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What are your thoughts on feminism in today's western societies?

EDIT: Should also read: And what roles does it currently play?

At this point I think it's importan to teach younger women to love themselves and not be the Baby Mama down the street bounce from one loser to the next. Also to help women in the 3rd world avoid being child brides, forced into being sex slaves, rent-a-wombs ect. We should also be active in the anti-childlabor movement. Afforable safe child care should also be a goal. Thats all I can think of as a dash out the door, I might be adding more later.

What roles? Hmm...
It has evened the balance, but there's still a way to go.

Not sure what modern femenism is...I'm only for it when women don't get the same opportunity as men in many skills they have the ability to accomplish.

I know in today's world most people use the word femenist as duragatory term for women meaning man hater or female extremist. I've ironically have had this word spout out a couple of times and didn't particularly see the reason why. Hey I'm all for men and women rights....and if being a femenist means not following what society "expects" in females, then I must be a femenist......

Yeah, I never understood the whole 'man hater' tag. I hear it uttered more than I see any actual man hating feminists. Actually, even more than I see feminists at all.

I think it's time to abandon feminism and start thinking in terms of humanism. Equality means equality.

I keep hearing that feminism has outlasted itself in the west, but I can’t agree. No western women are forced to marry, or killed off as children due to their gender, but feminism is about much more than these extremes.

Women make up half the work stock (47%) yet only 29% of all leaders are women. For top executives the number is 23%, for medium leaders it’s 32%.
In private sector only 25% of the leaders are women, while the number for public sector is 44%. The latter might seem high, until one knows that 2/3 of the people working in public sector are female.
3% of the women working in public sector have an executive job, while the number in private sector is 6%.
These numbers are for Norway, by the way.


In rape cases people still judge what the woman was wearing, whether or not she had a history of being sexually active and if she was flirty. The only thing that matters is that she said no. No means no!


As long as there expectations to a person based on gender, feminism is crucial.
As long as civilian females get looks for wearing camouflage clothes, or cropping their hair real short.
As long as girls are expected to behave better and less noisy than boys, as long as girls are expected to like “girlie” toys / clothes / interests, as long as girls are told that something is for boys.
As long as a teacher will snort “One would have thought a boy would choose that subject” when a female student tells him she wants her presentation to be about Concorde, as long as the same teacher tells some girls playing on a soccer team “Girls playing football?!”

I could go on with examples, but I think I have made my point. I’m not saying all girls should love video games or become soldiers or whatever; I’m saying that I want a society in which no one reacts with surprise that a female makes the choices she makes, be it be interested in “male” subjects, wear no makeup, or anything else in concordance with her personality.

I feel the same way for boys, of course, they shall be equally free to choose. However, there is a difference in how quite a few people view it. Sensitive males are ‘in’, they’re often well liked and well respected, and if someone reacts with surprise, it’s usually positively so.

Great points my husband still gets funny looks for being a male cheerleader and after they see he's married with kids and he's not gay some people think he's a prevert that likes teen aged girls when he had coached teams. Really he is a very competive person that sees parenter stunting as very under rated sport. Ofcouse I think it's funny that this peppie rah rah type of guy married a girl that wore all black and smoked behind the bleachers as a kid.

First of all - Jessica - I recommend "Whipping Girl" by Julia Serrano - it'll probably be as interesting to you as it was to me (it's about the feminist movements scapegoating of Transgendered Women)

I think, like all things, Feminism should maintain a sense of proportion. The stereotypical man-bashing male-imitating bull dyke is just as wrong as the men she's emulating for bashing someone based on gender. Does she really exist? Yes, I've met a few, but the vast majority of people who classify themselves as Feminists are just people who believe in equality of the Sexes, and admit that women are not treated equally with men.

The disparity goes both ways though. The American education system graduates more females at the college level then boys, here's an interesting take on that from the Freakonomics guys: (highly recommend reading their work - taking statistics to whole new avenues of exploration)

http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2 ... education/

And, for the more mainstream thinkers, here's an article from USA Today highlighting the same issue.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/ ... over_x.htm

So, why is it that our education system is so much more effective for girls then boys? With more girls coming out of school with a degree, and starting off one step ahead of boys in the work world because they have degrees -

-This study shows that the initial salary gap has closed (but it makes no mention of salary later in careers) http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/cu ... o=EJ755857



To my mind, it's just a matter of time. Just as with LGBT folk, the newer generation is more embracing of diversity, and as the baby boomer generation begins to retire and hand over the keys to younger people, these attitudes are going to change and the glass ceiling is going to shatter.

Do I believe it's already happened? No, there's still a tangible divide in the American Workplace, but it will be virtually non-existent for our children.

The old saying, "You can't teach an old dog new tricks" comes to mind here. The Good 'Ole Boys Network is still in charge, for the moment, because they came up in a time when they weren't competing against Women, but coming up behind them is a new generation who doesn't share their values. I believe it's true for many Minorities - the information age has shattered many of the artificial barriers that existed between humanity, and we're moving toward a more enlightened future. That doesn't mean there won't be speed bumps along the way, but they won't stop us.


So, I bring us back to Freakonomics - Why are our schools failing our boys? What can we do to stop it? - Because if we keep heading in this direction, the dynamic is just going to flip in about 20 years, and men will find themselves where women are today.

Thats no good ethier flutter. I think it's partly due to the letting boys run wild then being shocked when they do something that causes them or someone else real harm. We do our sons no favors when we do not hold them to high standers of behavior like our parents and grandparents did us no favors but not expecting us to use our brains and make something of our selfs. I hold both my sons to high standers of behavior because I know they are smart and able to be good productive men when they are grown. My boy have < I have no girls> freedon they have earned by showing that good behavior grades are a big part of this.

I have to disagree. Humanist movements that existed before feminism, excluded females from the rights and benefits they sought and achieved. What you are suggesting is a step backwards, not forwards, and while you can talk about equality meaning equal for everyone, the historical facts prove that without dedicated efforts to ensure the inclusion of females, we are excluded.

While not all humanist efforts have been feminist (or equalist), any genuinely feminist effort will be equalist and humanist. Of course many efforts that are not really feminist can and have been described as such, just as many less than desirable things can and have been wrapped in a veneer of respectability achieved by claiming (and perhaps even through proponents believing) that the efforts subscribe or fit some respectable intended goal.


It’s difficult to know what to do about achievement differences between males and females in academia, not least because the result seems to have happened rather swiftly given the continued disadvantages of being female in academic contexts (research for instances shows that the same essay will be graded lower if submitted under a female name than if submitted under a male name or by attributing a number that does not identify gender).

If the problem is that females are simply better at these things, then this would require that we either accept the inequality in results as merited (equal opportunity will not produce equal results), or we need to consider alternative means of acquiring and demonstrating academic/career potential/achievement.

The problem could be the way education is delivered or in how its results are measured (performance may be measured in ways that are more amenable to female performance than male). It could be the result of life cycle stages and timing (perhaps at the relevant age, males are in a life cycle stage that does not facilitate academic achievement, but rather risk taking, socializing and “rebelling against the man”, or something), or social expectations (perhaps rather than a biological life stage, there is a social/cultural set of expectations about males in this age group, that males in the age group enact to the detriment of their schooling). Perhaps as another poster suggests males are simply being taught to not behave in their interests academically, or not being_taught to behave in their academic interests ("boys will boys" may be a self fufilling prophecy).

The first step to addressing the issue would be to identify quite why there is a measured difference. This was not so difficult in regards to females. Social and cultural norms along with a history or exclusion were fairly obvious reasons for disparity in outcomes. It might be more difficult to nail down why males do not achieve equally with females given the removal of the constraints on female achievement.

Been interesting to read some of the responses here, and I do plan on picking up that book Flutter, as soon as I have some money to. It was recommended to me by a friend of mine. I hope to see more interesting responses.

Didn't mean to divert the flow of the conversation, but I see the future problem with equality being the under-education of our men.

And CRD brings up an excellent point - it begins in the home, with concerned and engaged parenting - but not every child gets that, and the disparity is measurable, and getting worse. It began 22-25 years ago, with our recent crops of would be college graduates. Did something massively change in parenting somewhere in the mid-80's to early-90's?

We've had a gradual slide of discipline for children in general, and we've now got 2nd and 3rd generations of families being raised by TV sets - and children's programming has always been frantic and disjointed. Sesame Street is short attention span theatre, and most shows follow the same model, on an escalated pace.

Plus, these children were brought up on the internet - with youtube at their beck and call to keep them constantly stimulated. Have you watched Fred, or Harry Potter Puppet Pals? - these are things my stepkids have shown me.... and they frankly disturb me. The minimal regulation of content on television seems draconian to what goes on the internet.

I think the first step is unplugging our kids and getting them out and engaged in the real world whenever possible. And making sure they don't bring the DS or PSP with them.

We live in a time when children feel entitled to constant stimulation, and when placed in a situation where they don't get it (school) they wither.

The rub is - we can't force parents to do the right thing for their children. I've heard parents say "Boys are easy - set them in front of a game and they entertain themselves" This was from a woman with 4 boys - She's right - they will stay there all day... it's up to us as parents to get them out of their shells and develop their social skills so they'll be able to engage and perform in school.


Aaaaaand, I've just gone waaaay further off topic then I intended.

I think feminism absolutely has a place in Western AND other societies. It needs to be instilled in our daughters AND our sons. We live in a patriarchy. It's like for every step forward we take in one area, we take another step backwards somewhere else. We've made huge strides in education but we're still horribly underrepresented in politics. Women's magazines are considered a special interest just like guitar magazines!

I think we also need to start teaching people what feminism really is. It's not a man-hating movement designed to put women in charge of everything. It's a movement toward equal rights and privileges and considerations for EVERYONE, not just one group. There are subsets of feminists who have their own definitions, but this is the idea of feminism that I grew up with and subscribe to. Female empowerment isn't meant to subjugate men, but many people think exactly that.

I don't identify with feminism. I don't really identify with women. I have always felt like my brain is more male than female, I find it very difficult to talk to women, less difficult to talk to men. I do like to be feminine though, long hair, painted nails, skirts etc. .... but it seems like I am less emotional than most women I know and more logic based. Women usually strike me as catty and gossipy.

However I can see the good feminism has done for society, I just don't connect how it applies to me, since I don't feel connected to women.

I think it's sad how modern feminism degrades the role of traditional mothers and childbearing. The earliest feminists were for the most part pro life.

The early feminist had bigger fish to fry then abortion for the most part. They worry more worried about voting, divorce laws, labor laws and brithcontrol. The information and avaibiled of brithcontrol is still a isuse for women under 18 I think tell someone not to have sex is the silly form of nonsexual eduation on the face of the planet next to the old wifes tale about biting the pillow.