Our Shared Shelf discussion

Hi everyone!
I’m writing to you because I’ve been wondering about something for a while, and I would like to hear your opinion.

Don’t you think that the world “feminism” is a bit reductive when referred to everything we’re fighting for?

I’ve often found myself in need of explaining to people that “feminism” is not only about women’s rights (even if this is a big part of the cake) but also about the rights of men, children, homosexual people, trans people and every human being and it also focuses on animals and the environment.

But everywhere I go I keep on meeting people who don’t know what an amazing movement this is, who just think it is something that has to do with the power of women over men or something similar (I know it used to be this way somewhere but that definitely is not what we want here!).
I know for sure that many of these people would be happy to fight with us for a better world and to become more sensitive about the subjects that are so dear to us.
And I have to admit that often I have wondered to myself “why is it gender-oriented if we are fighting for anybody?”

Therefore, as our purpose is that of reaching as many people as possible, I was thinking about how powerful could be the use of another word (without any mention to gender in it) to express this movement, and how could be much more easier to make people listen.

Just imagine for example a man who has grown in a culture where men are seen as better (and/or have more rights) than women, but has wondered if this is actually true. If he happens to read something about “feminism” in my opinion his mind would be soon “distracted” by the gender mention in it, so he would just consider it an extremism, probably make a laugh, and would go on reading something else. But what if he read a word that has to do with human beings’ rights for example? He would be a human being himself, so his attention would probably be drawn to the subject.

I apologize if there was another discussion about this topic and ask you please to link it down here so I can read your opinions, otherwise please let me know what you think!

I’ve been wondering the same thing!! My mom has said that feminism is synonymous to just being a good human being, and not every good human being calls themselves a feminist. But I believe that’s why I’m a feminist. I try to be a good human being, and I’ve found that everything feminism stands for is also what I stand for, so I guess I fall under the label of “feminist”. I believe that’s what feminism is, doing your best to be a good and kind to others, and letting people be what/whoever it is they feel they are.

Some people prefer not to call themselves feminists because of the negative connotation the word has, but I call myself a feminist to counteract that connotation. To show that feminism doesn’t have to be the way they think it is. Feminism encompasses all the wonderful things we are trying to do and condenses it into one word, and the fact that you are trying to explain this to other people is fantastic! I hope this helped? If not we can be confused together😂❤️

Ciao Bella :)

I love what you said because I also thought about something like that, is "Feminism" a relevant word for the cause ?

For many reason, I believe that : Yes, it is!
the first is we, if I can say we, because as a men I feel oftenly rejected as a cisgender, may be being a transgender male (female...🤔) will allow me more respect or even attention. We fight for the empowerment of the Women... And for Gender Equality. The both genders technically, recognized as gender in an administration, for example, when you fill a form, are "Man or Woman". So it's relevant to talk about Feminism and equality for women... But you have to consider, the transgenders who are women considered or vice-versa. Then it become hard not to forget someone, but I have to confess I have a deep admiration for our OSS Team Leader 🙈 who always find the right word to transcript our emotions and our revendications. Then it's also being a part of the history of women's right!

In and other hand : "No, it's not", because it's an exclusive term, regarding to the diversity of the people who claims rights and equality and it's may be offendent for the people who feel concerned by theses rights. So, I sometimes wonder about a new name, may-be a new vision, of what should be feminism without being a "must-do" theory, but something we can discuss and will allows good ideas to emerge, because, I feel that "anger" is not a good solution, even if it gives you an extraordinary power 😉 May be the old quarrels are sometimes a brake to progress...

What kind of word do you propose ??

I meant we can be confused together 🙄

If you are referring to OSS, it is more of a book club than a movement but it is a gateway to feminism. What you are referring is more of a human rights movement.

Feminism challenges the ideology that men reigns supreme and tries to break into the 'men's circle'. In other words, the professional zone. Men have obviously been in the work industry for much longer than the average women. The understanding of the work environment differs for men and women; physically and emotionally. Human rights movement tries to bring equality to impartiality such as apartheid, colonialism, slavery, and even patriarchy.

So if you want to bring equality to patriarchy, you are actually a human right activist, not a feminist. The truth is that feminism have reached a point of saturation in the first world countries. The only issue is that the ideologies haven't been absorbed by men in the lower ranks of society. That's why the growth is slow because the area of focus isn't reaching out to those who are ignorant, you are still reaching out to those who are already in the knowing. Obviously, not much is gonna change. Just my opinion.

@Heather : 🤔 Yes we can get confused together ... 😉

@Benarji : Not referring to OSS as a movement, only to the supreme Leader whoes rightness in her words are really empowering !

Btw, thx for the definition, it's always good to remember it, but I feel that this definition about patriarchy is exclusive to cisgender women
Even if patriarchy is real, there must be solutions for the one who want that state of things to change, changing people's, around you, state of mind...

🙈🙈🙈

Of course. Feminism is love. I love you. I love feminists. I am a feminist. And I think that feminism is love. You are all my sisters and brothers. And love unites us despite the different races and religions. I want a more egalitarian world where women are treated with respect and love.

Hello!

Loving hearing everyone's thoughts on this.

Is it not our responsibility to remove the negativity surrounding the word Feminism?

We should be proud of the word that has carried us this far, the word that our predecessors used, fighting for equality in the past and the word that we have made such progress with today.

We need to keep telling people what it means and showing people what it means, hold it up high and shout it out loud so we can keep making progress.

Also, having to explain it all the time is a great excuse to talk about it all the time... Just like now :-)

Much love.

Heather wrote: "I’ve been wondering the same thing!! My mom has said that feminism is synonymous to just being a good human being, and not every good human being calls themselves a feminist. But I believe that’s w..."

Thanks for your reply, I agree with what you say about feminism being a name for good human beings, but as I try to be very down-to-earth I think that in order to reach as many people as possible it would be much more useful to use a different name, because otherwise we find ourselves in need to fight on two different fronts, the one in which we say that (very briefly) everyone should be accepted and the one in which we have to explain that feminism is not only about women - and one of our main purposes is that of reaching as many people as possible. I know it is not nice to change it just because of it, but I am quite sure it would be much useful.

Alex wrote: "Hello!

Loving hearing everyone's thoughts on this.

Is it not our responsibility to remove the negativity surrounding the word Feminism?

We should be proud of the word that has carried us this ..."

Thank you for your reply! As I said in my previous comment (the one to Heather) I think it would be much more useful to fight just on one front, as it is already too difficult to make people really understand what it means to respect people different from ourselves. I don't know how it works in other countries, but here in Italy most of the people who say they respect other people don't really know what it means, and I can see it very clearly from their comments or general statements or what they say when for example a girl has a short skirt or a man is walking on heels. I feel so powerless anytime it happens and I realize we are still far from reaching a peaceful acceptance of the other, that's why I'd like you to think that it could be much more useful just to change name and focus our efforts in just one direction.

Benarji wrote: "If you are referring to OSS, it is more of a book club than a movement but it is a gateway to feminism. What you are referring is more of a human rights movement.

Feminism challenges the ideology..."

Thank you for your reply. I was referring to the word feminism, not to OSS.
What you said about "feminism" is the historical meaning of it, and it is only a very small part of "intersectional feminism", that is what OSS group talks about.
I strongly disagree with what you said about having reached a "point of saturation" of feminism in the first world countries, and you can see it from the fact that there are still few women at the top of many activities, from what people (from any rank of society) say about women, from the fact that there are many femicides (women killed because they are women, therefore because of a relationship with the gender) still, and you don't need to look for these example in poor countries, you only need to look at what Trump said about women, and I think you'd agree on the fact that USA is one of the first world countries.

humanism would be a broader and wider
it includes equality and equity of humanity
all for the well being of all human beings, granting their rights and freedoms

What do you mean by movement?

I’ve always thought a lot of the ‘negativity’ around the word feminism is caused by its opponents trying to paint it in a bad light. Any new word would inevitably have the same problem in the fullness of time.

Sarah wrote: "humanism would be a broader and wider
it includes equality and equity of humanity
all for the well being of all human beings, granting their rights and freedoms
"

If people would rather use a word that describes their broader concerns about injustice, that’s fine (it’s what I tend to do). However, humanism is a specifically non-religious ethical outlook and so would likely be off-putting for religious people

No one has given me answer to my question. If you are talking about physical movements, I don't think feminism is closely related to movements. Although I think everyone, whether the person is a female or male, have the right to move. walk and run. But I don't think it would be a good name for the movement.

@Rumell: Be patient ;) people might answer you later if they feel they have something relevant to say :)

Claudia wrote: "Hi everyone!
I’m writing to you because I’ve been wondering about something for a while, and I would like to hear your opinion.

Don’t you think that the world “feminism” is a bit reductive when re..."

I'm grateful you asked this question, Claudia. It's something I think about a lot, as a man who sometimes attempts to talk to other men about feminism. My answer is: I think we need more than one term. If the person I'm talking to is completely dead-set against the term feminism (such as equating it with man-hating, as Emma put it), I might get further by speaking in terms of more general human rights.

On the other hand ...

A benefit of the term feminism is that it invites men to examine their biases and privilege in a way that I don't think other terms do.

One example that comes to mind is the history of auditioning for symphony orchestras. It is my understanding that musicians used to audition in front of a group of interviewers--who were mostly men. The result was that female musicians were underrepresented in orchestras. Eventually orchestras started holding blind auditions with the musician playing behind a curtain. And voilà: hiring of female musicians increased. If you could show that hard data to the those men, some will be self-reflective enough to examine their implicit bias and sexism. And once they understand that this dynamic plays out throughout society, some will buy into feminism as a social cause addressing a systemic issue. If they get that far, they are in a position to examine their own male privilege.

If you never mention feminism, I don't think most men will ever get to that point.

-- Peter

Feminism is about not assigning gender to things, behaviour, personality traits etc. It supports men in the context of examining how patriarchy hurts them, for example the link between "effeminate" and homosexual. Feminism doesn't exclude the need for other movements like disability rights, fat acceptance etc (and it overlaps a lot with them because of how patriarchal society views disabled or fat women).
Some black women prefer the term womanism and it's perfectly fine of course.