Look, we keep talking about men being opressed. That was never really my issue. It's just becoming the focus of me and others bickering with one another.
Tbf, I really do need to specify what my concerns actually are, and I will try to do that.
I would say though, that I think your reference to Saudi is a bit misleading. We arent different to Saudi because we have a feminist movement and laws which stop us treating women like ****. We're different to Saudi in that respect because we have an entirely different culture. Women in the UK were never treated like women ae today in Saudi, well not simce long before the advent of a feminist movement anyway.
If you repealed equality legislation to orrow, and somehow banned feminist speakers (neither of which i would advocate), we wouldnt turn into Saudi Arabia.
Anyway, I really need to specify what my actual concerns are, so I will try to give some thought to that....
You are wanting to confine your argument to the UK or at least the West which to me is to ignore the real issues and not addressing the reality.
You think that we have not in past treated women as possessions as 'chattels' that we have not behaved like the Saudi's. Essentially we have, it's less than 100 years since women were not allowed to vote it is only in my lifetime that some equality legislation has been introduced. We have just had an example of primogeniture with the death of the Duke of Westminster his two eldest daughters do not inherit because the male line rules. We are far from being an equal country in many ways, in fact equality is an issue for the whole population not just the half who are female but we have little chance of redressing the whole while half of us have not even been granted equality by our Laws yet.
Yes I agree Rob there are instances with PC that cause problems and that some 'feminists' behave in an over the top manner, perhaps if we stopped putting people into boxes we might make more progress. The feminist box contains a wide variety of views and positions just as the white middle aged male box does. Peoples views are individual and people need to be treated as individuals, regardless of any other accident of birth. To be discussing views based on the colour of skin or the type of genitalia should really be laughable, the fact that we are not laughing shows how far we still have to go.
In the process of making an omelette you have to break eggs, in the process of making a civilised society you have to upset some people. When I grew up in London there were signs on doors saying no dogs, no Irish and no Blacks and people of divergent sexual proclivities had to keep it quiet for fear of arrest. We have advanced in some of these areas but at the same time a new puritan age has been launched and witch hunts have ensued.
Human's have in so many ways changed little from the stone age we are not as enlightened or advanced as we think we are.We are in fact dangerous animals in clothes (usually) and the surprise is how many of us are gentle and co operative. This forum shows that we can conduct a civilised debate despite widely varying political views.
I think Rob we have to put up with
some of the PC nonsense because it get's the message over to some less thoughtful types and the message of sexual inequality still needs putting over. I have a daughter soon to be a Doctor of International Law, she doesn't need much help, she is more than capable of dealing with the world as it is, but others do still need the playing field levelling. We are in the process of the levelling, once that is achieved we can hopefully return to the more relaxed society we all like.
When we can talk to strangers in a way closer to the way perhaps many of us talk to our friends THEN we will have a civilised society.
