"Most men are unlikely to respond to what they may hear as a feminist call for guilt, contrition, submission and/or disempowerment, yet their involvement and transformation are crucial to feminism’s success."
Feminism & intersectionality
Feminism is about ensuring equal rights and opportunities for all genders. It encompasses a range of social and political movements and ideologies aimed at ending sexism, exploitation, and oppression and achieving full gender equality in law and practice (European Council). However, women experience discrimination not only based on sex but also due to race, age, class, socioeconomic status, ability, gender or sexual identity, religion, and ethnicity. Thus, striving for equality requires an awareness of how these different forms of discrimination intersect, a concept known as "intersectionality."
Patriarchy & other systems of oppression
Patriarchy is a political and social system that insists men are inherently dominant and superior, particularly over those deemed weak -especially women-, and endowed with the right to maintain dominance through psychological terrorism and violence (bell hooks, The Will to Change, 2004). Patriarchy is interlocked with other systems of oppression, such as capitalism, colonialism, and racism. Consequently, bell hooks suggests to call this system “imperialist, white-supremacist, capitalist patriarchy.”
Patriarchy also suppresses men
Patriarchy does not only suppress women. It suppresses men as well. Parents are taught by patriarchy to devalue the emotional lives of boys. This disregard affects boys’ capacity and willingness to be vulnerable, weak, and to express sadness or pain (remember, “boys don’t cry”). It also impacts their capacity to love and be loved, as they learn to build relationships based on dominance and violence, rather than deeply connected partnerships based on equality and shared vulnerability (bell hooks, Rianne Eisler).
Patriarchy is also perpetuated by women
Patriarchy is perpetuated not only by men but also by women. Consider the case of female sexual suppression. From a popular feminist perspective, men use this to maintain societal power and patriarchal control over valuable resources (male control theory, MCT; e.g., Sherfey, 1966; Travis & White, 2000; Wood & Eagly, 2002). However, this is only one side of the story. According to the female control theory (FCT) of sexual oppression, women might also suppress other women’s sexuality as a competitive mating strategy, to enforce monogamy and paternal investment, using direct and indirect aggression (e.g., Baumeister & Twenge, 2002; Campbell, 1999, 2004; Fisher & Cox, 2009; Arnocky et al., 2012) or physical means (e.g., genital cutting) as a way for older women to control younger women’s sexuality (Shell-Duncan et al., 2011).
Why aren't we all feminists?
Feminism is not about women opposing men; it is a movement for equal rights and opportunities for all, challenging all systems of oppression. Who could be opposed to this? Achieving a society where everyone has equal rights and opportunities requires a collective commitment to feminism—or broader, to anti-oppression. Both men and women must deconstruct their internalised patriarchal structures to stop perpetuating unconscious oppression and ignorance.
Where are the men?
Why aren’t more men involved? When I attend lectures or conferences on feminism, men are underrepresented. I believe this is partly due to some feminists emphasis on guilt and contrition from men, and the submission and disempowerment that results from it. While on a systemic level this demand for accountability is justified and necessary, on a personal level, this approach seems to be counterproductive. Most men are unlikely to respond to a call for guilt, contrition, submission and disempowerment, yet their involvement and transformation are crucial to feminism’s success.
Instead, I propose inviting men to develop awareness, availability, and action:
Awareness of privilege and discrimination, so they can recognize and address these when they occur.
Availability the willingness to become undone in the process of accepting and being touched by the others—including women—on the other’s own terms.
Action to embody values of equal rights and opportunities, make them part of your way of life, and invite others to do the same.
In short, what we need is emancipation, not castration.
What do you think?
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