Might help also to describe what you think feminism is, since it’s one of those terms that is overloaded.
I once had a physical therapist tell me she wasn’t a feminist because she thought women couldn’t be as physically capable as men when serving as soldiers, and seemed to believe feminism requires treating women exactly like men.
I told her I was a feminist because I believe in equal rights for men and women, an idea she did not seem so opposed to.
Why does the name do harm? If it was “anti-sexism” instead would it be more appealing, or are all “-ism” labels bad in your mind? (Might I ask why the -ism is problematic? Would you have the same view of anti-racism, for example?)
Egalitarianism is a better term.
That just erases that, currently, women are far more oppressed than men. Men are negatively impacted by patriarchal society as well, we all stand to gain from its abolition, but erasing that it is women that are most subjugated makes room for opportunists to coopt the movement and shut down women.
This is the kind of thinking that pushes men away from feminism. When there is a clear intention to favor one sex over the other, the other will obviously be much less inclined to help.
There is no intention to “favor one sex over the other.” The present system is explicitly cismale-supremacist. Any attempt to erase that weakens the movement and serves to perpetuate sexism against women and non-binary folk. This is similar to the “All Lives Matter” movement as a way to disrupt the “Black Lives Matter” movement.
It might not be the intention but modern day feminism has become so much about what women can and cannot do and how men are pigs.
No, it hasn’t. This is the way conservatives frame the feminist movement, but the actual reality of feminism is far more grounded. When you cede the narrative and legitimize the conservative viewpoint, you weaken the movement.
I am a very strong believer of feminism but I will never accept that in public. It has a strong negative reaction from many people. Actions don’t evoke a negative reaction.
Where I live, there are literally people who mock people for being feminists while sending their daughters to professional colleges, allowing them to work, letting them decide if and when to have kids, etc. I don’t know, maybe this is a cultural difference.
That just cedes ground to the socially reactionary. It’s better to organize under the label of feminism and push for the necessary change, without letting reactionaries be coddled.
This.
I’m not OP, but many people associate feminism with strengthening women specifically. If you look up the definition it actually does focus gender equality, no matter what gender you have. So from my perspective the term isn’t really intuitive.
Another thing I don’t like about the definition (at least the one on Wikipedia) is…
While I sure get what they mean, I personally don’t like to classify one’s point of view as ‘male’. I agree that there are far more toxic men that seek more and more power. But i don’t dislike such people because they are men. I’d dislike their behavior just as much if they were women, non-binaries or any other gender. Classifying a character trait male IMHO is similar to calling a skirt or dress ‘women clothes’.
So yes, to me personally, anti-sexism / anti-discrimination or even better pro-equality are more appealing.
Do you think women face more inequality than men? What gender inequality is there to address, i.e. why does feminism as a movement of gender equality exist?
Yes, I think women face more inquality than men. And queer people face even more discrimination than women. But also cis-men that don’t fit well into the traditional gender roles, can face discrimation. I do not object the ideology behind femism. I just don’t like the term.
I think women do experience more gender based adversities, but I worry framing it like that creates an “us and them” situation between genders. We should fight inequality wherever it exists.
It also misses intersectionality. Not all men are advantaged over all women. A man born in poverty, violence, with a disability, or of a marginalised race, isn’t automatically better off than a rich white women born to a good supportive family.
Women face different inequality than men. Where women are treated as valuable property, men are treated as disposable tools or dangerous threats. Feminism has done much to elevate women above valuable property, but men are still treated as disposable or dangerous.
Labels that start off as descriptive become prescriptive. People who associate strongly with a label are less likely to have nuance to their views or change their minds. It becomes us and them.
You can become a prisoner of your labels.
isn’t feminism prescriptive / normative to begin with? It’s not a neutral description of injustice, it’s a call to action, a movement … no?
I hear you on the strong connection to a label, the way us-them dynamics can be dangerous - but the extreme opposite doesn’t seem to work either, so I don’t see this as a full justification of rejecting labels. If you are invested in a movement towards equal rights, sometimes having a banner to organize under and communicate by is useful … it might be helpful to think of a time before the feminist movement existed, and the motivations that exist for the movement.
The fact that there are so many definitions of what feminism is, shows that the label is not super useful. If you say you’re a feminist, you then have to explain which version you’re taking about.
It could be anything from “people should be given equal opportunity” to the extreme “all sex between a man and a women is rape”