equality blooms with spring, pt. II

[INDY500]

Originally Posted by VintagePunk

I was just sitting here pondering how to even begin responding to that post, but I think your response says it best.

Of course. Much easier isn't it?

Care to address my wacky idea that it wasn't only big, bad, mean men that were preventing women from gaining voting rights?

[INDY500]

Originally Posted by financeguy

Largely agree,

Why do hate women, sorry, fucking bitches, finance guy?

but I would probably argue feminists have been exploited by the neo-liberal corporatist globalist agenda for the latter's ends. So, underlying these trends that you've outlined is the neo-liberal agenda which is largely pushed by men.

Both of which, liberalism and feminism, have infiltrated higher academia to the point of turning those institutions of higher learning into monolithic institutions of indoctrination.

[Irvine511]

Originally Posted by INDY500

I reject the branch of Feminism that attempts to re-educate women to act and think contrary to their natures.

dude. seriously. are you about to tell women what is and isn't in their "nature"?

anyway, as ever, none of this has anything to do with the gay bashing that passes for discourse amongst the thugs on the right. anything less than total equality for gay people is gay bashing, hands down.

[phillyfan26]

Originally Posted by Irvine511

dude. seriously. are you about to tell women what is and isn't in their "nature"?

anyway, as ever, none of this has anything to do with the gay bashing that passes for discourse amongst the thugs on the right. anything less than total equality for gay people is gay bashing, hands down.

And then it becomes a discussion about what's equality and what isn't, and then you once again compare it to other oppressed people of the past and they say it isn't the same, and it continues in a circle, and at the end of the day everyone against gay marriage is still a bigot who will quote this post and get pissed off that I called a spade a spade.

I'm about to retire from FYM. Seriously. The fucking conservatives, man. I can't take it anymore.

[INDY500]

Originally Posted by Irvine511

dude. seriously. are you about to tell women what is and isn't in their "nature"?

You're asking the wrong person. Ask the radical feminists, the ones whom most women disagree with, who THEY are to tell women what is and isn't in their "nature" and best interests. Have you ever heard of Betty Friedan? Ever read 'Right-Wing Women: The Politics of Domesticated Females' by Andrea Dworkin. Do you believe all heterosexual sex is rape and marriage is slavery?

anyway, as ever, none of this has anything to do with the gay bashing that passes for discourse amongst the thugs on the right. anything less than total equality for gay people is gay bashing, hands down.

Thugs on the Right. Who engaged in thuggery against citizens only exercising their democratic right to speak at the ballot box and with their wallets in the wake of the Prop 8 vote in Calf?

And I'm guessing you and only you get to define the terms of "equality."

[anitram]

Originally Posted by Irvine511

dude. seriously. are you about to tell women what is and isn't in their "nature"?

Yes, seemingly some of the men around here have a better handle on our nature than we do.

[Diemen]

Originally Posted by INDY500

You're asking the wrong person. Ask the radical feminists, the ones whom most women disagree with, who THEY are to tell women what is and isn't in their "nature" and best interests. Have you ever heard of Betty Friedan? Ever read 'Right-Wing Women: The Politics of Domesticated Females' by Andrea Dworkin. Do you believe all heterosexual sex is rape and marriage is slavery?

The extremists in a movement represent the entire movement?

Thugs on the Right. Who engaged in thuggery against citizens only exercising their democratic right to speak at the ballot box and with their wallets in the wake of the Prop 8 vote in Calf?

Yeah! Those thugs! What with their not wanting to give money to businesses who consider them inferior and undeserving of equal rights under the law. The nerve!

[anitram]

Originally Posted by INDY500

I reject the branch of Feminism that attempts to re-educate women

Re-educate us into believing what? That we should have the choice to live our lives as you do? That those of us who want to have babies and find husbands should be free to do so, and that those who want to infiltrate male-dominated fields should be free to do so and that those who think they can do both should at the very least be free to try? Or is that all against our nature and it's best that we be more "womanly", get back into our houses and cook dinner and save this world from the crumbling morality which all happened once women decided that maybe it might be a good idea to get to vote, or to get to have divorce laws that don't keep us enslaved in abusive relationships and that give us an equal share of property on dissolution?

As for your question of why some women didn't want to vote...well when you're indoctrinated your entire life to believe one thing, it's hard to take those shackles off. Do you sit there and wonder if the women in Afghanistan who voluntarily wear the burqa hate women or could it be that maybe they don't know there is another way and they are afraid to death of a world they have never been part of? Maybe you really are that dense, but I believe otherwise.

[BVS]

Originally Posted by INDY500

How feminism went from seeking the freedom to be women in society to the freedom to cease being women.

You've become a bad parody of a caricature...

Pretty sad.

[BVS]

Originally Posted by financeguy

Largely agree,

Well yes, but we're all well aware of your gender issues.

[VintagePunk]

Originally Posted by INDY500

Of course. Much easier isn't it?

Care to address my wacky idea that it wasn't only big, bad, mean men that were preventing women from gaining voting rights?

Much easier than would be the exercise in futility and frustration that attempting to discuss it would be, yes.

And we all know that's not all you said.

[INDY500]

Originally Posted by anitram

That those of us who want to have babies and find husbands should be free to do so,

"We don't believe that any woman should have this choice. No woman should be authorized to stay at home to raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one."
-- Simone de Beauvoir
Considered the mother of post-1968 feminism.

Many of the top 20th-century feminist intellectuals don't think you should have that choice. They teach independence not just from men and motherhood but from morality and human nature as well.

Anyone else remember the thread about the declining happiness of women since the 70's? Coincidence it parallels the rise of modern feminism?

[BVS]

Originally Posted by INDY500

They teach independence not just from men and motherhood but from morality and human nature as well.

Do you have the Kool-Aid fed through an IV?

[Irvine511]

Originally Posted by INDY500

You're asking the wrong person. Ask the radical feminists, the ones whom most women disagree with, who THEY are to tell women what is and isn't in their "nature" and best interests. Have you ever heard of Betty Friedan? Ever read 'Right-Wing Women: The Politics of Domesticated Females' by Andrea Dworkin. Do you believe all heterosexual sex is rape and marriage is slavery?

all i can tell you INDY is that i know way, way more about "feminism" than you do.

[financeguy]

Fay Weldon: Feminism has made women into wage slaves, just like men
Ed Black
30.11.09

Feminism has turned many women into unhappy "wage-slaves", with only the better-off able to cope with the exhausting nature of modern life, according to author Fay Weldon.

The novelist, a pioneer of the feminist movement, said the sexual revolution of the Sixties ended the requirement for women to provide "sexual, childcare and cooking services".

However, there were many drawbacks, not least the effect that the demands of feminism had placed on working women, she told the Richmond Book Now Festival.

"The downside of feminism is that women are now expected to go out to work, which some women would rather do than looking after the children anyway," she said.

"Once it was only the men who were wage-slaves, and now it's the men and the women too. You know, I'd really rather blame capitalism.

"Probably 20 per cent of women are worse off and the enormous number are better off.

"You do feel some qualms for these women who actually have to shove their children's arms into clothes at five o'clock in the morning and get them off to the nursery."

Weldon, 78, whose books include The Lives and Loves of a She-Devil, said feminism was the "least worst" option for women.

"If you're an intelligent, competent and healthy person it's the most wonderful thing," she said. "If you have no aspirations and don't want to do anything except exist, than perhaps the pre-feminist world was better. There's never a perfect solution. There's just the least worst.

"And least worst is feminist society, which is more or less what we're getting now. And people are on the whole happier than they were before Although everybody's much more tired."

She made the remarks at the weekend as she promoted her 29th novel, Chalcot Crescent, which is set in 2013 and imagines a bankrupt Britain where everyone lives off "national meat loaf", laced with hallucinogenic drugs that keep people "happy and placid".

Asked about Martin Amis's recent remarks that the sexual revolution had been a more painful transition for women than men, she said that not all women had been empowered by it.

"It wasn't so much a sexual revolution as the coming of the Pill, really," she said. "Sex was suddenly something you could have without babies.

"Men took great advantage of that I think with the Pill women did turn into sex objects. The whole thing was rather upsetting."

She added: "I was never a good feminist. I never lived by my principles. It was a fib. I've sort of always been married. I had husbands and I picked up socks but actually, as my husband points out, he picks up the socks in real life."

Weldon held up Katie Price, the former glamour model Jordan, as a positive role model.

"It depends what you think the function of women is. If it's to look good, then she's fine. If it's to make a lot of money, then she's fine.

"So I suppose she must be empowering for women because one wants them to be prosperous and they like to look good.

"She drinks too much and sleeps with too many people and talks about it too much for common decency, but who of us is perfect?"

Fay Weldon: Feminism has made women into wage slaves, just like men | News

I do think that liberal politics at this stage operates as a kind of a cult, it's unacceptable to agree with some liberal opinions and not others, one must sign up to and believe unquestioningly the whole shebang - pure cult like behaviour.

One can also see this tendency in the way prominent lefties that supported the war in Iraq, such as Nik Cohen and Chris Hitchens, are subject to such vociferous personal attacks from some elements on the left.

[INDY500]

Originally Posted by Irvine511

all i can tell you INDY is that i know way, way more about "feminism" than you do.

Fine, you can have that Jeopardy category and I'll take Isolated Extremists That Strangely All Have Muslim Names.

[Bluer White]

Originally Posted by INDY500

Fine, you can have that Jeopardy category and I'll take Isolated Extremists That Strangely All Have Muslim Names.

[financeguy]

Divorced from reality

The left's hostility to family and marriage has had some profoundly unprogressive results

Tristram Hunt guardian.co.uk, Friday 8 January 2010 20.30 GMT

This week David Cameron got into trouble backing up the Communist Manifesto with his confused plans for marriage tax breaks. But the left should not be too cock-a-hoop, for it also remains far too much in the grip of Marxian thinking on marriage.

From socialism's earliest days, there existed a profound hostility towards traditional family forms. The French socialist Charles Fourier regarded marriage as a desperate hypocrisy that subverted the natural urge for sexual variety and resulted, at his count, in 32 different types of adultery. In Fourier's utopian future, citizens would be allowed full sexual freedom, women would have control over reproduction and children would be given the opportunity to choose between real or adoptive fathers.

In Britain, the socialist Robert Owen – who married into his New Lanark money – was equally opposed to wedded bliss. "Marriage, religion and property are the sole causes of the calamity that has existed since the world began." To move from the immoral world of selfishness to the moral world of fellowship demanded an end to the traditional marriage contract. His communes emphasised group education and doggedly resisted any "family interest" developing in opposition to the community.

To this tradition Marx and Engels added some materialist rigour. For them, the modern family was simply a product of private property and the nucleus of capitalist inequality. An abusive system of sexual inequality underpinned the practice of marriage comparable to the exploitation of the workers. "Within the family he is the bourgeois, and the wife represents the proletariat."

Marx and Engels chronicled the slow, steady loss of female power since the earliest societies, when gender equality was the norm as land and partners were held in common. But with private ownership and the advent of inheritable wealth, men demanded female monogamy. To pass on property to their biological offspring, paternity had to be established beyond doubt.

There was nothing God-given or natural about sexism; it was the inevitable result of capitalist economics. So behind the contented veneer of Victorian family life lurked "a conjugal partnership of leaden boredom, known as 'domestic bliss'". Its predictable accompaniment was widespread prostitution and relentless unhappiness. Indeed, Engels could see little difference between a street whore and a bourgeois wife, who merely "does not let out her body on a piecework, as a wage worker, but sells it once and for all into slavery".

In the 20th century, this Marxian assault on the family proved extraordinarily powerful. On the one hand, it transformed the prospects of women in the face of religious and customary oppression from Russia to China and Cuba. Female literacy and education in socialist societies stood among the world's finest. On the other hand, in the west it led to a voguish, new left assault on the nuclear family as bourgeois, repressive and past its sell-by date.

But there was always a more socially conservative strand to the Labour party's thinking. While the Second International made fighting for gender equality a priority, the Labour world of chapels, trade unions and friendly societies liked the family form just so. And for much of the postwar era, British social democracy was slow to develop policies on marriage and the family any different to the Tories'. It was in reaction to such institutionalised sexism that many on the metropolitan left embraced a Marxist hostility to marriage and the family as a political end in itself. As it did so, it aligned itself with an ethos of social hedonism with profoundly unprogressive consequences for the offspring of generations of unstable households.

Divorced from reality | Tristram Hunt | Comment is free | The Guardian

[Irvine511]

MP Iris Robinson, 60, had affair with 19-year-old toyboy

By Simon Creer, Paul Henderson and Eva Marie Gibney
Last updated at 3:09 PM on 08th January 2010


The astonishing details of MP Iris Robinson's affair with a 19-year-old - whom she had known since he was nine - have been laid bare today.

Her lover, Kirk McCambley, now 21, owns a cafe in south Belfast and the visitors' centre which houses the cafe was built by the council on which Mrs Robinson sits.

The wife of the Northern Ireland First Minister Peter Robinson helped Mr McCambley get started in business after first identifying a freshly developed council site on the banks of the river Lagan in south Belfast for his new venture and persuaded two local developers to stump up £50,000 in 2008 for catering equipment to kit out the cafe, Mr McCambley told the BBC.

Astonishingly Mrs Robinson demanded a £5,000 kickback paid directly to her after her lover received the funding.

But when the relationship soured, Mrs Robinson demanded the funds back - initially in two cheques, one directly to her and another to her local church.

Mr Fraser Black, the whistleblower for the affair in extensive interviews with the BBC - and Mrs Robinson's political adviser - said that Peter Robinson was giving Mrs Robinson cues as she attempted to row back from the scandal.

The two donors who provided the money to Mrs Robinson to help Mr McCambley were named as developers Fred Fraser, now deceased, and Ken Campbell.

A trail of text messages sent from Mrs Robinson's phone to Mr Black revealed how the money was to be paid back. The funds were to be funnelled through her church, for which her sister is pastor.

Iris Robinson regarded the money as a gift to her but after their relationship fell apart she was keen to reclaim it from him.

According to the BBC, Iris Robinson has not once declared the money. The programme revealed that she lobbied on behalf of Ken Campbell while she was looking for the £25,000.

Peter Robinson also came under pressure today for not telling authorities that his wife had not registered the payments she received from the property developers.

The First Minister said today he would 'resolutely defend' the allegations: 'I completely reject BBC Spotlight's attempt to implicate me by insinuation and innuendo.

'I am even more appalled by the inclusion on that programme of comments and conclusions made without any supporting facts — indeed with facts in the programme which support a contrary position.

'While I have learned from Spotlight for the first time some alleged aspects of my wife's affair and her financial arrangements, I will be resolutely defending attacks on my character and contesting any allegations of wrongdoing. To that end, I will be addressing the media today after I have taken legal advice.'

Deputy First Minister, Sinn Fein's Martin McGuinness, said he was 'shocked' at the claims and has called for an urgent meeting with Mr Robinson.
Northern Ireland First Minister Peter Robinson and his wife Iris behind his desk at the Parliament Buildings in Stormont

On the BBC programme, Mr McCambley spoke candidly about his relationship with Mrs Robinson. He said: 'I worked in the butchers since I was nine and I always seen her coming in and out. I knew her from a very early age through the butchers and through my dad.

'She looked out for me and made sure I was OK and obviously anyone who has lost a parent knows it is an incredibly hard time and she was there to help.'

Mr Black broke cover to talk to the BBC and said the relationship developed beyond a friendship and that the couple would take walks together. He said that Mrs Robinson was keen to 'support this guy'.

In her statement this week, Mrs Robinson has said that she encouraged friends to invest in the youngster's business.

Before his wife's lover's age was made public, Mr Robinson said: 'I love my wife. I have always been faithful to her. In a spirit of humility and repentance, Iris sought my forgiveness. She took responsibility upon herself alone for her actions and I have forgiven her.'

Her name will bring to mind comparisons with another famous - albeit fictional - Mrs Robinson who had an affair with a man half her age.

In the 1967 film, The Graduate, Anne Bancroft, in her late 30s, seduces Benjamin Braddock, a recent university graduate played by Dustin Hoffman.

Iris Robinson was not to be seen at her luxury home yesterday.

As political commentators pored over the full significance of the First Minister's statement it emerged that more potentially troubling revelations about the Robinsons could soon emerge.

UUP leader Sir Reg Empey said Mrs Robinson should stop claiming parliamentary privileges and allowances immediately.

Alliance leader David Ford said: 'Iris Robinson must resign as an MP, MLA and councillor immediately.

'Given the current political problems between the DUP and Sinn Fein, it is important that every measure possible is taken to safeguard the Assembly and political progress.'

Sinn Fein Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness said: 'I was shocked at the financial revelations made in last night's Spotlight programme.

'I have sought an urgent meeting with the First Minister to discuss the implications for the Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister.'

One political source said last night: 'There are questions being asked about why the First Minister chose this particular moment to comment about such a personal matter, given that the affair was more than 18 months ago.'

Yesterday former MP Edwina Currie, who famously had a four-year affair with John Major was scathing about the cheating Northern Ireland MP.

She branded Mrs Robinson 'a stinking hypocrite' for hiding her own shameful secret while referring to homosexuals as 'an abomination' and criticising other people's lifestyle choices while boasting about her deeply held Christian views.

Mrs Currie said: 'If you go on and on about God's commandments and keep flinging the tablets of stone at other people, sooner of later someone is going to pick up a bit and chuck it at you.

'Mrs Robinson has made stupid and ignorant remarks about homosexuals while she was busy betraying her husband and seeking love somewhere else.

'If the Robinsons learn to be more tolerant of other people's failings because of this - having found so many in themselves - that has got to be a good thing.' Pastor James McConnell from the Whitewell Tabernacle Church where the couple worship, said the revelations had done nothing to dampen his admiration of the couple.

He said: 'I am surrounding them with prayers and I am there for them 100 per cent. I think Iris can begin again in another way, not in politics, where she can help a lot of people.'

Peter Robinson and his wife Iris are, like many Ulster Protestant loyalists of their generation, God-fearing folk. Theirs has been a life of adherence to family values and a belief that what God ordains also should work its way into their political thinking.

When they married in 1970, they did so against the background of the Troubles, which began a year earlier. She was a secretary, he a college graduate who had started work as an estate agent. Three children soon followed, and there were many sacrifices along the way.

That's why, when he made his emotional address on television on Wednesday, there was a genuine sense that Peter Robinson not only was devastated by his wife's affair but also utterly betrayed in his formidable self-belief that life is about certainty and not frailty.

When he spoke of their 40 years together, he did so pensively, as if relaying them to himself as he spoke. He spoke of Iris's generosity in allowing him the freedom to engage in controversial, often extremist, politics, and the threats to their safety such a stance would attract.

He spoke of her bringing up their children, 'often alone', as he pursued his political ambitions.

Somewhere along the way, though, the Robinsons lost focus on the ideals that forged their very public lives. He, after all, became a founder member of the Democratic Unionist Party after the IRA killed one of his schoolfriends, an understandable catalyst to activism.

But last year came proof that even idealism can be waylaid by materialism. The Mail revealed that the Robinsons' annual income, a combination of salaries and expenses, was almost £572,000.They earned a combined total of £246,017 from six jobs. Both are Westminster MPs as well as MLAs. He also is paid £71,434 as First Minister while she pockets another £9,550 as a borough councillor for Castlereagh.

In a further embarrassment, it was revealed that Mr Robinson employed his daughter, Rebekah, as his office manager and private secretary, while his son, Gareth, is his parliamentary assistant. Iris employs their elder son, Jonathan, as her office manager, and her daughter-in-law, Ellen, as a parttime secretary.

Their incomes have led to many trappings of luxury. They own homes in Belfast, east London and Florida worth more than £1.3m.

Mrs Robinson used to drive an MG sports car in London and had three Minis, and now drives an Audi convertible.

He is less showy - he supports Chelsea, enjoys golf and bowling and breeds exotic Koi carp, some specimens of which can sell for many thousands of euro. Over four years, they also managed to claim £30,000 for food alone.

There were other controversies. When Iris was asked to comment on an attack on a gay man in her constituency, she used the opportunity to in turn attack homosexuality itself, calling it 'an abomination' that made her 'sick and nauseous'.

Another leader in Mr Robinson's position might have felt compelled to publicly chastise a party member making such incendiary statements but instead he said it was not Iris who considered homosexuality an abomination, but the Almighty himself.

In their 40 years together, Mr Robinson overturned a large UUP majority to become an MP in 1979, and has been re- elected seven times, most recently in 2005, making him the longest-serving MP for a Belfast constituency since the 1801 Act of Union. Elected to the NI Assembly in 1998, he has served as minister for regional development and minister for finance.

When Ian Paisley announced his intention to step down, Mr Robinson won the leadership unopposed last April and became First Ministerthe cheating Northern Ireland MP.

She branded Mrs Robinson 'a stinking hypocrite' for hiding her own shameful secret while referring to homosexuals as 'an abomination' and criticising other people's lifestyle choices while boasting about her deeply held Christian views.

Politically, Mrs Robinson, nee Collins, is generally seen as less solid than her husband and more likely to say what she is thinking rather than maintaining a diplomatic gravitas; she was censured in 2007 for using 'unparliamentary' language to describe another Assembly minister.

But it still came as a surprise on December 28 when she announced she planned to retire from politics because of depression. Then came this week's bombshell about her affair and suicide attempt.

Mr Robinson's candid TV appearance may have bought him some time to counter any further allegations (there is talk of financial impropriety on Mrs Robinson's part) - and also some sympathy, even from quarters where none existed previously.

He issued a simple plea: 'I only ask if people feel they must judge her, that they find within themselves, as I have done, the gift of doing so with mercy and compassion.' stone at other people, sooner of later someone is going to pick up a bit and chuck it at you.

'Mrs Robinson has made stupid and ignorant remarks about homosexuals while she was busy betraying her husband and seeking love somewhere else.

'If the Robinsons learn to be more tolerant of other people's failings because of this - having found so many in themselves - that has got to be a good thing.' Pastor James McConnell from the Whitewell Tabernacle Church where the couple worship, said the revelations had done nothing to dampen his admiration of the couple.

He said: 'I am surrounding them with prayers and I am there for them 100 per cent. I think Iris can begin again in another way, not in politics, where she can help a lot of people.'

raise your hand if this surprises you in the least, even if you know nothing about Irish politics (like me).

they're all the same, aren't they, the bigots.

[financeguy]

raise your hand if this surprises you in the least, even if you know nothing about Irish politics (like me).

they're all the same, aren't they, the bigots.

Well, if you don't know anything about Irish politics then perhaps you are not aware of the full context.

Would you want to be in their shoes? Is it better to understand or judge?

I am not a Unionist of course but I have some sympathy with the Unionist POV.

When a tribe has its back against the wall, as the Unionists feel they do as a minority group on this island, then collective psychoses of various types inevitably result. This is one of the reasons why fundamentalist ideology systems take hold.