The sometimes caustic and confrontational face of modern feminism
The American Indian people never had an issue with feminism because their society was built around a simple but utopian situation that worked, the women were the nurturing side of the coin with the say in many of the tribal matters, including the siting of the living sites.
The males were concerned with the hunting, protection and in some tribes farming and cultivation. The situation worked perfectly for thousands of years. Why was this successful?
A simple reason or reasons, being that the Indians operated as a community, young, old, weak, infirm, strong, it was help for all and help given to all would be repaid down the generations.
The Indians referred to the planet as the Mother Earth and were careful in their use of natural resources. The nuts and bolts of it is that the Indians said that a bow without an arrow is not much use, they regarded the man and woman as a unit as part of the combined people unit, which gave them success.
The late Russell Means an Indian activist talked about feminism and asked why women chose that path and why they seemed to want to be like men? From his Lakota Indian traditions, he had learned from grandparents and from their grandparents before how the family and social systems worked.
Too much attitude without reasoned argument to back it up
The feminists were an outrage movement from the start, they started with women who were challenging the status quo, from women in the 1800s dressing in knickerbockers to ride bicycles, a situation that had some reaching for the smelling salts and afraid that the spectacle might indeed frighten the horses, to the Suffragette movement which involved direct action to obtain the vote.
Any sane person would argue that women should be able to vote and the rise of the female as a power means came largely due to the two world wars. With men conscripted, there was a big requirement for factory labour for the war effort.
Women were recruited in vast numbers and were experiencing often for the first time freedom in a way, from being chained to a home and now had their own money, albeit likely not at the sale parity as if they were men.
Certainly the second world war a generation later paved the way for women to have a voice and be recognised. At the end of the war, many protested at having to relinquish jobs as the men returned from war service.
If we fast forward to 1976, the equality act was made law and discrimination was not allowable, equal pay and conditions was now set in law.
Whereas the 1960's Bra burners were seen as the hardcore face of feminism, things move on and in the 80's and 90's a new breed of underground left leaning feminists permeated the arena.
Rather than an equilibrium between men and women occurring, the reality was a thrust to make more ground up, as such a definite anti - male agenda seemed to be coming to notice.
I have spoken to many women about this and they are uneasy about what is essentially a gender war and this angry mob for want of a better word is being seen as a petulant and childish movement.
The 'girl power' and 'girls first' sort of attitudes is borne out of a herd mentality and has its roots in basic tribal psychology, women as the nurturers tend to herd, whereas men are more of the hunter and may work alone. The male's instinct is to spread the gene pool as far and wide as possible to ensure success and a survival of the fittest scenario.
The 'ladette' culture of the 90s was responsible for a number of problems today, a too positive attitude had women seeking to emulate men in hard drinking and casual sex, the 'I can do this if I want' because it is empowering mantra was their justification. They had started to push too far, why? Because they wanted progress or as a control method.
If you look at the growth of single women in the UK, is this by choice or the result of a failed experiment? Some women may choose to be single but, the 'girl power' type of attitude in when females became aggressive (they say 'assertive') has essentially backfired.
The portrayal of men in adverts as numpties who are incompetent would never be tolerated these days if a woman was in the role portrayed, so the belittling of men has created a new dynamic. A positive dismissive attitude towards some men by some women is creating its own 'herd mentality' and is damaging to society.
This has led to two situations, a growth in men finding partners from abroad through dating sites or dating much younger women who have a different attitude and those that can't be arsed to get involved in relationships with uppity and spiky women and make do with a Pizza and a wank instead.
This situation has produced a split in the attitudes of younger women, some have rejected the hard line attitude driven feminism and have moved back to a more equilibrium based format where they are treated with a respect but have a give and take situation.
The face of Snowflake reactionism
The opposite side of the coin has become project snowflake, a situation that includes men and women but has its feminist adherents. It goes beyond the normal battleground and now encompasses free speech and free space.
Rather than adopt an adult approach, it is rooted in the childish and petulant style of 'I want' and is redolent of the awful spoilt brat that your adult friends indulge but you secretly wish you could give a good kick in the pants to.
These are the people that rail against such feminist icons as Germaine Greer, I may not agree with everything she says, but she has the right to be able to make her point. But even she is seen as a threat it would seem.
To see Germaine Greer being turned away by feminists, if you'd said that to me ten years ago I would have questioned your sanity, now it appears that the sanity of others who seek to ban her from speaking is questionable.
Germaine Greer is a highly educated person, but maybe that's the thing, she has a wealth of experience and knowledge that the snowflakers who have to look everything up on Google don't. They must feel awfully threatened by someone who can make reasoned arguments, perhaps I have hit the nail on the head.
Then there is this awful concept of 'free space' where these angst ridden tykes feel the need for some sort of comfort zone. To be honest, no one's interested, its just another 'look at me' excuse in self indulgence. Its probably the result of people grabbing them by the collar and saying grow up and get a life.
These snowflakers are operating a divisive agenda, they sort of remind you of student agitators who shout a lot, but have warped ideologies about why their arguments are right and yours are not.
They bring to mind the spectre of the 'Millie Tant' character in the Viz comic, a woman who thinks that every man is out to attack her and has a slanted view of reality. Essentially, this character is a self indulgent attention seeker. Life and art perhaps?
In our so-called civilised society, people have no issue with a point of view that is different to theirs but the destructive and devisive new feminist militancy is going too far in the wrong direction. In fact, it is doing damage to the credibility of feminism and creating a divided society.
Most women are probably happy with the level of equality that now exists on planet sensible, it may not be wholly perfect but is better than the situation of a hundred years ago.
However for some, there is still a reason to rant...
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