Talk:Feminism

New and Confused. Intro includes argumentation?????

It's my first visit to this page, so forgive me if I say anything redundant. As a 45 y/o woman 41 y/o feminist and activist, I never felt the need to visit the page to learn. But over the course of this year, it's come to my attention that (and correct me if I'm wrong) that for years feminism has been coopted by the LGBT movement (personally I have issues with the term LGBT because as a bi I've never heard of any stiffling of rights for bis, but that's just me). I'm all for equal rights for all, but in my book that's neither here or there when I question myself on feminism. So when I read the opening paragraph and see the last line stating that "some argue" that feminism is not about women but about gender freedom for all, I have to stop and scream WTF???????

I realise there are a lot of intellectuals here who've done a lot of reading on the matter and have plenty of "sources" to argue either way. But my understanding of wikipedia is that it's not here to represent "all" opinions, but the concensus view, the definition of least surprise for a majority of readers.

As it stands, the intro reads like it was written by 10 hands having an argument. It's unreadable and ridiculous. But heck, who knows, maybe I'm not a feminist after all?? Who'd a thunk after so many years of fighting religious and patriarchal subjugation??--Tallard (talk) 01:38, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Feminism today isn't any more about political, economic, and social rights. It has overgrown the model of a more or less organized socio-political movement with a clear agenda (like fighting religious and patriarchal subjugation) and became something like a mass philosophy or a cultural trend consisting of an increasingly larger set of different (and sometimes conflicting) opinions and views all aimed to stimulate and empower women to express themselves in whatever manner they desire, and to chastise men so that they can express themselves only in a manner approved by feminist. — Preceding unsigned comment added by KSG123 (talk • contribs) 13:37, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Personally, i think the article needs to have more about abortion, as it seems to be the biggest litimus test many are holding out to define whether or not a person is accepted as a feminist. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.149.154.199 (talk) 11:55, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

Your mistake is to think that introductions or articles should provide a "consensus view." That is simply not the case. NPOV demands we include all significant views. This article does a decent job doing just that. The sentence you refer to is accurate. So your problem seems to be that you find it a "surprise." Well, don't we come to books and articles hoping to be surprised, hoping we will learn something new? Otherwise, why bother reading anything? The lead says "some people" hold this view. And you seem to think that if "some people" hold that view, people who hold other views are not feminists. How strange. To think that all people must think alike. I did not know feminists are battling it out to decide which one definition of feminism will over-rule all other definitions. In the meantime, at Wikipedia, we try to provide majority and minority views without taking any side or insisting that one view is the truth or that our article can tell any feminist what to believe or what not to believe. Wikipedia is just not about that. If you are looking for some ministry of propaganda, you came to the wrong place. You seem to want to make an argument, argue that your view is the only view. We make no arguments, we just describe the different views. Slrubenstein | Talk 23:25, 21 October 2010 (UTC)

69.149.154.199, the problem is that your personal views can't be included in the article. --Aronoel (talk) 15:24, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

Movement and Ideologies

"Contrary to common beliefs, studies have shown that feminists tend to have neutral feelings towards men, and self-identitied feminists tend to have less hostile attitudes towards men than non-feminists."

This sentence at the end of the Movement and Ideologies section is not relevant to the subject matter of the heading. Secondly the reference for this statement comes form an unrefereed book of articles and the experimental design of the work is appalling. I read the paper and wasted 15 mins of my life doing so. By narrowing or expanding the definition of feminism you could prove anything, including black is white.

I recommend the whole of the last paragraph of this section be removed. Pancur (talk) 22:16, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

I agree that that section may not be the most ideal place for it, but I'm not sure where else it should go. I'm not sure what the problem is with the source, it's a secondary source and a third-party published book with an editor. The authors of the specific article are professors of social psychology. I believe it meets all the criteria of wp:rs. --Aronoel (talk) 22:58, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

I have read this article and now others in the book, I would argue the unreviewed articles strongly promote a point of view on a complex topic. In of itself this is not necessarily a bad thing. However reading wp:rs I think the source fails on every count in the scholarship section. Coming from academia I am well aware that there is a vast difference between an edited volume and a set of peer reviewed articles. Academics are are not immune from publishing poor quality opinionated work. Unreservedly accepting references from 'edited' volumes is a dangerous precedence to set and is not the intent of wp:rs.

Further more a statement essentially irrelevent to the subject matter of a heading does not justify its presence by being unable to think of where else to put it. Perhaps it is a sign it should not be in the article in the first place. Pancur (talk) 05:02, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

I created a new section, put the paragraph there, and added text for which I anticipate sourcing later, although I don't think it's particularly controversial.

We don't generally require that sources be peer-reviewed, some selected articles on scholarship being exceptions by consensus on their talk pages or by practice by one or more editors. Were we to require peer review in our sources generally, many or most articles would not appear for the reason that peer review is generally applied to new discoveries and other new contributions to knowledge, whereas some knowledge has been known for so long or is so obvious that there may not be a peer-reviewed source for it, but may not be in dispute. As a polymathic reader, I've had difficulty determining which books are peer-reviewed; I've been told by a librarian that many university presses don't apply peer review, although I have one book in which the author credits one or more anonymous reviewers. I judge sources somewhat on a case-by-case basis.

Nick Levinson (talk) 06:12, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

I think the new section is a really good change to this article, thanks. --Aronoel (talk) 17:05, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

I could not agree more with Nick Levinson's statements. The phrase

".. peer review is generally applied to new discoveries and other new contributions to knowledge"

sums up where my concerns are. With the exception of the reference to a similar work, done in 1983 that I have no access to, this paper is the only study done on this topic and as such is new knowledge. I did find this volume on the web but have mislayed the link, I will dig it up. The formation of a new section has improved matters though.

Pancur (talk) 03:05, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

The greater part of the article can be found here http://www.amazon.com/Feminism-Womens-Rights-Worldwide-volumes/dp/0313375968#reader_0313375968

They freely admit the following

"In addition to our empirical study that we describe shortly, Iazzo's 1983 study
is the only one we found that examines feminists' attitudes towards men."

Apart form a nearly 30yr old study, of now questionable contemporary relevance, their work is the only one on this topic and is arguably new knowledge. Contrary to that stated above I do consider this to be controversial knowledge, Feminists' attitudes towards men are commonly a topic of discussion. The Iazzo study is Iazzo, A. N. 1983. "The construction and validation of Attitudes toward Men Scale." The Psychological Record 33: 371-378.

The journal for Iazzo is a small peer reviewed journal out of SIU Carbondale, Il.

Pancur (talk) 19:39, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

What I meant as not particularly controversial is the passage I added (the section's first paragraph) and the relevant controversy is about whether it would be challenged in Wikipedia as contrary to another editor's understanding; that feminists' attitudes toward males are widely discussed is also true but a separate matter.

The Psychological Record (from a different university) for 1983 is apparently unavailable online, unless JStor turns out to have it. However, the 1983 study insofar as described in the work referenced in the Wikipedia article's note 11 seems to be appropriately summarized in Wikipedia. The clause in Wikipedia that "self-identitied feminists tend to have less hostile attitudes towards men than non-feminists" I'm presuming is supported by the reference, specifically by the chapter authors' own study, and I can't see that part of the chapter (pp. 7 ff.); the clause is plausible in my experience, but if it's wrong it should be corrected.

Amazon limits what I can see from the 2010 book chapter even when I sign in, so I can't evaluate more of it. But my impression is that what I see of the chapter is fairly close to attitudes among self-identifying feminists, of whom I've met many over the years, albeit likely in another geographic area, without a control, and not systematically studied.

Studies of feminists probably often use fairly wide definitions because if narrow definitions are used an investigator needs much more funding to reach enough respondents, and widely-defined populations may be reasonably worth studying unless the definition is so wide as to be meaningless. Defining a feminist simply as 'self-identifying as one' is often adequate and probably would be for measuring what the 1983 study tries to, at least in the U.S., in addition to supporting design consistency among studies on different issues.

Even if the 2010 study was not peer-reviewed and even if the 1983 study is outdated, I don't think 2010 U.S. self-identified feminists' attitudes would have turned substantially anti-male. The willingness to self-identify privately as feminist has probably grown, among women since the 1970s and among men since the '80s or '90s (although it may not have if one has to be public about it, such as on job applications), and that growth would be among mainstream people, thus unlikely to accept being anti-male, thus diluting the anti-male attitudes more common among radicals.

If you do come across a better study, with similar or dissimilar results, we're interested.

Nick Levinson (talk) 23:08, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

Speechless.

Pancur (talk) 01:40, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

This entry has always concerned me as well

The title of the paper referenced here is the "Myth of the Man Hating Feminist". What myth? From my experience I don't think it is a myth that some Feminists are at least hostile to men. The paper then proceeds to extend the definition of "Feminist" and "Self Declared Feminist" to a large enough pool to dilute this population, funding arguments for this are a possible reason not an excuse. This study although not saying "black is white" it is saying "black is black", ie very little. The fact that in 30 yrs. there are only two pieces of work addressing this issue also says something.

The Wiki entry starts with the phrase "Contrary to common beliefs..", what common beliefs? I do not think it is a common belief that most feminists are hostile to men but I do think it is a common belief that some are. Unless carefully read this entry suggests it is concerned with the later but actually demonstrates the former. At best this Wiki entry is misleading and could lead to the counter myth "..studies show Feminists are not hostile to men", ergo Solanas, Dworkin, Daly etc were Feminists and hence not hostile to men.

At a minimum this should be rewritten to make it clear what it is actually being said and what the terms used precisely mean. Since imo it is frankly not very informative due to its sampling set and it is open to misinterpretation, I think it should be removed as it does more harm than good.

Zimbazumba (talk) 01:04, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

I think the current wording is pretty clear that feminists tend to have less hostility towards men, not that no feminist has ever been hostile to men. Also, unless I'm misunderstanding something, I'm not sure what the problem is with using self-identification as a feminist as the defining criterion for a feminist. --Aronoel (talk) 17:01, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

The myth is that most feminist are man-haters, at least in the U.S. Some hate men. Most, however, want men to change but see themselves as wanting men in their lives. While many feminists read the authors you cited, after a while probably most integrated their books into their more general views of feminism and of the world. Most feminists endorse a mainstreaming form of feminism and men are overwhelmingly part of the mainstream.

You say that "funding arguments ... are a possible reason not an excuse", but I don't know what "not [being] an excuse" means, since they may not have had an obligation to do the more thorough study. If you want to conduct a survey in which you determine what kind of feminist each respondent is and you have access to the money (it may cost you several dollars per respondent for a detailed phone poll and you'll want a large enough respondent pool to be meaningful for each type of feminism, so for a national survey with five kinds of feminism you may be talking about $20,000), and you can get your study refereed and published, go ahead.

Relying on self-definition helps with consistency between investigators and studies over years. It's not the only way to qualify respondents but it is accepted for many fields of inquiry.

If these are the best studies because they're the only studies, they probably should be cited in the article.

Nick Levinson (talk) 17:34, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps I could rephrase my arguments like so.

The sentence under discussion is awash with prevarication, weasel words and multiple interpretations.

(1) The phrase "Contrary to common beliefs..", what common beliefs? That Feminists tend to be hostile to men? I don't think it is a common belief, although you may think it is a common belief. This statement is in the same league as "Some researchers think..". It should either be clarified to a point of consensus agreement or referenced. If we are to believe the referenced paper it is concerned with the "Myth of the Man Hating Feminist", no ambiguity about that.

(2) Even we if agree with the phrase ".common beliefs.." does the definition of Feminism for the common believer correspond to that of those who consider themselves to be Feminists. (hidden prevarication)

(3) "Hostile" and "Neutral" are weasel words and can mean many things. The reader should have a reasonable idea about what is meant by these words without having to read the source paper.

(4) The sentence as a summary of the referenced work provokes a very different emotional response when re-phrased, eg. I could re-phrase it as

"..feminists tend not to have positive feelings towards men, and self-identified feminists although tending to have hostile attitudes towards men are in general less hostile than non-feminists. In general women tend not to have positive attitudes towards men".

Which I would argue is as valid and inane as the original wording. This is a sign of a sentence with problems.

(5) There are a wealth of peer reviewed papers on Feminist topics but a paucity of papers on this very interesting one. Perhaps it is not measurable or sufficiently well defined as a problem for meaningful research and commentary. Or possibly other researchers obtained results less palatable for publication?

(6) It was Nick Levinson not me who brought up funding, I was just responding.

In short I think this entry needs to be more precise or removed. I am open to suggestions.

Zimbazumba (talk) 01:44, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

(1) Many women who agree with feminist goals and who live lives benefiting from feminism want nothing to do with the label, and many say they want or have equality but are not against men and so they don't call themselves feminist. Mary Daly wrote an anti-male book (Gyn/Ecology), but relatively few feminists take a position like that. But it's much more common for men to treat feminism as anti-man and, because of that, many women have steered clear of describing themselves as feminist. It's not a bad idea to add a reference to the effect that either many men view feminism as anti-men or many women who agree with feminist goals or live feminist-like lives decline the self-label as feminist because of the common perception that feminists are anti-men. There probably are such statements in many secondary sources, even if there's no study on point.

(2) "[D]oes the definition of Feminism for the common believer correspond to that of those who consider themselves to be Feminists[?]" No, not entirely; the common believer would raise the level to which feminism is anti-male above what most feminists would say of their own beliefs. But a common believer and a common woman would also often disagree on whether she's a feminist, given joint knowledge of her particular beliefs but no joint knowledge of her labeling or lack thereof. E.g., equal pay for equal pay is widely endorsed by paid women but not as much pursued because men proceed as if there's already enough being done in that regard; comparable worth has even less support from men. This definitional difference is not prevarication; it is difference between people. One could design a survey in which we ask average people to name some feminists and then interview the latter, but that's even more expensive than what I suggested above, and I don't know of such a study; if it doesn't exist, we won't be able to cite it, and in that case we have to rely on the best sources that do exist and that still meet our standards.

(3) If you want to suggest a more precise term or meaning for hostile, go ahead. I think neutral as reflecting a middle value may be quite workable, but if you want to define it more precisely, go ahead, although I think taking up space to describe the scale and that a range around 80.00 (if I recall right) is what we're talking about may be more confusing for readers unless a lot more explanation is provided, and this is an article intended to introduce readers to all about feminism within 100 kibibytes and preferably less. It's okay for some content to be in cited sources; that's why they're cited. When a Wikipedia reader delves into a source and encounters a different dialect (such as that of scientists in a field who expect other readers to be scientists with approximately their level of expertise), because it's in the source and not in the Wikipedia article it is not Wikipedia's responsibility to explain all of what's in the source.

(4) Propose a better sentence, if you wish. I'm not sure how much can be proven by drafting a worse sentence.

(5) We rely on what's available. Study results being not "palatable for publication" is a problem known in medicine and elsewhere and perhaps in feminism. If nonpalatability resulted in publication, we can still cite them. If it did not, we can't cite them and that complaint has to go elsewhere and not here. I don't know of a study in feminism that was withheld from publication because its results were undesirable despite the work being well done.

(6) I did introduce funding, because it 's relevant to whether studies are defining feminism too loosely. To study more forms of feminism as distinct from each other and still produce totals that reflect general feminism costs more. That such a study doesn't exist is likely not an investigator's fault, so to say there's no "excuse" when there's no duty to get and spend more is incorrect.

Nick Levinson (talk) 17:22, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

I'll address (4) first by proposing the following. It eliminates the unsubstantiated introductory phrase and further illuminates the results of the study:-

"A study shows that feminists tend to have neutral feelings towards men, and self-identified feminists although tending to have hostile attitudes towards men are in general less hostile than non-feminists. In general women tend not to have positive attitudes towards men".

Prevarication, weasel words and 'studies' are a double edged sword. If you use one edge then the other is just as valid.

Zimbazumba (talk) 00:49, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

If you still see prevarication given that a definitional difference between people is not necessarily prevarication by either, point to the specific words constituting it. If you see a weasel word for which there is a feasible alternative, point to it and propose the alternative, but you seem to have decided not to and then complain about it anyway; weasel words without feasible alternatives stay. The word studies is correct in this context; two are cited (one within the article on the other). If you wish to suggest that most women, including nonfeminists, tend to have nonpositive attitudes toward men, please source it, as that is rather astonishing (one could push and make such a claim about feelings rarely revealed but for those a source is needed). Please tell us what you believe the common beliefs are, if the opening clause is wrong, but if you don't think it's wrong just unsourced, note that it is not necessary to source obvious statements, so your challenge is appropriate only if you think it is wrong, not merely that you think someone might wish it to be wrong. If you propose deleting the sentence on misandry, explain why. Nick Levinson (talk) 04:38, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

All women are either non-feminist, feminist or self-identified feminists. The study shows

Feminists tend to have neutral feelings towards men.

Self-identified feminists tend to have hostile attitudes towards men.

Non feminists are more hostile than non-feminists.

Ergo ALL women tend not have positive attitudes to men.

My source is the very study you are defending, the result is pretty damned significant and clearly should be mentioned. Either this work is a revolutionary piece of sociological research or nonsense. I choose the latter due to the absurd suggestion that women in general do not have positive attitudes towards men, I am using reductio ad absurdum.

As for the 'common belief' it has to be referenced, we can wiki lawyer that later is if you wish. As for weasel words it is for others not me to provide an alternative, their definition is embedded in the 'paper'. Your stance on prevarication is stone walling. My approach atm is that if you accept the study then you must accept all women tend not have positive attitudes to men. So either include this point or remove the entry.

Further more reading Pancer's entry again I agree this entry fails on wp:rs alone. Using Iazzo's work is ok albeit rather old, but all we know is that he addresses this issue (I don't have the paper).

Zimbazumba (talk) 13:32, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

The first clause is supported directly in the source provided: "Contrary to popular stereotypes, self-identified feminists had lower levels of hostility toward men than non-feminists." These popular stereotypes are also discussed specifically in the article.

I don't agree that "neutral" and "hostile" are weasel words. They are pretty specific, and they are used prominently in the source's conclusions. At the very least they are more specific than "not positive." I understand that you believe the sentence is poor and you are trying to demonstrate that, but really any sentence can be reworded to be misleading and confusing. So I don't think this justifies its removal.

Original analysis of studies is original research, which can't be included in the article. But I just want to point out that the study discussing hostility uses only two categoroes: self-identified feminists and nonfeminists. And also, hostility in this study was measured on a scale, so even men scored some degree of hostility. That doesn't mean that men tend to not have any positive attitudes about men. The highest reported score of hostility was among nonfeminists of color at 2.7 out of 5. Even that is not far from what could be considered neutral. --Aronoel (talk) 15:48, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

After going back and reviewing the sentence again, I think it has caused some confusion so I've made a few small changes to make it clearer. A possible clearer way that what is now the second sentence could be reworded is: "Additionally, feminists are less likely to have hostile attitudes towards men than non-feminists." I think this might be less confusing since there have been misinterpretations of the meaning of a scale of hostility. Please let me know if this might be a better option. --Aronoel (talk) 16:01, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

The reader should not have to read the original paper to understand what "neutral" or "hostile" mean, these are nuanced words in this context. If you consider "neutral" and "hostile" as well defined then so is "not positive" ie as "neutral or hostile" we can use that is you wish. My reductio ad absurdum still stands if you disagree with that statement. And I repeat Pancer's point that this study does not satisfy wp:rs, Iazzo's might this doesn't.

Zimbazumba (talk) 16:29, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Aronoel, sorry I missed your second post. Although now clearer I don't think it really changes much, albeit better written.

Zimbazumba (talk) 16:37, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

• First of all this is VERY simple. The point should be attributed to the source, so it should begin with;

  In their essay 'The Myth of the Man-Hating Feminist', Kanner and Anderson say that...

  Secondly, (and this is important) it is not our job to neuter sources because quotes from them use words we don't agree with: that is a serious and fundamental misunderstanding of WP:NPOV. We record all relevant mainstream perspectives neutrally - that measn we don't alter them. Thirdly: Zimbazumba, your decree that this source does not meet WP:RS is incorrect. If you wish to explore how an essay in an academic, editted collection relates to wikipedias policies on verification do it at WP:RS/N--Cailil ^talk 17:25, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback, Zimbazumba. I'm not sure if I understand what you are saying about "neutral" and "hostile." Most people understand what those specific attitudes mean and can look them up in a dictionary if necessary. "Not positive" is a very general term that could refer to any attitude thinkable that is not positive.

I believe the article (not study) meets wp:rs per my reply to Pancur above. --Aronoel (talk) 17:28, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

I think the addition of the introductory phrase

In their essay 'The Myth of the Man-Hating Feminist', Kanner and Anderson say that...

in conjunction with Aronoel's rewording enormously improves the entry. I can live with it as a suitable compromise. I thank you all for responding to my points.

I still agree with Pancur and will pursue that issue in the appropriate forum.

Zimbazumba (talk) 19:14, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Masculism and men's rights movements

Pro-feminist academics like Michael Flood, Michael Messner, and Michael Kimmel are involved with men's studies.

This statement gives excessive prominence to Flood, Messner and Kimmel. Their names already appear multiple times in this Wiki page. There are obviously many people involved in Masculism and the men's rights movements to highlight 3 all who are of similar views shows a lack of balance. This sentence should be removed or similar number of names from other perspectives should be added so flooding the entry with names. I vote remove it.

Zimbazumba (talk) 15:10, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

I think this is a good point, so I've removed their names from this sentence. --Aronoel (talk) 17:09, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

That reads a lot better, thanks. Zimbazumba (talk) 19:02, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Approach to men

The first paragraph should include some of the very extreme attitudes of fairly well known authors. Although distasteful I think they should be there. Also the last sentence reads like a false dichotomy. Suggest changing it to

"Some feminist ideologies oppose sexism but not men personally, because men will benefit from feminism,because men must be welcomed as allies in a struggle for women's rights and both genders must cooperate, because men and women are both oppressed with "men ... betrayed by their culture"[9] while most men have no power over women and "no clearly defined enemy ... oppressing them", and because men are oppressed by gender roles. Other feminist ideologies oppose both sexism and men as the agents and perpetrators of sexism, prominent examples being radical feminism and authors who have advocated that women ought to govern men, separate from men or destroy men. In the U.S., most feminists are more closely aligned with the former view."

The references for the included phrase "..have advocated that women ought to govern men, separate from men or destroy men." would be

Daly, Mary, Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism (Boston, Mass.: Beacon Press, pbk. 1978 & 1990)

Bunch, Charlotte/The Furies Collective, Lesbians in Revolt, in The Furies: Lesbian/Feminist Monthly, vol.1, January 1972, pp.8-9

Solanas, Valerie SCUM Manifesto AK Press, 1996. ISBN 1-873176-44-9 and [... link (deleted)]

Solanas actually said "destroy the male sex" not "destroy men" not sure if I am being PC here. I am aware 9 years later Solanas claimed her phrase was a literary device and there were attempts by others to characterize her work as a satire. The fact is she very publicly said it and attempts at damage control by her and others came much later.

Zimbazumba (talk) 19:07, 12 March 2011 (UTC) (Link deleted as apparent copyright violation facilitation, discussed infra: Nick Levinson (talk) 19:39, 13 March 2011 (UTC))

Whether to discuss in this article that some women advocate for governing men, which is true to a significant but definitely minor degree in recent decades in the U.S., has already been discussed at length on this page. The consensus is that it is to such a degree a minority position even among feminists that it belongs elsewhere but not here. (An article elsewhere about it was deleted after debate.) Calls for the destruction of men, by which I assume is meant mass murder and not the mere disheartening or disenfranchising of masses of men, in any calls that are clearly serious (e.g., not literary devices), are even rarer or (to my knowledge) may not exist and whether it's enough to meet a test of significance has to be considered. If the significance comes only from antifeminist criticisms, that may not be enough because of the tendency of opponents in any major political field to exaggerate (e.g., consider how in U.S. politics Republicans count most Democrats as extremist and how Democrats do likewise about most Republicans but we don't consider the U.S. government to be run mostly by Communists and Nazis).

I'm reading a later edition of Valerie Solanas' work for another article. Because she apparently did say that it was a literary device (albeit much later, I think), apparently including what "SCUM" may stand for, and her work with, or attempted work with, Andy Warhol suggests that literary devices may well have been part of her way of working at the time she wrote the book and before, it's pretty well necessary to explain that and to get a source to back up that even if not meant literally the Manifesto was understood and influential as advocacy of the sort, I'm not sure it's good for an introductory article. I'm also not clear yet whether it was proseparatist or advocacy for governing men and therefore how to characterize it. While some writers probably did accept her recharacterization as a downgrading of the work's importance, some feminists promoted it anyway, so the work may stand on its own, but I'll see.

Linking to a purported text, apparently full text, of the SCUM Manifesto looks like copyright violation facilitation, which is unlawful. I'm not sure if it can stay in the talk page. I don't plan to put it into the article unless someone can show that it is lawful. The book is available for purchase, probably in more than one edition.

(I've long thought that a copy I read years ago at a public library and that had handwritten markup may have been marked up by her, but I don't know; I can't very well argue that no one else did the markup.)

I'll look for Charlotte Bunch's article. I think she also wrote an anthology and maybe it has it.

Mary Daly's Gyn/Ecology is already cited in support of the second sentence and at the point of discussing radical feminism, since she was a radical feminist.

If you're proposing deleting most of the references or pagination, I disagree.

I changed the third sentence to replace "more feminists align with" to "most feminists align more closely with", applying part of your suggestion but keeping women's agency as active rather than passive.

Thanks. Nick Levinson (talk) 22:38, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

wp:npov states quite clearly that all significant views should be represented proprtionately. Significance does not necessarily infer believed by some numbers. A belief can be believed by very few yet be influencial in spawning debate, raisng awareness and inflaming passions. Addressing the phrases I wished to be included:-

Separate from men:- Mentioning Separatist Feminists I don't think is a matter for much debate. It was and is a significant movement, although not large in numbers. It has its own Wiki page.

Govern men:- Mary Daly's work might have been discussed in other contexts, but this is a new section about the approach to men. The playing field has now changed and the significance of her work has increased greatly. Mary Daly was an important Feminist thinker who had and still has a following. Her book Gyn/Ecology that I quote from is a famous book and the phrase ".. believing that women ought to govern men" appears on the Wiki page about Daly in the section "Views on men". I believe you have read the book yourself. This book is still available on Amazon, Chapters etc and receives a very significant number of positive reviews. Excluding her views on men as not relevant in a section entitled "Approach to men" violates wk:npov imo.

Destroy the male sex:- Valerie Solanas and the SCUM Manifesto are iconic, Both with their own wiki pages. The SCUM Manifesto imo is a historical document and remarkable piece of literature. It captures albeit as a deeply grotesque characture the inner resentments of many women. Even today quite moderate women chuckle when they read it. It raised passions and created debate. It was highly influential in extreme feminist circles of the time and now. I also have no reason to believe that Solanas considered it satire at the time of writing. The phrase "Destroy the male sex" appears in the first sentence of the manifesto.

I strongly feel that these 3 ideas belong in this section if added in an appropriate manner. We can work on the wording.

And finally the phrase "..most feminists align more closely with..", is now original research imo. Most women, ie those who agree with equality etc, would not of heard of most of the phrases in the opening sentence let alone proactively aligned themselves with them.

Zimbazumba (talk) 15:50, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

The consensus is that elsewhere is where they belong, not here. They're covered in articles linked to from here, including in the sidebar. In a single article that would be all about feminism, most or all of that and more could be in one place. But Wikipedia articles are limited to about 100 KiB each, preferably less, and so we break out subarticles and link them, and there are many already. By far, the prevailing view among U.S. feminists is nonseparatist and for equality (given many definitions of equality) and plenty of sources support that. One editor supplied roughly 20 of those sources and there are more. Both feminist and popular literature support the prevalence and I doubt there's a study contradicting that. (As a side note, this is a consequence of feminists appealing to mainstream women to be feminist and, almost by definition, most mainstream people do not turn radical; instead, either they reject feminism altogether or, in embracing feminism, they mainstream feminism itself, adapting ideologies to fit what adopters need in the mainstream. Acceptance of men is mainstream. I can quote Betty Friedan to that effect.)

The key difference between the first two sentences respecting how most U.S. women think or feel as to how feminism approaches men is in feminist opposition being "not [to] men personally" or affirmatively to "men as the agents and perpetrators". Any notion that far and away the first is not the more common view among U.S. women would need strong sourcing. Mary Daly, for example, was aspiring and not describing how most women already live. While you're right that most of the first sentence's subsidiary clauses' phrases as specific phrases would not be immediately familiar to most women, the phrases support the leading part of the sentence and are sourced.

Mary Daly is dead and I doubt her influence has grown since. Where her influence seems to turn up the most in popular or feminist literature is in what she demonstrated about language, such as in breaking down the word disease into dis-ease to show hidden meanings vital to feminism; this kind of linguistic analysis is employed in books by various authors, and she can get credit for inspiring a lot of it. And she's known as a feminist, probably known as a radical feminist. But I doubt most women can go much further than that in describing what she stood for. As an indirect example of that, I had difficulty finding a secondary source specifically citing her call for women to govern men (using any words to that effect). If you find one, it may be useful elsewhere, but it probably still wouldn't be enough for this article.

Valerie Solanas' work has been published a few times, including 2004 (the edition I'm reading), and multiple republication is important, but I don't agree on the ease of the interpretation without a secondary source backing it up. The best I can think of it Ultra Violet's book, and if that's the only one I'm not sure it would be adequate (although the book, while primary for much or most of its content, is probably secondary for her interview of Valerie). One could argue that shooting Andy Warhol was an act implementing such an interpretation, but we'd need a secondary source making that connection or find if she's been quoted to that effect, but she turned herself into to a police officer and I doubt her statements would be even nearly consistently in that direction; I think she spoke of his not taking her artistic work seriously. Even if she made some of her statements in order to lighten the court's reaction, she was freed in a few years and had plenty of opportunity in many later years to renounce any post-shooting statements, apparently at little or no cost to her. So we're left with substantial inconsistency at best, making interpretation something for an off-Wiki author to do in a secondary source. If you find one, please let us know.

The Furies: Lesbian/Feminist Monthly is not in my local libraries' large collections (one has catalogued an extensive feminist collection on microfilm) or at WorldCat.org. I searched for The Furies at the libraries and, when that got too many results at WorldCat, for "The Furies: Lesbian" at WorldCat and also for "The Furies" as a journal, magazine, or newspaper. I thought there was such a serial but maybe no library kept it. If you can verify the serial title you provided, please do. Otherwise, I can look for Charlotte's book. My impression is that she was separatist, not about governing men, but I can see.

Adding the new section to this article was mainly a reorganizing of content, not a redefining of the article's scope.

I considered whether to ask other editors about adding separatism, albeit not about governing men, and looked to see if separatism is already in the article. It is. In the Movements and Ideologies section, it's in the third paragraph, with a link. A common problem in Wikipedia is to move stuff to the top of an article until the top becomes top-heavy, and some editors might say I've also been guilty of that at least once. The same happens to the most prominent article of a set. In this case, it's a question of moving what's covered in other articles and in this article into a section on approach to men. All of feminism is about approaches to men, so maybe half the subject could be written into that section. A book or magazine article could be titled Approach to Men: The History of Feminism, but this is Wikipedia, where a length limit and internal prioritization apply.

Nick Levinson (talk) 19:39, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Taking the advice of Wiki for Beginners I have been bold and inserted a paragraph that highlight some of negative reactions to men. It feel has been added in a proportionate way and balances the entry. The text of which is

Betty Friedam criticized radical feminists for co-opting the Feminist movement with anti-male sentiments. Some more radical feminists have advocated that women ought to govern men, separate from men or even more extremely, although considered satire by some, "destroy the male sex".

I have removed the sentence "In the U.S., most feminists align more closely with the former position." it is original research as it asserts proactive taking of those stances. The latter stances are anyway indicated as being less popular by describing them as radical.

Zimbazumba (talk) 04:19, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

I reverted both edits. Please discuss first, in consideration of what I raised above. In addition, you did not supply page numbers for most of the references you added. If you do not agree with what I did or wrote and don't want to discuss it with me, you may ask other editors on this page for their feedback. Nick Levinson (talk) 06:10, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

I thought my response spoke volumes. However I'll be to be more explicit

(1) I have made significant well substantiated reasons why this material should be included.

(2) Your above reasons for their non inclusion is a long list of trivial objections. eg we might exceed the Kb limit for the page or that this material can be found on other wiki pages. We can go on for weeks like that.

(3) You have not meaningfully responded to my point of your inclusion of clearly original research that you included without any discussion.

(4) The Friedam point needs no discussion. It is a well know of view one of the most important feminists of the 20th century.

This entry is short, proportionate and adds balance to the entry.

I have reverted your edits. Unless you can offer significant, concise and well substantiated reasons for its removal then please do not revert my edits.

The opinions of other editors would be welcome as well. If this have to go to Wiki:Neutral_point_of_view then so be it.

Zimbazumba (talk) 13:46, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

I think having some info on criticism within feminism of radical feminism's approach to men is a positive addition to this section. However, I don't think SCUM or gynocracy need to be included because gynocracy is very fringe for this general article and isn't a significant part of radical feminism, as Nick has explained. SCUM's relationship with actual feminist movements is dubious and a better source for the inclusion of "destroy the male sex" would be a neutral or feminist source that says "destroying the male sex was an aim of some radical feminists" or something like that. Separatism is a type of radical feminism, so I don't know if this section really needs to get that specific on radical feminism.

I think the sentence about how most feminists align is important for this section, because there should be some indication of the prominence of these views on men. I think the sentence was factually correct but I'm having trouble finding a source that can back it up. At the very least, most of the sources currently in that section say things like "feminism is not anti-men" etc which I think indirectly supports the sentence. I'm not really sure if that's enough though.

Also, I think the first paragraph is good but the length makes it a little confusing, so I will try to summarize it a little. Please let me know what you think of my changes and the alignment sentence issue. --Aronoel (talk) 16:26, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Aronoel, thank you for your input. I disagree with you on removing my sentence on the fringe ideas, although fringe I still feel they are worthy of mentioning. Since agreement on this point is unlikely I'll possible take it to Wiki:Neutral_point_of_view

Concerning the sentence you added, I think Friedam is more than just criticising radical feminism. She is "..critical of radical feminists for co-opting the feminist movement with anti-male sentiments" this is different and the common way that commentators of her work represent her view. This is not an idea she communicated just once it was an opinion she repeated many times.

I simply can't agree with the final sentence inferring that most women aligned with the former view. This still imo is original research. The term feminist in this section has already been used to include that large block of women who loosely agree with ideas of women's equality. This group would have had little exposure to these sentences, and actually may not agree with them.

This section is about "Approaches to men" there has over the years been a streak of anti-maleness in the feminist movement in places and I think this should be represented in a proportionate way here.

I have reworded your sentence and will come up with another perhaps to add to it. I think your rewording of the first sentence is excellent(just read it).

Zimbazumba (talk) 21:23, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Actually reading your first sentence I am not sure about this?

"..and propose that men should be welcomed as important allies"

This may be the opinion of some, but actually part of the theory? Men being welcomed as important allies is not a phrase I here often in feminist writing or articulated very often by feminists in general. Are we not verging on original research again?

I'll remove it for now and we can discuss. I think we are beginning to get somewhere.

Zimbazumba (talk) 21:40, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

I clarified in the article which of Nick's references supported that specific claim. Regarding the Friedan sentence that you restored, could you provide a quote or something supporting it? I skimmed through the source before but I couldn't find an example of her arguing something like that. I may have just missed it though. Also, why did you remove the source I added about other feminists criticizing radical feminism?

The disagreement here is mainly about how significant negative views of men are in radical feminism and in the feminist community in general. This is an important question for this section. Fringe views are by definition not significant and don't belong in a very short, very general overview section. The rest of this disagreement has to be resolved with appropriate reliable sources and not our opinions. Unfortunately it doesn't seem like there is much literature addressing this specific question, but I'll keep looking. --Aronoel (talk) 21:54, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Aronoel. We are editing at the same time here and perhaps getting in a muddle in a rush to get to consensus. I believe we are close to it, perhaps we should slow down a bit.

I removed the source as it did not pertain to Freidan. The opinion of Friedan perhaps was not stated by her explicitly as is but is a well know synopsis of some of her thoughts in "2nd Stage" and other places. Commentators of her work frequently make the point that she held that opinion. We either find a source or reach a consensus that that was her view. It think stating her view in this form is important for balance.

I still am uncomfortable with "..and propose that men should be welcomed as important allies" without it the paragraph looks short, sharp and informative. Although it may the view of some it is a view that is not articulated very often. I think we have undue prominence issues.

Zimbazumba (talk) 22:27, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Aronoel, I have done some web crawling.

Re:- "Most feminist theories........ propose that men should be welcomed as important allies"

I can't find anything saying anything like this in "The Feminist Promise" in or around p. 394, which is what your RS is. Wrong page number? Its on google books http://books.google.ca/books?id=n6IBA0grWR4C .

Concerning Friedans opinion it is alluded to but not explicitly referenced as a quote but as a synthesis of her views Here are a few:-

(1) Houghton Mifflin Chronology of US Literature: http://www.answers.com/topic/betty-friedan

" She also targets for criticism radical feminists who have co-opted the movement with an anti-male, anti-family orientation that Friedan finds counterproductive"

(2) http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2006/feb/06/guardianobituaries.gender

"In The Second Stage (1981), Friedan, her eye on middle America, argued that feminists were alienating support by being confrontational and anti-men"

The author of this obituary is Sheila Rowbotham who is a well known British socialist feminist theorist and writer.

(3) http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/betty-friedan-465800.html

"I'm at odds with the radical feminists,"

(4) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betty_Friedan (although this page needs some work)

"As early as the 1960s Friedan was critical of polarized and extreme factions of feminism that attacked groups such as men and homemakers."

Zimbazumba (talk) 02:49, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Most feminists welcome at least some men as potential supporters of some part of feminism; the feminists who reject all men are, proportionately, strikingly few. I've inserted a rephrasing, but I don't understand a claim that this basic division is not believable until sourced. I doubt anyone has statistically studied the ratio in the population, because no surprise has been likely. It would never have been close except possibly in the beginning of any wave or movement and probably not even then. Books and articles about feminism, both academic and lay, are overwhelmingly mainstream and not radical; and rarely even discuss gynocracy. Organizations including NOW welcome men as members and supporters; I think most or all of the larger feminist U.S. organizations do, and did even when radicals got most of their publicity during the second wave, in the late 1960s. There are proportionately few men in the pro-mainstream feminist organizations, but they accept them on the basis, usually, of agreement with principles. I don't think you can point to even one credible source that contradicts that with a claim of a nearly 50:50 division or that rejection of men outweighs acceptance. If the proposal that men be welcomed as important allies strikes anyone as infrequent in feminism, perhaps it's the particular wording that is unusual, but the welcoming as allies is far and away predominant over rejectionism. This is basically well known from a wide reading of feminist literature. I've added a statement on point; feel free to add sourcing as you come across it and I might do the same. I don't think anyone familiar with U.S. feminism will seriously challenge its veracity until we add sources.

I've integrated Betty Friedan's objection to radical feminism in brief, but the main place to put it is where radical feminism is criticized, and that's in the article on radical feminism. That's not what this feminism article is. This article is introductory to many branches of feminism, and there is not room in this article to include a critique of each ideology, each theory, each wave, and each proponent or advocate named. That's where the 100KiB limit has meaning. Look through subarticles.

Synthesis is discouraged in Wikipedia. I've supplied a source and used one of Zimbazumba's. She certainly did repeatedly and angrily criticize radical feminism, but I wonder if she said that it had co-opted the feminist movement generally, since that would mean that she had conceded radicalism had taken over. She might have said it might co-opt feminism if they aren't stopped. For specific quotations offered by Zimbazumba, one is from Wikipedia and Wikipedia is not considered a reliable source for Wikipedia and another is from answers.com, which is generally considered only weakly reliable (example of position), and I don't evaluate the source answers.com is quoting, the Houghtoin Mifflin Chronology of US Literature, until seen. I deleted her Second Stage; if it's still useful, please cite it but with a page citation.

Removing content and its source on the ground that it wasn't what Betty Friedan wrote is inapropos. This article may include her work but is not exclusively about her. This being an intro to feminism, thus many more advocates should be cited.

Ideologies is indeed loaded (on the false supposition that only other people have one), but it seems to survive in Wikipedia, maybe because of a need to clarify that something is not fact (subject to more dispute) and maybe because of a prevailing bias on gender issues among Wikipedia editors generally. But theories has another use, illustrated in the article's Feminism sidebar. And feminisms may be too advanced, so that to some readers it may look like a grammatical error. So instead I'm trying movements, albeit also imperfect.

Grouping footnotes instead of locating them with each statement or substatement is not my style, but some editors prefer its visual simplicity. It does have a drawback of making tracing back a little harder, but past revisions permit that for the intrepid. The other drawback is that a long list of consecutive inline references may lead to a complaint of there being too many, so, for a little help, I'm combining three into one; they're for the same book, for different pages.

The Feminist Promise was a library book that I've returned. I've now reserved the book at two libraries, since neither Google nor Amazon shows p. 394. However, I don't doubt the paraphrase or citation I supplied.

No objection I raised was trivial. Length of the article is relevant to its scope, room has to be left for growth as usually more gets added over time than gets subtracted, and editing entails choosing what fits the scope. That something relevant is in another Wikipedia page often justifies linking to it, but not usually moving it up. Putting similar content in multiple articles creates an editorial maintenance burden. Some overlap is convenient, as when one article introduces another, but a lot of overlapping repetition is burdensome when new information requires finding and changing multiple articles.

Nick Levinson (talk) 10:23, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

"Movements" is better, thanks. Page 394 says, "the commitment to women... depends undeniably on the fact that women must take their place with a new generation of brothers in a struggle for the world's fortunes. Herland, whether of virtuous matrons or daring sisters, is not an option." Also see bell hooks' entire chapter called "Men: Comrades in Struggle" in her book Feminist theory: from margin to center. --Aronoel (talk) 14:10, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

I have reverted the previous edit

Nick, Two editors have spent a a considerable amount of time working on this entry. You have significantly rewritten it with out feed back from them. Please do not do that.

Friedan was was clear in that she was critical of radical feminism AND how it had infiltrated mainstream feminism. Two of the sources I found explicitly summerise her work that way. One of those being Sheila Rowbotham who is a well known British socialist feminist theorist and writer. I feel the Rowbotham opinion is the stronger reference, I have included her words with respect to Friedan.

My new version is short, sharp and informative. Please remember this is an introductory article were brevity and clarity are important. I am sure you will agree with me that my shorter entry alleviates greatly the limited Kb problem for each page as well, which as you well know is a serious problem.

Zimbazumba (talk) 14:18, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Aronoel. Sorry there was an element of cross posting there. I agree with movements rather ideologies. I still don't see how you sources support the statement

"...and propose that men should be welcomed as important allies..."

Some feminist may propose but whole movements?

Zimbazumba (talk) 14:36, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

ZZ, there are 3 active editors in this discussion right now, and I did give feedback on Nick's edits.

Regarding Friedan: not even Rowbotham says that Friedan believed the entire feminist movement had been co-opted. I think it's fine to say that she criticized radical feminism, but let's not go too far.

Regarding the other sentence you removed: I think this sentence is justified given the large amount of sources already in the section of feminists supporting men's involvement in feminism and the studies showing that most feminists are not anti-men. --Aronoel (talk) 15:34, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Aronoel, Nick rewrote that entry with out any consultation with you or me. At the time I reverted we were cross posting. If you read my last edit I changed the Friedan opinion of that given by Rowbotham.

Betty Freidan was one of the most famous and important feminists of the 20th century, of that there is absolutely no doubt. I think here views on this matter of enormous significance, to partially express them and bury them at the end of another sentence is simply not good enough. I had put

"In The Second Stage (1981), Betty Friedan argued that feminists were alienating support by being confrontational and anti-men"

With the reference being written by Sheila Rowbotham. So here I have the opinions of one of the most significant feminists of the 20th century, on the subject matter of this section, summarized by a respected and well known socialist feminist theorist and writer. Further more, the Rowbotham opinion appears as an obituary, ie a summary of her life, in the The Guardian which is a highly respected newspaper that has a left leaning and pro-feminist slant.

This deserves the prominence I gave it.

Make no mistake I will fight all the way on this one.

Please could we discuss things before changing the first part of this section. Things went so well yesterday and we made progress doing that.

Zimbazumba (talk) 16:06, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Nick's behavior was fine, he discussed his changes on the talk page. It's not like he has to get our approval before editing. You didn't get our approval when you reverted both of our edits today.

Honestly I can't understand why this particular quote about Friedan is so important, or worth fighting "all the way" about. It should instead be a brief mention of liberal feminist criticism of radical feminism if anything at all. Friedan is not the only notable feminist and Rowbotham's interpretation of her views is not the final word on the subject. Besides, Nick is right that in-depth discussion of radical feminism is not supposed to be in that section. Also I think the sentence you removed is important and justified, as I explained before. So I don't support this current version. --Aronoel (talk) 19:56, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Aronoel. I'll split posts for clarity. The reason I feel the Friedan reference is important atm is because without it this section lacks balance. An anti-male streak in the feminist movement (or lack of it) is a pretty important issue with regard to feminism. I think, as did Freidan and others, that it has existed to some degree. Friedan warned that it would be counter productive as it would alienate many woman and men. She was right it has. It has set the feminist cause back.

A passing reference to anti-male attitudes amongst radical feminists is not enough and a lack of balance. It is an overly sympathetic picture of feminist attitudes to men that frankly that most people would not recognize.

As Cailil says above "We record all relevant mainstream perspectives neutrally.." . The reference to Friedan is one single sentence from one of the important feminists of all time made by a significant author in a significant publication. Rowbotham my not be the last word but she is a fairly substantial word and more so than the commentators on other issues in the latter part of this section. Everything I have read, seen and heard suggests this corresponds to Friedan's view.

If you can not agree to this then either another editor, eg Cailil helps break the deadlock or we go to arbitration of some sort.

Zimbazumba (talk) 00:24, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Aronoel. I am not sure what sentence you are suggesting I removed. I am very uncomfortable with that:- Movements....

" propose that men should be welcomed as important allies"

which is still on the page. I think this is disproportionate. Some women might feel this and it might be the formal response of a movement if asked. But it should also to be seen to be acted on. The NOW website, which is a flag ship of communication for the largest mainstream feminist group in the USA, has a far as I can see absolutely nothing on it concerning this issue. I checked the main page, all links off the main page and searched the whole site for a number of relevant keys words. Basically nothing.

Zimbazumba (talk) 00:24, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

I, too, believe the claim should be removed, 1 feminist saying something is not enough to write on the feminism page that feminists believe..., that would be like 1 man saying "Most people consider The Lion King the best movie made" and then writing in the article, "The best movie by consensus".Props888 (talk) 19:41, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Also in the sentence: "In the West, the movements and theoretical developments were historically led predominantly by middle-class white women from Western Europe and North America, but, since then, more women have proposed additional feminisms.", there are two problems 1. It's still led predominantly by middle-class (ironically it could be led predominantly by upper-class white women now but I'm not sure) 2. "Feminisms"? How can it be possible to have "a feminism" that's different from feminism yet fit the definition of feminism, can I propose a communism or racism that's different from communism/racism yet at the same time communism/racism? Maybe who ever edited the page meant femenist movements?Props888 (talk) 19:59, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

I've lost a network connection for a while, so I'm elsewhere and catching up piecemeal.

Zimbazumba, reverting one editor's edits regardless of content is not good reverting. You've done it without even trying to explain or discuss each point. Please consider every item in any edit you revert and, unless every one should be reverted, edit manually and specifically only.

If you dispute only part of an edit, reverting all of it is overkill. Select what you dispute.

If you believe a citation is needed and don't wish to do the research yourself, you may add a {{Citation needed}} template at the proper location.

On NOW, see http://www.now.org/organization/faq.html#found ("truly equal partnership with men") and http://www.now.org/history/purpos66.html ("women and men"), both as accessed Mar. 17, 2011. That remains current.

Nick Levinson (talk) 15:16, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

How about something along the lines of "Mainstream feminist organizations and literature, along with most self-identified feminists, take the former position," instead of "In the U.S., many more feminists accept some men as supporters of feminism than blame all men"? I think the Kanner and Anderson source and references 7-16 support this statement. (ZZ, this was the sentence I was referring to that you removed) --Aronoel (talk) 19:11, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Aronoel. I think the sentence at the end is not correct and that there is a lack of balance. I am also of the opinion re-reading carefully that the first sentence is not correct either. Many feminists/movements have little to say on gender roles at all, and many have only a passing opinion on how sexism affects men. Though many do as well. In general it is fair to say that feminists/movements are accepting of men, though actively "proposing they be accepted as important allies" is not a picture I quite see. The views of a few authors do not imo prove these points.

I think the sentiments your are trying to express should be in this paragraph but in a proportionate and reasonably correct manner. The sentence you suggested is possible a bit more accurate but perhaps a bit wordy. I think we can incorporate the ideas of both sentences in some thing like,

"Most feminists and feminist movements oppose sexism but not men personally, and are accepting of men as allies. Many also feel that men are also oppressed by gender roles, and can ultimately benefit from feminism."

with appropriate references and scrap the last sentence, I thinks its sentiments are expressed in this sentence. The paragraph would also should shorter and clearer. The Friedan quote should be pulled out as before.

Zimbazumba (talk) 20:51, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

So the first section would now look like (with references added):-

"Most feminists and feminist movements oppose sexism but not men personally, and are accepting of men as allies. Many also feel that men are also oppressed by gender roles, and can ultimately benefit from feminism. Other feminist movements oppose both sexism and men as the agents and perpetrators of sexism, a prominent example being radical feminism.

In The Second Stage (1981), Betty Friedan argued that feminists were alienating support by being confrontational and anti-men."

I can go for that.

Zimbazumba (talk) 20:55, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

I understand that you feel that many feminist movements have little to say about gender roles, and are not accepting of men as allies. But those are really your personal opinions and there are more than a few authors listed as sources, as you can see. Maybe other people can comment on the sentence I proposed? --Aronoel (talk) 21:46, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Aronoel. My reading of my proposed sentences are that they express fairly explicitly that "Most feminists and feminist movements ... are accepting of [men as] allies" and that "Many also feel that men are also oppressed by gender roles"

I actually thought my proposal was fairly conciliatory. We can wait for other input if you wish.

Zimbazumba (talk) 22:05, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

In the interim since my previous offering was rebuked I have hardened on "Most" to "Some" in 2nd sentence so my offering is (with references added):-

"Most feminists and feminist movements oppose sexism but not men personally, and are accepting of men as allies. Some also feel that men are also oppressed by gender roles, and can ultimately benefit from feminism. Other feminist movements oppose both sexism and men as the agents and perpetrators of sexism, a prominent example being radical feminism.

In The Second Stage (1981), Betty Friedan argued that feminists were alienating support by being confrontational and anti-men.

etc, etc "

Zimbazumba (talk) 23:34, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Aroenel, here's what (at least what I think) you don't understand you say/assume that since most (or at least what you believe to be most since you've never put forth any evidence supporting that claim) feminist accept men as supporters they promote equality for men (which is SYNTH). If I start a political movement that states women should be slaves to men and I allow women who agree with my movement to support it does that mean my movement unquestionably promotes equality for women (allowing a group to support you and promoting equality for that group are two different things)? Props888 (talk) 02:21, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

I like Aronoel's sentence and can accept Zimbazumba's formulation with caveats: The U.S. or a more encompassing polity should be referenced since nations that repress feminism more effectively may have a higher share of radicalism, but I don't have a source for that; at least we shouldn't imply worldwide coverage for the statement. Aronoel's has some specificity that should be preserved. The Betty Friedan sentence should not be separate.

I'll probably have another source to add soon.

I can't log in as often nowadays but will try to stay in touch.

Props888, most U.S. feminists promote or accept equality. Also, most U.S. feminists accept men as partners or supporters of feminism. Most plus most equals most, even if not everyone in one camp is in the other. Reviewing literature will show that overwhelmingly those are the views that are supported.

Feminisms is a term accepted in academic literature, but perhaps it shouldn't be used here, because of the kind of confusion you illustrated. There are multiple communisms (re your analogy), Soviet and Maoist being examples. I don't recall reading of multiple racisms but it could be argued: in the U.S., that based on color alone vs. that based on color unless the subject person was born in a certain place considered acceptable for origin.

Nick Levinson (talk) 03:07, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

I think we at an impass on multiple issues and going round in circles, we need help coming to a resolution. Unless Aronoel has some more to say. Could either Nick or Aroneol please indicate the way they would like this section to look like so I can then make a post at wp:NPOVN

My final version is (references included later):-

In the West most feminists and feminist movements oppose sexism but not men personally, and are accepting of men as allies. Some also feel that men are also oppressed by gender roles, and can ultimately benefit from feminism.. Other feminist movements oppose both sexism and men as the agents and perpetrators of sexism, a prominent example being radical feminism. In The Second Stage (1981), Betty Friedan argued that feminists were alienating support by being confrontational and anti-men. etc, etc

Zimbazumba (talk) 03:53, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

I think the NPOVN could be a good idea. I believe that the final version should be:

Most feminist movements oppose sexism but not men personally, accept men as allies, and argue that men are also oppressed by gender roles and can ultimately benefit from feminism.. Other feminist movements oppose both sexism and men as the agents and perpetrators of sexism, a prominent example being radical feminism, which has been criticized by other feminists for its anti-male views. In the U.S., mainstream feminist organizations and literature, along with most self-identified feminists, take the former position.

--Aronoel (talk) 14:51, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

"Props888, most U.S. feminists promote or accept equality" that statement pretty much breaks half of wikipedia's guidelines and is just plain wrong because 1. Anyone who says "situation x is unfair to make it fair/equal we must do y" is just speaking their personal opinion no matter how fair/equal it seems to you (or even if it seems fair to every single person and/or thing capable of thought) 2. You must also say people who don't agree with "most" (at least your definition I doubt you tested every single feminist and over 50% agreed with something, down to the letter, that can only have 1 out of essentially infinite possibilities) feminists are promoting inequality and thus are immoral which is WP:JDLI 3. How do you know the exact definition of equality unless you're omniscient or somehow attained divin`e knowledge that allows you to become the only person to speak about things like morality and equality objectively?Props888 (talk) 19:42, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Post made at Neutral_point_of_view

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view/Noticeboard#Feminism_Page:_dispute_over_NPOV_on_Reactions_to_Men_section._We_need_help_resolving.

Still no sure if we have original research dispute here as well

Zimbazumba (talk) 00:30, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

It looks like a lot of this article is POV and almost like it's an advertisement about how great feminism is, especially with statements like this (in the lede of all places):"Feminism is mainly focused on women's issues, but because feminism seeks gender equality, some feminists argue that men's liberation is therefore a necessary part of feminism, and that men are also harmed by sexism and gender roles." Somehow I doubt that the feminist vision of equality is established as, unquestionably, true equality (which it represents as an established fact), it's also ridiculous to say that men would somehow benefit from feminism if the movement had it's way (at least legislation wise). Pertaining to your dispute over the section, it should be scrapped as different parts of the movement has had very different "approaches" to men.

Props888 (talk) 01:50, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

My post was, If there are any rational counter arguments I'd be interested.

We need help on the wiki Feminism page, we can not come to an agreement. I feel one version is balanced and the other is promoting a point of view and verging on original research. We are going round in circles. My version http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Feminism&diff=419509002&oldid=419311345#Approach_to_men Version I dispute. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Feminism&diff=419509513&oldid=419509002#Approach_to_men (1) "Most feminist movements ....... argue that men are also oppressed by gender roles and can ultimately benefit from feminism." I do not believe this to be true. There are numerous forms of feminism, including probably the largest being the social movement of most women who just believe in equality for women, for whom gender roles has no part of their thinking or would have no idea what you are talking about. The term "most", imo, requires either (a) A reliable source that has through empirical or other means has confirmed this. or (b) Consensus. In this case we have neither. (2) "In the U.S., mainstream feminist organizations and literature, along with most self-identified feminists, take the former position" This has not be verified as true and is circular. It asserts through its references that:- US mainstream feminism = Those who believe in gender role arguments There are many forms of feminism as this article shows. And what is a self identified feminist? (3) Removal of "In The Second Stage (1981), Betty Friedan argued that feminists were alienating support by being confrontational and anti-men" It has been removed with its reference being moved to those to do with radical feminism. This opinion belongs to one of the most famous feminists of all time and is not specific to radical feminism but a general commentary on feminism in general. It belongs in this page. Zimbazumba (talk) 00:38, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Zimbazumba (talk) 03:05, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Single sources are acceptable. Wikipedia does not try to catalogue all of them if one is representative.

If you haven't seen the passage in Betty Friedan's Second Stage yourself, you can still cite it, but you should do it indirectly, in this form: <ref>Source A citing source B.</ref> If A quotes B and you use the quote, you may cite <ref>Source A quoting source B.</ref>.

The sources on feminism repeatedly say that their pursuit is for equality, with many differences about exactly what that is (often, equality of opportunity) and how to achieve it. Criticisms are addressed. Beyond that, a disagreement with feminism itself is outside the scope of this talk page.

Nick Levinson (talk) 20:05, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Yes "the sources" do but not necesarily all or most pages/books/articles that are viable sources on feminism, pretty much all the sources on here are profeminism and statements by feminists on the feminism are taking at face value (it might be hard to believe but feminists tend to have a pro-feminist bias, shocking isn't it). And saying x promotes equality is like saying apples are better than oranges, it's an opinion, and even if it is true it would be impossible to prove, and it would be an obvious violation of WP:NPOV. P.S. sorry if I sounded condescending that was not my intention.Props888 (talk) 20:37, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

I put up my version then immediately put up Aronoel's version for people to see in NPOVB. That has been up for 24hrs, for purposes of balance I will now put up mine for 24 hrs.

Zimbazumba (talk) 02:40, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

I know this might be a bit too early to be editing your version but, "Feminism is mainly focused on women's issues, but because feminism seeks gender equality, some feminists argue that men's liberation is therefore a necessary part of feminism, and that men are also harmed by sexism and gender roles." It's way to undue, if not simply untrue, "Feminism is mainly focused on women's issues", is an understatement, I've never heard of any major feminist group go out and specifically advocate men's rights, the "some feminists" seem to be the few that are cited here. And "They have opposed domestic violence, sexual harassment, and sexual assault." is just unnecessary, I doubt feminism is one of the few groups that don't promote those things. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Props888 (talk • contribs) 14:27, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Feminists' contributions on "domestic violence, sexual harassment, and sexual assault" included explaining that rape is bad not just for the masculist reason that fathers want assurances of children's lineage but because it denies women's choices especially when rape is considered tainting and when rape results in an unwanted pregnancy for which abortion is to be politically denied, that sexual assault includes much more than rape, that domestic violence may justify intervention even if the batterer considers the home his castle not to be entered without his permission and the marital relationship none of anyone else's business, and that sexual harassment was to be named (the name came, I think, in the 1970s) and a subject for civil law enforcement in employment so that women could pursue their careers without (or with less) sexism and nations could thrive economically from women also doing nontraditional work. Thus, the subjects are appropriate for feminism articles.

People who don't consider feminism valid probably don't study it beyond that point and probably don't write about it, likely preferring other fields. A POV in a subject or person is reportable in Wikipedia as NPOV, because the Wikipedia article, not the source, must be NPOV.

Nick Levinson (talk) 19:11, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

A more experienced editor over in NPOVN thinks otherwise.

Zimbazumba (talk) 20:18, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Reorganization

I've been WP:BOLD and made a major change here. For months there have been discussions with new and drive-by editors about the relationship of men and feminism. I would like to remind all involved that this is a "parent article" - there is an article on men and feminism, as there is an article on feminist theory, feminist economics etc, etc. Thus, what might seem a relevant point about feminism to you is not necessary of due importance/weight to be mentioned here. Please base the introduction of new sections, material, etc, on how major reliable sources explain/historicize/analyse/describe the subject of feminism at a more macro level. More specific and/or nuanaced points should go in the relevant "sub-article" (ie Marxist feminism, feminist geography, Feminism in Japan) where due and appropriately sourced.

Secondly Nick made an excellent point above, articles are considered neutral when we record all relevant reliable sources and points of view, according each its due weight. However, we do not "neuter" sources because we don't like them that is a serious issue as it misrepresents a source and constitutes a novel synthesis or interpretation of it - thus violating WP:NOR.

The changes I've made have removed material that should not be in this article (per WP:Summary) that was given undue prominence, or was repetitious. I clean-up the redirect tag also. I expanded the history section as well.--Cailil ^talk 20:27, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

I'll need to read through it more carefully, but on first blush: very nice work. You took it from confused and conflictive to something that might be worth nominating for FA status. Obviously the supermoon has had a profound affect on you. --Ludwigs2 22:30, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Cailil! I can tell you've been working on this article for over three years. Great job! Sonicyouth86 (talk) 23:40, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Clearly a great improvement, well done.

Zimbazumba (talk) 00:03, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

I think a lot of these changes are really great, but I can't understand why all of the information on feminism and men was completely removed. Almost all of the sections here have their own entire sub-articles, "Approaches to men" is not really an exception. It was only a couple paragraphs, and the subject of men is undeniably much more represented in feminist literature than the specific "Riot Grrrl Movement," which has an entire sub-section here. Maybe we could discuss what was specifically not general enough in that section instead of just removing editors' contributions entirely. -Aronoel (talk) 00:42, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Actually, i was looking at the 'Distinction between sex and gender' section, which is only one line long, and thinking about changing the header to something like 'Biological and sociological gender' and then expanding it to include some of the discussions about men. The problem with the original paragraphs was that they were a wrangle over the bald-faced prejudice that feminists hate men, and didn't actually get into discussing the analytical treatment of masculinity in feminist theory. That's not really the way the article should go. --Ludwigs2 01:46, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

In that case maybe it should be reworded or expanded instead of deleted entirely. --Aronoel (talk) 02:25, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Basically Aronoel the previous sections had numerous issues and were being used (not by you but by others) for coatracking. But the over-riding factor was WP:STRUCTURE. There was a section containing 3 distinct 'reactions' of male groups to feminism without a) weighing whether those reactions should be recorded at all per WP:DUE or b) how much weight such a section should have in a parent article; as well as that there was a section on societal change, a narrative history of the movement, a piece on sex/gender distinction (each of which deal with men & feminism) and then another whole section on 'approaches to men'.
I'm not opposed to a summary section on Men and feminism being included as long as it's done properly - I just think the article as a whole had gone way off track thus the change. Doing it properly would entail following WP:SUMMARY, cleaning-up/rewriting the Men and feminism article - probably adding the text that was removed from here to it and then figuring out wherther Patriarchy should be mentioned in that article or here. I'm not saying the text I removed was bad - just misplaced.
I think Ludwigs' suggested section is a good one and a good place to start. But I would say that such material needs to be seen at a macro level - as such I'd recommendasking the material some questions: How is it placed by the research that's out there already? How much weight is it given by those studies? Should it be in Men and feminism or here? If both how much from that article should be summarized here?--Cailil ^talk 09:27, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

I don't think anyone was indulging in a "..bald-faced prejudice that feminists hate men". There has been an anti-male (as opposed to man-hating) streak at times. In the theory? no. In the practice? yes at times. straw-man

Zimbazumba (talk) 04:20, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

I've rewritten the whole section again from scratch, and I tried to address some of the issues people pointed out with the old section and I also tried to incorporate some of what used to be in the reactions section. --Aronoel (talk) 16:52, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Aroneal, My first impressions are that this is huge improvement over what was there before, and more in keeping with the type of entry appropriate for this page. This is probably a first iteration and will be honed if necessary. My first points are the references seem a bit old and words like 'encourage', 'some' and 'consensus' always worry me. The Friedan debate I suppose will continue. But basically very well done, though I will re-read a number of times.

Zimbazumba (talk) 17:46, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback ZZ. I don't know what the alternative is to "some" since this is supposed to be a general summary. "Consensus" seems justified to me considering its strong, repeated use in the source and the fact that almost all of the other sources reflect that attitude anyway. --Aronoel (talk) 18:06, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

The last sentence you just added might be problematic. It is not as tight as the others as it has more of a commentary flavor to it and might need some balance. I'll give it some thought and will post here first. I think wiki:style has something about how to avoid those words without losing the sense of what you want to say, this is not an over riding concern.

Zimbazumba (talk) 18:45, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Any constructive changes to the wording are welcome. --Aronoel (talk) 18:51, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Changes to Antifeminism

I'm having trouble understanding the changes that were recently made to the section "antifeminism." The removed paragraphs were pretty general and represented historical and worldwide anti-feminist views. The current section only includes the views of similar female US anti-feminists and criticism of their label. I would like to try to restore some of the removed material to address what I see as problems with this section. Edward Clarke's views would not be included. Maybe some of the detailed information about the US anti-feminists could be trimmed down if there is a length problem. --Aronoel (talk) 21:07, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and tried to rewrite this section, and I've tried to address other editors' concerns about wp:summary. I removed a few details that I thought were too specific for a macro-style section, and added some other material to try and give a larger picture of anti-feminism.--Aronoel (talk) 22:18, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

That reads really well. It has my support. (something I don't say often :)

Zimbazumba (talk) 17:41, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback. -Aronoel (talk) 19:35, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Betty Friedan and the term "anti-men"

Betty Friedan's obit in the Guardian reports blithely that she "argued that feminists were alienating support by being confrontational and anti-men and by opposing marriage and the family." The context is the point in time when Friedan was aiming for the center. Friedan was critical of radical feminists, not mainstream ones like herself.

Suzanne Levine and Mary Thom wrote that Friedan called Bella Abzug and Gloria Steinem "separatists" and "anti-men". Friedan would not have been applying the term to all feminists in this context; certainly not to herself.

Rebecca St. James and Lynda Hunter Bjorklund explain the historical entry of "anti-men" attitudes in 1970s campus faculties. If anti-men attitudes are discussed in the article (and they should be) then scholars are the best sources, not newspaper reporters.

Friedan herself writes that feminism is about "being yourself with men" in contrast to accusations that it is anti-family, etc.

Friedan also writes that she was surprised when Kate Millett stood up at an abortion-rights and child-care-rights march to say that it should be turned into a lesbian-rights march, that all women should be "political lesbians". Friedan got up to say that the movement should not be diverted and divided in this manner. Afterward, she questions herself in her notes, writing "Maybe sexual politics are even more anti-women than they are anti-men. Or are they anti-life?" So Friedan's own take on it appears to be that perhaps feminists are anti-women... Naturally, any reference to this private musing would have to come from a scholarly appraisal. Binksternet (talk) 20:34, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

The trouble with the word "mainstream" is that it is difficult to define and a bit of a weasel word, It leads to arguments like:- Mainstream feminists do not believe X, but A believes X, then A is not a mainstream feminist. Friedan wrote in a time before sound bites so there is no pithy quote expressing her sentiments, all we can do is interpret her work. Or rely on others cleverer than us.

Zimbazumba (talk) 04:41, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

On the mainstream and excluding a feminist: Not usually a concern. In the example above, A would not be a mainstream feminist. If a woman says, "I'm a feminist simply because I want the government to give free chocolate to women" (assuming we agreed that that's a feminist position), the position is not mainstream, and therefore we'd be right to declare her not a mainstream feminist. What's in the mainstream varies by time and place, but some positions almost always are and some almost never. Inclusions and exclusions of feminists can be valid. According to Prof. Alice Echols (p. 15), "[w]hereas liberal feminism sought to include women in the mainstream, radical feminism embodied a rejection of the mainstream itself." At p. 139, she wrote of "liberal feminists['] ... assimilationist goal of bringing women into the mainstream". And NOW long argued for equality in the mainstream of American society. Disputes are mainly at the boundaries.

(Citation to Prof. Echols: Echols, Alice, Daring to Be Bad: Radical Feminism in America: 1967–1975 (Minneapolis, Minn.: Univ. of Minn. Press (American Culture ser.), pbk. 1989 (ISBN 0-8166-1787-2)) (author then visiting asst. prof. history, Univ. of Ariz. at Tucson).)

As to Betty Friedan's views, I think either they evolved over the years or her expression of them did.

Nick Levinson (talk) 18:38, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Criticisms by some/other women

The section titled 'criticisms by some/other women' contains no actual criticisms by women, but is more concerned with the number of white middle class women involved in the feminist movement. Either the title needs to change, or actual criticisms need to be included. Ashmoo (talk) 13:12, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

I agree Ashmoo. The whole page is in a period of reconstruction atm and this section needs work. Criticisms by others of feminism tends to be a touchy subject around here, /sigh. Quotes form Hoff Sommers, Paglia, Friedan, McElroy etc I am sure exist. Its a matter of finding balance and relevance.

Concerning 'some' or 'other' I can see where Nick is coming from, the extra meaning each word carries depends on context. For me 'other' seems better here. Zimbazumba (talk) 14:24, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

I think it should be renamed. Maybe it should be included in the history section and not under "reactions." --Aronoel (talk) 16:14, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

I understand - the original placing of this was in the Black feminism, post-colonial feminism and multi-ethnic feminism section. All of which were criticisms of White western feminism for being ethnocentric and limited to middle class issues. I do agree with the intent of Nick's edit as well 'other' isn't an ideal word. However 'some' is a weasel word and must be avoided. I'd also support your point Aronoel inclusion in teh history section would make most sense--Cailil ^talk 19:47, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

A word is a weasel word only when a more precise alternative is available, when it fails to add useful information, when it conceals bias, when it is in lieu of identifying sourcing, or, in this case, when almost no one or almost everyone would be more accurate. A more precise alternative would be the title in place before recent edits, but maybe that was too long (I don't think it was but maybe it was); it was "Criticisms by women of colour, with lower incomes, or not Western". The word some does add useful information; taking it out would leave only "Criticisms by women". It is not concealing bias; the underlying views are stated or linked to. Sourcing is shown in the subsection. A lot of women fill each category (White, middle-/upper-class, etc. and of color, lower income, etc.).

Regarding the edit summary's statement that some implies 'few', the Oxford English Dictionary (online version), as accessed Mar. 23, 2011, some, adjective 1, with plural nouns means "[a] certain number of; a few at least." (definition 8a) and "[c]ertain (taken individually)" (def. 7a). The OED online version is behind a paywall, but some libraries get it. If you need further research related to the OED, I may rely on the SOED ([4th] ed.) instead, out of personal convenience.

It would be fair to say many. I think it would be impossible to quantify much more precisely.

Criticisms of feminism are legion in the world. In this article, we can only be brief, and are. Links help concision. Links to articles point to criticisms. It is in that sense that the subsection title refers to criticisms.

Moving into history is only apropos if the topic is no longer of much moment except historically. It's likelier that in third world nations and elsewhere it is still a major issue among feminists and would-be feminists (e.g., womanists, unless womanism is little in use today).

Nick Levinson (talk) 02:03, 24 March 2011 (UTC) (Mainly corrected weasel-word def., a missing parenthesis, & a missing comma & clarified re OED/SOED: 02:22, 24 March 2011 (UTC))

How about moving it to Movements and Ideologies, where black feminism, third world feminism, etc already are? Also, what do people think of moving all of the religious feminist movements (Jewish feminism, Islamic feminism, etc) and the Riot Grrrl Movement to Movements and Ideologies as well? Maybe we can also create sub-sections to make the movements more organized. --Aronoel (talk) 16:25, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Religious feminisms

About the religious feminisms - I would keep them seperate but would rather trim the section. In that case a new sub-article (unless Feminism and religion or other name, exists) is more useful. My reason for this is how other sources do it. Marxist feminism and Islamic feminism are not usually discussed as the same type of ideological movement in exitsing sources to do so here would constitute a form of OR. Similarly with Riot Grrl - it's more about trimming that section and listing other cultural actvities relating to feminism rather than conflating cultural activism, religious activism, and Political activism.--Cailil ^talk 00:15, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Quick notes only, before I lose network access: There is the feminist theology article, but I'm not sure the ideologies would be ideal there, since, at first glance only, the perspective might be different and require different treatment. I think religious feminisms can be in the feminism article's Movements and Ideologies section, perhaps as a single paragraph, without their adjacency being original research, and there's probably a citable source somewhere that sees a commonality among religiously inspired feminisms. I want to think more about Riot Grrrl. The religious, liberal, radical, conservative, nationalist, racial, and ethnic feminisms, among others, all belong in one section because each has feminist goals, a strategy, and an issues prioritization that makes them different from, say, cultural effects of feminism. Nick Levinson (talk) 02:36, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Would it resolve the problem to have sub-sections called something like "cultural activism, religious activism, and political activism?" While I understand that there are important differences between these types of movements, I think a lot of people will be confused that there are some feminist movements discussed outside of the "movements and ideologies" section. --Aronoel (talk) 15:48, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

It sounds interesting and maybe worth trying on that ground alone. Nick Levinson (talk) 18:22, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

While this is interesting I would say bear in mind what sub articles already exist and beware of OR by synthesis.
What we have (and what we should have) here is a parent article that reflects a series of sub articles that are broken up according how the research 'out there' is broken up. And each of these sub artciles contain the info that is seen as part of that category by the research 'out there'.
Long story short: lets see some sources and how they do it first, so that we keep this article in line with policy and of the highest quality possible--Cailil ^talk 17:15, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

PS a converse way of look at this (the religious movements) is to summarize Feminist theology only (and as broadly as possible) and use a see also or related tag for the christian islamic, jewish movements--Cailil ^talk 17:19, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

I made an attempt to reorganize the section and added religious feminisms. I used A Mind of Her Own: The Evolutionary Psychology of Women by Anne Campbell, American feminist thought at century's end: a reader by Linda S. Kauffman, and The complete idiot's guide to philosophy by Jay Stevenson ("These new attitudes can be based on all kinds of ideas: philosophical, religious, economic, cultural, personal, and political. As a result, there are many kinds of feminism.") --Aronoel (talk) 15:23, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

This is interesting but I have to ask where the divisions & groupings of Feminist ideologies for the 'Variations section' comes from?
Also I think the word 'variations' alone is not the most appropriate way to describe that section WRT sources. Ideology is a necessary and source based division for the article. I would suggest 'Ideological variations' or in fact I prefer how Nick had it, 'Movements and Ideologies'.
There is a general weighting issue here Aronoel. Especially with giving equal space to religious feminisms vis-a-vis ideological movements - it just does not reflect sources. There is a further weighting issue with the size of the men and feminism section again (it's the same size as the whole cultural change sub-section - which is utterly non-reflective of the Men and feminism article's appropriate weighing per WP:NPOV).
Before making bold wholesale changes to sections please refer to sources first. Then look at the article and see how much weigh is given to other topics of equivalent sourcing, then match the new section's length approximately to those of equal weighting.
You need to understand my point - the information you're adding is great, however it should be in the sub-article in its current level of detail - a summary is all that should be here--Cailil ^talk 18:35, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

I have the impression that the Men and Feminism section in its weighting and position within the article seems to imply that Feminism is legitimate only on the condition that it also advocates on behalf of men. It seems to reinforce an androcentric POV. Also, I'm not sure I understand why this article should engage the most obvious and lame backlash rhetoric and respond to such ridiculous accusations like "misandry." Sonicyouth86 (talk) 19:29, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

I think "ideologies" is loaded, and variations is already used in the feminism template. Here is an example of its use in a reliable source: I just changed it because I thought the simpler term was an improvement. What is the source for referring to the different movements of feminism as "ideologies"?

I didn't add any content to the religious feminisms, but I'm sure it can be cut down somewhat if you see a problem.

I did in fact refer to sources first when I wrote the men and feminism sub-section. It is supposed to be a short summary but I didn't want to neglect any important points or give a misleading impression, which people seemed to see as a problem with the original shorter version. From my impression of the sources, the subject of men and masculinity is an important one that a lot of different feminists have written about. However, I have not read every single book on feminist that exists, so I can't say for certain what the actual proportion is in the total body of feminist literature. Maybe you can let me know which specific points in the section don't belong here.

I don't really see that the section is "androcentric," since feminists have often argued that feminism will benefit men. Also, there is definitely activism for men's issues based in feminism. Also, the sources themselves seem to engage with the accusation of "misandry," so I just put what I found in sources. But feel free to edit the section for NPOV. --Aronoel (talk) 20:10, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

(outdent)You are not addressing the WP:NPOV (weight and structure) issues Aronoel. Changes must reflect the preponderance of sources, the articles they summarize and their context in the article. What you might think is a vital point about feminism and men - might be 100% perfect in Men and feminism but could also be undue here. The same goes for any issue (Feminist sci-fi, Black feminism, Feminism in USA etc etc). Also to address your points - I hope my last message didn't sound rude but I'm not being facetious when I pick you up on the removal of "ideologies" - yes it is loaded, but it is accurate. We refer to "feminist ideology" or "feminist politics" when we talk about 'feminist thought' and these feminisms are schools of thought. 'Feminist ideologies' is the term used by multiple sources & as I have said to others we don't neuter sources at WP - we just record them. This is a quick sample of books dealing with or using the term feminist ideologies and is not complete:

Extended content

Feminists Theorize the Political by Butler et al Gender Trouble by Butler Divergent feminist ideologies by Bollenbacher The new feminist movement by Carden Citizenship: Feminist Perspectives, Second Edition by Lister The Good-Natured Feminist: Ecofeminism and the Quest for Democracy by Sandilands Feminist Critical Discourse Analysis: Studies in Gender, Power and Ideology by Lazar American feminism: a contemporary history by Castro Theory in its feminist travels by King Anarchist feminist ideologies by Grant Making Feminist Politics: Transnational Alliances between Women and Labor by Franzway Feminist and queer legal theory by Fineman et al Feminist theory: from margin to center by bel hooks Discourse and the other by Hogue Beyond methodology: feminist scholarship as lived research Fonow et al Muslim feminism and feminist movement: Central Asia by Samiuddin Feminism: from pressure to politics by Miles et at What's right with the Trinity? by Bacon Beyond feminist aesthetics: feminist literature and social change by Felski Beginning theory by Barry Feminist theory and the body by Price

Other than this it must be said the sub-article is called 'Feminist movements and ideologies' too.
There is no reason to change the article because the Nav template is different. Rather change the template.--Cailil ^talk 20:48, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

To talk about the structure I remain convinced that the previous way of arranging the info about religion and the various ideologies is more in accordance with the sources 'out there'. I think one paragraph on men and feminism is fine - the size and scope of what's there presently is just too much. That info is good but should be in Men and feminism. So I would refer you back to my first 2 comments in this sub-section for my 2c--Cailil ^talk 21:01, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you want me to say about weight. There are a number of sources for each point, I can provide more if you don't think this is the case. I believe they are all equally justified in their presence here so I don't know which parts you want me to remove.

Without the categories the movements and ideologies section is just a giant disorganized list of movements. I believe there is a practical necessity for the sub-sections and I provided a source that mentioned these categories. (The complete idiot's guide to philosophy)

Most of the sources you listed above don't use "ideologies" to refer to feminist movements. However, this point is not important to me so I will change the section title back.

I am just trying to sincerely do my best to improve this article in areas that I see as having problems. --Aronoel (talk) 21:32, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Also I'm not sure if you realized that "men and masculinity" covers more than just Men and feminism. It also discusses Masculinity, Masculism, Male feminism, and briefly Pro-feminism and patriarchy. Many of these topics used to be separate sections here. -Aronoel (talk) 22:33, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

On men's weight, a caution regarding reliance on sources: Many of the academically advanced sources tend to focus on the subject and not on outsiders' critiques of the subject. Introductory sources might say more about objections to feminism as a whole, however, introductions tend not to be secondary, but tertiary. Wikipedia's mission is different, specifically requesting criticisms to ensure neutrality, so more content that is critical from outside the subject would belong in WP than sources would, on average, indicate. Nick Levinson (talk) 02:22, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

@Aronoel - hold on a minute, yes all the books I listed refer to 'feminist ideologies' either in indices, titles or the body of the works.
Yes I would like to see more sources that organize feminist ideologies in this way. I do realize you are trying to improve this article and encyclopedia but you need to understand there are 3 basic standards (verifiability, no original research and neutral point of view) for this site's articles, their content and their organization. Basing a reorganization of a page on a lower quality or less well cited sources or group of sources gives that POV an undue weigh and breaches WP:NPOV. Arranging articles in an ad hoc manner or in a way that is based on gut-feeling or opinion (however good or valid these might be) is a breach of WP:OR. These two issues are as big a problem as basing an article's content on personal opinion or experience.
@Nick: that's actually half my point. However you're missing the weighting aspect. Every source and POV must be weighed against the preponderance of mainstream 3rd party sources - especially in a parent article that has a series of sub-articles. For example the solution here is to summarize masculinism, pro-feminism, patriarchy etc in Men and feminism and to summarize that article here (when it's finished). In so doing one can figure out how much weight these subjects have in context and then much weight that whole subject has in the context of this article.
I realize how complicated that is, but this article will go nowhere if it doesn't follow the structure of WP:SUMMARY in full and total in accordance with WP:NPOV, WP:OR and WP:V--Cailil ^talk 23:25, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Relying on sources for weighting presents two problems specifically about weighting, which I was indeed addressing when I brought up one of these two issues: one that critiques from outside of feminism tend to get less weight in academic in-field surveys than Wikipedia wants and the other that new topics tend to get less or no coverage in those same surveys, because the latter lag until what to say about them is more determinable, yet the new often qualifies for Wikipedia. Nick Levinson (talk) 18:23, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Sorry Nick I wasn't following you, actually what you're presenting here is a common misunderstanding of WP:DUE. The only things we can use to assess weighting are sources. Editors can't 'make a call' on what gets included becuase as WP:NPOV explains: "in determining proper weight, we consider a viewpoint's prevalence in reliable sources, not its prevalence among Wikipedia editors or the general public." Again this a verifiability not 'truth' issue. If the preponderance of major reliable sources, as you say, "lag until what to say about them is more determinable" then so does wikipedia. Articles that do the reverse breach WP:NOR and WP:NPOV (and sometimes WP:NOTE) - we even have a tag for labeling articles that suffer from so-called 'recentism'--Cailil ^talk 18:45, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

We agree on relying on sourcing (and verifiability and notability are not at issue). However, Wikipedia:Recentism is not entirely against recency. While content about what's recent has to be sourced just as other content does, what's recent but not yet academically published may be included. If, say, some people start a fourth wave of feminism, the L.A. Times publishes a substantial and reliable article with views of fourth-wave members and reactions of second- and third-wave feminists, and no academic work mentions the fourth yet because it is new, we may include it even though we rely on citing two sources, one academic for other waves and one not academic but for the fourth wave, as long as we do not attribute to either source what is not in it. Nick Levinson (talk) 20:19, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes, but in an article like this one that parents a very broad subject which reflects a political, historical, theoretical and philosophical library of reliable sources 'out there' - such recent, or tangential information is not given equal weight, or explored in equal detail, in this article relative to, for example, the history of feminism. Currently the Men and, and religion sub-sections are given a disproportionate weighting and thus breaching WP:NPOV. This can be solved by spinning of good information into sub-articles and replacing the over-long sections here with appropriately weighted summaries--Cailil ^talk 01:17, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

US feminism

The feminism in the United States article: should we do something? I'm of split mind. It's potentially redundant but only because this Feminism article is too U.S.-centric now and has been for years. But if we move U.S.-only stuff to there, readers here will ask why it's not here. A single link won't suffice. Suggestions? Nick Levinson (talk) 19:57, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Basically I think you're right Nick. This article is too heavily USA centric and some of that should be corrected by moving info to Feminism in the United States - leaving a summary here. However to do that we would need a Feminism in Japan etc etc section.
It crossed my mind - years ago - that there should be a short summary of "Feminisms around the world" here (And a full article that covers this that's spun off like we did with the movemenst and ideologies section). So then we'd have a section that summaries the similarities, differences & events in notable feminist movements in specific geographic areas. However, to do that, we need there to be a couple of serious books that do it (and I'm sure there are some). I'll have a look myself now but if anyone finds anything please post it--Cailil ^talk 17:05, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

It may take a little less work than you suggest, but it's still a lot, and I think there'll be public resistance unless cuts to this article are made a little later and in a short burst. Already, some nationally-specific articles exist; see the feminism sidebar and the index of feminism articles (and I wouldn't be surprised if there are more), although national article titles don't all have the same general title format (some are about feminism, some on women's rights, and so on). I'd suggest copying whatever content is in this article that's nationally specific into nationally specific articles (the same is true of regionally-specific where appropriate) and adding links in here to those articles, but not deleting content from here quite yet. Then, in this article, in each topic, we should add global statements preceding national statements, and see if editors see problems with the global statements; and only after that should we delete the national content from here. We should live with some U.S.-centrism in one way: by having more links from here to specific topics in U.S.-specific articles. That, I think, would lower the likelihood of complaints that we took out the 19th Amendment. It also means that it isn't necessary to find one source that has already organized the content and then limit ourselves to copying that author's organization, although if such a book is helpful that's fine. This amounts to breaking content out subject to notability, globalizing (e.g., in here we could say "there were efforts to gain voting rights for women in some nations" and then link for U.S., Switzerland, etc.), and deleting from here, and that sequence of steps presents very little of a synthesis or original-research problem.

A related complication is that much of what we know about feminism in the U.S. is actually true of North America, Western Europe, and some other regions, but not consistently, either, and that can lead to either major OR/synthesis difficulties or complaints that we fail to acknowledge this. And if we cite as sources for a general Westernization the critiques from, say, third-world feminists, we may find those critiques very unspecific: what exactly does the "West" include (not to mention limits on monolithism)? A solution could be an article on feminism in the West or in developed/-ing nations and provide plenty of inbound links, plus outbound links to encompassed nations, since there's likely enough notability to support such articles, but we might need a source with an overview of feminism along the lines of developing/-ed, West/East, or the like.

Nick Levinson (talk) 19:23, 27 March 2011 (UTC) (Clarified on notability and deleted an erroneous period: 19:34, 27 March 2011 (UTC)) (Corrected as to edit summary (& edited this sig block for an essentially null edit): 19:51, 27 March 2011 (UTC))

I'm in broad agreement Nick. But what I might suggest rather than an article about western feminism do a gloabal article. A new page that parents all those many articles about women's movement in.. or women in... or feminism in... This could be done using books like: Myra Marx Ferree, Aili Mari Tripp's Global feminism; Basu et al's The challenge of local feminisms: women's movements in global perspective; and Smith's Global feminisms since 1945; and maybe the introduction to Feminist theory reader: local and global perspectives perhaps--Cailil ^talk 20:04, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Okay, except doesn't that cause two articles to overlap? Once this feminism article no longer has national- and regional-specific content, how would a global feminism article be different such that both articles would be separately notable and both would be separately useful to readers? I don't recall seeing the sources you've just mentioned but I imagine they have both global and subglobal content, and the latter can guide the drafting of subglobal articles; and then the feminism article can serve as a global overview. Or is separation between global and feminism introductory helpful and, if so, and if it's not premature to ask, how would the separation be defined? Nick Levinson (talk) 20:26, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Basically we'd create a big local feminist movements article (Wed need to use what ever term the sources use ie local/nation/regional) and then when it's done summarize that here in this one.
The books will have a 'grand narrative' that considers local/regional feminisms and their interrelation and that can be given as fully as is due on that page as well as a series of summaries of sub-articles. When that's done we can then summarize that whole page here (and that summary would have global and local mentions where due) along with an info box for navigation to a specific article (ie Feminism in Japan) perhaps--Cailil ^talk 20:56, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

unfamiliar subjects

A suggestion, inferrable, potentially saving some of us a few hours each. There's a feminist subject with its own article I don't know enough about to edit substantively. I plan to post a talk section on possible content for that article, so others can decide. But if they don't do anything about it, I plan to leave it alone, that is, not edit the article on point. I don't know enough about it. I don't want to make it worse. I don't want to read several full books or more in order to qualify myself. So I won't apply BRD there. I can still, say, copyedit or do other edits, but only if I know what I'm doing. I've used the same approach for transportation: I posted to Talk and then walked away. The suggestion I'm making here is for each editor to apply or not apply to all articles as they see fit and per subjects of expertise. Most, I think, already do. Thanks. Nick Levinson (talk) 20:18, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

sources on oppression of men vs men as perps

In case this material is needed in the future, this is some material on the issue of whether feminism is a response to the oppression of both genders by sexism or is a response to men as agents of sexism. This is material I likely would have added in some form until recent edits intervened. It could be used here or in the article on men and feminism. Most likely, this would be used not exactly as presented here, but paraphrased or otherwise more concisely.

Within reference elements, there are what look like quotation marks that may not belong. Generally, they're markup for italicization instead of quotation marks. Removal of nondisplaying nowiki elements would remove the effect of looking like quotation marks. The same is true of some other artifacts.

"[A]ttractive to many women was that liberal feminists indicted sex roles rather than men. From the beginning ["Betty"] Friedan had presented feminism as a sex-role revolution in which both men and women would benefit. Indeed, for Friedan feminism was but 'a stage in the whole human rights movement.'³¹⁸ And in 1970, Gloria Steinem, Ms. editor and the best-known exponent of this new liberal feminism, deployed radical rhetoric, but like Friedan implied that women's liberation was men's liberation as well. 'Men will have to give up ruling class privileges, but in turn they will no longer be the ones to support the family, get drafted, bear the strain of responsibility and freedom.'³¹⁹"<ref>Echols, Alice, ''Daring to Be Bad: Radical Feminism in America: 1967–1975'' (Minneapolis, Minn.: Univ. of Minn. Press (American Culture ser.), pbk. 1989 (ISBN 0-8166-1787-2)), pp. 199–200 & nn. 318–319 (page break between "'be the'" & "'ones'") (bracketed insertion per ''id.'', p. 405 (''Index'')) (author then visiting asst. prof. history, Univ. of Ariz. at Tucson).</ref> Note 318: "318. Friedan quoted in Zillah Eisenstein, The Radical Future of Liberal Feminism (New York: Longman, 1981), p. 182. In fact, not only did Friedan deny that men were the enemy, she suggested that women with their capacity for self-deprecation were their own worst enemies. See Betty Friedan, It Changed My Life (New York: Norton, 1983), p. 152." Note 319: "319. Nor would men 'have to spend a lifetime living with inferiors; with housekeepers, or dependent creatures who are still children.' Gloria Steinem, 'What It Would Be Like If Women Win', Time, August 31, 1970, p. 22." (In n. 319, "house-"/"keepers" across line break in original.)

"Would men but ... be content with rational fellowship [of "daughters", "sisters", "wives" and "mothers"] .... [w]e should then love them with true affection ... and the peace of mind of a worthy man would not be interrupted by the idle vanity of his wife".<ref>[[Mary Wollstonecraft|Wollstonecraft, Mary]], ''A Vindication of the Rights of Woman'', in ''A Vindication of the Rights of Men[/]A Vindication of the Rights of Woman[/]An Historical and Moral View of the French Revolution'' (per p. [iii] (title p.)) (or ''A Vindication of the Rights of Woman[/]A Vindication of the Rights of Men'' (per cover I)) (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press (Oxford World's Classics ser.), [does "4" without other digits mean 4th printing?] reissue 1999 (copyright 1993, 1994, & 1999) (ISBN 0-19-283652-8)), p. 231 and see generally ch. IX, ''Of the Pernicious Effects Which Arise From the Unnatural Distinctions Established in Society'' (reprints of ''A Vindication of the Rights of Woman'' (2d ed. 1792) & ''A Vindication of the Rights of Men'' (2d ed. 1790)).</ref>

Of the same book, "gentle reader" may be "male or female".<ref>Wollstonecraft, Mary, ''A Vindication of the Rights of Woman'', ''op. cit.'', p. 227.</ref>

The statement by Judith Butler that "'feminism ... seeks to liberate men'" was challenged in a section of this Talk page, now archived (post of 1-7-11 4:18a UTC), for its support. I recall verifying the paraphrase, but now I can't display the khup.com page properly, since the main vertical scroll bar is not showing up on my computer. The challenge was regarding pp. 4–12 but the pagination is different in the *.swf file. Perhaps it can be (re)verified another time.

"[T]he tendency of some radical feminists [was] to blame maleness rather than power relations".<ref>Echols, Alice, ''Daring to Be Bad'', ''op. cit.'', p. 201.</ref> However, not all radical feminists agreed. "Radical feminists deeply resented politicos' 'caricature' of them as man-haters.¹²⁴"<ref>Echols, Alice, ''Daring to Be Bad'', ''op. cit.'', p. 78 (n. 124: "124. Interview with Cindy Cisler.") and see p. 119.</ref> Some opposition to men was limited.<ref>Echols, Alice, ''Daring to Be Bad'', ''op. cit.'', pp. 63, 71, 81, & 171–172.</ref> <ref>Echols, Alice, ''Daring to Be Bad'', ''op. cit.''; see also pp. 99, 120, 147, & 244.</ref>

Two views were combined by a third-wave feminist leader. "Men are not the enemy.... The feminist movement needs to do a better job in welcoming and incorporating men.... But, I also believe that men need to do a better job of addressing their role in, and their experience with, gender oppression. The feminist movement should stop celebrating men's presence, but at the same time it should welcome men's involvement. It is possible to incorporate men into feminism without falling over ourselves to thank them.... Let's be partners—equal partners—and let's model within the feminist movement what we would like to see outside the movement. [¶] Similarly, men need to stop expecting that women will work it all out for them.... Men are feminists .... [U]ntil men ... begin to fight a patriarchy that hurts not just women but also men, we—women and men alike—will not achieve true equality and the endless benefits that go along with it."<ref>Seely, Megan, ''Fight Like a Girl: How to Be a Fearless Feminist'' (N.Y.: N.Y. Univ. Press, pbk. [2d printing?] 2007 (ISBN 978-0-8147-4002-6)), pp. 81–83 (page break between pp. 81 & 82 in ellipsis between "thank them" & "Let's" (ellipsis representing two sentences & page break within first) & page break between pp. 82 & 83 in ellipsis between "[U]ntil men" & "begin") & 84–86 (author former president, [[California]] [[National Organization for Women]], & 3rd-wave feminist activist, per ''id.'', p. 279 (''About the Author'')) (per Wikipedia, largely a primary source on point).</ref>

Nick Levinson (talk) 21:10, 26 March 2011 (UTC) (Corrected omissions of a space between two quoted words and of a space within a citation: 21:35, 26 March 2011 (UTC)) (Added paragraph explaining mistaken appearance of quotation marks and other artifacts within refs: 20:04, 27 March 2011 (UTC)) (Corrected my startling omission of author Mary Wollstonecraft's name in two referents (I had simply forgotten): 02:15, 29 March 2011 (UTC)) (Corrected en- & em-dashes having become hyphens when I saved text in a text file during the recent network loss & corrected "p." to plural: 15:09, 29 March 2011 (UTC))

I tried incorporating some of this. Let me know what you think. --Aronoel (talk) 15:53, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

I like it. Thank you. I tweaked, including inserting an author's name I had somehow completely forgotten to include in the original citation (it's all fixed now). I prefer more detailed citations (thus they're above) but some editors object and so I trimmed them in the article. Thanks again. Nick Levinson (talk) 02:15, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Sources

Aside from the fact that most of the sources seem biased on the surface, this article has more sources than needed and about 150/161 of the articles sources are books, and therefore hard to check (which is usually not a problem unless many sources are unavailable to the average reader) and the problem is compounded by the fact that many of these books aren't exactly "Dan Brown littering your local library's floor" common books. I'd like to take the problems up to the noticeboards but would like to hear your opinions on the matter first.Props888 (talk) 01:56, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Sources may be biased as long as the article is neutral. It is. It has recently been referred to the noticeboard for NPOV and the result so far has been the opposite of the complainant's apparent wish.

A source need not be commonly available. Sources are often available through interlibrary loan; in the U.S. at least, many public libraries offer that service, perhaps for free. Google Books and Amazon offer searching inside a book.

Sources have to be as numerous as the text, and the likelihood of challenging it for insufficient sourcing, may require; generally up to three for a point is not a problem, and in some cases that may be legitimately exceeded.

An article on any subject is ordinarily written primarily from the information in the subject's field, and so the feminism article is going to lean toward inclusion of feminist sources. Some criticism is to be expected and it is present. More extensive criticism arising from disagreement between fields of study may be more appropriately presented in the articles on the latter subjects, so that the feminism article may reasonably encompass and present its subject and still fit within Wikipedia's length limit.

If you still see a problem, please be specific.

Nick Levinson (talk) 02:34, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Sorry Props888 - the sources here are all fine as per wikipedia's policy on verification. Wikipedia judges sources by how well cited they are in the mainstream academic community (see WP:RS) not whether everybody's library has a copy. Secondly it is not wikipedia's job to neuter sources just to record all the major mainstream reliable 3rd party POVs on a subject. Per WP:FRINGE views not of significant serious citation (which is deferent to wider spread knowledge ie flat earth theory is well known but we don't give it equal weight on the globe article and vice-versa) may not even be mentioned. Your issue is with policy and I'm afraid questions about policy should be asked at policy pages - see WP:V--Cailil ^talk 18:15, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

@ Nick "An article on any subject is ordinarily written primarily from the information in the subject's field, and so the feminism article is going to lean toward inclusion of feminist sources. Some criticism is to be expected and it is present. More extensive criticism arising from disagreement between fields of study may be more appropriately presented in the articles on the latter subjects, so that the feminism article may reasonably encompass and present its subject and still fit within Wikipedia's length limit." As for your first sentence you are right but I never said anything to the contrary, all I said was the article has too many sources coming from the feminist movement a violation of WP:SELFPUB (5. the article is not based primarily on [sources as sources on themselves]). And who said I'm trying to "neuter" the sources by adding instantly recognizable and respected sources, which you seem to think is "just record[ing] all the major mainstream reliable 3rd party POV's on a subject", somehow I think that CNN is less likely to be challenged as a relible source than some person named Baca Zinn, Maxine; from my perspective it appears you are doing the exact opposite, putting in as much feminist literature as sources as possible. Articles should include many 3rd party "POV's", especially one like this, where the 3rd party sources should be plentiful. And to stray a bit away from the intended purpose of this section, another problem is WP:PEACOCK, it makes statements that essentially say feminism promotes equality (which then means anyone who doesn't agree with feminism down to a tee promotes inequality) and every single person benefits from it. This article also says, "the male-controlled capitalist hierarchy as the defining feature of women's oppression", which assumes 1. Capitalism is controlled/biased towards men 2. Capitalism oppresses women.Props888 (talk) 02:11, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

OK Props888 - that's enough soapboxing If you have a problem with wikipedia's standards for verification and/or reliable sources take it to policy pages.
Your argument is tantamount to saying that the article on geology has too many selfpublished sources because all the authors are geologists.
Also as a warning do not disparage the work of living people - no matter what your opinion on how reliable/well known their name is--Cailil ^talk 12:36, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

@Props888: Regarding your criticism of the article relying too heavily on obscure books, there is no requirement that references be accessible on the internet. Please see WP:SOURCEACCESS. Of course if those sources can be augmented with internet sources, it does helps to boost the article's verifiability. Kaldari (talk) 00:30, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Firstly, how have I 'disparaged' anyone's work, if you're refering to this,"CNN is less likely to be challenged as a relible source than some person named Baca Zinn, Maxine", all I was saying was a relatively unknown author would less likely be challanged as an RS than a big news org. And how is having all the sources on feminism the same as having all geologists on the geology article, geology is a field of study femenism is a political and social movement, there is nobody zealously arguing or defending the validity or benefits of geology, you're arguments hold no water, having geologists write the geology article wouldn't give the article a POV, nobody is pro-geology or anti-geology, however if you leave articles like nazism, conservatism, liberalism, communism, feminism in the hands of nazis, conservatives, liberals and communists, femenists, respectively, you will very likely get a POV, instead of waging an all out war on the straw man could you please civilly address my concerns about the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Props888 (talk • contribs) 22:54, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Props888 your points have been addressed and you have been warned to stop abusing the talk space. If you don't like wikipedia's standards for sourcing take it up on the appropriate policy page--Cailil ^talk 23:07, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

If you feel I haven't been following the guidelines point out how instead of directing me to the policy page, which says nothing of what I've done and Kaladri only addressed one of my points.Props888 (talk) 23:27, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Your point has been address by 3 editors (2 of whom are sysops) - your complaint is with wikipedia's standards for sourcing (ie WP:V). Take it there if you want it addressed. Otherwise you are soapboxing by using this page like a forum - which it is not--Cailil ^talk 23:37, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm not complaining about the policy I'm saying that this page does not follow policy. And what points other than the one addressed by Kaladri have been addressed?Props888 (talk) 01:08, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Cailil but will also add this in hope of assisting.

The rule restricting use of self-published sources applies to self-publication by people and institutions (including governments), not to movements and fields of study, although that rule may not be clear enough about that (I glanced at it), and, if it's not, it should be clarified.

Geologists will tend to be pro-geology, because if someone considers geology invalid they probably won't spend the time to study and practice in it. The same is true and more likely as to charges of invalidity for medicine and feminism. The problem with leaving an article on Nazi ideology to Nazis to write, to take one of your examples, may only be an unwillingness of the writers to be honest about Nazi ideology; otherwise, we don't care who writes the article. Nazi sources can be cited as long as they meet Wikipedia's criteria, and if I were researching modern Nazi ideology outside of Wikipedia I probably would turn to Nazi and third-party sources to find out. Feminism is a movement but it is also an academic field of study, with many books and journals presenting its findings.

CNN is a good source for some content. But, typically, a newscast, even a magazine-style news program (like 60 Minutes on CBS), does not go into the depth that a book does, and therefore we often turn to articles and books to write Wikipedia. A book's author or the book may not be well known but that is not relevant to reliability.

Thank you for your interest. Nick Levinson (talk) 02:28, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

From geology, "Geology (from the Greek γῆ, gê, "earth" and λόγος, logos, "study") is the science and study of the solid Earth and the processes by which it is shaped and changed." By this definition it is impossible to declare geology an invalid field of study without believing the Earth does not exist or it hasn't shaped and changed (though it is impossible to, within reason, refute any of those), thus one cannot rationally argue that geology is invalid (and I doubt you can take a pro- or anti- stance in a field of study where the subject matter's existence is not questioned). And while I don't question that it is possible to write an NPOV article with Nazi, feminist, etc. sources on its subject matter, however, it appears this article is written almost exclusively with feminist sources aside from a couple dictionaries used in the lead. And while it is possible to write a neutral article using sources exclusively from either side of the NPOV it is extremely unlikely and is usually, if not the cause of a POV article, a symptom of a POV article. The biggest concern that I have with this article is that it has virtually no criticism woven in the article or even controversies/criticisms section. And, while you do make a good point about books vs. news and magazines, the latter tend to have the benefit of being more reliable. In a book someone could say anything about anything even with no evidence to support their claims, their only barrier would be finding a publisher, whereas a person working for, say, the New York Times could not say anything they want since the blame for the misinformation goes mostly on the organization so the New York Times would have a much bigger incentive to make sure what they put on paper is true and has a large amount of evidence and sourcing than a publisher.Props888 (talk) 03:32, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

I want to reconsider whether we have enough critique in the article. We did recently, so recent edits may have dropped some of them in error. There are some in the article now, however, especially critiques by some feminists of other feminists' positions.

On geology: If someone believes that a deity created Earth in a day and that earthquakes happen because we're prying into something that's only a deity's business, they may consider geology an invalid study. That's a rare or only hypothetical perspective, but many sciences (e.g., health) are much more frequently criticized as invalid although quite scientific; the criticisms are often religious but nonetheless people makes choices about what they consider valid for study and practice. People who study or practice in a field tend to agree with many of its major foundations, and that includes authors and in-field editors.

On books: Books vary in their editing control. Self-published books are treated like self-statements, and generally rejected for Wikipedia except as self-statements; vanity presses are in that category. Books by academics or other well-regarded authors or from well-reputed or academic presses have more editorial controls and are less rushed than are newspaper stories (although newspapers do a terrific job much of the time). Errors occur in all major media and we're happy to cut the mistakes, but books per se are not the problem.

You said earlier that there were too many sources. We've answered on whether there are too many from within the field, but if your concern was simply too many regardless, no, there aren't, because much content is subject to challenge unless supported, especially in a controverted field, and up to three citations per point is acceptable and sometimes so are more.

Please don't mark posts as minor. That's for much more minor edits, such as correcting your own prior post to make a change with little difference in meaning. Marking as minor means some people might miss it.

Nick Levinson (talk) 15:53, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Since when does CNN report on the history and the theoretical schools of feminism?

I hope I will be forgiven for bringing up another article to illustrate my point. Compare this article to an article like masculism. There you have masculinist and other sources (and let's be honest, mostly no sources) that have been used to compile a list of arguments why masculinists think that men are oppressed or discriminated against. The sources have been used to present the POV "men are discriminated against in XYZ by XYZ" (by the way, an extreme fringe view anywhere outside the men's rights movement). This article, however, simply depicts the history of feminism, the different schools of thought, and its relation to other movements. There are no sections on human trafficking, domestic violence, the gender pay gap, rape, stereotype threat, the representation of women in the media or any other field of social, economic or political life where feminists think that women are discriminated against. When something like the feminist view on pornography is mentioned, it's only to say that there is sex-positive feminism and the anti-pornography movement. This is why it is no problem that we use "feminist sources." If CNN were to report on feminist views on pornography, they would say the exact same thing as those darn "feminist sources." The sources aren't used to argue why pornography (or any of the other things mentioned) is good or bad or what it means for the standing of women in this world.

Since you are so terribly concerned about the quality of articles, I am convinced that you'll immediately get to work on masculism or some other article that is in desperate need of some neutrality. This article here is in remarkable shape thanks to a handful of dedicated editors who've managed to stay polite and patient even when dealing with sudden and (almost) inexplicable mass arrivals of new editors (with remarkable knowledge of WP:PEACOCK and WP:SELFPUB!) who are willing to do whatever it takes to impose their fringe views (they call it NPOV) on Wikipedia. --Sonicyouth86 (talk) 20:43, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

The problem with masculism is an entirely different problem than with this article and in many respects that article is better than this one (i.e. that article uses cites, says, suggests, while this one states ones opinion as fact or representative like " Socialist feminism connects oppression of women to exploitation, oppression, and labor", "connects the opression of women" assumes that women are actively oppressed in the developed world which is not an established fact and may even be fringe and the second part "exploitation, oppression, and labor" does the exact same thing). Furthermore masculism cites at least three times as much non masculist sources as feminism cites non feminist sources (especially when you ignore the dictionary definitions) which is pitiful for an article with nearly 5 times as many sources and significantly more content and for such an experienced user as you it seems that, from your statement, policies don't matter when considering the quality of articles. @Nick: Although books do have editorial control it is no where near the level that news articles are; books are generally written to appeal certain demographics and as such would be skewed towards what that demographic believes. Take Richard Dawkins for example, he's a highly reputable scientist, though it wouldn't be much of a stretch to say that in one of his books he might say, "believing in religion is silly", though this isn't anything close to an NPOV statement it wouldn't be a big shock since most of his books are written to appeal to atheists, however just because he is reputable and knowledgeable about the topic doesn't mean we could say on the religion article, "believing in it is silly" we may say "Richard Dawkins believes believing in religion is silly" (if NPOV is the only policy we look at). News is written to report on all sides and keep personal opinions to the minimum. P.S. now understand exactly how minor a "minor edit" should be, thanks.Props888 (talk) 00:50, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Antifeminist criticism is adequately covered, along with a link to a longer article, which listed a book I was going to include in this article as a fourth referent in support of a point but now see I don't need to.

News stories often have less control than do books: just one journalist and just one editor, plus policies and resources, but often all on much tighter deadlines than apply to books (an academic book author I know saw 9 months go by between final manuscript submission and publication). All types of media are written for some audiences but not all possible audiences, so all types are subject to skewing: e.g., NPR and BBC differ in their editing on that score and consider how the N.Y. Times redacted from source documents differently than WikiLeaks did or didn't; as a result, we have to select, write, and qualify as necessary for a good article. At any rate, debating Wikipedia's policy on which sources are acceptable is beyond the scope of this talk page. If you find a particular statement lacks a proper qualification, please post accordingly.

Nick Levinson (talk) 18:01, 2 April 2011 (UTC) (Corrected by italicizing a newspaper's name and editing "a" to "as": 18:10, 2 April 2011 (UTC))

This is your last and final warning Props888: stop using this page like a forum. You have been directed multiple times to take this to the relevant policy pages (ie WP:V). You had also expressed the wish to raise the issue at 'the noticeboards' yourself in your first comment - take your issue there if you want it addressed. Otherwise your refusal to listen to the answers to your points is tendentious - this page is not for the debate of policy--Cailil ^talk 18:33, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Point taken Nick, however, other problems with this article are that it doesn't go too much in to the history of feminism in the history section I suggest we move the Civil Rights sub-section (and all or parts of other sections that go too much into history) into it and expand it. Also the sentence "Feminists have struggled to protect women and girls from domestic violence, sexual harassment, and sexual assault" seems a bit odd I don't think feminist actively go out and patrol the streets so it may be confusing. And the Theology and Religious sections seem a bit redundant maybe we should merge the two?Props888 (talk) 01:46, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Help with one sentence

Some feminists are engaged with men's issues activism, such as correcting legal and social imbalances in regard to father's rights, bringing attention to male rape and spousal battery, and addressing negative social expectations for men.

I think that sentence is misleading, especially the part about "correcting legal and social imbalances in regard to father's rights." The sentence implies that such legal and social imbalances in regards to father's rights actually exist. Where? In the US, in Russia, or in Afghanistan? Don't get me wrong, I'm sure that there are imbalances in regards to individual fathers but is there evidence (evidence as in research) of a systematic bias against fathers (in Western first world countries)? I'm not aware of such studies. However, there are studies which contradict it. Regina Graycar summarized some of those studies and wrote [1]:

It is common for men and the groups that advocate on their behalf to claim that they are discriminated against in the Family Court, particularly when it comes to parenting decisions. The fathers' groups persistently claim that the court is 'biased' against them. But their claims have no empirical support: the literature and the available studies show that, when cases go to the Family Court for a decision in a contested residence case, the court makes orders (in disputed cases) in favour of fathers at twice the rate of those made by consent.

Also, primary caretaker preference is sex-neutral. A father who has been the primary caretaker of his children is entitled to the primary caretaker preference and the judge will certainly not "discriminate against men." However, the traditional division of labor as well as certain stereotypes like the one that women are responsible for childcare make sure that women are by and large the primary caretakers of children.

Any suggestions as to what to do with the sentence? Sonicyouth86 (talk) 15:43, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Let's delete the phrase you put in italics. Binksternet (talk) 15:56, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

It's from the article on Maternal Presumption in the sources, but I guess it's mostly historical activism and the maternal presumption is gone in the US, so I'm fine with removing the italicized part. --Aronoel (talk) 21:40, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Atheist feminism

Should secular or atheist feminism be in this article? I'm not really sure if there is an atheist feminist movement. There are some atheists who are also feminists, and there is some feminist criticism of religion, but I can't find any good sources on atheist feminism as a movement. What do people think? Would it be good to put atheist feminism in the movements section, or put some info on feminist criticism of religion in the theology section, or not have it in this article at all? --Aronoel (talk) 18:16, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Yes insofar as sourceable (the usual caveat, nothing special here) (I assume you're asking because you didn't find many useful sources in the atheist feminism article, which seems to be largely about other than atheism, since criticisms of religions usually come from religionists), but I don't recall such a movement. Atheists have little by way of being a member of anything (a likely exception being in officially atheist nations that also permit or sponsor feminism (as in state feminism)), so such atheist feminism as exists is probably mostly from some individuals who have written of it. Ethical humanism (detractors call it secular humanism) and the Unitarian Universalist Church (which sponsors Beacon Press) may have something not quite atheist. My guess is the best place to put content about it will be in the movements and ideologies subsection, since the theology subsection is more about what's held in common among feminists of various religiously-oriented movements and ideologies, and it seems unlikely that atheist feminists would be particularly concerned that there be, say, portraying of a deity as female, although many feminists, including those who have theological interests but focus their feminism along secular lines (such as economic mainstreaming), likely support ministries employing women as well as men at all levels, and relatively few such advocates will happen to be atheists. Nick Levinson (talk) 01:25, 31 March 2011 (UTC) (Corrected by adding a missing comma: 01:34, 31 March 2011 (UTC))

Thanks. I'll try to put something together on secular feminisms. Let me know if you know of any good sources. Atheist feminism has sources on feminist criticism of religion but nothing to suggest a real movement or ideology. --Aronoel (talk) 17:25, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

As a caveat Aronoel again please consider the organization of the article and whether this info is better in a sub-article rather than here--Cailil ^talk 23:09, 31 March 2011 (UTC)