"I am every day more convinced that we women, if we are to be good women, feminine and amiable and domestic, are not fitted to reign; at least it is they that drive themselves to the work which it entails."
-Queen Victoria
Last week I saw that quote (ironically) used as a signature on a forum I sometimes go to. It got me thinking about why so many women hate having rights.
It seems like most anti-feminist women are women who already have all the opportunities they want. Queen Victoria, for example, lived in a castle where she bossed people around all day. I doubt, once she became Queen at least, she had to deal with sexism on an every day basis the way Elizabeth I had to either. She had nine children, who she didn't particularly like, referring to pregnancy as the "occupational hazard of being a wife". Her granddaughter-in-law Queen Mary took it a step further and called having children the "punishment for being a woman". Perhaps if Victorian feminism has included reproductive rights Queen Victoria might not have hated it so much.
Modern anti-feminists tend to come in two shapes. The college-educated conservative women like Ann Coulter who would probably hate being cooped up in a kitchen all day yet hypocritically try to force it on other women. The wife in The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood is an interesting example of how these women might react to being put in a world of their own design. The second type of female anti-feminist is the happy housewife who likes cooking, cleaning, and pushing babies out of her crotch and can't understand why anyone wouldn't want that life.
The first type would probably become feminists if they were forced to live in a world where women have no options. The second type are at heart well intentioned women who just can't see the world through another's eyes. I would like to be a stay-at-home mom someday, at least while my children are young. My mother stayed at home with me before I started school. Feminism is not trying to take away that kind of life, only to give women options should that not be what they want.
Being pro-choice shouldn't just be about reproductive rights. I don't want to force women to go out and get jobs when their husbands can provide for them, but I don't want to force them to stay home when they really want to work. I also think men should be able to stay at home and take care of their children.
As awful as anti-feminist men are, they're simply trying to oppress others, something humans have done for thousands of years. Anti-feminist women are a bit more of an enigma because I don't think they intend to oppress themselves, I just think they don't realize what it is to be oppressed. If Queen Victoria had been barred from ruling because she was a woman, she might've seen things differently. If Ann Coulter was banned from public speaking, writing, and even voting (which she has supported), I think even she might see things differently.
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I absolutely agree with your sentiment that feminism should embrace women's autonomy, and not try to stop women from taking whichever path in life they choose. But sadly there are plenty of women who rally against women that choose to be housewives, stay at home moms or sex workers, without any regard to the choices made by the women who do those things. I'm not trying to lump sex workers together with home-makers, but they face a lot of opposition from women who claim to be feminists.
I think that's why there is so much opposition towards feminism from happy housewives- they see it as a threat to their way of life. If the feminist community (as a whole) would drop the whole "sympathizer/supporter of the patriarchy" non-sense, it would greatly behoove us all.
"I am every day more convinced that we women, if we are to be good women, feminine and amiable and domestic, are not fitted to reign; at least it is they that drive themselves to the work which it entails."
Isn't she saying that women are in fact well fitted to reigning but are held back by the onus of being feminine? It isn't too hard to believe that it was true then because it's still true now, just ask any woman CEO or political candidate.
I'm not sure what you're trying to argue and the "pushing babies out of crotch" type comments aren't helping your position. It seems that you're trying to say that moral and ethical people don't try to force their lifestyle on others. But you're all caught up in the academically feminist words and concepts.
This honestly is a problem a lot of people have but come on. If you don't want Ann Coulter to make blanket judgments then don't make them on her. Maybe she knows she's a hypocritical wretch and gets a kick out of watching people get mad.
There are a lot more types of anti-feminists than just two! For instance, you forgot the ones who claim to be anti-feminist solely because they buy the common media narrative that feminists are hairy man-haters. Or the ones who think they are feminist but don't trust individual women to make their own reproductive and lifestyle choices.
Also, to claim that Queen Victoria wasn't subject to sexual/gender discrimination is quite a stretch. Aristocracy is (or was. I don't know how any modern countries that retain their aristocracy work inheritance) completely dependent on women having babies, specifically and most importantly the babies of the male they had married so that his wealth could be passed down to his and only his children. Essentially, female aristocrats have been nothing more than breeders, and the few that have tried to actually rule have faced incredible opposition because they weren't fulfilling their patriarchally-assigned breeder role that completely ignored any talent or abilities an aristocratic woman had because she was only supposed to be making babies.
"The second type of female anti-feminist is the happy housewife who likes cooking, cleaning, and pushing babies out of her crotch and can't understand why anyone wouldn't want that life."
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pushing babies out of crotches eh? How mature, you know, you might have a vendetta against these women (though I don't agree with them) there is no need to insult them. See, this is why I have a love/hate relationship with feminism as much as a love it there are women who (like you) aren't very tolerant though they claim to be. How about being a bit more tolarent towards these women. can't we live in peace and if we do disagree with the way these women live ther lives lets remember that no one is forcing a gun to these women heads and forcing them to "push out" babies. And let us also remember that all of us came from some woman's crotch.
Please be aware of your language use! As Seal123 above posted, it is divisive and offputting for women who chose to be mothers to read phrases such as "pushing babies out of her crotch" and feel that they are alienated by or dehumanized by feminism.
Remember that we think in words, and that language has an immeasurable power. I agree with your sentiments but it is important that we are all aware of our bias and take caution not to let it do harm.
"See, this is why I have a love/hate relationship with feminism..."
I do not think it is fair to judge feminism based on random comments that you do not like or agree with made by individuals claiming the label feminist. What I love about feminism is that it is very broad, and each feminist can make it her own.
"Maybe she knows she's a hypocritical wretch and gets a kick out of watching people get mad."
My opinion of Ann Coulter would be even worse if I learned that she does what she does just to watch people get mad. Developing a following and taking actions to harm women's rights is not something that should be taken lightly, or treated as a game. I have had the displeasure of knowing several of her followers and they certainly don't think her views are a joke.
I always have found it interesting when women are in the public sphere, telling women that they don't belong there. I always want to ask them why they are out there, working and appearing and arguing with men. It's baffling.
Your descriptions reminded me of a high-school class I had once, where one girl wanted nothing more than to be a housewife. Our teacher was a bit of a sexist, as in she insisted that women were just smarter, more moral and "better" than those men, and insisted that all women should work. While I think she was probably well-intentioned, she was amazingly rude to this poor girl. After all, feminism is about choice, and if that's what the girl wanted, that's what she should aim for. I remember pointing that out to her, and she said it was an anti-woman standpoint to say that women should be at home (if they want to be).
"she said it was an anti-woman standpoint to say that women should be at home (if they want to be)."
It would be anti-woman to say that they SHOULD be at home. Nothing wrong with someone who has the choice available to stay at home.
I believe it is worth pointing out, since it always gets around to SAHMs, that parenting is not the only reason to stay at home. Some healthy, educated adults, for some reason or another, may simply choose not to do paid labor outside the home. In Japan, they are called "freeters" or "NEETs" (not in employment, education, or training). Many consider them the parasites of society. Others consider theirs a new way of living in our times of relative prosperity and materialism. I know an elderly man who never "worked" again after retiring from the Navy after 20 years of service (at the age of 38), but devoted most of his life to community service, caring for his elderly bed bound parents, and now his wife in poor health. Choosing not to work or to stay at home does not have to mean a life of drudgery or indolence, nor a waste of one's education or life experience.
feminism is about choice
Wowcabbage, feminism is about equality, not choice. Look it up.
Yeesh, honey.
Read Andrea Dworkin's Right Wing women, do some research around the sexual revolution, and take a long hard critical look both at your "liberal" male peers behavior and that of "liberal" males in general.
Basically, the woman who is happy in oppression is a myth. I'm not saying that no women enjoy being SAHMs, but that the woman who genuinely wants to have thirteen kids and claims that this takes no toll on her psyche and thinks it is everybody's job to submit to her husband and claims to enjoy it... well, she's not necessarily happy just because she's claiming she is.
Dworkin rightly points out that many anti-feminist women are simply seeking the best deal they can get in a pervasive patriarchy.
1. Anti-feminist superstars like Ann Coulter are finding the only channel whereby their male peers will allow them power, woman-bashing.
2. Anti-feminist housewives have seen through the hypocrisy of a "sexually liberated" culture where liberal men just find new ways to coerce and use women, insisting that all women must get over our sexual repression in order to enjoy sex with them, that all women must have access to abortion so that we will be fear sex less and be more willing to have sex with them, insisting that all men use condoms so that women can get over our fear of STIs and fuck them more often, insisting on a woman's "right" to prostitution in order that there be a large number of women whose job it is not to say no so that they can fuck them, etc. Anti-feminist housewives understand that for most women on the face of the planet, the sexual revolution meant that instead of a woman being coerced into servicing one man, she would be coerced into servicing every man she saw.
Anti-feminist housewives are not taken in by the left and it's false promises of liberation for women. They choose one master instead of many because they are trying to minimize their abuse. They choose the best option available for them because they have seen how hard it is to fight and they don't believe they can do it or simply have made the decision to improve their quality of life by not doing it. They are only an enigma to a person who has not fully began to understand that the right to exist in the public sphere is a privilege that liberal men have granted us for which we pay dearly every day in ways that a housewife does not.