Why men should not be defining feminism and femininity

Not really directing this towards anyone specifically, there are many, many articles written by so called feminist men. This particular post was just a classic example of what I speak of, “Why it is necessary to challenge parodies of feminism.”

When I first started speaking out against feminism, what I was not prepared for was so much outright hostility from men. That caught me unaware and surprised me. Also, allow me to play the girl card here, but it was also flippin scary, terrifying actually. Kind of blows all my arguments against male privilege and oppression when “feminist men,” start trying to silence you. That is a parody of feminism right there. There’s nothing quite like having men shrieking at you about male privilege and doing their darndest to prove it’s a real thing in the world.

I hardly know where to start on this post, so I’ll just highlight some of the words being spoken over women, “male privilege, you can’t make a proper fist, way down in the pecking order, slut shaming, she is bossy, women are paid less than men, slavery, denied their very humanity, they are dirty, calloused and seemingly incapable of thought, they will be known as chattel, feminism seeks to right the wrongs of millennia…”

No! Just no. Stop it. That is not the world I walk in nor is it how I define myself. I do not “voluntarily surrender (briefly) that (male) privilege when I don those heels, skirts and bras.”  That is just a total parody of womanhood itself. I surrender nothing! I am not chattel, a slave, denied my humanity, I actually enjoy a rather privileged status. Men open doors for me, they stop by to put a light bulb in my car, they help me carry groceries, they drop some encouraging words on me. In the context of marriage, there is a great deal of protection and provision. I am not “chattel,” it is a bit more like being a princess. Yes, a princess! The  never ending slam on Disney movies did not go unnoticed.

Women have immeasurable value in the biological equation, we produce the children, we look out for hearth and home. We encourage and support men, we provide intimacy and companionship. This is hardwired into who we are, reflected in the natural world around us. Men protect and provide, they enable women to be women, they make it possible for children to grow and prosper.

Feminism seeks to not just erase the masculine, but the feminine as well. It is a rather appalling deception because it teaches women that they don’t walk in the world confidently, as a being having worth and value, as someone who can enjoy the love and protection of men, but rather as an oppressed creature having second class status, a slave, a hated and feared creature, a bit of prey just awaiting the hoards of barbarians and rapists.

Perhaps that is how men who don heels, skirts, and bras feel when they walk in the world of men, perhaps they become acutely aware of the sexual dominance at play there, but that is a distortion, a projection. What many feminist men call “sexual dominance,” and sneer at as if it is a very bad thing, an oppressive thing, is not how most women perceive it at all. It says far more about how feminist men feel about their own selves than how women feel about men in general.

Feminism teaches women that they are prey and that men are predators. It creates a victim narrative that rivals that to be found in the worst of the world of patriarchy and misogyny. If you want to get technical about it, patriarchy itself has often been supported and nurtured by women themselves, as the keepers of culture. Patriarchy and many of the ideas therein are actually designed to protect and provide for women and children. Outside of the structure of culture and civilization, we do become prey, forced to compete in a world of might makes right, just as smaller, weaker competitors. We don’t fare so well under that system!

There is always going to be injustice in the world. There are always going to be yahoos that don’t play fair. But are women truly oppressed? Do we walk in the world as chattel, as prey? According to statistics, not so much. Men have far higher suicide rates than we do, far higher homicide rates, they die earlier, and they are far more likely to get themselves maimed and injured than women are. I’m reminded of an experiment on street harassment, a woman who roamed some city streets and bad neighborhoods for 10 hours seeking evidence of the harassment women face. It took her ten hours just to collect a couple of “hey baby’s!” When men walk the streets looking for trouble like that, they don’t fear harassment, they fear death.

“Oppression” is really a subjective thing, often based on our own personal projections and experiences. Sometimes it involves some confirmation bias, because what you seek, you do tend to find. But is it objectively accurate? Not so much.

I really resent many aspects of feminism, because what they seek, they are also compelled to destroy. Feminist men often speak of equality, but what they really mean, is that they wish to pull women towards what they perceive as dominant, as superior, and that no matter how enlightened they claim to be, it is actually going to be the very masculinity they are rejecting within their own selves.

If one is a man attempting to walk in the world as a woman, one’s perceptions of the world of men and women are going to be that of a man, attempting to perceive his own self through the eyes of women. As interesting as that is, it is still the subjective perceptions of a man and how he experiences his own self. Women rarely perceive men this way, we tend to seek their higher selves.

Not to be impolite here, but I rather enjoy being a girl and really wish that the feminists, the feminist men, the lesbians, the gays, the cross dressers, and the transgendered, would stop trying to define womanhood for every born woman on the planet. I do not wish to pull rank here, but when a woman herself is not even allowed to define what it means to be a woman, we have the strangest kind of male privilege going on, one that often seeks to project itself by force if necessary. Yeah, tolerance ain’t always so tolerant.