore that she exists there will be no chance to educate her -whether it
is to encourage her to go back to school or to get involved.               
>
>I want to be a househusband on the same terms that the women of my
>class can be housewives, Lisa.  I want a wife that can support me as
>well as I can support her.  And let me tell you, they are hard to
>find.  Because most women that I have met in my economic class want a
>man who is even better-off.

I think it is fine that men want to be househusbands.  The only problem I have
with it is that I think parenting and housekeeping(etc) should be a more shared
venture and that having "specific" roles for mom and dad won't help society 
at all.  Anyways, it is unrealistic (in most cases) to be a one-income home. 

>
>By the way, for me, it is not the man-hating part of most feminist
>though that bothers me.  It is the hypocrisy.  Most of what I see with
>the label feminist is, either overtly or covertly, hypocritical.  And
>as such, well, in the long run, NOTHING will come of it.

I don't know if I posted it here or not but everyone expects feminism to be
this totally correct thing on one try.  I picture this balance with two 
sides of society - people expect feminism to give it one push and viola 
everything is equal.  But sometimes it is going to be pushed too far and 
sometimes not hard enough but at least someone is pushing!  All we can hope
for is that all this talk, all this trying _will_ change the system if even
just a little bit.
>
>--chet--

Lisa
farmerl @handel.cs.colostate.edu
P.S.(I don't know how the tone of this came off but I hope not badly.  I just
wanted to say that this semester at Colorado State a "Men and Masculinity"
course was offered - there was actually an article in the newspaper about it-
I think that class is exactly what this society needs to start breaking down
more of the barriers that men have.  )




