Feminism

Feminism. It's quite the movement. Seems to mean a whole bunch of things. A great deal of issues in the world involve women, so it shouldn't be a surprise that organizations like NOW seem to have something to say about every facet of society. Feminist groups have a lot of views I do agree with. Most of the time.

What the hell is feminism anyways? Feminism is, from the dictionary, "Belief in the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes" or similarly from wikipedia, "a social theory and political movement primarily informed and motivated by the experience of women. While generally providing a critique of social relations, many proponents of feminism also focus on analyzing gender inequality and the promotion of women's rights, interests, and issues."

All this sounds fine and dandy. I had expected to come to the conclusion that I am a feminist. (Males can be feminists, just like females can be fascists) But, I'm not. Actually, not only am I not a feminist, I hate the word feminism.

The problem with "feminism" is it sounds too much like "communism". Many men associate the word to man-hating. And with good reason, because while if you're a feminist it doesn't necessary mean you are a man-hater, but I'd say all man-haters are self-proclaimed feminists. This gives all the other, sane feminists a bad name. I don't understand how a movement promoting gender equality exists under such a gender-specific banner.

The one thing I love about the feminist movement is their push to end violence against women. They'll make little banners and wave them around, "Stop Violence Against Women". Wait a moment. What about violence against men? Or bunny rabbits? That's for a different protest, this is about violence against women. See I dont understand why they go to the effort of writing "Against Women" as if violence against women was any worse than any other sort of violence. Violence should be stopped in general. Save some letters and just write "Stop Violence". You'll get more supporters.

Besides being a little confused about the whole violence thing, feminism does have great ideas. Yet, feminism still has a bad reputation amoung males, even though its goals align closely to that of the typical male.

Here's some ideals feminism likes to put forward and why males should support them:

• Women should be educated.
  Yes, women need to go get edumacated, just like everyone else. How the hell are any of the tough problems going to be solved if everyone is contented to stay a moron? Imagine a wife that has the brains to manage the investments, fix the truck and secure your wireless network. Thats a keeper.


• A qualified woman should be given any job/task she wants
  If women want to be programmers or mechanics, that's great. All fields need more good workers.


• Women should be free from sexual repression
  This basically means something like no more burkas or female circumcision. It also means getting rid of the idea that only virgins are "clean", and installing the idea that women can sleep with whoever they want. In this light, Feminism is all about creating inhibition-free, horny women. Hooooray!

But then there are things feminists bitch about that men don't need to listen to very much, things like:

• The media's portrayal of women, blah blah blah blah.
  Somehow, the latest issue of Cosmopolitian or Vogue has too many pictures of supermodels which portray beauty as something not physically possible. Apparentely the media helps cause anorexia and bulimia, which is probably true. But don't fucking tell me about it! When do guys buy an issue of Cosmo? When girls ask for it! The money supporting this media isn't coming from the male population, because males that know anything don't wank to Vogue. Use some brain cells and figure out that the salaries for supermodels are supported my mostly female consumers.


• There are no women in engineering and science, and that's a problem.
  Cry me a river! A lot of women complain, "oh there aren't enough women in engineering" to which I usually say, "there aren't any men in fine arts". Then they usually say something like "yeah, thats true, but engineering is where the money is and it remains an old boys club!" Sure, having a lack of women in engineering creates a wide difference in incomes, but what people don't realize is that males in engineering would kill to have some females in the classroom. Males don't need to change their attitudes about having women in the sciences, women need to change their attitudes about being in the sciences. Saying "I'm in engineering" to a girl on campus is usually a game-ender, as the typical girl exhibits ZERO interest in the subject. Don't nag me, nag her.

So no, I am not a feminist. But I am a supporter of gender equality. I just don't like the title of "feminist" and I don't think the other feminists would enjoy my presence at their lunches.

Now, moving away from "feminism", what the hell does gender equality mean?

• "Never hit a Woman" is no longer a law
  If a woman punches me with the intention of inflicting injury, I'm punching her back. I don't care if she's your mom or a nun.


• She has to open her own damn doors and share the bills
  I'm not going to roll out any red carpet. She's just as capable a person as I am. Tradition is gone, therefore chivarly is gone. If she wants me to assume the role of the white knight, well, let's just say the white knight doesn't cook his own food... and it sure as hell isn't macaroni and cheese.

Support gender equality. It's in your best interests.