Why is sexism such a difficult topic?

Bigtoe107

Sharrow wrote: »

I think many people live thier lives with gender blinkers on.
If they or someone close to them hasn't experienced it or has and hasn't spoken to them about it then it doesn't happen.

I think that it is skewed by how we as society value younger women.
Young lads grow up and it's the young pretty girls who seem to have all the power and attensions and they don't see the pressure that those young women are under to conform to certain standards, they just see them getting into clubs easier ect.

And then when the move into the next stages of thier lives the 'wedding' is all about the brides rather then the couple and then women seem to hold all the cards when it comes to having children.

Unless a young lad is reared to be aware of the issues that impact on women, by his parents and family most of them just don't get, don't see it and never take the time to take of the 'blinkers' as that is how life is as far as they are concerned and anyone who contradicts what world view is bonkers. There are young women who are reared this way to but eventually life and sociteties issues with women do catch up with her.

This makes it very hard to challenge people's ideas.
If they don't have the experience of it, most will believe the rhetoric which they have been reared with and never question it, as finding out the world is more fúcked up then they tought can be hard to deal with.

I know a few men and women who when they groked what goes on, were so very angry that it happens and keeps happening and get frustrated with why more isn't done to change things, so when they go and try and to enguage on the topic they don't come off the best and get frustrated by those who don't get it and can't understand it, as they have no context.

Yes young men in society face pressures which young women don't and vice verse both need to be supported and change made to happen but you'll not make an ally out of a feminist by demanding she fight on your behalf why saying she has nothing left to fight for as she has already decided she does by becoming a feminist.

My Dad would call himself a feminist and he is, my brother not so much he sees being a feminist as being normal and part of who he was reared as much as he's Irish. It would be nice if that was the case for all of us but we are not there yet.

I agree with the general consensus of this post but I think it's quite nonsensical and indeed counter productive to say that the position of power young women find themselves in leads to societal pressures and thus sexism. This viewpoint can be applied to all groups i.e white males position of "dominance" in society leads them to being scapegoated. Again the answer is to remove gender classifications from almost all areas of life. That is to say that we should no longer have to provide gender based information when doing anything. All our achievements should be based on merit

Bannasidhe

Bipolar Joe wrote: »

Holy sh!t......

It's different because one is a mindset, something a group of people could want. The other is a statement put forth as fact.

First shouting, now swearing. Tut tut .

I apologise for misinterpreting what you wrote. It honestly did appear to me as if you were stating women didn't pay alimony rather then that there is a section of the female population that want it each and every way. Which I will not deny there is. I have a collective name for them but won't post it here as I may get banned for sexism.

Morag

I said "seem to have all the power".

As a society we tell women they are the most desirable when they are young and they should be young and pretty and that is how they should strive to be and no matter what they do if they are not pretty then they have failed, or it they are deemed to be undesirable they have failed and then it's all about having a man and babies. These are seem to be the primary goals of women and no matter what else she does these are the questioned asked.

We currently have the first female states attorney and the first question most people wanted to know was if she had children, cos if she chose her carreer over having a family she'd have been doing it wrong and then when it turned out she did it was well who's been rearing those kids.

Those questions would never have been asked about a man assuming that position.

I wish would could removed gender but society judges us by gender and we have many gendered double standards, and those do impact on people's thinking and reactions and they won't change or go away until we highlight them and challenge them.

That is part of what feminism does as a philosophy, it gets us to question how we think about women and out attitudes towards women.

Bipolar Joe

Sharrow wrote: »

I said "seem to have all the power".

As a society we tell women they are the most desirable when they are young and they should be young and pretty and that is how they should strive to be and no matter what they do if they are not pretty then they have failed, or it they are deemed to be undesirable they have failed and then it's all about having a man and babies. These are seem to be the primary goals of women and no matter what else she does these are the questioned asked.

We currently have the first female states attorney and the first question most people wanted to know was if she had children, cos if she chose her carreer over having a family she'd have been doing it wrong and then when it turned out she did it was well who's been rearing those kids.

Those questions would never have been asked about a man assuming that position.

I wish would could removed gender but society judges us by gender and we have many gendered double standards, and those do impact on people's thinking and reactions and they won't change or go away until we highlight them and challenge them.

That is part of what feminism does as a philosophy, it gets us to question how we think about women and out attitudes towards women.

Good post. Let's get married.

SheFiend

Sharrow wrote: »

with women expected to spend X amount of time on appearance and doing more then 50% of domestic chores even if both partners are working and working the same amount of hours, plus caring for family members gets left usually to women.

Women's time is not as respected or seen as valuable as men's, so men get to thinker and invent more and were women have been able to do so, they just have never gotten the same sort of backing.

The examples you mention are of choices women make. What is "expected " of them would not be expected of them as an individual if they refused to participate in these lifestyle choices.

It is unfair to suggest this is sexism. The feminist movement begged women to educate themselves, become independent, stop living up to traditional expectations, but the reality is a lot of women chose to continue and so perpetuate the cycle of expectations.

The worst sexism against women i see comes from women themselves.

Eric Cartman

SheFiend wrote: »

The worst sexism against women i see comes from women themselves.

exactley

hardbackwriter

Sharrow wrote: »

I think many people live thier lives with gender blinkers on.
If they or someone close to them hasn't experienced it or has and hasn't spoken to them about it then it doesn't happen.

I think that it is skewed by how we as society value younger women.
Young lads grow up and it's the young pretty girls who seem to have all the power and attensions and they don't see the pressure that those young women are under to conform to certain standards, they just see them getting into clubs easier ect.

And then when the move into the next stages of thier lives the 'wedding' is all about the brides rather then the couple and then women seem to hold all the cards when it comes to having children.

Unless a young lad is reared to be aware of the issues that impact on women, by his parents and family most of them just don't get, don't see it and never take the time to take of the 'blinkers' as that is how life is as far as they are concerned and anyone who contradicts what world view is bonkers. There are young women who are reared this way to but eventually life and sociteties issues with women do catch up with her.

This makes it very hard to challenge people's ideas.
If they don't have the experience of it, most will believe the rhetoric which they have been reared with and never question it, as finding out the world is more fúcked up then they tought can be hard to deal with.

I know a few men and women who when they groked what goes on, were so very angry that it happens and keeps happening and get frustrated with why more isn't done to change things, so when they go and try and to enguage on the topic they don't come off the best and get frustrated by those who don't get it and can't understand it, as they have no context.

Yes young men in society face pressures which young women don't and vice verse both need to be supported and change made to happen but you'll not make an ally out of a feminist by demanding she fight on your behalf why saying she has nothing left to fight for as she has already decided she does by becoming a feminist.

My Dad would call himself a feminist and he is, my brother not so much he sees being a feminist as being normal and part of who he was reared as much as he's Irish. It would be nice if that was the case for all of us but we are not there yet.

You really think young boys need to be educated about feminism while growing up , judging by the frightening suicide figures and the crisis faced by so many young men , I'd have thought thier were bigger issues to tackle re young men

Logical Fallacy

Discussing sexism is tough because a small faction on both sides of the argument have no real interest in discussing sexism...they just want to sit there and make their point then do the internet equivalent of sticking their fingers in their ears and saying "la la la la la i can't hear you la la la la la".

It's boring, and despite the fact that other groups on both sides of an argument will actually be there to discuss and debate it they will get distracted by the drama that unfolds within the thread rather than simply ignoring it.

This can be applied to any internet discussion about anything...it's just that easy to completely derail a topic.

Morag

Bipolar Joe wrote: »

Good post. Let's get married.

That's a bit sudden.
Well how would you feel about taking my family name?:pac:

hondasam

Sharrow wrote: »

They do

Also with women expected to spend X amount of time on appearance and doing more then 50% of domestic chores even if both partners are working and working the same amount of hours, plus caring for family members gets left usually to women.

Who are these women and who expects them to do all the domestic chores?
It might have been the norm thirty years ago but not now.
If any woman chooses to live like this it's her choice, it's not for others to say she is wrong or to criticise her.
Is it fair to say 50% of car maintenance, gardening and outdoor work is done by men?

drkpower

Because so many people prefer to look at issues solely from their own perspective rather than looking at it from an others' perspective first.

Morag

hardbackwriter wrote: »

You really think young boys need to be educated about feminism while growing up , judging by the frightening suicide figures and the crisis faced by so many young men , I'd have thought thier were bigger issues to tackle re young men

I am aware of those issues, I have a son and a daughter.

I think that all young people should do social sciences and social history in secondary school to break down those gender stereotypes and give them an awareness and some sort of understanding what each other goes through.

strobe

I posted this elsewhere before in response to a similar thread. I don't think this is the whole story but I do believe it's a significant problem with trying to discuss the topic.

strobe wrote:

Some men use the cloak of mens rights simply to have a go at women. Some women use the cloak of feminism simply to have a go at men. They do this deliberately to try and guilt (not sure if that's the word I want there) people they feel should be in their camp to be in their camp, and the annoying thing is so many people fall for it constantly. Often women that are blatantly just anti-male and have no interest in equality will begin "I am a feminist and I think......(attack on men)" and men that dislike women will do the same "Mens right are.....(attack on women)". The problem is because these people exist there are also other people that will try and label you one of them. Someone expresses a genuinely egalitarian opinion and are tagged feminazis or misogynists to try and discredit them.

Also, my sig I think applies:

It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was Us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us... It's Them that do the bad things.

I also think a lot of the more reasonable people that get involved in these discussions can get caught in the trap of 'choosing sides' and attempting to 'win' rather than trying to engage in discussion because your gender like your race or a couple of other things are clearly a very personal thing, it's somewhat more directly personal than with political leanings for example, and look at how bad political threads can get.

However is it specific to discussions of 'gender issues' or 'feminism'? I'm not so sure. As sad as it is to say I think if the racial divide was as evenly split as the gender divide here we would see the same thing play out if 'race rights' were brought up. In fact you do see that occur on some US forums and the likes.

There is also the fact that a lot of the people that post in these threads are regular contributors to them. So arguments and bad feeling carries over from older threads between certain people and kind of builds and builds over time. So then you see people immediately going on the defensive or on the attack with certain other people even if the comment they have made in the actual current thread does not necessarily warrant it. A lot of attempted score settling and the like can go on.

Maybe it's also just that awful side of (internet)human nature rearing it's ugly head. The whole tribalistic Us versus Them crap and that is then spurred on by the usual trolls and what have you that seem to get off on fostering disharmony.



So in summary... ehh... I dunno, I guess.

(Hmmm that post is sort of all over the place. Sorry, I'm a little tired.)

Bigtoe107

Sharrow wrote: »

I said "seem to have all the power".

As a society we tell women they are the most desirable when they are young and they should be young and pretty and that is how they should strive to be and no matter what they do if they are not pretty then they have failed, or it they are deemed to be undesirable they have failed and then it's all about having a man and babies. These are seem to be the primary goals of women and no matter what else she does these are the questioned asked.

We currently have the first female states attorney and the first question most people wanted to know was if she had children, cos if she chose her carreer over having a family she'd have been doing it wrong and then when it turned out she did it was well who's been rearing those kids.

Those questions would never have been asked about a man assuming that position.

I wish would could removed gender but society judges us by gender and we have many gendered double standards, and those do impact on people's thinking and reactions and they won't change or go away until we highlight them and challenge them.

That is part of what feminism does as a philosophy, it gets us to question how we think about women and out attitudes towards women.

The reversal of this is that as a society we tell men to be the strong protective bread winners. Which itself comes with huge pressures which a lot of males cannot cope with as evidenced by the huge number of male suicides.

Also I think feminism is redundant we should be thinking about all gender roles and attitudes not just ones directed at women

The King of Moo

hardbackwriter wrote: »

You really think young boys need to be educated about feminism while growing up , judging by the frightening suicide figures and the crisis faced by so many young men , I'd have thought thier were bigger issues to tackle re young men

Just because they're taught about feminism doesn't mean other topics have to be sacrificed.

Anyway, I think if boys were at least taught about things from a female point-of-view, it might reduce the negative attitudes some men have towards women, and in a small number of cases might indirectly help with some of the problems that can lead to suicide for young men.

Morag

hondasam wrote: »

Who are these women and who expects them to do all the domestic chores?
It might have been the norm thirty years ago but not now.
If any woman chooses to live like this it's her choice, it's not for others to say she is wrong or to criticise her.
Is it fair to say 50% of car maintenance, gardening and outdoor work is done by men?

If your really interested I suggest you read this.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/25275873/Dividing-the-Domestic-Men-Women-and-Household-Work-in-Cross-National-Perspective-Edited-by-Judith-Treas-and-Sonja-Drobnic

I think that when two people chose to set up home together they should look at the skills sets they have between them and sort out who will do what according to skill, ability and personal preference.

Yes more women know how to use a drill these days and more men do know now to do the laundry for the house but that is not how it is in the majority of households. We still have parents who don't teach their sons to be able to cook and clean and look after them selves, which is shocking and failing thier kids as parents imho.

If you were reared to turn your hand to the domestic chores and have an equitable system worked out with your partner then awesome, wish more people did and but don't think this is the case for everyone.

Feisar

The King of Moo wrote: »

I think the main problem is that too many people retain the immature "us against them" attitude towards the opposite sex from school, and reinforce their belief by surrounding themselves with like-minded individuals.

Are people really that simple!?!?

As an aside I know it wasn't the main thrust of your argument but there was no point in my quoting the whole post.

Feisar

Sharrow wrote: »

If your really interested I suggest you read this.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/25275873/Dividing-the-Domestic-Men-Women-and-Household-Work-in-Cross-National-Perspective-Edited-by-Judith-Treas-and-Sonja-Drobnic

I think that when two people chose to set up home together they should look at the skills sets they have between them and sort out who will do what according to skill, ability and personal preference.

Yes more women know how to use a drill these days and more men do know now to do the laundry for the house but that is not how it is in the majority of households. We still have parents who don't teach their sons to be able to cook and clean and look after them selves, which is shocking and failing thier kids as parents imho.

If you were reared to turn your hand to the domestic chores and have an equitable system worked out with your partner then awesome, wish more people did and but don't think this is the case for everyone.

Since I've moved out of home at 17, now 27 I've lived with loads of people. It's shocking how many people both male and female who can't cook etc. It's defiantly not just the lads that are guilty of this one. But your right it's an awful failing on their parents part.

hardbackwriter

Bigtoe107 wrote: »

Sharrow wrote: »

I said "seem to have all the power".

As a society we tell women they are the most desirable when they are young and they should be young and pretty and that is how they should strive to be and no matter what they do if they are not pretty then they have failed, or it they are deemed to be undesirable they have failed and then it's all about having a man and babies. These are seem to be the primary goals of women and no matter what else she does these are the questioned asked.

We currently have the first female states attorney and the first question most people wanted to know was if she had children, cos if she chose her carreer over having a family she'd have been doing it wrong and then when it turned out she did it was well who's been rearing those kids.

Those questions would never have been asked about a man assuming that position.

I wish would could removed gender but society judges us by gender and we have many gendered double standards, and those do impact on people's thinking and reactions and they won't change or go away until we highlight them and challenge them.

That is part of what feminism does as a philosophy, it gets us to question how we think about women and out attitudes towards women.

The reversal of this is that as a society we tell men to be the strong protective bread winners. Which itself comes with huge pressures which a lot of males cannot cope with as evidenced by the huge number of male suicides.

Also I think feminism is redundant we should be thinking about all gender roles and attitudes not just ones directed at women

Men have always been raised to be protectors and bread winners, some say the rise in suicides has become more apparent since society changed it's views on how gender roles are defined , thus men are taught that traditional definitions of masculinity is problematic and is discouraged , some attribute this to the confused state of this generation of men

The King of Moo

Feisar wrote: »

Are people really that simple!?!?

As an aside I know it wasn't the main trust of your argument but there was no point in my quoting the whole post.

No, not all people are like this.

And most people are quite complex individuals who might seem progressive in one sense but sexist in another sense.

I don't think people consciously maintain these attitudes at the front of their minds.
No adults, for example, would say "Girls are stupid!" or "Boys are smelly!"

But I do think that this general attitude does affect some people's attitudes towards the opposite sex. They don't openly hate them, but you can see it in the way some people conceive of the other sex.
I think you can find lots of this combative yet not nakedly aggressive attitude in the locked thread on feminism, for example.

strobe

The King of Moo wrote: »

Anyway, I think if boys were at least taught about things from a female point-of-view, it might reduce the negative attitudes some men have towards women[...]

And visa versa of course, if that road is to be travelled.

hatrickpatrick

To be honest I'm just tired of seeing my gender attacked again and again and again in the media with absolutely no balance whatsoever. Some of the things which are ok to say about men would get a guy fired for saying about women. That's my issue.

Equality means equality in everything. Yes, of course it should mean equal pay for equal work. There's no question of that and I'd be the first to attack genuine cases of discrimination in that regard.

It also means no more first dibs on lifeboats, and registering for the draft if and when such a draft exists.

My issue with feminism is the extreme amount of "equality until it sucks for me", which is a poisonous and hypocritical mentality, and has absolutely no place in the 21st century.

The King of Moo

strobe wrote: »

And visa versa of course, if that road is to be travelled.

Absolutely. I think that would help to remove some of the "us and them" attitude some people seem to have, and eventually would ideally lead to a situation where people wouldn't really give a crap about whether you're a girl or a boy as it wouldn't be such a big deal.

hondasam

Sharrow wrote: »

If your really interested I suggest you read this.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/25275873/Dividing-the-Domestic-Men-Women-and-Household-Work-in-Cross-National-Perspective-Edited-by-Judith-Treas-and-Sonja-Drobnic

I think that when two people chose to set up home together they should look at the skills sets they have between them and sort out who will do what according to skill, ability and personal preference.

Yes more women know how to use a drill these days and more men do know now to do the laundry for the house but that is not how it is in the majority of households. We still have parents who don't teach their sons to be able to cook and clean and look after them selves, which is shocking and failing thier kids as parents imho.

If you were reared to turn your hand to the domestic chores and have an equitable system worked out with your partner then awesome, wish more people did and but don't think this is the case for everyone.

tbh I don't have any interest in those studies.

I prefer to live in a happy home where people help each other rather than debating who cooks today or who washed up last time.
The one thing I notice with this recession and so much unemployment is men are cooking more, out of boredom or they just have the time I don't know.
I have never treated my son any different to my daughters, he had his cooking day same as the rest of us.
I do think majority of men cook, clean and do other chores now.
I see a lot of men doing the school run these days so it has changed.

Personally if I get a flat tyre I phone a man, that will never change for me.

drkpower

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

Equality means equality in everything.

That is pointless absolutism which doesn't help either 'side'. Equality has to reflect reality.

Scanlas The 2nd

hondasam wrote: »

Sharrow wrote: »

If your really interested I suggest you read this.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/25275873/Dividing-the-Domestic-Men-Women-and-Household-Work-in-Cross-National-Perspective-Edited-by-Judith-Treas-and-Sonja-Drobnic

I think that when two people chose to set up home together they should look at the skills sets they have between them and sort out who will do what according to skill, ability and personal preference.

Yes more women know how to use a drill these days and more men do know now to do the laundry for the house but that is not how it is in the majority of households. We still have parents who don't teach their sons to be able to cook and clean and look after them selves, which is shocking and failing thier kids as parents imho.

If you were reared to turn your hand to the domestic chores and have an equitable system worked out with your partner then awesome, wish more people did and but don't think this is the case for everyone.

tbh I don't have any interest in those studies.

I prefer to live in a happy home where people help each other rather than debating who cooks today or who washed up last time.
The one thing I notice with this recession and so much unemployment is men are cooking more, out of boredom or they just have the time I don't know.
I have never treated my son any different to my daughters, he had his cooking day same as the rest of us.
I do think majority of men cook, clean and do other chores now.
I see a lot of men doing the school run these days so it has changed.

Personally if I get a flat tyre I phone a man, that will never change for me.

I doubt men do any more or less chores than 10 years ago.

hardbackwriter

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

To be honest I'm just tired of seeing my gender attacked again and again and again in the media with absolutely no balance whatsoever. Some of the things which are ok to say about men would get a guy fired for saying about women. That's my issue.

Equality means equality in everything. Yes, of course it should mean equal pay for equal work. There's no question of that and I'd be the first to attack genuine cases of discrimination in that regard.

It also means no more first dibs on lifeboats, and registering for the draft if and when such a draft exists.

My issue with feminism is the extreme amount of "equality until it sucks for me", which is a poisonous and hypocritical mentality, and has absolutely no place in the 21st century.

The media has a massive role In how Gender roles are represented and it's prety obvious that the feminist perspective has the ear of media , women are potrayed as the sane voice of reason in most tv shows while men are homer Simpson

hondasam

Scanlas The 2nd wrote: »

I doubt men do any more or less chores than 10 years ago.

I dunno I see lots of young men doing the house work these days and the cooking. Maybe that's just the ones I know.

The King of Moo

hardbackwriter wrote: »

The media has a massive role In how Gender roles are represented and it's prety obvious that the feminist perspective has the ear of media , women are potrayed as the sane voice of reason in most tv shows while men are homer Simpson

You can turn that on its head though.

Many TV critics complain about writers using the convention of having the wife be a nagging shrew who stops the fun-loving, good-natured husband from having a good time.
Marge and Homer are often held up as a good example of this trope.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ParentingTheHusband
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HenpeckedHusband

I don't think tv is particularly sexist compared to any other aspect of society.

token101

Sharrow wrote: »

They do but if you were looking at investing in a company and the person behind it is a woman all the same sexist reasons crop up and most men won't that that risk and that gamble.

Also with women expected to spend X amount of time on appearance and doing more then 50% of domestic chores even if both partners are working and working the same amount of hours, plus caring for family members gets left usually to women.

Women's time is not as respected or seen as valuable as men's, so men get to thinker and invent more and were women have been able to do so, they just have never gotten the same sort of backing.

Do you mean think more or tinker more? Either way it's rubbish. You have absolutely no evidence of any of this. If a venture capitalist/bank/investor sees an idea worth investing they'll invest. Doesn't matter about what colour,race,religion,gender the person is. Money's money. This kind of nonsense is insulting. Are you trying to tell me that the few female entrepreneurs that are out there did it all alone, devoid of credit, support , etc? Utter bollocks!!

And do you personally inspect every home in the country to confirm this stuff about 'chores'? Have you anything to back this up?

Feeona wrote: »

Thread about sexism about men=that's terrible, what can be done about it? (from both genders)

Thread about sexism against women=what are you talking about? get back in the kitchen. (from an extremely vocal minority)

It seems that it's not difficult to talk about sexism against men. Rather that it's difficult to talk about sexism against women.

Yeah :rolleyes: Any quotes or anything at all to back that up? Or just making sweeping statements for the sake of it?