Suddenly, everywhere I look I'm seeing these fascinating blogposts about how extreme and manhating and generally disturbing feminism is. Apparently, I'm not the only one who has noticed this. The post Gawker links to, this little masterpiece, is only the latest. And there's Ishita's post here, though she does at least admit the possibility that the "extreme" position is not necessarily the only feminist one (though I'd question what she considers extreme, and her authority to judge what is and is not a non-issue. However.)
My problem with these posts is not (as Gawker's is) the mischaracterisation of feminism. Shanky sets up rather a ridiculous strawfeminist which is easily *proved wrong* and when this is pointed out to him he backtracks and says no, of course he didn't mean all feminists, only the extreme ones, and in the process only makes himself look ridiculous. Which is fine with me.
The thing that confuses me is this. Feminism is a pretty big field and there are a lot of debates/arguments/fistfights going on within it at any given point in time. The sheer intellectual volume within feminist thought often intimidates me. There are huge issues within feminism on which I don't feel qualified to take a stand because of the strength of the arguments coming from various sides. I read quite a lot of feminist blogs as a result. The ones in my sidebar I visit regularly, but they lead me to other blogs (Belledame222 and Spotted Elephant both have a great collection of links in their sidebars and have been pretty much invaluable to me) and I was under the impression that I'd read, if not extensively, at least a little from all over the spectrum. But now I keep hearing about these shadowy "extreme" feminists, *feminazis*, etc, and either I'm so extreme that everything they say seems moderate (and considering most people I've discussed my feminism with, even when they've disagreed, have accepted that what I was saying had some merit this seems unlikely) or I'm missing out on a number of views that I'd be very interested in hearing. Or these extreme feminists don't actually exist - note that those whining about them don't seem to specify who they are.
So really, I'm genuinely curious. Who are these feminists? Give me names, or links or... something.
Wednesday, 10 January 2007
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
30 comments:
Hey Aishwarya
Actually, along with my problem with his mischaracterization of feminism which I made clear in the main body of the post, I also made exactly the same point you are making, albeit in the comments section of my post. This is what I said :
"Feminism itself argues that its goals are culture and race specific......feminism is a complex entity with a multitude of different beliefs. The blogpost I referred to mischaracterizes it into something that can be conveniently attacked, without considering its other aspects."
That's exactly what shanky did : create a strawfeminist possessing qualities he pulled out of thin air and then based on that, "proved" why feminism is wrong.
By the way, if you are looking for extremist feminists, please check out cyke's comment on my blogpost where he refers to, according to him, extremist and "self aggrandizing" feminists. I do not know any of them or their philosophies so cannot confirm if that's indeed true, but you might take a look at his list since you are interested.
hmmm have you read this?
I did mention in the comments to Ishita that I dont see why we need to limit a so called feminist perspective to only certain issues. I agree with you completely about that fact that one person doesnt have the authority to judge what is and is not a non-issue.
Did you read this post by Ginmar?
The post she's linked to in my opinion is a great example of setting up a strawfeminist argument.
Oh and since I'm feeling very link happy and all, please read this little gem which I got off desipundit.
It's priceless, I assure you.
OMFG! Feminazis! Secret amazonian cabals!
Oh god no...the MAUVE HAND!
If I hear any goosestepping (with clear heels) in my neighborhood, I'll be sure to let you know.
Hmmm...I take it you don't believe in ghosts either?
feminazis. thats all i'd like to pick out of this article.
for the rest, im just going to blend into the general blogreaders' crowd. seeing which, i shouldn't really have said anything.
but still - feminazis - i just couldn't resist. priceless!
and also, just coz i have to give an opinion, i found most of the linked articles (on your post and in comments) to be similarly rambling and indecisive. no one really said anything. so whats the deal?
ahem...also, as a completely independent observation, i find a lot of feminism to just be an outlet to frustration over men.
now, i do support feminism. i believe in equality in all opportunity. but sometimes, its just needless.
rakhi sawant getting protection from women's cell of-whatever-that-was, after her publicity-seeking campaign with mika, is probably the latest example of that. this sort of thing reduces one's faith in feminism. i see studies in papers and research done by big NGOs over WHY there isnt a proportional distribution in gender among CEOs of large companies and shit like that.
perhaps, there are innumerable organizations actually helping women fight dowry and infanticide etc, but its rakhi sawant who gets media mileage. perhaps thats why people like to rant against feminism.
and maybe someone should fight Ekta Kapoor. now that is an anti-feminist.
as for me, i embrace women of all races, castes and religions.
[i just couldn't resist offering an opinion after all.]
@confused+baffled; I've had enough arguments about this recently so I didn't want to comment, but your comment on the rakhi sawant incident...well, I had to :) Did you see clips of the incident on tv? Did you see the savage way Mika grabbed her and 'kissed' her? Why do you have a problem about the fact that some people actually thought it disgusting how a man could act like a sex-starved baboon who needed but a camera and a suggestion from a fellow guest(or was it the camera person?) to do that to,well, anyone? I'm no great fan of Sawant, but I do believe that even people who create, protect and project an item girl image(whatever that means and with all its trappings) have rights. And those include that of not being sexually assaulted, which is what this was.
confused & baffled: And while we're about it, why exactly is investigating unequal opportunities for women in the workplace (either as CEOs or more generally) "needless"? Just curious.
Does it remind you of the 'I don't know what exactly a feminist is, but people invariably call me that when I express opinions in any way different from that of a doormat' comment? I (mis?)quoted from memory so forgive ne lapses from the originial.
Bah! The whole thing makes me sick.
@Confused and baffled: I am too (confused and baffled, i mean!)
'as for me, i embrace women of all races, castes and religions.'
One gold medal coming your way for that!
@xyz: i dont know if i should entirely trust the clipped clips we are usually shown. but i did see a very interesting interview of hers subsequently on tv, in which she vehemently tried to portray the victim. her actions, mannerisms, behavior in the interview seemed to suggest differently. after seeing that, i cant believe the kissing episode was anything more than a publicity campaign.
lol..perhaps she didnt know she was going to come on bigg boss back then. the mika sort of publicity must be so passe to her now.
@falstaff: as general workers - i dont see anything wrong there. but i dont understand how a research at the top echelons can really help.
you cannot dictate terms with a large company to employ a woman CEO for better representation of women now can you? when all actions are driven by economics and on a pure profit-basis, everyone does what they feel is best for them. questioning the presence of woman CEOs in hardly a case for repression or upliftment. its more like just checking whether women at the upper echelons actually put in as many hours or whatever. im not saying they cant, just perhaps they dont. and thats that. you cant do anything can you? you cannot tell ratan tata to keep a woman in the post next to him, just because Sudha Murthy seems to do a good enough job where she is.
thats what i meant there.
@revealed: :-) do i get my name on it? maybe just saying confused&baffled. that would be quite good na?
confused&baffled: No, you can't require companies to hire women as CEOs. Nor should you. I'm unconvinced that you can or should require them to hire women at any level. What you can do by studying the reasons why women don't make CEOs is understand the organisational and social constraints that keep them from getting there and think about ways in which those might be influenced. Maybe women don't become CEOs because they're unwilling to put in the hours. Maybe. But we don't know that unless we research it, do we? Maybe there are plenty of women who are just as qualified and willing to put in the effort but don't get hired as CEOs because corporate boards are old boy's clubs. And if that's true maybe shareholders in a company would want to know about it. At any rate, I don't see how you can decide whether or not there's something we can do about it until we've researched it and figured out where the problem lies.
And let's say women don't become CEOs because they don't want to work the hours. Okay. Why are they unwilling to put in the hours. Is it because they were born with an innate preference for working shorter hours. Or is it because organisations are notoriously bad about providing support and flexibility for women so that they never manage to get to the point where they have even a fighting chance of becoming CEOs. And if the latter, then again, surely there are things we can do about it.
CEOs don't just drop out of the skies, you know. The same issues that plague women at lower levels of the organisation ensure that they're kept from climbing to CEO positions. And that, along with the fact that the absence of women CEOs has enormous symbolic significance, both within organisations and outside them, is reason enough to research it.
@falstaff: *sigh* that was beautiful. I have tears in my eyes. Now, if only I could have thought of that, instead of offering a gold medal! Dang it! (yeah, they were tears of frustration that I can't write out well reasoned arguments)
@falstaff: ahaa...i see.
@aishwarya - hullo! stumbled by from szerelem's. Nice blog you've got here!
@confused&baffled - hehe, I agree with your statement on a large number of posts being an outlet for men-bashing :)
@falstaff - hmm, I'm not quite sure any research into that would get anywhere. You're right about women facing all kinds of difficulties getting to the top - but I think that by the time they get there, any disadvantages they might've had before are swept away into the cupboard. They refuse to acknowledge that they're the exceptions rather than the norm.
A simple anecdote would be what I read about a journalist researching this very point after Indra Nooyi's appointment as Pepsi's top honcho. As she called offices of the leading female CEOs or equivalents, a large number of responses were of the form "Ms. X would like to be known more for her achievements, rather than talk about gender dis-balances in the upper corporate echelons".
There's also the finding (I forget who it was) which talks about how women are built differently when it comes to taking hard decisions - they often use a fair bit more of their emotional faculties than men would, given the same situation.
Just my $0.02 :)
oh _dear_ lord. I just read that desipundit link which punkster left.
*shudder*
Oh, this reminds me; I found a book in a thrift store the other day that I want to send you. It's called: What every married woman should know. it's a second edition from 1953....
I can't describe it, it's so alien it made me want to cry and laugh at the same time. didn't even manage to read it all.
armchair philosopher: I'm not sure we're talking about the same kind of research here. I'm not talking about interviews with top CEOs asking them what disadvantages they face - partly because they're unlikely to want to talk about them, and partly because there's clearly selection issues at play. I'm talking about the research into 'glass ceilings' by people like Morrison and von Glinow (1990 - American Psychologist) that helps provide direction for research into factors creating gender differences in the workplace by people like Herminia Ibarra over at Harvard.
Certainly journalistic research into the causes of women not making CEO is unlikely to lead anywhere. But journalistic research is generally useless anyway.
P.S. Oh, and there's plenty of research into how men and women act differently in organisational situations. See, for instance, Robin Ely's work on gender differences in the workplace, the most recent of which argues that moving to a less 'manly' culture improves safety performance in high-risk situations, precisely because workers in less masculine organisational climates are more willing to talk about feelings and share their vulnerabilities rather than pretending to be superhuman and going ahead and doing things even when they don't know how to or aren't in any condition to.
Not only may women be more open about their feelings and more willing to use them in decision making - this may be a good thing.
Why the crap is the Melly hiding here and never on lj or msn? :P
I miss the Melly!!!!
/end gratuitous off topic post. :P
love,
Gawker - Obviously I need to read your comments then! :)Thanks for directing me to those specific ones.
Szerelem - I remember reading that post, yes. I agree with you, of course.
Megha - Oh yes. And the Desipundit one too, unfortunately. What with the Indian penal code protecting my modesty and Dude Hyderabadi upholding my dignity I can't go wrong!
Anang - *snicker*
Falstaff - Thanks, I've been having computer trouble for a few days and have only just read these comments. You explained it to C&B better than I could have, anyway. :) And no, I don't believe in ghosts.
C&B - See, you're doing exactly what I've complained about in the post. "i find a lot of feminism to just be an outlet to frustration over men". Really? What feminism is this? I write a whole post about people who make accusations about feminism without giving specifics...I would have thought that the comments to this post, at least would be free of that particular problem.
Falstaff has already addressed your issues with feminism in the workplace quite clearly, so I won't do that. As for the Rakhi Sawant thing, let me get this straight. Your problem with her is that she didn't act like a victim of sexual assault in an interview you saw, she is therefore faking the whole thing for publicity and feminists should concentrate on more important things like dowry, right?
Firstly, even assuming that your experience with women after sexual assault has been so wide ranging that you can consider yourself an authority on the subject, what if you're wrong? Must all victims of assault follow a rule book in their behaviour? Honestly?
Secondly, as I said above in the post, people who honestly believe they can decide what is and is not an important enough issue for feminism are indulgingin a piece of narrowmindedness that is really very arrogant. as I've said before (and apparently I need to say it again), while dowry and infanticide are important issues in and of themselves, they're also symptomatic of a larger problem with society - a constructed version of what women are. And that constuction takes place through all sorts of means - language, literature, the media, pornography, fashion, etc. When feminists turn their attention to these areas they are invariably criticised for not focusing enough on the 'real' issues - but personally I see it as trying to tackle the problem at its source.
xyz the one and only - it really is that simple, isn't it? people have a right (gasp!) not to be assaulted
revealed - C&B's "embracing women" comment made me furious when I first read it - look how I carefully avoid commenting on it in order not to seem humourless. Heh.
TAP - I'm always slightly suspicious of these studies that "prove" men and women to be temperamentally different - to what extent do they attribute these differences to innate biological difference and to what extent to social forces? Also, the study you're quoting appears to rest entirely on the assumption that emotional involvement is necessarily a negative in decision making. Can they prove it?
Alie - I had an immensely uncomfortable moment just there when you said you were sending me a book for married women...until I saw the date.;) Have you read "On Becoming a Woman"?
Aggie!- I'm not hiding...personal life has just gotten too dull to be recorded...do you really want to know about my college projects? Honestly? (And you're one to talk, are't you? When was the last time you updated lj?;) )
@aishwarya: hmm..yes i suppose that makes sense.
no, i dont really have much first hand experience or knowledge. just a whole load of speculation really. was waiting for someone to properly clear it up. i see now.
I have heard about that book and this one is quite similar to it.
I think every girl/woman should read (and own) a book like that nowadays, just to remind them of how things were....
actually, it also would serve well as obligatory reading for every male, hah!
Aishwarya: You're welcome. I must admit that my interest in research on Women CEOs stems at least as much from concerns about corporate governance as concerns about gender discrimination.
Okay, I know I shouldn't be hogging comment space, but I can't resist. I just came across this article in the latest issue of the Academy of Management by Perspectives by Connie Helfat and co-authors that looks at the outlook for women CEOs in Fortune 1000 companies in the next twenty years. The full article's available only to Academy members, but the discussion and conclusion section reads:
"We began this study by asking about the pipeline of women to the CEO position. Based on an extensive data collection effort, we have provided quantitative estimates of the percentage of CEOs that may be women in 2010 and 2016. We estimate that in 2016, between 4.9 and 12.8 percent of CEOs may be women. Within this range, we believe that a particularly likely estimate is 6.2 percent, because it includes only line and CFO executives as candidates for the CEO position. Although low, this estimate is substantially greater than the 1.8 percent of CEOs in the Fortune 500 who were women in 2005.We found other promising signs as well. In
companies with women executives, the women were younger, had less company tenure, and less tenure in their current positions than the men.
These factors suggest that many companies were aggressively hiring and promoting women into the top executive ranks. Moreover, although women clustered lower down in the executive hierarchy than men, two-thirds of the women executives held positions in the two levels just below the second-in-command. Once women are in the executive hierarchy, they do well in terms of rank.
In order for women to continue to make and accelerate the sort of progress that our data indicate,
they need to reach executive rank in the first place. Therefore, getting more qualified women into the executive hierarchy is critical. This first and foremost requires a change in the almost 50 percent of firms in the Fortune 1000 that had no women at the executive level. These companies can draw lessons from those companies that have
made advances in this area. Our findings suggest that companies achieved greater representation of
women in the top executive ranks through aggressive promotion and hiring, policies that companies
lacking women executives could emulate. Moreover, even companies that had women executives could benefit from additional efforts of
this sort, in light of our findings suggestive of “tokenism.”
Aggressive promotion and hiring of women into top management requires a pool of available talent. Companies cannot simply recruit talented women from other firms, since eventually this approach will leave some firms short of talented women. Companies must further develop and increase
the overall pool of talent from which to draw female executives. This has particular import for the still low proportions of women in line positions, which are an important route to the top of the executive hierarchy. Unless firms find ways to move women into line positions and retain them, the route to the top will remain much more difficult for women than for men.
The extant literature contains many useful suggestions for developing the pool of women with top management potential. For example,
providing developmental experience for lowerlevel female managers can increase the proportion of women in top management (Powell 1999). Specific approaches that companies can take to develop the careers of women include: mentoring (formal and informal); developing and utilizing women’s networks inside and outside
of the organization; and creating and implementing leadership development programs for women (Society for Human Resource Management 2004). A good deal of research has documented the importance of mentoring and
networking to the career success of women (e.g., Metz & Tharenou 2001), as well as differences in networking success for men and women (e.g.,
Lyness & Thompson 2000; van Emmerik, Euwema, Geschiere, & Schouten 2006).
A structured hiring and promotion process that holds decision makers accountable also has less room for personal biases to affect hiring and promotion decisions (Powell & Butterfield 1994). This in turn can help to increase the percentage of
top executives who are women (Powell 1999). Companies therefore can benefit by reviewing human
resources policies and practices to insure that they are fair and inclusive (Society for Human
Resource Management 2004).
In addition to the indirect steps just mentioned, companies can seek to directly increase the proportion of women who are candidates for top (and other) management jobs, which is particularly important when most job incumbents and applicants are men (Powell 1999). Specific
hiring and promotion policies and processes include: incorporating the advancement of women into performance goals for line management; training line management to raise awareness and understanding of barriers to the advancement of
women; identifying best practices that support the advancement of women; tracking the advancement
of women in the organization; and developing a list of women for succession planning (Society
for Human Resource Management 2004).
Representation of women in top management is also sensitive to the interest of women in holding these jobs and in remaining in the organization if faced with limited career opportunities(Powell 1999). Support for women with families, such as flexible work schedules, child and elder care assistance, and temporary leaves
of absence for family reasons, can increase the interest of women in holding top management jobs and in remaining with the organization
(Powell 1999). Having more women in top management positions also may lead to less turnover of women at lower levels of the organization,
in part by influencing the perceptions of women that the organization provides opportunities
for career advancement (Powell 1999;
Cohen & Elvira 1997)."
- Helfat, Harris and Wolfson, 'The Pipeline to the Top: Women and Men in Top Executive Ranks of US Corporations', Academy of Management Perspectives, Nov. 2006. 42 - 64
feminism is not an absolute term for someone to be "for" or "against" it as such. everybody has their own feminisms. when one calls him(her)self a feminist (i do), what he/she means is not necessarily the same universally.
i mean, every person has their own feminism. of course there are things that bind many of these feminisms together, but still they are different.
here's one feminist, though this post is somewhat incomplete.
Rich!would like to interact with you, Aishwarya.
hullo hullo...
my authority is none, but my personal opinion is a direct result of my awareness and my discretion.
i mentioned specifically that two things are non-issues, also appending an etc. which would refer to similar instances.
i cannot admit to making an issue out of male-bashing without proper cause and knowledge...true men exploit, rape, hurt women. but it is unfair to form an opinion about them collectively. and i did mention i have come across women who do exactly that and i am sure you will agree. feminism unfortunately is often used as a means for uneducated criticism of the opposite sex especially in an all-girls environment. and it is entirely dispensible.
as for reservation, i think sheila dikshit is a highly able cm and she is where she is entirely on merit...i just need to understand why women need to represent women specifically. dismissing the idea that a man could take up issues that plague women the world over is again unfair.
i am not against feminism. hell i feel outraged when i come across stories such as the ones i mentioned on szerelem's blog, stories of rape and ridicule, stories of submission and sorrow.
i only voiced my opinion about a state of feminism when one tends to lose sight of what needs to be rectified immediately as opposed to yes, 'non-issues' such as reservation and male-bashing.
Ishita - Once again, I have to ask WHERE these male bashers are. No, indiscriminately condemning half the worl's population as evil bastards is not a good thing. Now if you can SHOW me some feminists who are doing this your argument will actually have some coherence.
I don't get it - I write a post asking for PROOF, and yet people insist on going on and on with these generalised statements about 'male bashing' (and I practically live in an all-girls environment and I have no clue what you are on about) and it's getting really annoying because either my post was amazingly unclear or people are just not reading it.
Also,
my authority is none, but my personal opinion is a direct result of my awareness and my discretion.
Well good for you, but some of us think these things might actually be issues, and we don't like being dismissed out of hand as reactionary idiots before you've bothered to try and read up on why we think these things matter.
apologies. been busy for a while.
ok here goes.
if you would read my post again, and properly. i mentioned i was awed some, and some not when i was reading certain posts.
lets for example take a certain post of tamil punksters. she is genreally ranting about a certain guy who launches an elaborate gushfest, and in the process mentions that men have gotten raped too. to which tamil punkster very brazenly states statistics.
THE OUTRAGE THAT RAPE EVOKES IS NOT DEPENDENT ON STATISTICS BUT THE ACT ITSELF. if a woman rapes a young boy[and it HAS happened] it is as disgraceful and shocking as a man raping a girl.
the post was written long ago and if you want i can research more and come across more such instances.
please understand that i PERSONALLY feel that when you assume a broad idea such as feminism, it should start by concentrating on particular issues to instigate any change.
tamil punkster also goes on to mention about some hostel in madurai that made it mandatory for its women inmates to maintain a record of their menstrual cycles in a logbook. who gives a shit when women are getting raped, burnt and abused. the incident in particular is as heinous as my mum reading my personal diary. an invasion of privacy and nothing else.
some issues need more attention. and i stand by that.
Post a Comment