#we're treated like agents of patriarchy

[killbenedictcumberbatchagain]

patriarchy and biphobia really go hand in hand

[ftmtftm]

I need young radfems to understand that the goal of the majority of Feminist organizing is to understand and take down Patriarchal control. Not just reform, but actively take down. That is not solely a Radical Feminist goal. You are being actively lied to if someone is telling you otherwise. The only difference is a lot of other Feminist organizing recognizes that Patriarchy is only one piece of the puzzle when it comes to discussions on systemic power and violence, rather than the whole picture - which is how Radical Feminism often treats it.

A Radical Feminist lense places the weight and power of Patriarchy inherently on manhood or "maleness" as a concept - rather than actually examining the root causes of our modern Patriarchal society. Radical Feminism doesn't actually examine or question why manhood or "maleness" is actually considered something to be valued or where that notion comes from - it just treats it as a fact of our world, which is so limited in scope because fails to address why the world is currently the way it is.

Radical Feminism doesn't question what kinds of manhood are actually given structural power and what kinds of manhood are punished by the Patriarchy itself. Radical Feminism homogenizes manhood/"maleness" into a big scary boogy man that only exists as a tool of subjugation without considering the ways in which Patriarchy actively subjugates men who deviate from its ideal vision of manhood.

Do you really think the world is so black and white? Do you really think that the socially constructed power structure of Patriarchy is so innate to society that the responsibility for it also falls on your fellow victims of it? Have you, for instance, considered the works of international feminists who discuss the material reality of the fact that Patriarchy is an agent of Colonialism? Have you considered that Patriarchy as we know it stems from world conquest and that for hundreds of years other societies existed outside of Patriarchal influence and control?

Are you so naïve that you cannot conceptualize your own liberation alongside the liberation other victims of systemic violence and oppression? Where is your sense of solidarity with people who have lost their cultures because Colonialist politics were forced into their lives, subsequently enacting Patriarchal control over their societies? Have you considered the fact that scorched earth politics only serve put you in the position of dominance in the same way as any other Colonialist, rather than actually meaningfully liberating anyone from dominance and subjugation.

I understand that it is incredibly easy to view the world simplistically. It is easy to view systems of oppression as separate concepts with one or two that you believe should take priority. It is easy to create a victim complex for yourself when your political theory is constantly telling you how victimized by the world you are. It is easy to internalize this in a way that makes you uncaring towards other causes that might seem unrelated to your own at first, but in reality are intrinsically connected to your own cause.

The world is so messy. These systems work all together and you are not immune from being agents enacting other forms of systemic violence. That is not a moral failure on your part for existing in ways the systems of our world prioritizes without your consent - just like it is not a moral failure of the average man for simply existing as a man in a world that prioritizes him without his consent.

To seek liberation from the Patriarchy without also seeking liberation from Colonialism, from White Supremacy, from Capitalism, etc. etc. in solidarity with other victims of those systems and to also seek that liberation from those systems without recognizing the active role of women in maintaining them is to do absolutely nothing politically meaningful beyond the selfish power seeking yourselves.

There are so many other kinds of Feminists and Feminist theories out there that don't rely on putting womanhood in a constant state of self victimization. That actually address the ways in which Patriarchy acts in tandem with many systems to disrupt the lives of anyone who doesn't conform to it. I promise you Radical Feminism will not give you the liberation you are seeking and there are other avenues for Feminist thought beyond just "Radical Feminism VS """meaningless liberal reform"""".

Anyone who tells you there are only two options for Feminist theorizing - especially if they are creating a "we're right and everyone else is wrong" binary - is a grifter and a liar who wants to take advantage of your pain for their own goals. They do not truly care about you or your liberation, they care about gaining power for themself.

[brazenautomaton]

Ok, what do MRA think of women? I'm genuinely asking in good faith. Just trying to understand.

Women are not a moral class and don't make decisions as a group. Sexism is a system made by men and women and participated in by men and women. The purpose and effect of sexism is not to exalt men and punish women; sexism exists to maximize women's safety at the cost of agency, and maximize men's agency at the cost of safety. The most successful men are highly rewarded, a hell of a lot more of them die, and male deaths are invisible because we're so hyperfocused on women's safety.

Feminism is not seeking equality, feminism is a sexist ideology that makes the demands of sexism and enforces the outlook of sexism in the way most beneficial to upper middle class white women. (Karen Straughn termed this "the Ladies' Auxiliary of the Patriarchy.") Due to the biases of sexism, feminism is very powerful and successful, as it is basically telling everyone that the way to fight a sexist outlook is to embrace every bias of sexism deeper than ever. The bias of sexism says that men are agents and women are victims, that men act and women are acted upon, and it is the responsibility of men to use their agency to change a woman's environment to make her comfortable. Women's comfort is men's responsibility, and things that make women uncomfortable are treated as if they kill women while things that kill men are treated as if they make men uncomfortable.

Feminism is obsessed with women's safety and justifies all its demands in terms of women's safety and says women's lack of safety is proof men hate women and must atone for it. Women are safer than men and have been safer than men at every location and every point in time in human history, but "everyone knows" that women are in so much more peril than men, because the biases of sexism leave people literally incapable of concluding women are safe.

MRAs do not blame genders, they blame systems and ideologies. Feminism is not synonymous with women, and feminists are terrible people who actively despise men and never stop lying, who get away with it because they claim to be synonymous with women and act threatened and imperiled by people disagreeing with them.

Women have more opportunities to be selfish sexist pieces of shit because the rules of society have been set by feminists to allow them to be selfish sexist pieces of shit, but demographics do not have a moral character. And that's not like me trying to make them sound the most charitable, when you look at places like r/FeMRADebates where the purpose is allegedly to debate, you see the rules are set up to explicitly allow generalization and ascribing traits to genders, but not to ideologies, because feminists want to do the former and MRAs want to do the latter.

[jisforj]

I really don't personally understand the pushback towards the idea of toxic femininity. Coming across the term gave me so much to think about and gave me a real model with which to explain my more negative relationship towards femininity and womanhood. It gives a real basis for the "not like other girls" thinking that is often based in misogyny, but also often stems from flinching away from toxic femininity and its expectations. Hell, I think being upfront and outright saying the beauty industry exploits toxic femininity and the expectations it places on people percieved as women is a lot better than saying "all makeup and skincare bad" the way some people do. I know the idea has given me the tools and words I've needed to communicate my distress with a number of misogynistic structures, at least.

More about my opinions on toxic femininity under the cut, trigger warning for discussions of transmisogyny, and brief mentions of assault, racism, and child abuse.

Toxic femininity is the way women are assumed to be, and expected to be; catty, overly complicated, passive aggressive, vain, all the ways you hear how "women interact with each other" and whatnot. Toxic femininity is when privileged women harass and degrade you over not performing femininity "properly" or to their expectations. Toxic femininity is the false sense of solidarity people tote because "we're both women and we understand each other" even though oftentimes that's been the opposite of my experience. Toxic femininity is the way people treat womanhood and feminine presentation as an obligation you must adhere to lest you be cast aside as an outsider, if not a threat or predatory interloper. Toxic femininity is the way you're expected by society to make yourself smaller physically, socially, emotionally, mentally in order to fit into the acceptable mold of what a woman can be, what femininity can mean.

And all of this is exacerbated when you're a trans woman, these expectations of womanhood, these demands to fit into only the most cissexist idea of what a woman can be in order to be seen as one at all. Divergence from the norm is seen not just as a failing or a betrayal, but also as proof that you are one of those threats, those interlopers, and you are subsequently stripped from the respect you deserve as a woman, in favor of being incorrectly seen as a dangerous man. However strict adherence to that norm is also used as a weapon, to paint trans women as misogynistic agents of patriarchy at fault for affirming those standards, as if the toxicly feminine presentation (or even just hyper feminine, even if it's not necessarily toxic, because trans people can't win) of some trans women is not a symptom of patriarchy but a cause for its existence.

And if all of this sounds just like misogyny or whatever, congrats! That's the point! Toxic femininity is absolutely rooted in misogynistic ideals for women, and to properly talk about it you absolutely need to examine gender roles and sexism as a whole, which is such a big part of why I think toxic femininity as a model is such a good tool. The difference I think is that toxic femininity is a tool of misogyny and patriarchy meant to keep people in line, and encourage the strict gendered policing of those around you.

As such, I believe it is also a tool that can be used by the people suffering under toxic femininity in order to be levied at others and exploited for their advantage. The most egregious examples being the fragile white woman archetype who leverages her race and femininity to enact violence against POC; or the women who get away with committing violence against others, but men especially, because they are the woman and must clearly be the victim; the way female child abusers are given a slap on the wrist, if that, because of ingrained ideas surrounding women being good caregivers and the harm they cause not being as severe. This is something I think trans women have almost no access to, and certainly not on any scale society would accept, as toxic femininity is one of the primary bludgeoning tools used against them, but I do think in some more trans centric circles these same dynamics can be found as well, often in the form of lateral aggression.

Just as men are held to the impossible standards of toxic masculinity, and are rewarded for performing masculinity "correctly" I think the same can be said of women and toxic femininity. It is not a privilege to be held to those standards, and we all suffer under these strict, hypergendered means of control, but it is also true that these same dynamics can be exploited and used as a tool of violence against others. The ability to do so and access to power through this is highly dependent on other intersectional aspects, and the more privilege you've been given by society the easier it is to wield. Binary trans people complicate these issues and suffer exacerbated effects of those expectations, while also being both punished and rewarded for adhering to the expectations of your actual gender in a way cis people aren't. However trans people can similarly leverage these dynamics against other trans and gender marginalized people in the form of lateral aggression, but this is a facsimile of the power cis people have access to through these means. Nonbinary people are ostracized entirely from the models set in place by our binaristic, cissexist society, and are often unwillingly shoved into one of the two boxes or seen entirely as other, and therefore a threat to the structures in place as a whole depending on their gender and presentation.

(Obviously this is not exhaustive, and there is more to be added and even corrected, as I am not all knowing. Just had some thoughts that I'd like to bring to a wider audience.)

[lapeaudelamemoire]

Last thoughts before crash sleep -

People think you're being pedantic and purposefully abstract when you say 'Gender is a construct,' except you mean what you say - we literally construct gender.

Gender is not biological sex, in this case - it's not genital-configured, but we conflate the two so that if you have the stereotypical reproductive organs of one biological sex that we associate/equate with a particular gender, the same way we might associate a watermelon's flesh with being red although yellow watermelons exist, your gender identity is constructed for you - aka you are socialised a certain way within a certain framework - based on that stereotype.

And if [a] gender is literally a social construct, then when we complain or criticise a gender, such as if we say 'men', it follows that we're criticising the construct itself, rather than individual persons.

Male ideology as it stands now/patriarchy, is problematic. The same way that Nazi ideology is problematic. But for some reason it's okay to say 'I hate Nazis,' but not 'I hate men.'

No one is talking about the biological genital configuration of individuals that makes us call people with that 'men'. It's not like people with penises are automatically problematic because they have a dick. We call such people 'men', but what 'makes them a man' is the way they've been socialised or brought up.

And the fact is that Men as a group or an institution have historically oppressed women. Arguably the only reason Men don't and didn't kill women off completely is because a) there would be no way to reproduce, and b) sexual desire in heterosexuals.

It would be one thing to say 'I hate all [human] males' because that would in fact be discriminating by anatomy, but it's wholly another thing to say 'I hate men', which relates specifically to being taught What It Is And Means To Be A Man, which is literally an unwritten but no less real manual or book.

Men disproportionately commit violent acts; historically segregate themselves from women; treat women like property, but for some reason it's wrong to say 'I hate Men' the same way you might say 'I hate the government' or 'I hate politicians'?

There's a common thread in Men, like there's a common thread in a political party, or 'Christians' or any group with a name - Labour, Republican, Solidarity - it's about ideology, a shared viewpoint, a culture.

Why should I not say I hate a systematically oppressive creed of people whose beliefs and behaviour - i.e. taking away women's bodily autonomy like regarding abortion; broadly hold the idea that women are irrational or that women should cover up their bodies and be modest, or are universally nurturing and Should Have Children Because and have innate parenting instincts that not all men have bc 'a child? I already don't want to marry that's too much commitment hahah!'; women are Just Better With Emotions; harassing women and heckling them for sex, etc. - are harmful and flawed?

I like men. I'm bi. There are several men I love and a rare few I respect. A good few of my favourite authors are men.

I also hate Men. Because the same authors whom I love, and the same men I love, and the same men I respect, are still also Men, with all the pitfalls that come of belonging to that class (yes I said class, like a Mage, or a Thief, or a Warrior).

There are bigger things than individuals; but I guess if we've already conflated chromosome data with social constructs then sure just misapply the use of a word in the context of referring to an overarching entity/identity as meaning I Have A Vendetta Against All These Singular Persons Who Happen To Be Thusly Called Because I Cannot Separate The Specific From The General Or Apply Situational Context Or Recognise And Accommodate Varying Frameworks And Alter My Viewpoint To Understand Syntax.

Edit: After seeing a reply on a diff post let me put it like this - men are the medium through which Men-ness is perpetrated. Men, the individuals, are agents of Men-ness. Men-ness speaks through and works through men; they are the tools or the instruments for Men.

It's really easy to blame men for things? Yeah, that's probably because they are doing the thing. But I blame both men, and Men the structure, that tells the men to do this thing.