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Throughout the 2012 election, a common phrase to hear was
the “War on Women”. This was mostly used by democrats to criticize the way the
Republican Party was limiting women’s rights. Senator Todd Akin made comments opposing abortion in the case of a rape stating that, “If it’s a legitimate
rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down”. Comments
such as Akin’s sparked talk of the war on women even further. With all of this
talk of the war on women, Suzanne Venker of FOXNews made it clear she believed
another war was going on, the war on men.
In her
article, “The war on men”
she discusses the relationship between feminism and marriage. When discussing
her article further during a follow up interview,
she is quick to remind her audience that she is not saying that men do not want
to marry independent women, but they do not want to marry “masculinized” women.
Over the past few decades, society’s perception of women has vastly improved.
It used to be that women were expected to stay home to cook and clean, now
women are C.E.O’s, senators, and other powerful positions in the workforce. Not
to say that gender equality has been totally achieved, but steps have been made
towards a more equal society. “This new phenomenon has changed the dance between men
and women”.
Venker believes that in order to be considered equals in the
workforce, women have developed their “masculine” sides. They have become much
more aggressive to get what they want and tend to look at men as the enemy, the
people keeping them from being successful. Men don’t want to marry women
anymore, but Venker says, “Men haven’t changed much – they had no revolution
that demanded it – but women have changed dramatically”. She argues that this shift
in thinking of women’s place in society is what is changing the gender dynamic.
The competition between men and women has increased to the point where women
and men can equally fight for the same positions and raises, and thus men don’t
want to marry women anymore.
When reading this article, I thought back to Iris
Young’s article “Throwing like a Girl”. When describing the three modalities of
feminine bodily existence, she talks about how women have inhibited
intentionality, or inhibited confidence. This means the women lack the
confidence to preform and therefore they tend to act in a matter that
illustrates their lack of confidence. In terms of women in the workforce, if a
woman wanted a position of power at a company, she would lack the total self-confidence
to say that she could hold the position, and thus would be less likely to get
the position. Nowadays, women have the
confidence to compete with the men in the workforce and this is breaking Young’s
perception of femininity. Venker assures her readers that there is a way to fix
this marriage issue writing, “Fortunately, there is good news: women have the
power to turn everything around. All they have to do is surrender to their
nature – their femininity – and let men surrender to theirs”.
Venker argues that the problem with marriages now is that
women aren’t feminine enough. If only women lacked confidence in themselves
like they used to and men would want to marry them. Articles like these set all the progress
towards gender equality back. Women have been fighting for rights to be
confident and equal members of society for decades and the idea that they must
change this in order to please men, makes women more unequal than ever.
Sources:
Venker, Suzanne. "The War on Men." Fox News . 26 2012: n. page. Web. 2 Dec. 2012. <http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/11/24/war-on-men/>.
Young, Iris. "Throwing Like a
Girl: A Phenomenology of Feminine Body Comportment Motility and
Spatiality.." Human Studies 3. (1980): 136-156.
https://docs.google.com/a/umich.edu/viewer?a=v&pid=sites&srcid=dW1pY2guZWR1fHBvbHNjaTEwMWYyMDEyfGd4OjgzMjNhM2Y5ZDliOWUyYg
(accessed November 9, 2012).
Images:
http://cdn2-b.examiner.com/sites/default/files/styles/image_full_width_scaled/hash/ce/be/1335511232_wow.jpg
http://nation.foxnews.com/sites/nation.foxnews.com/files/styles/dv1/public/636_112612_fx_waronmen.jpg
http://www.feministezine.com/feminist/books/images/Iris-Young-Throwing-like-a-%20Girl.jpg
The word feminist has a negative connotation, but really whats wrong with a woman fighting for her rights? Strong women are still punished for acting the way men do, often times being a feminist also means you are called butch or a lesbian which is an outrageous claim. The three modalities of feminism are not traits confined to women and society needs to learn that. Being a women does not equal feminine behavior and being a man does not equal masculine behavior. Gender lines are blurring and people need to learn to be more accepting. Men need to change their ideas about women and accept women as their equals.
ReplyDeleteThis is a very interesting connection. I am surprise to read that there is truly this theory that marriage doesn't work because women aren't "feminine" enough. (I think marriage doesn't work in many causes for other, superficial reasons. That's another story). It's interesting to analyze what happens when women began to challenge men.
ReplyDeleteIt's pretty obvious that competition is human nature. In fact, it's animal nature in general. But so long as the conditions of "biology" are being met, marriage isn't a necessity. What I mean by this is that, technically, the biological advantage and successful results from reproductive (this is more or less based on a biological anthropology level). With that being said, if women are just as intelligent and successful as men, then everything should be fine if they are still reproducing. And thanks to today's technology, women don't need marriage to reproduce.
I know that looking at this from a biological level seems silly. But, if we analyze why and how animals (or humans) function and what they need for survival, then we can sometimes make theories about human social behavior. The power struggle between men and women is so strange, because in other species that doesn't really exist.
Madeline,
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with your ideas on feminism, and thought this was a very perceptive blog post because when I read Iris Young, I definitely thought about the fact that the self-consciousness and awkwardness of women’s movements is a socially constructed problem, which has been mitigated by the feminist movements that have occurred in the 20th and 21st centuries. I think that in opposition to Young’s argument, women have to have more aggressive body language to assert their equal importance and power in the workplace and anywhere else. The article you cited, however, I think brings a bad light to a conservative view of feminism, because while the things discussed in your blog are abhorrent conservative comments on women, they are a bad representation of the entire party’s viewpoints.
The conservative party has many “masculinzed” women figures like Ann Coulter, who are criticized for their aggressiveness that is characteristic of male political figures. Though many are opposed to things like abortion, it is not because they want a man to make a woman’s decision for her, it is because they view this as infringing on the rights of a person (to some people it is a person) whose voice cannot be heard, and therefore their rights must be protected and spoken out for on their behalf. They do not view abortions as bringing women equality, and they take the view of society as a meritocracy that allows women and men to be equal in the workplace, because it is not about gender, it is about making the company better. I think that personally what brings the most equality to women is individualism and hard work, because if someone won’t hire or equally pay a woman who deserves it, then someone else will, and the loss only punishes the sexist person who did that in the first place.
ReplyDeleteMadeline,
Very interesting article. First, I would first like to debunk the idea of the Republican "War on Women". This is a lie that has been mass-produced by the liberal news media. Just because an idiot like Akin makes stupid comments about rape an abortion doesn't mean that all Republicans agree with him, or that its a party platform. Now I'm personally a self-identified Republican, and there is no war on women from me. I'm different from my party, in that I am pro-choice. Our party needs to change its views on abortion, and I believe that will help get rid of this Republican "War on Women" crap.
Second, I’m really happy that our society is now much more friendly to women. Women should have every right that a man does. They also should be paid the same and so on. Discriminating based on gender is wrong and I personally have no respect for people that do it. Everyone should have a fair chance, regardless of your gender.
Finally, I don’t believe that men would not want to marry independent women. The type of girl that I look for is one that is not afraid to speak her mind, and one that is independent. No one likes a person that is overly clingy or relies on someone too much. Its also attractive to me if a women is financially independent based on the reasons listed before. The whole power thing is ridiculous. Why would I not want another source of income in my household? That part just doesn’t make much sense to me whatsoever.
Matt McCool
Great job pointing out some flaws in Venker's argument and also connecting this to the Young article.
ReplyDeleteWhat I find troubling about Venker's idea is that it women's goals and beliefs are based on men. What men want women to be, what they desire in women, and what they don't think women should be. Inherent in this type of thinking is that women are a function of men and can't be defined without the figure of a man present. This is obviously troubling on many levels and I think should undermine any arguments Venker makes about modern gender roles.
In gender discourse we have to be able to recognize that each group should have independent rights no matter what the wants of the other might be. Nobody should be denied rights because of how it would change their relationship to another group.