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'I'm The Only Feminist There Is – The Others Are All Out Of Step'
British Feminism Is Totally Effed, Says UK Observer
Telling A Child She's Beautiful Could Be Sending The Wrong Message
Daily (Hate) Mail
British Novelist Says Spice Girls Made Generation Y Drunk, Slutty

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tiredfairy
08/24/09

In reply to 'I'm The Only Feminist There Is – The Others Are All Out Of Step'
You know, while perspective is certainly important, and I remind myself often that my life could be far worse...the argument that unless you're facing the horrors of situation x you don't have any "real" issues is really problematic. One could say that about anything. "You were stabbed? Well, at least you weren't shot!" or "Your family is poor and can't afford new clothes and lives in squalor? At least you're not homeless!" It's the same argument used against women when we wanted pesky little things like the vote, and the ability to get jobs and own property.

We deal with the problems we face, at every level. Dealing with pay gaps and the rest isn't what subverts action away from things going on in other places. Sexism does. And racism does. I don't know any feminists who seriously believe that what's happening in Afghanistan is less important than pay gaps or magazine ads. We just have marginally more control over what goes on in our own backyard than we do in our neighbors.

Belittling the things that do continue to limit many people's access to equal choices isn't helpful, nor is constant comparison to things that are worse. They're all part of same abusive system that perpetuates the same tired ideas and limiting structures.
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battleaxonista...is a humorless bitch
08/24/09

In reply to 'I'm The Only Feminist There Is – The Others Are All Out Of Step'
Hmm, I can smell the rotten fruits and veggies coming. But, in all honesty, people like her are the reason so many women are hesitant to call themselves feminist. Of course it doesn't help we shine the brightest lights on the most 'contrarian' or 'difficult' feminists.
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Kali Mama
08/24/09

@battleaxonista...is a humorless bitch: But being outrageous is a strategy in and of itself. People are going to seek out the middle ground of a debate. If what you're up against is (for instance) subordinate help-meet evangelicals, being rational and tempered isn't going to help. Being outrageous turns on the ears and might inch in some people closer to your cause.
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bluebears
08/24/09

In reply to 'I'm The Only Feminist There Is – The Others Are All Out Of Step'
Doris Lessing has always had a conflicted relationship with the feminist movement and never self-identified her writing (most famously The Golden Notebook) as feminist, even though others did and do.
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Princess Leela
08/24/09

In reply to 'I'm The Only Feminist There Is – The Others Are All Out Of Step'
Watching these upper-middle-class first-wave feminists tie themselves into pedagogical knots makes me realize that for the women of their generation, there was potentially some very interesting freedom to be had in NOT being upper-middle class. My grandmother also "married and divorced when it was still outre" (ie, circa 1950), and while no one gave her a medal for it, no one excoriated her for it either. She just raised her kids, got a job and lived her life.
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Rare Affinity
08/24/09

@Princess Leela: Going by her early life, I would not describe Weldon as upper middle class. I used to admire her as a writer and still buy her novels. However, ever since she had a family exclusively of sons, she seems to have lost all sympathy with young women and blame them for the problems she believes face young men. Hence her provocative and rather silly statement on rape.
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Penny
08/24/09

In reply to 'I'm The Only Feminist There Is – The Others Are All Out Of Step'
That said, I cannot respect her assertion that rape isn't the worst thing that can happen to a person. Rape isn't the worst thing that could have happened to her.
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daria-says-what
08/24/09

@Penny: Agreed. For a woman who is all about feminism as a series of individual choices, she makes a surprisingly insensitive blanket statement about an entirely subjective experience.
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BrutallyHonestBabes (aka Mrs. Sarah.of.a.Lesser.Hobbit)
08/24/09

In reply to 'I'm The Only Feminist There Is – The Others Are All Out Of Step'

I'm a better feminist than everyone. I have this internet badge to prove it.

I so appreciate all the work women like Ms. Weldon have done - but really, can't we all just support each other?
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LaComtesse
08/24/09

@BrutallyHonestBabes (aka Mrs. Sarah.of.a.Lesser.Hobbit): Umm how can you be a REAL feminist with that PHALLIC SYMBOL on your womyn self! SHAME! SHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAME!
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WaltzingMatilda
08/24/09

@BrutallyHonestBabes (aka Mrs. Sarah.of.a.Lesser.Hobbit): My feminist is bigger than your feminist.
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BrutallyHonestBabes (aka Mrs. Sarah.of.a.Lesser.Hobbit)
08/24/09

@WaltzingMatilda: I have another feminist - a semi-automatic one.
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PilgrimSoul
08/24/09

@BrutallyHonestBabes (aka Mrs. Sarah.of.a.Lesser.Hobbit): Ahem.
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WaltzingMatilda
08/24/09

@BrutallyHonestBabes (aka Mrs. Sarah.of.a.Lesser.Hobbit): Do you have a permit to carry that feminist? I always keep my feminist strapped to my leg at town hall meetings.

What else do you have in your arsenal? Sawed-off feminist? Ninja throwing feminists?
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Penny
08/24/09

In reply to 'I'm The Only Feminist There Is – The Others Are All Out Of Step'
I would be suspicious of someone who self-identified as feminist and agreed with everything I believed. Feminism cannot be owned by one person, group, race or gender. She has opinions, I will give her that. Which I respect.

I must admit, the whole "choose your choices" bit goes over my head. If they are your choices, you've chosen them....right? It seems like a tired line. Why not just call it what it is? Doing whatever the fuck you want and not caring if you come off as an asshole, a hypocrite, or a renegade.
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bluebears
08/24/09

@Penny: exactly. Obviously I think that people should be autonomous, its just that it irritates me when people use feminism (or some other ism) to give their own choices some sort of bigger import.
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emilyanne
12/08/08

In reply to British Feminism Is Totally Effed, Says UK Observer
Jessica, I really enjoyed this post but I want to make two points:

1. The Observer is NOT the Guardian's Sunday magazine, it is the oldest Sunday newspaper in the UK which although it happens to now be owned by the Guardian has an entirely separate staff and editor and has always followed its own agenda independent of the Guardian (although admittedly this might change soon). Can you tell I used to work for The Observer, not the Guardian...

2. While I agree there should have been more voices under 35, it is disingenous to say there are none given there is a pretty prominent column written by Anushka Asthana, the paper's deputy news editor who is both under 30 and happy to call herself a feminist.
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bowleserised
12/08/08

In reply to British Feminism Is Totally Effed, Says UK Observer
BUT I think that a lot of women come round to feminism as they get older. My "I'm not a feminist because I don't hate men" friends are now, in their thirties and forties, starting to get the point of it.

It becomes more and more relevant as you get older and want to be paid more, to have kids and have a pension.
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RhymesWithSilver
12/08/08

In reply to British Feminism Is Totally Effed, Says UK Observer
I believe in equal rights for women. However, every time I talk to someone who is a self-proclaimed "Feminist", or identifies very strongly with the "movement" (?), they always end up saying something that makes me want to haul off and punch them. I don't have anything more in common with women as a group than I do with men. There is no "common goal" if we can't agree on what it is, past basics like suffrage, education, and access to credit. Most women my age feel like they've been given their rights, so only those with more extreme views have felt the need to identify themselves strongly as feminists. I believe the remaining inequalities will iron themselves out, largely due to changing attitudes among both men and women, and there are just too many angry, hypersensitive nuts on the "Feminist" bus these days for me to feel comfortable riding.

Oh, and can I please strip the "This is What a Feminist Looks Like" shirt or totebag off the next haggard, belligerent woman I see screaming at a Starbucks barista? She's doing no one any favors...
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SarahMC
12/08/08

@RhymesWithSilver: How are things going to "iron themselves out" without, um, feminism?
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scullymurphy
12/08/08

@SarahMC: Well because women will get back to ironing and cleaning the house and stuff. You know; where they belong!
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AtomiClash: humanitarian misanthrope
12/08/08

In reply to British Feminism Is Totally Effed, Says UK Observer
I recently met up with friends from high school after a few years. One friend is going to med school to be a surgeon through the Air Force. She wants to fly, become and astronaut and then go into politics (so far, she's on the path, remarkably enough she's a bit of an over-achiever). She also loves the Twilight series, and I couldn't help but yelp about the anti-feminism rife within the novels.

"Well, I'm NOT a feminist," she said indignantly. "Unless that means one day becoming a crazy old cat lady."

My response, "Like hell you aren't a feminist!" And then I had a minor aneurysm; I don't know, I blacked out for a bit.

The problem is that the term "feminist" holds such negative connotations that many women are afraid of self-identifying as such.

Most disturbingly, however, is the subtle implication that if a woman considers herself a feminist, she will drive men away (possibly in droves). The problems with that concept are too many to list!
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gherkinfiend
12/08/08

In reply to British Feminism Is Totally Effed, Says UK Observer
Also the batshit craziness of Germaine Greer probably isn't helping the feminism cause in the UK.

She was touring TV stations a few weeks ago ranting about how oppressed the insects on I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here are and how disappointing it was that Gordon Ramsay used commercial marmalade in a recipe...

When this is what the most famous feminist in your country is talking it may make the movement seem a tad irrelevant to you?
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gherkinfiend
12/08/08

In reply to British Feminism Is Totally Effed, Says UK Observer
@Eeva: They also fail to point out that one of the reasons younger women across the spectrum aren't getting involved in active feminism is that most of the organizations and opportunities for that are based on university campuses which limits their availability to a huge proportion of British women, especially from less wealthy backgrounds.

The ever widening rich-poor gap in the UK isn't helping the feminists of differing views and backgrounds become more cohesive...
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Plum-Pie
12/08/08

@gherkinfiend: God yes, the Southall Black Sisters are the only organisation I can think of who don't operate in this way: [www.southallblacksisters.org.uk]
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susanstohelit
12/08/08

In reply to British Feminism Is Totally Effed, Says UK Observer
I've had many discussions with my fiance about this - how second-wavers are really out of touch with the current movement and that makes it hard to identify with the feminist movement. I think we need a new term or a new understanding of what feminism is - because young women like myself, others on this site, and throughout the world are always going to be reluctant to identify with a movement that is focused primarily on the struggles of straight, white middle-class women. We need a movement which embraces complexity and intersectionality - and which motivates people by looking forward, rather than whining about how far we've fallen.
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PilgrimSoul
12/08/08

@susanstohelit: On the other hand, I'm going to find it hard to identify with a "new movement" that takes as its foundational principle that feminists are "whiners."
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scullymurphy
12/08/08

@susanstohelit: I still don't understand how wanting social, political and economic equality for women is a straight, white, middle-class issue. And I'm not talking about the history of the movement here.
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PilgrimSoul
12/08/08

@scullymurphy: there's nothing to understand. it isn't.
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yvanehtnioj
12/08/08

@PilgrimSoul: Thank you for being here. Even when I sleep in and get to work late, I know you'll be on the job, pointing out the complete waste of time that is the "I'm young and therefore 2d wavers can't understand me! I can name an old racist feminist so therefore all feminists over 36 are racists!!!" rant.

p.s. I'm 26.
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Shamrockette
12/08/08

In reply to British Feminism Is Totally Effed, Says UK Observer
This all comes down to the male-dominated society. Us women are expected from birth to view men as our superiors, because they work to put food on the table, they will provide for you and that they *deserve* to have women in their lives. Also, we can't POSSIBLY live without a man in our lives.

Unfortunately, many men have abused this status and many treat women like shit. But when women are done wrong, they're forced to believe that it's THEIR fault for getting the brunt of it.
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