{"id":8536,"date":"2024-04-16T02:46:31","date_gmt":"2024-04-16T02:46:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movesflash.com\/?p=8536"},"modified":"2024-04-16T02:46:31","modified_gmt":"2024-04-16T02:46:31","slug":"feminists-who-needs-them","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dev2025-2-2.movesflash.com\/index.php\/2024\/04\/16\/feminists-who-needs-them\/","title":{"rendered":"Feminists\u2026 Who Needs Them?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Feminists\u2026 Who Needs Them?<\/em><\/h1>\n

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In 1963, Betty Friedan wrote a book. It\u2019s a fairly well known title, and a staple textbook in many a college women\u2019s study class. It\u2019s a great look into the proscribed roles in life that our mothers were breaking away from, even as our grandmothers couldn\u2019t understand what was wrong and men sniffed or rolled their eyes. (Or did worse.) <\/p>\n

You may have heard of it, whether mentioned in praise, for study, or in general disgust. It\u2019s called The Feminine Mystique.<\/p>\n

(Remember that post-feminism world rant I told you about? Brace yourself.)<\/p>\n

It was just the start of a great movement, just the first attempt to put into words a problem that so many women faced but couldn\u2019t give voice to. Just the start of a small revolution that people seem to think is somehow finished. Right. Finished. As though somehow the feminist fight, like the civil rights fight, is finished. Like women can be lawyers and CEOs now, so everything is a rainbow magic land, so why are people still harping on about that old, tired movement from history that nobody really needs to talk about?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not so unusual to hear from the mouths of men, childish about and possessive of their privileges as they are, to whine about feminism. Since the movement of feminism began they have tried to write it off as a phase, to suggest that really just women were unsatisfied in their sex lives. Which, okay, I\u2019m sure they were. But that wasn\u2019t the problem, and it still ISN\u2019T the problem. It works for men to turn the feminist movement into a \u2018man-hating\u2019 or \u2018reverse oppression\u2019 (oppression my ass) movement because it makes them feel better about themselves, about the privilege they enjoy and the rape culture that\u2019s propagated through the patriarchy. It\u2019s easier to look at bra-burnings and the extreme ends that feminists resorted to in the \u201870s when they were desperate not to be written off and to tell women \u2018Don\u2019t actually fight for your own autonomy, your own freedom, your own rights. You can vote! You\u2019re allowed to have a job! Look, if you stick with feminism you\u2019re clearly just an unfeminine lesbian who wants to burn her bra. Join the ranks again and be content.\u2019<\/p>\n

Fuck content.
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There\u2019s nothing to be content about. Feminism isn\u2019t won. Feminism hasn\u2019t even gotten more than half-way to the ultimate goal! And yet more and more I hear or see women, in person, on TV, over the internet, and that is exactly the shit that\u2019s coming out of their mouths. Yes, things are different than they were in the \u201810s, \u201820s, \u201830s, \u201840s and \u201850s. Yes, we\u2019ve gotten to a point where women aren\u2019t going to be burned for speaking out of turn or having ideas. We\u2019ve managed to get to a point where women are expected to be able to read and write as a basic component of education, and that\u2019s awesome. Many, many things are better, and pretty much anyone born after 1980 takes this \u2018better\u2019 for granted, because hey – we don\u2019t live under the thumb of religion, right? At least we\u2019ve got it a fuck of a lot better than the Arab world, or something, right? <\/p>\n

What the fuck is wrong with you?<\/p>\n

How the hell can you think that this \u2018better\u2019 is good enough, and how do you DARE think that we don\u2019t still have all of these  problems? Having the vote isn\u2019t close to being an indication that feminism\u2019s work is done. Sure, a male boss probably isn\u2019t going to tell you that he\u2019s so happy to be getting \u2018the same brains for less money\u2019, but if feminism had done it\u2019s job we wouldn\u2019t still be making 70 cents to a man\u2019s dollar for the same damned job. If feminism had finished it\u2019s work, day care and job schedule flexibility would be available for all mothers in all sectors and women wouldn\u2019t be pressured to choose family or career. It would be a given that men could get off their assess to do some fucking laundry every now and then, because they\u2019re not children. \u201cBoys will be boys\u201d would be banished from our vocabulary because there is NO reason that boys should get away with shit based solely on their private parts that girls aren\u2019t given the same leeway with. Toys wouldn\u2019t be colored blue and pink and girls wouldn\u2019t be under pressure to be princesses all the damned time. A boy would be able to wear pink without being called \u201cgirly\u201d, and people would appreciate that a girl can play sports, or punch you in the face.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t forget that even as we speak one of the most fundamental rights a woman can have in regards to her health is under attack from men on all sides of the country! Because obviously old white men know better than a woman and her doctor what is best for her body. Obviously old white men are better at making choices about shit that they will never experience, and that\u2019s why their laws about women\u2019s bodies should be accepted. Because obviously women are still just here to be incubators and milk cows – even if they don\u2019t want to be.<\/p>\n

All because things are \u201cbetter\u201d. \u201cGood enough\u201d. So good enough that now, apparently, we need a new counter-movement! They call themselves Male Rights Activists and I have nothing but a couple middle fingers for them. It\u2019s not just men; there are even women who are joining in. Because men have done such a good job of making feminism into a dirty word that even women are getting swept up in images of lesbians with sledge hammers taking swings at poor, innocent men who only want to keep the women suppressed and in their place. Oh it\u2019s so fucking sad!<\/p>\n

Fuck that.<\/p>\n

Good enough is never good enough. If good enough was good enough then we wouldn\u2019t still be so goddamned hypocritical in our attitudes towards femininity and female sexuality. Girls are supposed to be beautiful, they\u2019re supposed to try and attract boys so they can propagate the human race, BUT NOT TOO MUCH. Don\u2019t wear a skirt too short! Or a shirt cut too low! If you do that than you\u2019re naughty! If you don\u2019t take enough precautions and you let yourself have the same kind of fun that men have, so you probably deserve it if they try to take advantage of you. After all, a girl is being too sexy.<\/p>\n

And let\u2019s not forget how women have to have special literature. Because how could men enjoy \u2018chick lit\u2019? It\u2019s all about\u2026 you know, relationships! Love! Not killing things but maybe communicating with them! Or dealing with emotions and figuring out how to go about expressing them! Because that\u2019s GIRLY. Not for MEN. If that\u2019s not a direct piece of bullshit from the Patriarchy, I don\u2019t know what is. But girls are accepting of it. We\u2019re accepting of it because that\u2019s how we\u2019re raised, and it\u2019s so fucking pervasive that we don\u2019t even consider it might not be normal.<\/p>\n

You\u2019re going to sit there and tell me that feminism is over? That its work is done? I don\u2019t even know how hard to hit you over the head with a frying pan. I\u2019m letting you in on this secret for your own good, children: Feminism isn\u2019t over. You may want to be a housewife, and that\u2019s absolutely fine. But don\u2019t you dare stop fighting for your sisters for whom that life isn\u2019t fulfilling. Complacency will cost you just as much as it will them.<\/p>\n

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