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I'm really confused by your reply here. 1) I find it hard to believe you didn't understand what GP meant, even if he could have said it better. 2) sidestepping
by dlss 10y ago
I'm really confused by your reply here. 1) I find it hard to believe you didn't understand what GP meant, even if he could have said it better. 2) sidestepping the issue of offending someone and instead arguing semantics isn't a very cool conversational move.
However, perhaps #1 is the case, so I'll try to clear the air. Here's my take on what the two of you are saying:
> I'm responding to your claim that both MRAs and feminists have "awful" reputations, which is false
I have personally heard more complaining about feminists, though I take that to be more an indication about the relative numbers of Feminists and MRAs in the world.
In my experience people with a strong ideological viewpoint have bad reputations outside of social circles dominated by that ideological viewpoint (Conservative Christians, Scientologists, Anarchists, Hard-Line Libertarians, MRAs, Feminists, etc) <-- hopefully you're not all of those, and so at least one was a good example.
Which is to say I think you're saying that in the circles you personally hang out in, feminists are generally highly regarded... which is to say you mostly hang out with feminists... and that GP is saying that in the circles he hangs out in feminists are not highly regarded... which is to say there are fewer feminists per capita than in your social circle.
I think both GP and you should have been more careful about misrepresenting your personal experiences as somehow universal. If you had, you would probably have avoided this back and forth.
> Feminism, on the other hand, is one of the more important social movements of the last 150 years
Feminism and feminists aren't the same thing. For example, Capitalism was an incredibly important idea globally, and is widely regarded as a good thing. Capitalists on the other hand are generally viewed as greedy. Incidentally, capitalists will often try to frame themselves as part of capitalism to subvert this negative impression... roughly the same thing you're doing here with respect to feminism.
- kasey_junk 10y ago> Feminism and feminists aren't the same thing...Capitalists on the other hand are generally viewed as greedy. That is a false equivalence. Anyone who supports feminism, that is equal rights for women, are feminists, the noun. Capitalists, the noun, are not just people who support capitalism, they are in fact wealthy people who take advantage of capitalism. Finally, the idea that MRA & feminism have equal historical provenance is laughable. MRA is largely attributable to the last 5 years & is plainly a recent reactionary movement.
- dlss 10y ago> Anyone who supports feminism, that is equal rights for women, are feminists, the noun. http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/07/social-justice-and-words-words-words/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/07/social-justice-and-word... ... which is to say I feel like most people understand the word feminist to mean something other than "99.9% of people living in a western democracy" > the idea that MRA & feminism have equal historical provenance is laughable Completely agree here, and am confused where I might have implied otherwise.
- tptacek 10y agoThis very long, very Scott Alexander post has essentially nothing to say about the meaning of the word "feminism", but I'll say again that the reason MRAs refer consistently to "third wave feminism" is that the other waves of feminism secured women's right to vote, outlawed overt gender discrimination in pay, criminalized marital rape, and won Roe v Wade, so demonizing "feminism" is a rhetorically risky strategy.
- dlss 10y agoYeah, in my limited experience, MRAs generally suck at distinguishing between feminism the ideology and feminism the concept, so they end up tripping over themselves trying to explain how they are for women's rights but also against feminism.
- kasey_junk 10y agoNo idea what that post has to do with anything. This whole thread on the other hand is about how feminism & MRA do not exist as opposites on a spectrum. Feminism, as you say, is an exceedingly common position. MRA on the other hand is a new, reactionary & uncommon position. But its proponents routinely try to play this rhetorical trick. My point was mainly about your incorrect statement that feminist was to feminism what capitalist is to capitalism. They are not the same thing and thus any extrapolation about negative connotations is unlikely to be correct. As Thomas says, even anti-feminists usually categorize their antagonism with terms line "third wave".