Notes for a talk at ICMI with the following title: Feminism: Not “progressive”. Not “egalitarian”. Not “liberal”. Not “left-wing”.
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Feminism is not “progressive”: It’s regressive; it is based on misandry, sexist discrimination, hate & bias; it suppresses science (esp. on domestic violence, on female violence and on criminology in general); it is conspiracist; it asserts the existence of a non-existent entity “Patriarchy”; it is ultra-conservative, in its treating women as helpless infants. Infantilism about women is conservative, not progressive.
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Feminism is not “egalitarian”: It demands, and achieves, preferential treatment for a privileged group (women). By definition, this is anti-egalitarian.
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Feminism is not “liberal”: To the contrary, it is socially conservative—women are infants, without agency; it is illiberal & authoritarian; it demands increasing state power; it uses the police and institutional power as a tool of social control; it is moralistic & Puritan. More or less by definition, these are central principle of state-enforced illiberalism, social illiberalism and social conservatism.
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Feminism is not “left-wing”: It has no interest in economic fairness (esp. those at the bottom of society); it is openly anti-working-class. Marxism and socialism are, by definition, left-wing because their primary concern is with economic exploitation, wage slavery, alienation of the worker, co-erced theft of their labour, and so on. Feminism is, in no way, “left-wing”. Feminism is a form of Identity Politics. This, in general, is an anti-left-wing position. Furthermore, it is a form of Identity Politics closely aligned with the State, policing, punishment and incarceration (so-called carceral feminism). Again, these are not “left-wing”. They have been traditionally right-wing positions for centuries.
The ICMI20 talk is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZQf1JDa28Y&list=PLOXfnai0-o0I8BtOpmjbn_3FGYBHiV64S
This video is extremely slow and not concise, so you’ll have to excuse everyone for not making it through your 1k view video from 2 years ago from a guy who advertises himself as a mathematician first. (Not to completely knock the guy, he at least has done a decent amount of research on what different sects of ideologies exist in relation to feminism, seems to recognize imaginary arguments (Blank Slatism) and is quick to throw away conspiratorial thought)
Does not define feminis as a “belief in gender equality”, reasons:
1 Feminists reject gender equality, and is anti-equality (hes apparently only going to elaborate on this 20+ minutes in, but at least he knows gender-essentialist feminists are their own bag of worms and tries to narrow the topic to not-quite-blank-slatists)
2 Surveys show low amount of people define themself as feminist but large suport gender equality
2 does not really follow as an argument to dismiss feminism as a belief in gender equality, there’s multiple ways of considering yourself a gender equalitist, in fact, I would say most people consider themselves to view everyone as equal, so gender equalitist becomes a very useless term very quickly due to the sheer amount of different worldviews on what that involves (like this video!). Numbers also don’t exist in a vacuum, we have to consider stuff like the 2014+ conservative movement to argue against feminist ideas, I would personally argue that youtube was a popular space of discourse that had a lot of misrepresentation of feminist principles and end-goals through snappy clips of ‘triggered feminist owned’ videos.
Also as of 2020, 61% of American women defined themselves as feminist, I wouldn’t compare that to schizophrenia??? but of course he says this without actually saying the number of people who identify themselves as feminist
Alright now that we spent 18 minutes talking about what intersectionalist feminism isn’t, we are given a list of ‘mumbo-jumbo jargon’ that he attributes to cult behavior
That’s weird considering I think you could make a list like this for most academic fields,
Claim: there’s no recognizion that females engage in violence as well (19:00)
Tarana Burke has said MeToo is a survivor’s movement
This is by a law professor who studied feminist legal theory writing a long justification for acknowleding women’s acts of violence, this seems like a defacto case of the word contemporary (and is the first thing to come up on a search on ‘feminist acknowledging women violence men’)
Philosophy Tube, did not discover that her girlfriend didn’t perform violence against her when she transitioned and is still a feminist as far as I’m aware
Jess Philips (mentioned in the video) in 2019 multiple times acknowledging female offenders’ existence in parliament as she worked on the latest Domestic Abuse bill
could probably go on, especially because the closer you get to blank slatism you get, you’ll see that it only makes sense to acknowledge female violence but I think it’s established that being a feminist doesn’t neccessitate not believing in female violence. Well that’s annoying I had to provide all that evidence, and all he said for you to accept his terms is “there’s very little recognizion that females engage in violence as well”, when in the description he even cites #MeToohas been pathologizing masculinity as harmful.
Claim: This is mumbo-jumbo, because it is not scientific, this is the mumbo-jumbo jargon of a cult 19:40
Jargon is the specialized vocabulary of any profession, trade, science, or hobby, he has not specified anything that makes it cultish, and thinking soft-sciences has to have hard-science jargon just sounds like stem-brain (courtesy of smbc)
Claim: Misandry & Hate is perpetuated by mainstream feminists (goes on to name ‘very well known people’) 21:20
Judy Bindland(?) sorry i tried googling variations to make sure i got the name right, but I couldn’t find any feminist by this name
Suzanne Moore who whined in 2016 how her movement isnt actually that popular, and I don’t know why we’re mentioning RADFEMs in the first place when we already acknowledged that we wanted to throw these accusations at all of feminism
“many many other examples”, enlightening…
I think this is an appropriate time to use his own excuse of “drops in a small small ocean” exception
Claim: Sexist discrimination against men exist in the education system
He’ll back this claim later I guess (Addendum after the fact: he didnt)
Claim: Feminism suppresses science that goes against its narrative
Example: 5 decades of domestic violence science suppressed, this is called Gender Symmetry Estate
Research on partner violence consistently shows that women are more likely to be victims of severe physical violence, including injury, hospitalization, or death, compared to men. Studies have also consistently found that men are more likely to be the perpetrators of partner violence. These gender differences are supported by extensive empirical evidence and have been replicated across multiple studies and various countries. (CDC, WHO, NIJ, and various various scholarly journals are not just fake - There’s also a very very good paper critiquing Straus and others’ papers, you can read through and be the judge. paper’s author also recognizes violence can go both ways, and woah woah hold on a sec, there’s even substiation of feminism as being misrepresented?? This paper seems like a pretty open and shut case.)
Claim: The reason for the Gender Pay Gap is because men and women have different occupations and different choices, in lifestyles they have different patterns, and this reason is being suppressed
And do you think maybe we should prioritize so that jobs on both sides of the spectrum feel an inclination towards have decent pay? Why do we act like education, and nursery has so little value for instance
Also this isn’t suppressed, and wasn’t in the year he posted this, it’s readily available. (There’s an argument that people like Hillary Clinton misunderstood these studies or the real solution to them, but they have mostly been corrected over the years) occupational segregation should be addressed basically. You’d also think he’d link to things that are suppressed considering it’d be hard to find. idk, consider your evidenceless claim dismissed
Bonus Claim: Gender pay gap reportings are forced by governments
Gender pay gap reporting refers to the practice of collecting and disclosing data on the difference in average earnings between men and women within an organization or across a particular industry or sector, I don’t see an issue with this being enforced.
Claim: the Patriarchy is a conspiracy theory because the leader in some countries and universities and police departments are women
I’m sorry… But this is a clear misunderstanding about what Patriarchy is claiming.
the concept of the patriarchy asserts that societies are organized in a way that systematically privileges men and grants them greater power, authority, and control over resources compared to women. It suggests that this power imbalance is not merely a result of individual choices or preferences, but rather a result of deeply ingrained social, cultural, and institutional structures. This dominance is not limited to individuals but extends to systemic patterns and norms. It’s argued that it perpetuates gender inequality by reinforcing traditional gender roles and expectation, and that it does this because it leads to disparities in opportunities, resources and decision-making power.
It posits women as being objectified and treated as commodities way more often. It argues that the on-the-book laws and cultural nroms perpetuate these unequal power dynamics. It does not imply that all men benefit equally from this system or that women are devoid of agency or power, and modern patriarchy theory generally recognizes that men suffer too under patriarchy (see former paper that I said was a slamdunk)
Claim: They believe in gynocentrism
radfem shit, again I thought we were here to shut down feminism as a whole, especially when the next sentence is “Feminism is Anti-Egalitarian”, says it’s an empirical fact
Claim: Women are given privilege in the legal system, not given the same responsibilities as men
Decidedly full of shit down to any level. What do you want me to say, he made it the fuck up. How is there 20 minutes left
Claim: Feminism sees men as disposable. People only cared when girls were suffering that one time when boys also suffered and in greater amounts
Feminism acknowledges men as being seen as disposable in current society and is one of the movements trying to work towards getting rid of that, it just so happens that feminism believes patriarchy’s traditional-values teaching is the source of this. This also doesn’t make sense if we take his claim that feminism is a minority belief seriously.
Claim: Feminists deny Due Process
Consider your evidenceless claim dismissed
Claim: Feminism is excusing and downplaying perpetrated violence
see https://sci-hub.se/10.1016/j.avb.2011.04.006
Claim: The science on this matter is reasonably clear
you just said it’d been denied for 4-5 decades
Claim: and yet female perpetrated violence is downplayed and male domestic violence is overplayed
This could easily be argued to be part of patriarchial society, but there’s still no source despite such large claims
Claims: These gender gaps exist 30:00
I agree. I think I’ve heard about the existence of almost all of these. But he’s also just saying things without sourcing anything.
So consider your evidenceless claim dismissed.
Claim: No feminist is advocating for anything to be done about these gaps
Just…
Claim: Feminism is neither liberal, because it treats women as children
didnt even elaborate how this time, let alone name real examples
Claim: Undermine due process
doesnt elaborate how
Claim: Suppress freedom of speech because they say that they are being sexistly oppressed and use that to shut down free speech
I don’t think they challenge the 1st amendment, but while I have you, Paradox of Tolerance
Claim: expanding state power
feminism is when you want the state to do its job I guess
Claim: Sex work is considered a form of oppression under patriarchy
There is a very loud SWERF group in feminism but I think most feminists already have come around to see that it’s best for it to be legalized and protected
Claim: Mobbing/Vigilante Methods/Cancelling is illiberal
Paradox of Tolerance, and while there are obviously instances where I disagree with mob-rule type decisions, people generally rile up to hold others accountable - I don’t agree with
retributive justice and hope society in general comes around, but that is not a feminism issue.
Claim: Authoritarian Control & Obedience
cant name a single policy that furthers this narrative
Claim: Feminism is not leftwing because Marxist-connected feminism is on the decline
I have no fucking idea whether or this is the case, outside of intersectional feminist spaces almost all critique Capitalism as part of what needs something done with
Claim: There’s actually a lot more women doing super great, it’s just that men are the top 0.01% while there are way more women below them [in like the top 10% i guess?] and Theresa May was a conservative prime minister
I don’t see how the first part would make feminism not left wing, but yeah there can be conservatives that think they’re feminist despite ignoring big feminist ideas I guess
Well that was a fun thing noone will read, my job here is done
I read it and thought you made some salient points. There’s aspects I disagree with and I think we could have an interesting discussion around them. But I don’t have the patience to create multiple comments with sources that you have, I’ve done it all before and really don’t want to get down in those reeds. I didn’t watch the video either, so I’m going to assume that the video itself was poorly structured.
“There’s also a very very good paper critiquing Straus and others’ papers”
Could you give me the title of this specific paper (I tried clicking the link but it is saying the connection is not private - if it is the one I am thinking of, there is a good chance that Straus has already responded to it. Here’s Straus defending the scale https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22865343/ ). On this point though, I guess it comes down what methodology you feel is better. The organisations you mentioned look at arrest statistics. Whereas papers that find parity look at factors that may be impacting men (such as the theory they are less likely to report, and even less likely to see it as abuse when it is happening to them - some research backs this up). Erin Prizzey who set up the first domestic abuse shelter has been on record saying it is an issue with learned patterns of behaviour, rather than a gendered issue. For instance, was this study covered in your debunking https://www.researchgate.net/publication/261543769_References_Examining_Assaults_by_Women_on_Their_Spouses_or_Male_Partners_An_Updated_Annotated_Bibliography or this https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2968709/. There are many studies on this. There are reasons to doubt the CTS measure that Straus employs, but there are also reasons to doubt arrest statistics as men are less likely to be a part of arrest statistics, some would theorise this is because they are less likely to be reported and seen as less serious by society as a whole https://link.springer.com/epdf/10.1007/s11199-018-0949-x. There are more studies demonstrating this as well, though I would have to find them but here’s a couple https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666518220300061?via%3Dihub, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0749597820303630#:~:text=The%20moral%20typecasting%20framework%20proposes,facilitate%20categorizing%20women%20into%20the. I don’t think it is unreasonable to assume that these aspects may skew the statistics on perpetration rates between men and women.
“And do you think maybe we should prioritize so that jobs on both sides of the spectrum feel an inclination towards have decent pay? Why do we act like education, and nursery has so little value for instance”
In regards to this point. I wholeheartedly agree that education and nursery should offer more pay, but I think there is different value other than financial. It is also worth noting that the market decides the price. There is only costs in teaching and nursery etc. I really don’t think it is reasonable to expect their pay to be comparable to companies that make mobile phones (for example) at costs of around £700.00 a pop (that people willingly pay), this isn’t so much a decision on what fields are worth more but on market demand, that women make most of the contributions to.
“Gender pay gap reporting refers to the practice of collecting and disclosing data on the difference in average earnings between men and women within an organization or across a particular industry or sector, I don’t see an issue with this being enforced.”
I do, average pay doesn’t really give indication as to the factors. My company (in an attempt to close the gap) a few years ago put my team on the same pay. I thought this was great as it resulted in a pay rise. However, we where we were put on the same pay. My colleague, who had worked her way through the levels and was on more money than men due to the fact she had worker harder was now being paid the same as me who hadn’t put that effort in. This wasn’t fair on her. I don’t believe the mere fact of measuring averages is an effective way of measuring fairness.
I could touch on more of your points but - from your response - it does seem like your responding to a poorly constructed video and I don’t have the time or inclination to discuss these fully.
Thank you for your input, however. I found it an interesting read.
Assuming your colleague had gotten raises through merit, it’s obviously silly to roll that back, I would’ve thought that they’d account for raises given that it wasn’t actually implied that they had to act on this, just disclose the difference, and this reminds me I’m probably foolish in imagining such a thing would just be itself in a vacuum (ie not fuck up things that are kinda encouraging people to do their job better)
Sorry for the long wait, “Gender and types of intimate partner violence: A response to an anti-feminist” (literature review) by Johnson MP. in 2011, which was a year before
I use this paper most of all to show what feminist academics thought even 10 years ago, since the video seemed to still have these misconceptions, and they mostly argue against Straus for misrepresentations and ill conclusions of others’ works and beliefs.
Your second study doesn’t seem to support the point based on its abstract, from point a to f
First Study: References Examining Assaults by Women on Their Spouses or Male Partners: An Updated Annotated
is a bit of a mess, as most of the things citing it doesn’t really use it for the purpose of saying “women are as physically aggressive as men”, and it for some reason brings a child-abuse study(?), a bunch of anecdotes, and an internet survey from the middle of a sociologist’s book (not paper) up in its first part, but this put me down a further rabbithole of Gender Symmetry discussion which I hadn’t delved into before, 1 2 and I’ll admit it at the very least doesn’t seem like a settled debate, so I retract what I have to say about Gender Symmetry itself since idk anymore
I fully agree, (think my wall even says so) but from any not-radfem feminist perspective, this seems to be parts we acknowledge, it’s just also viewed as caused by Patriarchal society as it previously stood and perpetuated by how it currently stands
Thanks for your input as well, it forced me to learn a little more about what I don’t know
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