Succinct Questions to Gauge Normie Openness to Pro-Feminist/Gender Abolitionist Ideas

Chernobog

Yesterday, 10:56 AM

So, to make a long and not necessarily relevant story short: I have an evaluation system for talking to strangers. I am a weird, particular person with a weird, particular, and often highly objectionable worldview. My views on sex role stereotypes are obviously a huge part of this, so I try to find out what others think with a non-leading, more subtle/non-judgmental approach.

The questions currently in rotation are:
"Gender identity is an essential human characteristic.
Strongly agree<--->Strongly disagree"
and
"Homo sapiens can change sex.
True/False/Unsure".

I like the second question alright, but sometimes I think people don’t really understand or haven’t thought much about the first to really respond in a way that reflects their actual beliefs.
 So, a new question I've been playing around with is:
"Masculinity and femininity...
-Are essential human characteristics
-Have been applied in rigid and imperfect ways, but are not inherently harmful ideas
-Are offensive woo-woo"

I have a tactical disadvantage because I don’t want to belabor the point by asking too many questions on the same subject, but the gender issue has gotten so broad with so many moving goalposts it’s hard to know where to aim, even on a personal level. I find the acceptance of sex-role stereotypes equally offensive to science denialism, though picking one question over the other seems a bit like nailing the board down at one end only for it to spring up on the other re:filtering for traditionalists vs. libertines.
I realise my situation may be too particular to be asking for viable advice, but maybe some of you have similar things rolling around in your heads and strategic ways to suss out if someone who might be “pro-trans” or “moderate-conservative” on paper but isn’t going to be totally anti-feminist in conversation. If you think about stuff like this, I’d like to hear your general thoughts.

Clover
Kozlik's regular account 🍀🐐

1,224

Yesterday, 9:53 PM

Those seem like pretty good questions! I wonder about one that's like "do you think that men and women naturally have different hobbies/interests?" or "why do you think [x] hobby/career/activity is so strongly [female/male] dominated?" This could help see how quickly they justify gendered divides as "natural."

As I write this, I'm reminded of my pet peeve episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation where Riker explains "sex" differences in appearance/behavior of humans to a grey theybie alien, where he said something to the effect that human women wear makeup because iNsTiNcTs or some shit and I was like 🙄🙄🙄

This is an interesting thought exercise. I think figuring out if they fall into using the nature fallacy/biological essentialism to justify gender is the way I would go.

Edited Yesterday, 9:53 PM by Clover.

Chernobog

7 hours ago

(Yesterday, 9:53 PM)Clover Those seem like pretty good questions! I wonder about one that's like "do you think that men and women naturally have different hobbies/interests?" or "why do you think [x] hobby/career/activity is so strongly [female/male] dominated?" This could help see how quickly they justify gendered divides as "natural."

As I write this, I'm reminded of my pet peeve episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation where Riker explains "sex" differences in appearance/behavior of humans to a grey theybie alien, where he said something to the effect that human women wear makeup because iNsTiNcTs or some shit and I was like 🙄🙄🙄

This is an interesting thought exercise. I think figuring out if they fall into using the nature fallacy/biological essentialism to justify gender is the way I would go.

Oh god lmfao TNG episodes where Riker is being a Kirk-tier chauvinist 😹 I think I grew to expect that stuff from Riker so readily that the one that broke my brain was when Picard got in on the action and badgered those space-Irish women into Having Babiez! Society Is Crumbling And It's Their Fault! The dedication to getting away from the cringe-ness of the original series there was.... weak. Oy vey.

But you've reminded me of an older version of The Gender Question, which was a true-false along the lines of "Men are naturally more active, assertive, etc.", which I scrapped because so few people agreed with it that it wasn't really doing the job. Pro-trans people unanimously disagreed with that one, which, cool, but, the question was too easily pegged as a sexism test. Which can work when you're asking as an impersonal entity, but tricky when you're an individual woman asking in a social context. I think this reaffirms my commitment to the new question though, I rigged it up with so many key words and concepts I should at least test it out.

YesYourNigel

289

3 hours ago

It's not easy to gauge because a lot of libfems will wax poetical about how anyone can do whatever they want and how gender roles / evopsych are nonsense but not actually take it seriously. Because a crucial part of liberal feminism is the idea that femininity is some special persecuted culture, rather than a set of damaging beliefs and limitations holding women back, so really the only thing these disclaimers are doing is feeding into the choice-feminism delusion - anyone can do whatever they want so that means that an insecure anxious feminine woman caked in makeup, lacking in handyperson skills and being sexually submissive is totally valid and you're a misogynistic bigot for seeing her as a part of a larger pattern. This same thing also applies to a lot of very gender conforming Gender Critical people who've clearly never once thought about gender roles critically despite parroting nice-sounding ideas about how anyone can present any way you want.

And like...I can't see how you can possibly see 90% of people following the gender roles that they're fed with and punished for straying away from since birth and reach the conclusion that this is freely chosen, or that it ever could be. In general I find anyone who subscribes to some variant of the liberal "follow your heart" bullshit to be extremely naive at best and straight up aggressively defensive of their basic normie interests at worst. People aren't drawn to liberal feminism because they want change, they're drawn to it because it reaffirms the norms currently in place except through enlightened lens so they can sleep better at night.

For example, I've seen countless libfems say that gender roles are offensive woo-woo, but then a trans person walks in and all of a sudden gender roles are only bad because they've been applied in rigid and imperfect ways, but are not inherently harmful ideas. This heel-turn was actually what first made me wake up to how misogynistic the whole thing is, and also made me realise just how deeply pro-femininity/gender role biases go in liberal feminism. So I guess what I look for is how invested the person is in defending femininity and thinking the only problem is someone holding a literal gun to someone's head for gender-role-related ideas vs how invested they are in questioning gender roles themselves, even without any meanie oppressors actively threatening your safety, and also without turning their brains off because some hyperfeminine woman or a TIP is going to throw a tantrum over how offensive this is.

For me, this has become an insurmountable issue with feminism, this idea that women, despite being held back and screwed over so much by men and for so long, are in a good place as they are currently and don't need to lift a finger to heal from mountains of trauma and insecurities that the patriarchy has saddled them with. Healing isn't about just stopping a person from stabbing you, it's about actually getting medical assistance and recovering from your injury. Most feminism I find is only invested in stopping the stabbing, but not in actually getting the person to a hospital or heaven forbid healing them for stab wounds specifically instead of telling them they're very brave and victimised for bleeding all over the place.

This is something where I ironically relate more to TIF spaces, specifically the ones that talk about how to get rid of feminine insecurities and emulate the more authoritative, empowering aspects of male socialisation - hit the gym, learn handyperson skills, assert yourself, be more sexually selfish etc. ofc in their case it's all done in pursuit of a self-hating delusion where they bought into the age-old scam for women that patriarchal double-standards are meant for anyone's benefit as long as you play nice and win male approval. Nevertheless, it's such a different experience compared to feminist spaces that are often just "girls rule, boys drool".

Edited 3 hours ago by YesYourNigel.

YesYourNigel

289

3 hours ago

Quote:Oh god lmfao TNG episodes where Riker is being a Kirk-tier chauvinist 😹

Very telling that trans activists use this episode to show how progressive the show was 🙃