Tuesday, December 20, 2016

Feminism

I was all for feminism when it was focused on legal equality between the sexes.  Then again, I was all for racial civil rights when the focus was on removing racial barriers, not on categorizing everyone by race.  That makes me old fashioned in today's environment.

I agree with Christina Hoff Sommers:
Perhaps the women's movement is too elitist and out of touch with ordinary citizens, especially working-class women. That seems right, but I would go one step further. Today's feminism is not merely out of touch with everyday Americans; it's out of touch with reality. To survive, it's going to have to come back to planet Earth.

First of all, it's time to stop calling the United States a patriarchy. A patriarchy is a system where men hold the power and women do not. Women do hold power in the United States — they lead major universities and giant corporations, write influential books, serve as state and federal judges and even manage winning presidential campaigns. American women, especially college-educated women, are the freest and most self-determining in human history. Why pretend otherwise?
 
Feminism is drowning in myth-information. Advocates never tire of telling us that women are cheated out of nearly a quarter of their salary; that one in four college women is sexually assaulted, or that women are facing an epidemic of online abuse and violence.

Such claims are hugely distorted, but they have been repeated so often that they have taken on the aura of truth. Workplace discrimination, sexual assault and online threats are genuine problems, but to solve them women need sober analysis, not hype and spin. Exaggerated claims and crying wolf discredit good causes and send scarce resources in the wrong direction.

Today's women's movement also needs to reckon with the fact that men struggle just as much as women. 
If that isn't enough of a start for you, nothing is!

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