A woman's handy guide to navigating the patriarchy

[sqbr]

So I woke up at 5am this morning coughing and couldn't get back to sleep, and filled the time with whatever random links I came accross, as it happens a whole bunch of feminist discussion. This combined with various ideas and stuff in my head to create A woman's handy guide to navigating the patriarchy. Definitely a first second draft, what with the whole "made at 5am" thing, and obviously it's a bunch of huge generalisations, it's satire. (And much snarkier satire than I do normally, being up at 5am makes me cranky)

I've had the idea for a flowchart illustrating the fact that women are screwed whatever we do for a while, mostly inspired by various commenters on posts about sexual assault going "But if she'd just...". Specifically, the realisation that the level of attention we're expected to give men to be "polite" is higher than the cut-off for the level of attention which counts as "leading a guy on, it's your own fault if you get assaulted".

Some specific links which got me thinking for various reasons:
Comics oughta be fun!: a serious note and various follow on posts
Versions of Equality
Why I never want to hear the term 'high maintenance' again
Why I am not a feminist
WARNING: has fairly graphic rape description Real consent manifesto and it's comments (especially the guy who kept saying "But if she'd just used a safe word...")

Stupid muse giving me ideas I'm ill equipped to implement, I suck at diagrams. Cam helped a lot in making it clearer, and the "worthy of respect" box was his idea :) There's a lot more things I could add, but it's complicated enough as it is!

Comments

Heh. Posting on these things is easier when I'm sick.

[greteldragon.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure if its a good or a bad thing or just plain weird that the one of those links that I could relate to, and that appeared to be the most like my life to me was the Why I am not a feminist link. Even with the focus on you know, being admitted to any 'ethnic' group, to which I am not the standard audience, and half the point probably doesn't apply to me, though I suppose it just shows the ideas she has in it kinda go past just the religion and race situations she's putting it to.

Have you found any links on why I am not a feminist for women who are ''white" or talk about being anti-feminist in a way that doesn't relate it to race, that say something as well put as that?

I think the real consent manifesto takes an issue I have a lot of concern with, but I'm not sure I like what it does with it (especially the 'if you have a safe word' type arguments in the comments).

I'm not sure I like your flowchart, even though I get its satire :( It's possible its just outbittering me (something I don't come across often :P) Sorry :(

Re: Heh. Posting on these things is easier when I'm sick.

[alias_sqbr]

Have you found any links on why I am not a feminist for women who are ''white" or talk about being anti-feminist in a way that doesn't relate it to race, that say something as well put as that?

Hmm, maybe, none come to mind. I'll keep an eye out while on my future feminist adventures and mention it on my lj if I find any. I think the fact that the most visible criticisms of feminism come from sexist conservatives means that it all becomes very polarised and feminists become very defensive, so I'm interested in more nuanced criticisms of the movement myself.

Yes, I wasn't 100% happy with the actual point of that "manifesto" myself, it's more that the comments were such a perfect example of what I was talking about. The author, Amanda Marcotte, is actually really controversial, I actually came accross that post via a link from another post where someone was ranting about how full of crap she is :D

I do get pretty bitter when I'm sick and up at 5am :) Also I actually have a quite dark and nasty sense of humour, I just tend to keep it to myself since people often don't take it very well.