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Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:02:54 -0500
To: improvetheworld &AElig umich.edu
From: Clare Dibble <clare.dibble &AElig gmail.com>
Subject: Re: Feminism debate
Status: O

Kevin Lochner said:
And Grandpa Reeves, with all due respect, you're either a brave or foolish
man for including that joke about - "no means maybe."  I think the
current-day feminist incarnation of that joke would go something like
this:

"no means maybe" means harassment
"maybe means yes" means rape
"yes means she's not a lady" means you're not a man

I say:
I think we are missing his point (I'm sure he can let us know if we
are or not).
Feminism, what it means to be feminine, and cultural reactions to
gender change over time.  It wasn't so long ago that people really
felt that way (no means maybe...).

My Grandma was given a coffee mug that says, "I want the perfect
secretary... one who types fast and runs slow." as a gift from a boss
for whom she was a secretary.  Knowing my grandma Wolfe, I doubt she
slept with him, but it was something she kept... and took as a
compliment. But my breath was almost taken away when I found it going
through stuff in her house to clean it out.  It was hard for me to
comprehend that such an item was ever mass produced.

I can't imagine all the forces that caused my mom to be an English
teacher and me an engineer despite her being much more of a
technophile, but I imagine such coffee mugs played some role in it.

But does it really show a hatred of women?  It is hard for me to
imagine it does, since it was received as a compliment.  Saying that
it is a hateful comment comes very close to saying that all
(pornographic) sex is rape.  And I'm pretty sure I know some
exhibitionists who would be offended by such a statement.  I'm glad I
don't live it the coffee mug era, I would be terrible at it.  But they
at least had clearly defined roles and expectations, which is
something that feminism has cast off, but offered little to replace it
with.

This ability to change and hopefully improve between generations is
one reason why I think it is a good thing that people eventually die. 
We, as humans, are not nearly so adaptable as we like to think in our
underlying beliefs, prejuduces and morals.  My grandparents are more
racist than I would expect, but it didn't carry over to my parents so
much; my parents more homophobic.  I'm sure I have a blind spot to my
prejuducies, but with any luck I will have some children and they can
be open minded enough not to pick these ideas up and humanity will be
better for it.

But, as Danny said, labels are useful.  It is not that I am unaware
that people come in different colors or sexual orientations, it just
largely does not matter to me.  Feminism is tricky though because it
matters a lot to each of us who plan to participate in this culture's
mating ritual what gender other people are and what that means to
them.  And people ask others about feminism/ gender roles since they
are looking for ideas on how to think about it themselves.  How else
do you explain such a huge response to this thread? :-)

Clare

P.S.  I consider myself a liberal, but not radical, feminist.

I was intrigued to read about Dworkin's idea of a "woman state" like
isreal is for jews.  Not all jews live in isreal, but it is there
waiting if they are persecuted and need a safe place to go filled with
people with whom they share a fundamental bond.