Is Feminism Still Relevant?

[BVS]

Originally Posted by jeevey

I think the principle extends beyond couples. Very often rape occurs because a man believes he is justified in taking control of a woman's body- his claims to it override her autonomy. That's whether he knows her or not. The Stubenville case is a great example. The perpatrators didn't have any sort of vendetta against the girl. She didn't antagonize them, there was no social aggression. One boy was under the impression that she wanted him. And when she was no longer capable of saying yes or no, they just thought it would be really fun to stage a massive scene of sexual humiliation- that they had a right to decide what happened to her. That's misogyny.

I never once for any second suggested that no rape had anything to do with misogyny.

I was just trying to get us(mainly you) from lumping all rape or all violence into the same category, which is where you were taking this thread.

You've been a bit exhausting to try and have a discussion with in this thread, too many twists, assumptions, and avoidance. I may have to bow out for awhile...

[Jive Turkey]

You need to stop taking everything out if context. I'm implying that rape is a hold over from more primitive times. Do you think the chimp that rapes other chimps is doing so because he hates the female chimps?
And since you brought it up, pedophilia is a completely different issue. Not even sure why you've included it. But do you think the priest who rapes choir boys does it out of hate for choir boys?

[Jive Turkey]

Originally Posted by BVS

You've been a bit exhausting to try and have a discussion with in this thread, too many twists, assumptions, and avoidance. I may have to bow out for awhile...

that's makes two of us.

[IWasBored]

I had to go back to the beginning of this thread to figure out what the original topic was. I don't even know what is going on in here anymore.

[iron yuppie]

Originally Posted by Jive Turkey

You need to stop taking everything out if context. I'm implying that rape is a hold over from more primitive times. Do you think the chimp that rapes other chimps is doing so because he hates the female chimps?

I'm all for scientific reasoning, but I think this is a really dangerous train of thought. It's essentially biological determinism in suggesting that men have a primordial urge toward sexual aggression. The next step is to say that it's natural if that aggression turns violent. I'm no scientist, but I suspect that behavioral science is far from exact in this sense.

[BonosSaint]

I had to go back to the beginning of this thread to figure out what the original topic was. I don't even know what is going on in here anymore.

Originally Posted by dazzledbylight

Why don't we turn this thread into a general thread on women's fight for further equality?

Because of our habit of taking up less space than we deserve (with the possible--but not always--exception of bathrooms, closet space and luggage ), this became a catch-all feminist thread. The topics will shift.

I do agree with people here that when discussing how woman fare, it is important to distinguish between violent misogynist/nonviolent misogynist and sexist responses to women (as well as misandrist and sexist responses to men). I do not think misogyny is pervasive (although certainly something that should be of serious concern for women). I do think sexism is pervasive if you define sexism as lesser regard, differing standards and expectations, imposed limits, judgment of a woman's appearance as her prime value (or lack of value), etc.

washingtonpost.com
By Shankar Vedantam
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, July 13, 2006

Neurobiologist Ben Barres has a unique perspective on former Harvard president Lawrence Summers's assertion that innate differences between the sexes might explain why many fewer women than men reach the highest echelons of science.

That's because Barres used to be a woman himself.

In a highly unusual critique published yesterday, the Stanford University biologist -- who used to be Barbara -- said his experience as both a man and a woman had given him an intensely personal insight into the biases that make it harder for women to succeed in science.

After he underwent a sex change nine years ago at the age of 42, Barres recalled, another scientist who was unaware of it was heard to say, "Ben Barres gave a great seminar today, but then his work is much better than his sister's."

And as a female undergraduate at MIT, Barres once solved a difficult math problem that stumped many male classmates, only to be told by a professor: "Your boyfriend must have solved it for you."

"By far," Barres wrote, "the main difference I have noticed is that people who don't know I am transgendered treat me with much more respect" than when he was a woman. "I can even complete a whole sentence without being interrupted by a man."

Barres said the switch had given him access to conversations that would have excluded him previously: "I had a conversation with a male surgeon and he told me he had never met a woman surgeon who was as good as a man."

Barres's salvo, bolstered with scientific studies, marks a dramatic twist in a controversy that began with Summers's suggestion last year that "intrinsic aptitude" may explain why there are relatively few tenured female scientists at Harvard. After a lengthy feud with the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Summers resigned earlier this year.


The episode triggered a fierce fight between those who say talk of intrinsic differences reflects sexism that has held women back and those who argue that political correctness is keeping scientists from frankly discussing the issue.

While there are men and women on both sides of the argument, the debate has exposed fissures along gender lines, which is what makes Barres so unusual. Barres said he has realized from personal experience that many men are unconscious of the privileges that come with being male, which leaves them unable to countenance talk of glass ceilings and discrimination.

Barres's commentary was published yesterday in the journal Nature. The scientist has also recently taken his argument to the highest reaches of American science, crusading to make access to prestigious awards more equitable.

In an interview, Nancy Andreasen, a well-known psychiatrist at the University of Iowa, agreed with Barres. She said it took her a long time to convince her husband that he got more respect when he approached an airline ticket counter than she did. When she stopped sending out research articles under her full name and used the initials N.C. Andreasen instead, she said, the acceptance rate of her publications soared.

Andreasen, one of the comparatively few women who have won the National Medal of Science, said she is still regularly reminded she is female. "Often, I will be standing in a group of men, and another person will come up and say hello to all the men and just will not see me, because in a professional setting, men are not programmed to see women," she said. "Finally, one of the men will say, 'I guess you haven't met Nancy Andreasen,' and then the person will turn bright red and say, 'Oh Nancy, nice to see you!' "

Summers did not respond to a request for an interview. But two scientists Barres lambasted along with Summers said the Stanford neurobiologist had misrepresented their views and unfairly tarred those who disagree with crude assertions of racism and sexism. Harvard cognitive scientist Steven Pinker and Peter Lawrence, a biologist at Britain's Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, said convincing data show there are differences between men and women in a host of mental abilities.

While bias could be a factor in why there were fewer women at the pinnacles of science, both argued that this was not a primary factor.

Pinker, who said he is a feminist, said experiments have shown, on average, that women are better than men at mathematical calculation and verbal fluency, and that men are better at spatial visualization and mathematical reasoning. It is hardly surprising, he said, that in his own field of language development, the number of women outstrips men, while in mechanical engineering, there are far more men.

"Is it essential to women's progress that women be indistinguishable from men?" he asked. "It confuses the issue of fairness with sameness. Let's say the data shows sex differences. Does it become okay to discriminate against women? The moral issue of treating individuals fairly should be kept separate from the empirical issues."

Lawrence said it is a "utopian" idea that "one fine day, there will be an equal number of men and women in all jobs, including those in scientific research."

He said a range of cognitive differences could partly account for stark disparities, such as at his own institute, which has 56 male and six female scientists. But even as he played down the role of sexism, Lawrence said the "rat race" in science is skewed in favor of pushy, aggressive people -- most of whom, he said, happen to be men.

"We should try and look for the qualities we actually need," he said. "I believe if we did, that we would choose more women and more gentle men. It is gentle people of all sorts who are discriminated against in our struggle to survive."

Barres and Elizabeth Spelke, a Harvard psychologist who has publicly debated Pinker on the issue, say they have little trouble with the idea that there are differences between the sexes, although some differences, especially among children, involve biases among adults in interpreting the same behavior in boys and girls.

And both argue it is difficult to tease apart nature from nurture. "Does anyone doubt if you study harder you will do better on a test?" Barres asked. "The mere existence of an IQ difference does not say it is innate. . . . Why do Asian girls do better on math tests than American boys? No one thinks they are innately better."

In her debate with Pinker last year, Spelke said arguments about innate differences as explanations for disparities become absurd if applied to previous eras. "You won't see a Chinese face or an Indian face in 19th-century science," she said. "It would have been tempting to apply this same pattern of statistical reasoning and say, there must be something about European genes that give rise to greater mathematical talent than Asian genes."

"I think we want to step back and ask, why is it that almost all Nobel Prize winners are men today?" she concluded. "The answer to that question may be the same reason why all the great scientists in Florence were Christian."

Male Scientist Writes of Life as Female Scientist

We discussed this topic a while ago.

My favorite part (assuming it's accurate) :

After he underwent a sex change nine years ago at the age of 42, Barres recalled, another scientist who was unaware of it was heard to say, "Ben Barres gave a great seminar today, but then his work is much better than his sister's."

We need to watch who and what defines us. Doesn't mean every reaction we have is valid. Doesn't mean a reaction we have is necessarily invalid either.

[Pearl]

I know rape jokes was just analyzed to death, but it's being discussed in the comedy world now. This article makes a good point:

And when feminists say that rape jokes contribute to rape culture, this is a big part of what they mean: That if you send rapists the message that what they did is normal, and something we can all laugh about – the way that jokes like Morril’s and Tosh’s do – then the next time they’re with a woman who’s too drunk to say yes, they’re going to know that they’ve already got some implicit approval for whatever they choose to do. So when I – and presumably a lot of other people who think that Tosh, Morril, and the rest of the rape-jokes-are-hilarious crowd are assholes – get upset about the jokes, it’s not that I’m offended. I’m really hard to offend. It’s that I’m mad that the person had a mic in their hand, and a whole room full of people listening to them, and they decided that the way they were going to make them laugh was to tell a joke that would made a rapist feel better about himself.

The Soapbox: What Do Rape Jokes Make Rapists Think?

Basically, yes. Why shouldn't a comedian be aware of the message he's sending? Censorship isn't necessary, but a little responsibility helps.

[Jive Turkey]

Originally Posted by iron yuppie

I'm all for scientific reasoning, but I think this is a really dangerous train of thought. It's essentially biological determinism in suggesting that men have a primordial urge toward sexual aggression. The next step is to say that it's natural if that aggression turns violent. I'm no scientist, but I suspect that behavioral science is far from exact in this sense.

I wasn't implying that all men have some suppressed urge to rape. I'm arguing that the act of rape has a long and well documented history in the animal kingdom. To suggest that, when it comes to humans, there must suddenly be some other motivating factor is unrealistic.

Originally Posted by BonosSaint

Because of our habit of taking up less space than we deserve (with the possible--but not always--exception of bathrooms, closet space and luggage ), this became a catch-all feminist thread. The topics will shift.

I do agree with people here that when discussing how woman fare, it is important to distinguish between violent misogynist/nonviolent misogynist and sexist responses to women (as well as misandrist and sexist responses to men). I do not think misogyny is pervasive (although certainly something that should be of serious concern for women). I do think sexism is pervasive if you define sexism as lesser regard, differing standards and expectations, imposed limits, judgment of a woman's appearance as her prime value (or lack of value), etc.



Male Scientist Writes of Life as Female Scientist

We discussed this topic a while ago.

My favorite part (assuming it's accurate) :



We need to watch who and what defines us. Doesn't mean every reaction we have is valid. Doesn't mean a reaction we have is necessarily invalid either.

Great article. I tend to side with Steven Pinker in that men and women are predisposed to being better at different tasks, but predispositions aren't limiting. There are plenty celebrated men in mathematics; there's no reason for there not to be more women in science. The world could use their brains.
For an illustrative look at how hard women have it in science, read up on the history behind Wilson and Crick's discovery of the double helix structure of DNA

[deep]

is this a win for feminism?


Miss World Removing Swimsuit Portion Of Contest

[jeevey]

Valuing women based on appearance, versus controlling what women wear lest they be too sexual for onlookers- tough choice.

[MrsSpringsteen]

prospect.org

E.J. Graff

June 10, 2013

Fifty years ago today, in 1963, Congress passed the Equal Pay Act. The idea was simple: Men and women doing the same work should earn the same pay. Straightforward enough, right? Change the law, change the world, be home by lunchtime.

Well, maybe not by lunchtime. After all, back then the law still accepted the idea that men and women were born for different jobs. Newspapers like The Washington Post still had separate classified ad sections for “men’s” jobs and “women’s” jobs. Female law school graduates had trouble even getting interviews. The pre-1963 world being what it was–sexist, in a word—you’d figure activists might well have estimated that the culture would need at least a decade to catch up and treat women fairly on the job.

“When I first came to the Women’s Legal Defense Fund, which is now the National Partnership for Women & Families (NPWF), in 1974, it was very fashionable to walk around with those big buttons that had “59¢” with the international “no” sign, the slash, through it,” Judith Lichtman of NPWF told me. “We all wore those buttons.” Women then were making the ridiculous 59 cents to a man’s dollar.

Fifty years later, women are still earning about 77 cents for a man’s dollar—and it’s been bouncing around at that level for about 15 years. There’s plenty of discussion around the attempts to take away women’s reproductive rights, and around the consequences of sexual assault. But I just don’t see the same outrage about that missing money—even though the daily consequences are just as damaging. How often does a woman need emergency contraception or an abortion? Maybe once or twice in her lifetime. How often does she get paid less than the guy down the hall doing the same damn entry-level job, or the same nonprofit, government, medical, legal, or managerial job? Every single day.

So where’s the outrage?

Let me back up and admit that, yes, things are much better for women now than in the 1960s. Doctor, lawyer, engineer, astronaut, pro-basketball player: We take it for granted that girls can do just about everything, and will probably outperform the men they go to college, law school, or medical school with—at least while they’re still in school. And yes, because of the Ledbetter Act, Lilly Ledbetter could sue if, today, she found out that for the past thirty years men with fewer credentials and less experience were being paid more than she was. [And yet we still have a gaping wage gap within nearly every occupation, right out of school.

Let’s look at some of the facts. The wage gap, of course, varies by all kinds of measures. Women in Wyoming make only 64.3 cents to a man’s dollar, while women in Washington, D.C. are paid up to 88 percent of what the men there make. (Single childless women do even better, but that only means that once women have children, they fare much worse—more on that below.) If we’re looking at race, you can guess how much worse it is for black women and Latina women compared to white men: 68 and 59 cents on the white male dollar respectively. But it also varies by occupation: female RNs make 95.7 cents to a male RN’s dollar; a female cook makes 89.4 cents to a male cook’s dollar; but female accountants and auditors make only 76.5 cents to the men in their profession’s dollar; and female truck drivers are bumping along with flat tires at 71.8 cents on the dollar.
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The wage gap starts right away: One year out of college, men make more than women even when they have the same majors from comparable institutions, and went into the same occupations. Let me quote the American Association of University Women, or AAUW’s, 2012 study “Graduating to a Pay Gap:”

"Among teachers, for example, women earned 89 percent of what men earned. In business and management occupations, women earned 86 percent of what men earned; similarly, in sales occupations, women earned just 77 percent of what their male peers earned…."

And we all know that the starting gap is just like the alligator’s mouth: it widens over time. Start with a $3,000 difference, and by the end of your careers, you and he are living in completely different economic zip codes.

Former Massachusetts Lieutenant Governor Evelyn Murphy, for whom I wrote the book Getting Even: Why Women Still Don’t Get Paid Like Men—and What To Do So We Will, likes to ask women what they would do with that extra 23 cents. Eat more fresh vegetables and fruit? Pay off your student loans? Buy a new car? Send the kids to more expensive summer camps? Then she asks women to add that money up over a lifetime. Depending on your educational status, ladies, you will make $700,000 less than a man (that’s with a high school degree), $1 million less (college degree), or $2 million less (MBA, JD, MD).

The situation is much worse for mothers. If you give neutral reviewers the same job applications or job evaluations and you that a woman has children, she not only gets offered less money than anyone else (men with or without children, women without children), but also is allowed fewer absences and fewer tardy arrivals before she’s fired.

So how do we fix this? AAUW and NWPF want to see Congress pass the Paycheck Fairness Act, which would give more oomph to the 50-year-old law that’s showing its age, closing some loopholes and improving enforcement. Among other things, it would make it illegal to fire you for comparing pay with your coworkers, which ought to be a duh. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is trying to figure out an appropriate way for the government to collect pay data by sex, since the government is already collecting a lot of different kinds of employment data; the idea is that if companies saw their own gendered wage data, they could work on fixing any gaps—and if they didn’t fix those gaps, the EEOC could come in and investigate.

Here’s where I find the hope: Four out of ten American households with children now have women as the primary earners. That’s hopeful because it means the pay gap is a family issue. I regularly hear about men outraged when their wives, girlfriends, sisters, or daughters are fired for being pregnant (having to find another job sure does hold back your advancement) or are passed over for manager or get sexually harassed in the Air Force Academy or whatever face discrimination takes in their lives. I hear, over and over, that these good men won’t let their wives or friends or sisters just roll over and get walked on; they insist that women stand up and push harder on the family’s behalf.

Sometimes I wonder whether it’s easier for young feminists to argue about women’s bodies because it’s not sex but money that’s the real American taboo. Sometimes I wonder whether it’s that sexual freedom is a young person’s issue, immediate and consuming at that life stage. But you don’t quite notice how pinched your finances are compared to your male peers until you’re in your thirties or forties, and you look around and realize: Wait, I ran circles around him in college; how did he get there when I’m still back here?

That’s why I got such hope from the broad conversation that Facebook CEO Sheryl Sandberg’s book, Lean In, launched. Sure, as some objected, her solutions are focused on women in business, but for God’s sake, let’s at least get the conversation started somewhere. Nothing can change if we’re not all talking about the subtle and overt ways women don’t get paid fairly. Equal pay is a family issue; it’s about children’s well-being. And that makes it a societal issue. So what if earlier feminists couldn’t get the wage gap fixed by lunchtime? That just means it’s our turn now.

[BonosSaint]

NY Times

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

June 10, 2013
Sexism’s Puzzling Stamina
By FRANK BRUNI
This month the Supreme Court will issue raptly awaited decisions about affirmative action and gay marriage. But what’s been foremost in my thoughts isn’t race, sexual orientation or our country’s deeply flawed handling of both.

It’s gender — and all the recent reminders of how often women are still victimized, how potently they’re still resented and how tenaciously a musty male chauvinism endures. On this front even more than the others, I somehow thought we’d be further along by now.

I can’t get past that widely noted image from a week ago, of the Senate hearing into the epidemic of sexual assault in the military. It showed an initial panel of witnesses: 11 men, one woman. It also showed the backs of some of the senators listening to them: five men and one woman, from a Senate committee encompassing 19 men and seven women in all. Under discussion was the violation of women and how to stop it. And men, once again, were getting more say.

I keep flashing back more than two decades, to 1991. That was the year of the Tailhook incident, in which some 100 Navy and Marine aviators were accused of sexually assaulting scores of women. It was the year of Susan Faludi’s runaway best seller, “Backlash,” on the “war against American women,” as the subtitle said. It was when the issue of sexual harassment took center stage in Clarence Thomas’s confirmation hearings.

All in all it was a festival of teachable moments, raising our consciousness into the stratosphere. So where are we, fully 22 years later?

We’re listening to Saxby Chambliss, a senator from Georgia, attribute sexual abuse in the military to the ineluctable “hormone level” of virile young men in proximity to nubile young women.

We’re congratulating ourselves on the historic high of 20 women in the Senate, even though there are still four men to every one of them and, among governors, nine men to every woman.

I’ll leave aside boardrooms; they’ve been amply covered in Sheryl Sandberg’s book tour.

But what about movies? It was all the way back in 1986 that Sigourney Weaver trounced “Aliens” and landed on the cover of Time, supposedly presaging an era of action heroines. But there haven’t been so many: Angelina Jolie in the “Tomb Raider” adventures, “Salt” and a few other hectic flicks; Jennifer Lawrence in the unfolding “Hunger Games” serial. Last summer Kristen Stewart’s “Snow White” needed a “Huntsman” at her side, and this summer? I see an “Iron Man,” a “Man of Steel” and Will Smith, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon and Channing Tatum all shouldering the weight of civilization’s future. I see no comparable crew of warrior goddesses.

Heroines fare better on TV, but even there I’m struck by the persistent stereotype of a woman whose career devotion is both seed and flower of a tortured private life. Claire Danes in “Homeland,” Mireille Enos in “The Killing,” Dana Delany in “Body of Proof” and even Mariska Hargitay in “Law & Order: SVU” all fit this bill.

The idea that professional and domestic concerns can’t be balanced isn’t confined to the tube. A recent Pew Research Center report showing that women had become the primary providers in 40 percent of American households with at least one child under 18 prompted the conservative commentators Lou Dobbs and Erick Erickson to fret, respectively, over the dissolution of society and the endangerment of children. When Megyn Kelly challenged them on Fox News, they responded in a patronizing manner that they’d never use with a male news anchor.

Title IX, enacted in 1972, hasn’t led to an impressive advancement of women in pro sports. The country is now on its third attempt at a commercially viable women’s soccer league. The Women’s National Basketball Association lags far behind the men’s N.B.A. in visibility and revenue.

Even in the putatively high-minded realm of literature, there’s a gender gap, with male authors accorded the lion’s share of prominent reviews, as the annual VIDA survey documents. Reflecting on that in Salon last week, the critic Laura Miller acutely noted: “There’s a grandiose self-presentation, a swagger, that goes along with advancing your book as a Great American Novel that many women find impossible or silly.”

I congratulate them for that. They let less hot air into their heads.

But about the larger picture, I’m mystified. Our racial bigotry has often been tied to the ignorance abetted by unfamiliarity, our homophobia to a failure to realize how many gay people we know and respect.

Well, women are in the next cubicle, across the dinner table, on the other side of the bed. Almost every man has a mother he has known and probably cared about; most also have a wife, daughter, sister, aunt or niece as well. Our stubborn sexisms harms and holds back them, not strangers. Still it survives.

[Jive Turkey]

I think this can go in here

http://bitchsandwich.tumblr.com/

[Pearl]

Originally Posted by Jive Turkey

I think this can go in here

http://bitchsandwich.tumblr.com/

Your point?

[Jive Turkey]

Originally Posted by Pearl

Your point?

Really?? Do you not understand what it is?
God forbid should we inject a little humour in here

[Pearl]

Originally Posted by Jive Turkey

Really?? Do you not understand what it is?
God forbid should we inject a little humour in here

Did you post this to poke fun at the guys who are trying to seem tough by tweeting, "make a me sandwich, bitch!", or are you trying to stir up something here?

Let's say I posted a similar site of girls poking fun at guys for not being real men or whatever. Would you find it humorous or would you roll your eyes and move on?

[Jive Turkey]

Originally Posted by Pearl

Did you post this to poke fun at the guys who are trying to seem tough by tweeting, "make a me sandwich, bitch!", or are you trying to stir up something here?

Let's say I posted a similar site of girls poking fun at guys for not being real men or whatever. Would you find it humorous or would you roll your eyes and move on?

You clearly have no idea what's going on in that website

[Jive Turkey]

Maybe this explanation will help

New Favorite Tumblr: Make Me a Sandwich Bitch

[Pearl]

Originally Posted by Jive Turkey

You clearly have no idea what's going on in that website

There's no need to be rude here just because I don't see the world from your eyes.

[Jive Turkey]

Originally Posted by Pearl

There's no need to be rude here just because I don't see the world from your eyes.

psst, you were the first one who was rude I was just trying to spread the funnies