This semester one of the courses I’m teaching at Griffith is a first year course called Introduction To Politics. Last week the tutorials in this course discussed feminism (amongst other things) and I posed my students (about 80 spread across 3 tutes) the following questions:
Is there still a role for feminism in Australia and the world?
[Hints: Has equality between the sexes been achieved in Australia? Has it gone too far, or not far enough? Can you think of current specific issues in Australia where feminist demands should be supported? What about overseas? Are you a feminist?]
The view of most the students, and of most of the women who spoke, was that equality of the sexes has, at least in some respects, not been achieved in Australia, that it has not gone far enough, that there are various issues where feminist demands should be supported (examples cited included RU486, domestic violence, parental leave and equal pay) and that there is still a role for feminism in Australia and the world.
Some women also volunteered the opinion that they were feminists, but qualified this by saying that they were moderate feminists, i.e. they believed in gender equality rather than replacing male domination with female domination.
My three tutes are not exactly a representative sample, but what this discussion suggests is that:
(a) young women still see gender equality as both a worthy goal and one which has yet to be achieved;
(b) there is a perception of the existence of an “extreme” misandrist feminism to which young women don’t relate. It would be interesting to know who or what they perceive as the advocates of this kind of feminism.
On the whole, these structured discussions of basic feminist tenets were certainly at odds with the current spate of handwringing about the “conservatism” and “anti-feminism” of the current generation of young women.
I think it would certainly be worth trying to discover – and more importantly make them discover for themselves – where they get the idea of “extreme” feminism from. That is, have they formed these ideas from reading ‘extreme” feminists’ work, or have they formed them by reading opinions, commentaries and caricatures by anti-feminists?
Your two-point summary is close to the impression that I get from the (limited) discussion of feminism in my tutorials.
On questions of substantial equality, there is general agreement from most people (guys and girls) that certain improvements have been made/won, but that there remain fundamental systemic biases.
I have also noticed the tendency to speculate about the existence of certain ‘radical feminists’ who are seen as ‘ruining things for everyone else’. Who these people are is never made clear, yet there is almost universal agreement that ‘they’ are a bad influence.
In this, I think the students are just picking up a popular talking point used to criticise feminism in general, the old tarring-everyone-as-extremist tactic. Unfortunately, this tactic is deployed not only by students, but also by certain colleagues who should know better.
Those were pretty leading questions, though, those ‘hints’ of yours, Paul. It’s not surprising you got the results you did.
In what way were they leading Rob?
A leading question is one in which the answer is contained in the wording of the question in one of two ways, either by asking for a yes/no answer to a statement, or by using particularly biased wording, for example:
The defendant looked suspicious, didn’t he?
or
How suspicious did the defendant look?
None of Paul’s ‘hints’ could be appropriately classified as a leading question. If that had been your objection in court it would have been denied quite firmly.
Rob, what is “leading” about “Has equality between the sexes been achieved in Australia? Has it gone too far, or not far enough?”?
hmmm, beyond the tarring-them-all-with-the-extremist brush, is the tarring-all-gender-studies-as-feminism brush.
there is a big difference between gender studies, as an academic discipline, and feminism, as a political ‘calling’ (in the weberian sense). There are multiple ‘feminisms’ but most work to redress the distribution of either power or capital or a specific version of the two in the context of gender relations in what were and are predominately patriarchal societies. There are many ways this happens. The academic study of gender is not necessarily feminist nor is it necessarily concerned with the redistribution of power or capital.
my stuff is a case in point. between people and their cars, and between people-into-cars, is a socio-technical relation that is heavily gendered. the conditions of possibility that enable such a relation is in part a (Foucaultian and ANT) gender studies question, (particular dispositifs and agencement, or what English-speaking D&G’ers call an assemblage) but the study of the relation itself and how such a relation is modulated/controlled, although heavily gendered, is _not_ a gender studies question. Or it hasn’t been in the past. The simple reason is that it is mostly a post-human ‘gender’ question.
“post-human”
OK, you’ve lost me.
But I would have thought it foolish to separate what ‘enables’ a condition and what ‘controls/modifies’ it. Surely they’ll often overlap hugely.
Or perhaps I really just don’t get what you’re saying.
Or perhaps I really just don’t get what you’re saying.
F. David … you are not alone. There are many of us.
Posing a question like ‘has equality gone too far, or not far enough’ basically answers itself. You can’t go ‘too far’ with equality, so you can’t answer in the affirmative.
Consider an alternative construction:
I’d call that pretty leading, myself.
Oh yeah, Rob, that’s a much more neutral way of putting it.
It wasn’t intended to be neutral. It was intended to be leading.
Oh, OK – I apologise then for misunderstanding you.
But do you really feel that Paul’s hints were anywhere near that leading?
Let’s unpick it a teeny bit.
The question itself carries the implication that feminism has had a role, and the unstated presumption is that it has been for the good, because if it ’still’ has a role, it must have been good to be worth continuing with. Also, continuity is generally regarded as good, so that too will incline the response in the direction of ‘yes’.
This is borne out by the first of the hints, which takes it as a given that what feminism is about, and has achieved or seeks to achieve, is equality of the sexes, although it does not specify in what respect. No-one is going to argue that equality is not a good thing. But all the inherent assumptions are really quite arguable (e.g. equality of the sexes is goal or an ideal, while feminism is an ideology, etc.).
The second hint I’ve already talked about.
The third invites students to find a position on which to agree with feminism, not dispute it. A non-leading alternative would be to ask: identify an issue on which feminists ahve made demands. Are they valid and supportable, or not? ‘What about overseas?’ is in fact something of a deflection — it invites students to recall things like FMG, the burqa, etc. with the imputation that feminism can ’solve’ such issues.
And finally, if you have responded the first questions as you are being quietly encouraged to, it’s going to be pretty hard to answer the final one in the negative.
If my ten years of experience in tertiary teaching is anything to go by, Rob, students don’t lack forthrightness in challenging all sorts of paradigms. You should also take into account the fact that there are no doubt readings which have been set for Paul’s students – the questions don’t stand alone.
Some of my first year students in Social Sciences in Australia at Griffith are working on a project where they have to find literature for and against feminist perpectives on Australian society, and for and against social constructivist views of gender. The idea is that they won’t take a stand themselves, but learn to weight up the respective strengths and weaknesses of differing and conflicting literatures.
I’m looking forward to seeing the papers.
Rob resorts to an Althusserian “symptomatic reading” of the questions I set in order to argue that I am evil-minded and my students are weak-minded.
Rob goes to quite some lengths to deconstruct the question “Does feminism still have a role in Australia?”. I know Rob doesn’t like postmodernism, but I would like him to consider the possibility that his reading of this text is: (a) not the only possible or valid reading; (b) not what I intended when I wrote it; and most importantly (c) is not necessarily the way most of the students would have read it.
Rob says “the first of the hints… takes it as a given that what feminism is about… is equality of the sexes”. According to the Concise Oxford Dictionary, feminism is ‘The advocacy of women’s rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes’. If I am setting leading questions in order to run an agenda, the criticism obviously applies to the Oxford Dictionary and anyone else who subscribes to what I would have thought was a fairly basis and non-contentious definition of feminism. Rob doesn’t suggest an alternative, certainly not one which is less contentious.
Mind you, some of the students were able, without any encouragement from me, to imagine that feminism might be about something else.
“The second hint I’ve already talked about.” Yes. Believe it or not, there are people who believe that equality between the sexes has gone too far, or who believe that we’ve gone past a desirable equilibium in some areas to a situation of male disadvantage. Also, this form of words is used in the Australian Election Study in its questions on Australians’ attitudes to gender equality (and about 10 per cent of respondents do agree that gender equality has “gone too far”). So Rob’s argument is with the Research School of Social Sciences at ANU, not just with me.
“The third invites students to find a position on which to agree with feminism, not dispute it.” It also leaves open the possibility that students could argue that there is no such position. Whilst Rob’s “non-leading alternative” is a fair enough way of posing the question, I doubt that it would have elicited a different response from the students who cited RU486, parental leave, domestic violence and equal pay as issues where feminist demands should be supported. They all seemed to have strong views which predated their participation in the tutorial.
“‘What about overseas?’ is in fact something of a deflection” It is also somewhat irrelevant as pressures of time prevented the discussions getting to this point.
I would also point out for readers’ benefits that these questions were discussed by the students in small groups for much of the tutorials, with no preaching or prodding from me, and with reporting back from the groups at the end.
I have been quite generous with my time in responding at such length to Rob’s pedantry, and in so doing have risked contributing to the thread drift which Rob started, so to get things back on course I’ll observe that Rob’s hidden curriculum seems to be the familiar refrain that women (and young women in particular) are incapable of independent critical thought or independent agency, and that the responses of the young women in my classes do not reflect their own considered position on these issues, but the Svengali-like influence of a leftie academic. This sort of reasoning has not been without its uses for patriarchs, paternalists and misogynists throughout the ages.
With respect, Paul, I think you are extrapolating a bit to think my comments on your question and its hints for discussion constituted a political commentary on you or your students, or the left or right.
I’m sorry to say this, but I thought your propositions were poorly constructed. I simply tried to identify the underlying presumptions which co-existed with the questions within the text. That’s not pedantry, it’s analysis. I’d be as happy to deconstruct my own alternative ‘leading’ questions, which similarly suggested their own answers.
As for your riposte that “I’ll observe that Rob’s hidden curriculum seems to be the familiar refrain that women (and young women in particular) are incapable of independent critical thought or independent agency….”, I’ve never thought, argued or written any such thing.
If anything, I’m surprised the dodgy proposition was not torn apart by your students. I’m happy to learn that ’some of the students were able, without any encouragement from me, to imagine that feminism might be about something else’. although I wonder what you mean by ‘imagine’, in this context.
Oh, and I am a postmodernist, by the way — but these days mainly for the purposes of irony.
Wasn’t that the point of postmodernism in the first place?
I agree with you Paul. I find it hard to believe Rob is being serious.
Anyway, back on topic, I agree that parental leave and fertility control issues like RU486 are legitimate feminist issues. I would add family friendly conditions of employment and childcare issues to the list of top priorities.They are also issues that men have a legitimate interest in as well.
However I am not so sure on the issue of pay equality. I don’t believe the current pay differential reflects current discrimination. In my view the inequality that exists reflects differences in occupations, the fact that husbands and wives often decide that the male will be the main breadwinner, and also “inertia” in the system. What I mean by inertia is the ongoing but steadily declining effects of past discrimination. For example, based on my experience in the federal public service most of the senior managers are old men who been in the system for 3 or more decades ago. Women are unable to move up to the top ranks until these old gents retire.
Women now outnumber men in studying medicine. Women are also catching up to men in other traditionally male only occupations like engineering.
Not my kind, Mark. I was deadly serious as a young man and still haven’t fully recovered.
Perhaps you should move on from postmodernism, Rob.
There are a number of problems with the “inertia” argument, Steve. For instance, women have outnumbered men in Law Schools since 1987, and nearly 20 years on, partners, QCs and judges who are female are still thin on the ground. The same thing can be documented with reference to a number of professions and occupations.
I’m not as edu-ma-cated as some here obviously are, in fact I dropped out of my uni course without finishing it, but I thought I would contribute my thoughts…
I went to uni in Melbourne in the early ninties, when there was a fairly “extreme” strand of feminism around – especially if the grafitti in the toilets were anything to go by! These were the days of Riot Grrls, The Beauty Myth and the Dworkin/mcKinnon anti-porn crusaders, and I think for alot of these young women it was the first time they were able to be strident/angry and they were having fun with it. But to the younger students at the time, it looked a bit extreme and eventually became ridiculed and unfashionable except to the womens studies crowd.
Add to that, alot of people blame “feminism” for not being able to find a work/family balance and there is a perception amongsome groups of men, obviously agreed with by politicians, that certain institutions such as the family court, are weighed heavily against men – again the fault of “feminists”.
On top of that, feminsts are seen by most as aligned with the hard left, not a very fashionable group these days either. So you end up with this perception that equality is great, women becoming whatever they like is great, but “feminism” is about more extreme positions than that.
I know it sounds simplistic to talk about “fashionable” thinking, but most young people at uni are still very susceptible to peer/cultural influence when it comes to how they feel about things.
I’m trying very hard to work out why that would be so, since one of the main things feminists argue for in the workplace is work/family balance.
Steve, pay gap is almost entirely due to reasons of gender.
A plumber is considered to be worth more money than a nurse – this is in great part a result of the view throughout much of history that “women’s work� – caring etc. – comes naturally to them, therefore they don’t require as much in terms of monetary compensation, because it’s intrinsically rewarding. So it isn’t just that “men choose different jobs�, it’s also that the jobs women choose are often devalued by society and the market.
Also, the fact that more women work part-time, leave the workforce for longer periods, etc., mean that it is a gender issue – more women making a particular “choice� than men. This is often a self-reinforcing problem – because women usually earn less, it makes more sense for them to quit their job instead of the man, which then means less career advancement and less pay when she returns to work.
Of course it’s a gender issue.
(And before anyone starts, I haven’t made any comments about how these things should/ could be rectified; just pointing out that that it is a gender issue.)
Rob, I think you’re splitting hairs rather. But wouldn’t you agree that ‘equality’ understood as a levelling principle, is certainly capable of being carried too far? For instance, if 50/50 gender quotas were ruthlessly imposed on everything, I would consider that to be taking equality waaaaaay too far.
Perhaps you’d say that equality as a levelling principle isn’t what Paul says and if that’s what he meant he ought to have been more specific – maybe that’s true. But he’s reporting a fairly informal conversation with students.
While we’re on the subject of language and education, giving out ‘hints’ in the classroom can mean (and here probably does mean) suggesting a more specific range of talking points for students to exercise their thinking about. If you don’t do a certain amount of that, then the group discussion tends to fragment and people begin to talk past each other rather than to each other.
I would not like to think that suggesting particular topics to talk about is considered equivalent to ‘hinting’ to students what opinions they should express.
(going off topic now, sorry) but then if harmless and pedagogically helpful setting of talking points *is* considered by rightists to be some kind of indoctrination then I begin to understand what some blog commentors (not present company) have in mind when they talk about having left politics shoved down their throats at university. (going waaay off topic now) I am putting together a syllabus for a life-writing subject, reading it, not actually doing it, and I’m considering putting the book of Baghdad Burning on the course. Actually I really want to include it. But I won’t if it’s going to be perceived as some kind of political gesture and make people react against the book, the course etc. (It is a political book, of course, as people’s lives often are, which is part of why I want to use it, but it’s not doctrinaire.) What do people think?
“Add to that, alot of people blame “feminismâ€? for not being able to find a work/family balance
I’m trying very hard to work out why that would be so, since one of the main things feminists argue for in the workplace is work/family balance.”
What I meant was, the rash of writings/articles by women blaming “feminism” “for making us think we could have it all when it’s so hard and now I don’t have time to have a child”. I remember one woman in particualr got alot of attention recently for espousing just such a view. (I can’t remember her name, perhaps another reader can help?) I don’t agree with that view, by the way, I’m just giving an example of why feminism seems to be unpoopular now, when clearly equality is not unpopular.
You raise a good point Mark. However I also said “husbands and wives often decide that the male will be the main breadwinner”. I’ll give the example of my own sister, who has a husband and a 3 year old daughter. Hubby is a senior manager in Coles and works 60 hours plus a week. My sister is a qualified social worker and is taking her time finding a social worker job because she only wants part time work outside normal working hours, so her husband can mind the child. In the mean time she is happy to do a few hours night shift at Coles for a low wage. As we are talking about a consensual arrangement between husband and wife, I don’t think we can say discrimination is an issue.
I think that’s right, funkypaws, and that’s what I was getting at in my point about feminism=equality of the sexes — though I still don’t know what Paul means by that.
Most of the good things about feminism are actually social justice objectives and that’s why no-one really has a problem with them (equal pay, call me Ms not Miss or Mrs, child-care, not being defined exclusively by sexuality, etc.). And you don’t need to be a feminist to be disgusted by female genital mutilation.
“Feminism” as an ideology does have an image problem. Maybe it’s because feminists need feminism, but the rest of us don’t.
Just thinkin’ aloud on that last point…..
Oh, I hate that – when I started writing my comment it was right beneath one of Rob’s that was ages back. (I paused in the middle to have an argument with a person from the Commonweath Bank) I didn’t mean to make it look like I scrolled up the thread till I found a comment I wanted to argue with.
I need chocolate.
For Laura
Rob, you are being very simplistic. While most women shy away from the feminist label they at the same time support the mainstream feminist agenda eg. work/family balance, childcare etc..
Rejection of the feminist label has more to do with the conservatism and “apolitical” nature of middle Australia and the tendency, partly thanks to the media and conservative ideologues, to think of hairy armpits and bra burning when the word feminist is mentioned.
Women wouldn’t have many of the rights and opportunities they enjoy today if the feminist movement didn’t exist.
funkypaws wrote:
Was it Virginia Haussegger you were thinking of?
I thought you made a good point in your earlier post when you wrote about the intersection of peer groups and cliques with student politics on university campuses. Students fresh from secondary school tend to have very strong opinions either way about being visibly political and doing activism and so on. I agree that the visibility of womens groups on campus seems to put some people off ‘feminism’, more so perhaps than what is actually taught in womens studies subjects.
Thank you Anna. I feel heaps better now – much less frazzled
Steve, I’ll go right out on a limb here in the expectation of being eviscerated.
I don’t actually think feminism had much to do with achieving equality for women, in practical terms, although first wave feminism won them the vote. I think that once technology had removed the necessity for women to stay in the kitchen washing dishes, cleaning nappies, etc. etc. — after all, someone had to do it — plus medical technology had delivered the means for women to control their own fertility — the rest of it just followed. Remember that before the invention of detergents, washing machines and microwaves and suchlike, you needed someone in the house full time to do the washing, feed the family, etc. if you didn’t have servants.
When the social necessity was removed, there were certain sociological consequences. What were women to do with their time? Well, obviously, work; accumulate profesional accomplishment, capital and property as men had long done; exercise life choices long available to men but not to women.
Is it too much to wonder if capitalism has not freed women to a far greater extent than feminism ever did, and that the latter simply parasites upon the accomplishments of the former?
Just askin’…..
I’ll go right out on a limb here in the expectation of being eviscerated.
Looking for trouble, eh?
Anna, there is some truth to what you say with respect to nurses. Most nurses are female and nurses are grossly underpaid. I understand they once had pay parity with teachers but slipped behind for some reason. Nonetheless there is no pressure on women these days to choose nursing over medicine.
I’m not sure how female apprentice plumbers, carpenters and so on get treated these days. Are more women now comfortable with pursuing such employment options? I would be interested to find out.
Thank you Laura that was exactly who I meant…
Rob, your point doesn’t explain why in America in the 50’s, a time when labour saving devices had been invented and good economic times meant that ordinary folk could afford them, this co-incided with a time of increased pressure on women to stay at home. In fact, women staying at home was meant to highlight the differences between the capitalist US and the Soviet Union, where women had to work.
Second wave feminsim was the only thing that got rid of the attitude that once a woman married she would never work again, and that as she would never work past marriage, what was the point in educating her?
Rob, your argument reifies capitalism. It also sounds suspiciously Marxist.
You got it, Laura.
Oh – and fridges. Before the invention of domestic refrigeration, it was necessary to go to the market every day to buy fresh produce in order to feed the family. That necessity was also removed by capitalist technology, thus freeing up a large chunk of the woman’s day.
Steve, because I am too tired to give you a serious and long response to a problem that has been discussed ad nauseum, I give you a quote by Maureen Dowd:
Going to the market had its benefits. It got you out of the house, and brought you into a public place where you could catch up with your neighbors.
Like Steve and funkypaws, I think the postwar explosion of domestic technology had a lot to do with conspicuous consumption, and it’s no coincidence that western womanhood became a highly domesticated, decorative phenomenon at much the same time. The freed-up time didn’t tend to translate into fulfilment and achievement outside the domestic sphere. Making housework easier is good, but not the same as sharing it equitable among the householders. Women still had to do the chores, too. And as Betty Freidan said: Housework expands to fill the time available.
I don’t actually think feminism had much to do with achieving equality for women
??????!!?%$#@*&%???!!
*Picks chin up off floor*
*Puts eyeballs back in*
There you go, folks, you heard it here: the official hijacking of the achievements of feminism by anti-feminists.
Rob, what in the name of all that’s rational do you think feminism is?
I suspect he thinks it’s good trolling-matter, P. Cat.
funkypaws, what was suddenly possible for women involved profound sociological change. Such things always hurt, and they are resisted at first by those afraid of change — and profoundly afraid of profound change.
Anne Summers once wrote that the entry of women into the workforce, beginning in the 70’s, was the most profound sociological change that had occurred since the industrial revolution. That came with moral, economic and demographic problems also. I may be an optimist , but I’d say, 30 years later (lasting change tends to be generational), we are now just about over them. Things aren’t perfect now, but they never will be — even for capitalism.
Perhaps the true virtue of second wave feminism was that it made it easier for women to garner the strength to take advantage of the liberating potentials offered to them by capitalism. It did not create them, however.
Because we all know that once medical technology gave us the means, that was the end of the story…
A copybook response, Pav’s Cat, thanks.
Rob, just what is it you get out of all this button-pushing? I ask out of scientific curiosity only.
Always happy to oblige. Womanly of me, n’est-ce pas?
Just curious: what’s the protocol on board sinking ships these days? Are women and children still first, or do we have to divvy up the lifeboats 50/50?
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Utilities/printer_preview.asp?idArticle=12041&R=EBF131C9C
Rob now says: “Perhaps the true virtue of second wave feminism was that it made it easier for women to garner the strength to take advantage of the liberating potentials offered to them by capitalism. It did not create them, however.”
That’s more like it Rob. Technology isn’t a social actor. Technological development may open up certain possibilities but flesh and blood people need to make those possibilities real. For instance RU486 has been around for many years. However a sleasy deal between the Coalition and Senator Harridine put it off-limits.
It took collective iniative by women from all political parties to actually make this fertility control option available to women. This is feminism in action.
What button-pushing is that, Laura? I’m expressing an opinion, is all.
Duh, Laura. It’s so he can provide proof that feminists are ANGRY.
Note that now that professional women in two-income families can afford to hire cleaners to do the heavy scrubbing stuff (another sign of conspicuous consumption), suddenly women’s work has expanded to include obsessive fitness regimes far beyond what is required simply for healthy weight maintenance. Such regimes fill the time available that women could otherwise use to do something truly for themselves alone, and continues the woman as domestic ornament meme nicely.
These are just choices that people make, tigtog. There’s no way that people who disagree with such choices can stop them being made. There’s no sinister system. There’s just choice.
I don’t really understand why Rob feels feels the need to clarify that it was ultimately Economics which bettered the position of women in the west? Isn’t that fairly obvious? Ultimately economics is why anything happens – that doesn’t mean we refuse to say that the Marxists were responsible for the Russian revolution because it was ultimately economics that provided the catalyst. Same with any social change (the French revolution, the anti-slavery movement in the US etc) it just seems stubbornly obtuse to insist that we must not credit feminiism with changes, because it was actually economics.
By the way, can I just say I’ve been reading this blog for about a month now and I love it! So great to come here and see intelligent articles and commentary. Well done to everyone involoved.
Welcome, funkypaws. We hope you enjoy your stay.
funkypaws, I am quite happy to acribe the improved condition of women in western societies to capitalist economics, with feminism playing a subsidiary role (maybe parasitism was putting it too strongly). Question is, will Pavlov’s Cat, Laura, Anna, Steve M., Mark, Kate, Naomi and Kim, to name only a few?
…err, not to mention Paul N.
‘there is a perception of the existence of an “extreme” misandrist feminism to which young women don’t relate. It would be interesting to know who or what they perceive as the advocates of this kind of feminism.’
Sheila Jeffreys, according to my students. The women students in particular were appalled that someone would use their sexuality as a political statement…
…although I think they were all secretly impressed, too.
funkypaws — I second Anna in welcoming you (if I have enough cred to do that!). As a new writer here myself, like you, I have to say I’m quite impressed by the range, character, and quality of this community. Hope you have an enriching and fun experience.
That being said, I now have to of course massively disagree with you.
By ascribing economics as an ‘ultimate’ factor in human history, you are grossly simplifying human existence and experience. Case in point: you ascribe to economic factors the ‘anti-slavery movement’ in the US. This is massively mistaken. Although slavery *was* in fact economically inefficient (among other things), if that sheer rationalist perception had been the deciding factor, we might have expected to see slavery wither from within the South, of its own accord… rather than a bloody and contentious civil war. The abolitionist North came by its anti-slavery convictions through a rigorous application of its Christian morals as it understood them (comparative historians of slavery in other, um, ‘cultures,’ take note!). The self-styled ‘Christian’ apologists of the South had to play a massive game of Twister in order to engage them.
There’s also the complicating factor that the South, having imported a vast foreign population which was immensely aggrieved, and which outnumbered the slave-owning whites in many or most places, was probably a little, um, nervous, about the prospects post-Emancipation. All of this is just a little more iffy than sheer economics.
A final thing, under-appreciated in my own opinion: if you read the letters and diaries of Northerners and Southerners for a good 20 or 30 years before First Bull Run, you’ll notice that the people had developed a sheer, atavistic, hardening *dislike* for one another that is hard to explain from economics; a human, and weird, distorting factor, if ever there was one.
That being said, Cheers!
Science, economics and law make possible the actualisation of pre-emergent ideas and desires, some of which people die for.
Science without the desire is in deep trouble. See Monsanto.
Paul wrote:
“(b) there is a perception of the existence of an “extreme” misandrist feminism to which young women don’t relate. It would be interesting to know who or what they perceive as the advocates of this kind of feminism.”
Hi Paul,
For four years (1999-2002) I haunted your stomping ground of Griffith University. As a casual political observer, I came to be of a similar view to your students. That is, happy to be associated with moderate feminism, but keen to distance myself a long way from the radical feminism that had the status quo. I will throw some random observations from my days at GU.
For approximately half of my years at GU, the student magazine, “Gravity”, was produced by the hard left. I am led to believe that these people were trots. Gravity of this era published a number of manifesto’s, ranging from the moderate to hard left. I assure you that views were published in this magazine that were clearly anti-men. Regularly, there would be writing that wrongly accused large men on the whole for the ills of very small groups of men. As with most men, I absolutely reject the idea that men think domestic violence is acceptable, yet this claim, and many others, was published in this trash.
Massive posters were put up advertising a clothing label around 2001/2002. Two of them would cover those large circlar message board things. Some had men, some had women. Soon after they were put up, the one along the path to my car got some graffiti on the one with the woman. Something about sexist men. Yet the man poster was right next to it, untouched. Double standards like these were very common.
Way back at first year uni in 1999, during student elections, a hard lefter stood out the front of my large first year mathematics lecture to convert us to the cuase. The mostly young male audience was at least watching, because she was jumping up and down and not wearing a bra. The speech was ended alongthe line “and stop the rank sexism that is in classes like this!”. Our middle aged female lecturer rolled her eyes and started the lecture. It still amazes me that anyone can seriously think that a massive lecture of mostly young males DOES NOT WANT MORE FEMALES. Hello?
Let’s face it, it’s these sort of experiences that make an impact on a young student. Most students are not sitting around analysing the definition of feminism. What they see is radicals out there attacking men, blaming men, swimming in hypocricy – very angry people with a chip on their shoulder. They don’t necessarily even consider things like RU486 to be a feminist issue.
You are lucky that you are able to talk to some people in your lectures. Outside, where people may never hear a definition of feminism, my bet is that the distaste for feminism based on radicalism is stronger. I see intelligent, headstrong young socially progressive women in the Labor Party who firmly need to state that they are not feminist. In reality, these women *are* feminists, the perception has merely been hijacked by lunatics.
And that, Paul, is enough crap for me to write here tonight
None of that was crap, Stu
I think that, in general, as well as the inherent un-conversiveness (you find a better word!) of being ranted at and accused of complicity in the crimes of some larger group you supposedly belong to – by fanatics of any flavour – there’s always at tendancy to associate ideas with their extreme iteration and reject them on that basis, especially if you were suspicious of the concept to begin with.
In feminism’s case, all the hard-slogging researchers who study work-life balance or analyse workplace/educational heirarchies or magazine culture and-self image are going to struggle to get heard when people like Sheila Jeffreys can shout so much lounder and longer and get all the column inches with bigoted sensationalist lines about self-mutilation and conspiracies and ‘get there first’.
The view of most the students…
I need to get myself over to Griffith.
I’ve done my share of gender studies and politics subjects (BA, major in social theory – 9
brownie pointsessays to go until I get thebadgefunny shaped hat)but feminism is viewed very poorly here, at least judging by class numbers, and comments by others in other subjects.
The number of times I’ve heard a woman say “Oh I don’t like feminism”, or a man complaining about the hairy lesbian activists making husbands look dumb in advertising could finance me for a year if it were converted to dollars.
There’s no sinister system. There’s just choice.
Depends what influences the choice though…
Speaking as a former student politician, sadly a lot of student politicians are bad advertisements for politics as such.
This one drives me nuts! Whenever I hear it I want to burst out:
“You don’t like owning your own stuff? You don’t like choosing who you marry? You’d rahter not have a vote and be seen as property in the eye of the law? Fine – don’t be a feminist!”.
I think it’s time for everyone to learn just what feminism is and what it’s achieved for women and society as a whole, because a lot of people just don’t seem to know.
Women now outnumber men in studying medicine. Women are also catching up to men in other traditionally male only occupations like engineering.
Hmmm, yes, I notice that in the first week of classes when one of my classes follows an engineering lecture – it is a game of spot the female.
As a almost 20-something second yr student who is female, I notice the trend among women to classify themselves as not feminist.
I think it can be linked to two things: 1) they don’t want to be seen as lesbian and 2) they still like ‘feminine’ things – they do shave their armpits.
A good friend who I adore who physically lives out the feminist ideals that sometimes I admit that I am unfortunately too shy to, does not call herself a feminist even though I think she is a walking specimen for feminist ideals. She doesn’t because to her a feminist is something who doesn’t shave their armpits. It would make Baby Jesus cry!
It’s weird, Elizajoey.
I think that there’s a caricature somewhere of the 70s feminist that is reproduced endlessly and has entered the popular imagination – and maybe it has something to do with hairy armpits as well!
Speaking as someone who’s into depilation, personally…
Exactly, amazing kim. People chose to be slaveholders once, and now we say that is wrong.
Cultural prejudices can shape people’s choices in ways that ultimately manifest as warped and iniquitous, and our cultural milieu has a huge social momentum that is difficult to push back against. Our choices are constrained by many considerations – the free choice beloved by economists is a theoretical myth.
For a trivial example, just try being a woman in a city office who doesn’t want to torture her feet with high heels. Women have to wear shoes that literally warp the bones of their feet or they get reprimanded in many low level office jobs for “not looking professional enough”.
Where was I reading that for women in the 70s, being able to wear trousers to work felt like a liberation?
I’ve argued a pro-feminist line here but I can’t let Anna’s Maureen Dowd quote pass- “by the time women get to take over something — like Hollywood or Bush administration diplomacy — the thing is already devalued beyond recognition.”
Maureen strikes me as a vastly over rated poor little rich girl. Her flippant one liner is nonsense. If you disagree then how would you answer these questions:-
Did Maggie Thatcher devalue the British Prime Minister’s job?
Is the role of doctor devalued by the increasing numbers of female doctors?
Has the status of nursing improved with more men entering that profession?
The answer to all these questions is must surely be no.
If I ran the NYT I would show Maureen Dowd the door (and hire a brighter, more coherent woman).
Tigtog says: “For a trivial example, just try being a woman in a city office who doesn’t want to torture her feet with high heels. Women have to wear shoes that literally warp the bones of their feet or they get reprimanded in many low level office jobs for “not looking professional enoughâ€?.”
On a stinking hot day I envy the women in short dresses and revealing blouses and pity the men in trousers and strangulating neck ties.
The day a bloke can turn up to work in a hot pink miniskirt all of us will be much more liberated!
Try wearing a bra on a stinking hot day, Steve.
Just sayin…
Or stockings.
Not that I know about stockings. I do know about bras.
When I worked in an office none of the women, including the executives, wore high heels. They kill your legs during long meetings, apparently.
Steve’s right. For men, the business suit is the only acceptable outfit, whatever the weather. Don’t ask me why, but that’s the way it is. Women have a huge range of sartorial choices.
A city office, Rob? I’m glad to see some sanity has arrived then since I was supplementing my student stipend by part-time clerking in a merchant bank.
A man can get away with a handful of suits and a dozen shirts and ties, and it is perfectly acceptable for him to look almost exactly the same every day. And those suits stay looking perfectly fashionable for a number of years.
Women are held to a higher decorative standard, and if they try to stick to a similiarly limited business wardrobe are considered to lack the self-promotion skills necessary to rapid executive advancement. And all those sartorial choices are held over women as an extra test of skill in some way, and if you fail you are dowdy,frumpy, etc. The extra expense is not inconsiderable either, and cuts into disposable income. But if that expense is not taken, the greasy pole is that much harder to climb.
Of course gendered expectations constrain men too. That’s the whole point. There’s a whole monolithic edifice of obsolete cultural constraints that need to be reexamined. Not that I’m a fan of the more anarchic forms of libertarianism: a social species needs some constraints for group order and thus individual peace of mind.
Because there’s a word for people with truly unconstrained choices: sociopath.
Rob, don’t tell me you wear a suit in Alice Springs?
Another Kim? The more the merrier I guess. We’ll take over the world one blog at a time.
Women are held to a higher decorative standard, yes, but there’s also the fact that men really don’t want to be seen as feminine – it’s the “other” coming into play.
Though feminism has achieved quite a lot, it’s resulted in one party (the feminine) being allowed some of the rights and privleges of the other (masculine), rather than both drifting towrds the middle ground of gender ambiguity. Femininity is still the “other”, it’s just that individual women now have the choice to co-opt some of the traditional trappings of the masculine world. Or that’s my early-morning incoherent ramble anyway.
I think that there’s a caricature somewhere of the 70s feminist that is reproduced endlessly and has entered the popular imagination
I think that’s exactly right. We’re playing with stereotypes, when the world clearly isn’t that simple.
Kim wrote:
That reminded me of something my Mum told me: when she began teaching in the Victorian state system in the early 1970s the education department had just issued a directive to the effect that it was now OK for women teachers to wear pants to work….as long as the pants were the bottom half of a pantsuit with a jacket long enough to completely cover the arse area.
No it’s me, Kimberella, The Amazing Kim.
I’m unrecognisable when gravatars are down
So that was why my high school teachers wore hideous pantsuits? It was a uniform directive?
Man, they must have really hated wearing skirts to have put up with those.
On the subject of heels, I was also astounded when a friend who goes clubbing in Sydney (the city) told me that places don’t let girls in unless they’re wearing heels. I know clubs like to be exclusive etc but these aren’t even those type of clubs. Reminds me why I like my neck of the woods where I can wear flats and not torture my poor feet.
Steve Mann
I think you’ve misinterpreted Dowd’s comment. It’s not that the role was devalued BY a woman being in that role but that the role was ALREADY devalued by the time that woman accessed that role.
*
My major comment for why feminism is STILL necessary is the way in which this so-called equality has travelled. It is alright for a woman to do traditional ‘male’ things but for males to GO DOWN and do something that is traditionally ‘female’ is seen as degrading to them.
When statements such as ‘you run like a girl’ or the MANY variants of this are still used as all-purpose insults, feminism is still needed. It shows that why is fine to be male and for people to want to do traditional ‘male’ things, there is nothing as bad as wanting to ‘downgrade’ yourself to something that is traditionally ‘female’
Not in Alice, no, Kim. Only estate agents wear suits in Alice.
Funny thing, I’ve always rather envied women the fact they get to wear so many outfits to work. They get to express their personalities, we get to be dull monochrome. Once I did a gig as a medieval minstrel for a uni do — now that was great. Got to wear some fabulous clothes.
Oh Rob, you’re a jape-ster! I’ve always envied men’s salaries, myself.
You are aware that even women don’t (often) get to wear minstrel clothes to work, aren’t you Rob?
More’s the pity, Anna. Maybe instead of ‘jeans for Friday’ we could have ‘minstrels for Monday’.
The problem with using the term equality in the gender debate is that male and female are not the same. Just saying.
About the only things that females can’t do in Australia now is join a Combat Corps in the Army. And that won’t last much longer.
All the other arguments about women being paid less and not getting career advancement is fundamentally about individual choices – the choices of study/job/career and lifestyle choices such as getting pregnant and child care choices and (that woeful term) work/life balance choices.
(O/T but whoever came up with the term work/life balance needs a good roasting – everything somebody does is a part of life and therefore ‘work’ is a part of life. My ‘work’ is part of who I am and I compromise and balance all activities I particpate in whether it is child care or sport or watching the evening news or dealing with clients.)
For Razor, with thanks to the hilarious Ilyka.
Gosh, I’m glad Razor has sorted out work-life balance, the second shift et al. It’ll all be downhill from here on. Hey, that’s an unintended double-entendre, but under the circumstances…
OK this thread has gone on long enough for me to ask: does anyone know whether there are ANY female pilots in Aust commerncial aviation? I fly once a week for work, and it’s really weirding me out how it’s always a fellow saying I’m going to need a cardi when the plane lands.
Yes Helen I too am glad that Razor has told us women to stop whinging about the mummy track and less pay and second shift and just do it. After all, we were the ones who choose to go into lesser paying jobs, and have babies, and then try to work after we’d had those babies, and try to keep a tidy house as well.
No, society has nothing to do with those things at all.
Not sure about women in combat, Razor. I thought the Israelis tried that and it turned out not to be a good thing after all.
Kate – now you are starting to understand. My Wife and I are bringing up our daughter so she believes she can be the Prime Minister of this great nation or anything else she wants to be as long as she has the get up and go and the talent to achieve it. Doesn’t matter whether she is a girl or a boy. If she wants to be a girly girl or a hairy arm pits girl – that’s her choice. We have the ability to make the decisions/choices and actions that have consequences and outcomes that we are responsible for.
Rob,
I don’t personally have a problem with women in Combat, having been an Officer in a Combart Arms Corps in the Army. I do have big issue with mixed gender units because of the well publicised problems this creates.
I expect we will see women in Combat Arms Corps when they are allowed to play mixed AFL/NFL/Super14/NBL etc.
Laura – I know a young lady who was a commercial pilot but is now an Air Traffic Controller.
The chick who used to fly Blackhawks in the Army is, last I heard, flying water bombing choppers in Perth.
The way I heard it, Razor, was that Israel abandoned the policy of having women in combat units because if they were wounded, and a tactical retreat was the best survival option, the male soldiers would either not retreat, thus getting all of them killed, or would carry the wounded women with them, thus slowing them down. Anything rather than leave them to the tender mercies of the enemy.
Not sure if that’s reliable information, however.
Here’s an interesting post and thread about women combat pilots.
I have a copy of the Atlantic article about F-15 Strike Eagles crewed by dames, mentioned in the linked thread, which includes the immortal quote delivered by radio 15,000 feet above Afghanistan to the Taliban targets below: “Congratulations. You’ve just been killed by a woman.”
Reminds me of how I got funny tingles as a youngster watching the Angels take off from Cloudbase.
‘fact I can’t think of anything much sexy than a female fighter pilot. Unless she’s Modesty Blaise or Mrs Peel as well.
Pakistan have recently inducted four female combat pilots into their air force.
I’m not a combat pilot. I’m a General with lotsa tanks.
Wise, Zoe.
In the tanks you don’t have to wear an RAF moustache.
I hear they take a lot of waxing, and are liable to catch fire.
“I’m a General with lotsa tanks.”
OK, I’ll rephrase the first sentence of the last para of my last comment.
“‘fact I can’t think of anything much sexy than a woman deftly controlling complicated technologies and highly focused men.”
Yes I’d agree that in face to face combat, men generally have a biological advantage, but also a chivalrous weakness ie: they go all girly at the thought of their womenhood left to the mercy of the enemy. Dames are much more ruthless when it comes to the crunch.
And when it comes to modern Western battlespace weapons delivery and CI4 systems, I see no reason why women can’t assess data and wrangle resources and technology under pressure or direct threat as well as men.
And if they believe they’re also fighting to protect the life of their kid and the world that shelters it, then the men better step well back ‘cos then it gets real nasty.
Also, I’ve met both Zoe and Angus Houston and I know who’d I’ve rather have in a tight corner…
At least I don’t have a novelty number plate like Angus.
I’m off to bed. Land war in Asia tomorrow morning, early.
I’ll get the Viet Cong to give you a wake up call darling. At the Tet of dawn.
I’ve seen female commercial pilots at Sydney Airport whilst waiting for a flight home to Brisbane.
This reminds me of something funny. In the late 1980s a book came out called Brainsex which argued that women’s brains were wired differently to men’s and that this made women less capable than men in terms of spatial skills, numatistic skills, etc. The book included the quip “Would you fly on an equal opportunity airline?” The authors were clearly not aware that Australia’s airlines have been equal opportunity ever since Deborah Wardley won her case against Ansett’s refusal to let her train and work as a pilot in 1979, and we haven’t lost a single plane in that time. QANTAS continues to be the safest international carrier in the world.
There’s some other stuff on this thread which I should reply to, but time is not on my side on Thursdays.
Also, a feminist reviewer of the book for New Scientist archly observed that the stereotypically feminine art of dressmaking requires considerable spatial reasoning skills.
Right on, Paul. I’ve always wanted to know why men who are apparently so clever at spatial reasoning never know where they are at the mall.
(Nabs – all quiet on the Eastern front.)
Female pilot:
Sorry, but I felt it was an appropriate prelude to a gratuitous Angelina picture!
My partner is very directionally challenged. Whenever we leave a building he will walk to the opposite direction of the way that we ought to be travelling. He is so consistently wrong that we now use his first instinct as a guide of where not to go.
Those of us who enjoyed Jody Foster in Contact might also be amused to reflect that the first human-crewed space flight to Mars will (if sanity prevails) have an all-woman crew. This is because:
(a) On a round space trip of several months, perhaps more than a year, it will be necessary to minimise the mass of the human payload to enable more computer circuitry, experimental equipment, safety equipment, storage space, etc. It will also be highly desirable to minimise the throughput of energy and materials via the crew’s metabolism. Therefore my 186cm 100kg Anglo male bulk would be a liability compared to my efficiently proportioned 156cm size 8 philosopher friend at my local.
(b) There would be obvious psychosocial difficulties with putting a mixed-gender crew together in such a confined space in such limiting circumstances for such a protracted period – an all-woman crew would probably be much more stable in such circumstances.
(c) Male muscle and testosterone would probably not be much use against hostile high-tech ETs.
The big question is: could human society cope with the cultural shock of the first landing on Mars being an all-woman affair.
Rob, The argument about males not adequately performing their military role becasue of their concern for females is a furphy – no evidence to support it as far as I’m aware.
I think the Canadians allowed females into Ground Combat Arms roles in their Defence Force (I’m pretty sure they got rid of the Army/Navy/Airforce seperation) but very few females have taken the plunge.
I do recall reading a psychology type article that discussed male v female in combat roles that inferred that females were much more ruthless than males and therefore ideal for killing roles. Don’t know if that is good or bad.
My experiance with females in the military has been no different to that with males – you get some really smart and professional operators and you get some that couldn’t fight their way out of a wet paper bag and you wouldn’t follow even out of courisosity.
I knew the femoloopies would have a cadenza over the “different” post above.
As I said before, females can do anything they want in Australia with very few exceptions.
But Paul women can’t drive! Oh hold on… anyway, what if women get their periods in space! Urghy menstrual blood floating everywhere! Therefore, men should go instead.
Razor, why don’t you read God Emperor Of Dune by Frank Herbert and tell us what you think of Leto II’s rationale for an all-female army-cum-bodyguard.
Razor, don’t be rude. I don’t call you a misogynist troll, you don’t call me a femoloopy, and we’ll all get along just fine.
Paul,
While you’re at it, could you please draw out the influence of Sardaukar tribal practice on zensunni mysticism, and its relevance to Leto II’s military doctrine? And why on Earth are fishspeakers, a fictional caste from a sci-fictional novel, relevant to this discussion?
Kate, if you want to think that I am targetting you then that is your choice. Check out the links on the lovely post by Anna Winter for me before you start calling me rude. Nice piece of work, that one, I’m sure you’ll agree.
Paul, thanks for the reference but I’ve got a pile of books next to the bed that I haven’t made a dent in for the last year so I won’t be taking your advice.
I just recalled that Mumar Ghadaffi had (has?) an all female body guard. They are reportedly all very attractive, but that is of course an “eye of the beholder” issue isn’t it.
Oh and Kate, you are free to call me a misogynist if you like but I can assure that I am a huge fan of women. Do you really think I’m a misogynist after what I said I want for my daughter? Really??
I can cop the troll tag, but misogynist is way off the mark, unless heterosexual males who beleive in everybody being judged on their merits are classified by feminists as misogynists now.
Woohoo!
You must have a good local.
I think Kate’s point is that just as we wouldn’t call you something you aren’t, don’t call us (or me, it seems) something we aren’t.
You can debate with people without lobbing insults at them about their perceived mental state.
Anna – you are the one who linked to the unsavoury piece, not me. If you think that linking to that type of piece is good mannered debating then we obviously had very different debating coaches in high school.
I had intended to not repsond to your link in order to just let it sink into the smelly pit where it belongs but I do have just one question.
Are you proud of doing that? Would you show your children that link as an example of your debating skills and obvious commitment to debate “without lobbing insults at them about their perceived mental state.”
Moderation of that – you’ve got to be joking!
Whatevs, Razor. You clearly haven’t been involved in many debates about feminism if you think it’s clever or original to say “but men and women are different”.
Mine was a flippant response to a comment that added little to the conversation.
It’s irrelevant to your use of the word “femoloopy”, which is what Kate and others objected to. Just because we don’t take you as seriously as you’d like us to, doesn’t mean we’re crazy.
Anna, you are perfectly correct that I “haven’t been involved in many debates about feminism”. This has been a personal choice because there is little point debating with somebody when I just know that I am never ever going to get the last word in. I learnt that at an early age from my two sisters.