Skdadl at Bread n Roses asks...
Why are so-con women so angry?(...)What can be upsetting them so much?
Okay, I'll bite.
There are tons of things about radical feminists that make me angry.
Statements like:
Feminists never hurt them in the first place,
Well, feminists have been claiming to speak for ALL women for forty years. Without consulting them. And women who DARE counter what they have to say are put down as some kind of extension of patriarchy-- they're not real women. They're not "really themselves"-- they can't think for themselves, they can't act for themselves, because women who think and act for themselves are feminists. They can't be anything else.
And yet, part of the feminist mentality is to not have people speak or act on one's behalf. The idea that you need a husband or father to sign a permission slip for a bank account or a loan is obnoxious. They don't want someone else-- particularly a man-- speaking for them.
But what do you suppose they do?
Feminists are part of that leftist crowd that hates having people impose their morals on them.
And what do you suppose they do?
Feminists dislike it when people stereotype women. But what do you suppose they do when it comes to so-con women?
They say stupid things like:
First, I'm impressed by the amount of time the 'traditional' women have for blogging. Don't they have children and husbands to look after? Maybe they all have nannies and housekeepers?
Like so-con women only care about their kids 24/7-- they have NOTHING else in their lives.
And if they have time, it must be because they're rich ladies disconnected from the "rabble".
When Toedancer explains that moms have free time, what does fern hill say?
Yabbut, Toe, you probably did something fun or useful with your free time. Not these people. They spew hate and lies.
Oh, so fern hill thinks blogging is not fun, and that our assertions aren't true, ergo, we're a bunch of pathetic losers.
Skadl concludes:
Something is missing in their lives.
If you are not a feminist, if you are a stay-at-home mom who happens to reject feminism and you're outspoken...that means you have an empty life. Get it? If you're not a feminist, if you're an anti-feminist, you're nothing.
You can't be a thinking woman.
You can't be independent.
You can't a non-conformist.
You can't be fulfilled.
You can't be anything.
You're a pathetic loser.
And brebis noire adds insult to injury:
It must certainly be linked to that infamous SWC study "Statistics demonstrate that feminists have more orgasms"
I guess you missed that real study that says that conservative Christian women have the happiest sex lives.
I WONDER WHY stay-at-moms think feminists have a hate-on for them.
I think feminists have this need to imagine so-con women as June Cleave/Stepford wive clones. Because if we were anything other than that, that might challenge their preconceptions that being a so-con is somehow oppressive; that so-con women can't be bright, articulate, assertive or accomplish anything of value. That would mean that feminism isn't as relevant as they would like it to be.
Well welcome to the 21st century ladies. Your stereotypes are about fifty years behind.
That's one thing that makes me angry about feminism. And I haven't even touched the issue of fetal rights, affirmative action, the gay agenda, the male-bashing and so forth.
But you know, in spite of my anger, I don't think you should get the impression that I approach this with a dour face. When I read feminist reaction, a good part of the time, I'm laughing out loud. I laughed out loud at the title of this thread. In fact, I think it says a lot that at least one feminist has to portray us as "angry". That's an interesting interpretation of our emotional output. It might say more about her than about us.
I blog because I enjoy doing it. I love an audience, I like speaking my mind, and I like contributing to the political discourse. When I'm blogging, I'm happy.
Another thing I find interesting is that we're having this conversation. Because Bread n Roses is off limits to anti-feminist "ideologues" such as myself. But some of the posters admit to reading my blog...They read it with horror...but they read it. And they sometimes comment on it when I have something to say about their posts.
They very well might comment on this. And I might respond in kind.
For so long so-con women have been shut out of the public discourse on women's issues. At least, in the mass media. It's about time we have this discussion. It shows some progress on our side.
UPDATE:
Lagatta wrote:
Well, they can f*ck off and die. Sorry, I have no more sympathy with so-con women than I do with racists.
Is that misogynist?
So much for sisterhood.
Debra wrote, regarding so-con choices:
It is interesting though that feminists in fact do value the unpaid labour of women. Whether it be in caring for children, the elderly, volunteering in their neighbourhoods.....
Here's the thing. Volunteer work or unpaid work is a gift. It's not meant to be monetized. Money is a means of exchange so that you can exchange goods and services. Childrearing is not an exchange. It's not "here, I'll raise your children, and you'll put bread on the table." It's not meant that way. But feminists want to make childrearing and other unpaid labour the same as a monetized exchange, and the inference is that if it's not taken into account in an economic caculation, then it's not as valued. That's ridiculous.
It is one of the points of feminists that current societal structure could not continue to exist without such unpaid labour.
I completely agree. But putting a dollar sign on it, or not, doesn't make more or less valuable.
Those without children help not only by often caring for children so their mothers can have some free time, but by fighting for things that will make stay at home mothers lives easier. Like childcare for when they decide to work.
I love this. They fight for things that help stay-at-home moms. Like daycare. Which doesn't help stay-at-home moms.
After all the type of help offered by the current system ends when a child is six. Yet often moms want to stay home till children reach school age. So the system as it stands doesn't help those mothers.
I'm confused. Most kids are in school by age six.
Progressives generally look at all sides of an issue to find common talking points, and create situations of benefit to all.
Too often right wingers and fundamentalists cannot do this. Because to do so would create at the least a modicum of doubt about the choices they have made.
Oh brother. It's the "right-wingers are dumb" argument.
When the entire structure of your life and religion is based on believing that things can only happen in one way; that there is black and white, good and bad, right and wrong to even consider that the sacrifices you have made were not necessary would be to extinguish that tiny flicker of hope that you will someday not regret putting your life under the control of someone else.
Here's a newsflash: even if you're religious, and you believe in another's authority, it's still your life. Atheists, like Debra, don't get that.
Another newsflash: so-cons are capable of analysis and can see many sides of things.
Again, the stereotypes: religious people are stupid. Since leftwingers have the truth, right-wingers must be suppressing all cognitive dissonance about what they experience.
I'm not about to sit here and say there are never any so-cons who become socially liberal. But I do know that for the most part, so-con women do not have the slightest doubt about what they're doing, in general.
I remember talking to a women who belonged to a very fundementalist church, she was extremely upset. She had been accosted by man who grabbed her and told her he wanted a blowjob. She had managed to get away and was trying to compose herself before she had to talk to her husband.
She said she couldn't tell him what happened because then he would know that she knew what a blowjob was and what would he think of her. I said he might think she was an adult. But she was convinced only "bad women" understood the term and he would lose respect for her. So she choose not to tell anyone else what had happened.
Well Debra, I don't know any women like that. In my generation, we all know that is. So-cons are not all sheltered.
They can't lash out at those they feel have power over them so they lash out at those who have escaped.
I think that is utterly ridiculous.
