I shame the matriarchy

so we all talk about "feminism" an awful lot.

feminism is, feminism thinks, feminism will, etc blah blah blah.

or better - real feminism is/thinks/will, etc.

Like we know. As though Feminism lives next door to us and we are over her house just every other day, having coffee or margaritas or soy-chai-green-tea-pomegranate-lattes or whatever. and since we're such close friends who share simply every waking thought, we know exactly who Feminism really is, what Feminism thinks at any given time, and what Feminism wants for her birthday.

but I wonder if our universal secret is that we all think Feminism's house is nicer (greener, cleaner, more hip) than ours, and Feminism's car is nicer (greener, more efficient, better bumper stickers) than ours, and Feminism's clothes are nicer (more organic, more awesome, more carelessly-stylish), and Feminism's life is just a thousand times better than ours in every way, and although we know Feminism doesn't want us to, we can't help comparing ourselves to Feminism.

god I hate Feminism. she's so perfect.

(meh - thought this was going somewhere. maybe not.)

but here - this whole question of equality vs. liberation is intriguing to me.

consider:

if you think men are shit, then who wants to be equal to shit, right?

no sense working for equality when it would be a big ol' stoop-to-conquer-fest.

alternately, if you think men are shit because you believe that men think women are shit, then yay hooray equality achieved, we're all shit, and we can all put down our signs and go home. what's for supper?

I can see where the idea of working for equality with something you hold beneath contempt would be laughable.

so, then liberation, right? de-coupling women from men and The Patriarchy, so that women can make un-coerced choices and exercise free will in the absence of domination by men?

except what will we do with all the men littering the landscape?

If you think that penises = Patriarchy, whether by nature or nurture, then men's minds will never allow liberation of women. not now, not ever, no matter what women do.

but you know, maybe feminism is more about changing men's minds, and men's behavior, than we're all willing to admit.

huh. baby's crying. better go see what's up. I'm going to let this half-formed thought out into the world and see what happens. maybe I'll decide I'm full of it midway through comments. (wouldn't be the first time.)

y'all heard about this, yeah?

short version - Total douchenozzle Kyle Payne enjoys his double life - anti-porn radical feminist activist by day, pervy little female-classmate-feeler-upper by night - (who does he think he is -- Batman?), until his bitch ass gets caught last february, resulting in a trial at which he plead guilty just the other day, sentencing to take place in August.

here's his blog, where he discusses nothing about the case. it's almost like it's happening to someone else, which is weird because it clearly ain't.

you know, Kyle, you'll never impress John Stoltenberg with this kind of behavior...

it is interesting to note, in the strange-ass bedfellows department, that the feminist, antiporn radical feminist, and oh-please-you-can't-possibly-call-yourself-feminist blogospheres are all coming together in sisterhood for a little well-deserved group humiliation of this complete waste of flesh. warms the cockles of my heart, that does.

(it doesn't appear, at least at the moment, that anyone's blaming Mama for raising a rapist/sexual-assault-committing-guy. just sayin'.)

and I'm not saying anything new here, clearly. just adding my flaming torch and pitchfork to the mob, really.

I'm not even outraged, or surprised, or even a teeny bit disappointed. It's kind of business as usual, isn't it?

but where's 4chan (and their good pal Anonymous) when you need them, huh? this fuck really deserves it!

so I got this comment a while ago, off this old-ass post -- haven't really been sure what to do with it:

The first thing I thought of when I saw how flippantly you were treating the issue of oppression, was, "he's gonna be a rapist".

Because, geewhiz, your son would never internalize negative perceptions about women, so you don't have to worry about it.

There's a difference between making fun of our sexist, racist culture, and dismissing it as a problem which needs no further attention.

You dismissed it. That's probably kinda harsh considering all the stresses of new parenthood, but it's exactly when we are most stressed that our true beliefs emerge. You dismissed it.

and I'm all - oy, this again?

but maybe it's more than just nasty bitches looking for the worst possible thing to say to me this time. maybe there's some point I'm really missing, or some mistake I'm really making, that will condemn my little boy to years and years in prison someday.

I don't think I'm flippant about oppression, except where oppression has it coming. it's a little like saying that Mel Brooks is flippant about Hitler.

but what makes a rapist in the first place? a mom who does not take The Patriarchy remarkably seriously on her blog? that's it? that's all I have to do to turn an otherwise happy, healthy little human being into a monster?

I'm thinking there's probably more to it than that. I'd have to teach him that girls are icky and have cooties, or conversely, teach him that girls are helpless victims of evil men and he should be ashamed of his ugly Y chromosome, or maybe teach him that girls exist for his pleasure alone and he should exploit them at any and every opportunity, starting in nursery school.

or all of that at once. with a side order of mommy-doesn't-love-you.

which, no. seriously. I'm way too lazy to go out of my way to teach something I don't believe myself.

as far as "internalizing negative perceptions about women," I'd like to know more about what is meant by that. damaging media messages? yeah, that's an uphill battle, no doubt. harmful social/interpersonal interactions? sure, I get that too. but what else was this commenter trying to say? I don't know. wish s/he would have elaborated as to how s/he thought I was helping an infant internalize negative perceptions about women by blogging disrespectfully.

hey - you got a problem with how I raise my kid? please, feel free to tell me all about it. give examples. be detailed. explain how my mistake will come to damage a woman that my son hasn't even met yet.

you're not interested in saving womankind from the scourge of Wolfgang? then piss off.