More Feminism Thoughts

I am forever being asked why I am so frustrated with feminism, by friends of both genders who have accepted the claimed philosophy rather than the often seen behavior of feminism...  And today, another such example came up.

One of my female friends was commenting on how for many years, due to feminist "indoctrination" (her word), she felt mildly guilty about asking a man to help her open a stuck jar or other strength related task, or for thanking him if he did.

And after much discussion, the conclusion was reached that it was because men are not supposed to assume women need help and women are supposed to believe that they are perfectly capable without any help from a man... and yet there still exist many situations in which a man is not considered to be a "real man" if he does not help a woman who needs it.

Which led me to the following:

One of my frustrations with feminism is the extent to which men are still expected to help out, but are not suppose to OFFER to, except when they are. It's so confusing.

We are to assume women are perfectly capable of doing things for themselves, but we're assholes if we won't open a jar for them that they cannot open for themselves.... but we're also assholes if we assume they need help and offer it before it is asked for... except when Emma Watson suggests that men have not helped out because they have not been invited, after which feminists all over the place had their heads explode, saying "Haven't been asked, it was their fucking DUTY, they shouldn't have waited to be asked!"

So... to sum up, we should never help unless asked, except when we should know to help without being asked, but not if the person being helped doesn't want the help, which we're supposed to know even though she has neither asked nor told us this is something she doesn't want to ask about.

Seems all perfectly fair to me... Easy peasy, I know EXACTLY how to behave.

RIP Critical Thought

By all that's good in the world, is ANYONE thinking critically any more?

Or have we collectively just decided to surrender our critical thinking skills in favor of pundits and sound bites and emotions?

People who just weeks ago were war weary now rarin' to go back into the Middle East, guns a blazing, forgetting how little that has EVER accomplished in that region and how much of a quagmire it's going to be.  Great!  Let's condemn another tens of thousands of our young adults to PTSD and all sorts of mental and physical disfigurements, because ISIS.

And sure, that whole global climate change thing sounds scary, but if it's going to impact me in the slightest to fight it, well, it's just easier to believe the deniers.

And sure, sure, Emma Watson, so nice to have you remind us that feminism isn't anti-men, as you exhort men to heed the call to fight for exactly HALF of gender equality.  Sure, we've all been so indoctrinated that female infant genital mutilation is a crime against humanity.  The fact that we do it to the majority of our boys?  Oh, that's just because it looks prettier that way.  I will believe that feminism isn't anti-male when it starts pushing for ALL of gender equality, not just half of it.

And increasing numbers of people are calling for greater involvement by religion (by which they mean "Christian religion") in politics, because of course the wisdom of our forefathers in building a country this strong for this long is only worth anything so long as it doesn't offend our delicate sensibilities.  The GOP currently has the lowest approval ratings of any political group, and yet they're seen as "religion friendly" and so people vote for them, because who cares how badly we fuck things up, so long as the people in charge stroke our egos and tell us how attacked we poor majority members are.

Hell, latest polls even show a back slip in support for same sex marriage, and thank goodness, we were running the very real risk of seeming to be gaining tolerance.

Is there any hope for this country?