Posts by giovanni tiso
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Up Front: Say When, in reply to Bart Janssen,
But my problem still stands, when you say you're a feminist you mean something different from when Deborah says she is a feminist and when Jacqui says
I'm sorry - how is that a problem? They may all mean different things, but in applying the label to themselves they're indicating that they care more to claim the things that feminists have in common than to disclaim the things that set them apart.
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Up Front: Say When, in reply to Bart Janssen,
Emma's discussion of her freedom to wear what she wants without be abused no longer exists. That strongly suggests the label is not helpful.
I wouldn't be so sure, given that in the early hours of this thread Emma herself tweeted this.
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Up Front: Say When, in reply to Bart Janssen,
Do you really need to be labelled Ben? What’s wrong with having ideas and opinions and experiences and thoughts without having a label?
Sometimes it's about making a stand. I consider myself pro-feminist and a socialist. I could fudge or overcomplicate either position so that people won't pigeonhole me or caricature me, but those are good descriptors of my politics and it would be a little precious of me not to use them. Besides, "Hi I'm Bart" might work at a dinner party, but in order to organise politically you simply need other people, and to identify with a variety of groups and currents of thought. Labels can be affirming and also say true things about who you are.
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Up Front: Say When, in reply to Islander,
We tend to get totally ignored.
Even here.But not here, I noticed.
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Up Front: Say When, in reply to linger,
Agreed – but I’d note that “not the same” is not necessarily “worse”.
Can we agree that speaking for people is problematic? Wouldn't it be better if people with disabilities were able, enabled, allowed to speak for themselves? And for me the same goes for feminism. I'm not discriminated on the basis of gender. I can make an honest effort to understand what it's like, or what it's like to have my sexuality scrutinised, etc. but it will never replace the actual experience of it. And without the experience of it, I question my capacity to imagine an alternative to it (since I believe it's not just a matter of, say, "abolishing sexism" - it goes beyond that). In fact to the extent that I have an understanding of any of this it is because I have been schooled by a variety of women over the years, through books and internet forums but mostly in person. A whole heap of stuff was not obvious to me, and some of it still isn't I'm sure. Hell, am I a wholly lovely, progressive, equality-conscious male? No. There's still a lot of shit there, you can't just wish it or reason it away.
Which is not to say that every woman experiences every form of gender discrimination, either, or that there aren't many that cross the gender barrier. But I'd rather it was them who got to speak about and against the oppression that women still suffer (sometimes from other women). It seems... safer that way, if nothing else.
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Up Front: Say When, in reply to ,
I don’t particularly think the adult on adult statistics are particularly relevant other than to say that adult men are less vulnerable to female rapists.
That's not inconsequential, also in terms of how that power imbalance is amplified by enabling social conventions that excuse adult on adult rape to this day.
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Ta, Steven. This would still make males account for a vast majority of cases - which is not to say that sexual abuse perpretrated by females is any less traumatic or in any way excusable.
(In fact I remember that research from an earlier discussion. But - and again, without prejudice to what you're saying - the statistics on adult-on-adult rape are quite different, aren't they?)
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Up Front: Say When, in reply to Russell Brown,
Gio, Steven has written similar things here before, and I don't think he'll mind me saying that it's not born of theory or evidence, but extremely traumatic personal experience. I'd just ask you and others to bear that in mind in your responses. Ta.
Yes, I didn't mean to appear confrontational in my response. I think my statement may well be ignorant but is borne out by our crime statistics at the very least - we could just leave it at that. Or not, I don't mean to foreclose any discussion either.
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I would submit that it is more than acceptable to have a debate on the relative merits of different currents of feminism, and that reducing it simply to a matter of choice would run the danger of glossing over how some choices are made possible by privilege. Nina Power for instance in One Dimensional Woman makes a case against what she calls consumer feminism and I think it's perfecly tenable.
However using the label "lifestyle feminism" without an actual argument behind it strikes me as more of a passing, gratuitous sneer than anything else.
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Up Front: Say When, in reply to ,
I was just asking that we really do some real research and also establish what constitutes rape, before bellowing out bullshit statements.
I'll own up to that. If you want to disabuse me of the notion that most rapists are men, I will most certainly examine whatever research you have to send my way, and amend my position if necessary.