Respect for Women

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"Empowering" someone to be a sad loser with no social redeeming value or relevance? Sure.

By that logic, then since meth is illegal, deciding to become an unemployed meth addict just because "you can" is somehow "empowering". Nonsense.

Not all choices are created equal, choosing to be HS dropout versus earning high grades and finding a meaningful career that contributes to society, for example.

I chose to drop out of education. It's nice to know that some consider my choice of what to do with my life as being inferior to someone else's choices.

I was just using that as an analogy, some people might drop out because they're pursuing a higher purpose such as some actors and entrepreneurs.

I was simply talking about the principle of being intentionally lazy or self-defeating.


We're not talking about what "people consider", we're talking about facts.

People can do whatever they want, become a junkie, rapist, murderer, etc and pretend it's "empowerment" - but they don't get to 'decide' whether it's a good or bad choice anymore than they get to decide "2+2+5", since it's already decided for them by the laws of nature, much like mathematics.

If someone chooses to make intentionally self-destructive choices just because they don't like being "told what to do" then they'll never be empowered, they'll always be no one.

That's as silly as me deciding to jump in front of a speeding semi-truck just because I was "told not to" - what of any real social worth did you accomplish? None, nada.

My reasons for dropping out of education are my own but without knowing anything about my reasons, or the reasons of anyone else who has dropped out of education, you're prepared to make a blanket statement that that choice is inferior to someone else's choices? That isn't a fact it's a subjective opinion, your opinion.

No it's an objective fact. You get to choose to murder someone or not, but you don't get to "decide" whether murder harms people or is beneficial - it's decided by natural law.

And as I mentioned the "HS" example was just an analogy; dropping out of HS itself isn't automatically bad, the motivations behind it are the key.

Likewise drug addiction objectively leads to dependence on chemical substances (the opposite of empowerment), so no taking drugs just because "they're illegal" is not truly empowering.

A "I want to do whatever I want" attitude is the same as that of an infant, and how many infants are in any actual positions of political power or authority?

So back to the subject, a real feminist like Waris Dirie is an empowered woman; a slu*ty woman sleeping around with as many guys as possible just because "society doesn't like it" who dies from her STDs isn't empowered at all, she's just a nobody who's dead and became nothing when she died, like every other practitioner of the world's oldest profession - none of whom ever made history simply for being a whore.

Well most school teachers are women.

Regardless, fact is the average "internet feminist" is not a Harriet Tubman, Rosa Parks, Waris Dirie - and there's no virtue whatsoever in doing things just because someone "told you not to", anymore than there is drinking a bottle of hydrochloric acid simply because the warning label "says not to".

The average "angry internet feminist" obviously isn't empowered, or else she'd actually do something meaningful with her life like Waris Dirie instead of spending all of her free time complaining about how oppressed she is, and how males are to blame for her own lot in life, and pretending anyone will actually care about her after she's dead and gone.

The internet gives the illusion that way more people care than actually do in reality. In reality no one cares whether or not you have a 2-bit Tumblr blog, or whether you "identify" as a feminist or not - there's millions out there just like you.

You simply don't get it do you? You are judging people based upon your value system but those people might have entirely different value systems of their own. I wouldn't presume to judge anybody else's choice because I'm not them and I don't know why they decided to make those choices. People have a right to live their own lives, including any choices they make, as they see fit, until such time as those choices bring them into conflict with the law. Even then it's still their own personal choice whether to uphold the law or not.

Just like how young earth creationists have a "different science system" than the scientific method. Yet one is correct, the other isn't. Go figure, some people have wrong values just as they do wrong "science".


I would, because I don't care "why" they made the choices, I'm only talking about objective facts.

Just like I might not know exactly "why" someone in the 21st century still believes the earth is 6,000 years old, but that doesn't make the belief itself "just as true" as the scientific consensus, no.


Not just the legal law, but natural law. By that logic then if slavery wasn't legal on the books it would be "right".


A right or wrong choice, yes.

You can make your own choice to murder or rape - hell you can move to a country in Africa where murder and rape isn't punished by the law, but you don't get to decide whether the choices are right or wrong, harmful or not harmful - it's decided by nature, just as much as science and mathematics.

So do whatever you want to, but don't try to pretend that all choices are just as "good or harmful" as others - that's as illogical as saying the earth can be round, and the earth can be flat at the same time depending on the "perspective" of the observer instead of science.

So what it amounts to is that unless people's choices conform to what you believe is right then those choices must be wrong? What made you the arbiter of right and wrong?

By your own standards have you acheived your education aims and lived a productive life that benefits society?

Don't patronize me and don't bully me. You just make yourself look like a small petulant wannabe looking for attention.

Ah, the righteous indignation as justification for disgusting personal attacks approach.

Expressing my opinion in an environment where we are on an equal footing, with an equal degree of power and zero leverage over one another can never justifiably be labelled bullying. Your accusation is unwarranted, unjustifiable and unwanted.

Patronising you would necessarily require that I imply or assert that you are somehow inferior to myself, whilst adopting an air of condescending indulgence. As my interaction with you consisted of me bluntly, but politely, asking you to refrain from personal attacks, in plain text, along with a reminder that your expressed opinions on a public forum are not divinely unassailable, you have zero ground upon which to base your accusation of condescension.

Frankly, my opinions on any individual who posts on PPR are virtually non-existent. I'm interested in your expressed thoughts, not your feelings. If you feel intimidated, antagonised, inferior or threatened due to my own expression of thoughts and opinions, it is entirely your problem to resolve.

On that note, you have chosen to ignore my request that you refrain from personal attacks and elected to call me a "small petulant wannabe". Whilst I appreciate the irony of you doing so immediately following your claim of "bullying and patronising", in the interests of pursuing useful and mutually satisfying debate, I am obliged to remind you that personal attacks are in violation of the site rules.

Finally, if you are incapable of addressing me without resorting to petty remarks about my character, I suggest that you refrain from soliciting my attention at all.

Perhaps you shouldn't have implied that feminism is 'useless'.

He didn't. He actually wrote...

Telling the truth is offensive now? WP really should get a safe space board.

Uhm, calling anything useless is an opinion... if I called you that it certainly won't be universally held.

Even if I had implied that feminism is useless, it would still constitute a valid opinion. In addition, it would in no way justify the personal attacks.



I was going to make a flippant remark about my preferred pronouns, as discussed in another thread, but I realised it may be misinterpreted. Instead, I offer my gratitude.

Thanks for pointing out Mootoo's error.



My safe space is known as AFK.

I agree with your suggestion, but I insist that it be called the Special Snowflake Board. The rules would need to be incredibly stringent, including an automatic ban for directly referencing into or out of the board from or to any other part of the site.



If you're aware such statements qualify as opinions, perhaps you shouldn't be advising other people not to share theirs.