[BEFORE YOU READ: THIS IS NOT AN ATTACK ON FEMINISM (cause for some reason you guys think the world is against you, lol)] I think this a concept Ive been thinking about for a long time but could never quite put into a simple explanation (though I have tried once and failed horribly). I saw this from my friend, which I was intrigued to know what exactly was said here, expecting some kind of funny joke, but this probably thoroughed out my concept more than anything. Pleasant surprise. If you are too damn lazy to read the article itself, it basically sums up both feminine and male problems, though there is a huge bias for men. However, what made this so pleasantly surprising was I realized a whole bunch of facts (that no doubt someone will have a problem with determining its validity) that were problems for men but are not publically acknowledged, nor known. I didnt know half of the stuff here. So what am I getting at? My concept lies in the fact that when we want to focus on one problem area, we often forget many others, and is that a right thing to do? We have breast cancer awareness, but the sad truth is more people die from simple stuff like cholera. Since when have you heard about the march for cholera awareness? We have a black history month, but that makes a vast other majority feel left out and nonexistent. They did have an unpleasant past as slaves, but so have other races (though arguably not as bad). Stereotypically, the world is run by whites and then we have your blacks with their special month, and maybe if youre lucky you have a Asian thrown in there for good luck. What about Middle Easterns? They seem to be getting a huge amount of hate? What about Latin Americans, who many Americans generalize as Mexican? What about Pacific Islanders? Central Asians? Native Americans? Eastern European? I could go on forever, and I dont think that it is considered fair until we have a month for every single one of those races. Yet we seem to be lacking... and we seem to forget that there are other struggles other than the popular ones: We are ignoring those who are having problems. Which also means we are ignoring the real problems. One thing that caught my eye from Lisa was We have every right to be angry! We have been oppressed for so long, we just cant forget the past! Which prompted me to ask, when have YOU been oppressed? Id argue that you grew up clothed and well fed. Maybe you never ate as much as you liked but no one died of starvation and malnutrition. You have an education, and you are the worlds most wealthy people if you have power and running water. You may have some turns and curveballs in your life, but you are relatively well off. You still live with internet (or how else you would be viewing this) as well has a computer of some kind. That does not sound like oppression. Females do not have an equitable position in history, I know, but nowadays, that is not you. Especially for people of this country, one of the most rich in the world. Females get paid a few cents less for every male dollar? Sounds unfair, but I wont care unless you are struggling to support yourself, which btw, traditional roles call for males to be providers for the household. Ill guarantee you that that is a lot of stress. A males only purpose in life is to earn money, or fail. Unless for some reason there is a mass poverty of women who are unable to feed themselves and get basic utilities because of the few cent difference that I am unaware of, I wont care about those damn few cents. But what if there is? I would be completely unaware of mass starvation of underpaid women somewhere because all I can hear about is how well off women earn a bit less. Then we ignore a truly great problem. If you dont think this is logical reasoning, then do you know about areas in California, right here in the United States, that fail to have running water because of the drought? Running water is a luxury and if you dont believe me, try going a week without anything from a piped source. I didnt know about them until I found a small article by accident. I could be mistaken that this is unknown but all I see in the news is ISIS and American Sniper. ISIS? Government problem. I dont care cause I cant change anything. American Sniper? Cool movie, so Im assuming there is nothing else important going on the world. OH WAIT, people dont have running water in my own state? I CAN DONATE AND HELP!!! And yet people wont because I certainly doubt anyone knows about it. (Again I could be wrong about THIS particular issue, though I am trying to give an example). What else are we ignoring when we focus only on a few areas? But another thing that I thought of from Lisas quote was that you often put your struggles in something much greater than yourself. Personally, I can guarantee you that the feminists at my school have not earned a real working wage that they were indubitably robbed of thousands or even millions because of this few cent difference. I will argue that many of you were not raped, many of you do not exercise the right to practice politics (yet) and many of you talk and fight for things that you have never experienced personally. AND this goes for all people of all groups of support/awareness/etc, not just feminism. When someone says something contradictory or even neutral about your specific situation, for some reason you act like the world is against you. You show open hostility to those you deem as outsiders, thinking them to be unsympathetic, malicious, and ignorant, without considering them to be a person with their own opinions, viewpoints, and experiences in life. Im sorry to say but that sounds a lot like discrimination, almost bigotry. People who see themselves apart from the world grow to be embittered by it. They see a few cases, read a few statistics, and can confidently draw conclusions about things they do not know about. Yet all of our knowledge is a hand-me-down from someone else. We study other peoples books, other peoples observations, and try to draw ourselves in their world. Doubt me? Can I ask you to prove something so commonplace and accepted such as the shape of the earth? Can you prove that it is round without any outside source of previous information. All information and assumptions must be original. Sounds pretty difficult, almost impossible, and yet you are so confident to say it so without having to work out the problem yourself. Have any of you been to North Korea? How do we even know if it exists if we never been there ourselves? Facts can be bended, and ultimately, facts are nothing more than someones experience handed down and commonly accepted. 200 years from now, people will call us ignorant, stupid, and barbaric and yet we find ourselves to be the pinnacle of human development, to see everything we know as true and wonderful. At this point, I might sound self contradictory arguing my point but it really isnt. I want to emphasize hesitation on matters directly outside your area of control. Many of you will grow into people who will have significant power and will be able to effect a change as you see fit. Excellent, good for you. Right now? You are one person out of 7 billion. What makes you think that the whole world will change because you want it to? Do you think youre above the average? If you do, well the average person sees themselves as better than the average sooooooooo..... Right now though, this post will reach a few people that I know, some will be too lazy to read, others not, and then a small fraction from that will be thinking about my argument critically. I want people to stop thinking about such abstract things as democracy, wages, world politics, equality, inequality, justice, etc when many of them cannot do a single thing. Open discussion of knowledge? Sure, with a grain of salt, but it should be nothing more unless you have experience and can do something to change it. Otherwise, I see from my personal experience, it causes nothing more that tension and group polarization. I dont know a lot. I learned a lot but I dont know cause I have not done it in my life. I do know simple things though. I wont argue for female rights, nor mens rights because I know nothing about them, and I do not find my life to be uncomfortable. However, I know when Im sad, when Im happy, when Im hungry and when Im thirsty. I know when Im cold, I know when Im warm, I know when Im uncomfortable, when Im tired of people or tired of being alone. I can do things to change that. I want to enjoy a nice meal in a warm house, and I know that sometimes I will want to share that moment with someone else, and I can do things to help me achieve that. This post is my invitation my to you to join my meal, so we can enjoy the little things in life with the people we see and those who are the closest to us. Thats what should matter, and personally thats what I think I know, I can change, and therefore I should fight for if ever taken away. I do not know if this country I live in is a democracy or an aristocracy, heck I could be standing in an asylum waving at the wall and I wouldnt know. But I feel; that I know, and I see those that I love around me. When I see a person I know struggle, I will help only that person and nothing more because I will lose focus if I seek things beyond my situation. Never, will they ever be a part of a group or a movement; they will always be their self, and I will treat that person on that basis. I ignore odd concepts such as religion, good and evil, and politics, and direct my attention to the things I and other people feel. That is where my focus will ever be, and nowhere else.
Posted on: Sun, 25 Jan 2015 02:40:39 +0000
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