what do you think about female empowerment?

[Zacharie]

Regarding to sexuality and gender of course.

i have my own controversial ideas but i just want to know others ideas about it. what is it exactly? do you feel it's good or bad for us as LGBT+?

[Yep, me]

This entirely depends on context for me.

[Zatarra]

Hopefully it will put a further dent into toxic machismo attitudes, as men (typical alpha-macho guys) will be more careful of locker room banter and such in the workplace. 

That will hopefully end up benefiting (trickle down benefit?) sex-repulsed aro aces (non-libidoist) like myself i.e. less sex-talk, crude jokes and machismo in the workplace.

 

[Yep, me]

Just now, Zatarra said:

Hopefully it will put a further dent into toxic machismo attitudes, as men (typical guys) will be more careful of locker room banter and such. 

That will hopefully end up benefiting sex-repulsed aro aces (non-libidoist) like myself. Also more caution initiating workplace romances since you wont want your 'attention' to be misinterpreted as harassment.

I find it better to work with female co-workers - I cant stand typical male environments with toxic machismo.

I wouldnt mind seeing machismo "alpha" types walking on egg shells either. I do favour female empowerment for the principle...however as an sex-repulsed aro-ace male I am also hoping for "trickle down" benefits for me as well i.e. less sex-talk, crude jokes and machismo in the workplace.

It won’t sadly, in fact it will help the toxic machismo attitudes. Why? Because men are told by our culture to challenge others, and be dominant, we need to be empowering everyone in order to fix society.

[MoraDollie]

26 minutes ago, Zacharie said:

what is it exactly? do you feel it's good or bad for us as LGBT+?

It's about having women or feminine-based identities feel good about themselves and feel like they are at least equitable towards men (equal and equitable are two very different things). Considering the fact that mass media is constantly pushing bullshit garbage about women with their everyday image through advertisements, social messages through movies and TV shows and the like, we need it. 

 

"Empowerment" is NOT "DOWN WITH MEN! BURN THE PATRIARCHY" No, that line of thinking is apart of the radical feminist movement. 

 

It's not inherently related to the LGBT community. 

[Zacharie]

24 minutes ago, Kumoku said:

It's not inherently related to the LGBT community. 

No but it definitely afects it. thanks for your input.

[andreas1033]

Everything in this world turns into hate groups.

 

So, no matter if its meant as something good, it normally gets turned into something people use to hate with.

 

Personally i do not care what females do, as i its nothing to do with me. I am glad my gen of males whom became adults in 90's in europe, were really the first passive gen of males. The side effect of that is females being more aggressive in society. I do not care, as like i said, i have nout to do with them. Being totally asexual, i have nout to do with females, so i do not really care, about such a thing as what this thread is about.

 

People should be glad, you all have a chance at an education, and you can if you live in 1st world country today, make your own life. This a thing the majority can do, and its best for everyone.

 

But generally speaking giving more power to a group, turns that group into a hate group really. Its the human way. I am just glad, i have nothing to do with people in general, or being asexual, i have anything to do with females in general.

 

Thats why i always say, i do not belong to any group, people in groups tend to end up hating. Groups of humans tend to end up becoming hate groups, so you should be careful, what group you end up belonging too.

[TheAP]

Moved from Intersectionality to Philosophy, Politics and Science.

 

TheAP

Intersectionality moderator

[Zacharie]

1 minute ago, TheAP said:

Moved from Intersectionality to Philosophy, Politics and Science.

 

TheAP

Intersectionality moderator

thanks mod. i didn't knew where to put it honestly

[Lichley]

Why can’t we all just be equal. 😔

[Zacharie]

45 minutes ago, Lichley said:

Why can’t we all just be equal. 😔

that's the thing. I think we are NOT the same at all because differences exist but that doesnt make any of them less valuable. we are not the same but we are equal in value, physically and as identities. is finding the value on our differences as humans, whatever we identify as, including LGBT+ individuals.

[Yeast]

Where I live, women generally earn lower wages than men do for the same jobs and tend to be promoted less. I'd like to see everybody offered the same opportunities regardless of age, race or sex. I hear about "freedom" all the time but what it really seems to mean is freedom of enterprise. Personal freedom depends entirely on cultural norms. These norms are the things that have to change before there is any real freedom in my country.

[RK800]

I think it's important.

[CaptainYesterday]

[deleted]

[CaptainYesterday]

[deleted]

[Yatogami]

I feel both male and females are equal already. The empowerment stuff is just, I do not know how to express it properly... BUT. I do feel that it does more harm than good. Because it tends to do the opposite in practice. It teaches zero tolerance, rather than patience and understanding. It convinces women they are exactly like men to the point of casualties. It teaches women, men are pigs who just want to take advantage of them. It teaches them conspiracy theories like the wage gap, and that there is somehow a conspiracy to not hire women in STEM. When it is really just biological preference.

 

So much of this is disproven, but taught as fact anyways. It is like people cannot think for themselves anymore, and need Big sister feminism to tell them how to live. Because Big sister feminism has drilled fear and paranoia into them since they were young and impressionable.

[Guest]

On 3/15/2018 at 4:56 PM, Zatarra said:

Hopefully it will put a further dent into toxic machismo attitudes, as men (typical guys) will be more careful of locker room banter and such. 

I don't see a problem with locker room banter. If it remains in the locker room. Making it public opinion, is where it becomes a problem.

 

I mean I can think of Trump's banter. Nothing he said was offensive to me. Who he was, and what position he was in, made it unacceptable. Not the banter.

 

Also I think workplaces benefit from balance.

 

I've worked in all male and all female workplaces, and can honestly say both extremes have their drawbacks.

 

Many all female workplaces, have catty and gossipy environments. Last one I worked in, was me working around women complaining about men all day. I had to play the dumb male, to fit in, or risk offending the women who felt all men were stupid and gross. I refused, so became "intimidating". Reverse genders, and a woman in the same male dominated environment, will literally have to command her respect to get a crumb of it.

 

All male environments, typically have those toxic macho attitudes within them. Blending  bit of both, forces one to pay attention to the other. If  the genders are somewhat even, you will have no choice but to pay close attention to harassment and the like, which will often occur for say, a woman working in a male dominated environment.

[Epitaph]

I've no qualms with it other than the issue of not knowing when to stop. That's where the more radical feminists come from. Any social movement works exactly the same as a business. The most important thing to remember if you own a business is your overhead. Every business no matter how small or big has a ceiling where upward momentum ends. You can go no higher, it all goes downhill from then on. The difference with social groups is the momentum isn't money, it's goals and objectives. you can only achieve so many of the core important objectives before you hit the ceiling and lose momentum.

 

 

[Sally]

7 hours ago, Malum said:

 It teaches them conspiracy theories like the wage gap, and that there is somehow a conspiracy to not hire women in STEM. When it is really just biological preference.

 

Biological preference?  Do you mean that employers prefer to hire men?  Or do you mean that women prefer not to work in STEM jobs because of their biology?  

[CaptainYesterday]

[deleted]

[Sally]

STEM is not about things, it's about ideas and concepts.  

[Zatarra]

1 hour ago, Perspektiv said:

I don't see a problem with locker room banter. If it remains in the locker room. Making it public opinion, is where it becomes a problem.

The problem arises when they expect you to join in ...and as an aro-ace you have nothing to contribute.

then you become the target of their mockery/ridicule/homophobic abuse

[Guest]

23 hours ago, CaptainYesterday said:

Women have every right that men do and a few more. 

Yeah but men get to pee standing up (without their pee going down their legs) so they obviously have it better.

[Yatogami]

1 hour ago, Sally said:

Biological preference?  Do you mean that employers prefer to hire men?  Or do you mean that women prefer not to work in STEM jobs because of their biology?  

Biological preference, as in certain genders prefer certain fields of study for their careers. Nothing to do with who they want for hire. The amount of females in STEM, are not proportionate. Even if discrimination existed, it isn't enough to account for the difference. Yes, discrimination has a limit to how much it can "prevent" from happening in the work place without violating the law and being shut down. Generally put, Females are more likely to be nurses or psychologists. While men are more likely to be mechanical engineers, or architects. This is not to say that women cannot do it, but that women prefer not to do it. There are of course, always outliers. 

 

55 minutes ago, Sally said:

STEM is not about things, it's about ideas and concepts.  

STEM literally means "science, technology, engineering, and mathematics" Generally, these fields do not include people, unless of course you are in a specific field such as medical science. Which is dominated by women as much as men. Captain was discussing the fact that men prefer "Thing" orientated jobs. "Thing" being an umbrella term for working with your hands, and constructing physical projects. Rather than working with "People", which refers to helping people and improving their lives, their psychology, and the like. 

 

Sorry if I am not clear in my explanation. 

[Polygon]

It's good. It's a partition out of a greater goal of having everyone feel empowered. So much of society and culture is built upon groups and categorizations, so although it might sound good in principle that we shouldn't have to define ourselves by what groups we're in, we're still very much attached to these things because... well... "societyyyyy, maaaaaan". It seems like the ultimate aim of empowerment is to shed the idea that particular groups must behave in particular ways. Putting forward the idea "you can do x, you can do y, you don't have to do z, etc." seems like a good thing to me, at least on the surface. This extends to everyone: ex -  Men should be able to share their emotions, be encouraged into nursing/teaching/female-dominated fields if that's their passion, and should have issues of domestic/sexual abuse taken seriously. 

[Epitaph]

1 hour ago, Zatarra said:

The problem arises when they expect you to join in ...and as an aro-ace you have nothing to contribute.

then you become the target of their mockery/ridicule/homophobic abuse

Not to discredit, but being ace doesn't have much to do with it. You can be an otherwise common run of the mill person and not join in banter and you'll get the looks and the treatment anyway. At that point, if you happened to announce that you were ace, then really, it's more like adding fuel to the fire.

[Zatarra]

9 hours ago, E is for E said:

Not to discredit, but being ace doesn't have much to do with it. You can be an otherwise common run of the mill person and not join in banter and you'll get the looks and the treatment anyway. At that point, if you happened to announce that you were ace, then really, it's more like adding fuel to the fire.

being a run of the mill person - you would have some clue of what all the fuss was about. Being aro-ace and sex repulsed the banter sounds like an alien code to me that I cant decipher. It makes no sense and I cant seem to fake conversation.

You make a good point, that is precisely why I never announce my asexuality. As for my lack or participation or interesting stories of exploits/conquests...I just go with 'health complications' implying I am impotent/broken...that seems to ward off the homophobic abuse.

 

Back to my original point, I have noticed when there are more female co-workers around the 'banter' sharply declines if not disappear entirely

 

[Guest Jetsun Milarepa]

I've gotten so fed up with 'male' and 'female'....it would be such a relief to just have 'people' - then it would be the best person for the job, not the dominant male or the token woman syndrome. Unfortunately, overloaded hormones combined with competitiveness will prevent that for a while yet.

[Guest]

12 hours ago, Zatarra said:

The problem arises when they expect you to join in ...and as an aro-ace you have nothing to contribute.

then you become the target of their mockery/ridicule/homophobic abuse

I just use wit to put such people in their place. Such people are typically insanely insecure.

 

I don't think it has any place in the workplace, but in say a sports team or locker room, this is the norm.

[Comrade F&F]

I'd argue that it's a stipulation from societal norms. Very conservative environments will preach and honor a submissive and passive woman; but those traits do not work in a competitive environment. We've come a long way for gender equality, but we've still got some ways to go.* 

 

As for STEM, I have noticed a pretty depressing trend in the STEM study centers. My female classmates will say, "I'm too dumb," or "I don't belong here." I have never, ever heard this come from a male classmate. Not once. There is also, regrettably, an unspoken fear within the STEM community. Most of the people teaching these fields are old, white-haired men. Now don't get me wrong, a great deal of them are highly respectable and bastions of knowledge. But it goes without saying that I've been warned that as a young woman I should be wary around all these men. I don't believe for a second that any of my professors have ill intentions - but yet, that fear still exists to others.

 

*Gender equality is not only for women, but men. Men should have the comfort of being passive if that is what their identity is, and not forced into macho norms.