From: histlib@erich.triumf.ca (Mary Olin)
Subject: Re: men's issues vs. women's issues
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Organization: TRIUMF: Tri-University Meson Facility
Date: 25 Jul 92 05:44:11 GMT

In article <14odc7INN7s6@agate.berkeley.edu>, uunet!infmx!robert@ncar.UCAR.EDU (Robert Coleman) writes...
>slarsen@verdi.helios.nd.edu (susan larsen) writes:
>
>>I think of life as a hike in the woods.
>[...]
>>Now he stands at the
>>raging river and he looks over to his companion for
>>assistance.  Well, the companion is not by his side
>>because she is still about a quarter mile back struggling
>>to get out of the last ravine.
>
>>So are men and women of today really at the same spot
>>in the woods? Have we really achieved a level of
>>equality where we as a people can stand together to
>>fight a common foe?
>
>>Or, do women still have some catching up to do?
>
>  The key point here is that you believe men are far ahead on the
>same path, as if both have had to face the same problems; in fact,
>men and women are on different paths, and everywhere the woman has a
>ravine to climb up, the man has a cliff to climb down.
>
>	Do you envy my (mostly imagined, but that's another story)
>ability to scale to the highest positions of power that you are
>excluded from because of your gender?  Well, you can have it.  I
>don't want that power, thanks.  I'd much rather watch my children
>grow and love me, without feeling that I'm failing them for not
>providing for them to the best of my ability; a simple pleasure of
>life that men have been excluded from for generations,
>
>	It's very easy to look at "the enemy" and see only their
>advantages, maybe you'll find that our progress isn't very different,
>that our problems are linked to your problems, and our problems are
>worth your time for that reason if nothing else.


I, personally, have found your point of view very appealing, Robert. I
would love to be able to consider myself a humanist rather than a
feminist. It looks as though your basic point is that if one group in
a society is oppressed, all are oppressed, and I agree. It is
important for us to be aware of the effects of inequality on those who
are seen as the dominant group.

What I haven't seen you addressing, though, is the fact that the degree
of oppression is not necessarily the same. Let's take your ideas to more
obvious cases. Would you expect the blacks of South Africa or the women
of Saudi Arabia to be as sympathetic to the problems of the dominant
groups in their countries as to their own?

There's also the ugly fact that there still exist in our culture men
who do actively try to exclude women from their traditional power
base.  Women, on the other hand, do not (at least not in any sort of
systematic manner) try to exclude men from child-rearing and other
traditionally female roles.

How about a compromise. When we women are talking with men like you,
we call ourselves humanists and work together on our mutual problems.
When, on the other hand, we're talking to those in our culture who are
the source of the problems we both have, we women and men like you all
call ourselves feminists. One name for dealing with areas where the
oppression is equal, another for areas where it's not.

Mary



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