Letters to the Editor
Linney Uston
Published Letters: 255 Editor's Choice: 5
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Fawning
[Read the article: Tough titties]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Asking Rebecca Traister to critically interview the author of this book is a bit like asking Lenin to critically interview the author of the Communist Manifesto.
What I loved the most about this fawning blowjob of an interview is that when Valenti says this: "There is no public space for women; the whole world is a prison where you have to be constantly aware at all times that you're a potential victim." And Traister doesn't bat an eyelash. Any woman who really thinks this way is too pathetic to crawl-out from under her bed.
Let me get this straight: Valenti thinks the reason a lot of women think that feminism is uncool is because of "propaganda", yet just basically issued one of the most over-the-top manipulative statements I've ever seen and doesn't realize that maybe it's the extreme rhetoric of moderate feminists like her that turns women off?
It's amazing- working-class women know that it's good to be on your guard when you're around drunk people. White girls like Valenti are the only people in the world who don't seem to realize this. Telling a woman to merely exercise caution is no different from telling a woman to be hypervigilant. This from a woman who 5 minutes before that the whole planet is a gulag and THEN goes-on to say: "Not changing our messages for fear of backlash has really hurt us and made us not want to own up to our mistakes as much as we should..."
And Traister sits there, saying nothing about this mix of ideas which simply don't fit together very well.
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You haven't been paying attention
[Read the article: Tough titties]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"...When you break it all down, is it wrong to want women to have the same opportinities as men in our society, to have better representation in government, to be able to paid equally for the same work as men?"
Are you even reading what we're saying? NO ONE is arguing against that. We're arguing against the intense anti-intellectualism which exists among those who call themselves feminists.
The reason why most people agree with feminism yet do not call themselves feminists is because of the intense anti-intellectualism which shades into man-bashing and outright hypocrisy which exists among those who proudly allow the label to define themselves.
How is it equality to, on one hand, demand subsidies for women-only institutions while, on the other hand, demand that men-only instutitions be dismantled? It's a flat-out double-standard justified by ideological overgeneralizations that normal people don't believe; That's not equality and no amount of pretending makes it so.
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Hah!
[Read the article: The K Chronicles]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I love Keef... ^_^
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So...
[Read the article: Kurdistan: A peaceful enclave?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]...except for women, no one else is dying in Iraq. Right?
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We women are weak and spineless creatures...
[Read the article: The new girls club]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]...who need paternalistic forms of protection from the scourge of (GASP!) unwanted flirting! (SWOON!)
Fetch the smelling salts! I think a man just smiled at me! I'm so delicate and easily-damaged, how will I EVER recover from this?
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Am I the only one...
[Read the article: Stone Age women "created a future"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]...who has started to detect an inferiority complex underlying some of Tracy Clark-Flory's Broadsheet entries?
"Got overcompensation?"
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Covered with white, sticky irony
[Read the article: Protect your private bits!]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"Both foot-binding and female circumcision were cultural practices forced on women by (particular! not all!) men in societies that were extremely paranoid about female power."
Ironically, foot-binding traditionally was and female circumcision still is primarily performed by older women on younger women.
But we all know that whatever adult women do is men's fault because they but are mindless puppets without any ability to understand their own behavior.
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"Okay, guys, not everything has to be about you."
[Read the article: Protect your private bits!]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Except that's exactly the analogy which was made at the end of the entry: "If men's genitals were being cut, there'd be outrage." The posters merely followed-up with the accurate observation that infant boy's genitals are, in fact, ROUTINELY cut and it's not considered an outrage. The fact that you don't consider it to be an outrage is a stark confirmation of this notion rather than the rebuttal you seem to think it is.
Trying to compare laser surgery (a fringe practice of elective surgery among wealthy women) with FGM (a widespread practice of involuntary butchery) and intimiating some kind of common thread of victimhood between the two would be perverse if it wasn't so completely pathetic.
But for white feminists, it is exactly this brand of pathetic victim-mongering which is par for the course.
At some point the feminist movement is going to have to come to terms with the contradiction in their dogma that women are individual human beings with their own free wills and drives but every stupid-ass thing they do to themselves is due to the destructive influence of men.
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As if!
[Read the article: Women's rights latest ammo against AIDS]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"Gender equality is good for more than just shutting up us tiresome feminists"
If only that were true.
Even in situations where men and women are treated basically alike, the typical feminist reaction is to complain that women's special needs are being callously ignored. An obvious problem with having a grievance-based identity is that the manufacture of grievances can never end.
And as for the quip "us tiresome feminists", it nicely captures Broadsheet's usual custom of repeating truthful statements in a sarcastic voice, does it not?
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self-protective dumbness
[Read the article: It's hard to be a dude these days]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"First, how in the world does empowering a historically disadvantaged group send the message that they are superior to any other group?"
Well, the "girls rule, boys drool" t-shirts might point you in the right direction.
When do you think it'll get acknowledged that demanding special compensation for white women's 50 million years of oppression was a form of wrongheaded overreaching which is currently feeding a backlash?
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To get equality, women must have the upper hand
[Read the article: It's hard to be a dude these days]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]In what way is demanding that women get an equal shake demanding "special compensation?"
Lessee... All the special women-only mentoring programs, all the special "programs to empower girls", all the special laws to prevent "violence against women and no one else", all the special federal set-asides to require a certain number of contracts go to women's businesses, all the "girls r00l" gender-based cheerleading, all the "sexual harassment" seminiars which say that women are specially damaged by rude jokes... should I go on?
It takes real brains to miss all that. You must be brilliant.