Modern Feminism-Good for Society?

Tombo2001 wrote: »

You are not wrong in any of the above - the only issue I have is that I'm not sure you can blame women for any of this.

I didn't T. As I said I don't run the victimhood narrative, nor do I run the blame game or point at nebulous oppressors by way of simplistic explanation. I do point at "feminism" though for pushing all of the above and with spurious ballsology to support their politic.

If you look at politics for example, we've never had a female president in the US or Taoiseach in Ireland. And while we easily could have today - nonetheless the history of politics is one where the starting point was that women couldnt vote and that politicis was a male only bastion that women had to break into. Women could directly point the finger at men in that case and say - this isnt fair.

The problem with this regularly trotted out notion is in the half truths of history. In most western democracies the non landowning common man didn't have the vote either. In most democracies(Switzerland being the obvious exception where women didn't get the vote until 71) the average woman got the vote soon after or at the same time the average man did. Indeed women landowners and the wealthy often had the vote before the common man or woman.

The plain fact is this; for most of human history the average man was a bullet and spear stopper expected to fight, work and die for the powerful, the average woman was the babymaker of bullets and spear stoppers expected to fight, work and die for the powerful and a babymaker to more babymakers. Men were the expendable gender, women were the "valuable" gender, so long as they were fertile. Rinse and repeat. The "gender war" was far more a class and power war than a gender one.

It remains somewhat similar today. If you regard modern western feminism it is overwhelmingly concerned with the issues of White, middle class, university educated women. Anything beyond that tends to be tokenism and often dismissed as cultural equivalence. The average self identifying western "feminist" is usually more concerned about things like being "slut shamed" and "more women in STEM!!" than the plight of Brown women living in actual patriarchal societies. The joke is that it's often the case that in quite a few patriarchal societies you find more women in STEM fields and in senior management than in more "feminist" societies. EG there are more senior management women in no gender quotas Russia than there are in gender quotas Sweden or Norway.

In all of the things you've listed out above - if women are better educated than men - can women be blamed for this? We know that men are better networked in the workplace than women (look at company boards for concrete and undeniable evidence of this). As such, there is less pressure on men to be well educated.

The education gap exists long before company boards or employment. More school age boys have lower literacy levels than girls. Ireland is actually good on this score as the gap is narrower than other developed nations. This gap continues into university years. Here's a UK link from the BBC on this. And this gap trend widens in other western nations. The "better networks for men" is a nonsense and isn't in play until you get to boardroom level. This gap is reflected in pay too. Oh yes. Before children come into play Irish women on average earn more than Irish men. The women's council of Ireland had this on their website. Of course as you will see couched as a negative, but they then removed that page entirely. Doesn't fit the narrative. But when I spotted this six years ago on another thread on the matter I copied the text involved.

Me. In 2015. wrote:

The latest figures from the EU Commission show that the Gender Pay Gap in Ireland is 13.9% - in other words women in Ireland are paid almost 14% less than men. The Gender Pay Gap exists even though women do better at school and university than men. In the Irish context, what is perhaps most disturbing is the high cost of motherhood. Figures from the OECD show that in Ireland the Gender Pay Gap for women with no children is -17% but this increases significantly to 14% for women with at least one child – a jump of 31 percentage points. The gender pay gap exists across the sectors.
For the bottom 10% of earners, the Gender Pay Gap in Ireland is 4% but this rises to 24.6% for the top 10% of income earners, suggesting the continued presence of a glass ceiling and indirect discrimination.

Emphasis mine. Note how they don't come out straight and say that childless women earn 17% more on average. Blink and you'd miss it kinda thing. You'll also note that they mention women do better in education than men, yet little focus is given by society to why men are failing in that area.

Be physically assaulted? Women dont randomly attack men on the street. Men do.

I agree on that score. In cases of domestic abuse international studies show that in non reciprocal violence women are slightly more likely to be the aggressor. The couples with the highest risk of partner abuse? Lesbian couples. Must be all the "toxic masculinity" flying around. Where are the shelters for male victims of domestic abuse? In the UK, US and Australia there are more shelters for the pets of female victims of domestic abuse than there are male shelters. When the first shelters were set up in the UK in the late 60's they took in both women and men as the founder and her associates noted that men needed this service too. Didn't last long when the 70's "feminists" got going. To the degree that the woman who founded the shelters across the UK was subsequently barred from entering them for questioning the equal rights "feminist" credo.

Weaker access to custody? The legal system was largely devised by men, and goes back to a starting point where women were not allowed work when they got married.

Women work now and I don't hear a peep outa the we're all for equality "feminists" on the matter. I thought this "feminism" was for equal rights gender notwithstanding? It's not. As was noted earlier the clue is in the name.

The second point is: Instead of giving out about Feminism, why not use it as an inspiration for how you can pursue better rights, better living conditions for men.

That is, if you really care that much about the valid points that you have raised.

Because "feminism" is the antagonist for much of this and as I said it and so many other political credos these days use the same tactics and I wouldn't be up for fighting fire with fire. Sadly much of western society and debate is too used to these divisive tactics and expects them. Measured debate that might actually make a difference, or screeching about rights without responsibilities, oppressors and the oppressed and never being satisfied with the results for your particular group? Well the latter tends to win.

Tombo2001 wrote: »

All very good points, and I would agree with a lot of it, disagree with some of it - particularly the networking piece, its strongly male oriented. As an example, corporate entertainment - heavily focussed on sports that are principally followed be men. Where do large banks or legal firms have corporate boxes? In Croke Park. The Aviva. Who does that suit better? Men or women? Men, clearly.

Oh certainly T, but you have to be a man who moves in that social circle in the first place. Genitals alone most certainly won't get you in. It can depend on the business. I've seen women's networks at work too. Though have noticed it's often more about a network that recommends external services and people rather than each other. Men seem to be better at the latter. So for example if I get a woman client who reckons I'm the bees knees(clearly drunk. ) I've found I'm far more likely to get recommendations from her to other women(and men), than if it was a male client. Men don't seem to do that very much and if they do it's usually to one or two good mates of theirs rather than any wider network.

I've also noted that men's friendships tend to last longer and are more about shared interests and activities, rather than more overt emotional connections. The latter tend to be more sensitive to change. So the boxes in Croker kind of thing would be more a "male thing" anyway. Men also are more likely to discuss things rather than people.

There's been some research into these average differences.

Some research has looked at similarities and differences between male-male and female-female friendships. While the similarities tend to outweigh the differences, there are some interesting ways that men’s friendships differ from women’s.

The most common finding is that men’s friendships tend to be more “instrumental” and less emotional, while women are much more likely than men to share emotions and feelings. Men’s friendships are often based on shared activities (e.g., poker or golfing buddies), and are more “transactional” — reciprocating favors and working together on projects. In other words, men share activities, women share feelings.

For the most part, men’s friendships tend to be less intimate and less supportive than friendships between women. However, there is some evidence that women’s friendships tend to be more fragile than men’s.

While as the author points out there are as many similarities those differences are likely more advantageous in business settings. Which makes sense as men pretty much "invented" business and tailored it to how they operate. If women were always the business people no doubt there would be subtle differences in how that might play out too.

On the above, I read the Reni Eddo Lodge book and she made that point strongly, that the feminism agenda didnt encompass the black female experience.

Aye. Generally speaking Black women are a demographic usually absent from much of "liberal"(I hate that label but..) thought and politic. You can even see that in advertising where you have interracial couples. It's almost always a White woman with a Brown or Black man. You rarely see the reverse. Black women and their issues tend to be more "invisible".

What it boils down to though - and noone should be particularly shocked by this - people care first and foremost about their own rights. Thats what they agitate for.

I dont see the people who marched for gay marriage also supporting better living conditions for travellers. Or the 'Repeal the 8th' activists campaigning about direct provision. (By and large, I'm sure some do).

Oh certainly T. However those same activists are not claiming equality as their credo regarding directly involved parties. SSM folks aren't claiming they're for equal rights for hetero couples, Repeal the 8th aren't claiming they're for equal rights for Right to life campaigners, or are concerned with Traveller rights or Direct Provision. They're largely "in opposition" to each other, or wholly unconnected. Feminism regularly claims front and centre to be a gender equality movement not in opposition to men. While at the same time and with a straight face crowing on about "toxic masculinity".

Why would it surprise you that white middle class women are principally concerned with the welfare of white middle class women. Why would you blame them for that.

You have to fight your own battles.

Again T because they claim to be a progressive intersectional equality movement, when in fact any such nods to that are tokenism at best, hypocritical and divisive at worst.

true-or-false wrote: »

You're confusing the gender pay gap with equal pay for equal work - they're two different issues.

The gender pay gap is very real. Whether you think it's worth solving is a different issue, but yes, it definitely exists.

One problem and question I have with this gender gap is this; if women get paid less for working the same job and hours, why hire men? It would make sound financial sense to proactively hire more women. More work for less pay. Ker-ching!

And as I noted earlier the Women's council of Ireland showed that before children came into it Irish women were on average better educated and better paid to the tune of 17 percent compared to men. The pay gap went the other way to the narrative.