What's up with this category (Gender and Womans Studies)?

Question

Why all the juvenile hatred of feminism? And why the insults instead of arguments? I could see if someone disagreed with what a feminist said could post a question, but many people on here post these really immature and spiteful remarks with no reason whatsoever.

Answer 1

Yes, pretty pathetic, isn't it? And you nailed it with "juvenile." There are a lot of people who participate regularly in this forum and say intelligent things...but the "trolls" feel obliged to "take women (esp. feminists) down a peg." Apparently, this is because feminism has signalled the end of civilization as we know it. There's no reasoning with certain people, and many of us have given up trying. Yahoo's administration does not feel this is worth doing anything about, despite numerous complaints. There are posters who use avatars of Marc Lepine, and recently the Cho person from the Virginia Tech massacre--again, Yahoo sees no problem, apparently. In any case, for me, I rely on the intelligent posters and do my best to ignore the others--but if you block them, they get really personal and start making personal attacks in this public forum, and they e-mail some pretty obscene things. So, if this is the end of civilization as we know it, it sure as hell has nothing to do with feminism...it's immature, insecure, misinformed "trolls" with too much time on their hands. Thank you for noticing. It's a sad commentary, I must say.

Answer 2

1) Y!A has this section because GWS is an academic discipline in many universities. 2) It is feminists studying and theorizing about how gendering occurs in societies and the effects of this gendering 3) Men's and gender studies do not exist because nobody has created such an area in the world of acadaemia. Women's and Gender Studies exist for much the same reason as Native Studies, Jewish Studies, etc. 4) It isn't women studying themselves. It's really not about women, it's about social influences 5) It is not discriminatory because that is what it is called. Some universities still have Women's Studies programs, but most have changed to Women's and Gender or Gender and Women's Studies 6) Feminists put up with it because we know why it's called what it's called. Women's Studies was intended to bring light onto the history of women that is missing from conventional texts, feminism, and to discuss the implications of the social construct of gender (not the biological sex differences)

Answer 3

From what I can see is that there are some really resentful people on here who have been (for lack of a better term) "burned" by a woman in the past. They have taken it upon themselves to preach venomous hatred towards females. There have been men on here who have outright called me a liar when I explained how I was taken to the cleaners by my ex husband in our divorce. History proves that women have been systematically and consistently treated with less respect from men due to religion and government. The Salem Witch Trials were about extermination and misogyny, not witches. I personally don't think that anyone should get treated better or worse for any reason be it that they are male, female, black, white, tall, short, young, older, etc. I just want to be treated fairly.

Answer 4

I've wondered the same thing myself. I'm just hoping this is only a small segment of men and not representative of a large group who hate all women for whatever reason.

Unfortunately, the computer give people the cyber mask to make stupid comments just to rile others.

Answer 5

GWS seems to attract a few hostile juvenile boys and men, with a lot of time, who are incapable of intelligent discussions. They see the word woman or women and think it's a place to bash women and feminists, they ignore the word studies.

Answer 6

I'm so glad you asked! I have pondered this since I stumbled in here, though I usually ignore the more inane questions.

If, as the poster above suggested, some people see feminism as a hate movement, I expect they are speaking from a place of hate themselves. I still don't see how that justifies all the personal insults.

Answer 7

Maybe because they aren't educated enough to know the difference between an insult and an argument? Maybe they don't understand what "argument" means in a scholarly sense.

Answer 8

Very astute. Also, you will note how any rational man who points out the hatred and insanity around here gets called a "mangina" or some other stupid term made up by these crap for brains bigots to insult men who would dare to call them out on their b.s.

Answer 9

Are you saying it's not a two-way street ? There will always be idiots on both sides of an argument. Some people see Feminists as a hate group.

Answer 10

It's crazy, isn't it? Even the GLBT category doesn't have to put up with quite so much abuse. I don't really believe in the idea of womb envy, but this place makes me wonder sometimes.