Why is there so much hatred of feminism amongst men on the spectrum. I think we spectrumites have a lot to learn from feminists!
I wrote a little bit about some of the reasons feminists get stereotyped in another thread:
I can actually identify with this, as it's a pretty familiar tactic to me, taking the most extreme and unpleasant members of a group and portraying them as if they're representative, like the media always managing to find the craziest fundamentalist at the Tea Party Rally, or the smelliest hippy at the OWS event to interview. Or, ironically enough, like feminists themselves promoting particular subgroups, such as certain internet comment sections or fraternities, as if they're representative of men as a whole. Kinda sucks when they shoe's on the other foot, doesn't it? I get this one pretty regularly on a number of fronts, from Ted Nugent and Alex Jones being held up as typical gun owners to Ayn Rand quoting Objectivists representing all of libertarianism to, yes, neanderthal frat-boys being put forward as the personification of men; it's a bogus tactic, and one I wish more people were aware of when it wasn't being done to them personally.
However, feminism does have it's share of self inflicted wounds, from the obsession with "privilege checking" to the jargon and politically correct scolding to the vicious infighting and backstabbing so rampant on social media, the perpetual outrage and hair trigger taking of offense, the dogma, etc, doesn't present an entirely inviting picture of the movement. Unfortunately, even if the mentioned behaviors are perpetrated by a minority of feminists, the dynamics of the internet make them pervasive enough to become the stereotype, and there are enough actual feminist out there who conform to it that it is an easily reinforced one, as can be seen in the myriad L&D and PPR feminism threads. My own experience certainly reflects this, as I've been dismissed simply because of my race and/or gender, or having used a common word or phrase that has been deemed verboten in feminist circles, and as a white, gender-normative cismale, I don't feel that engaging with the type of feminist who hurls those words around as pejoratives is particularly worth my time, even though I have a better understanding of the underlying issues than most; it's much more likely that others will simply write off the whole bunch.
In short, the movement has a real image problem, one that won't be solved simply by blaming the ignorance of outside observers for their failure to understand all the nuances and schisms of the various schools, especially when feminists themselves often end up at loggerheads over minutia and such.
Here are some of the sources I've used to form my opinions on feminism, in addition to my own personal experiences with feminists here and elsewhere:
http://www.thenation.com/article/178140 ... itter-warshttp://www.salon.com/2014/01/31/the_fig ... he_v_word/http://reason.com/archives/2014/02/02/i ... r-on-womenhttp://www.salon.com/2013/09/26/study_everyone_hates_environmentalists_and_feminists_partner/http://www.xojane.com/issues/why-you-ll ... -mansplainhttp://www.realclearpolitics.com/articl ... 21106.htmlIt's helpful to remember that 'feminism' =/= 'woman' or even the entirety of women's rights, but unfortunately they all tend to get lumped together. I highlighted a particular article in my quoted links that contains a study showing that people also tend to dislike activists generally, that has some useful insights as to why feminism is often held in such bad odor.
17 May 2014, 9:43 am
