Where are the EXJW Feminist Philosophers?

by Luther bertrand 90 Replies latest watchtower scandals

  • slimboyfat
    slimboyfat

    Nothing is "entirely". Of course there are some benefits to men. I am stating an extreme view in part as a response to what I see is the one sided discourse that dominates the subject. Common discourse would have us believe that equality benefits everyone and harms no one. This is obviously nonsense. The power given to women by equality is (largely) power taken from men. We shouldn't pretend this is not the case. A more honest argument would acknowledge that giving women equal rights involves lowering the power of men, but that it's nevertheless the right thing to do.

    There is a similar dishonesty that surrounds the gay marriage debate. Advocates of gay marriage (I am in favour in case there's any doubt) often say that heterosexuals don't lose anything by supporting gay marriage. I think that is simply not true. Heterosexual couples do lose something when gay marriage is recognised. They lose the privileged position that their family structure has traditionally enjoyed. That's a hell of a lot to lose actually! An honest argument would acknowledge that loss but would argue that it's the right thing to do anyway and that society will find new ways of structuring itself.

    People who really understand the implications of equality, like Germaine Greer and Norman Mailer, know that it necessarily involves losers as well as winners. Equality is not a slight adjustment it is a revolution.

    Pretending that women's rights and gay rights is an unqualified good for everyone is dishonest. There are losses as well as gains an honest discussion should be open to exploring these.

  • cofty
    cofty

    In the western world the rights revolution has mostly happened already.

    A minority wish it had waited for them to join the fight and they behave as if their work is all still ahead of them.

  • slimboyfat
    slimboyfat

    I don't know I think it's only just started. Equality doesn't just mean giving women the same opportunities as men. It means restructuring society in a way that suits women as well as men. You can't measure that with statistics. It involves huge ruptures not small adjustments. Gender equality is arguably one of the most significant developments in millennia. To think it's done and dusted in a century or so is not realistic. If it's like an earthquake then we've only felt the first jolt. The quake itself has seconds to run, the wreckage then assessed, a plan for a new city to emerge at the other side.

    How many of the world's richest people are women? And how many of those inherited from their father? When there are as many self-made billionaires as men then maybe "equality" will have been achieved. But actually I think real equality would involve change so fundamental that I doubt there would even be billionaires in such a scenario.

  • cofty
    cofty
    How many of the world's richest people are women?

    Who cares? 99.999999999% of men are not billionaires.

    In terms of things that actually matter in the lives of ordinary men and women the rights evolution in the west has largely happened already.

  • slimboyfat
    slimboyfat

    You sound like you wish it were all over. If you really believed it why so shrill?

    Why does it matter that fewer than 10% of billionaires are women and most of those inherited their wealth? Because capitalism knows no more concrete measure of power.

    Capitalism itself is both sustained by and ultimately undermines patriarchy imo. The force that drives our age will also be its destroyer. Unless someone sets off the bomb.

  • cofty
    cofty
    You sound like you wish it were all over. If you really believed it why so shrill?

    ad hominem yet again.

  • slimboyfat
    slimboyfat
    Well I am giving you reasons why it's not over (crucially wealth, the ultimate measure of power in capitalism) and instead of engaging you keep repeating as if a mantra, "it's over already".
  • cofty
    cofty

    You're complaining about the shortage of female billionaires.

    I can't find it in me to care.

  • TD
    TD

    sbf,

    How many of the world's richest people are women? And how many of those inherited from their father? When there are as many self-made billionaires as men then maybe "equality" will have been achieved.

    So I take it you were less than impressed with Ms. Sandberg?

  • slimboyfat
    slimboyfat

    TD I think we need to allow for the experience that some women do genuinely prefer a patriarchal system. They don't just appear to, they actually do (although I even doubt the usefulness of such a distinction). Patriarchy has benefits for women as well as drawbacks. It provides clear rules and roles whereas equality can be more chaotic and uncertain. It can provide security whereas equality can involve precariousness. Some women as well as men are always going to be attracted to that, just as fascism holds an appeal for some people especially in uncertain times.

    Along these lines I really enjoyed Andrew Holden's discussion of JWs as representing a retreat from the modern world and its "freedoms" into the "certainties" of the past, including patriarchy. It got me to read Erich Fromm's Escape From Freedom, an excellent book for any former JW to read when trying to make sense of the conflicted sense of loss as well as gains in emerging from a totalising system.

    http://www.lancaster.ac.uk/fass/resources/sociology-online-papers/papers/holden-averting-risk.pdf

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