What is really sad is that the post that seemed to set Newt off irt me is:

Newt, srsly mate, you're overdoing the point. BB is right here, the word she chooses to define herself as is her business regardless of what that word means to you.

What matters is her attitude, and she has clearly and repeatedly espoused equality for all. I don't agree with everything she has put forward, but on that she has been very consistent. Now you're just doing what she mentioned earlier, keeping the conversation bouncing along on a thin pretext way past it's point of usefulness.

Do you see any gender politics in there one way or the other? The right to self determination includes Bareboard's right to identify as whatever she wants, and that is (or should be) a standard human right that humanists would hold pretty sacred. Right?

Newt keeps trying to turn it in to "The 3rd wave feminazis are trying to tear me down" so he doesn't come off looking like the total twat he's made of himself in this thread, but that's not the conversation that occurred, at least imo.

so i am sitting here drinking my coffee reading this thread and i have to say...

depressing.

so many wonderful people that i admire and respect getting twisted about?

words.

not the intent,nor over-all context..but words.

i can see where @newtboy is coming from,and what he is laying down is pretty non-controversial.i also see what @bareboards2 is laying down,and is not really in opposition to what newt is talking about.

both ideologies can reside in the same context and not be in conflict.in fact they compliment each other and ....and maybe i am reading their positions wrong..they actually agree on the fundamentals.

@bareboards2 actually addressed this by pointing out that "tone" can be misinterpreted.(good for you BB) and really the exchange between newt and BB was about their own self-identification.

yet this entire thread is almost exclusively focusing on words,and the gravitas and weight given to those words by the individual,which is subjective.

i feel newts pain.
i had a run where i was posting videos exposing hyper-militant third wave feminists and how they were using the justice system to punish those who disagreed with them,and every self-identified feminist came out of the wood work to declare their disappointment in me and defend the very thing they identified with.

what confused me was why people would even attempt to defend that absolute cluster fuck of abuse as somehow even being remotely to do with actual feminism.until i realized that many hadn't even watched the video or read the articles .so they were not defending those third wave feminists that had abused a justice system but rather defending a term that they self-identified as.

after long (and i mean long ..@Payback is still in therapy) back and forths between myself and fellow sifters.when i FINALLY got them to address the specific situation,not one...not ONE sifter..felt morally obligated to defend those feminists actions.

why?
because taken on its singular merits,those feminists were fucking wrong.

then why all the defensive posturing?
why the passive aggressive swipes at me?
and the exhaustive back and forths just to get self-identified feminists to at least admit that those particular feminists had abused their position to punish a man for simply disagreeing.

because they were defending feminism in general.
because they self-identified as feminists and failed to see the situation as it was and jumped to defend a WORD that they happened to identify with.

as a whole we can,as a society hold onto philosophies that are not mutually exclusive.
so you can be a feminist and a humanist.
or a humanist and an MRA advocate.

@bareboards2 may be a feminist but i know that if she witnessed me being harassed and discriminated against she would jump to my defense,as would @newtboy.

there are people who identify as something and yet can still be major dickweeds.so what they self-identify as does not automatically give them a pass.

so dont get so caught up in identity politics my friends.
they are just words after all.
just listen to the person talking,they will reveal if they are a total tool soon enough.how they self-identify is irrelevant.

"We" is those like me, that have always supported equality( for over 40 years in my case), but never liked calling that "feminism", as that word implies both separation and a bias, both of which EXCLUDE equality. There are many who think that. My mother is one, it's not just men.

You do not have to fight at all, I don't know why you seem to want to. Because someone suggests that it might be something to think about is not the same as saying 'YOU MAY NOT USE THAT TERM'! You may chose to not think about it if that is your choice, you may chose to think differently. No one is telling you how to think, I'm telling you how I think.

No one said "your wrong to use that term". I said there are reasons it's not a good name for a movement that is NOT based on a female centric, female dominant mindset. No scolding. My choice is my choice, my thoughts and reasons are mine, yours are yours, why are you so looking for me to be scolding you or telling you you're wrong? I'm not doing either.

It is only descriptive if the goals are promotion of purely female causes and rights, but not if the goals are equality....but that means they lose a LOT of people that have called themselves 'feminists' in the past, and not just men.

Um....OK....so forget equality for men then? Any time the equation is in the woman's favor, that's fine, huh? No thanks, THAT'S why we need another name. You can keep "feminism", as I think that's exactly what it describes, "equality for WOMEN, period". 'Humanist' as a concept (as I understand it) excludes that mindset of separate and pit against, it does not embrace and reinforce it.
Equality for people. Period.

Why is it that my stating my thoughts, to you, means I'm instructing you how to think, and stating you must "hew" to my definition? I certainly made no such conscious implication. May I, a man, not have an opinion without being labeled an oppressor of women?

No, clearly you don't understand my reason or goal in stating my thoughts and I feel that you have over-reacted based on that total misunderstanding.

Fine. Then I'm an equalitist. I care about equality and fairness for all people. You may separate and then choose sides, that's your right, your option, and your choice to make for yourself.
EDIT: Make that egalitarian...thank you @Babymech for pointing me to the correct term.

Seconded. You can subscribe to feminism and individualism, or feminism and collectivism, or any other combination of these different schools of thought - one is not 'better' than the others in the sense that a hammer isn't 'better' than a saw or a drill.

The way that the internet is turning actual schools of thought and study into 'teams' to be on is the same mechanism that drives a lot of amateur identity politics. "I don't want to be on team feminist because that team is rude on twitter, so I'll be on team humanist" is a sentiment that works great in vlogs, but which kicks all the actual thought and theory behind humanism and feminism, respectively, to the curb in favor of team politics. This is not to say that we shouldn't have 'teams,' just that we can make up those teams without discarding years of high quality thinking and actual crisp definitions.

@newtboy Uh..dude, "humanist" and "individualist" are already philosophical schools of thought that have determined meanings that aren't anywhere near the realm of feminism (eg, an activist movement for equal rights).

I mean, unless you're trying to stretch humanist to not mean, essentially, secular thought distancing from the dogma of the church and individualist as not the idea of the individual has more weight than collective good or the state. But.. you might have to contend with the fact those aren't the definitions of things you believe you came up with.

Who is this "we" of whom you speak?

Because I have proudly called myself a feminist since at least 1976, if not before.

I started calling myself a Humanist also maybe in 1990? Somewhere around there? I am not giving up the term Feminist though. No matter who tries to co-opt it or suppress my use of it.

Or even "oppress" my use of it, if I might go that far. Why do I have to fight you to use a simple word to describe myself?

The scolding continues, by the way. Telling me that I am wrong to use a term I have proudly used for over 40 years. Because you and some of your friends don't like it and don't want to use it, for your own valid reasons.

Please stop telling Feminists that the word was never "descriptive of their goals" when in fact it is very descriptive.

Equality for women. Period.

I'm not telling you to stop labeling yourself only a Humanist. I was clear that I understood your point when I said that Humanist is an umbrella word that covers Feminist.

Is this going to be one of these long back-and-forths, where you try to talk me out of something? I really don't want to go there. It's exhausting.

Maybe the real question you might consider asking yourself is -- why is it so important to you that I hew to your definitions? Is it just an intellectual exercise, the fun of the argument? Well, it isn't fun to me. It feels lecturing and minimizing of my personal experience and knowledge and life lessons I have learned.

I know you don't intend that. However, I am telling you straight out, clearly, that is how it feels to me and I don't like it. I've been on the receiving end for FORTY FUCKING YEARS why it is inappropriate for some reason or other to call myself a feminist. The reasons change, but the goal always seems to be same: To stop me and others from overtly saying that we care about women and their place in society.

It's not going to happen. After 40 years, it just isn't going to happen.

I'm a feminist. I care about women and their place in society.

To quote Rashida, it is important to become more sensitive before being less sensitive.

I agree that being a Humanist is more inclusive. However, that umbrella word covers the valid word "feminist."

Trying to erase the word "feminist," scolding women and men for labeling themselves feminist, ignoring their particular need for that label as equality is struggled for is anti-Humanist, @newtboy.

Just sayin'.

And I'm the first person to speak up for how hard it is to be a man. Men are HORRIBLE to each other, for starters. In fact, I said it just last night, more than once, during a convo on the patriarchy after watching the 2007 movie made in Turkey called Bliss." There was some serious oppression of women in that movie -- very hard to watch. And it is important that the pressures that men are under are seen as just that -- human struggles and repressed pain that is masked by some really shitty outward behavior.

No need to tear down anyone else who is trying to improve their life and society in general. It is called being a Humanist.

From Mod Squad to that....my how the powerful sets have fallen!

I think "feminist" has turned out to be a terrible name for a movement that wants equality, "humanist" or "individualist" are MUCH better names for them IMO, while "feminist" is much more descriptive of the 'she-woman, man haters club' faction that's really based in an 'us VS them' mentality rather than an 'we/together' mentality.

Not only that, but when you suffer at the hands of cold, calculating oppression lacking entirely in humanistic compassion, when its flashing a badge and looking down on you like lesser than an enemy, but a nothing, a problem, a defect barely worth your time that simply needs handcuffs and a room without a view. The bounds of civil society begin to evaporate, because you no longer have a value to western civilization. Your pursuit of happiness ends and the collapse of your individual capitalist worth plummets.

And then nothing matters. Nothing. I fully understand why some people pick up guns and bombs and go on rampages. Even if it sickens me to consider such atrocity, i get it. Im staring into the darkness and it stares back and it makes sense.

Maybe after years of worthless surveillance, the powers that be will begin to understand this simple and very human truth. Dont devalue other humans.

Ever.

If you watch some of the other pieces of media this bearded douche has appeared in, you would know he is just as bigoted as he appears.

I find new wave feminists to be rather hypocritical. All feminists should really just be humanists. Equal rights for all, not special treatment just for women.

Hrm...

"whatever you humanist fuckheads are arguing for"

"I'm sorry, did I trigger you? Did I piss in your safe space? Aww."

Why is it that people that go out of their way to offend suddenly complain when it comes back at them?

I had a pretty reasonable response brewing to the post where you came up with the fuckhead bit, and trashed it because reasonable didn't seem what you were interested in. So why waste my time trying to reason with a person who is unreasonable right?

And hey, that's my presumption. Mebbe I caught you on a bad day, mebbe I'm being the ass here, it's entirely possible.

But this conversation is pretty much as pointless as vocal 3rd wave feminism. It's going around in circles, people occasionally getting mad, and the majority of the sift probably peaked in and decided they couldn't be fucked wading in among the 10 or so people dedicated to perpetuating the "conversation"... And of course it's not really accomplishing anything, we're all still being relatively civil to each other even if a bit terse...

The battle for equality isn't won, but it's pretty close (well, at least in the west, just forget about the majority of the worlds women who still live in conditions that make the 50's seem blissful...). 3rd wavers aren't fighting massive social injustice anymore, they are battling things like #gamergate and feedback against Sarkeesian, Tucker Max or that Return of Kings mob (who seem to be the biggest trolls on the planet but w/e).

Seriously, they are spending a lot of time and energy arguing with the lowest common denominators (who by and large love the attention). There used to be a time you could safely ignore the village idiot because, hey, he's a fucking idiot. Now, any dumbass can post on the internet and people will descend on them like the proverbial plagues of Egypt, followed shortly by supporters showing up. Not because those one offs are indicative of even a significant minority in broader society, but because it generates plenty of online hype to see "some guy" say something fucking awful and then the sides line up to start yelling at each other...

So I'm not overly concerned if we end up agreeing because in the grand scheme of things, it's also fairly pointless. We're both entitled to our opinions and they seem to be vaguely in the same park aka "equality good, hate and oppression bad", seems like a good place to stop.

You don't need to link any angry man-hating feminist videos, and I don't need to link any angry woman-hating videos by people calling themselves humanists while threatening Anita Sarkeesian's life. We both know that they exist, and should ideally agree that this doesn't mean most self-labelled feminists hate men and most self-labelled humanists don't hate women. In fact, the vast majority of feminists and humanists don't even make angry videos on the internet.

Then you go into statistics on rape by men against women outside of prison and rape by men against in prison. This is a fucking horrible cultural phenomenon, and I discussed that. Above. You saw it? Yeah you did. But you wanted to make pretend rape threats instead, which fine, that's your deal, I guess. Nevertheless I can quote myself, again:

"if we concede that there's a pervasive and destructive culture of rape of women by men outside of prison, I will also concede that there's a pervasive and destructive culture of rape of men by men in prison. In fact, I'll go ahead and concede that anyway. Which is fucking awful, but doesn't mean that feminists are wrong for railing against the situation outside of prison."

Furthermore - I gave you some quotes specifically showing you good sources of arguments. Not examplesof things men should tolerate or be fine about it. Quite the opposite, in fact. Don't pretend that I said that men should be fine with rape, because I never did. I said that just as white people have the privilege to shrug off inflammatory comments by BLM activists while still respecting the underlying movement, men have the privilege to be able to shrug off some inflammatory comments by feminist activists while still respecting the underlying movement. I am a little surprised that you responded with "I should have some people rape the fuck out of you" but okay, that's how you roll. If you don't want to go back on that comment - we'll just let it stand on its own, I guess.

As for Nicholas Cristakis in the video you link to, there's a shitload to discuss there, but it's much more nuanced and weird than feminism vs whatever.

- There's the weirdness of the role of a 'Master' and what it has come to mean at Yale. While I think the students are being unbearably unbearable, it would be a little different if they did it to a teacher rather than a master, who has a sort of weird guidance counsellor / therapist role. I don't know why that role needs to exist, or what it means in practice normally.
- There's the absolute insufferable pampered entitled gall and rudeness of those students which makes my goddamn blood boil.
- There's the question of racism and cultural appropriation at halloween (which started the whole thing) which to me is both a silly and difficult debate; I'm absolutely disguested by blackface, but I don't really mind if some four-year old white or black or hispanic girl wants to dress up as Mulan.
- There's the issue of job security in the academic world and what kind of protection Christakis has from fallout over a perfectly reasonable letter his wife wrote...

Those are all interesting, I agree, but I don't see what the video has to do with this one.

You might have had a point if you hadn't pissed it all up the wall with this pearler...

"whatever you humanist fuckheads are arguing for"

So ya know what, enjoy being a victim because my dick opens every door in the world for me, no effort required. /eyeroll

Why is it that the Videosift crowd is generally competent enough to call bullshit on "no, all lives matter"-rhetoric, but not enough to see through this type of nonsense? It's the exact same fallacy - yes, men do suffer in modern society, and yes, white people are mistreated by cops, but that's not a reasonable argument against feminism or against Black Lives Matter.

There's a decent quote by Anatole France on this kind of simpleminded 'equality in name only': "In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread." Trying to create equality on paper, and be color-blind or gender-blind or money-blind or whatever you humanist fuckheads are arguing for, just cements the actual inequalities in society, all because you don't want to 'focus on differences'.

Many self professed feminists believe it is about hating men too, but I assume "no true feminist" would ever do that right?

I wasn't trying to wilfully misunderstand you, but rather to pursue my whole contention about any political/social argument:

Individual People and specific arguments over ideologies always.

When the reverse is true and ideology is placed before people or the specific merits of an argument, the result is dehumanising and anti-intellectual (even if by the slimmest margins sometimes).

That's not to say that, where mutual understanding already exists, ideological terms are completely useless. But the moment individuals disagree, those ideological assumptions are going to get in the way of a productive dialogue.

My whole point I guess is that this seems rather anti-humanist if you will pardon the irony of taking an ideological position.
If as a humanist one believes that the optimal way is for everyone to be judged only on the merits of their individual words, deeds and capacity.

Rather than by culture, race, gender or some other involuntary and/or irrelevant factors.

Assuming you agree in principle with that definition of humanism in terms of goals, then what we are arguing here really is collectivism vs individualism.

You are suggesting we can get better results by pushing the "right" version of said ideology and suppressing the "wrong", correct?

I am arguing ultimately that we seem to get better results in the long term, by encouraging free and critical thought and allowing all ideas (no matter how egregious) a fair fight.

This puts me contrary to many tenets of the various feminist ideologies and concordant with others. Sometimes wildly so.

If I want to try to be a good humanist, I have no choice but to try and understand each on their own terms.

When someone describes themselves as a "Feminist", that could mean anything from "kill all men" to "women should have fundamental legal equality".

It seems almost as redundant as racial and cultural epithets, it tells me very little really important about you or how you really think, to know you are Black, or White or Asian or Polish, Spanish etc. etc. It's just another excuse to put an idea above the person in front of you or to not have to think too much about ones own.

i.e. Collectivist thinking.

I think this may represent the very antithesis of intellectual progress.

However I am a Hegelian and I just defined a Thesis-antithesis relationship............ That means the next great breakthrough should lie in the synthesis of the two.......

................

Collective individualism! All we should need is a mass movement of free critical thought and.....bollocks.

It's over people, we have officially peaked as a species! I'm calling it