Hypocrisy, Thy Name is Feminism

from JoeUser Forums

More than 1/3 of traditionally all female Wells college's students are currently camped out in the lobby of the school's administration building, or on the lawn outside. At issue is the board of trustees' decision to admit men to the college next year.

Feeling that males will dominate the class, and that "coeducation silences women", the protestors say they will protest until the board reverses their decision.

In my opinion, this is the 21st century equivalent of Martin Luther King walking up to George Wallace and DEMANDING "separate but equal" education for African-American students. The statement that these women are making is that women are intellectually inferior, and that admitting males to the campus will only prove it.

Pardon me, but isn't that the OPPOSITE of what the feminist movement set out to portray? Haven't they demanded for, and rightfully received, admission to all male colleges (I've got news for women; men act quite differently in the presence of women as well, so the arguments used to preserve all female colleges could equally be applied to all male colleges).

Have these women considered the implications of leaving a single sex campus for a boardroom that consists of both genders, or do they intend to continue their discriminatory practices beyond academia and into the corporate world? Have they considered the harm they are doing to the very laws they are trying to preserve in potentially setting court precedents upholding the right to a single sex academic environment?

Frankly, I think these women are showing poor judgement and creating potential conflict out of an issue that was bound to be brought up in litigation sooner or later anyway.

signing off,

Gideon MacLeish

1,642 views 18 replies
Reply #1 from JoeUser Forums Top
Oh man. Fairness is a two way street. They demended access to ex-all male schools and now they want to deny men access to all-female schools?
Reply #2 from JoeUser Forums Top
Um, I'm going to take issue with this one, partly for fun and mostly because I'm serious.

1. Not wanting men in their school doesn't necessarily mean they want women in men's private school. That's a logical fallacy. I'd hazard a guess that if you belong to a single-sex educational institution, you respect others' rights to belong to one as well.
2. There are single-sex colleges and prep schools that are alive and well, and as long as they're private institutions, they're entitled to stay that way.
3. These women are protesting a heritage that is ending. They have every right to disagree with a board's decision--hell, I think I was in a college sit-in at one point.

Now, to their posters. First I would bet that there are a bunch more posters than the two Gideon's posted and I read about in the AP article--these two are particularly flamboyant and, of course, catch the media's eye. Second, "coeducation silences women" is unture--but moving from an all-female to a coeducational college does change the dynamics. Wells is pretty well known for putting out intelligent women--that's the heritage. Now that's going to change and it'll become just another prestigious private college. Not bad, but a change. Third, the whole "Males will dominate the class" or whatever that argument is, that's just stupid, so I agree there. Fourth, their method of protestation is a tried and true way of getting attention--which is what they're going for.

Finally, I entirely disagree that "the statement that these women are making is that women are intellectually inferior, and that admitting males to the campus will only prove it." Here's what the Wells College president has to say about womens' colleges: Basically, out of the sixty to seventy womens' colleges in the U.S., they
* Report greater satisfaction than their coed counterparts with college in a variety of measures - academically, developmentally, and personally.
* Have more career success; they are happier, tend to hold higher positions, and earn more money.
* Develop measurably higher levels of self-esteem than women at coeducational colleges. Indeed, after two years in a coed school, many women have lower levels of self-esteem than when they entered
* Participate more fully in and out of class.

So by admitting men, the women are facing a decline in these issues, which is, ultimately, that their chances of success go down by going co-ed (this conclusion drawn from what they're told in and about the college). That's what they're protesting, and what they have every right to protest.

-A.
Sins of a Solar Empire II
Reply #3 from JoeUser Forums Top
I'd hazard a guess that if you belong to a single-sex educational institution, you respect others' rights to belong to one as well.


And that's a "human condition fallacy"--assuming that humans are logical. If they were (logical) we wouldn't have the saying "that's like the kettle calling the pot black".

* Develop measurably higher levels of self-esteem than women at coeducational colleges. Indeed, after two years in a coed school, many women have lower levels of self-esteem than when they entered* Participate more fully in and out of class.


These two points support the idea that women are inferior to men and need a seperate school to hide that fact.
Reply #4 from JoeUser Forums Top
These two points support the idea that women are inferior to men and need a seperate school to hide that fact.


Well, no, it just show they are different. Like, You wouldn't put lambs and wolfs in the same cage if you want both to grow and develop. And youu cannot say lambs are "inferior". As an average, a wolf could kill a lamb without much problems, but does that makes a lamb inferior? Is Stepehen Hawkings 'inferior' to Mike Tyson?

So, I agree with Angloesque. I also like my toilet to be "men only", I like to eat in a restaurant where they don't let various riff-raff in, and my state doesn't like refugees and politic asilants. We are all chauvinists and hypocrists if you look at it that way. But we all have the right to choose. And as far as we are not hurting anybody (are there males clamoring to be let in theri college?), we are not doing anything wrong.
Reply #5 from JoeUser Forums Top
I am a feminist but I disagree with the position of the feminists you speak of (assuming you are not misrepresenting them).
Reply #6 from JoeUser Forums Top
Looking at the responses though Gideon, you are misrepresenting them and they may have a point.
Reply #7 from JoeUser Forums Top

Champ,

Frankly, no they don't have a point. NOT ONE Women's group has stood up and defended the "tradition" of all male universities.

Reply #8 from JoeUser Forums Top
Well, no, it just show they are different.


Good point.
Reply #9 from JoeUser Forums Top
So since women report better results from attending all-female schools, what studies have been done on men who attend all-male schools?
Reply #10 from JoeUser Forums Top
1. Not wanting men in their school doesn't necessarily mean they want women in men's private school. That's a logical fallacy. I'd hazard a guess that if you belong to a single-sex educational institution, you respect others' rights to belong to one as well.


They should have thought of that (or their mothers as the case may be) before the forced the Citadel and VMI into coeducation. I guess the feminist just did not think their actions through to their logical conclusion.
Reply #11 from JoeUser Forums Top
Well, no, it just show they are different. Like, You wouldn't put lambs and wolfs in the same cage if you want both to grow and develop. And youu cannot say lambs are "inferior".


Actually, they are. In the Darwinian sense. But you are comapring apples and oranges. Women are homosapiens, and men are homosapiens. try comparing female lions to male lions, or the same sex of the same species.

Your analogy only propigates the myth that women are inferior. We are not talking the olympics here, but a classroom setting.

For the record, I support single sex instutions. However, I support both Male and Female ones. So Champ, the femist are failing just as they failed during the Clinton administration. The sad fact is, they are no longer a valid advocacy group. They are merely a democrat puppet.
Reply #12 from JoeUser Forums Top
But you are comapring apples and oranges. Women are homosapiens, and men are homosapiens.


Indeed. You just can't compare 2 of different species to 2 of same species. The analog is flawed.

I don't support or not support uni-sex colleges or anything. It don't matter to me at all.
Reply #13 from JoeUser Forums Top
Angeloesque's anology is flawed, but her point is not. Men and women are different in many significant ways.
Reply #14 from JoeUser Forums Top
Sure there is some differences, but so what?

Respect is a two way street. so does fairness.

How long will your friend be friend if that person accepts your gifts but don't give you any at all "because guy don't like giving gifts"?

Those feminist ladies men to allow women to formerly all men only places, now they want to REFUSE men entry into ladies only areas? (No, I'm not talking about restroom)
Reply #15 from JoeUser Forums Top
forced the Citadel and VMI into coeducation


I am ducking as I write this as I can already see things flying at my head; but there is a significant difference between the two cases.

For starters, both VMI and the Citadel are public institutions, funded by tax dollars. Moreover, they are military institutions with no female equivalent--and when they did create the female version it wasn't as prestious or reknown as the original. In fact, the Supreme Court ruling declared that the female version of VMI's "student body, faculty, course offerings, and facilities hardly match VMI's." Both the Citadel and VMI were in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment: No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Private institutions, such as Wells, are not in violation of this because they are not receiving "State" money.
Reply #16 from JoeUser Forums Top
Feeling that males will dominate the class, and that "coeducation silences women", the protestors say they will protest until the board reverses their decision.


In my experience there might be some validity to these two points, even if they are a bit too emphatically stated. Having been to two universities (hey, I know the sample size isn't that impressive, but it's still better than one), I have consistently seen males dominate tutorials even though females have had the numerical superiority (take into account I studied the humanities at both universities, and in my experience, humanities have consistently shown higher female enrolment).

So yes (again - based on personal experience) I have witnessed males dominate tutorials and in doing so "silence women", and not through any feelings of inferiority on the part of the females, but by a difference in communication styles and perceived rewards to be gained in such an environment. Males seem to be more prone to verbosity and competitiveness, and i have seen the dynamic of a class change as soon as this style of male participation has been introduced (having had the privilege of being the only male in a tutorial before other males showed up the next week, and having the good sense of keeping my mouth shut to see how females communicated with out the agitation of the "male voice").

Pardon me, but isn't that the OPPOSITE of what the feminist movement set out to portray? Haven't they demanded for, and rightfully received, admission to all male colleges (I've got news for women; men act quite differently in the presence of women as well, so the arguments used to preserve all female colleges could equally be applied to all male colleges).


Are these women actually feminists, are they protesting a singular issue that they see as a threat to their individual benefit? This distinction could be important as i am yet to be convinced of the fact that all females are feminists, and furthermore, that all protesting females are protesting feminist issues. All i know is that my High School is still a single sex school (all boys school) and there is yet to be a protest at its front gates.

I can understand the charge of hypocrisy though. If all female colleges are to be allowed than that also stands for colleges that seek to be male only, the only principle that should stand being that the quality of and opportunity for education at either institution should be no different from the other. I am yet, however, to meet a male that would seriously consider protesting the inclusion of females in our educational institutions, but this might just be the point these women are arguing - the one thing that can be said to be different between the sexes is that sometimes, if not always, our priorities are very different

Sorry about the length of the comment.

Marco
Reply #17 from JoeUser Forums Top

Are these women actually feminists, are they protesting a singular issue that they see as a threat to their individual benefit? This distinction could be important as i am yet to be convinced of the fact that all females are feminists, and furthermore, that all protesting females are protesting feminist issues.

This is a very valid point, and one that I pondered while I was reading this.

I don't think that they are feminists at all.  I think that they are trying to keep a traditional foundation to their school.  If anything, they are fighting the feministic (is that a word?) "cause".  They are protesting a tradition, and a way of being educated that they do not want changed.  I see no fault in that.

Not all women are feminists.  The idea that women should be treated fairly is not a "feminists" viewpoint.  "Fair" and "same" are not the same thing.  Feminists want to believe that everything should be the same and equal between men and women.  There are a lot of women that want to be treated fairly, but don't care about the "equal" crap.

As you might tell, I'm not exactly a feminist.  I think women deserve to be treated fair, but not always "equal".  Face it, we're not equal- we're different.  That's not to say one is "better" than the other, we're just different.

Reply #18 from JoeUser Forums Top
Given how much attention has been given to golf courses this really does shed light on the hypocricy of many femninists.