We Have Failed Our Daughters. From the 2d Wave to the 3d Wave

I've been watching 3rd wave feminism and the havoc it has wreaked in the last few years with dismay. It reminds me of an out of control toddler.

It truly breaks my heart to see the issue of womens' rights, an issue that has always been very close to my heart, turned into one of shallow bigotry against men, hatred against anyone who disagrees, and whining, bitching and moaning over the most absurd of issues (manspreading? seriously?) like children running to the mommy / daddy state and begging for support. When the support doesn't come the usual temper tantrum ensues.

The 3rd wave doesn't understand the concept of rights, especially women's rights and the role that concept plays in society in general. They seem to see it as a means to brow beat and abuse those they don't like (especially if they're male) or to support self-serving goals/agendas. They also don't understand how to achieve rights.

It just makes me shake my head.

And then I realize, it's my fault. It's the fault of my generation of women's rights activists. The 2d wave.

We did this to our daughters because we didn't teach them the most important aspects of women's rights.

We didn't teach our daughters that:

1. Women's rights are directly connected to Human Rights, to Civil Rights. Our rights must exist within that context. They cannot exist independent of that or they become Special Rights, the rights of a privileged (or underprivileged) group. Gaining rights for ourselves by taking away the rights of others benefits the divide and rule game of the elites and not us. The 2d wave fought for women's rights as well as the rights of the disadvantaged, the poor, the children.

2. Men are our allies in our fight for women's rights. Not our enemies. They are not our problem. Any state/government which diminishes our rights and freedoms is the problem. We should be focusing our attention on them and the numerous ways that they are removing ALL of our rights as well as those rights specific to women such as the right to control our bodies.

3. a. Rights are not given to us not matter how much we beg, stomp our feet or scream about it. Protest, screaming out on the Internet, writing blogs, doing any of these things by themselves accomplishes little or sometimes it accomplishes the wrong things.

3. b. Rights are won. They are won through organized systematic community-based actions. They are won by organizing at the grass roots level (online and IRL), helping people to understand the issues and why they matter and winning their hearts and support. They are not won by brow-beating those potential allies into submission using trite PC phrases, irrational arguments and initiating hate campaigns and deceptions against them when they dare to disagree. Patience, tolerance, understanding the issues, having open rational discussions is what wins us allies.

4. As strong women, we must assert ourselves, assert our rights, and act to defend them in both the legal arena and society at large or, in the case of anarchists, in an appropriate way that fits into your belief system. I'm not an anarchist so I don't know what that would be. The main point, irrespective of belief systems, is that if we don't act, then any problems that result are on us. No-one else. We have to shoulder that responsibility. Passivity, going along, accepting discriminatory and harassing environments without taking action is what the 2d wave fought hard against. As women, we are not weak, passive creatures and victims of happenstance. We have to act and in order to do that we have to take our strength, assert it, and never back down when we are acting to defend our rights. The blame game is simply a means to avoid taking a stand and rationalizing our own inaction. It's a way of avoiding responsibility.

The job of the 3d wave was easy at the beginning of the new millennium. All you had to do was defend and protect the rights that the 2d wave fought for and won. You didn't do your job because we didn't teach you what needed to be done. We assumed you knew. Of course, as the old saying goes, assuming things makes an 'ass' out of you and me. It certainly has done that in spades.

Now, today, in 2016, thanks to our Whistleblowers, we are seeing terrible erosions of rights. Erosions that impact everyone including in the areas of women's rights. As women, we are losing the right to control our bodies such as weakening of or elimination of abortion laws. The laws such as sexual harassment as well as labor laws are becoming ineffective because people (men and women) are not asserting their rights. There are many reasons for this including the fact that it's gradually becoming more difficult to do. Especially for the poor who don't have the means or resources to hire lawyers and assert their rights in the courts.

We are ALL responsible for that. For taking our rights for granted and for not acting to defend them.

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Censorship and the RadFems

The following has been copied in it's entirety from: Venture Philosophy by Naomi

Please note that I agree in full with the points made by the author of this blog post and strongly object to YouTube's censorship of the video, based on false complaints by skanks who can't handle a little disagreement or difference of opinion. I have uploaded the censored video to my YouTube account, as have others, in protest of this censorship.

Women are not fragile, delicate little flowers that have to be protected from evil. At least I'm not and nor are the many Freethinking feminists that I know. We are perfectly capable of standing up on our own, in our own right and engaging in rational debate irrespective of the claims of the RadFems who seem to need to hide behind demogoguery and sleazy tactics in order to impose their particularly bigoted world view on the rest of us.

I support women's rights and have stood up on the issues facing women from a very young age. I never bought the RadFem bullshit when it was initially introduced in the 1980s. It was destructive to the women's movement then and continues to be now. 

Feel free to compare the Scum Manifesto to the Schroeder's Rapist Manifesto and tell me how they're different in nature.

Naomi's blog post from Venture Philosophy:

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The American Mothers Political Party is a Hate Group. Not only do they spew hatred towards men, but they also commit acts of censorship. I am a recent victim of these angry harpies. Bill Windsor recently discussed some horrid e-mails these women were sending him. He openly discussed the stalking on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. His Youtube video is linked below. These bitter women called him everything from a pedophile, rape enabler, pervert, and money hungry bastard whose greatest desire in life is to drink the blood of babes. These women are insane. I  am a friend of Bill Windsor. I am proud of his work, and proud that I was able to help him in his mission to uncover corruption in the United States Courts. He is not a misogynist. He speaks for mothers, fathers, and grandparents.

I made a video entitled "American Mothers Political Party is a Hate Group." In that video, I did two things. First, I discussed some public comments some individuals were leaving on Facebook. These comments are for anyone to see. Second, I asked my viewers to sign a White House Petition calling on our president to help us fight corruption within the government.

When I put the video up Wednesday, the women had it flagged and pulled. I appealed the decision. The video was reviewed and YouTube reposted it to my channel last night. I was happy, I won, I thought that it was over. Wrong.

Five minutes ago, I went to upload a new video and discovered that I couldn't. The reason? The women flagged the same video a second time. I have just appealed it for a second time. Probably tomorrow or the day after I will find out if YouTube will agree with me for the second time that it does not violate any terms of service. It is a real pain because I cannot use my YouTube account until YouTube reposts the video.

I would like to ask my viewers, and all people against radical feminism to help me teach these cry babies a lesson about internet censorship. Below is a MediaFire Link. Please download my video, and re-upload it to your YouTube channel. These women may be able to censor me - but they will not be able to censor all of you.

http://www.mediafire.com/?5dpif2jc9a8deg9

I would also like to add, that in all of the things I have said against Feminism and the MRA - not once did any Men's Right Group stoop so low as to pull a video they did not like. They came here to the comment section and spoke their mind. They did not pull a cowardly move like this.

The FreeThinking Woman

"I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is: I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat, or a prostitute." --Rebecca West

Trying to define the term Feminism is challenging because it means many different things to many different people.

My definition is quite simple.

Feminism is the movement for equal rights for women whatever that might entail during any given period in history.

Given my definition I don't accept the concept of "protofeminism" nor do I believe that there were only three "waves" of feminism.

That said, for now and in the interests of clarity, I will make my comments within the context of accepted historical standards.

Historically speaking there have been three "waves" of feminism defined. 

The first wave began in the 18th century along with the development of the FreeThought movement and Rationalism and was supported by many FreeThinkers from it's inception. 

It's neither an accident nor a coincidence that the suffragette leaders were FreeThinkers for the most part. 

The reason for this is that it was the FreeThinkers who were questioning the standards and the existing beliefs, holding them up to the light of reason, discarding that which didn't meet rational standards and upholding that which did.

That's not to say that Christian women didn't play a role in fighting for the right to vote. They did. It was, in fact, the one unifying issue between Christian feminists and FreeThinking feminists.

However, there was a divergence of interest on other issues where the Christian feminists focused on Temperance (prohibition of alcohol) whereas the FreeThinking feminists focused on Abolition (banning slavery) amongst other issues.

While the stated focus of this First Wave was womens suffrage, the right to vote, it's real focus was much more than that.

It was about the right of women to recognized as persons under the law.

After all, that's precisely why women didn't have suffrage. We were legally considered chattel, the property of the men who were in charge of us whether they were our fathers, husbands, uncles, brothers, caretakers, etc.

Note that according to Amendment XIV of the US Constitution, citizens were persons and on those grounds granted the privileges defined by the Constitution including the right to vote. Since women were not given the right to vote they were not considered persons under the law or citizens as defined by the XIVth Amendment.

Amendment XIV

(The proposed amendment was sent to the states June 16, 1866, by the Thirty-ninth Congress. It was ratified July 9, 1868.)
Section 1


[Citizenship defined; privileges of citizens.]


All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

While the women of the day who posed arguments to support their right to equality did so within the context of the times and in relation to the existing social theories which kept them enslaved, the real issue was glaringly obvious and while unstated, was reflected clearly in Marion Kirkland Reid's, A Plea For Women (1843), where she elucidated three issues which stood in the way of women's rights. These three issues formed the foundation for both the First and Second Wave Feminist movements.

They were:
1. Lack of civil rights
2. Unjust laws against women
3. Inability to obtain an education

If women were considered human beings, people under the law, the above would have resulted in violations of the existing Constitutions in various western countries.

In addition, it was implicit in the existing social theories of the day which Reid also addressed that women were not considered persons under the law: 

1. women and domesticity
2. women and Christianity. 

Reid spoke to these in the context of "women's appropriate role in society".

So Reid's major contribution was to objectify through these issues the real problem which was that women were not considered to be persons under the law, by the society of the day.

Reid's document, combined with the shunning of women from around the world, who attended the first World Anti-Slavery Convention in 1840 led to the Seneca Falls Convention in the US, on women's rights. The Declaration of Rights and Sentiments was authored here by Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and became the foundation for American feminism.

Excerpt:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights governments are instituted, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of those who suffer from it to refuse allegiance to it, and to insist upon the institution of a new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness."


***


"Closing Remarks
Now, in view of this entire disfranchisement of one-half the people of this country, their social and religious degradation—in view of the unjust laws above mentioned, and because women do feel themselves aggrieved, oppressed, and fraudulently deprived of their most sacred rights, we insist that they have immediate admission to all the rights and privileges which belong to them as citizens of these United States."

Once suffrage, the right to vote, was won, a major hurdle was overcome. This right, through the XIXth Amendment of the US Constitution legally established that women were persons under the law.

Amendment XIX

(The proposed amendment was sent to the states June 4, 1919, by the Sixty-sixth Congress. It was ratified Aug. 18, 1920.)


[The right of citizens to vote shall not be denied because of sex.]


The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.


[Congress given power to enforce this article.]


Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

This allowed women to move things to the next level, to establish legal and social equality in other areas.

Women now began the process of establishing an identity through media and culture,  legal rights, employment inclusion and equity, reproductive rights, exploration of gender issues and female sexuality, fighting for social reform on many fronts including Family and Property Law.

None of these issues was won easily and at times resulted in the imprisonment of advocates. 

In addition, many rights were removed after WWII since women were no longer needed in the work force.

This environment led to the Second Wave of Feminism.

Simone de Beauvoir, mother of modern feminism, existentialist philosopher, feminist, polyamorist, bisexual, lover of and inspiration to Jean Paul Sartre wrote the ground-breaking book, The Second Sex in 1949 which laid the foundation for this Second Wave of Feminism.

Beauvoir's critique of First Wave Feminism corrected errors in and advanced the philosophical approaches originally adopted by First Wave Feminism.

She established the concept that women's goal wasn't to be like men but to be equal to men, that equality was established by the freedom to choose, and was responsible for coining the term, Women's Liberation.

History Of Feminism : Wiki