Feminism

She discusses the banning of the sati (the widow's sacrifice [killing] of herself on her husband's funeral tombstone). "the white man saves the brown woman from the brown man." The white man/European calls sati barbaric and oppressive. The brown man objects that sati isn't that common and cries that similar atrocities were performed in Europe (like the burning of witches and heretics); the brown man continues to explain that sati is a surefire way for a woman to achieve 'moksha' (self-liberation from the cycle of rebirth). Spivak points out that in the few places where sati was practiced, such as Bengal, women had the right to inherit which means there may have been some corrupting fiscal influences involved in the performance of sati (death by means of getting money). Still, all we hear about sati are re-presentations of what sati meant to women but it's never spoken by the sati-performing brown women themselves- thus the subaltern cannot speak.

Yes, but hypothetical opposite that does not really exist as an organized ideology. There are no machist bookstores or government funding for machist organisations.

We have now millions of Mexicans in the US sending money to their wives south of the border. And it seems not one woman sends money to her man. Would machism advocate power of men to force women to work and send money? Machism as an idea is absurd. The real opposite of feminism would be equalism, a 50:50 treatment of both sexes to bridge the child custody gap, incarceration gap, voting gap, wealth gap, work gap, sexuality gap etc. In other words, the end of the privileged status for women.

No, they are not opposites. Feminism actually is a form of equalism. We try to give woman the same rights as men and to eliminate discrimination. Machism is the idea that men are superior to woman. The counterpoint of feminism is masculism. Its main idea is give men the same rights as woman. The opposite of machism is femaleism that states that woman are superior to men.

It had undertones of Lesbianism and helped women to transition away from an oppressive patriarchy to Lesbianism.

It's not a phase; if women are lesbians, they stay lesbians, unless they discover themselves to be bi.

Ten percent of women are lesbian.

In the first wave of feminism, which began in 1848 with the Seneca Falls convention, the women (and some men) who were involved with the movement were eager for gaining women Suffrage (the right to vote), but they were also interested in other issues. Under the common law in the 1800s, women were considered the property of their husband. Women could not own land or make business decisions, few were allowed to go to college, and if their husband beat them, it was rarely considered a crime (the husband was believed to have the right to "discipline" his wife). So, leading feminists like Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucretia Mott, Lucy Stone, and others advocated for women to be treated equally under the law, as well as to have other rights that only men had back then.

Second wave feminists, myself among them, organized during an era (the 1950s-1970s) when many things had improved. Women had the right to vote, many women attended college, and wife-beating was no longer acceptable in society. But we had a different set of issues to contend with: women were not given equal pay for equal work; many occupations were still closed to us even if we had the qualifications; a number of women endured sexual harassment at their job yet it wasn't considered a societal problem; and women were still stereotyped as too emotional and not very intelligent-- this was especially true on television, in movies, and in advertisements. We began the work of changing society's attitudes about what women were capable of. We also advocated for better opportunities for women in predominantly male occupations, and for laws to protect women from sexual harassment.

Feminists hate men, are hippies, don't shave, are lesbians, and that only women are feminists.

Alice Paul

butt nut

Liberal Feminism.

Granting equal rights to women will harm children and families.

Liberal Feminism holds that the oppression of women is the denial of their equal rights, representation, and access to opportunities. Liberal Feminism takes a gender-neutral/gender-blind approach and holds that all men and women are created equal and should be treated the same, and seeks to reform oppressive systems. Liberal Feminism focuses strongly on fixing women's exclusion from political power.

Radical Feminism, is, as its name implies, more radical than Liberal feminism. Radical Feminism carries the belief that "the personal is political" and sees that the oppression of women is caused by patriarchy, a system of male authority, strongly manifested in sexuality, personal relationships, and the family, and then carried over into the rest of the man-dominated world. As opposed to Liberal Feminism, Radical Feminism does not take a gender-blind/gender-neutral approach; Radical Feminism acknowledges that there are differences between men and women, and society should change to value those differences instead of devaluing the "feminine."

Stone

Yes, most girls who were hippies were also feminists. The hippie movement was concerned about peace and social justice, which included gender equality.

50% of humans are female and historically they have not been treated equally in most societies. Demonstrably many societies have not provided them with the same life opportunities as men. It is not unreasonable that this imbalance should be corrected and political feminism has been the means for achieving this.

However, what has been forgotten is that societies also placed strictures on the role men should play and the feminist movement has not addressed (or indeed cared) about this.

Thus while you obviously feel marginalised and aggrieved by feminism, stopping it would not only be inadvisable but impossible. What is needed is an equivalent male led movement to get society (including the newly empowered women) to address the unfairnesses and society imbalances heaped upon men.

Blue KoolAid?

It refers to a potential criticism of early feminism which promoted the ideals of white, heterosexual, middle class women over all others. Betty Friedan, for instance, said that gender equality (regarding voting) was more important than racial equality. Third wave feminism emphasizes that gender inequality is linked to racial, socioeconomic, and sexual inequality, within interlocking systems of oppression.

The abolitionist movement was against people being dis-empowered and enslaved because of their colour. The feminist movement grew from the same point, particularly in the USA and England, for women realized they had been dis-empowered because of their gender. Neither gender or colour was choice.

This was in the early 1960's.

post-structuralism

I'm not sure what you mean by "persuasive". Your definition sounds negative to me. I would define a feminist to be someone who is actively seeking equal rights for women.

( As a not totally intended by product of that effort, she might not object if women were given more than equal rights, but I would not put that into the definition.)

An anarcha-feminist is a feminist anarchist - traditionally holding the beliefs that patriarchy is a manifestation of involuntary coercive hierarchy which should be replaced by decentralized free association.

No. Sex refers to whether one is biologically male or female (or intersex) and is determined by external genitals, internal reproductive organs, chromosomes, and gametes. Gender refers to the roles and behaviors expected of members of each sex. The terms are not sociologically or biologically interchangeable, though they are sometimes used interchangeably in informal situations.