From: jenk@microsoft.com (Jen Kilmer)
Subject: learning about "feminism" (was: Re: Equal -numbers-)
Date: 06 Jan 93 22:32:19 GMT
Organization: Microsoft Corporation

In article <1993Jan5.224614.3803@netcom.com> payner@netcom.com (Rich Payne) writes:
>From: muffy@remarque.berkeley.edu (Muffy Barkocy)
>-Feminists came along and said "everyone should be
>-free to follow their own interests, and this is not true for women, so
>-things need to be changed."  
>
>I've been considering this some more, and I still cannot agree with
>it. I originally posted that this was not what feminists "came along"
>and said, but upon reflection, this is not even what is being demanded
>today....
>
>This is the only place where I have heard any claims about "everyone should 
>be free to follow their own interests"...

My reaction to this was to wonder where Rich learned about
"feminism". And to wonder where Muffy learned about "feminism".
Where did they get such different ideas...since they're definitely
different.

Then I started thinking about where I learned about feminism. I
learned about feminism as a bad thing - "the feminists want to
take over the world, they want women to work instead of staying
home, they want women doctors, lawyers, soldiers, policewomen...
women SOLDIERS, for Christ's sake! They want to DRAFT WOMEN!!"

I was in junior high at the time, I and I couldn't figure out
why it was okay to draft boys and to "send sons off to war" but
not the girls. I'd also done enough babysitting and housework
to know tht's damn boring and that I'd rather make money than
get spit up on and peed on and pooped on anyday. 

I listened to my mother complain about how she wished she'd gone
to high school and gotten an education and not assumed 'a man'
would take care of her. She talked about how her first husband
walked out one night and never came back. She told me I had to
take care of myself and be able to pay my own mortgage and 
support my own kids because NOBODY is going to do it for me. 

In history classes I learned about people like Margret Sangar
and suffragists and Marlo Thomas - women who thought that 
women didn't have to be women, they could be people and do
whatever they wanted to do. Women could vote. Women didn't
have to have children if they didn't want to. And men could
take care of babies and kids and have feelings and be househusbands
and not have to support a wife and kids. These people were
called "feminists".

My high school counselor encouraged me to become a teacher because
I worked so well with kids. My high school math teacher encouraged
me to continue with math and computer programming. I realize that
while working with kids is rewarding, I knew that I didn't want
to teach...I liked the day care job I got after graduation, but
I could barely support myself in that field, and I wanted a bit
of $ecurity. I liked computers. I majored in computer science.

Classmates, profs, friends, and relatives who didn't think I
should be majoring in cs [major gpa:3.88] would somehow tend
to use the word 'feminist' in describing me. They told me that
I didn't have the right to do what I wanted - that I SHOULDN'T
like computers, and even if I did, I SHOULD get married, have
kids, not work, etc.  

So yeah, I interpret 'feminist' to mean that this gender-role-crap
is crap. We can all do what we have an interest in doing. And
I interpret 'anti-feminist' to mean that it doesn't matter what
an individual WANTS to do, the individual has to be pressed into
the cookie-cutter shape dictated by gender roles. 

The above is meant to speak about my experiences and how I
understand feminism. I majored in cs and got the bare minimum
of social sciences - didn't waste time on women's studies or
anthing else I wasn't required to take or interested in <grin>.
I would be interested in how other people understand feminism too.

-jen


Newsgroups: alt.feminism,soc.men,soc.women