Avoidants and Sex

Ebontiel wrote:I would also like to point out that the National Organization for Women, the organization of which Betty Friedan served as first president, argued to the Supreme Court of the United States that our male-only draft discriminated against men. It's funny that you seem to be using Betty's name as an insult, when the organization so closely tied to her name has lobbied for MASCULINE equality as well.

This is laughable. What do you mean by masculine equality? Aren't men the standard by which feminists base their arguments for equality?

I would like to add that no man asked the National Organization for Women to lobby for female draft eligibility. It was just a brick in the wall. Anyone who attempts to convince you otherwise is deceiving you.

Smacster wrote:

Ebontiel wrote:I would also like to point out that the National Organization for Women, the organization of which Betty Friedan served as first president, argued to the Supreme Court of the United States that our male-only draft discriminated against men. It's funny that you seem to be using Betty's name as an insult, when the organization so closely tied to her name has lobbied for MASCULINE equality as well.

This is laughable. What do you mean by masculine equality? Aren't men the standard by which feminists base their arguments for equality?

I would like to add that no man asked the National Organization for Women to lobby for female draft eligibility. It was just a brick in the wall. Anyone who attempts to convince you otherwise is deceiving you.

Would it make you feel better if I said that that NOW lobbied against gender discrimination, regardless of what that gender is? That's what I was getting at, I'm sorry if you got bogged down in semantics.

What does asking for it have to do with anything? They saw a gender imbalance and sought to redress it. Are you saying that it's a waste of time to protest an all-male draft? I don't quite understand what you're trying to say, here.

Ebontiel wrote:

Smacster wrote:

Ebontiel wrote:I would also like to point out that the National Organization for Women, the organization of which Betty Friedan served as first president, argued to the Supreme Court of the United States that our male-only draft discriminated against men. It's funny that you seem to be using Betty's name as an insult, when the organization so closely tied to her name has lobbied for MASCULINE equality as well.

This is laughable. What do you mean by masculine equality? Aren't men the standard by which feminists base their arguments for equality?

I would like to add that no man asked the National Organization for Women to lobby for female draft eligibility. It was just a brick in the wall. Anyone who attempts to convince you otherwise is deceiving you.

Would it make you feel better if I said that that NOW lobbied against gender discrimination, regardless of what that gender is? That's what I was getting at, I'm sorry if you got bogged down in semantics.

What does asking for it have to do with anything? They saw a gender imbalance and sought to redress it. Are you saying that it's a waste of time to protest an all-male draft? I don't quite understand what you're trying to say, here.

They were doing it for their own benefit. Not for "masculine equality". A brick in the wall.

Let them fight for gender equality, but using the excuse of "We're doing this for you, too!" to men is preposterous.

I actually like the idea of an all-male draft. Men go to war, women keep the home. America needs to return to traditional family values.

Smacster wrote:

Ebontiel wrote:Would it make you feel better if I said that that NOW lobbied against gender discrimination, regardless of what that gender is? That's what I was getting at, I'm sorry if you got bogged down in semantics.

What does asking for it have to do with anything? They saw a gender imbalance and sought to redress it. Are you saying that it's a waste of time to protest an all-male draft? I don't quite understand what you're trying to say, here.

They were doing it for their own benefit. Not for "masculine equality". A brick in the wall.

Let them fight for gender equality, but using the excuse of "We're doing this for you, too!" to men is preposterous.

I actually like the idea of an all-male draft. Men go to war, women keep the home. America needs to return to traditional family values.

Traditional family values are only traditional if you consider Jean-Jacques Rousseau to be the be-all-end-all of the field. But hey, if the system works for you, regardless of other people, why not go with it?

Ebontiel wrote:

Smacster wrote:

Ebontiel wrote:Would it make you feel better if I said that that NOW lobbied against gender discrimination, regardless of what that gender is? That's what I was getting at, I'm sorry if you got bogged down in semantics.

What does asking for it have to do with anything? They saw a gender imbalance and sought to redress it. Are you saying that it's a waste of time to protest an all-male draft? I don't quite understand what you're trying to say, here.

They were doing it for their own benefit. Not for "masculine equality". A brick in the wall.

Let them fight for gender equality, but using the excuse of "We're doing this for you, too!" to men is preposterous.

I actually like the idea of an all-male draft. Men go to war, women keep the home. America needs to return to traditional family values.

Traditional family values are only traditional if you consider Jean-Jacques Rousseau to be the be-all-end-all of the field. But hey, if the system works for you, regardless of other people, why not go with it?

You just made a jump that was not logical. I would ask you to elaborate (because Rousseau was a colossal moron and stands at odds with everything I believe), but I don't really care.

Rousseau's portrait of family life was wildly popular in its heyday and formed the backbone of Victorian society, which stands in stark contrast to the family dynamics of the peasant of the middle ages: women worked just as frequently as men, often waited until they were in their late twenties to get married, and only had a few children. Depending on how you define traditional, it could mean something superficially similar to today or something vastly different, all within the context of European-descended society.

Ebontiel wrote: They saw a gender imbalance and sought to redress it. Are you saying that it's a waste of time to protest an all-male draft? I don't quite understand what you're trying to say, here.

The majority of male soldiers didn't especially want females on the battlefield. Too much distraction and sexual politics and it interferes with the male bonding that helps keeps morale up. A typical military man wants his females underneath him or nowhere to be found.

Feminists wanted more women in the military to hurt the men and make them less effective, and to boost their own egos, has nothing to do with "equality".

Ebontiel wrote:
I would also like to point out that the National Organization for Women, the organization of which Betty Friedan served as first president, argued to the Supreme Court of the United States that our male-only draft discriminated against men. It's funny that you seem to be using Betty's name as an insult, when the organization so closely tied to her name has lobbied for MASCULINE equality as well.

And I would argue that masculinity is safer (but not necessarily safe) from ridicule than femininity is. For women, social acceptability is meekness, politeness, strength in silence and suffering. For men, it's arrogance, physical strength, charisma and sexual conquest. Neither are fair, both are damaging, but one leads to victimization far more frequently. Harriet Jacobs wrote, "People wonder why women don’t 'fight back,' but they don’t wonder about it when women back down in arguments, are interrupted, purposefully lower and modulate their voices to express less emotion, make obvious signals that they are uninterested in conversation or being in closer physical proximity and are ignored. They don’t wonder about all those daily social interactions in which women are quieter, ignored, or invisible, because those social interactions seem normal. They seem normal to women, and they seem normal to men, because we were all raised in the same cultural pond, drinking the same Kool-Aid.

Odd, throughout my life I have seen women being told "you can do it!", "Girl power!" and various empowering statements. I take far more $#%^ from women than men, and I see far less meekness, politeness, and submissiveness from women than I do men. Women seem to be walking around trumpeting slogans to make themselves feel stronger and to empower themselves, while boys are told to stop acting like boys, and are doped up on drugs to make them calm down. Women are often just as, if not more confrontational than men these days.

And keep in mind, men are also trained to show no emotion except anger. Its not just women who are "oppressed".

And as for NOW, I cant even list all of the sexist crap they pull. All over the country they try to shoot down mens support services under the basis of discrimination, yet are proponents of all female services. They sue against fatherhood programs, yet want to retain govt funded womens programs. NOW is by no means impartial. They are fighting for womens rights, not human rights. Its just selective equality.

CSRevenant wrote:And as for NOW, I cant even list all of the sexist crap they pull. All over the country they try to shoot down mens support services under the basis of discrimination, yet are proponents of all female services. They sue against fatherhood programs, yet want to retain govt funded womens programs. NOW is by no means impartial. They are fighting for womens rights, not human rights. Its just selective equality.

###$ yeah. White males are the only group that can't support each other. If we do it, people think we're David Duke and the KKK. If anyone else does it, it's just XYZ-power and "you go girl!"

I can't believe that bitch judge was confirmed for the supreme court after explicitly saying that latino females were better qualified for the job than while males because of their race and sex.

You guys are just creating staw feminists to knock down. SOME radical feminists want to keep men down--most do not. Most acknowledge, as I have already stated, that Western gender roles, when rigidly hewn to, are damaging to both sexes. You can't use that as a point of debate if I have already established it! And I would like to see news stories about women's groups lobbying to get men's support groups shut down--not that they were shut down, but that a feminist group explicitly was to blame. Until then, foundless accusations.

Women are still subject to scrutiny simply on the basis of their sex. Look at Hillary Clinton--regardless of her qualifications, regardless of her husband, she made headlines because of her cleavage far more frequently than the average male politician. Same with Nancy Pelosi, same with Sarah Palin. The only male politican to have reached similar levels of objectification is Obama, and we all know how close half the population in this country were to giving him a BJ.

I'd also ask, sfguy75x, to say that women in the military are there to boost their own egos and to hurt men in the face of an enlisted woman, and see how fast you have a very, very angry woman on your side. If women in the military threaten men, it is only because they are challenging traditional gender roles and "invading" a space that was considered men only. Do you have any evidence at all that women are disruptive in the military? In the current war in the Middle East, they're arguably even a benefit, as Nicholas D. Kristof wrote in the New York Times. (http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/25/opinion/25KRIS.html)

And CSRevenant, boys are not the only ones doped up on drugs to calm them down. I read somewhere (I apologize for not being able to find the link) that ADD was often underdiagnosed in girls because they were either encouraged from a very young age not to act out or because of different manifestations of the disorder. But women were historically considered to be a literal weaker sex, conceived through cold and unsatisfying sexual encounters, victim to a wandering uterus, prone to flights of fancy, threatened by education, incapable of rational thought. I am not the most rational person on the planet. I proceed by intuition far more than my engineer father would appreciate, but that does not mean I am incapable of understanding logic or of applying it, no matter how hamhandedly. Women trumpet "girl power" as a reaction against a well-documented and extensive discrimination that continues to this day.

If we are going to drag anecdotal experiences into this, I saw boys acting like boys and being encouraged to keep doing it. I saw girls acting like girls and being praised for it. Boys who liked cooking were mocked and teased. Girls who liked sports were insulted. It's an unfortunate fact that the symptoms of AvPD are strongly censured traits in males, and extremes of those encouraged in females, but we exceptions do not make the rule.

While NOW may be too radical for me to endorse all of their legislative efforts, I provided at least one example where women argued to potential male benefit against gender inequality. I am not a Women's Studies major, I only took one class on the subject in college thus far, so I do not feel well-informed enough to speak on the rest of their actions. If you have proof, I would be glad to review it. I was also unable to find any evidence of feminist groups attacking men's groups, but again, I admit ignorance in these matters. If you have evidence, I would like to see it. However, I must note the existence of many fathers' rights organizations and a disturbing gender imbalance in child custody cases, divorce proceedings, and male-victim crimes in which women are the perpetrator. A lot of moderate feminists seem to be aware of these issues as well, and being a feminist does not preclude one from supporting these groups.

Since I was the one to drag this off-topic and some of us are dangerously close to dragging this into an elementary GIRLS SUCK BOYS RULE/BOYS SUCK GIRLS RULE slapfest, let me be the one to drag it back on-topic. (From avoidants and sexual hang-ups to dating tips for dudes to feminist ranting? I love this forum!) Hoplite Elite originally wanted to know if avoidants could derive pleasure from sex--and I would think that we would. Sex is inextricably bound up with intimacy, and often conflated with it, so the same fear that drives us away from relationships might drive us away from sexual encounters. Situations like Parador's and one-night stands seem almost ideal: intimacy on a small scale and temporary basis, so we can jettison the contact were it to become even remotely threatening. But that's sad.

I just can't imagine someone finding me worthwhile enough a person to reach that level of intimacy (and no comments from the peanut gallery, there).