From: rdh@veritas.com (Robert Hartman)
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Re: Kill and Inter the Draft, and "callousness"
Date: 13 Aug 1992 17:06:05 GMT
Organization: VERITAS Software
Distribution: world
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Originator: muffy@anableps.berkeley.edu

In article <16bc6jINNp1i@agate.berkeley.edu> dbailey@cix.clink.co.uk writes:
>This was originally emailed to soc.feminism late on Sunday.  For
>some reason it has not appeared.  In the meantime a series of
>hurtful attacks on me as "callous" have been posted, which this
>would perhaps have forestalled.  I'm hoping that this does get on
>to the conference.
>
>Robert Hartman quotes me (too selectively) as saying:
>>>For those of you who still hang on to this draft issue,
>>>pretending that male draft registration balances women's
>>>issues, may I be permitted to kill the argument by pointing out
>>>that in other parts of the world (which do exist, even on the
>>>net) there is no draft, and no registration.

My point is that this is not why Robert C mentioned the draft issue.
It appears to me that you have misconstrued his point, which was
that feminist responses to men's issues often appear callous.

>Whereas I actually concluded:
>>... The women's issues in society (very similar to those in the
>>US) are not apparently any nearer to solution in Britain as a
>>result of men not being subject to a draft.

Well, this point got lost in all the brouhaha over what appeared to me
to be a side-issue.  If your point is that a willingness to participate
in resolving men's issues might be helpful in resolving women's issues,
I tend to agree.  --Provided of course that equality and mutual respect
can be maintained.  However, in agreeing with you I also I want to make
clear that I don't think that women or men should subordinate the
resolution of their own issues for the sake of each other's.
Where there is a natural confluence of issues, I would hope that
men and women could participate together.  But I don't think
things should be forced, or that one side or the other should be
deplored for not choosing to participate in any given case.

>He continues:
>>As I understand it, the topic was introduced as one example of a
>>"men's issue" that feminism appears to be callous to.  By
>>claiming that men cite this issue mainly to show that it balances
>>women's issues, you digress from the original argument.
>
>In fact the original mention that I responded to was by Tom who wrote:
>
>>>>>In particular I understand when I see the Japanese plan to
>>>>>compensate 100,000 women for being forced into prostitution
>>>>>during the war, when everyone dismisses the fact that millions of
>>>>>boys were seized, taken from their homes, and forced to become
>>>>>murderers (soldiers).

I responded elsewhere to the topic of comfort women, in which I pointed
out the difference between being forced to defend one's country and
being forced to provide sexual services to one's enemy.  There is no
way those women can ever be compensated, but the gesture will do a lot
to ackowledge that what happened to the comfort women was wrong.

I feel as strongly about men who scratch around for anything they can
find to dismiss women's issues as I do about it when I think I see
women dismissing men's issues.

I do not dismiss women's issues, and I expect the same degree of
respect for men's issues from women.  That's my point in a nutshell.

I realize that my tone was pretty harsh.  But then, I regularly take
men to task in this forum.  It was not meant to be personal.  I was
attacking a behavior that I do not condone.  You just happened to be
the person who exhibited it in this case.  I apologize for the distress
my doing so has obviously caused you.

>Since this awful subject regarding treatment of Korean and other
>women had not, to my knowledge been previously mention in this
>conference, I saw its being first used to raise the suffering of
>Japanese soldiers as extremely callous, as well as clearly
>inaccurate, and grossly insulting to the women. It would seem
>that it is not I that have strayed from the subject.  Perhaps I
>might receive an apology?

I see.  There are two different threads here, and it is now clear to me
that you were responding to one while I was responding to another.  Use
of the draft as a way of dismissing the plight of the comfort women is
clearly as callous a thing as I've ever heard of.  Insofar as I
misconstrued your reactions, I again apologize.

>Why is it that certain men on this conference use every
>opportunity to raise the idea of women physically attacking men?
>As an eminent film critic said on tv tonight, introducing 'Play
>Misty for Me' and referring to the frequent use by Hollywood of
>the theme of violent women, it is a perversion of the normal
>reality in society that, by implying that bright and assertive
>are dangerous, or that women are no different from men serves the
>purpose of preventing the advancement of women and to preserve
>the status quo.

Well, I'm not one of those men.  Also, this seems to me like a
digression.  If you want to continue this discussion, let's start a
separate thread.

>Read my words:  THERE IS NO DRAFT IN MY COUNTRY, OR YOURS.

There IS DRAFT REGISTRATION in my country.  This means that
EVERY YOUNG MAN IN MY COUNTRY IS STILL SUBJECT TO THE THREAT.
So although no one is being drafted here at present, the practice,
and its psychological and cultural ramifications for men, is
still very much an issue.  AND YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO DISMISS IT.

STOP IT!!!!!!!

>The largest and oldest established organisation for sexual equality
>in this country, of which I was for several years on the
>Executive Committee, has a constitution which is strictly gender
>neutral.  Membership is open to anyone.  Men form less than one
>percent of the membership, and they are virtually all husbands of
>women active in the organisation.  The fortunate (ie draftless)
>men of this country do not care (or worse) about women's issues
>and I see no convincing evidence that there are any terribly
>difficult specifically "men's problems" (apart from in the
>medical or psychiatic sense) of interest to them.  That seems to
>be the clear opinion of British men and it would seem foolish for
>me to disagree with them.

I don't know what to say about British men.  As I mentioned in other
postings, the reason why I do not participate in the women's movement
here is that I do not get a sense that there is room for me or my
perspective in it.  It's not for any lack of interest or desire to be
supportive on my part.  To me, being supportive entails speaking up
about shortcomings when I see them.  The sense I get is that that would
be particularly unwelcome of me as a man in the feminist movement.  If
there isn't room for my integrity, there isn't room for my work.

>If we are using the word "callous" and backing people who say
>there should be only "human's issues", where is your concern for
>the millions of female babies that are murdered in India so that
>their fathers will not have to pay a dowry, and which is
>concerning me at present?

Again, this strikes me as a side-issue.  I deplore practices such as
those.  I do not participate in them.  What would you have me do?
What are you doing?

> ... About the millions of girls forced to
>suffer clitoridectomy every year, in various places round the
>world, which is also one of my concerns.  Where is your concern
>for the girls of Burma who are kidnapped into forced prostitution
>then executed when they catch AIDS, indeed about the WWII
>"comfort women" whose lives are still so scarred?

Again, these things make me sick to my stomach!  What would you have me
do?  What are you doing?

> ... Nearer home,
>what are you doing about America having one of the lowest
>proportion of women in its legislature of any country?

I am not complicating matters for those women who are in politics by
sticking my nose in where it isn't quite welcome.

> ... What about
>the women of America who have to brave crazed fundamentalists to
>obtain an abortion?  Where is your concern that there are so few
>women on this network, and nowhere warm and welcoming to attract
>them?  While you are taking my time here, couldn't you be doing
>something valuable?

Hmmm.  I think that when look back over my history of postings here,
you'll find that I've done a lot of work toward educating other men in
this forum.  And even if my comments didn't apply to you personally,
I'll bet that there are a few women out there who might have gained
something useful from my blunt and honest feedback--the same blunt and
honest feedback that I occasionally give to men in this forum.

>As you may recall, feminists have been very active in the
>anti-war and nuclear disarmament movements.  I would have thought
>that these were beneficial to men.

Now we're getting to the meat of the issue I was concerned with.
Examples citing instances where women volunteered to participate in war
seem misdirected to me.  Examples of women actively participating in
"men's issues" provide concrete evidence to counter the claim that
feminists are callous to men's issues.

>The large proportion of feminist effort that currently is devoted
>to environmental, anti-racist, anti-AIDS, anti-poverty and other
>movements should also count, I would have thought, as work with
>and somewhat to the benefit and against the oppression of men.
>
>And, to be completely up to date, I think you may find that some
>of the prime reporters who are saving lives in the former
>Yugoslavia, exposing the treatment of captive or minority men, in
>a situation where many jounalists have been killed, are women.
>Would anyone suggest that they are not also feminists?
>
>So where on earth is the evidence that feminists are not
>concerned about issues other than specifically those of women?
>It is just such a self-serving defamation of millions of good women.

These are some very telling examples.  I certainly hope that a
lot of men are reading this.

>>However, I expect feminists who've had their political
>>consciousness raised....
>
>Actually mine has always been high, and gets higher with what I see
>and experience.  The idea that women should raise other women's
>political consciousnesses went out round here about fifteen years
>ago, or earlier.

Why is that?  (Can we start another thread please?)

>>...to be able to distinguish patronizing and divisive approaches
>>from those that actually work.  I found your entire line of
>>argument to be misdirected and patronizing.....
>>
>>It seems that men aren't the only ones who need to do their
>>homework when it comes to understanding the oppression of others.
>
>Please do not patronise me.

Please do not dismiss my honest critiques as mere patronization.

To do so patronizes me.

-r


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