Is feminisim still important for today's society?

1. 63

   Thunder Vixenposted 13 years ago

   Any opinions? I'm reading a book called Full Frontal Feminism it's very interesting and has many good points. Has anyone else read this book? I had already posted this but in the wrong category.

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2. 67

   alternate poetposted 13 years ago

   I have not read that paarticular book - but feminism is a double edged sword so be careful.  When I was studying about ten years ago I covered this among everything else and it all seemed reasonable enough with loads of good points that are useful in analysing texts.  However most people take the metaphysical ideas that can provide a specific femenine point of view to extremes, IMO this can ruin your life as it points you down an impossible road in the long run.  At the base of it all it is just a reaction to men having always been number one, the battle that it can draw you into is not a real bwar, it is a never-ending guerilla action that dvides and separates.  AS one writer puts it, "Feminism is just a way of some women dominating other women."  I have this broad view that it is also abou equality and men and women can never be equal, they are different in ways that rely specifically on not being equal.  I would completely agree that a better way of negotiating the difference is needed, but the idea of equality, as we understand the term, generates confrontation and division rather than negotiation and change.

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3. 83

   kerrygposted 13 years ago

   It certainly is still important to today's society. Like any other movement, feminism certainly has attracted its share of extremists, but at its heart, it is still a movement for equal rights for women, and even most people who claim to hate feminism support its basic principles, such as the idea that women should be free to choose their own careers (or become a housewife, if that's what they want) and the idea that equal work deserves equal pay.
   
   Worldwide, of course, it's even more important. Just look at this Iranian stoning case that's in the news right now. Iran is trying to spin it as the woman being executed for murdering her husband, but what she is really being executed for is adultery, despite the fact that a) her husband was already dead when the supposed relationships took place and b) the judge never heard any evidence, either for or against her, before passing his sentence. At the same time, the man accused of murdering her husband is not facing the death penalty at all.
   
   They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so here's one - the hole where a teenage girl in Turkey was buried alive for talking to boys earlier this year:
   
   
   
   Muslim countries aren't the only ones where this kind of stuff happens. In India and China, sex selective abortion and infanticide kill millions of girls every year. In Africa, 140 million girls are living with the effects of female genital mutilation. Even here in the US, 1 in 4 women will be raped and/or physically assaulted by a boyfriend or husband in their lifetimes. In countries such as Afghanistan and Ethiopia, that rate rises to 90%.

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4. 60

   paradigmsearchposted 13 years ago

   Bigotry is still very much alive and well on this planet. Combating it in all its forms is definitely the right thing to do.

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