I guess you could say that I consider myself a "men's rights" feminist. I'd prefer the term "liberal feminist," but so many people don't understand what that means... I'm tired of thinking of things in terms of how society is unfair to women, when in many cases it's as equally unfair (if not more so) than men, simply by virtue of the male population not having the general level of consciousness about what's happening as many women do. There seem to be some extremes going on in the feminist movement, and I'm not for that. Things have been immensely unfair to women for many, many years, but we still have to realize that things still are unfair to men. Women can legitimately choose to either stay at home and "keep house" or enter the paid workforce, but men don't really have that option. That's unfair. Women live their lives in fear of violence and/or sexual assault by men, but men are the ones who have to prove themselves, every day, that they're not "bad guys," which (personally speaking) would really bother me. That's unfair. Women can express feelings and are encouraged to talk about what's bothering them, but it's considered weird or unmanly for men to express their feelings. That's unfair. Now, because of social norms about who "gets" eating disorders, men aren't getting the psychological and physical help they need. That's not only unfair, that's dangerous. I guess the question I'm asking is, why do we think of society in terms of "why can't women be more like men?", when it doesn't seem that great to be a man in a male-dominated society, either? Wouldn't it be great if, instead of looking at sex equality in terms of women equaling men, we looked at sex equality in terms of everyone being equal in opportunity and outcome to one another? Call me crazy...
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"Equal rights are not special rights." (Anonymous)
"Feminism is the radical notion that women are people." (Audre Lord)
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