I know this post is long, but @Colossus, at least, should read it. The tl;dr is that the above post is massively problematic. You can probably skip down to "feminism is good, great even" for the most important parts.
@joek Constantly? Hardly. And it was irony rather than actual use.
You see, the thing is it's not really believable if you claim it was irony and then use the word again in this post.
Also I'm never talking to anyone here directly with these sort of comments matey, so when I say things like 'Don't be offended' it's not to you it's to whoever I'm talking about...
Possibly you missed the point of my comment. Possibly you are being obtuse. Either way, I'll spell it out for you: you don't get to tell anyone, whether or not it is me, whether they have the right to be offended about anything.
Don't make it personal, hate the argument not the person behind it... Point is, it feels like you're trying to make it personal. I'm asking nicely, lay off.
You think that my above post is me trying to make it personal? Seriously? And you criticise others for being offended? Wow.
If you think my above post was
in any way personal, please tell me where. I am genuinely confused here.
No, feminism is good, great even.
Some of your best friends are feminists, right?
Look, the thing is, you can say that you support feminism all you like, but my only experience of your attitude to feminism is you saying that feminists shouldn't be doing something because you personally don't like it, claiming that they're
as bad as the people giving them death threats, and generally being anti-feminist. And on that basis, I'm going to judge that you are not a feminist, or a supporter of feminism, in any way. You're at best clueless about what the issue is here.
I am all for true equality, I don't give two portugals if you're male/female/trans/other, be a decent person and leave me the portugal alone to do whatever I want to do and that's great.
You're all for equality, but you think that criticising men for doing something which actively harms the fight for equality is a bad thing? Which is true?
Objectification is an odd thing to get annoyed about imo. When people 'objectify' other people, it's not them, it's their assets. Leave men to objectify womens assets if they want because hell, they're pretty portugaling amazing and they look great. They may never get laid by some girls for doing that, but hey I know girls that love it when guys are looking at them like that, because it makes them feel (and here's the kicker) like a woman. I'm totally cool with women objectifying male assets and don't feel the need to take it personally in the slightest I may be a little jaded that it's never about me but hey 
. I can accept being portugal ugly without needing everyone else to never talk about how good looking another person is.
Oh, for portugal's sake. This is like feminism portugaling 101 or something, here.
Objectification is not just "talk[ing] about how good looking another person is". It's exactly what it sounds like:
The demotion or degrading of a person or class of people (esp. women) to the status of a mere object.
And, to quote Granny Weatherwax in
Carpe Jugulum:
Sin, young man, is when you treat people like things.
No one is saying that you can't appreciate women's looks. What we're saying is that you should treat women as portugaling people too. By, for example, not infantilising them by consistently referring to them as "girls". Or, e.g., not wearing a shirt to work which is covered in images of women in fetish gear, and then going on live TV, wearing that shirt, and referring to a spacecraft as "sexy, but not easy". Is this really that hard to understand.
And, if there is a woman who likes being objectified, rather than having their looks appreciated, then knock yourself out. Objectify her. That doesn't give anyone else the right to objectify other women, who
don't want to be so treated.
Finally, when you say "well, objectification is harmless", maybe you should read the article I linked to about a peer-reviewed study showing the harms of objectification. That was, after all, why I linked it. Or possibly you did and you're arguing in bad faith.
Urgh, your logic hurts. We read different things, that's cool. Don't just dismiss what I'm saying because my language is 'colourful' and it happens to disagree with what you've seen so far. Take it with skepticism, sure I'm always an advocate of that in most everything. I can't find where I read it, its been buried in a mountain of other armadilloe but yes there were definitely shots fired from both sides. If you're denying that then....Erm...yikes
I'm not disagreeing with you because you are swearing. As this reply has shown, I swear to emphasise points. Nor am I disagreeing with you because your stance contradicts what I've seen so far. I'm disagreeing with you because I have seen no evidence, and you have been unable to provide any evidence, that what you say is at all true and because you clearly don't understand many of the issues at stake, such as e.g. the problem of objectification.
I'm not denying that there were shots fired from both sides. I'm simply saying that in every article, blog post, blog comment, forum post and so on I've read on this topic, I've not seen anything from one side that was in any way equivalent to death threats, or trying to get someone fired because of an opinion they hold. I'm also saying that since you haven't been able to give me any evidence of these things, other than asserting that they're happening, I'm not going to change my mind. You should support that: it's the skeptical viewpoint, after all.
The feminist I portrayed displays a reasonable reaction, maybe I wasn't clear enough: I was showing equality there see because she thinks about doing the same. The femenazi, not so much which is who my rant was aimed at, you may be oblivious to them but yeah go to enough places, hell take 20 minutes browsing youtube and you'll find all kinds of bullarmadillo (more or less) exactly as I'm saying it.
I'm not doing your research for you, here. Show me where it's happening, and I'll condemn it. As it is, the majority of the backlash has been against people (such as Rose Eveleth) who have expressed perfectly reasonable opinions.
A quote from Anita Sarkeesian: "There's no such thing as sexism against men" So yes, she is the typified person I'm hating on.
1. As far as I am aware, Anita Sarkeesian has not commented at all on Matt Taylor's shirt. So claiming you're hating on her when you are in a thread talking about the Philae landing, and the controversy over Matt Taylor's shirt, is just bullarmadillo.
2. The idea that there's no such thing as sexism against men is a relatively widespread, and perfectly coherent, view. For the same reason that there is no such thing as racism against white people in the West. Men have historically had, and still have, masses of privilege relative to women, and I don't understand why some people find this hard to accept. (If you think that there is such thing as sexism against men, I'd love to see examples. Bonus points if that "sexism" is caused by women.)
What do they do? Cause negativity and arguments all over the place, reducing my enjoyment of browsing the internet for pictures of cats and music by Maria Brink.
Seriously.
1. If you're just looking at cat pictures, you shouldn't have come across this debate at all. I've never searched "funny cat pictures" on Google and come up with a debate on feminism.
My next point is going to actually contain a personal attack. If you can't handle it, then I really don't give a portugal.
2. If you think that your right to look at the internet is more important than feminists' rights to discuss the problems of misogyny in our society, and the fact that women and men are not equal, then you are a portugaling terrible person, and you epitomise if not everything which is wrong with today's society, then a hell of a lot of it.
To quote Martin Niemoller:
When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.
When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.
When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.
When they came for the Jews,
I remained silent;
I wasn't a Jew.
When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.
I would much prefer they stayed to their own forums and promoted their agenda endlessly and futilely there instead. Real equality progression I've always said has to be made by white men. (Which I know is kind of ironic )
Today I learned:
* Rosa Parks did not real.
* Martin Luther King did not real.
* The Stonewall Riots did not real.
* Malcolm X did not real.
* Emmeline Pankhurst did not real. Nor did Emily Davison. Nor any of the other Pankhursts.
Real equality has never been made by straight white men. I see no evidence that it's going to suddenly become so now. (And besides, many straight white men did comment on this, so your point is invalid).
Seriously, you are suggesting that what women did wrong is talk out of turn in a way where you, as a white man, could hear them. And yet, as you said above, you support feminism. Wow. Do you see the irony here?
By that I mean that because we've had it so easy and got accustomed to being paid more/whatever and because we do have most higher paying jobs and a load of industries are against women working in them, one of them I'm actively trying to combat* it's up to our generation and I think this time we're actually going to do it, if not then real progress is going to be made when the likes of Jubal are in their 30's/40's and equality won't even be a thing, it'll just be natural to offer jobs to whoever has the right creds for it.
I wouldn't hold your breath, frankly. Equality will continue to go to those who fight for it.
EDIT: This is pretty much what I'm saying but a lot better, words never have been my weapon of choice. http://goo.gl/L2cPLx
If you genuinely support the sentiments expressed in that image, there's no hope for you. Supporters of female representation in metal music should be running the portugal away from you about now.
I'm not going to do a point by point fisking of it, but:
* Saying that people are objects. Nope, they're portugaling people.
* Suggesting that campaigning against objectification is bigoted. portugal that noise.
* Suggesting that it's the problem of the people focusing on what Taylor is wearing. Nope, he chose to wear it. It's no one's fault but his (and his bosses, for not saying that it's entirely inappropriate for the workplace)
* Saying that seeing what he's wearing is the same as objectification, which is just wrong.
* Being a misogynistic portugalwit who brings out the tired old fainting couches trope.
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