I'm a feminist and I don't agree with your definition, because I don't agree with the claim "society generally treats men more fairly than women". For 2 reasons:
1. I think that certain pockets treat men worse and certain pockets treat women worse. I think it's hard to divide society "genera…
I'm a feminist and I don't agree with your definition, because I don't agree with the claim "society generally treats men more fairly than women". For 2 reasons:
1. I think that certain pockets treat men worse and certain pockets treat women worse. I think it's hard to divide society "generally" here. And when you consider public society vs private society, it gets even harder. I'll remind that it's feminists who first brought up gender roles harming men. Many feminists have sons and husbands they love after all. I think serious feminists should specialize into the gendered-topic where they think they can do the most good. For example, in college I was engaged in a lot of consent and anti-rape dialogue. That was 13 years ago so it was still really neglected back then—people would really argue about it and victim-blame, and you could actually disprove them and change their minds on what type of treatment is possible and ethical in the bedroom and courting. But if I had to pick a topic today to harp on about, it would probably be how messed up dating life and dating culture is (for both genders).
2. Even if I wanted to take the one-sided slant you are, your use of the term "fair" is strange here. I think the word you are looking for is "favorably".
That said, I'm a weird feminist that has stubbornly decided to still call myself one despite some embarrassment around it. For a while I thought, "People misunderstand and misconstrue feminist goals and ways of thinking, and it'll be embarrassing if people do that to me". But then I decided to focus more on how people would be wrong to do that rather than make decisions based on embarrassment. Thing is, that in recent years, I see people pre-dismiss the true and useful points made by self-described feminists because calling oneself a feminist makes one pattern-match a big, bad SJW who doesn't listen and so can't have the full story. So I'd like to remind people that feminists have good points, by naming myself a feminist and being rational anyway, I guess. I have no idea how much of what a feminist says is actually worth listening to (both novel to the listener and correct). It could be anywhere from 0-100%, depending on the feminist, the topic at hand, and the listener. But I think usually there is something there the listener could apply to their own life if they listen. I'm not so worried about people in this blogosphere dismissing the good points of feminists. I think that people here will usually avoid the ad hominem tactic of dismissing [anyone who'd call themselves a feminist] and try to take in good faith what each feminist says to you. But many people don't. You can see their noses wrinkle when the word feminism is brought up, and I just don't think that is fair or likely to lead to good things..? My passive and easy way to help with this problem is to keep calling myself a feminist and change people's minds about feminists where I can.
Another thing to keep in mind is that modern feminism leaks into a lot more topics than you'd think. So I think its usefulness is not done! Feminism as social justice movement has created a lot of spaces where people reflect on gender as it relates to their actual happiness and such (what policy should care about, one day). And just the other day (at a conference of educated people!) I was reminded there is more to do to get feminists ideas out there: A man I was speaking to said he is against polyamory because he thought cheating works better on a society-wide scale.. Agreements to and consenting expectations of the women in your life be damned, I guess? He also said he was against gay marriage because "children need a mother". He thought that gays and lesbians should marry eachother so they can perform traditional gender roles for kids. So, in like 2 minutes that was a lot of topics (monogamy, forced marriage, partner transparency, erasure of gay people, parenting roles, passing the bucks of happiness and freedom onto the next generation) that feminist dialogue can help inform compassionate and useful views on.
So I think feminism's usefulness isn't done. Feminism is theory, but it's also the collected reflections on the all-important feelings and life outcomes of women and men when faced with certain gender roles, laws, experiences, etc. It's provides a toolkit and some answers that I think we should keep at hand while we design modern society. I can definitely see personal freedoms backsliding some before they get better (as with abortion rights), if we don't have people actively on the lookout for gender-based mistreatment. Those people on the lookout tend to be feminists. This is not surprising since we know that giving people a label makes them more attached and invested in ideas.
FWIW, I think the men's rights movement has done some of this right. But they've also done much of it horribly, with much less inquisitiveness, broad of a focus, and dialogue that takes everyone's needs into account and prioritizes freedom over gender roles than the feminist movement. I think there are way more anti-collabrative, self-interested, spiteful, and sexist bad apples among MRAs than feminists. And from what I can make out reading the subtext, I think the men's rights movement's societal endgoal looks a lot less collaborative, fulfilling, emotionally healthy, and happy then the feminist movement's societal endgoal. More a dystopia than a utopia.
Anyway, diversity within the feminist movement isn't so unusual. Feminists have been going by different credos for a long time (third wave called themselves feminists despite not agreeing with 2nd wave feminists, etc).
But it makes it hard to come up with a coherent definition. If I had to try to define it:
Feminist: Someone who believes that men and women should be treated equitably, and that there is still more noteworthy work to be done on this front. They believe that societal changes necessary to increase future happiness and prosperity regardless of gender are unlikely to happen without further targeted action. This action usually includes but isn't limited to: mass reflection and dialogue around shared gendered experiences, large-scale collaboration and study into what gender equity means and how to ensure it, and society-wide interventions (including across cultures). Feminists believe this work is morally imperative. Feminists also believe that ideally changes should be designed and checked with help from people who specifically care about ensuring gender equity as opposed to some other self-interested goal (eg, we can't trust free markets to solve it properly alone). While feminists may disagree on what actions to focus on, they do agree that it is unlikely that systems of gender oppression (of all kinds: micro or macro, anti-men or anti-women, intentional or unintentional) will be noticed, dismantled, and replaced with better systems and culture without the involvement of gender-educated, sociologically-informed advocates. Feminists try to be these advocates as part of their civic duty. This inherent civic duty varies hugely but is always present: Some are hugely-dedicated primary changemakers. But many other feminists aim to be useful mainly privately and when needed in their daily lives, such as by being active listeners on gender issues, to look out for the people in their lives being mistreated based on gender and to say something when they see something, to dismantle sexist tendencies within themselves, and to support efforts to create more equitable systems when suggestions come up in their own sphere (such as workplace or home)."
In other words, yes, most people think that women and men should be treated equally/equitably. But people who call themselves feminists think there is still a reason/need to call oneself a feminist specifically and see themselves as part of a broader movement of people working together (even pretty passively) to ensure positive change around gendered experiences. Feminism is maligned enough now that no one calls themselves one otherwise tbh 😅
I believe my definition also captures feminists' low trust in systems (society, govt, corporations, etc). Feminists don't expect people in charge of systems to notice problems, self-correct, and maintain corrections, and it is this framework which necessitates citizen action (even if it's mild like calling out your buddy on his sexist joke, but it can go so far as micromanaging social change in sometimes misguided ways). Feminists are basically people trying things for themselves. I think it's okay to note that feminism does have more of a focus on women than men. On one hand, this might make sense for now given how socially entrenched the mistreatment of women has been. Backsliding is a real risk and keeping the pressure on and trying to make sure you catch all the injustices toward women which might correlate with all the really bad things we have mostly handled, might make sense for a little longer. Additionally, if you want to do your best work, it often makes sense to focus on things you understand best, and women do understand women's issues better than they understand men's. On the other hand, I wish men would talk more about men's rights under feminism. I used to see that more. I'm afraid the MRA movement swept many men up which is too bad, and some extremist feminists probably accelerated men's aversion to feminism despite the desires of other feminists.
(I put my own definition of feminism at the end)
I'm a feminist and I don't agree with your definition, because I don't agree with the claim "society generally treats men more fairly than women". For 2 reasons:
1. I think that certain pockets treat men worse and certain pockets treat women worse. I think it's hard to divide society "generally" here. And when you consider public society vs private society, it gets even harder. I'll remind that it's feminists who first brought up gender roles harming men. Many feminists have sons and husbands they love after all. I think serious feminists should specialize into the gendered-topic where they think they can do the most good. For example, in college I was engaged in a lot of consent and anti-rape dialogue. That was 13 years ago so it was still really neglected back then—people would really argue about it and victim-blame, and you could actually disprove them and change their minds on what type of treatment is possible and ethical in the bedroom and courting. But if I had to pick a topic today to harp on about, it would probably be how messed up dating life and dating culture is (for both genders).
2. Even if I wanted to take the one-sided slant you are, your use of the term "fair" is strange here. I think the word you are looking for is "favorably".
That said, I'm a weird feminist that has stubbornly decided to still call myself one despite some embarrassment around it. For a while I thought, "People misunderstand and misconstrue feminist goals and ways of thinking, and it'll be embarrassing if people do that to me". But then I decided to focus more on how people would be wrong to do that rather than make decisions based on embarrassment. Thing is, that in recent years, I see people pre-dismiss the true and useful points made by self-described feminists because calling oneself a feminist makes one pattern-match a big, bad SJW who doesn't listen and so can't have the full story. So I'd like to remind people that feminists have good points, by naming myself a feminist and being rational anyway, I guess. I have no idea how much of what a feminist says is actually worth listening to (both novel to the listener and correct). It could be anywhere from 0-100%, depending on the feminist, the topic at hand, and the listener. But I think usually there is something there the listener could apply to their own life if they listen. I'm not so worried about people in this blogosphere dismissing the good points of feminists. I think that people here will usually avoid the ad hominem tactic of dismissing [anyone who'd call themselves a feminist] and try to take in good faith what each feminist says to you. But many people don't. You can see their noses wrinkle when the word feminism is brought up, and I just don't think that is fair or likely to lead to good things..? My passive and easy way to help with this problem is to keep calling myself a feminist and change people's minds about feminists where I can.
Another thing to keep in mind is that modern feminism leaks into a lot more topics than you'd think. So I think its usefulness is not done! Feminism as social justice movement has created a lot of spaces where people reflect on gender as it relates to their actual happiness and such (what policy should care about, one day). And just the other day (at a conference of educated people!) I was reminded there is more to do to get feminists ideas out there: A man I was speaking to said he is against polyamory because he thought cheating works better on a society-wide scale.. Agreements to and consenting expectations of the women in your life be damned, I guess? He also said he was against gay marriage because "children need a mother". He thought that gays and lesbians should marry eachother so they can perform traditional gender roles for kids. So, in like 2 minutes that was a lot of topics (monogamy, forced marriage, partner transparency, erasure of gay people, parenting roles, passing the bucks of happiness and freedom onto the next generation) that feminist dialogue can help inform compassionate and useful views on.
So I think feminism's usefulness isn't done. Feminism is theory, but it's also the collected reflections on the all-important feelings and life outcomes of women and men when faced with certain gender roles, laws, experiences, etc. It's provides a toolkit and some answers that I think we should keep at hand while we design modern society. I can definitely see personal freedoms backsliding some before they get better (as with abortion rights), if we don't have people actively on the lookout for gender-based mistreatment. Those people on the lookout tend to be feminists. This is not surprising since we know that giving people a label makes them more attached and invested in ideas.
FWIW, I think the men's rights movement has done some of this right. But they've also done much of it horribly, with much less inquisitiveness, broad of a focus, and dialogue that takes everyone's needs into account and prioritizes freedom over gender roles than the feminist movement. I think there are way more anti-collabrative, self-interested, spiteful, and sexist bad apples among MRAs than feminists. And from what I can make out reading the subtext, I think the men's rights movement's societal endgoal looks a lot less collaborative, fulfilling, emotionally healthy, and happy then the feminist movement's societal endgoal. More a dystopia than a utopia.
Anyway, diversity within the feminist movement isn't so unusual. Feminists have been going by different credos for a long time (third wave called themselves feminists despite not agreeing with 2nd wave feminists, etc).
But it makes it hard to come up with a coherent definition. If I had to try to define it:
Feminist: Someone who believes that men and women should be treated equitably, and that there is still more noteworthy work to be done on this front. They believe that societal changes necessary to increase future happiness and prosperity regardless of gender are unlikely to happen without further targeted action. This action usually includes but isn't limited to: mass reflection and dialogue around shared gendered experiences, large-scale collaboration and study into what gender equity means and how to ensure it, and society-wide interventions (including across cultures). Feminists believe this work is morally imperative. Feminists also believe that ideally changes should be designed and checked with help from people who specifically care about ensuring gender equity as opposed to some other self-interested goal (eg, we can't trust free markets to solve it properly alone). While feminists may disagree on what actions to focus on, they do agree that it is unlikely that systems of gender oppression (of all kinds: micro or macro, anti-men or anti-women, intentional or unintentional) will be noticed, dismantled, and replaced with better systems and culture without the involvement of gender-educated, sociologically-informed advocates. Feminists try to be these advocates as part of their civic duty. This inherent civic duty varies hugely but is always present: Some are hugely-dedicated primary changemakers. But many other feminists aim to be useful mainly privately and when needed in their daily lives, such as by being active listeners on gender issues, to look out for the people in their lives being mistreated based on gender and to say something when they see something, to dismantle sexist tendencies within themselves, and to support efforts to create more equitable systems when suggestions come up in their own sphere (such as workplace or home)."
In other words, yes, most people think that women and men should be treated equally/equitably. But people who call themselves feminists think there is still a reason/need to call oneself a feminist specifically and see themselves as part of a broader movement of people working together (even pretty passively) to ensure positive change around gendered experiences. Feminism is maligned enough now that no one calls themselves one otherwise tbh 😅
I believe my definition also captures feminists' low trust in systems (society, govt, corporations, etc). Feminists don't expect people in charge of systems to notice problems, self-correct, and maintain corrections, and it is this framework which necessitates citizen action (even if it's mild like calling out your buddy on his sexist joke, but it can go so far as micromanaging social change in sometimes misguided ways). Feminists are basically people trying things for themselves. I think it's okay to note that feminism does have more of a focus on women than men. On one hand, this might make sense for now given how socially entrenched the mistreatment of women has been. Backsliding is a real risk and keeping the pressure on and trying to make sure you catch all the injustices toward women which might correlate with all the really bad things we have mostly handled, might make sense for a little longer. Additionally, if you want to do your best work, it often makes sense to focus on things you understand best, and women do understand women's issues better than they understand men's. On the other hand, I wish men would talk more about men's rights under feminism. I used to see that more. I'm afraid the MRA movement swept many men up which is too bad, and some extremist feminists probably accelerated men's aversion to feminism despite the desires of other feminists.