Why don't feminists want to be around men?

Question

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/gender_society/75691/2

That is an article I stumbled across. The writer is talking about how 'womyn' (appparently anything with 'men' in it is evil) shouldn't have to be dependent on men.

Why do feminists reject cooperation so badly? Though very few men rely on women for their wage, almost every man relies on women to raise him as his mother and to bring him and his children happiness when he is married.

She bases this upon her decision that any interaction with men will result in 'male violence'. Despite the fact that most violence is directed at men and half of domestic violence is directed against them. (http://www.glennsacks.com/4_feminists_myths.htm)

What gives? I'd like to hear some feminist views on the matter.

CarrieP:

I wish you were right, however you probably missed
'In order to really challenge the SYSTEM OF MALE VIOLENCE'
Her view is that all men are ingaged in a system of violence against women. Not only is this new to me, and likely any man you meet. It is ridiculously sexist. She talks of steriotypes, then blatantly says that all men are engaged in a vast system of violence against womyn. This is misandry at its worst.

Also, it will probably surprise you that more than half of all domestic violence victims are men. (see the source from glennsacks) And in the 1800s, men could only divorce if he could prove his wife had been unfaithful. Yet another feminist whitewashing of history.

Also, in old english. Wer-man and he-man were teh words for man and woman. Man, referred to humanity as a whole.

To leiagh: No, men are the victims of 80% of crime, I have no idea where you got that statistic from, it is complete fabrication.

BABAYAGA:

http://www.csulb.edu/~mfiebert/assault.htm

That is the source he quoted, it includes over 200 seperate studies across a wide demographic that conclude that women are just as violent as men is relationships. The author is professor of pshycology at California State University. Will that do for a source?

Answer 1

I think you missed the point. Although I agree with you that her presumption about a "system of male violence" is claptrap," I'd say her whole premise is about rejecting the inclination to typecast men as muscle-on-demand.

Here's another take on rejecting the roles than society imposes upon men, and by which women are unduly favored and privileged:



If you're male and....

You can expect live as long as a woman, thank a masculist.

You aren't expected to provide most of the family income, thank a masculist.

You can actually participate fully in the parenting of your children and not have your wife dictate your level of involvement, thank a masculist.

You can turn down a second job, and not feel that your letting your family down, thank a masculist.

You can control your own fertility so that you can determine when and if you want to raise a child,
thank a masculist.

You had a man as your primary care-giver in the first five years of your life, thank a masculist.

You can expect women to fight and die for their country, thank a masculist.

You can expect the government to care about your vote as much as they care about a woman's vote,
thank a masculist.

You do not have to compete against a woman who is sleeping with the boss to get a promotion, thank a masculist.

You get accused of rape and you are not presumed guilty until proven innocent, thank a masculist.

You hear a noise in the night and your wife gets up to investigate, thank a masculist.

You are no longer twice as likely as a women to be sent to prison for the same crime, thank a masculist.

You get joint-custody of your children following divorce and separation, thank a masculist.

You wife beats you and it is illegal and the police stop her, instead of arresting you and blaming you for her violence, thank a masculist.

You buy a car and you are not charged higher accident insurance simply because you are a man, thank a masculist.

You are on trial and your presumption of innocence is given the same weight as that of a woman, thank a masculist.

Your health and well being is regarded by the community as being equally important as that of a woman,
thank a masculist.

You are a victim of violent crime, and people show you the same concern and compassion as they do to female victims of violent crime, thank a masculist.

Answer 2

seem at it like this. the female maintains to be abode and does each and all the housekeeping and has a tendency to the little ones. Her activity is a 24 hour one, no? Then the guy gets up and is going his 9-5. Brings abode the Sir Francis Bacon. great. yet his activity is barely an 8 hour affair. His has some end to it. So at the same time as i do no longer think of the guy ought to come abode and can vacuum the whole abode or do each and all the dishes or ought to do extensive artwork, I do think of that it would be very gracious if he might pitch in slightly. lower back, i do no longer think of he ought to ought to do lots, yet i do no longer think of that coming abode and right now parking your butt on the sofa with a chilly one is particularly trustworthy the two. purely help out. it particularly is that basic. It makes her activity slightly much less annoying, it then makes your relationship slightly better, and it improves your intercourse existence by using fact she's no longer so drained, and it will tutor your little ones (boys relatively) the honour that a guy ought to have for a woman and what she does.

Answer 3

There are some women (or womyn) who choose to live a segregated life from men -- I would imagine they all have their own reasons for doing so.

Feminism and feminists are like any group -- there are as many ways to be a feminist as there are ways to be a person.......

It is like anything -- in order to bring attention to issues we need to talk about them -- and sometimes you will get pretty radical opinions -- and stances -- but even if you disagree with them, you are at least thinking about them -- read it all -- take your cues from what you know, and make an informed decision for yourself.

Answer 4

The article you linked to was not about feminists not wanting to be around men. It was one woman's story about overcoming stereotypes. First she talked about how she was belittled for being a girl and was discouraged from being self sufficient in the simplest things. She talked about how she over came it and things in the feminist movement that inspired her. As she matured and got over her own insecurities she was able to do the same thing when thinking of men. She was able to see that while women are belittled when they work towards self sufficiency and certain types of work, men are belittled when they don't. She encourages us to see men as individual people, rather than work horses and heavy lifting slaves. To break down stereotypes about men just like we are breaking down stereotypes about women. As a mother of a son, I learned this earlier than some women. Your question implies that one part early in her journey, a program or workshop about avoiding male violence by becoming self sufficient, was the entire journey and was the focus of the article. For your information, that wasn't the focus of the article. The focus of the article was applying equality to men.
You need to go back and read it again without your adversarial bias. I think you have no concept of what a feminist really is.

Answer 5

Be careful when reading articles, especially online, the author(s) do not necessarily represent the group as well as they think they do. Not many feminists spell women with a y, many feminists are happily married to men and most enjoy the company of men.

Answer 6

No, professors of psychology never do as a source. On your second link; BS. I have seen that old happy bullet retread too many times to be taken in by it. The violence men do can not be even intimated by women. That is the brute reality; not some statistical shuffle. I work with statistical analysis all the time and I know skewed data when I see it. You people have been relying on this psychobabbleist too long; get yourself a new source.

PS Truth and the approximations thereof interest me; ideology, of any type, does not.

Answer 7

Saying that half of domestic violence is directed at men is a MYTH. Who cares if statistically speaking women are violent towards men at same, or even higher rates. Men are stronger and therefore do more damage.

Therefore female violence against men, while exactly the same in terms of intent and classification as assault or domestic violence, is to be COMPLETELY EXCUSED on the basis that men typically hit harder when they do it.

This also means that on the all important issue of emotional abuse, because many strong women can handle the physical abuse, but not the emotional, because men hit harder physically, they are also bigger emotional abusers. It all comes back to men being physically stronger.

And let's not talk about initiation. Who cares if women initiate domestic violence more. MEN HIT HARDER DAMNIT. If you decide to have a fight with a 6'10 linebacker, you got what you deserved if he beats you up. Just like if a woman fights a man, and gets beaten up THAT MAN HAS TO GO TO JAIL BECAUSE HE WAS THE ONE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE VIOLENCE IN THAT SITUATION AND ADDRESSING "WHO STARTED IT" IS NOT AN ISSUE OF SELF-DEFENSE IT IS CHILDISH.

Note that by no means am I condoning violence against women at a level which they can dish out.. if a man does something which women typically do, like (from the bibliography) kicking, slapping, scratching, throwing an object, using a weapon or biting - HE IS TO BE PUNISHED TO THE FULL EXTENT OF THE LAW because his gender is usually worse, equating this violence with the blackest of domestic violence.

Whoever is stronger is the one who is wrong.

Men are stronger, therefore it is men and not women who are abusive.

See, the myth of half of all domestic violence being directed at men is completely debunked.

Now, don't you dare note that there are some feminists saying that the woman who wrote the article is an extreme feminist and real feminists are not like that - and another group of feminists justifying what she said as acceptable and supporting it; because that would be misogynistic.

Just like you'd better not dare note that half the feminists and castrated males in this thread said that domestic violence is 50/50 committed by men and women, but men hit harder so the ratio actually becomes 0/100 with men committing all the abuse - and another group saying that the rate is 0/100 full stop because "everybody knows men are the abusive ones" therefore any statistics on the rate, even those disregarding who is stronger, you can show us must be falsified in some way or another (who cares how exactly, they just are).

No contradictions or fallacious logic here. Welcome to womyn's studies. I hope you didn't expect to convince us with anything that doesn't flatter our non-existent (only males have them) egos.

Answer 8

Those aren't feminists...those are man haters. The two are very different, trust me. I consider myself somewhat of a feminist, but more of a "new age" fem-Nazi, I guess you could say. I have no problem with gender roles because we have them for a reason. I also don't believe that any contact with men will result in some kind of violence...although I'm not sure I believe that half of domestic violence is directed against them, that seems a little unlikely considering how women are the victims of about 80% of all crime.

Answer 9

Women (I like the traditional spelling myself) shouldn't be dependent on men. We can live for ourselves. If men have trouble doing the same thing, it's hardly our concern. It's up to you to find some way to deal. I don't agree with the feminist you're citing, as she's far more radical than an egalitarian like myself. Still, we just have an easier time with independence than you.

But I still like being around men. I have tons of male friends and I love them all dearly. I just don't rely on them for happiness.

Answer 10

How could you have possibly got THAT interpretation from that article? Are you kidding?

She is saying that women, in order to be fully equal, need to take the bad with the good. As much as it sucks to do the dirty work sometimes, we can't leave it all to men, otherwise we're simply reinforcing gender roles.

She is not saying that any interaction with men results in male violence - that's not even the point of this article. That was one teeny little comment that you took completely the wrong way. What she said is that one of the reasons the women's liberation movement started was so that women could have the option of being independent. Back when women either didn't work or worked for extremely low pay, they had no choice but to be financially dependent on men, which meant that if you were abused, you had no choice but to put up with it. It wasn't until the women's lib movement started that anyone even talked about, or recognized, domestic violence. That's all she's saying - not that ALL men are abusive, but that it's nice to have the option not to HAVE to stay with an abusive man if you happen to be in a relationship with one.

CHILL OUT!!!

EDIT: I'd also like to address your comment "'womyn' (appparently anything with 'men' in it is evil)." Some feminists like using the term womyn, not because men are evil, but because the word "woman" is an example of how much the idea of men as default and women as secondary/other has penetrated our society - so much that it's part of language. I, personally, don't use the term "womyn," but I respect the decision of others to do so. Who are we to question the way some people choose to identify THEMSELVES? Why should people have to define themselves by someone else's definition? If people want to be called "African American" or "people of colour" or "womyn," then that's their choice and we should all respect it.

EDIT II: Putting the comment "system of male violence" in context for you:

We forget that we help confine men to a narrow set of social roles and expectations that parallel the very social roles and expectations assigned to women that we are fighting ourselves. How many times have you called your husband, boyfriend, male friend or relative when you had a flat tire, had a washing machine to move or had computer problems because you simply assumed that they would be able to help you because of they are male? And what impact do you think that these sorts of expectations have on men in general?
In order to really challenge the system of male violence, we need to challenge not only the restrictive roles and rules assigned to women; we need to challenge those assigned to men as well.

She is referring to the system of male domination and female subordination.

One meaning of "violence," used especially in Women's Studies:

vi·o·lence (vī'ə-ləns)
n. Abusive or unjust exercise of power.

I wish men could understand these things without feeling personally attacked. You're not a violent person? Good for you. Neither are a lot of men. Does a violence and rape culture exist? Is it based on "masculinity"? Absolutely. (Please refer to Wendy's excellent explanation on the ties between violence and "masculinity.") Please don't feel like when someone says these things, they're speaking of you, or any other person, in particular.

Re: your comment on the origins of the words man and woman - if anything, that actually reinforces "man" as default. And as I said before, regardless of your opinions on the subject, we need to allow marginalized groups the ability to define themselves as they choose.