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 KalashnikovMarine wrote:

Well what is the concept of feminism? It can be radically different from wave to wave and person to person.

That's the point. 1st wave is not 2nd wave and 2nd wave is not 3rd wave.

Instead of being lazy we could be precise, but Americans are nothing if not lazy.

Edit: And unwillinging to admit to their laziness. Can't be lazy and pull oneself up by one's own bootstraps.

 dogma wrote:

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:

Well what is the concept of feminism? It can be radically different from wave to wave and person to person.

That's the point. 1st wave is not 2nd wave and 2nd wave is not 3rd wave.

Instead of being lazy we could be precise, but Americans are nothing if not lazy.

Edit: And unwillinging to admit to their laziness. Can't be lazy and pull oneself up by one's own bootstraps.

I have a labor saving device to pull my bootstraps up for me

 dogma wrote:

Edit: And unwillinging to admit to their laziness. Can't be lazy and pull oneself up by one's own bootstraps.

Hey! We're not... that thing you... eh, feth it.

 Grey Templar wrote:
But here is a question for you.

Would it be socially acceptable to portray a minority with the same exact character?

Could you have a show where the only Black character is a complete and utter moron? How about if he was Latino or Indian?

My guess is there would be an immense amount of outrage. Yet its ok to portray a white guy as being a complete idiot.

Are you a white man?

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
But here is a question for you.

Would it be socially acceptable to portray a minority with the same exact character?

Could you have a show where the only Black character is a complete and utter moron? How about if he was Latino or Indian?

My guess is there would be an immense amount of outrage. Yet its ok to portray a white guy as being a complete idiot.

Are you a white man?

Yes, and I take offense to the fact that white men being portrayed as idiots is socially acceptable.

Just like I would expect a person of color to be offended if making his race out to be idiots/morons/whatever was socially acceptable.

It is a terrible shame that there are no examples in the media of white men being portrayed in a positive way.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
But here is a question for you.

Would it be socially acceptable to portray a minority with the same exact character?

Could you have a show where the only Black character is a complete and utter moron? How about if he was Latino or Indian?

My guess is there would be an immense amount of outrage. Yet its ok to portray a white guy as being a complete idiot.

Are you a white man?

Yes, and I take offense to the fact that white men being portrayed as idiots is socially acceptable.

Just like I would expect a person of color to be offended if making his race out to be idiots/morons/whatever was socially acceptable.

Whites aren't made out to be idiots because they're white. The stupid characters are nearly always white, because nearly all of the characters are white. The minorities and (to a some extent), women aren't "The Idiot", because they're there to have the single defining trait of minority. I'll grant you there are some exceptions to this but they're just that, exceptions. For the most part whites (and dudes), get the moron role because they get all the roles.

 Manchu wrote:

 Chongara wrote:
If anything is harming men it's not any kind of discrimination or "war on men" or whatever else the whiners might harp on. It's that we have a rather antiquated, rigid model of masculinity and an unhealthy, irrational resistance to changing it.

I think that is quite true. Men are their own worst enemies when it comes to this. Just talking to a close friend recently, he remarked "for a long time, I thought being a man meant fighting and winning against all other men." I don't think that "king of the mountain" mentality is really some kind of prehistoric, bio-hardwired imperative like we tend to assume these days. Male friendship has been eviscerated by that kind of thinking. I believe that not only the demand for but the widespread acceptance of gay rights is tied to this inasmuch as in previous epochs homosexual relationships could be totally encapsulated within the larger sphere of male friendship. But in these days, male friendship is totally anemic, leaving male romance to fend for itself.

My thoughts on this particular point, are that yes the "current" ideal of masculinity is apparently outdated. My dad taught me that the ultimate man is simply one who provides, cares for, and protects his family as best he can. While it may be seen sometimes as a bit of a mafioso outlook, given today's social climate in regards to the number of single parent households, especially those who have no male role model for kids to grow up with, it is very telling to me about why we are in the current state that we are.

Basically, I have seen too many of the more vocal feminists basically say that ANYTHING a man does is wrong, so how can we do "right" if we're always wrong? Surely there is something out there that we CAN do, and do well. Now, obviously we can't all decide to occupy Soldier Field with nothing but men, and have a "man talk", and hash out what it means to be a man, and how to best be men... But, there's gotta be something out there that society can generally agree on, and say "yes, this is where men are best, and society as a whole will flourish because of this"

A lot of men, and some women as well, seem to conflate feminism and misandry.

 d-usa wrote:

 azazel the cat wrote:

Bromsy wrote:Look, I'm pretty reasonable about this whole thing, but there seems to be a lot of "White men have had it so good for so long that they got nothing to complain about."... but how long does that gak last?

Seriously, when is the last time, outside of a cartoon, where you have seen a bumbling, ignorant character that isn't a white male? I bet it wasn't on prime time TV.

The black guy on The Walking Dead.

In the comics, he's a strong, capable leader. In the TV show, he's a fat, bumbling fool that fumbled keys costing a man his life (maybe) and later, he almost killed himself with the door of a parked car. In fact, the only reason I think his character hasn't been killed off yet is because

Spoiler:

The Governor is going to cut off someone's hand, and I have a feeling that it's not gonna be Rick's as it is in the comics.

I'm going to throw in these:

Griff on Married...With Children
Turk on Scrubs

I do not know of Griff, but Turk is a different matter. HE is shown to be intelligent, he is a surgeon, but a complete goofball and unable to do things emotionally. He is a macho man which is often made fun of. Just like with the father of Married with Children. You see, it used to be in sitcoms and television that men where the leaders of the family, their word was wise and absolute. But if you see in recent television, the father is considered out of touch. They grew up with the idea that the Husband is leader of the household and he cant be wrong, But with growing equality its unable to be put in action. He is considered the last remnant. You see alot of this in Sitcoms. and as i have wrote about before, television and media have a very very unique way of influencing life, altering peoples perception, so many do consider men idiotic because that is how it goes on television.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

 Chongara wrote:
If anything is harming men it's not any kind of discrimination or "war on men" or whatever else the whiners might harp on. It's that we have a rather antiquated, rigid model of masculinity and an unhealthy, irrational resistance to changing it.

I think that is quite true. Men are their own worst enemies when it comes to this. Just talking to a close friend recently, he remarked "for a long time, I thought being a man meant fighting and winning against all other men." I don't think that "king of the mountain" mentality is really some kind of prehistoric, bio-hardwired imperative like we tend to assume these days. Male friendship has been eviscerated by that kind of thinking. I believe that not only the demand for but the widespread acceptance of gay rights is tied to this inasmuch as in previous epochs homosexual relationships could be totally encapsulated within the larger sphere of male friendship. But in these days, male friendship is totally anemic, leaving male romance to fend for itself.

My thoughts on this particular point, are that yes the "current" ideal of masculinity is apparently outdated. My dad taught me that the ultimate man is simply one who provides, cares for, and protects his family as best he can. While it may be seen sometimes as a bit of a mafioso outlook, given today's social climate in regards to the number of single parent households, especially those who have no male role model for kids to grow up with, it is very telling to me about why we are in the current state that we are.

Basically, I have seen too many of the more vocal feminists basically say that ANYTHING a man does is wrong, so how can we do "right" if we're always wrong? Surely there is something out there that we CAN do, and do well. Now, obviously we can't all decide to occupy Soldier Field with nothing but men, and have a "man talk", and hash out what it means to be a man, and how to best be men... But, there's gotta be something out there that society can generally agree on, and say "yes, this is where men are best, and society as a whole will flourish because of this"

Actually holding a council of men sounds like a good idea to me. XD

Men are, on average, much physically stronger than women, and somewhat more intelligent. So I have nothing to fear at all.

I've never bought into the whole victimisation thing, since outside of the media flying rodent gak-insane feminism doesn't really exist.

 Testify wrote:
Men are, on average, much physically stronger than women, and somewhat more intelligent. So I have nothing to fear at all.

vaht ave you done!

*ducks and runs before the PC police arrive

Statements like that one generally don't bear response. They stand on their own, and speak volumes to all onlookers.

So the alternative is to believe that men and women are the same at everything? That is utterly absurd, and speaks of a highly protected upbringing.

 Testify wrote:
So the alternative is to believe that men and women are the same at everything? That is utterly absurd, and speaks of a highly protected upbringing.

Of course not... men and women ARE different...

Duh... women haz boobs...

Boobs are awesome...

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:
My thoughts on this particular point, are that yes the "current" ideal of masculinity is apparently outdated. My dad taught me that the ultimate man is simply one who provides, cares for, and protects his family as best he can. While it may be seen sometimes as a bit of a mafioso outlook, given today's social climate in regards to the number of single parent households, especially those who have no male role model for kids to grow up with, it is very telling to me about why we are in the current state that we are.

Having the ability and desire to provide for and protect one's loved ones are great traits to encourage in males seeking to be men. And they're ones that most men will have naturally.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:
Basically, I have seen too many of the more vocal feminists basically say that ANYTHING a man does is wrong, so how can we do "right" if we're always wrong?

I've seen very few of them, and I grew up around a lot of pretty hardcore feminists, including Dianic Wiccans. Dworkin-esque extremists are rare. IME jackass reactionary chauvanists pretending otherwise are a bigger problem.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:
Now, obviously we can't all decide to occupy Soldier Field with nothing but men, and have a "man talk", and hash out what it means to be a man, and how to best be men... But, there's gotta be something out there that society can generally agree on, and say "yes, this is where men are best, and society as a whole will flourish because of this"

I don't know if society as a whole can really agree on something like this. But it's certainly something we can do in our local social and religious communities. When I was a teenager, our regional pagan community held manhood and womanhood initiatory rituals and trials for the young men and women. I sure wasn't a man yet after mine, but I learned some important things about being a man from the men who participated in the talks and teachings and the rituals. We certainly can talk about the values we want to instill in our young men, and the ideals we want to strive to achieve.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Testify wrote:
So the alternative is to believe that men and women are the same at everything?

Not at all.

 Grey Templar wrote:
But here is a question for you.

Would it be socially acceptable to portray a minority with the same exact character?

Could you have a show where the only Black character is a complete and utter moron? How about if he was Latino or Indian?

My guess is there would be an immense amount of outrage. Yet its ok to portray a white guy as being a complete idiot.

As I pointed out in my answer to Bromsy, while it is more acceptable to make the white guy the idiot, that isn't the only piece of screwed up race relations we see in popular entertainment, and so looking at just it is really just looking for ways to pretend you're the put upon race.

For instance, can you name a mainstream movie or TV show where a black guy gets with a white woman? I mean, on Star Trek where people made out with aliens all the time, when it was Geordi's time for some alien action... they still had him make it with a black alien. But white guys make it with black women all the time.

Or the cliche about the black guy never surviving in the horror movie. Even now that horror movies are so aware of their own genre conventions that they joke about the black guy always dying... they still keep doing it.

Then there's the feminist test for movies - that a film only passes if there is a scene in which a conversation takes place between female characters, and isn't about relationships with the male characters. Simple test, that most every film fails.

So talking about how the idiot character is almost always a man is really hyperfocusing on the one tiny area where white men get the worst of it, while ignoring the great sea of privilege surrounding it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Testify wrote:
So the alternative is to believe that men and women are the same at everything? That is utterly absurd, and speaks of a highly protected upbringing.

No, the alternative is to acknowledge that men and women have, on average, advantages in different kinds of intelligence. Men have better spatial awareness and maths, women have stronger communication and memory skills.

Then you have to acknowledge that there is no 'general intelligence' that binds those elements together, and to produce a 'general intelligence' would be to assign a weighting to the various types of intelligence - a highly subjective and entirely pointless exercise.

As such, the only possible answer is to acknowledge men have a slight advantage, on average, in some areas of intelligence, while women have a slight advantage, on average, in other areas, and that's all there is to it.

 sebster wrote:

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Testify wrote:
So the alternative is to believe that men and women are the same at everything? That is utterly absurd, and speaks of a highly protected upbringing.

No, the alternative is to acknowledge that men and women have, on average, advantages in different kinds of intelligence. Men have better spatial awareness and maths, women have stronger communication and memory skills.

Then you have to acknowledge that there is no 'general intelligence' that binds those elements together, and to produce a 'general intelligence' would be to assign a weighting to the various types of intelligence - a highly subjective and entirely pointless exercise.

As such, the only possible answer is to acknowledge men have a slight advantage, on average, in some areas of intelligence, while women have a slight advantage, on average, in other areas, and that's all there is to it.

Why would you assume that those "areas of intelligence" ( a spurious term made popular by members of arts faculties) are equal?

 Testify wrote:
So the alternative is to believe that men and women are the same at everything? That is utterly absurd, and speaks of a highly protected upbringing.

Save for body mass and upper body strength, I'd say that the individual variation and social pressure are by the more dominate terms in the ability equation than any sort fundamental biological differences. Even in those things there is certainly enough overlap in the tail areas of the spectrum to keep them from boiling down to a pure matter of sex. It can be fairly argued that women simply haven't been given chances for long enough to make any real conclusions on many forms of academic achievement.

However, If we're going to be making assumptions I wouldn't bet on them fitting neatly with our previously existing narrative, which has been consistently been proven wrong far more than it has been right.

 Chongara wrote:

 Testify wrote:
So the alternative is to believe that men and women are the same at everything? That is utterly absurd, and speaks of a highly protected upbringing.

Save for body mass and upper body strength, I'd say that the individual variation and social pressure are by the more dominate terms in the ability equation than any sort fundamental biological differences. Even in those things there is certainly enough overlap in the tail areas of the spectrum to keep them from boiling down to a pure matter of sex.

Yeah, and if it weren't for the huge difference in military prowess, the United States Army is basically the same as the Luxemburg defence force

I would bore you with a list of male inventions but honestly there's little point. Think back to your school days and university. If you can't tell the difference between men and women, particularly on the upper end of the scale, then so be it.

 sebster wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
But here is a question for you.

Would it be socially acceptable to portray a minority with the same exact character?

Could you have a show where the only Black character is a complete and utter moron? How about if he was Latino or Indian?

My guess is there would be an immense amount of outrage. Yet its ok to portray a white guy as being a complete idiot.

As I pointed out in my answer to Bromsy, while it is more acceptable to make the white guy the idiot, that isn't the only piece of screwed up race relations we see in popular entertainment, and so looking at just it is really just looking for ways to pretend you're the put upon race.

For instance, can you name a mainstream movie or TV show where a black guy gets with a white woman? I mean, on Star Trek where people made out with aliens all the time, when it was Geordi's time for some alien action... they still had him make it with a black alien. But white guys make it with black women all the time.

Or the cliche about the black guy never surviving in the horror movie. Even now that horror movies are so aware of their own genre conventions that they joke about the black guy always dying... they still keep doing it.

Then there's the feminist test for movies - that a film only passes if there is a scene in which a conversation takes place between female characters, and isn't about relationships with the male characters. Simple test, that most every film fails.

So talking about how the idiot character is almost always a man is really hyperfocusing on the one tiny area where white men get the worst of it, while ignoring the great sea of privilege surrounding it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Testify wrote:
So the alternative is to believe that men and women are the same at everything? That is utterly absurd, and speaks of a highly protected upbringing.

No, the alternative is to acknowledge that men and women have, on average, advantages in different kinds of intelligence. Men have better spatial awareness and maths, women have stronger communication and memory skills.

Then you have to acknowledge that there is no 'general intelligence' that binds those elements together, and to produce a 'general intelligence' would be to assign a weighting to the various types of intelligence - a highly subjective and entirely pointless exercise.

As such, the only possible answer is to acknowledge men have a slight advantage, on average, in some areas of intelligence, while women have a slight advantage, on average, in other areas, and that's all there is to it.

Yeah, you wouldn't call an astrophysicist a dumb ass because he doesn't know how to fix a car and you wouldn't call a car mechanic stupid for not knowing much about dendrochronology, everyone has there strengths and weaknesses and you're going to find that some people are more

or less knowledgeable than you are on certain subjects, that's how life works.

 Testify wrote:

 Chongara wrote:

 Testify wrote:
So the alternative is to believe that men and women are the same at everything? That is utterly absurd, and speaks of a highly protected upbringing.

Save for body mass and upper body strength, I'd say that the individual variation and social pressure are by the more dominate terms in the ability equation than any sort fundamental biological differences. Even in those things there is certainly enough overlap in the tail areas of the spectrum to keep them from boiling down to a pure matter of sex.

Yeah, and if it weren't for the huge difference in military prowess, the United States Army is basically the same as the Luxemburg defence force

I would bore you with a list of male inventions but honestly there's little point. Think back to your school days and university. If you can't tell the difference between men and women, particularly on the upper end of the scale, then so be it.

You're seriously trying to play the "Men have invented more stuff" card, when for hundreds of years most women were only allowed the role of "Icbubator"? The majory of those who tried to step outside that role were met with ostracization and dismal at best, imprisonment or even death at worst. We're still very much living with the legacy of that, heck we're hardly even 50 years removed from some of it being par for the course. It still happens in some parts of the world.

The statement shows a total lack of recognition that the playing field is in no way level for women, regardless of what fundamental differences may or may not exist. It's just so far removed from even the most basic understanding of the cultural context that has existed for the past 2000 years that it borders on delusion.

I would bore you with a list of male inventions but honestly there's little point.

You ain't just whistling Dixie, bud. But I think the point made is the opposite of the one you intended.

 Chongara wrote:

 Testify wrote:

 Chongara wrote:

 Testify wrote:
So the alternative is to believe that men and women are the same at everything? That is utterly absurd, and speaks of a highly protected upbringing.

Save for body mass and upper body strength, I'd say that the individual variation and social pressure are by the more dominate terms in the ability equation than any sort fundamental biological differences. Even in those things there is certainly enough overlap in the tail areas of the spectrum to keep them from boiling down to a pure matter of sex.

Yeah, and if it weren't for the huge difference in military prowess, the United States Army is basically the same as the Luxemburg defence force

I would bore you with a list of male inventions but honestly there's little point. Think back to your school days and university. If you can't tell the difference between men and women, particularly on the upper end of the scale, then so be it.

You're seriously trying to play the "Men have invented more stuff" card, when for hundreds of years most women were only allowed the role of "Icbubator"? The majory of those who tried to step outside that role were met with ostracization and dismal at best, imprisonment or even death at worst. We're still very much living with the legacy of that, heck we're hardly even 50 years removed from some of it being par for the course. It still happens in some parts of the world.

The statement shows a total lack of recognition that the playing field is in now way level for women, regardless of what fundamental differences may or may not exist.

Conversely, it's impossible for you to prove that women's success in academia is anything other than positive discrimination in action.

 Testify wrote:
Why would you assume that those "areas of intelligence" ( a spurious term made popular by members of arts faculties) are equal?

I didn't assume they were equal. That's just woeful reading on your part.

I said they were seperate, and each to be taken seperately. As such, if we have 'men are better with spatial intelligence' and 'women are better with memory' it is a complete nonsense to say 'and memory is 1.2 times more important than spatial intelligence, therefore women are smarter overall than men'.

Instead we just say 'men and women are better, on average, in different things, and it is impossible to declare one sex overall more intelligent than the other'.

I shouldn't have to be typing that out again. It was perfectly clear in my first answer. Read more carefully in future, to avoid wasting the time of both of us.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Testify wrote:
I would bore you with a list of male inventions but honestly there's little point. Think back to your school days and university. If you can't tell the difference between men and women, particularly on the upper end of the scale, then so be it.

Yeah, because men and women had completely equal access to economic opportunities during the Renaissance.

Seriously dude, you're making yourself look ridiculous here.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Testify wrote:
Conversely, it's impossible for you to prove that women's success in academia is anything other than positive discrimination in action.

fething seriously? 100% honest you believe that?

 Testify wrote:
I would bore you with a list of male inventions but honestly there's little point. Think back to your school days and university. If you can't tell the difference between men and women, particularly on the upper end of the scale, then so be it.

On one hand, you have Thomas Edison, who invented being an abject dick and the concept of abusing people who made you money, but on the other hand, you have Marie Curie, who invented cancer (probably not funny, and not quite true).

Men have had more chances to invent things than women have. This much is a fact, as only as recent as a hundred years ago, women weren't really allowed to invent anything that wasn't forcefully ejected from their bodies after about nine months, and even then, most of the credit went to the male unless the result was lame or a different color.

 Mannahnin wrote:

I would bore you with a list of male inventions but honestly there's little point.

You ain't just whistling Dixie, bud. But I think the point made is the opposite of the one you intended.

It also helps to build a nice portfolio of inventions over time when your gender isn't barred from academics for huge periods of time.

 Testify wrote:

Conversely, it's impossible for you to prove that women's success in academia is anything other than positive discrimination in action.

Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter, I'm all for calling an axe an axe, but really? I know a woman or two much more intelligent than I am. Like, genuinely, wholly, these people can achieve things that I could only dream of. Seriously, learn the difference between gender roles and reality.