quote:

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I like pamused ideas to "ignite" the blogosphere with discussion, memes, etc. Lets starts a "five things feminists did for me this week" meme (e.g. I got to use birth control!). It would be good to use these developments as a springboard for discussion. - polly jones

i think the "5 things a feminist did for me" idea is brilliant. rather than attack the philosophical positions of real women and some of their blogging heads (ie big blue wave), we focus on the gains made on behalf of canadians by feminism. specific examples that are the results of funding provided by the SWC are particularily compelling.

i suggest we establish a list of bloggers from any community who are willing to write a post listing "5 things feminism did for me this week". once the group is established, we agree on a day and time to post our lists as a collective voice.

we create our own "meme" by flooding the progressive bloggers aggregator with our lists. many of our dear friends from the bloggingtories regularily troll progressive blogs and they would not be able to resist the bait.

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2. I got acknowledged as a person

3. i no longer have to put up with sexual harrassment in the work place.

4. I have had more career opportunities with equal wages

5. I got equal property rights in the event of marriage breakdown

6.I have the right to choose

7. Safety from abusive marriages and partnerships

8. I can go topless just as men do on hot days

9. My husband can be a better father

10. Can be taken seriously if sexually assaulted

11. My husband cannot sexually assault me.

Oh no, wait, I guess we're not quite there yet.

1. I started in a "male" job and would never have made it past the starting gate without pressure from women's groups on major corporations.

2. Women in politics and business have become role models in visible leadership (despite the fact that we still aren't far enough advanced).

3. The language of work has changed dramatically and stereotypes are no longer politically correct - I have felt the difference in the environment.

4. I now have rights under the law - not just on paper but I actually must be treated like a person of value.

5. I watch young women take for granted those things that I fought so hard to do when I was younger and I am so happy. They can put their energy into their own lives and not worry about what others think of them.

6. I now go to the bank as a single woman and do not feel like I am not quite good enough or not quite worthy enough to be trusted.

7. Professions are becoming more equally represented with women - making the chance for leadership roles for young women more possible.

8. Trades, with the stablity of earnings, are beginning to be more accessible to women - including the police, fire departments, construction, armed forces, and apprenticeships

Those are my main reasons why feminism has been important to me. It is not just the overall societal changes that count - it is my life that changed as I watched and worked.

quote:

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Originally posted by jeff house:
I think feminism really helped me to understand the need to treat others as equals, and to root out deeply inscribed prejudices.

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That is a very good point alright jeff, and I would add it is my opinion that tolerance towards those with physical amnd mental challenges have also gained recognition and societal understanding, though there is still a ways to go, because of the feminist movement.

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Originally posted by strata:
I now go to the bank as a single woman and do not feel like I am not quite good enough or not quite worthy enough to be trusted...There is so much more to do. The glass ceilings need to be broken for the changes to continue.

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quote:

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Originally posted by remind:

8. I can go topless just as men do on hot days

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I think various towns have made bylaws claiming that it is nonetheless contrary to local law, and these are commonly enforced.

I know someone was booted out of the Fergus, Ontario swimming pool for that reason.

Frankly, the thought that the right to go topless was a pressing point of oppression was more indicative of the mindset of leftish upper middle class white students that anything else. I remember women's rights activists involved in immigrant communities in Toronto just baffled that anyone could consider this to be more pressing than childcare, pay equity, violence against women, discrimination against women of colour in hiring or a myriad of other important issues that impacted and still impact on the day to day lives of millions of women in Canada.

Ontario women have had the right to go topless in public for, what, ten years now? When's the last time you saw a woman stroll down the main street in your town without a top? When's the last time you even saw a topless woman at the beach? Changing the law is one thing but merely striking down the law has not and will not change consciousness in this culture that links all nudity to sex adn that make it impossible for a woman to walk down the street topless without becoming the target of sexual harassment.

In short, I don't think Gwen Jacobs actually accomplished very much for feminism in this country. If anything she did more harm than good to feminism and the women's movement.

If women out there in babbleland disagree with me I will, of course, defer on this question since I'm in no position to speak for women but what I've said is simply what I heard from a lot of women at the time so I think I'm on pretty solid ground.

[ 26 September 2006: Message edited by: aka Mycroft ]

I don't think she actually set back the feminist movement. I don't think it was like getting women the vote or anything, but hey, she won the right to do something she as a woman felt like doing which didn't hurt anyone else.

I like what Gwen Jacobs herself had to day about it:

quote:

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Many reactions were predictable although most seem to be surprisingly supportive.

Gwen Jacobs was one of the happiest. After five years, her conviction and fine have finally been overturned. She said in a statement that it is now up to individual women to decide when and where to "express the freedom to remove our shirts".

"Changing a prejudicial law is the first step in changing society's perceptions. If we do not wish to be perceived as sex objects, we need to control the context in which we present our bodies as sexual."

"If we continue to allow society to define our physical bodies as strictly sexual, we will never get beyond that limited means of expression. We will never be more than slaves to our gender."

She said that "The original victory for me was that I took my shirt off, the rest was red tape."

Jacob, who wrote her statement while nursing her 16-month-old child, said that she hopes that her one day her daughter will ask "What was all the fuss about?" when she learns of this case.

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3 Things feminism has done for me:

1. Ensured that my family has two, not one, breadwinners with real earning power (modest though it is) - creating a flexibility and freedom for both of us that would not otherwise exist except in the rarest of cases. It also creates a degree of financial security for our child that would not be in place 50 years ago.

2. Fought for parental leave EI provisions, which allowed me to take almost two months off to be with my son in his first year.

3. Initiated a transformation towards a social and cultural dynamic of adult interaction as equals in power and rights. The work is not yet complete, but at least at the personal and professional level I get to enjoy engagement with my peers, male and female, with a minimum of gender-based heirarchical foolishness. It ain't perfect yet, but it's enormously better than it was 30 years ago.

modern feminism has taught me how to view society and my life through a female lens---not a simple feat given the thousands of years of male societal dominance.

our male philosophers, religions, political structures, & historians constructed a society so permeated with gender imbalance, that even today it is largely invisible to us.

feminist scholars have done a heroic job of researching and publishing a wealth of hitherto hidden, scrambled and virtually indeciferable information that can help humanity understand how pernicious this imbalance is, for every human society.
this body of herstory explains why we need to, at long last, change our fundamental ideas about the outmoded and destructive social constructs that are not serving us and, in fact, could well lead to our very demise.

1. Instilled the realization of the extent of Male privledge that I very much took for granted and assumed everyone else had (regardless of gender)

2. Much greater respect for what my Mother sacrificed as a stay at home mother to raise me.

3. Knowledge of the extent of patriarchy within our society, it's effects, and the knowledge we can change.

4. Understanding and Embracing of attributes that are referred to as weak within the patriarchal society

and finally
5. A firm(er) understanding of what it means when a feminist refers to males 'defining their reality'

...and number 6 that I don't enjoy admitting as much. A general intolerance for those who diliberately perpetuate patriarchy, apathy towards those who perpetuate by ignorance, and some frusteration with those who don't realize the 5 things above are not an easy thing to come to terms with for those immersed in the culture.

Before I give you my list, I want to assert that I am in fact a feminist. Also, although I am Métis, to look at me you would just think 'white' so by colour association I belong to a more 'privileged' class than many aboriginal people. However, coming from an aboriginal perspective, here are my 5 things about what 'western' feminism have done for me:

1: Feminism showed me that race and class determine whose gender issues matter.

Feminists fought tirelessly for the right of white women to vote. Aboriginal men and women were not enfranchised until the 60s.

2: Feminism shows me that gender analysis can be culturally ignorant.

Many feminists wrongly characterise certain aboriginal traditions as 'sexist', without understanding the full cultural context.

3: Feminism has at times put the aboriginal struggle against colonialism in peril.

Bill C-31 came about as a result of lobbying by both aboriginal and non-aboriginal women. However, it has created a deep division in our communities, and has exacerbated colonialism in many respects. Rather than the focus being on the colonial machinery that affects ALL of us, attention has been drawn away from that and onto women.

4: Feminism has offered solutions that come from the outside, rather than the inside.

In campaigning FOR us, many western feminists have in fact diminished our own capacity to speak for ourselves. Our feminism comes from a different worldview, and is not necessarily compatible. We look to our traditions to find models of gender equity.

5: Feminism has inspired many of us to become aboriginal feminists.

We have had to fashion our own philosophical base, and our own approach to feminism as aboriginal people in response to the pressures of western feminism. I think this is true of many other non-European or minority women.

I want to be completely honest. I come at this as as a man that grew up in a feminist dominated household at a time when male bashing was at a peak with a matriarch mother that resented men, as did her sisters. I am a happily married man. My experience with feminism comes from home, work and social and personal interactions. So, here's my take on what feminist has done for me. Not trying to be a troll. I just want to get it out since a lot of people think that feminism is perfect.

1. Taught me that my oppinion and feelings are less important than those of women's. Women need to come first in thoughts or you risk isolation and reprisal. Women are encouraged to speak to their inclinations, while men must diminish theirs in their own minds and accept women's first in order to be "fair" to them.

2. Taught me that women can be as cruel as they are kind. That being cruel can be empowering to them, and women like power at least as much as men. Especially when they share the experience. But that cruelty can't ever be acknowledged, because:

3. Women are as perfect and innocent as you can get, all while being at least men's equals in every discernable way. Men are somehow more flawed than women. Slow, dimwitted, over-sexed, violent, aggressive; and sure to hurt women and children. It's only a matter of time.

4. Women have an ability to be as strong as me in any way they choose; but may need "special treatment" from me and others in order to give them a level playing field. They can compete with me tooth and nail in whatever they want, whether I compete with them or not; and I need to help them do it. They can play as dirty as they want about something that they might not even care particularly about. All just to proove a point.

5. And finally, it's taught me that women have rights to socialize with me and my male friends/associates, even if don't want them to; but the opposite can't ever be true. Boys and men simply shouldn't be allowed to socialize together if a girl or woman wants to be there too. But women must be able to do so as they need to in order to foster healthy relationships and self-image.

[ 24 October 2006: Message edited by: Alen ]

quote:

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Originally posted by oldgoat:
Indeed. While I genuinely regret that your life experience has left you with this sort of emotional baggage, and I wish you well in working it through, this forum isn't going to be the place where that happens. While I don't judge your intentions in posting, other male babblers have tried in the past to use the feminist forum as a therapists couch, and it really doesn't work out well.

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Well, I appreciate your kind words. In my oppinion real discussion requires a variety of oppinion to understand truth. Otherwise you end up with a self-love fest; closed off from the world. Nothing is perfect. And sometimes the things in life that you are the most sure about are the ones that you never get the whole picture on.

I do take a bit of offence to your insinuation that I need therapy because of what I've been through and learned, though. I haven't read any of that type of slant delivered to others... but then I haven't read every post.

If noone is interested in discussion; then I will indeed move on.

Take some time to look through some past threads, if this is a forum you are honestly interested in participating in. As well, please note that the forum's mandate asks for participants to post from a pro-feminist point of view.

If you are unable to do so, you are free to post your views on feminism in one of babble's other forums, as long as you respect the discussion board's policy.

quote:

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Originally posted by writer:
Alen, please. This might be new to you. It is very old, and very tiresome, for many here.

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I'm ever respectful, and very open to intelligent discussion. I've even been known to concede my oppinion attimes. But there is a renewed bad taste in my mouth.

quote:

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Originally posted by Alen:
But there is a renewed bad taste in my mouth. I will go.

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You just do that then Alen. all the thinking to yourself: "yep, yep, them nasty feminists, that down trod me through my youth, are nasty closed minded men haters, who will brook no discussion."

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Tan'si,
Before I give you my list, I want to assert that I am in fact a feminist. Also, although I am Métis, to look at me you would just think 'white' so by colour association I belong to a more 'privileged' class than many aboriginal people. However, coming from an aboriginal perspective, here are my 5 things about what 'western' feminism have done for me:

1: Feminism showed me that race and class determine whose gender issues matter.

Feminists fought tirelessly for the right of white women to vote. Aboriginal men and women were not enfranchised until the 60s.

2: Feminism shows me that gender analysis can be culturally ignorant.

Many feminists wrongly characterise certain aboriginal traditions as 'sexist', without understanding the full cultural context.

3: Feminism has at times put the aboriginal struggle against colonialism in peril.

Bill C-31 came about as a result of lobbying by both aboriginal and non-aboriginal women. However, it has created a deep division in our communities, and has exacerbated colonialism in many respects. Rather than the focus being on the colonial machinery that affects ALL of us, attention has been drawn away from that and onto women.

4: Feminism has offered solutions that come from the outside, rather than the inside.

In campaigning FOR us, many western feminists have in fact diminished our own capacity to speak for ourselves. Our feminism comes from a different worldview, and is not necessarily compatible. We look to our traditions to find models of gender equity.

5: Feminism has inspired many of us to become aboriginal feminists.

We have had to fashion our own philosophical base, and our own approach to feminism as aboriginal people in response to the pressures of western feminism. I think this is true of many other non-European or minority women.

I do not necessarily see any of these points as negative, nor do I regard feminism in a negative fashion. However, I do believe that many traditional feminist philosophies regarded (or ignored?) race and class as secondary to gender, and our answer to this is that for those of us living in the Fourth World, gender is secondary to race and class.

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I too am of mixed heritage (Acadian and Mic Mac) and I don't agree with some of this.

You said:

quote:

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1: Feminism showed me that race and class determine whose gender issues matter.

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So it was the fault of women that aboriginal people's did not get to vote until much later? I do not agree. It was the fault of the power structure retained by men. Aboriginal people's are just another group to be put down, along with women. I have no idea how hard women fought for the right of FN people to vote, I'd need to do some research prior but I am certainly not going to blame women for a system they still have no control over and certainly did not then.

I agree that many feminist ignore realities and sometimes even dismiss the realities and lived lives of other races and cultures. I disagree that all feminists are responsible for taking race out of the equation. There were feminist working for racial and social equality even then.

Your point number 3 applied to all people everywhere, not just women. I am amused that you blame women for all these things while completely ignoring the reality of who and what they have to fight against.

I agree with your point number 4. As a person who looks 'white' myself, and who grew up in western society, and all that entails, I found it did not put me at odds at all with the traditional teachings. I was quite easily able to define my own form of feminism from both western (where I was raised predominantly) and FN aspects of women and their place in traditional FN society. Feminism taught me that there can be and are many facets of feminism that are useful to all women, everywhere, regardless of race and class.

When I was taking women's studies in university, I learned that not only were first wave feminists mostly white women, but that they were openly and even actively racist against FN people and people of colour, and that they really were fighting for white women, not for other women. That's not to take away from their fantastic accomplishments, and I realize that movements need to start somewhere, and it's generally the most comfortable who can afford the time and the social capital to take the risks. And they were products of their time and place.

But I think we shouldn't forget the way a lot of early feminists excluded people of colour and aboriginal people from their struggle. I remember seeing a poster one time, done up by early feminists, which had a caricature of a black man and a Jewish man next to a picture of a genteel, obviously upper-middle-class white woman in a fancy dress, with a caption that said something about how those men could vote but the woman could not. And I saw this in a women's studies course, because they wanted to hit home with us about why we were going to be dealing with class and race issues in a course about feminism.

[ 25 October 2006: Message edited by: Michelle ]

First of all, I am of course speaking of generalities…I could not possibly talk about ‘all feminists’, since there is no such thing. There may be common goals of gender equity, but there are feminists along all points on the spectrum.

If you look at the history of the suffragettes, and early western feminism, you will find that many white feminists were openly racist (which was acceptable by society’s standards at the time). Black feminists, for example, were often forcibly excluded. Hence, the need for black feminism, third and fourth world feminism. The rise of different KINDS of feminism rose out of the lack of analysis among western feminists in terms of race and class, and the assertation of the universality of the female experience. (You can search some info on Sojourner Truth for example and see some of the arguments made by black feminists back then, if you can, read her speech "Ar'n't I a Woman?")

In any case, I am not saying that it is the fault of western feminists that natives did not get the vote…but their own internal racism IS their fault. Aboriginal people are not just ‘another group to put down, like women’. Aboriginal women are not like non-aboriginal women, look at any stats. Aboriginal women are the poorest of the poor, and the more likely to be victims of violence. That needs to be taken into account when talking about aboriginal feminism…race and colonialism are far more destructive forces than gender inequality in our experience. Not so middle class, white women’s experience. It’s not about assigning blame to women for something they had no control over…it is about recognising that the things they DID have control over (their own racism and classism) impact their feminist analysis.

Nowhere have I blamed “all women” or “all feminists”. This is not a condemnation, this is a critique, and a description of post-colonial feminism. When you talk about various facets of feminism being useful for all women, you are simply repeating what I have already stated. Feminism does not exist as a whole, it exists in parts, impacted by the identities of the women involved. What aboriginal feminists, black feminists, third world feminists have taken from western feminism are those facets we find useful. What we have added are our own experiences, based on race, based on culture, based on colonialism.

Luckily, we live in a time where feminists from all over the spectrum can work together, and bring different points of view to the table. Back in the 19th century, this was simply not so. White middle-class women, though a subjected class still, nonetheless had much more political power than poor or non-white women. I acknowledge that, and look to post-colonial theory to find a place for aboriginal feminist concerns. Again, this is not a negative thing, it is a recognisation of differences, which some feminists STILL argue do not exist. (though I would argue those women are now in the minority)

[ 25 October 2006: Message edited by: Yiwah ]

quote:

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Aboriginal people are not just ‘another group to put down, like women’. Aboriginal women are not like non-aboriginal women, look at any stats. Aboriginal women are the poorest of the poor, and the more likely to be victims of violence. That needs to be taken into account when talking about aboriginal feminism…race and colonialism are far more destructive forces than gender inequality in our experience. Not so middle class, white women’s experience. It’s not about assigning blame to women for something they had no control over…it is about recognising that the things they DID have control over (their own racism and classism) impact their feminist analysis.

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"Dat man ober dar say dat womin needs to be helped into carriages, and lifted ober ditches, and to hab de best place everywhar. Nobody eber helps me into carriages, or ober mud-puddles, or gibs me any best place!" And raising herself to her full height, and her voice to a pitch like rolling thunder, she asked. 'And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! (and she bared her right arm to the shoulder, showing her tremendous muscular power). I have ploughed, and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man--when I could get it--and bear de lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne thirteen chilern, and seen 'em mos' all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain't I a woman?"
[...]
"If de fust woman God ever made was strong enough to turn de world upside down all alone, dese women togedder (and she glanced her eye over the platform) ought to be able to turn it back, and get it right side up again! And now dey is asking to do it, de men better let 'em."

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I'm having trouble accepting that women can be the stronger one in all areas of any type of relationship, but feminism is helping me to get there,

and it's also helped me realise I need to get there. (by all I don't mean necessarily all at once).

It has made me a better mother to my children, cos I involve their father, and I teach them all woman's rights. An understanding of the past helps me understand my parents.

It made me realise I need to stand up for the isssues. The term "just being politically correct" meant the speaker was not listening to the problem, and didn't care about change. The push for change needs to be ongoing, weither it's loud or soft it needs to continue. It is the reasponsibility of every person in every situation to say it's not right, everytime they hear or see any predjudice, you don't have to say it loud, but you do have to say it clearly. If you don't visibly (don't just shake your head, walk out)or verbily object to predijuce then you are supporting it.

1. Taught me that when I inscribe 'Danger Woman Driver' with my finger on the dirt-caked side of the family VW at age 11 (some rubbish I picked up at school) my mother would not drive me to my dentist appointment.

2. Taught me to 'Question Authority'.

3. Taught me that it was alright that I couldn't join the guys for their touch football game because my cheesecakes weren't done.

4. Taught me that my mother's name was not 'Mrs. Derek Ford'; and presumably taught the sender of said post when it was returned to them.

quote:

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Originally posted by N.Beltov:

2. Gave me the opportunity to compare female managers to male managers and decide which I would prefer;
3. Continued the ice hockey tradition in my family through my niece, since none of my nephews have shown any interest in it;

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How do others feel about 3. - was it OK to only turn to the girl after discovering the boys wouldn't play? Also did she have to be a better boy than the boys to get your attention? Would you have noticed her if she had played a girls sport?

quote:

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Southlander: ... was it OK to only turn to the girl after discovering the boys wouldn't play? Also did she have to be a better boy than the boys to get your attention? Would you have noticed her if she had played a girls sport?

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"to only turn to" etc. Are you making this stuff up? Where did you read that? Further - where did I write that my niece was better (or worse) than my nephews? She plays hockey and they don't. That's it. There never would have been girls' hockey for her to play without feminism. And who says ice hockey isn't a girls' sport anyway? Don't be in such a hurry to misunderstand my remarks.

sorry may be misunderstanding of sutilties of english language spoken in different countries! so what exactly did the mention of nephews mean?

"I watched my nephew at athletics, since my nieces didn't compete"? does that sound totally gender neutral? Does it mean if the neices where there you wouldn't bother with the nephew? Surely you watch her cos it's fun, or healthy, or you enjoy the blood, or swhatever, but why mention the boys? I wore my red hat since my blue one was at the cleaners? doesn't it sound like i prefer the blue hat?