Men are/not oppressed

When the very heavy topic of women’s oppression is raised, particularly in the context of an oppressed woman trying to communicate that to a man who is skeptical at best its acknowledged, but only in a subtle manner.

What I commonly hear, after dragging a thought process out for far too long is “yes women are oppressed but men are also oppressed”.

I’m going to go through explaining the difference between oppression in terms of sex and oppression in general.

We have to look at our society now in terms of social class.  Women and men are two distinct social classes in our society.  Men as a social class are not oppressed for being male.  Women however, are.

Men can experience oppression, in fact the majority of men on this planet do face some kind of institutionalized oppression, often alongside women.  But they do not suffer the sexual oppression that women do.  A man may be suffering from every disadvantage and belong to every other marginalized grouping of people on the planet and he remains male, and as such will not face the oppression that women do.

So yes, men, I acknowledge there are various ways in which you can be marginalized and oppressed as individuals, but as men you are not.  You have privilege in that one area of life.

What freaks me out is that a person can be so argumentative about whether or not women are oppressed, and yet pull at the end of an argument when denial is no longer an option, the “yeah but men experience bad stuff too”.  If its so obvious that women faced these problems on a societal level, why have we been arguing to begin with?

Its that kind of willful sidestepping of any legitimate grievance that women have about their experiences as women that shows the nature of just how deep the socialization goes.

The feminist value of itouch?

This interesting bit of information was brought to my attention by a video my friend Diana Boston made on youtube.

As feminists who oppose the sexual exploitation of women, its not an easy road to travel.  You will be personally attacked, you will be shamed, your sexuality will come under fire.  But this will happen to you if you’re not a self-identified feminist.  If you are a person who in any way expresses some kind of hesitance about the full on pornification of our society or expresses concern that legal models of prostitution do not eliminate harm associated with prostitution you will be attacked, shamed and smeared and HATED.

You are against freedom, you are a misogynist, you are responsible for the murder and torture of prostituted people, you have sexual hang ups, you’re an “authoritarian” who wants everyone to conform to your world view, a moralist, someone who looks down on prostitutes, privileged, someone who refuses to speak to prostitutes (nevermind knowing prostitutes and their lives intimately from family, friends and neighborhood women who influenced your ideas against prostitution in the first place), etc.  All feminists are familiar with these tactics.  They are made by desperate people who don’t want factual information to be spread regarding their favorite pastime, pimping women.

So when Steve Jobs decides he doesn’t want porn apps on his technology it should come as no surprise that liberal media slams him for it.

Read the article here

The writer, Mr Ryan Tate eloquently states to Steve Jobs that he doesn’t want freedom from porn, because porn is just fine and his wife agrees with him!  Is there anything more condescending than some guy who could give a fuck about women’s natural concern over pornography being EVERYWHERE AT ALL TIMES touting his wife’s opinion as some kind of deal sealer?

“Well my wife who married my misogynist ass apparently likes porn too!”  As if women aren’t capable of being completely and utterly PRO sexism.

Steve responds to him pretty politely even though this guy doesn’t really deserve it, and tells him that he might feel differently about porn if he had kids.

Of course Ryan Tate’s children would never be exposed to porn and its not going to hurt them if people in his house are watching teen gang bangs and incest play.

I’m not really sure why its such a big deal that apple doesn’t want to have porn applications available.  In a society where porn is on billboards, on magazine covers, on television, on Rite Aid advertisements.  Is it such an imposition on freedom that you buy something else on the free market that you don’t need to carry around like a technogeek who is just so logged in and so ahead of the times?

I think of these pro capitalist, pro exploitation privileged dudes getting so butthurt that on one piece of equipment they can’t have sexual access to women at all times and I think of women being kidnapped in Juarez, gang raped, mutilated and set on fire after being stolen from the sweatshops that make little pieces of trinkets for these American pigs and know that the world will be a better place when the oppressed are put in power.