Let's Not Kill Feminism

I recently read an article on the Canada Free Press (CFP) titled "Feminism is hateful & hated. Let's kill it!" by the conservative Kelly O'Connell. The point of the article was to argue against feminism and explain how it was bad through its historical growth and how it has effected the dynamic between men and women. Connell is a women who encourages patriarchy. The whole thing left me with one massive headache. This is a quote that sums up the end of her argument. Read it and see what I mean.

"The answer to the question—“If the Women’s Movement is Dense, Obnoxious & Contradictory, Why Does it Persist?”: is—Because we let it. America is in desperate need to revive its respect for men, fatherhood, polite society and masculine-based religion. This can only happen when men themselves stand up for their dignity and demand a return to roles as leaders in politics, religion, family and society. Until this happens, expect women to walk all over wimpy men until confronted by real men."

Throughout the whole article she talks about how disrespectful women now are to men and how feminism inspires women to be lesbians and how men need to step up to take back their place. It was a painful read, but at least it provided me some insight to how people who oppose feminism think. And that insight is horrifying.

Women who oppose feminism somewhat horrify me. Feminism, at its basics, is about rights of every kind for women. While there are different groups and movements and degrees at feminism, to say you disregard feminism as whole because you actually disagree with one part----like men who discredit feminism because of the radfem movement---is so, so, so detrimental to women.

I feel like a lot of people who dislike feminism or women's rights movements have never had to deal with issues that many women specifically or usually deal with, and I'm not talking just about periods are finding the right size of bra. Like the issues of having to be wary of walking alone at night, or facing sexual harassment at work from clients or co-workers. Feminism helps deal with those problems, either by educating people about them or providing help for women who need it.

Feminists, are, at the core, people who care about women. For example, Planned Parenthood is a huge advocate about sexual and reproductive health care, and they primarily deal with women. A lot of people hate it because of abortions and birth control---but I doubt that any of those people who disagree with it have ever been placed in a situation where having access to such is critical.  PP helps with women who are in those situations, and that can mean the world to these women. That's feminism: helping women who can't get help in a world where feminism is told that it doesn't matter. Where women don't matter.

Still, people are going to laugh and mock. You can look at that in three ways: horrible, because they don't think women need their rights or have already "attained" them; good, because that means they've never been in a personal situation where they've had to deal with violence or injustice towards women; or just plain evil, where they want to rip women down because they think it's their right as a man. Some may think that's just ridiculous, but they are really men who think that way. And there are women who have to live with those men.

So let's not kill feminism. Because if we kill it? Women go down, too.