June 10 - The Femi-Nazis
I used to have this book called WHO STOLE FEMINISM, which was written
by a lady named Christina Hoff Sommers in 1994. Ms. Sommers, considered
herself a feminist but her critics considered her an anti-feminist
because she did not agree with them. I do not have the book because I
gave it to Hayley, a local high school student who is interested in
women's studies. WHO STOLE FEMINISM was written before Hayley was born.
The premise of Ms. Sommers' book is that there are two kinds of feminists - good feminists and bad feminists. She gives the bad feminists a name, which is "gender feminist." She said that gender feminists do bad things and/or silly things, like hold seminars and then insist on calling them "ovu-lars."
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When I hear the term Femi-Nazi, I immediately think of Rush Limbaugh, who popularized the term on his conservative talk radio show in the 90s. I have never heard Rush Limbaugh speak, but I did see him in a Pizza Hut commercial once. Also, some liberal friends of mine heard him a few times and they assure me that he is bad.
I do not know if "Femi-Nazi" and "gender feminist" can be considered synonymous. But if a woman tells me I have to say "ovular" instead of "seminar" because the latter is too phallocentric, I will tell her that she is bad.
-
A comedian named Al Franken once wrote a book called RUSH LIMBAUGH IS A BIG FAT IDIOT. Here it is:
The book consists of left wing rhetoric and is punctuated by fat jokes.
-
Merriam-Webster defines feminism as " the belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities."
I guess this means I am not a feminist. There are times when sexual discrimination is a wonderful thing.
Let us pretend that I am directing a production of Glengarry Glen Ross, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1984 for David Mamet. There are no women in the play. None. It is written for seven men, all middle aged, mostly realtors but there's a cop in there too as well as a client. Throughout the play, the men con each other, bargain with each other, and do a whole lot of swearing.
Now imagine some Femi-Nazi artistic director demanding - in the name of equal rights and opportunities - that at least three of those roles must be played by women.
I don't care if they get Judi Dench, Meryl Streep and Helen Mirren. That's going to be a shitty play.
You know what you need to sell real estate? Brass ovaries..
-
And get this - I actually feel bad for actresses (I hate the gender neutral term actor as a designate for thespians of either gender. I think the word actress sounds majestic.)
Get a load of this bit of theatre philosophy I wrote way back in 1999. I still believe it today.
" It seems to me that the majority of female characters in plays (most of which are written by men) are females because their gender is essential. In other words, if gender is non-essential to the thrust of a character in the context of a play, the character will tend to be male. Women, in plays, must always be women. They are someone's wife or a rape victim or a prostitute."
This is why Quentin Tarantino is good. Kill Bill was all about women when it could have been about men.
And probably would have been had anyone else wrote it.
-
Back in college, I got into an argument with a feminist over a play I had written. I don't know if she was a Femi-Nazi (though she did spell women like this: W-O-M-Y-N.) All I know is she kept saying that every one of my arguments came from a position of "male privilege."
"You have no idea what it is like to be discriminated against because of your gender," she insisted.
"Sure I do," I said. "I experience it every month when I pay my car insurance."
I was driving a 1981 Mazda GLC at the time and I paid about $1400 a year for insurance. If I was a woman - exact same age, exact same vehicle, exact same coverage - I'd have paid about $1100.
I didn't fight it though. I knew that men my age were more apt to go stunting or get into a collision than women would.
So hooray for the insurance companies for being so pragmatic.
-
Equality is one thing. Common sense is another.
If it's August and I have to build a new homeless shelter before the cold weather sets in, I'm probably going to go with the work crew that has 100 men rather than the PC group that has 50 men and 50 women. Reason: Construction is a labour-intensive job and men, as a general rule, are better equipped to do that work than women.
And the hospitality industry is filled with employers who will not hire men as servers, hosts, receptionists, etc. They say that studies show time and time again that the public prefers dealing with women.
-
Once I wandered into a Toys R Us and I saw something like this:
It was magical, I tell ya. The store designer had segregated everything. Little girls could go get their dolls and aprons and homemaker sets and the little boys could get their dump trucks and doctor kits and I'm-the-wage earner fun packs.
Then a special interest group told Toys R Us that they were bad and that they should simply let toys be toys.
Yes, and I am here to say that I love watching women's hockey and I love listening to women sing and that women should be allowed to do everything except play James Bond or teach skydiving.
Men should be allowed to do everything except give me massages or make Pina Coladas or teach Grade 2 or write poems about cats or make wedding cakes or insist that all boxes of Kleenex have yarn covers on them or drive white Honda Civics with powder blue seat covers or listen to Michael Buble or order Diet Coke in restaurants or dot their i's with hearts or have the letters L-U-V in their email addresses or sit down to pee.
I guess that makes me sexist.
The premise of Ms. Sommers' book is that there are two kinds of feminists - good feminists and bad feminists. She gives the bad feminists a name, which is "gender feminist." She said that gender feminists do bad things and/or silly things, like hold seminars and then insist on calling them "ovu-lars."
-
When I hear the term Femi-Nazi, I immediately think of Rush Limbaugh, who popularized the term on his conservative talk radio show in the 90s. I have never heard Rush Limbaugh speak, but I did see him in a Pizza Hut commercial once. Also, some liberal friends of mine heard him a few times and they assure me that he is bad.
I do not know if "Femi-Nazi" and "gender feminist" can be considered synonymous. But if a woman tells me I have to say "ovular" instead of "seminar" because the latter is too phallocentric, I will tell her that she is bad.
-
A comedian named Al Franken once wrote a book called RUSH LIMBAUGH IS A BIG FAT IDIOT. Here it is:
The book consists of left wing rhetoric and is punctuated by fat jokes.
-
Merriam-Webster defines feminism as " the belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities."
I guess this means I am not a feminist. There are times when sexual discrimination is a wonderful thing.
Let us pretend that I am directing a production of Glengarry Glen Ross, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1984 for David Mamet. There are no women in the play. None. It is written for seven men, all middle aged, mostly realtors but there's a cop in there too as well as a client. Throughout the play, the men con each other, bargain with each other, and do a whole lot of swearing.
Now imagine some Femi-Nazi artistic director demanding - in the name of equal rights and opportunities - that at least three of those roles must be played by women.
I don't care if they get Judi Dench, Meryl Streep and Helen Mirren. That's going to be a shitty play.
You know what you need to sell real estate? Brass ovaries..-
And get this - I actually feel bad for actresses (I hate the gender neutral term actor as a designate for thespians of either gender. I think the word actress sounds majestic.)
Get a load of this bit of theatre philosophy I wrote way back in 1999. I still believe it today.
" It seems to me that the majority of female characters in plays (most of which are written by men) are females because their gender is essential. In other words, if gender is non-essential to the thrust of a character in the context of a play, the character will tend to be male. Women, in plays, must always be women. They are someone's wife or a rape victim or a prostitute."
This is why Quentin Tarantino is good. Kill Bill was all about women when it could have been about men.
And probably would have been had anyone else wrote it.
-
Back in college, I got into an argument with a feminist over a play I had written. I don't know if she was a Femi-Nazi (though she did spell women like this: W-O-M-Y-N.) All I know is she kept saying that every one of my arguments came from a position of "male privilege."
"You have no idea what it is like to be discriminated against because of your gender," she insisted.
"Sure I do," I said. "I experience it every month when I pay my car insurance."
I was driving a 1981 Mazda GLC at the time and I paid about $1400 a year for insurance. If I was a woman - exact same age, exact same vehicle, exact same coverage - I'd have paid about $1100.
I didn't fight it though. I knew that men my age were more apt to go stunting or get into a collision than women would.
So hooray for the insurance companies for being so pragmatic.
-
Equality is one thing. Common sense is another.
If it's August and I have to build a new homeless shelter before the cold weather sets in, I'm probably going to go with the work crew that has 100 men rather than the PC group that has 50 men and 50 women. Reason: Construction is a labour-intensive job and men, as a general rule, are better equipped to do that work than women.
And the hospitality industry is filled with employers who will not hire men as servers, hosts, receptionists, etc. They say that studies show time and time again that the public prefers dealing with women.
-
Once I wandered into a Toys R Us and I saw something like this:
It was magical, I tell ya. The store designer had segregated everything. Little girls could go get their dolls and aprons and homemaker sets and the little boys could get their dump trucks and doctor kits and I'm-the-wage earner fun packs.
Then a special interest group told Toys R Us that they were bad and that they should simply let toys be toys.
Yes, and I am here to say that I love watching women's hockey and I love listening to women sing and that women should be allowed to do everything except play James Bond or teach skydiving.
Men should be allowed to do everything except give me massages or make Pina Coladas or teach Grade 2 or write poems about cats or make wedding cakes or insist that all boxes of Kleenex have yarn covers on them or drive white Honda Civics with powder blue seat covers or listen to Michael Buble or order Diet Coke in restaurants or dot their i's with hearts or have the letters L-U-V in their email addresses or sit down to pee.
I guess that makes me sexist.
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