I'm heading back to Norwich for the summer tomorrow, so I've spent most of this week cleaning. That means I've had lots of time to listen to the radio, which is great. I've particularly enjoyed The Making of Music, Frontiers, and Late Junction. Midweek also had some interesting discussion about climate change. I love the BBC - and that you can listen to all this stuff online too is even better.
Of particular interest was an issue raised by Heresy (a comedy programme that 'challenges received opinion'). They talked about feminism, and specifically they wondered why most people seem to think that there's no need for feminism anymore. It does seem strange, after all: we definitely don't yet live in an equal society, and women seem to be just as demeaned as they ever have (as the show points out, almost every magazine still sells itself with pictures of pretty women).
In fact, in the UK, there seems to be a growing culture of young women sacrificing their diginity and becoming just as loutish as the worst of the young men. I remember some foreign sportsman (David Ginola?) moving back home because he didn't want his daughter to grow up as an 'English woman'. Quite often, I can see why*.
So, do you think there is still a need for feminism? Do the women among you feel like society treats you as equal to men? Why are large swathes of today's youth ready to reject feminism as an obsolete concept?
*Obviously I'm not suggesting that ALL women are like this. Please interpret me charitably - these are hot potatoes and difficult to write about unambiguously.
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According to Wikipedia:
"Feminism is a number of social, cultural and political movements, theories and moral philosophies that are concerned with cultural, political and economic practices and inequalities that discriminate against women...."
I admit I don't really know much about feminism. However, I think the question you ask may be too broad (if feminism is not one single view, but a number of movements and philosophies).
There are things that may be associated with "feminism" that are good (e.g. equal pay for equal work). But I think there are things that are sometimes linked to feminism that I would not approve of. One area I would probably disagree most with feminists is in the area of theology, because I think the Bible talks about differences in the roles for men and women (e.g. 1 Timothy 2:11-14 and Ephesians 5:22-33).
If feminism is about affirming the fundamental equality of men and women, then I would say feminism is absolutely essential for the modern age. While I am dismayed about the use of female sex appeal to sell products in our society, I realise this is also as much about modern consumerism as anything else.
I would say a feminist outlook is desperately needed in mainstream religion, and even in Christianity, some sections of which still believe that women should not be in ministry leadership. Also, I feel that the monopoly of the male pronoun to refer to God is a very archaic tradition.
Throughout the Bible the metaphor of marriage is used for God's relation with his people, e.g. Hosea, Revelation 19:7.
C.S. Lewis argues for male headship in marriage (in Mere Christianity, I think), and against what he calls "Priestesses in the church" (in God in the Dock: Essays on Theology).
I don't agree with everything C.S. Lewis writes, but I think he makes some valid points here. Perhaps the marriage relationship was created by God in order to be a picture for us of something of the relationship between God and his people (see Ephesians 5:22-33).
If this is so, then the male pronoun used for God in the Bible, and traditional Christian theology, might not just be an unfortunate side-effect of past patriachal culture, but something God intended, in order to communicate with us something about his relationship with us.
Feminism as a concept is all good and fine. 'Equal', not necessarily 'same' treatment is pretty agreed on by the masses I think now.
Feminism as a movement, lifestyle, and soap box is perhaps a little unhelpful now though. The aggressive feminism is probably doing more to bring gender discrimination into the conscious mind than is actually helpful, and often makes people treat 'same' when it's not actually wanted or appropriate (I'm sure you can think of examples on various levels).
I agree in some cases, gender still weighs in where it shouldn't. But this has evolved beyond feminism and into the topic of equality as a whole, because it can be as true for men. It's perhaps an issue of skin deep discrimination more than anything, but to wave a flag of Feminism over these problems is selfish and, well... gender exclusive, which is kind of ironic.
Regarding the degradation of women... magazine models choose to be such, and ladettes choose to be such. That actually is a result of equality.
The sexism would come in if a women was only allowed in magazine to sell products in her underwear, but that's not true. They can and do, but also there's equal opportunity to be a columnist for the skilled writer, regardless of gender.
You might also be suffering from 'noticing' the scantily clad women because you're hetro-men and they put those images in your path. Believe me, there's plenty of man-based eye candy in advertising too. As said in a previous comment, the degrading roles in advertising is a symptom of modern consumerism - but it's nothing top do with gender discrimination. In fact, last year there were more counts of anti-male discrimination in TV ads than women - men are depicted as simple and stupid while women almost always smart and graceful.
I wonder, if we just let the issue to rest in politics and conversation now - would it perhaps not just disappear altogether in a generation or two? Is the talk and hype what keeps the view of women not being equal alive through mere publicity?
As said by Carl too - these are kinda hot potato's, I should be clear that this might not be my view across every sphere of life but just a thought off the top of my head.
I agree with Phil's top comment. Most people equate equality with "sameness". Women are now free to get bladdered if they want on a Thursday night. That isn't equality.
However I disagree with the rest of what Phil says. Women do have the freedom to choose whether or not to be models, whether or not they promote themselves and products scantily clad but that's like saying that the women in Victorian times could choose whether to be a prostitute or not. Of course they have a choice but they aren't necessarily liberated enough to make an informed choice!
Feminism is about examining the cultural influences that make girls want to be TV presenters and "It" girls rather than prime ministers or CEO's. After examining those factors I'm not really sure where feminism goes: campaigning, writing, staging protests, there are allsorts of avenues but all of them seem ineffectual as I think about them.
I do believe that feminism has huge relevance in today's culture but I'm wondering about the neccessity of separating men's and women's issues because I think there are huge issues with the crushing of men's egos and a need for a movement looking into how to re-establish men in a healthy way. This isn't about beer and being a "real man" but about saying it isn't on to make jokes about men's incompetence and having a Mr Muscle type guy bumbling around to laugh at.
Society isn't fair. Two seperate factions are need to explore the issues, one for women and one for men.
If you'd like a sweeping statement to sum it all up how about this; I blame the media?!
I agree with Ben.
There was an article in Glamour magazine a few months ago about what women want from men and how it's changing. When feminism was in, men became gradually more passive, more in tune with their feminine side, willing to cry etc. I think that's a product of feminism and it's not a good one.
Now women are realising that they can't really respect wishy washy men - I think to restore men to their rightful strong leadership roles, women need to back down a bit and let them take those roles rather than doing everything for them. Maybe that's why it looks like feminist ideas are no longer so popular.
Just a theory from a fashion mag but I think it's quite true!
another thing is that in a lot of cases feminism hasn't come full circle. we're beginning to get equal rights and hopefully soon equal pay in the workplace (on average at the moment a woman earns 30% less over her lifetime than a guy in the same job- thats a stat from a history lecture on feminism so I can't link to it sorry!) but in a lot of cases women's previous home burden, which they were left to do all day in the past, things like cleaning, looking after the kids and cooking the evening meal hasn't been lifted, so women are now in some cases working effectively 2 jobs. when men in all social situations are happy to share that burden fully with their women, then maybe feminism will be getting somewhere but even then there are the issues of things like overworked single parents etc. A lot of that probably made no sense, but hey.
I thought the debate on heresy was interesting.
I would say without question there's a need for feminism. Feminism isn't about equality, a debate which is won and therefore a voice that is no longer needed.
Feminism is about correcting the structural injustices associated with gender that mean for example a disproportionate amount of female graduates are not in graduate jobs compared to their male counterparts, a disproportionate amount of men are on boards of companies compared to women, the voice in power is more representative of men than women in content, style and gender of "speaker." The fact that poverty broadly speaking affects more women than men etc...
Yes, equality is about making sure men are not disadvantaged too but feminism is needed because for me western society still stacks the odds in favour of whether you're a man.
That to me is not right.
"a disproportionate amount of female graduates are not in graduate jobs compared to their male counterparts"
Both my mum and dad are graduates. They both started started out as teachers. However, for many years my mum was either not in any paid work, or worked part time. This situation will be replicated in many families in our country. Is this necessarily a bad thing? Some women may decide that being a full time mum for a few years is more important than career progression.
That is not necessarily a bad thing.
At least some feminists seem to argue that a woman who chooses to not pursure a career is failing as women (see here for example).
Sorry, I meant in the first couple of years after uni.
I wouldn't agree with Hirsh. In fact I'd argue that there are few issues that should enable women to stay at home as a mum in order to further equality of opportunity that aren't in place.
1) It should be as easy for a woman to stay at home and return to work as it should a man
2) The absence shouldn't disadvantage that person from opportunity - promotion, learning etc
3) The choice to stay at home should be genuinely a full choice for either partner.
It's then down to your politics as to how you resolve them and the role of the state I guess.
I think one of the good issues Linda Hirshman raises is the issue of women getting back into work with a gap on the CV (resumé).
At least for the first six months of life, it makes sense for the mother to be the primary carer for a child, because breast feeding is better than bottle feeding.
But if women do have a few months (or years) off work they should be able to continue their career afterwards if they want.
The Bible tells husbands to "love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her" (Ephesians 5:25) so it would be wrong for men to think they can have an easy life while women do the housework and child-raising. Ephesians 6:4 teaches that fathers should be invovled in bringing up their children.
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