How Feminism emancipated men more than women

What is with all the controversial topics, you say.

I am fortunate to know a number of women whom I would consider to be extremely intelligent and sophisticated and I feel honoured in being able to have inspiring conversations with them. Not all our conversations revolve around shoe shopping (however sometimes that does come up).

It is through these discussions that I suddenly had an epiphany.

I'll start at the beginning.

So remembering what I do of history, or herstory, however you wish to call it - there was a movement by women in England (yada yada). The movement came over to North America. Women wanted to vote. Women wanted equal rights to men (whatever that means). Women wanted to be able to work and earn money. During the 2nd world war, women took over a lot of men's stereotypical positions (because men were off to war). They enjoyed financial freedoms. They wanted more of it. There were movements for control over birth rights (aka birth control and access to abortions....legalizing abortions...yada yada).

Women burned bras. Women got the right to vote. Women got the right to earn a living. Women earned the right to not be housewives.

Great! Now women are equals. Well, I don't want to get into a huge raging war with feminists nor anti feminists.

Certainly there is still a lot of inequality in the world, and whether you believe it or not, the "right" to have children has still not been provided to men. It is still a woman's physical imperative or ability to have children and that is something men can never do as equals. Nor can they ever truly understand the physical realities of having children.

The one thing that men can do, however, is control the rights to their sperm and willingness to take on a relationship/women or to have children. This is similar to the idea that women can control whether they get pregnant (as much as possible of course with an extra cost to this because birth control is very expensive).

Thanks to feminism, women are allowed, in theory, to participate in the world as men. This means they can choose not to have children. They can choose to have a job. And they can choose to have casual sex.

I however have come to the conclusion that women cannot be like men nor should they be.

To be clear: I believe women are entitled to work and earn equal pay to men. I believe women should have the right to birth control. I believe in a woman's ability to make choices for herself when it comes to having an abortion or not (although I do not believe in reckless use of this option). I believe in a lot of things that my idea of the original feminism entailed and I support what "original" feminists were trying to do.

But here is the consequence of the feminist situation.

In my experience of chatting with men and women online, and in person, I have come to the conclusion that now women working as equals to men is an "expectation". Strangely, although I was raised to believe that women and men would eventually earn equal pay and have the same rights, and I entered the work force with my generation of feminist raised women,  after university and post -graduate education, I began to see an apparent female struggle:

Women were either dropping out of the work force in order to have children or they were finding difficulty in finding the right male to partner with and thus their careers could flourish (or perish). 

For the past ten years I have started to recognize that having children, now, for two working parents is becoming more and more difficult.

In being a parent and discussing the issues with a close friend (who is also a mother) we have come to the conclusion that it just doesn't seem to make sense for women to work, even though we both wish to and want to.

If you consider that often women are still earning less than men; ultimately what happens is a woman will be paying what she earns in order for another woman to work for her and raise her child. A lot of women are seeing this as a ridiculous option.

Now you're wondering, how does this mean men are more emancipated than women by feminism? And what does all of this have to do with having children? I'll get to this......

A further consequence to feminism, in this sense, is that the choice to be a housewife has been stigmatized, by many women but also a lot of men. It is something that they find fearful and unattractive (not all but a lot because of course these men were raised by feminist ideals as well).

Since women feel that they can be promiscuous and do as they please, they are having sex randomly, as men may.

How feminism created emancipation for men is that it removed the social pressure to settle down and take care of a wife and child.

Not only can a woman decide to work and earn her keep, and not have children, so too can men choose not to be pressured to choose a wife and raise a family.

It is now a lot easier for a man to choose a career and have casual sex. He no longer requires to partner up with a woman. He is no longer socially obligated or pressured to have children.

Take this one step further, and many men nowadays are insistent that a woman have a career, but also be a mother, while perhaps 200 years ago the only pressure for a woman was just to have children and maintain a home - now she must do all three.

With a woman 'earning her keep" the use of a man becomes virtually nil too and men feel this. A woman can have children on her own; her own career; hire people to take care of her children, if her career is successful.

Men have been emancipated in the sense that should they choose not to obtain a successful career path, they can cling to a woman who is financially successful and be a househusband.

I unfortunately find all these options to be completely unnatural and almost absurd.

Regardless of people's belief in socialism I completely support the idea of women being paid to have children and raise them (or men), just so long as the responsibility does not solely fall on women.

If feminism is to be true to its original intention to emancipate women then women should be able to have the choice to have a family and a career. Right now, it's still mostly a matter of choosing one or the other because it is very difficult to do both.

Now it just seems that it is still the men who come off on top. They do not have to commit, because free sex is each person's right. They do not have to have children, because of course, women do not have to be limited to their biological requirements, so neither do men. Men can control their reproductive organs and deliverance of sperm, just as women have a right to not get knocked up. And men do not have to get married to a woman if he gets her pregnant. He can simply disappear or pay a small monthly amount via child support payments.

Even more absurd, the emancipation of men by feminism has removed career opportunities for sex workers. Now that men can get casual sex from liberated women, why should they pay for it?

Either way, I really cannot see how individuals are in any position at all now to need to be in relationships.  There simply is nothing requiring men to take on any responsibility, more so than ever before.

Thanks suffragettes.

Unfortunate for women who wish to be housewives this is devastating news. Those women who do not wish to work are now being forced to because men are no longer being forced to work and take on wives and children.

This "so called" emancipation of women seems to really have benefited men more than a lot of women nowadays.

Since women can do everything on their own, so can men, but really - this is what has been the problem with men running loose all along, so what has really changed? Now it's just easier for them to get away with it.

For those few women who struggle with the ideology of being a career woman but really wanting to be a mother, I do truly feel sorry for you and I do blame the Suffragettes for not having insight into the possible long term of effects of their political movement, completely.

Having said all this, I do hope politically stronger women than me can create a true equality, that also takes into account those women who solely wish to be mothers.

I also hope that if a man and a woman (or whatever gender you consider yourself to be) decide to get together and have children that they make reasonable choices. I have certainly met men who gave up their careers in order to have children because their wives earned more money and had a more successful career, and that's totally cool. I support these things if it works for both parties. I have had many men wish to be my househusband and unfortunately I hated the idea and it just could not work. It's not that I necessarily want to be a housewife, because that's not exactly my main goal in life, it's just that I also don't want to feel like I am stealing away a man's role by being the main bread earner. It certainly didn't make me feel very sexy, as a woman. And frankly, having kids is really difficult and I like to cook.

Anyways, my main point was this:

Men. You may complain about not having a role in society anymore, that feminism took away your manliness rights, but really - you're the one benefiting. No one is pressuring you to get married, have a job, and have children. You can have casual sex, and keep all your money that you earn, or do not earn, for yourself. What could you possibly have to complain about? Feminism emancipated you, more than us.

Of course, I can leave this off with a small story of the man who refused to grow up. He was about 57 years old when I met him. I won't say how I know this man but he was a friend of a relative and he was supposed to help me with some insurance thing. I recall being very uncomfortable with the way he looked at me. I was only 26 at the time.

Apparently 2 years later he met a woman who was - my age - 28 years old and ended up marrying her and having a child. When the child was 2 years old, this guy died. Look, you can wait or not have children, but the reality is.......it's going to hit you that you are not immortal. I only hope that if you choose a completely "free" life that you manage the consequences of your decisions too.

Pretend that we're Dead by L7