cloven hooves The Personal Is Political General What People Get Wrong About Christian Women Who Voted for Trump

What People Get Wrong About Christian Women Who Voted for Trump

What People Get Wrong About Christian Women Who Voted for Trump

 
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Jan 7 2025, 10:17 AM
#1
(I also posted this on Ovarit and am repeating the post here because I thought the article was thought-provoking)

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/01/what-people-get-wrong-about-christian-women-who-voted-for-trump/

This not a one-sided slam piece. One thing I wish they'd explored is the contradiction between religious obedience and love for anti-establishment, "I do what I want" leader figures.

This article makes me more interested in having a similar conversation with conservative women in my family and friend groups, next time we're able to have a sit-down and not just fun texts back and forth. I don't have to agree with them, but I guess I just want to understand better.
Elsacat
Jan 7 2025, 10:17 AM #1

(I also posted this on Ovarit and am repeating the post here because I thought the article was thought-provoking)

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/01/what-people-get-wrong-about-christian-women-who-voted-for-trump/

This not a one-sided slam piece. One thing I wish they'd explored is the contradiction between religious obedience and love for anti-establishment, "I do what I want" leader figures.

This article makes me more interested in having a similar conversation with conservative women in my family and friend groups, next time we're able to have a sit-down and not just fun texts back and forth. I don't have to agree with them, but I guess I just want to understand better.

Clover
Kozlik's regular account 🍀🐐
452
Jan 7 2025, 12:35 PM
#2
Thanks for sharing. (Link to the Ovarit discussion.)

Quote:Decked out in MAGA gear, women students were just as thrilled as the young men—maybe more so. “They felt like this was God’s will,” Gaddini says. “He has spared the nation by giving us Trump. Even after we’ve made so many mistakes, He’s giving us one last chance to get it right.”
These people are psychotic. I don't know what else to say.

Quote:Yet many on the left, she says, dismiss Christian women “as being kind of brainwashed, just servants to the patriarchy and not free-thinking,” thus minimizing both their agency and their effectiveness. Among progressives, “there’s an inability to see how intelligence and political acumen could lead you to a place of supporting Trump,” she adds. “And yet it has for millions of women, and they’re not going away.”
Am I expected to believe that the paragraph above meant to convince me that Christian women voting for Trump are doing it out of intelligence and political acumen, jumping for joy and claiming that electing Trump was "God's will"?

To be clear, I think the author is coming at this from an angle of the people thinking these things are being misogynists and only claiming conservative Christian women are brainwashed servants to the patriarchy and not freethinking, but don't worry author, I think the same thing (and worse) about conservative Christian men.

Quote:It doesn’t make sense that evangelicals would vote for him. And then you put the two together: Why would a female evangelical vote for Trump?
I'm sorry, is the author serious? Is the author seriously baffled that female evangelicals would vote for a misogynistic man? Like... what?

Quote:I’ve also been looking at Christian women more broadly—not just evangelicals, but also Catholics and mainline Protestants. Because what I’ve seen over the last few years is that those groups have come together to do politics in a new way. They’re putting aside some of their theological differences and focusing on the larger political project.
Yes, what a grand moment when all of the various sects of Christianity realize they have the same goal of oppressing women and promoting patriarchy. It's so wonderful to see people put aside their differences and come together. đŸ„č

Quote:Trump said at a few campaign rallies, “I want to protect the women.” One Christian woman I interviewed said she wept when she heard that because it was so resonant with what she needed. 
Meanwhile, the feminist mantra is very different: Do not rely on any man to take care of you.
I think there is this strange conclusion from misogynists and gendies (I have decided I am now also going to call conservatives/right-wingers who promote gender conformity "gendies" because why the hell not) that because feminist women acknowledge it is dangerous for women to rely on a man, that it concludes that we must be completely isolated and independent from everyone. It continues this conflation of personal independence and individualism, completely failing to realize that just because women should not rely on a man (especially in the traditional patriarchal sense) that it does not mean women should not be able to rely on their society or community. I would like to think that in an ideal feminist world, women would not have to rely on a man in a patriarchal nuclear family structure for support and stability (because such a notion would be completely abolished), and can instead rely on a healthy strong structure of social safety nets that exist for all people. I wonder if this failure to recognize this for many, that when they hear feminist women say "do not depend on a man" they picture a woman all alone like a spinster in a witch hut far out in the deep dark woods, comes from a deep misogyny that does not recognize women as part of the community, as part of a human society. The idea that, if a woman does not "have a man", she has literally no one.

Quote:Several of the [Liberty] students I’ve interviewed told me that when they were younger, they were bullied by liberals in their home state or high schools. I’ve had them sit across from me and read me the messages they got on social media from classmates calling them horrific things because they posted a picture with a Trump sign.
That really sucks. Nothing quippy to say here. Bullying people isn't okay. As we see here, it can further isolate people into antisocial groups.

Quote:It’s a sense that critical race theory, trans rights—which they would call gender ideology—and, to a much lesser extent, gay rights have infiltrated their schools and are trying to indoctrinate their children.
Of course, Mother Jones conflates those who use the term "gender ideology" with "being right-wing", sigh. This has been a somewhat interesting article, but I suppose I was expecting too much from a liberal news media source.

Quote:On a symbolic level, I would point to an event I attended at Liberty two days after the election. The speaker, who was a professor, gave a talk about a somewhat obscure character from the Old Testament. After an hour, she finally came to the point: This imperfect king had made all these mistakes, yet God had used him to deliver His promises. Nobody at that event said Trump’s name. Nobody mentioned the election. But the message was clear: That is our situation now.
Again, these are the people who I'm expected to believe have intelligence and political acumen? People who believe Trump is God's King to deliver God's promises? I weep for humanity.

Quote:Your next book is a history of Christian women in US politics over the past 50 years. And a lot of the women students you spoke with at Liberty University are envisioning careers in politics and law. Yet much of the work they take on will be aimed at eroding women’s rights. Some on the religious far right don’t even want women to vote. 
This has been a contradiction that has entangled right-wing Christian women since the 1970s. On the one hand, they are fighting for traditional gendered roles; on the other hand, they themselves want to be in politics. They’re embracing elements of feminism such as equality in women’s work. But they would never call themselves feminists and in fact, their work is to oppose feminism. [...] Feminism has infiltrated their conservative sphere and is propelling these women forward, without them maybe wanting to acknowledge that, and certainly without secular feminists wanting to acknowledge that.
What is she talking about "secular feminists not wanting to acknowledge" how conservative women are exercising the rights women before them have fought for (in order to dismantle those very rights)? The conservative mantra of climbing up the ladder painstakingly created for them by past generations and then pulling it up and out of reach for everyone else behind them is very clear to me with these conservative women, as it is with all conservative-minded people. I'm very well aware that conservative women are hypocrites who get to enjoy so many rights that feminist women before them have fought for, some even died for, just for those conservative women to trample all over said women's legacies by supporting fascists, conservatives, and misogynists. (What's funny is I was going to write "Amy Baron Cohen, anyone?" but then decided not to, and then went to reading the next paragraph and it talked about her. đŸ« )

Welp, that was a depressing read with a demoralizing ending. It just kept getting worse and worse. Sigh. I think I read it with some hope of understanding people who I disagree with, maybe hoping to see some logic in their reasoning, and I ended up just shaking my head in disappointment at their politically suicidal ideology.
Edited Jan 7 2025, 1:12 PM by Clover.
Clover
Kozlik's regular account 🍀🐐
Jan 7 2025, 12:35 PM #2

Thanks for sharing. (Link to the Ovarit discussion.)

Quote:Decked out in MAGA gear, women students were just as thrilled as the young men—maybe more so. “They felt like this was God’s will,” Gaddini says. “He has spared the nation by giving us Trump. Even after we’ve made so many mistakes, He’s giving us one last chance to get it right.”
These people are psychotic. I don't know what else to say.

Quote:Yet many on the left, she says, dismiss Christian women “as being kind of brainwashed, just servants to the patriarchy and not free-thinking,” thus minimizing both their agency and their effectiveness. Among progressives, “there’s an inability to see how intelligence and political acumen could lead you to a place of supporting Trump,” she adds. “And yet it has for millions of women, and they’re not going away.”
Am I expected to believe that the paragraph above meant to convince me that Christian women voting for Trump are doing it out of intelligence and political acumen, jumping for joy and claiming that electing Trump was "God's will"?

To be clear, I think the author is coming at this from an angle of the people thinking these things are being misogynists and only claiming conservative Christian women are brainwashed servants to the patriarchy and not freethinking, but don't worry author, I think the same thing (and worse) about conservative Christian men.

Quote:It doesn’t make sense that evangelicals would vote for him. And then you put the two together: Why would a female evangelical vote for Trump?
I'm sorry, is the author serious? Is the author seriously baffled that female evangelicals would vote for a misogynistic man? Like... what?

Quote:I’ve also been looking at Christian women more broadly—not just evangelicals, but also Catholics and mainline Protestants. Because what I’ve seen over the last few years is that those groups have come together to do politics in a new way. They’re putting aside some of their theological differences and focusing on the larger political project.
Yes, what a grand moment when all of the various sects of Christianity realize they have the same goal of oppressing women and promoting patriarchy. It's so wonderful to see people put aside their differences and come together. đŸ„č

Quote:Trump said at a few campaign rallies, “I want to protect the women.” One Christian woman I interviewed said she wept when she heard that because it was so resonant with what she needed. 
Meanwhile, the feminist mantra is very different: Do not rely on any man to take care of you.
I think there is this strange conclusion from misogynists and gendies (I have decided I am now also going to call conservatives/right-wingers who promote gender conformity "gendies" because why the hell not) that because feminist women acknowledge it is dangerous for women to rely on a man, that it concludes that we must be completely isolated and independent from everyone. It continues this conflation of personal independence and individualism, completely failing to realize that just because women should not rely on a man (especially in the traditional patriarchal sense) that it does not mean women should not be able to rely on their society or community. I would like to think that in an ideal feminist world, women would not have to rely on a man in a patriarchal nuclear family structure for support and stability (because such a notion would be completely abolished), and can instead rely on a healthy strong structure of social safety nets that exist for all people. I wonder if this failure to recognize this for many, that when they hear feminist women say "do not depend on a man" they picture a woman all alone like a spinster in a witch hut far out in the deep dark woods, comes from a deep misogyny that does not recognize women as part of the community, as part of a human society. The idea that, if a woman does not "have a man", she has literally no one.

Quote:Several of the [Liberty] students I’ve interviewed told me that when they were younger, they were bullied by liberals in their home state or high schools. I’ve had them sit across from me and read me the messages they got on social media from classmates calling them horrific things because they posted a picture with a Trump sign.
That really sucks. Nothing quippy to say here. Bullying people isn't okay. As we see here, it can further isolate people into antisocial groups.

Quote:It’s a sense that critical race theory, trans rights—which they would call gender ideology—and, to a much lesser extent, gay rights have infiltrated their schools and are trying to indoctrinate their children.
Of course, Mother Jones conflates those who use the term "gender ideology" with "being right-wing", sigh. This has been a somewhat interesting article, but I suppose I was expecting too much from a liberal news media source.

Quote:On a symbolic level, I would point to an event I attended at Liberty two days after the election. The speaker, who was a professor, gave a talk about a somewhat obscure character from the Old Testament. After an hour, she finally came to the point: This imperfect king had made all these mistakes, yet God had used him to deliver His promises. Nobody at that event said Trump’s name. Nobody mentioned the election. But the message was clear: That is our situation now.
Again, these are the people who I'm expected to believe have intelligence and political acumen? People who believe Trump is God's King to deliver God's promises? I weep for humanity.

Quote:Your next book is a history of Christian women in US politics over the past 50 years. And a lot of the women students you spoke with at Liberty University are envisioning careers in politics and law. Yet much of the work they take on will be aimed at eroding women’s rights. Some on the religious far right don’t even want women to vote. 
This has been a contradiction that has entangled right-wing Christian women since the 1970s. On the one hand, they are fighting for traditional gendered roles; on the other hand, they themselves want to be in politics. They’re embracing elements of feminism such as equality in women’s work. But they would never call themselves feminists and in fact, their work is to oppose feminism. [...] Feminism has infiltrated their conservative sphere and is propelling these women forward, without them maybe wanting to acknowledge that, and certainly without secular feminists wanting to acknowledge that.
What is she talking about "secular feminists not wanting to acknowledge" how conservative women are exercising the rights women before them have fought for (in order to dismantle those very rights)? The conservative mantra of climbing up the ladder painstakingly created for them by past generations and then pulling it up and out of reach for everyone else behind them is very clear to me with these conservative women, as it is with all conservative-minded people. I'm very well aware that conservative women are hypocrites who get to enjoy so many rights that feminist women before them have fought for, some even died for, just for those conservative women to trample all over said women's legacies by supporting fascists, conservatives, and misogynists. (What's funny is I was going to write "Amy Baron Cohen, anyone?" but then decided not to, and then went to reading the next paragraph and it talked about her. đŸ« )

Welp, that was a depressing read with a demoralizing ending. It just kept getting worse and worse. Sigh. I think I read it with some hope of understanding people who I disagree with, maybe hoping to see some logic in their reasoning, and I ended up just shaking my head in disappointment at their politically suicidal ideology.

Jan 7 2025, 1:42 PM
#3
Thank you Clover. Gosh what a relief. I found this article frustrating in ways I couldn’t properly articulate, but you’ve basically outlined every problem I had with it.

I don’t know why I thought this article was going to be some thoughtful look into these women’s politics and voting patterns. There was nothing in here I didn’t already know or that changes my perspective on these women. They are exactly what I thought they were.

Honestly, I am so tired of being expected to sympathize with women who are perfectly happy to benefit from the sacrifices of previous generations of feminists while going out of their way to malign feminism and dismantle progress for all women. At this point the insistence that there is some deeper reason for why they do these things that I just don’t understand and must do everything I can to sympathize with feels like gaslighting (maybe that’s not the right word, but I think you get my point).

I wanted to reply to this on Ovarit, but I am just not in the mood for the inevitable backlash right now.
periwinkle
Jan 7 2025, 1:42 PM #3

Thank you Clover. Gosh what a relief. I found this article frustrating in ways I couldn’t properly articulate, but you’ve basically outlined every problem I had with it.

I don’t know why I thought this article was going to be some thoughtful look into these women’s politics and voting patterns. There was nothing in here I didn’t already know or that changes my perspective on these women. They are exactly what I thought they were.

Honestly, I am so tired of being expected to sympathize with women who are perfectly happy to benefit from the sacrifices of previous generations of feminists while going out of their way to malign feminism and dismantle progress for all women. At this point the insistence that there is some deeper reason for why they do these things that I just don’t understand and must do everything I can to sympathize with feels like gaslighting (maybe that’s not the right word, but I think you get my point).

I wanted to reply to this on Ovarit, but I am just not in the mood for the inevitable backlash right now.

komorebi
“I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.” – Audre Lorde
134
Jan 7 2025, 2:53 PM
#4
Thank you for sharing, Elsacat (and Clover for the detailed response).

Out of respect for my blood pressure, I will refrain from responding in detail to the article except to say that reading it just made me really sad... Sad and frustrated.

My general view is that you don't win an argument by being correct in an absolute sense; you win an argument by convincing the other person. In that sense, I think it is incredibly important not to be a "smug liberal," not because I am overflowing with empathy (I'm definitely not LOL), but because the more people you can convince to agree with you, the more power your movement will have. But now, even normal, reasonable criticism of conservative ideology is lumped in with being a smug condescending liberal and blanket dismissed. It's absolutely maddening, and it just makes the situation feel so hopeless. You can't change the mind of someone who isn't open to the possibility of having their mind changed. At that point, what *can* you do?

It also drives me insane that they keep saying we just don't understand them and there is actually some deep motivation behind their actions that if we just understood, we would agree with them. Like...look, I promise you it's possible for someone to understand what you're doing and still think you're completely wrong. Sigh. OK, gonna go back to work now and try not to feel so sad 😅
komorebi
“I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.” – Audre Lorde
Jan 7 2025, 2:53 PM #4

Thank you for sharing, Elsacat (and Clover for the detailed response).

Out of respect for my blood pressure, I will refrain from responding in detail to the article except to say that reading it just made me really sad... Sad and frustrated.

My general view is that you don't win an argument by being correct in an absolute sense; you win an argument by convincing the other person. In that sense, I think it is incredibly important not to be a "smug liberal," not because I am overflowing with empathy (I'm definitely not LOL), but because the more people you can convince to agree with you, the more power your movement will have. But now, even normal, reasonable criticism of conservative ideology is lumped in with being a smug condescending liberal and blanket dismissed. It's absolutely maddening, and it just makes the situation feel so hopeless. You can't change the mind of someone who isn't open to the possibility of having their mind changed. At that point, what *can* you do?

It also drives me insane that they keep saying we just don't understand them and there is actually some deep motivation behind their actions that if we just understood, we would agree with them. Like...look, I promise you it's possible for someone to understand what you're doing and still think you're completely wrong. Sigh. OK, gonna go back to work now and try not to feel so sad 😅

Jan 8 2025, 12:56 AM
#5
Gonna say more when I have time but I just checked out the Ovarit thread and I'm giving it some 3 hours before the mods rush in to censor any feminazi meanies for hostility over not wanting to hold hands with conservatives because that's not being 😁KiNd😁 enough. Because all women are welcome, even the conservative ones đŸ€—. Then they will, without a hint of irony, go off to call liberal women names and whine about SJW censorship.
Edited Jan 8 2025, 12:57 AM by YesYourNigel.
YesYourNigel
Jan 8 2025, 12:56 AM #5

Gonna say more when I have time but I just checked out the Ovarit thread and I'm giving it some 3 hours before the mods rush in to censor any feminazi meanies for hostility over not wanting to hold hands with conservatives because that's not being 😁KiNd😁 enough. Because all women are welcome, even the conservative ones đŸ€—. Then they will, without a hint of irony, go off to call liberal women names and whine about SJW censorship.

Possum
angry lesbian 🌈
13
Jan 8 2025, 10:58 AM
#6
I'm done entertaining the idea that Christian women vote Trump because they're đŸ„ș smol sensitive bwainwashed widdle babies đŸ„ș and as feminists our #1 priority is to validate their feminist identity because that's 'solidarity'. I'm not gonna call anyone a cunt or a b*tch because that IS misogynistic but they are idiotic, short-sighted, stupid anti-feminists. They have the beliefs they have because they want a hierarchy of women and they want to be at the top. That's it. I don't think it's more complicated than that. For women who are literally illiterate and kept on a fundamentalist compound in the deep south, sure that's a victim of brainwashing. But women who are educated and free enough to participate in these conversations are not brainwashed.

I really believe that conservative women are just as obsessed with the madonna/wh*re dichotomy as men. It's not brainwashing. It's an informed choice. They want a privileged class of mommy-wife women and an underclass of single-wh*re women, the exact same way conservative men want a privileged class of landowning-leader men and an underclass of worker-soldier men to exploit. They want a return to the (idealized image of, because obviously it wasn't actually fun for most housewives) 1950s where mommy-wife gets to stay home and putter around the house all day. It benefits mommy-wife when women are forced out of the workforce because then single-whores have no option but to be underpaid domestic servants for mommy-wife. They oppose abortion because they want a society where if you're infertile or just want a new toy baby to play with you can pop down to the local Magdalene laundry and steal a baby from her single-wh*re unwed mother. They want a society where if Nigel or Nigel Jr. rapes someone, he gets away with it because consequences would disrupt mommy-wife's lifestyle and potentially put HER in the single-wh*re caste if Nigel goes to prison and can no longer be breadwinner.

Obvious disclaimer that I don't hate straight women and moms blah blah blah. I just hate women who want this hierarchy where straight married Christian motherhood is privileged. I love moms! My hatred of this dichotomy is partially because I know a lot of single moms and it's very clear to me that they need things like social safety nets, abortion as a healthcare option, employment opportunities, social opportunities, educational opportunities, etc etc etc, all things that conservatism is allergic to. They do not need Christian husbands and a repeal of voting rights. My tone isn't aggressive because I hate wives and mothers. My tone is aggressive because the nasty tone I am typing in right now does not even compare to how nasty the ideology I'm complaining about is. And I regret ever participating in Ovarit discussions and being gentle and sweet and patient because it did not work, these women have 0 interest in female liberation no matter how kind we are so might as well be mean.
Possum
angry lesbian 🌈
Jan 8 2025, 10:58 AM #6

I'm done entertaining the idea that Christian women vote Trump because they're đŸ„ș smol sensitive bwainwashed widdle babies đŸ„ș and as feminists our #1 priority is to validate their feminist identity because that's 'solidarity'. I'm not gonna call anyone a cunt or a b*tch because that IS misogynistic but they are idiotic, short-sighted, stupid anti-feminists. They have the beliefs they have because they want a hierarchy of women and they want to be at the top. That's it. I don't think it's more complicated than that. For women who are literally illiterate and kept on a fundamentalist compound in the deep south, sure that's a victim of brainwashing. But women who are educated and free enough to participate in these conversations are not brainwashed.

I really believe that conservative women are just as obsessed with the madonna/wh*re dichotomy as men. It's not brainwashing. It's an informed choice. They want a privileged class of mommy-wife women and an underclass of single-wh*re women, the exact same way conservative men want a privileged class of landowning-leader men and an underclass of worker-soldier men to exploit. They want a return to the (idealized image of, because obviously it wasn't actually fun for most housewives) 1950s where mommy-wife gets to stay home and putter around the house all day. It benefits mommy-wife when women are forced out of the workforce because then single-whores have no option but to be underpaid domestic servants for mommy-wife. They oppose abortion because they want a society where if you're infertile or just want a new toy baby to play with you can pop down to the local Magdalene laundry and steal a baby from her single-wh*re unwed mother. They want a society where if Nigel or Nigel Jr. rapes someone, he gets away with it because consequences would disrupt mommy-wife's lifestyle and potentially put HER in the single-wh*re caste if Nigel goes to prison and can no longer be breadwinner.

Obvious disclaimer that I don't hate straight women and moms blah blah blah. I just hate women who want this hierarchy where straight married Christian motherhood is privileged. I love moms! My hatred of this dichotomy is partially because I know a lot of single moms and it's very clear to me that they need things like social safety nets, abortion as a healthcare option, employment opportunities, social opportunities, educational opportunities, etc etc etc, all things that conservatism is allergic to. They do not need Christian husbands and a repeal of voting rights. My tone isn't aggressive because I hate wives and mothers. My tone is aggressive because the nasty tone I am typing in right now does not even compare to how nasty the ideology I'm complaining about is. And I regret ever participating in Ovarit discussions and being gentle and sweet and patient because it did not work, these women have 0 interest in female liberation no matter how kind we are so might as well be mean.

Clover
Kozlik's regular account 🍀🐐
452
Jan 8 2025, 12:29 PM
#7
Possum For women who are literally illiterate and kept on a fundamentalist compound in the deep south, sure that's a victim of brainwashing. But women who are educated and free enough to participate in these conversations are not brainwashed.
This is something I had been wanting to write about at some point, I wanted to call it something like the "self-selecting bias of right-wing women." And basically it's about how, from what I can tell, since right-wing women have committed to living their lives in the private sphere, by virtue of that nature, any right-wing women who are on social media or broadcasting their experiences online are more likely to be women who have "lucked out" in the selection of the right-wing man and right-wing communities they have "chosen" to submit to. The right-wing women who are not so lucky, likely do not have free time to laud about how feminists are sad loser meanies online and how their private sphere lives are "so great", as they're likely busy forced to take care of their children, their family, their insulated communities, etc. with no time to themselves to reflect on their lifestyle, to think about it beyond "I'm safe in my bubble", or to get help. This is not even factoring into account how much abuse/domestic violence they are likely to endure and keep silent about. By nature of the private sphere and conservativism being insular, we do not get the full picture.

This is also something that cracks me up, when Christian conservative women online pearl-clutch about the increasing religious extremism of Islam getting closer to their communities, or them trying to focus on Islam instead of all Abrahamism because "look at the women in Afghanistan"—because somehow their Jesus version of Abrahamism with women being forced/coerced into the private sphere is somehow better than other forms of Abrahamism where women are forced/coerced into the private sphere. "Women and girls in Afghanistan can't go to school anymore, they can't learn anymore, they're becoming illiterate!" But apparently it's okay for many low income girls in the United States to become illiterate due to poorly funded public education systems that have been continuously gutted over the years by Republican conservative governments. (But don't worry, those American girls will have the power of Jesus !! Thank God girls here in America have Jesus to turn to instead of Allah!!) (This is also where we can start veering into the absurd "Christian" belief that if you are wealthy, it is because you are good, and God who rewarded you. So therefore if you are poor, you are bad, therefore they don't even have to feel bad about poor illiterate girls. God works in mysterious ways, you know, all of those ways somehow benefit the right-wing and antisocial regressive political ideologies, what a coincidence...)

And to contrast, liberal/leftist women by virtue of their politics, live their lives in the public sphere. They can't or don't necessarily need to hide things that fucking suck. Left-wing women do not necessarily "have to" shy away from criticizing the misogyny of the left. We can criticize the commodification and industrialization of the female body through liberal political stances on prostitution, pornography, and surrogacy. (There's a reason to left has jokes about being a circular firing squad, and also why we are "big tent." A lot of us disagree with a lot of things from people "on our own side", and a lot of criticisms of each other's leftist/liberal politics can be freely seen.) The misogyny of left-wing men is increasingly available for the right-wing to see and criticize, I would say largely due to leftist women/feminists who do not need to fear being ostracized from some insular small community that keeps them "safe." The right-wing can say "look at how the left wing treats women as 'dirty whores'" to young girls, as if the way the right-wing pedestalizes women in public is 1. the only alternative and 2. not somehow a different flavor of misogyny, a more sinister one. The devil is in the details.

I have seen there are actually some former "trad wife" social media accounts, that try to warn women about how "depending on a man" and living the submissive private sphere lifestyle is not all it's cracked up to be. There have also been revelations that popular social media accounts of right-wing women that glamorize the "trad wife" lifestyle are literally just for show.

Possum And I regret ever participating in Ovarit discussions and being gentle and sweet and patient because it did not work, these women have 0 interest in female liberation no matter how kind we are so might as well be mean.
Same mood for much of this, especially the beginning. Just yesterday I was writing in the Ovarit thread for this same article about how I was burned about this over the summer, and I'm over this shit. And kind of related to what YYN said just above:
YesYourNigel hostility over not wanting to hold hands with conservatives because that's not being 😁KiNd😁 enough. Because all women are welcome, even the conservative ones đŸ€—. Then they will, without a hint of irony, go off to call liberal women names and whine about SJW censorship.
I have also noticed this double-standard on Ovarit, specifically the part about how feminist women must avoid getting too annoyed with conservative women on Ovarit, and yet somehow there is no issue with how much we can criticize liberal women and transgender-identifying women and girls. I think I've seen more hostility to the very few TIFs or liberal women who have tried to participate on Ovarit, because those groups of women actually get the criticism from both the feminist women and the conservative women of Ovarit. By this happening, Ovarit does not become a place for "all women" like it claims. So I find it bizarre and quite ironic when conservative women on Ovarit tut-tut feminist women for getting short with them, and the more "gentle" feminist women also trying to encourage any "abrasive" leftist/feminist women to be more understanding towards the conservative women, when I do not see the same level of "gentle nature" being applied to liberal women. Conservative women are quick to talk about unity and how we shouldn't be divided when their views are brought up for questioning, but are also all too happy to chime in with how neoliberal feminism is stupid and libfems are stupid. How interesting.

That being said, I think the conclusion I draw from this is to not explicitly be mean to conservative women. However, at the same time I think I've grown tired of being asked to handle them with kiddie gloves. It almost kind of reminds me of the sane-washing of Trump. Where so much of media has been normalizing his idiotic mannerisms that were supposed to think it's normal. It's not normal. Conservatism is an ass backwards regressive ideology. If men who support conservatism are selfish morons, then why aren't the women who support it as well? This is also something I have an issue with, and I think because I've grown up in a liberal area, I never had this notion of women being these delicate feminine creatures that need to be coddled. And while I understand a lot of growing up in a liberal area means just being exposed to left-wing misogyny, I think it still holds true that if women are human, well, humans can be selfish, humans can be self-defeating, humans can be stupid. So in my view, not calling a spade a spade, just because the person is a woman, seems sexist.

Okay, I went off on a bit of a tangent there, going back to not being intentionally mean to conservative women. I guess being mean is subjective. Perhaps my recent comments on Ovarit towards conservative women have been "mean." But I don't view it as any worse than my occasional bashing of libfem and TRA women's political ideologies. And one thing I am tired of, with this whole "feminists need to be nice to conservative women" thing, is that we are basically being asked to be fucking feminist Gandhis or some shit. Except "feminist Gandhi" is a redundant phrase, a feminist woman who puts up with all the bullshit of the world, who takes the shit from all sides, with a gentle demeanor and the patience of a saint, is just any woman at that point. All women have to put up with absolute utter misogynistic bullshit throughout their lives. The feminist women are the ones who decided to call it out and be fucking done with it. Being asked and trying to perfectly be some sort of unangry, gentle, kind-spirited woman who "fights" for women's liberation while stopping at every moment to console any conservative woman who is crying over some aspect of misogyny they might lose that benefited them in their comforting feminine hierarchy, falls into the same misogynistic bullshit trap that women have been asked to do for millennia—keep sweet and obey.
Edited Jan 8 2025, 12:30 PM by Clover.

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Clover
Kozlik's regular account 🍀🐐
Jan 8 2025, 12:29 PM #7

Possum For women who are literally illiterate and kept on a fundamentalist compound in the deep south, sure that's a victim of brainwashing. But women who are educated and free enough to participate in these conversations are not brainwashed.
This is something I had been wanting to write about at some point, I wanted to call it something like the "self-selecting bias of right-wing women." And basically it's about how, from what I can tell, since right-wing women have committed to living their lives in the private sphere, by virtue of that nature, any right-wing women who are on social media or broadcasting their experiences online are more likely to be women who have "lucked out" in the selection of the right-wing man and right-wing communities they have "chosen" to submit to. The right-wing women who are not so lucky, likely do not have free time to laud about how feminists are sad loser meanies online and how their private sphere lives are "so great", as they're likely busy forced to take care of their children, their family, their insulated communities, etc. with no time to themselves to reflect on their lifestyle, to think about it beyond "I'm safe in my bubble", or to get help. This is not even factoring into account how much abuse/domestic violence they are likely to endure and keep silent about. By nature of the private sphere and conservativism being insular, we do not get the full picture.

This is also something that cracks me up, when Christian conservative women online pearl-clutch about the increasing religious extremism of Islam getting closer to their communities, or them trying to focus on Islam instead of all Abrahamism because "look at the women in Afghanistan"—because somehow their Jesus version of Abrahamism with women being forced/coerced into the private sphere is somehow better than other forms of Abrahamism where women are forced/coerced into the private sphere. "Women and girls in Afghanistan can't go to school anymore, they can't learn anymore, they're becoming illiterate!" But apparently it's okay for many low income girls in the United States to become illiterate due to poorly funded public education systems that have been continuously gutted over the years by Republican conservative governments. (But don't worry, those American girls will have the power of Jesus !! Thank God girls here in America have Jesus to turn to instead of Allah!!) (This is also where we can start veering into the absurd "Christian" belief that if you are wealthy, it is because you are good, and God who rewarded you. So therefore if you are poor, you are bad, therefore they don't even have to feel bad about poor illiterate girls. God works in mysterious ways, you know, all of those ways somehow benefit the right-wing and antisocial regressive political ideologies, what a coincidence...)

And to contrast, liberal/leftist women by virtue of their politics, live their lives in the public sphere. They can't or don't necessarily need to hide things that fucking suck. Left-wing women do not necessarily "have to" shy away from criticizing the misogyny of the left. We can criticize the commodification and industrialization of the female body through liberal political stances on prostitution, pornography, and surrogacy. (There's a reason to left has jokes about being a circular firing squad, and also why we are "big tent." A lot of us disagree with a lot of things from people "on our own side", and a lot of criticisms of each other's leftist/liberal politics can be freely seen.) The misogyny of left-wing men is increasingly available for the right-wing to see and criticize, I would say largely due to leftist women/feminists who do not need to fear being ostracized from some insular small community that keeps them "safe." The right-wing can say "look at how the left wing treats women as 'dirty whores'" to young girls, as if the way the right-wing pedestalizes women in public is 1. the only alternative and 2. not somehow a different flavor of misogyny, a more sinister one. The devil is in the details.

I have seen there are actually some former "trad wife" social media accounts, that try to warn women about how "depending on a man" and living the submissive private sphere lifestyle is not all it's cracked up to be. There have also been revelations that popular social media accounts of right-wing women that glamorize the "trad wife" lifestyle are literally just for show.

Possum And I regret ever participating in Ovarit discussions and being gentle and sweet and patient because it did not work, these women have 0 interest in female liberation no matter how kind we are so might as well be mean.
Same mood for much of this, especially the beginning. Just yesterday I was writing in the Ovarit thread for this same article about how I was burned about this over the summer, and I'm over this shit. And kind of related to what YYN said just above:
YesYourNigel hostility over not wanting to hold hands with conservatives because that's not being 😁KiNd😁 enough. Because all women are welcome, even the conservative ones đŸ€—. Then they will, without a hint of irony, go off to call liberal women names and whine about SJW censorship.
I have also noticed this double-standard on Ovarit, specifically the part about how feminist women must avoid getting too annoyed with conservative women on Ovarit, and yet somehow there is no issue with how much we can criticize liberal women and transgender-identifying women and girls. I think I've seen more hostility to the very few TIFs or liberal women who have tried to participate on Ovarit, because those groups of women actually get the criticism from both the feminist women and the conservative women of Ovarit. By this happening, Ovarit does not become a place for "all women" like it claims. So I find it bizarre and quite ironic when conservative women on Ovarit tut-tut feminist women for getting short with them, and the more "gentle" feminist women also trying to encourage any "abrasive" leftist/feminist women to be more understanding towards the conservative women, when I do not see the same level of "gentle nature" being applied to liberal women. Conservative women are quick to talk about unity and how we shouldn't be divided when their views are brought up for questioning, but are also all too happy to chime in with how neoliberal feminism is stupid and libfems are stupid. How interesting.

That being said, I think the conclusion I draw from this is to not explicitly be mean to conservative women. However, at the same time I think I've grown tired of being asked to handle them with kiddie gloves. It almost kind of reminds me of the sane-washing of Trump. Where so much of media has been normalizing his idiotic mannerisms that were supposed to think it's normal. It's not normal. Conservatism is an ass backwards regressive ideology. If men who support conservatism are selfish morons, then why aren't the women who support it as well? This is also something I have an issue with, and I think because I've grown up in a liberal area, I never had this notion of women being these delicate feminine creatures that need to be coddled. And while I understand a lot of growing up in a liberal area means just being exposed to left-wing misogyny, I think it still holds true that if women are human, well, humans can be selfish, humans can be self-defeating, humans can be stupid. So in my view, not calling a spade a spade, just because the person is a woman, seems sexist.

Okay, I went off on a bit of a tangent there, going back to not being intentionally mean to conservative women. I guess being mean is subjective. Perhaps my recent comments on Ovarit towards conservative women have been "mean." But I don't view it as any worse than my occasional bashing of libfem and TRA women's political ideologies. And one thing I am tired of, with this whole "feminists need to be nice to conservative women" thing, is that we are basically being asked to be fucking feminist Gandhis or some shit. Except "feminist Gandhi" is a redundant phrase, a feminist woman who puts up with all the bullshit of the world, who takes the shit from all sides, with a gentle demeanor and the patience of a saint, is just any woman at that point. All women have to put up with absolute utter misogynistic bullshit throughout their lives. The feminist women are the ones who decided to call it out and be fucking done with it. Being asked and trying to perfectly be some sort of unangry, gentle, kind-spirited woman who "fights" for women's liberation while stopping at every moment to console any conservative woman who is crying over some aspect of misogyny they might lose that benefited them in their comforting feminine hierarchy, falls into the same misogynistic bullshit trap that women have been asked to do for millennia—keep sweet and obey.


Kozlik's regular member account. 🍀🐐

komorebi
“I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.” – Audre Lorde
134
Jan 8 2025, 1:38 PM
#8
(Jan 8 2025, 12:29 PM)Clover I have also noticed this double-standard on Ovarit, specifically the part about how feminist women must avoid getting too annoyed with conservative women on Ovarit, and yet somehow there is no issue with how much we can criticize liberal women and transgender-identifying women and girls. I think I've seen more hostility to the very few TIFs or liberal women who have tried to participate on Ovarit, because those groups of women actually get the criticism from both the feminist women and the conservative women of Ovarit. By this happening, Ovarit does not become a place for "all women" like it claims. So I find it bizarre and quite ironic when conservative women on Ovarit tut-tut feminist women for getting short with them, and the more "gentle" feminist women also trying to encourage any "abrasive" leftist/feminist women to be more understanding towards the conservative women, when I do not see the same level of "gentle nature" being applied to liberal women. Conservative women are quick to talk about unity and how we shouldn't be divided when their views are brought up for questioning, but are also all too happy to chime in with how neoliberal feminism is stupid and libfems are stupid. How interesting.

The double standard is what made me stop visiting the place. When women are censored for presenting actual feminist views in a way that isn't "kind" enough, like YYN, but literal conservative disinformation is allowed to remain in the comments, don't try to tell me that it's a place for "all women." At least from my limited perspective, there seem to be little to no attempts to try to guide discourse in a way that might be productive, and so everything just devolves into a lowest-common-denominator "hur hur DAE trans r dumb??"...which is precisely the sort of "discourse" that attracts conservative women, but not others.

It reminds me of what proudcatlady (I think?) said on the "elephant in the room" post - paraphrasing, "every website eventually becomes an echo chamber, so it's time to decide what kind of echo chamber this will be." I think an admin responded that she'd rather shut down the site than have it become an echo chamber, and at the time I remember I commented to a friend sarcastically, "well, guess it's time to shut the site down then" lmao.
komorebi
“I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.” – Audre Lorde
Jan 8 2025, 1:38 PM #8

(Jan 8 2025, 12:29 PM)Clover I have also noticed this double-standard on Ovarit, specifically the part about how feminist women must avoid getting too annoyed with conservative women on Ovarit, and yet somehow there is no issue with how much we can criticize liberal women and transgender-identifying women and girls. I think I've seen more hostility to the very few TIFs or liberal women who have tried to participate on Ovarit, because those groups of women actually get the criticism from both the feminist women and the conservative women of Ovarit. By this happening, Ovarit does not become a place for "all women" like it claims. So I find it bizarre and quite ironic when conservative women on Ovarit tut-tut feminist women for getting short with them, and the more "gentle" feminist women also trying to encourage any "abrasive" leftist/feminist women to be more understanding towards the conservative women, when I do not see the same level of "gentle nature" being applied to liberal women. Conservative women are quick to talk about unity and how we shouldn't be divided when their views are brought up for questioning, but are also all too happy to chime in with how neoliberal feminism is stupid and libfems are stupid. How interesting.

The double standard is what made me stop visiting the place. When women are censored for presenting actual feminist views in a way that isn't "kind" enough, like YYN, but literal conservative disinformation is allowed to remain in the comments, don't try to tell me that it's a place for "all women." At least from my limited perspective, there seem to be little to no attempts to try to guide discourse in a way that might be productive, and so everything just devolves into a lowest-common-denominator "hur hur DAE trans r dumb??"...which is precisely the sort of "discourse" that attracts conservative women, but not others.

It reminds me of what proudcatlady (I think?) said on the "elephant in the room" post - paraphrasing, "every website eventually becomes an echo chamber, so it's time to decide what kind of echo chamber this will be." I think an admin responded that she'd rather shut down the site than have it become an echo chamber, and at the time I remember I commented to a friend sarcastically, "well, guess it's time to shut the site down then" lmao.

Possum
angry lesbian 🌈
13
Jan 8 2025, 7:50 PM
#9
Clover This is something I had been wanting to write about at some point, I wanted to call it something like the "self-selecting bias of right-wing women."
Won't quote the whole thing because it's so long but I think you're right about this. They're constantly pulling out that Dworkin quote about how the left views women as public property, the right as private property. But then they only use it to criticize the left and forget to talk about the dangers of being private property. Or they whip it out intentionally as a response when they see the right being criticized to prevent a discussion on the dangers of being private property.

Clover I have also noticed this double-standard on Ovarit, specifically the part about how feminist women must avoid getting too annoyed with conservative women on Ovarit, and yet somehow there is no issue with how much we can criticize liberal women and transgender-identifying women and girls.
Yes, this is exactly why it makes me so cranky. There is endless patience for conservative women but none for libfem women. Can barely criticize conservative women without being accused of tradphobia but it's fine to call TIFs and "SJWs" the nastiest, most misogynistic shit you can imagine. It's especially frustrating since ime it's much easier to peak libfems than it is to peak conservative women.

I think libfem women at the top of the pyramid are materially benefiting from their position (like, famous academics or higher-ups in NGOs who get rich off it) and therefore will never come around to our side. But the average libfem is just pro trans/surrogacy/sex work/etc because she's trying to be nice. Or she's never been exposed to radfem theory since it's banned on regular social media. In my experience with libfems if I talk to her privately and she isn't afraid of being cancelled, and I'm careful to phrase it in a way that doesn't sound hateful (ie phrase it as "biologically male person who identifies as a woman" instead of "ugly freakazoid who I hope Daddy Trump sends to a prison camp"), she will agree that things on the left have gone too far.

Whereas the average conservative woman believes that a fetus has a soul and that a magic man in the sky wants pregnant women to die of sepsis to protect that sweet little fetus soul. I have no idea what to do with that. She probably needs a professional cult deprogrammer.

komorebi It reminds me of what proudcatlady (I think?) said on the "elephant in the room" post - paraphrasing, "every website eventually becomes an echo chamber, so it's time to decide what kind of echo chamber this will be." I think an admin responded that she'd rather shut down the site than have it become an echo chamber, and at the time I remember I commented to a friend sarcastically, "well, guess it's time to shut the site down then" lmao.
"every website eventually becomes an echo chamber, so it's time to decide what kind of echo chamber this will be." is an awesome line, I love it. I dislike echo chambers but yeah on social media it's unavoidable so maybe we should go for the less shitty echo chamber. I think it's especially bad on Ovarit because Ovarit has that Reddit format where post order is by like/dislike ratio and heavily disliked posts are hidden. One time I got into an argument with a forced birther and eventually her comments got removed but my comments stayed with like 20+ downvotes from the other lurking forced birthers. I get that internet karma points don't matter but it's demoralizing. There's no point in sticking around to be a lefty voice if your comments are gonna be downvoted that much.

It's also why it's so hard to provide specific examples (like everyone was asking for on that elephant in the room thread.) because you have comment threads like:

Trad Kamala Harris is Hitler.
+100 votes

Radfem Actually, Kamala Harris is not Hitler.
-100 votes

And then eventually the mods delete Trad's comment (but don't ban her from the site 🙄) so the only "proof" of bad vibes looks like this:

Trad [DELETED]

Radfem Actually, Kamala Harris is not Hitler.
-100 votes
Edited Jan 8 2025, 7:59 PM by Possum.
Possum
angry lesbian 🌈
Jan 8 2025, 7:50 PM #9

Clover This is something I had been wanting to write about at some point, I wanted to call it something like the "self-selecting bias of right-wing women."
Won't quote the whole thing because it's so long but I think you're right about this. They're constantly pulling out that Dworkin quote about how the left views women as public property, the right as private property. But then they only use it to criticize the left and forget to talk about the dangers of being private property. Or they whip it out intentionally as a response when they see the right being criticized to prevent a discussion on the dangers of being private property.

Clover I have also noticed this double-standard on Ovarit, specifically the part about how feminist women must avoid getting too annoyed with conservative women on Ovarit, and yet somehow there is no issue with how much we can criticize liberal women and transgender-identifying women and girls.
Yes, this is exactly why it makes me so cranky. There is endless patience for conservative women but none for libfem women. Can barely criticize conservative women without being accused of tradphobia but it's fine to call TIFs and "SJWs" the nastiest, most misogynistic shit you can imagine. It's especially frustrating since ime it's much easier to peak libfems than it is to peak conservative women.

I think libfem women at the top of the pyramid are materially benefiting from their position (like, famous academics or higher-ups in NGOs who get rich off it) and therefore will never come around to our side. But the average libfem is just pro trans/surrogacy/sex work/etc because she's trying to be nice. Or she's never been exposed to radfem theory since it's banned on regular social media. In my experience with libfems if I talk to her privately and she isn't afraid of being cancelled, and I'm careful to phrase it in a way that doesn't sound hateful (ie phrase it as "biologically male person who identifies as a woman" instead of "ugly freakazoid who I hope Daddy Trump sends to a prison camp"), she will agree that things on the left have gone too far.

Whereas the average conservative woman believes that a fetus has a soul and that a magic man in the sky wants pregnant women to die of sepsis to protect that sweet little fetus soul. I have no idea what to do with that. She probably needs a professional cult deprogrammer.

komorebi It reminds me of what proudcatlady (I think?) said on the "elephant in the room" post - paraphrasing, "every website eventually becomes an echo chamber, so it's time to decide what kind of echo chamber this will be." I think an admin responded that she'd rather shut down the site than have it become an echo chamber, and at the time I remember I commented to a friend sarcastically, "well, guess it's time to shut the site down then" lmao.
"every website eventually becomes an echo chamber, so it's time to decide what kind of echo chamber this will be." is an awesome line, I love it. I dislike echo chambers but yeah on social media it's unavoidable so maybe we should go for the less shitty echo chamber. I think it's especially bad on Ovarit because Ovarit has that Reddit format where post order is by like/dislike ratio and heavily disliked posts are hidden. One time I got into an argument with a forced birther and eventually her comments got removed but my comments stayed with like 20+ downvotes from the other lurking forced birthers. I get that internet karma points don't matter but it's demoralizing. There's no point in sticking around to be a lefty voice if your comments are gonna be downvoted that much.

It's also why it's so hard to provide specific examples (like everyone was asking for on that elephant in the room thread.) because you have comment threads like:

Trad Kamala Harris is Hitler.
+100 votes

Radfem Actually, Kamala Harris is not Hitler.
-100 votes

And then eventually the mods delete Trad's comment (but don't ban her from the site 🙄) so the only "proof" of bad vibes looks like this:

Trad [DELETED]

Radfem Actually, Kamala Harris is not Hitler.
-100 votes

Jan 9 2025, 8:10 PM
#10
Quote:For women who are literally illiterate and kept on a fundamentalist compound in the deep south, sure that's a victim of brainwashing. But women who are educated and free enough to participate in these conversations are not brainwashed.

But every woman is brainwashed, literally from day one. Women live every moment of their day being convinced they're inferior, that they live in a foreign, man's world and that men know best. They also get sucked into religion that preys on their BeKind female socialisation and sells them obedience to male authority.

Quote:I really believe that conservative women are just as obsessed with the madonna/wh*re dichotomy as men.

They're really not. It doesn't make sense for women to care about who's the Madonna and who's the wh*re - they don't get anything out of that. Women "care" because men care, because MEN are the possessive narcissists who want a pure virgin they can control more easily and use as breeding stock, and women know their only hope for a normal life lies in sucking up to men.

It's easy to get frustrated with women backstabbing other women for the sake of men and to conclude that both men and women are working towards the same kind of male supremacist goal, but they're not. Women work for male benefit out of defense from the patriarchal system they have no way of escaping. Men aggressively and proactively work for their own benefit because they're selfish shitheads who don't like consequences and who want a free personal bangmaid. This is a crucial, fundamental distinction - men are promised the world in a patriarchal system, whereas women are promised protection from the men's world. All women have a lifetime of degradation, threats, warnings and usually victimisation by men, and it's within these norms that they are sold the fantasy that they will have a cushy life if only they appease their oppressors and prove themselves as obedient cogs in the system. No-one in their right mind would advocate their own abuse and subjugation otherwise. It's also why conservative women consistently come from more religious, misogynistic and male-reliant backgrounds that feel normal and impossible to change. They don't all independently decide that, oh yeah, actually it's great to get beaten and raped with no recourse, and it's cool to be treated as subhuman. Conservative women deal with just as much abuse as any other woman in a patriarchal system, they just internalise it and think if they coddle men even more, they'll be spared. Whereas men, who live with their heads up each other's asses all their life and who can afford in a patriarchal society to forget that women exist, simply prioritise their own benefits.

It's important to remember that male supremacism doesn't make a lick of sense for any woman to support. It's like a black person supporting white supremacism. It's always a defensive tactic meant to appease the oppressors, the "fawn" option from fight, flight, freeze, fawn. Which is also why we make a distinction between regular and internalised misogyny. Women parrot misogyny, men actually believe it.

This is also why it's so much easier to get women to see through the nonsensical bs of sexism compared to men, unless said woman has already ended up married and used to revolving her life around her Nigel (which said Nigels have no interest in doing in reverse). Meanwhile, men will go full FlatEarther mode and deny even the most blatanty obvious reality (such as the extent of male violence over women, and the lack of any female violence in return) just so they wouldn't acknowledge how immoral and unfair the patriarchy is.

And there's a huge difference between two groups where one is told they deserve to exploit and oppress a whole group due to their fundamental natural inferiority, vs a group that's told all their life they're inferior and nothing but sex objects, and who desperately wants to distance themselves from that by projecting loyalty, obedience and tolerance of mistreatment. Men are told they deserve special privileges, whereas women are constantly on the brink of being relegated into the wh*re/Bad Woman category, or just the Spinster Abyss of Lost Souls, aka women that everyone hates or ignores because, even though they're not actively doing anything wrong, they're not attractive and servile enough to have their existence noticed via the benefit they provide to a man.

Quote:They want a privileged class of mommy-wife women and an underclass of single-wh*re women, the exact same way conservative men want a privileged class of landowning-leader men and an underclass of worker-soldier men to exploit.

So, you are right that conservative women are sold a fairy tale of a cozy traditional life with a loving-gentleman-husband-supported nuclear family, but you're missing the crucial difference: conservative women do not exploit lesser women, they just enable male exploitation of them, and of themselves. Because conservative women aren't somehow fundamentally immune from exploitation and abuse by some inherent trait - they're experiencing it all the time or told they'll experiemce it violently if they don't appease their oppressors enough. This does not make sense for humans to support for themselves. Purely shitty, selfish people advocate for their benefits only. They want to see themselves on top. Even the men who worship other men do it because they see themselves in their shoes.
Women don't. Power is off-limits to them. Male supremacism by definition doesn't allow any kind of female supremacism, only female "doesn't-deserve-to-be-abused-quite-as-much"-ism. Different tactics need to be used on women, which is why women experience gender-role brainwashing all their life, complete with the expectation of relying on and marrying their oppressor. "Power" for women is not being mistreated quite as much because you're not one of those bad disobedient women who deserve violence, you're a good obedient woman who turns the other cheek when faced with constant abuse and dehumanisation, and that's why your oppressor will take pity on you, as long as you serve him well.
Also, liberal women chase the same kind of approval from men, and will throw other women under the bus in order to get it, such as prostitutes and surrogates (things that religion at least nominally disapproves of, though usually not specifically out of any concern for women's rights). In fact I'm surprised you mentioned conservative women support surrogacy because that's something liberal feminists are notorious for.

I think your characterisation of conservative women's supposedly thought-out motivation misses the mark in several aspects: they don't think "Rape victims need to be silenced because my meal ticket can't land in jail, that'd make me a wh*re", they think "bf/hubby/Nigel really wants this and he should get it because you should turn the other cheek when men want something".  They don't think "Women shouldn't work so I can eventually have a cheaper housemaid", they think "Who will feed and clothe the poor Nigels, and the children that said Nigel would let starve to death without the mother's intervention?"

Yes, conservative (and liberal) women are selfish and deluded in a sense that they want to carve out a special little NotLikeOtherWomen place in the patriarchy for themselves, but this isn't the same kind of infantile selfishness that men have where they just want to take, take, take because it's THEIRS and they want it so they should have it because they haven't moved past the development of a 5-year-old. This is a decidedly ideological, virtue-signaling kind of selfishness, and it's completely reliant on appeasing men. You lose the men around these women, and they'll eventually see reason. You lose the men around men, and they'll still keep screaming that they should get a bangmaid because they really really want one and why can't they have it WAAAAH

Quote:My tone isn't aggressive because I hate wives and mothers. My tone is aggressive because the nasty tone I am typing in right now does not even compare to how nasty the ideology I'm complaining about is.

Despite my disagreement with the characterised logic behind the motivations of conservative women, my god is it good to hear a spade called a spade and not have to walk on eggshells because poor widdle conserwative women might get chased away đŸ˜„

Quote:And I regret ever participating in Ovarit discussions and being gentle and sweet and patient because it did not work, these women have 0 interest in female liberation no matter how kind we are so might as well be mean.

Yeah, liberal feminists at least agree on the barest basic bones of women's rights, whereas conservatives will straight up advocate treating women like cattle. It's the difference between debating, say, an uneducated normie on astronomy, versus a Flatearther. Why the fuck would anyone think these women would ever care about women's rights, especially when the whole reason why they're on Ovarit is to complain about how TIMs look ugly in dresses compared to real women who were made to wear it better 🙄 Why the fuck would you think these people are somehow going to magically convert to feminism, doubly so when challenging them is "being divisive" and "hostile"?
The only thing that treating conservativism with kiddie gloves does is it enables and normalises more conservative rhetoric which attracts more conservatives like flies to shit, and ends up chasing away or straight up banning actual feminist women who won't stay quiet and walk on eggshells. Like, conservatives don't even agree with the most basic tenets of feminism and yet they're supposed to get coddled and treated as equals in feminist discussions? Actually, not even feminist, just trans. Like what...Not only do they not care about feminism, they're expressly ANTI-feminist! That's several steps above mere ignorance!
Edited Jan 10 2025, 8:16 AM by YesYourNigel.
YesYourNigel
Jan 9 2025, 8:10 PM #10

Quote:For women who are literally illiterate and kept on a fundamentalist compound in the deep south, sure that's a victim of brainwashing. But women who are educated and free enough to participate in these conversations are not brainwashed.

But every woman is brainwashed, literally from day one. Women live every moment of their day being convinced they're inferior, that they live in a foreign, man's world and that men know best. They also get sucked into religion that preys on their BeKind female socialisation and sells them obedience to male authority.

Quote:I really believe that conservative women are just as obsessed with the madonna/wh*re dichotomy as men.

They're really not. It doesn't make sense for women to care about who's the Madonna and who's the wh*re - they don't get anything out of that. Women "care" because men care, because MEN are the possessive narcissists who want a pure virgin they can control more easily and use as breeding stock, and women know their only hope for a normal life lies in sucking up to men.

It's easy to get frustrated with women backstabbing other women for the sake of men and to conclude that both men and women are working towards the same kind of male supremacist goal, but they're not. Women work for male benefit out of defense from the patriarchal system they have no way of escaping. Men aggressively and proactively work for their own benefit because they're selfish shitheads who don't like consequences and who want a free personal bangmaid. This is a crucial, fundamental distinction - men are promised the world in a patriarchal system, whereas women are promised protection from the men's world. All women have a lifetime of degradation, threats, warnings and usually victimisation by men, and it's within these norms that they are sold the fantasy that they will have a cushy life if only they appease their oppressors and prove themselves as obedient cogs in the system. No-one in their right mind would advocate their own abuse and subjugation otherwise. It's also why conservative women consistently come from more religious, misogynistic and male-reliant backgrounds that feel normal and impossible to change. They don't all independently decide that, oh yeah, actually it's great to get beaten and raped with no recourse, and it's cool to be treated as subhuman. Conservative women deal with just as much abuse as any other woman in a patriarchal system, they just internalise it and think if they coddle men even more, they'll be spared. Whereas men, who live with their heads up each other's asses all their life and who can afford in a patriarchal society to forget that women exist, simply prioritise their own benefits.

It's important to remember that male supremacism doesn't make a lick of sense for any woman to support. It's like a black person supporting white supremacism. It's always a defensive tactic meant to appease the oppressors, the "fawn" option from fight, flight, freeze, fawn. Which is also why we make a distinction between regular and internalised misogyny. Women parrot misogyny, men actually believe it.

This is also why it's so much easier to get women to see through the nonsensical bs of sexism compared to men, unless said woman has already ended up married and used to revolving her life around her Nigel (which said Nigels have no interest in doing in reverse). Meanwhile, men will go full FlatEarther mode and deny even the most blatanty obvious reality (such as the extent of male violence over women, and the lack of any female violence in return) just so they wouldn't acknowledge how immoral and unfair the patriarchy is.

And there's a huge difference between two groups where one is told they deserve to exploit and oppress a whole group due to their fundamental natural inferiority, vs a group that's told all their life they're inferior and nothing but sex objects, and who desperately wants to distance themselves from that by projecting loyalty, obedience and tolerance of mistreatment. Men are told they deserve special privileges, whereas women are constantly on the brink of being relegated into the wh*re/Bad Woman category, or just the Spinster Abyss of Lost Souls, aka women that everyone hates or ignores because, even though they're not actively doing anything wrong, they're not attractive and servile enough to have their existence noticed via the benefit they provide to a man.

Quote:They want a privileged class of mommy-wife women and an underclass of single-wh*re women, the exact same way conservative men want a privileged class of landowning-leader men and an underclass of worker-soldier men to exploit.

So, you are right that conservative women are sold a fairy tale of a cozy traditional life with a loving-gentleman-husband-supported nuclear family, but you're missing the crucial difference: conservative women do not exploit lesser women, they just enable male exploitation of them, and of themselves. Because conservative women aren't somehow fundamentally immune from exploitation and abuse by some inherent trait - they're experiencing it all the time or told they'll experiemce it violently if they don't appease their oppressors enough. This does not make sense for humans to support for themselves. Purely shitty, selfish people advocate for their benefits only. They want to see themselves on top. Even the men who worship other men do it because they see themselves in their shoes.
Women don't. Power is off-limits to them. Male supremacism by definition doesn't allow any kind of female supremacism, only female "doesn't-deserve-to-be-abused-quite-as-much"-ism. Different tactics need to be used on women, which is why women experience gender-role brainwashing all their life, complete with the expectation of relying on and marrying their oppressor. "Power" for women is not being mistreated quite as much because you're not one of those bad disobedient women who deserve violence, you're a good obedient woman who turns the other cheek when faced with constant abuse and dehumanisation, and that's why your oppressor will take pity on you, as long as you serve him well.
Also, liberal women chase the same kind of approval from men, and will throw other women under the bus in order to get it, such as prostitutes and surrogates (things that religion at least nominally disapproves of, though usually not specifically out of any concern for women's rights). In fact I'm surprised you mentioned conservative women support surrogacy because that's something liberal feminists are notorious for.

I think your characterisation of conservative women's supposedly thought-out motivation misses the mark in several aspects: they don't think "Rape victims need to be silenced because my meal ticket can't land in jail, that'd make me a wh*re", they think "bf/hubby/Nigel really wants this and he should get it because you should turn the other cheek when men want something".  They don't think "Women shouldn't work so I can eventually have a cheaper housemaid", they think "Who will feed and clothe the poor Nigels, and the children that said Nigel would let starve to death without the mother's intervention?"

Yes, conservative (and liberal) women are selfish and deluded in a sense that they want to carve out a special little NotLikeOtherWomen place in the patriarchy for themselves, but this isn't the same kind of infantile selfishness that men have where they just want to take, take, take because it's THEIRS and they want it so they should have it because they haven't moved past the development of a 5-year-old. This is a decidedly ideological, virtue-signaling kind of selfishness, and it's completely reliant on appeasing men. You lose the men around these women, and they'll eventually see reason. You lose the men around men, and they'll still keep screaming that they should get a bangmaid because they really really want one and why can't they have it WAAAAH

Quote:My tone isn't aggressive because I hate wives and mothers. My tone is aggressive because the nasty tone I am typing in right now does not even compare to how nasty the ideology I'm complaining about is.

Despite my disagreement with the characterised logic behind the motivations of conservative women, my god is it good to hear a spade called a spade and not have to walk on eggshells because poor widdle conserwative women might get chased away đŸ˜„

Quote:And I regret ever participating in Ovarit discussions and being gentle and sweet and patient because it did not work, these women have 0 interest in female liberation no matter how kind we are so might as well be mean.

Yeah, liberal feminists at least agree on the barest basic bones of women's rights, whereas conservatives will straight up advocate treating women like cattle. It's the difference between debating, say, an uneducated normie on astronomy, versus a Flatearther. Why the fuck would anyone think these women would ever care about women's rights, especially when the whole reason why they're on Ovarit is to complain about how TIMs look ugly in dresses compared to real women who were made to wear it better 🙄 Why the fuck would you think these people are somehow going to magically convert to feminism, doubly so when challenging them is "being divisive" and "hostile"?
The only thing that treating conservativism with kiddie gloves does is it enables and normalises more conservative rhetoric which attracts more conservatives like flies to shit, and ends up chasing away or straight up banning actual feminist women who won't stay quiet and walk on eggshells. Like, conservatives don't even agree with the most basic tenets of feminism and yet they're supposed to get coddled and treated as equals in feminist discussions? Actually, not even feminist, just trans. Like what...Not only do they not care about feminism, they're expressly ANTI-feminist! That's several steps above mere ignorance!

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