are women losing their sense of feminity?

[Niamh]

by natural laws, evolution. why must women insist on making men out to be the villains?? there was never a vast conspiracy made up of men for the single purpose of controlling women.

rather, it was a band of rabble-rousing women who disrupted the course of social history. i'm not suggesting that all women were particularly "happy" about their place in the world; surely men prevented what they thought to be "normal"--that being a woman who stayed home to care for her children while the husband worked and provided. what was so wrong with that arrangement??

feminists point to history as if all were tragic, as if all men were systematically involved in the suppression of women "rights." gimme a break. it was merely a different value under which women cultivatedfeminine habits and attitudes that they have long since abandoned.

and for what? to behave like beyonce knowles? britney spears? paris hilton? because they can?? ok, so do.

You did suppress our rights. you made us second class citizens, wouldnt let us vote or work after we were married. Men portrayed us in the medieval period as bearers of the seeds of evil so that they stand above us and put us in our place. If a woman was displeasing to his wife, all he had to do in the past was claim she was a witch and hay presto gone! All the laws that were ever placed in statute about womens rights and their "place" in "normal" society (before the suffregette movement) were ALL written and passed by men. Dont you understand that this ideal of a woman staying at home, rearing her children, looking after the house and her husband, were all laws made by men, FOR men, and was in truth a form of slavery created by men.

How anyone can think that we are less feminine, because we have gotten much of the freedom from a male surpressed society that we deserve, and therefore no longer abide by the laws created by men for women, is beyond me. And we do not aspire to be like Britney spears and Paris Hilton. And as for the image of most of these famous pop singers, their image is generally decided in a nice corparate music industry building, full of men with mens ideals.

[SleepyWitch]

by natural laws, evolution. why must women insist on making men out to be the villains?? there was never a vast conspiracy made up of men for the single purpose of controlling women.

as‧so‧ci‧ate1 S3 W2 [See pronunciation table in "How to use dictionary" pages]
1 [transitive] to make a connection in your mind between one thing or person and another
LDOCE online

nature or evolution can make connections in their mind? that's new to me. well, you live and learn
next time i meet Nature or Evolution in the park I'll ask them what they associate with women/men.

[jon1jt]

Yeah...um...I don't think so. Otherwise we would hear, "Why don't you call up *insert female's friend's name here* and go out for coffee?" instead of, "Are you going out with her again?". And I've often noticed the attitude...on occasion...that when men get together with their buddies, they're bonding whereas when women get together, we're 'conspiring'.

Female friendships can be incredibly empowering and that empowerment can bring about confidence and that confidence, in a woman's own mind, body, sexuality and just general worth, can be very feminine. Would you rather have a mouse or a tiger?

well, that's true, idril. men can be bratty little boys most of the time. the men you speak about are just insecure (and stupid), the absolute worst kind to be with. my question -- which requires a brutally honest answer from a woman -- is why the hell do women get involved with those kind of men in the first place? you mean to tell me that women never once detected their significant other's controlling characteristic early on while they were dating?? you mean it's only after several years that they come to see things as they really are?? bullsh##. most women are with a guy long enough to observe character flaws. there is no excuse to be with the kind of controlling man you describe, let alone to be married to one. if women want to be respected, then they first ought to be better judges of character so that the men who are not controlling will think more highly of them. you will in essence earn respect from the right men and the control freaks will end up alone where they belong.

what's pathetic is that women are no better---in more instances than not women strive to control the same men that they claim are controlling them. i remember my high school girlfriend who once said indignantly early on, "you're going out with them again?" she was referring to friends i had made long before she ever came into the picture. it made no sense to me then and it makes no sense to me now.

again, it's the woman's fault, who tends to be an awful judge of character.

Female friendships can be incredibly empowering and that empowerment can bring about confidence and that confidence, in a woman's own mind, body, sexuality and just general worth, can be very feminine. Would you rather have a mouse or a tiger?

well that's true. but it's also the case that most women who find that sense of empowerment tend to be guarded, in the sense that they believe men are "conspiring" to take something away from them, something they have worked so hard to "earn" (as if they never had access to free choice).

as to your question of whether i desire "a mouse or a tiger," may i ask you, is the tiger temperate?

Dont you understand that this ideal of a woman staying at home, rearing her children, looking after the house and her husband, were all laws made by men, FOR men, and was in truth a form of slavery created by men.

the last i checked the history books it was MEN who went off to war and fought like warrior poets. they also produced the food (with the assistance of women). sure, there were women warriors, Sparta is an example. but when you stress that laws were made "for" men, i shudder. women need to stop revising the facts of history -- the arrangement of women staying home and child rearing while the men -- which you failed to mention -- went off to fight wars, was in fact in the best interest of the whole SOCIETY.

i am surprised that the notion men "enslaved" women is not more offensive to men. if men were so interested in oppressing women we can do that right now and there wouldn't be much that a woman could do about it. the age of barbarism between men and women is ending, and that's a good thing. rape and domestic violence is less frequent now than ever before. we live in a civilizing society, not a civil society. social conditions ebb and flow, but things are getting better. and in that milieu we come to discover what's in the best for ALL, not only for oneself. it's part of the social compact agreement we learned in first grade.

women should stop perceiving "rights" as individualized, for even individual rights are tied to the collective good. you disregard that, as do most women. and it's in that utter disregard that women find the justification to act like slobs.

there was nothing in the beginning of time to inform us that "all people are equal." we had to discover that, are still discovering that. tell a pack of hungry dogs that they're equal when you throw them a steak and watch to see if they share it.

so it's true, as you say, that "all laws [were] made by men." you fail, however, to consider the fact that men made laws and over time changed those laws, oftentimes at the behest of women agitators. political and social conditions made inclusion possible, and men were instrumental in that. give men credit where credit is due, and let's stop rewriting history on here, there's enough of those books at Barnes & Noble.

[Lyn]

What? War is in the best interests of society? Always? In which context? Rape and domestic violence are at lower rates than ever? In which country? Even in the Western world, do you KNOW how many women are raped and don't report it? Do you know the pathetically low percentage of cases that even make it to court when they are reported? I remember a psychology study in which men of university age were questioned if they would rape a woman if they thought there would be no consequences, and around 60% said they would. 60%!
"There was nothing at the beginning of time to inform us that "all people are equal?"" Well there was nothing at the beginning of time to tell us not to kill each other either, but I'm not planning on doing it. Why can't people be considered equal to each other?

I don't believe that all men are conspiring against women, that is ridiculous. But neither do I believe that I am of less worth because I am a woman. I know plenty of men who think that way -for example, one man I know holds the view that women should not be priests because a woman should not be allowed to advise men what to do. Some men pretend to believe in equality whilst unconcsiously seeking to control or own their women like they are posessions. Others are perfectly lovely and realise that WE ARE ALL JUST HUMAN.
I am fed up with the patronising tone of people, male and female, who tell feminists, or people who believe in equality, that they are ridiculous and whining about nothing. Really. They are not.

[jon1jt]

i could never imagine a female president in the place of Ronald Reagan as president to make this statement with the same degree of resolve and how that resolve was interpreted by the Soviets and the world:

"Mr. Gorbachev, tear down that wall!"

[Scheherazade]

i could never imagine a female president in the place of Ronald Reagan as president to make this statement with the same degree of resolve and how that resolve was interpreted by the Soviets and the world:

"Mr. Gorbachev, tare down that wall!"

Hah! If Maggie Thatcher had said it, Mr Gorbachev himself would have been tearing the wall down brick by brick the very next day!

[kilted exile]

Hah! If Maggie Thatcher had said it, Mr Gorbachev himself would have been tearing the wall down brick by brick the very next day!

Lets be fair tho' Thatcher doesnt really count as a woman (phrase "spawn of Satan" comes to mind...)

[Nightshade]

I dont get why people hate Thatcher so much.... I suppose it was a have to have lived through it thing I guess.

[Niamh]

Rewriting history? I'm simply stating history as i know it from studying it. And trust me, i'm not rewriting it.
Do you not think that women would not have liked to fight in wars back in the past if they were given the chance? Of course they would have. Some women are apart of many countries armies today, and i'm sure given the opertunity they would have grabbed the chance to do it in the past. But then in saying that, there was Joan of Arc!
And i dont think its right to say that men rewrote laws because women "agitators" made them do it. We shouldnt have had to fight for our rights in the first place.
Also as for rape and demestic violence being on the decline...its not true. In Ireland alone it is believed that in Dublin one woman is raped every day of the year, only a fraction of cases are reported and only 5% of the cases end up in court. Domestic violence is still about. Its not a thing of the past.

[QUOTEkilted]Lets be fair tho' Thatcher doesnt really count as a woman (phrase "spawn of Satan" comes to mind...)
[/QUOTE]As i've said elsewhere... i think she secretly was a man!

[Nightshade]

How aobut bodica? and hutchepsouit and the guy who establissed the anciet egyptien middle kingdom.
or shugurt eldorr of course she got too big for her boots and was eventually assasinated by being beaten to death with wooden shoes if I rember correctly and then they invented a great dessert that was supposed to symbloise her dead body ( Its Umm Ali if any one is in the slightest bit interested).

Actually heres another thing in early islamic history women were part of the army and were encouraged to learn to fencing, archery, ridding and swimming. course with 100 years the old male chauvnistic pre isalmic cultural tendencies took over and it wasnt until ( barring the slight shugert eldoor thing) 1919 that women once again ( in egypt at least) took a part in militanish manor.

[Virgil]

I dont get why people hate Thatcher so much.... I suppose it was a have to have lived through it thing I guess.

I don't hate Thatcher. She was great. Absolutely critical to winning the cold war. Also check what Sarkozy is saying in France. France before Thatcher had a better standard of living than Britain. After Thatcher Britain surpassed France and continues to pull away with the continuation of her free market reforms. France continues to be mired in socialism and is suffering. Today people are leaving France for a better life in England. Great Briatin ought to thank God for electing Thatcher.

[jon1jt]

freedom to choose?

women exercised their freedom to choose in the age of hunters and gatherers in that they chose to be part of that arrangement going out picking wild fruits and vegetables. from my reading of that period, men didn't force women to serve that function. rather, it was an "economic" arrangement that became convenient for both of them.

in the last 300 years, women have marched lock step with the traditions imposed upon them by their parents. women could have rejected the life prepared for them by standing up to their their parents and saying NO as some brave women have done and still do.

the fact is, mothers are quite eager for their daughters to find a good rich husband. and they apply pressure with, "we'd love grandchildren, dear."

is it possible that women are unfeminine (and bitter) today because they are in effect rebelling against the life that their parents decided for them? perhaps more women would be cohabitating were it not for meddlesome, pushy parents.

a man being a bachelor is not perceived as negatively as a woman being a spinster. so it's the woman's fault for submitting to social pressure. men have little to do with that. in fact, men are the victims.

[SleepyWitch]

Mr Virgil, last time I checked, the cold war was not won, it just kinda ended.
My politics profs in England even said American and English politicians and conservative gov. thinktanks were taken by surprise when it did. they could never have immagined that someone like Gorbatchev would turn up. all their scenarios involved (nuclear) war and when a group of feminist political scientists was invited to play a role game against the gov.'s specialists, the women predicted what was actually to happen a couple of years later, whereas the gov. team (all guys) nuked all their enemies without provocation just in order not to look like "wimps"

don't remember exactly where I read that, but it was either "Wars, wimps and women: talking gender and thinking war" by Carol Cohn or Bananas, Beaches & Bases - Making Feminist Sense of International Politics by Cynthia Enloe.
they are both renowned political scientists and provide detailed analyses. if you guys have any doubts that/how patriarchy works, these books/articles will be an eye-opener.

[Scheherazade]

Today people are leaving France for a better life in England. Great Briatin ought to thank God for electing Thatcher.

Along with Sleepy's comments about the Cold War:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/5237236.stm

There are also more links to the related articles on that page.

[SleepyWitch]

interesting article, Scher!

since we're completely off-topic anyway: Dear Mrs Thatcher was against German reunification because she had a somewhat paranoid fear that a reunited Germany would rise again and make trouble. Not only does the illustrate that she missed out on 40 years of post-war history (seeing as Germany and France along with some other countries where the chief architects of the EU, an institution founded to prevent future wars withing Europe), it also seems to indicate that she was willing to let East Germans live under a totalitarian and inhumane regime for some longer.
Now what do you call that?
ok, to be fair, I don't know at what point exactly she said German unification shouldn't be hastened... maybe the SED regime was already phasing out when she said that... but if she was such a great heroine and "won" the Cold War, shouldn't she have been a bit more willing to bring democracy to Eastern Germany?

edit: back on topic: here's another tough nut to crack for our "psychologists"/geneticists/essentialists: What did Mrs Caveman say when she banged her head on the roof of the cave?
a) "Sh*t!" (or its Stone Age equivalent)
b) "Oh, how very unfortunate."
c) she smoothed out the creases in her huge billowing skirt and polished her highheels
d) she farted and scrathed her head