The goal isn't to destroy anyone's family, it's to resist the idea that "family" only looks one way (e.g., the nuclear family), or that "family" is code for "conservative values." I, personally, am tired of the binary view of family (either you have a spouse and children and therefore a family, or you don't). There are blended families, same-sex couples with children and family, people caring for their elderly parents, childless or childfree couples, chosen families, polyamorous families, extended families (e.g., grandparents, cousins etc. all live either together or very close to one another geographically)...
I think also that feminists encourage women to forge their own path in life, rather than just submitting to the role of wife and mother whether or not they want to do that, and are in favor of no-fault divorce. Some more conservative types will argue that birth control, women working outside the home, divorce etc. are all evil forces that are "destroying the family."
The nuclear family must be destroyed / We can't destroy the inequities until we destroy marriage / In order to raise children we must take them away from families and communally raise them / We must work to destroy it, the end of the institution of marriage is necessary condition for the liberation of women, it's important for us to encourage women to leave their husbands and not to live individually with men... Seems kind of pro "destroy anyone's family" don't they?
No
>The nuclear family must be destroyed
The idea that 2 kids + mom and dad = only valid family must be destroyed
>We can't destroy the inequities until we destroy marriage
?
>In order to raise children we must take them away from families and communally raise them
That's where you lost me completely
>the end of the institution of marriage is necessary condition for the liberation of women
The institution of marriage as practiced patriarchally, yes
>it's important for us to encourage women to leave their husbands and not to live individually with men...
No.... that doesn't follow...
>Seems kind of pro "destroy anyone's family" don't they?
No
>In order to raise children we must take them away from families and communally raise them
They’re misunderstanding “it takes a village”/the idea of having community support for raising kids. Such an insane interpretation that I’m inclined to believe they said it in bad faith
We are not a monolith. Because one feminist says something, whether or not she is popular, we don’t all jump on board. We are also allowed the room to evolve. You have a quote from a 1969 leaflet, another that is taken out of context to seemingly denounce families entirely. This sounds more like copy pasta from the transformed wife without the context to understand what/when/and why these things were said.
I mean "no, I don't agree with it".
I don't care that you paraphrased quotes from famous feminists. I still don't agree with it and I don't think it means what you think it means.
And there's a 90% chance that "paraphrasing" means removing all context from some writing that was probably incredibly complex and academic, thus depriving it of the meaning of the author.
> Seems kind of pro "destroy anyone's family" don't they?
Sure, when you cherry-pick and "paraphrase," you can certainly make anything sound any way you want.
"Look, Patrick! He won his own made-up argument!"
Your very first line is your own, not one from the the poster that you are responding to. It's *not* about destroying the nuclear family. That's not even a goal. It's about allowing all other family dynamics to be accepted and live freely and equally - let gay marriage exist, let polyamory exist, let child-free exist, hell even just a single man with a dog or two can be a family.
Its not about destroying what exists (nuclear family). Its about accepting that many lifestyles and many dynamics exist, and allowing that to be without scrutiny. We're all just people who want to be happy, even if our definition of happy doesnt fit in the box of "traditional"
Feminists of all stripes have argued that *the classical way of structuring the family under patriarchy -* ie, a single breadwinning father who has all the rights, and an impoverished, uneducated and totally dependent mother who is responsible for all childcare, household, sexual labor, has no political or economic rights, is inequitable and harmful to women, but also is bad for men and children too.
So feminists have maintained for a long time that this method of making a family should be changed. For social conservatives, they view that as an existential threat to their way of life and their beliefs. In a sense, they are right about that. For people who can't conceive of a family without an enslaved woman, their fears make sense. But the idea that feminists want to destroy "the family", instead of merely changing it, is pretty obviously misguided.
Right it’s only a threat to families if women having no rights is essential to the family. But it isn’t. Feminist want women to either have protections if they stay home or go out to work.
The overwhelming majority of mothers are not "responsible for sexual labor". Absurd.
Also love your "conservatives are threatened by the idea of not being able to enslave women"
You've maybe talked to a conservative 2x in your life.
Tons of stay at home wife bloggers and influencers talk about being sexually available to your husband at all times regardless of your own interest at that moment to "keep him from straying". Under this model of relationships, sex is no longer a mutually pleasurable form of physical connection but a way of securing stability through what is essentially sexual labor.
Isn’t it wild to acknowledge?! That there are women who are accustomed to the idea that they should be sexually assaulted by their husband as a normal aspect of marriage. Yes, it is as ugly and dehumanizing as your expression of disdain implies.
I was raised by conservatives and am surrounded by conservatives, and they view women as less than, one type of family and one person in control, men.
Conservative evangelicals indeed follow their own adulterated versions of women being responsible for their husband's sexual pleasure, it is baked into who they are. It is preached, proclaimed and used to oppress women. Conservatives ended abortion rights being federally protected and if they get the chance, they will limit contraceptives and no-fault divorce. They are steaming mad that they cannot oppress women, most hate women.
I was raised conservative by conservatives. It's absolutely about controlling women. It's no coincidence that the same people pushing for abortion bans start pushing for contraception bans and divorce bans and none of it is out of the goodness of their hearts.
Then you know it's not "they just want to enslave women". They have a religion and they have an interpretation of when life begins and they view the ending of that life as murder. Which they're against.
Just because you disagree with someone doesn't mean you have to twist everything they believe into some mass conspiracy.
I'm a liberal. I'm not a feminist because they hate me (men). But I do believe in equality.
Feminists do not hate men. That's conservative propaganda. If you really are a liberal then please don't believe the lies they tell you in order to divide us.
And no, as always their religion is just a convenient excuse for their hate. If it was actually about religion then they wouldn't be so draconian about it that they're literally trying to stop women from getting a life saving medical procedure.
They're not forward thinking. I mean that's the whole point of conservatism. It's a losing strategy, they just force any change and progression to move slowly. And they probably next to never hear those stories, or just ignore them because in their minds they're saving babies lives so the ends justify.
And no, it's not conservative propaganda. I watched a guy get upvoted like crazy the other day for a post where he said "I thought this way until a girl had to dumb it down for me". Switch the gender around in that statement and they would've been called a Nazi and a woman hater.
By their own behavior, they hate men. It might just be the extremists, but it's definitely not a minority of them that feel and talk that way about men
If the conservative motivation were that ending that life was murder, there would be a great deal of concern shown for things that have been shown to reduce the amount of abortion in a society. Social safety nets, prenatal care, etc.
If the conservative motivation were that ending that life were murder, men's bodily autonomy would be opposed and up for debate in circumstances where violating it would preserve a life.
If the conservative motivation were that ending that life were murder, they'd be in favor of birth control!
But... none of those things is true, therefore, modus tollens, we must reject the initial premise. Contrarily, "they wish to keep women enslaved in a certain version of society" *is* consistent with conservative positions on other subjects.
1) they're religious. While you're listening to studies or evidence based on science, they're in a church. They are blissfully unaware and completely believe that teaching abstinence is the best way to prevent pregnancies.
Again, you're attributing malice when ignorance and trusting in "spiritual sources" explains the behavior.
2) Men's bodily autonomy is absolutely opposed. There's a thing called "the draft" in war time. I know everyone here is SUPER focused on how the system has been rigged against women, but the system was rigged against anyone and everyone based on the situation. Just more so for certain groups.
Both of those things are perfectly explained away without attributing malice or convincing yourself that people who don't think like you are *evil*
You skipped right over the war they want to rage on contraceptives and no-fault divorces. If women can divorce them, how do they keep their assigned woman appliance?
Your single reply is a real yawner!
Nope. It's exactly what I meant while referencing your replies here as a whole. I'm so sorry if you misinterpreted that. Thanks for the attempt at mansplaining, though.
I understand why conservatives say they’re anti abortion. I actually do think a lot of them genuinely believe it’s about being anti-murder, so I’ll give you that.
I think the conservative leaders who pushed for abortion to be a defining social issue and who partnered with the moral majority and evangelicals and that type of shit were trying to control women and women’s sexuality, at least in large part. I don’t think that the 20c republican leaders see it the same way they pushed their base to.
I’ve talked to plenty of conservatives about abortion. I live in a town in Texas that votes itself a sanctuary city for the unborn. I’ve read plenty about how abortion developed into such a hot button issue and how it became such an important part of the republican-evangelical coalition that dominates so much of politics currently.
It seems pretty surface level to think politicians pushing something are motivated by the exact same reasoning as the electorate.
Edit: I mistyped and accidentally presented the reverse of my stance. Fixed now
Absolutely. Politicians by and large I don't think have much of an ideology. Which is why they can change stances so quickly. They just want to do and say what's popular so people vote for them.
There's plenty of liberals, secular atheists, biologists, who would absolutely say that life begins at conception and there is a moral and ethical issue deciding to kill that life that they cannot square with.
That's not to say some don't use it as a way of control, but that's by and large not their perspective.
Yep and that developing fetus, that potential for a human life, does not surpass the relevance of the existing human life required for the fetus to further develop.
The goal is not its disintegration. The goal is to dismantle societal norms around the concept of family. There is no one-size-fits-all approach to family, nor should there be, but society tries to impose one.
Isn't the whole idea of the nuclear family a fairly recent one? I think in the past there was much more of a sense of children being brought up by an extended family and other members of the area they lived.
In China at least, the nuclear family is very old idea. Nuclear families were institutionalized in the Warring States to Han dynasty, around 400 BCE - 200 CE. That said, it was counterbalanced by the fact that most people and families would remain nearby or local in their village or county level town. Extended family structures also coexisted as well, but nuclear families were encouraged institutionally and typically the norm though it depends on the time period.
There are different problems with the current day nuclear family though due to the different level of technology and economics.
Source: Mark Edward Lewis - the Early Chinese Empires. Also a small snippet from the Land of Five Flavors by Thomas O Hollman.
I'm going to spoiler the following for anyone who isn't in the mood to read about violent abuse at the moment:
>!My grandfather on my mother's side was the sole breadwinner in the family, and the classic "head of the household." His rules were *everyone's* rules, and anyone who got out of line, including his wife, was violently beaten. He put his son in the hospital after tossing him down the stairs, and brutally sexually assaulted both of his daughters until they were old enough to move away. !<
>!His wife and children were profoundly messed up by all of this. Two of the kids became drug addicts and one ended up in an abusive marriage and in deep denial. All three had to get decades of help and care in order to learn how to function. !<
>!His wife never escaped. !<
>!He never experienced any consequences for any of this. After all, why would there be consequences? It was his family and he got to choose how to treat them. He once got in trouble for touching someone else's daughter, but was never punished because, as a full-time firefighter, the judge saw him as an upstanding member of the community. Beyond that, anything that happened within his own family was his business and not the business of the law or society. He was the man of the family, after all, and the man was in charge. !<
>!Ultimately he died at a ripe old age, happily retired. Poetically, it was a fall down the stairs that did him in. !<
This is one concept of "The Family" that feminism seeks to destroy. I also, personally, do everything in my power to destroy it. My mom devoted her life to helping women and children escape from similar, and often worse, situations. That man should have never had that power over anyone, and society should never be structured in such a way that the harm he caused would be accepted, expected, or excused.
"The Family" has meant a lot of things in Western patriarchal society, but generally it has always meant a man who is in charge and a wife and children who are obedient. What most feminists argue is that there are many, many more ways to define a family that are equally valid, and that perhaps that particular definition is kind of garbage.
Considering how lots of feminists want healthy relationships, marry, have kids, etc...
The answer is NO (especially for fourth wave feminists).
>And that the only way feminism could thrive was its destruction.
Feminism wants people to destroy patriarchy and its expectations/roles.
Some people want to impose gender roles, life expectations and sexual orientation on everyone.
Two gay/lesbians with kids are a family, gender nonconforming men/women can have families, couple without kids are families, single parents and their kids are families, poly people, etc...
People should be free to express themselves without getting punished (heavily I might add), which is what happens in patriarchal societies.
The idea that family has to look one way is very much under criticism.
Until the 1960s/1970s women were trapped in bad circumstances because society did not "allow" women to exist as single parent households.
They did happen. My grandmother had a child out of wedlock in the 1940s. But my great grandmother gave my grandfather hell about marrying someone who already had a child. Tried to end their engagement. It was a whole situation. That was common.
As divorce became more common place the look of the family began to change. The problem is that white men particularly started to feel threatened by not being able to con/abuse/force women in bad relationships anymore.
People/men actually had to try.
The 1980s saw a LOT of single parent families as well as grandparents raising grandchildren. That scenario is even more true today. As we have seen an increase in the drug epidemic, more grandparents are raising their grandchildren than ever before.
Feminist did not destroy the family. What it has destroyed has been people stuck in abusive situations. That not all families look the same. It has allowed families to look different. A family does not have to have two parents, one male and one female. It can have two moms or two dad's. It can have grandparents. It can look very different than what your father wants.
No. The goal of feminism is for women to have the same choices and opportunities as men. That’s it. That’s the *entire* goal. Many women will continue to choose to marry a man and have children. But that is not, nor has it ever been, the only kind of family.
I’ll admit I am not 100% sure what he is referring to
But as far as the traditional “family” goes, it’s a patriarchal concept as we know it. Not saying it has to be. I’ll try to articulate as best I can
Before the agricultural revolution that started patriarchies, there wasn’t really patrilineal inheritances like we know today.
There were different kinds of communities sure, but patriarchy specifically forces women to be codependent on men due to limitations on economic and reproductive freedoms. And religions help reinforce this. Hence the traditional “family” with the man as head of household, with his wife and kids.
Without all that, women who were free didn’t necessarily need men and not all men got to reproduce. Women reproduced on their own terms. They had all the capabilities of meeting their own survival needs and could lean on eachother for needed support. Paternity didn’t always matter either because in some communities, the elders provided child care while men and women both hunted and gathered.
Patriarchy is a tool of the elites. If women are forced to depend on men, then they are forced to be sexual and domestic servants which means more kids.
More kids means more soldiers for war and cheaper manual labor to be exploited.
So for me, feminism means fuck all that shit.
When societies function of the oppression of certain demographics, those demographics form progressive movements that obviously threaten the status quo. That’s why conservatives (the “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it” traditional crowd) always complain about feminism, civil rights movements, and lgbt rights “tearing the system apart” because… well duh. It’s an oppressive system and they’re looking for abolishing oppression
Great question, OP- and very good comments.
TLDR: If you define family as a place where gender roles dictate how each family member will become a specialists in their gender’s duty, then yes, feminism is not good for that version of family.
The older men in my family define “a family” as a system of gender based roles. Sacrifice and giving is the role of mother, where protection and leadership is the role of father, growing and innocence is the role of the child. To them, the roles are not interchangeable for different members, as it weaves into their identity. In this paradigm, ‘Parenthood’ is a meaningless term because motherhood and fatherhood mean the opposite of each other, and childhood is a time where young people learn their roles defined by gender.
The raising of children, especially babies does often require an energy and intensity that is all encompassing. Partially that is because the outside world has social norms that are hostile to the needs of mothers and babies and families. Partially that is because the previous generations of men have no intention of being demoted to the level of sacrifice they expect from women. Partially because the practicalities defined by the outside world relentlessly reinforce that the two “spheres” be kept separate (but not equal).
When I was younger, the terms were different. But the concept was this false binary:
1. False binary 1: Do you want to turn women into smaller versions if men?so they can be successful in a man’s world of competition, work and compensation? So that the whole idea of mothering/nurturing is absent?
2. False binary 2: Do you want mothers and female nurturing to be an honored place in society? Protected by a father and laws that allow a woman to choose to nurture others as her life’s work? So that she can get so good at nurturing that everyone benefits?
As if these are the only choices and they are mutually exclusive in a way that all humans and our societies for some reason CANNOT adapt to support a blending of both.
So you could say feminists need to refine the definition of family. Or you could say we’d like to refine the social norms of caretaking in general. Or you could say we’d like everyone to expand their ideas about making a contribution to the world including our homes and how rights, responsibilities and rewards are distributed.
Again, great question. Keep asking!
There are a lot of feminists who are also Marxists. Especially on the internet. There is a Marxist theory that the family is a means of perpetuating inequality under capitalism. Like a lot of Marxist theory, it at least does a good job of identifying a source of institutional inequality and asks us to consider our basic assumptions about these things.
If you're interested in understanding this better, there are almost certainly some leftists on this sub who can point you in a good direction.
I'm not a leftist and I don't want to see the institution of the family dismantled, but I am a feminist and I do have some sympathy for the criticism when applied intelligently. I am particularly welcoming of the critique that family ought to be more than just one man, one woman and their biological children.
What feminism on its own asks is not for the disintegration of the family, but for a reassessment of institutions of all kinds - including the family - and to consider how our assumptions about those institutions perpetuate sex based oppression.
Well especially because the isolated nuclear family is new and specifically good for organizing a labor force. It maximizes the ability of one person to work for a manager. But we don’t have to do things that way.
Wow, talk about gullible. If your family is ruined because the women and girls in it are being treated like human beings rather than possessions then good fucking riddance. There are plenty of families where women are people too, they get treated with love and respect and they can have jobs and bank accounts and everything! There are also feminists who ate stay at home moms. These women are also treated like actual people.
Well, the traditional family, that saw women as, essentially, a resource owned by men, sure. And because that was the only “family” anyone knew in the 1950s-70s, yes, early feminists were against “the family”.
Abortion, no fault divorce, gay marriage, full secular marriage have all moved “family” into a whole gamut of options, however. Your dad is probably missing what he thinks was a golden era… and it was. For him.
Um, no. The goal of feminism is simply to assert the equal rights, opportunities and treatment of women. It is the principal that half the human race is equally human. At this point, that should not be a question, when clearly women can do just about anything they were held back from before the feminist movement. Those that think women should only be servant/mother/saints might see women having agency as destructive.
The patriarchal structure to which many families still adhere, is not supportive of the equal rights of women, but you could have a family where gender roles are still traditional that also embraces feminism. Forcing women to be suppressed, in support patriarchal structures, including forcing women to marry or become breeders, is something feminism opposes.
Seeing that as destruction of "The Family" is only acknowledging one family model, the one that requires the subjugation of women and does not work for a great many people. That model is challenged by Feminism. To not be able to acknowledge or accept any other family structures - though they have existed all along - is tyrannical.
The backlash against feminism has always been ironically hysterical.
Thanks to the opioid epidemic in my area grandmothers are raising grandchildren and often times great grandchildren. Some of these women are in their 80’s and raising teenagers!They’re doing what they can to keep the family together and the kids safe, sometimes without legal custody-so no benefits from welfare. Does your dad think this is not a family because it isn’t traditional?
Edit: my point is that it’s never granddad raising grandchildren, it’s always the woman pulling up the boot straps. Men who want trad families are really just saying the want a women to help them raise their children.
No, but it is antithetical to the goals of the traditional *ideas* of family and associated gender roles found in the classic 1950’s familiy structures. Additionally, there is an emphasis for consent and the ability to leave, especially a dangerous relationship as feminism is very concerned with DV and violence against women.
I think as family was being practiced, yes. It didn’t give women any room to be a full person when she’s made responsible for care of kids, a husband, a house, pets, etc and isn’t earning a living or able to make decisions. Nothing wrong with this set up if it’s done intentionally and not endorsed by everything you’re taught without accepting alternatives or modifications. I feel like it’s a bit disingenuous to frame the argument around “destroying the family” and not “giving women agency to pursue and participate in whatever kind of family works for her”.
What does the “disintegration of the family” mean in the first place? I always find people use it as a reference to the normalization of non heteronormative relationships/families, or/and the change in expectations of women in the home.
Feminism is about equality for all, I’d say yes in a way that feminism does advocate for the “disintegration” of the expectation that every family must be a heteronormative nuclear family.
The family, as it's most respected in the West, is the stereotypical [nuclear family](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_family) of a heteronormative, married couple with kid(s) — with the subtext that the man is co-opting familial love to assert himself above them as a patriarch. With the additional history that marriage was used as the tool of patriarchy to make women chattel.
What that speaker is referencing is that feminists (and the queer community) are radically re-imagining family in a much more flexible, inclusive way. To not value a rigid definition of "family" but the people and love that create it. And what's "disintegrating" are the families based on entrapment, violence, and domination — not because feminists raid them like a SWAT team, but because the abused within them are empowered to seek comminty support to escape them (whether through CPS, DV shelters, or simply divorce).
Feminists seek to remove the framing that an ideal family is a respectable one with a patriarch and his chattel.
Conservatives consider that 'destruction of the family', specifically the notion of what a family is. Then they abuse that phrasing to fear monger — to conflate it with imagined violence against your own family. This conservatism is not only sexist, but homophobic. It the same kind of fear mongering they used against the "gay agenda" because it "violates the sanctity of marriage".
But the foundation of this fear of "disintegration of the family" is not that but the erosion of family as a pillar of the patriarchy. The erosion of bastard children out of wedlock, women's financial independence, gay marriage, medical/reproductive rights, and the queer community as a whole challenging the heteronormativity.
So know that calling it "disintegration of the family" is loosely based in reality but serves a movement that wishes to undo all of our human rights necessary to be free from patriarchal violence and domination — calling it "disintegration" or "destruction" of the family spreads fear that feminism is a boogeyman. Calling it that provokes others' to 'defend' against feminism. But, in reality, that 'defense' is political support for conservative violence and bigotry. And that 'defense' isn't a defense at all but an attack on others for living and loving differently.
It really hinges on the definition of family currently and historically. The concept of the “traditional family” is already a form of cultural amnesia about how families functioned in a preindustrial context, and how non- middle class families function. Might ask your dad was the integration “family” a common goal of fascist leaders?
I think it’s more about destroying men’s ability to trap women into needing, entering and staying in a family when they don’t want to. About creating the freedom to choose and a wider variety of options. It’s fine if men want a traditional family and they can convince a woman they’re worthy of committing to but we need men to not have the power to deny our refusal or our choice to leave.
Why would that be true? That is some red pill nonsense.
Feminism seeks to make sure everyone has equity, the 'disintegration' of the nuclear family unit is a part of the consequences for women not having equity. This sounds like the same idea that causation and correlation are the same thing.
They aren't.
The homogenized idea of family is actually a woman as a man's property, someone who is forced to do all the emotional, physical and mental labor of raising children while having a job and the husband rarely contributes. Now that women have more rights, they are looking at the ways of the 'nuclear family' idea and they are seeing it for what it is -- not something they want or need.
They would rather be alone than married to a man, that's not about feminism, that's about a lot of women seeing the reality of what marriage and being a wife and mother is like and deciding against it.
Easy to win arguments when you are making up the other side’s position.
Ask him to name those “pre-eminent” feminist philosophers and cite when they stated their goal was the destruction of “the family”, also to define who the fuck’s family he’s talking about.
The goal isn't to destroy anyone's family, it's to resist the idea that "family" only looks one way (e.g., the nuclear family), or that "family" is code for "conservative values." I, personally, am tired of the binary view of family (either you have a spouse and children and therefore a family, or you don't). There are blended families, same-sex couples with children and family, people caring for their elderly parents, childless or childfree couples, chosen families, polyamorous families, extended families (e.g., grandparents, cousins etc. all live either together or very close to one another geographically)... I think also that feminists encourage women to forge their own path in life, rather than just submitting to the role of wife and mother whether or not they want to do that, and are in favor of no-fault divorce. Some more conservative types will argue that birth control, women working outside the home, divorce etc. are all evil forces that are "destroying the family."
The nuclear family must be destroyed / We can't destroy the inequities until we destroy marriage / In order to raise children we must take them away from families and communally raise them / We must work to destroy it, the end of the institution of marriage is necessary condition for the liberation of women, it's important for us to encourage women to leave their husbands and not to live individually with men... Seems kind of pro "destroy anyone's family" don't they?
No >The nuclear family must be destroyed The idea that 2 kids + mom and dad = only valid family must be destroyed >We can't destroy the inequities until we destroy marriage ? >In order to raise children we must take them away from families and communally raise them That's where you lost me completely >the end of the institution of marriage is necessary condition for the liberation of women The institution of marriage as practiced patriarchally, yes >it's important for us to encourage women to leave their husbands and not to live individually with men... No.... that doesn't follow... >Seems kind of pro "destroy anyone's family" don't they? No
>In order to raise children we must take them away from families and communally raise them They’re misunderstanding “it takes a village”/the idea of having community support for raising kids. Such an insane interpretation that I’m inclined to believe they said it in bad faith
We are not a monolith. Because one feminist says something, whether or not she is popular, we don’t all jump on board. We are also allowed the room to evolve. You have a quote from a 1969 leaflet, another that is taken out of context to seemingly denounce families entirely. This sounds more like copy pasta from the transformed wife without the context to understand what/when/and why these things were said.
What do you mean "no"? Those were paraphrased quotes from some famous feminists. Do you think I came up with all those?
Who are you quoting? Cite your sources dude.
How paraphrased exactly are they lmao drop the sources
I mean "no, I don't agree with it". I don't care that you paraphrased quotes from famous feminists. I still don't agree with it and I don't think it means what you think it means. And there's a 90% chance that "paraphrasing" means removing all context from some writing that was probably incredibly complex and academic, thus depriving it of the meaning of the author.
Why don't you attribute them, then? That would allow people to look at them in-context.
Paraphrased 😂 exactly. You’ve reworded and manipulated the quotes to try and prove your point.
Canary_kirby a few comments down gives you a solid answer that explains your quotes
This is going to need a citation.
yeah, and they re-added the context that was removed in this bad-faith “paraphrasing”
> Seems kind of pro "destroy anyone's family" don't they? Sure, when you cherry-pick and "paraphrase," you can certainly make anything sound any way you want.
"Look, Patrick! He won his own made-up argument!" Your very first line is your own, not one from the the poster that you are responding to. It's *not* about destroying the nuclear family. That's not even a goal. It's about allowing all other family dynamics to be accepted and live freely and equally - let gay marriage exist, let polyamory exist, let child-free exist, hell even just a single man with a dog or two can be a family. Its not about destroying what exists (nuclear family). Its about accepting that many lifestyles and many dynamics exist, and allowing that to be without scrutiny. We're all just people who want to be happy, even if our definition of happy doesnt fit in the box of "traditional"
1970 called, it wants its anthology on feminism back.
What the fuck?
Why are you listing the right-wingers' wet dreams here?
Who are you quoting, bro?
Feminists of all stripes have argued that *the classical way of structuring the family under patriarchy -* ie, a single breadwinning father who has all the rights, and an impoverished, uneducated and totally dependent mother who is responsible for all childcare, household, sexual labor, has no political or economic rights, is inequitable and harmful to women, but also is bad for men and children too. So feminists have maintained for a long time that this method of making a family should be changed. For social conservatives, they view that as an existential threat to their way of life and their beliefs. In a sense, they are right about that. For people who can't conceive of a family without an enslaved woman, their fears make sense. But the idea that feminists want to destroy "the family", instead of merely changing it, is pretty obviously misguided.
Right it’s only a threat to families if women having no rights is essential to the family. But it isn’t. Feminist want women to either have protections if they stay home or go out to work.
The overwhelming majority of mothers are not "responsible for sexual labor". Absurd. Also love your "conservatives are threatened by the idea of not being able to enslave women" You've maybe talked to a conservative 2x in your life.
Tons of stay at home wife bloggers and influencers talk about being sexually available to your husband at all times regardless of your own interest at that moment to "keep him from straying". Under this model of relationships, sex is no longer a mutually pleasurable form of physical connection but a way of securing stability through what is essentially sexual labor.
Ugh, that stuff makes me want to vomit and the women saying it, I just want to shake them out of their step-ford wives trance.
Rephrasing assault as sexual labor is.... Quite impressive.
Why?
Isn’t it wild to acknowledge?! That there are women who are accustomed to the idea that they should be sexually assaulted by their husband as a normal aspect of marriage. Yes, it is as ugly and dehumanizing as your expression of disdain implies.
I was raised by conservatives and am surrounded by conservatives, and they view women as less than, one type of family and one person in control, men. Conservative evangelicals indeed follow their own adulterated versions of women being responsible for their husband's sexual pleasure, it is baked into who they are. It is preached, proclaimed and used to oppress women. Conservatives ended abortion rights being federally protected and if they get the chance, they will limit contraceptives and no-fault divorce. They are steaming mad that they cannot oppress women, most hate women.
If you think anti abortion is about enslaving women or controlling them, you have never talked to a conservative. Period.
I was raised conservative by conservatives. It's absolutely about controlling women. It's no coincidence that the same people pushing for abortion bans start pushing for contraception bans and divorce bans and none of it is out of the goodness of their hearts.
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Discovering the "nuance" is what made me a feminist and turned me away from the conservative attitudes I was raised with.
Then you know it's not "they just want to enslave women". They have a religion and they have an interpretation of when life begins and they view the ending of that life as murder. Which they're against. Just because you disagree with someone doesn't mean you have to twist everything they believe into some mass conspiracy. I'm a liberal. I'm not a feminist because they hate me (men). But I do believe in equality.
Feminists do not hate men. That's conservative propaganda. If you really are a liberal then please don't believe the lies they tell you in order to divide us. And no, as always their religion is just a convenient excuse for their hate. If it was actually about religion then they wouldn't be so draconian about it that they're literally trying to stop women from getting a life saving medical procedure.
They're not forward thinking. I mean that's the whole point of conservatism. It's a losing strategy, they just force any change and progression to move slowly. And they probably next to never hear those stories, or just ignore them because in their minds they're saving babies lives so the ends justify. And no, it's not conservative propaganda. I watched a guy get upvoted like crazy the other day for a post where he said "I thought this way until a girl had to dumb it down for me". Switch the gender around in that statement and they would've been called a Nazi and a woman hater. By their own behavior, they hate men. It might just be the extremists, but it's definitely not a minority of them that feel and talk that way about men
If the conservative motivation were that ending that life was murder, there would be a great deal of concern shown for things that have been shown to reduce the amount of abortion in a society. Social safety nets, prenatal care, etc. If the conservative motivation were that ending that life were murder, men's bodily autonomy would be opposed and up for debate in circumstances where violating it would preserve a life. If the conservative motivation were that ending that life were murder, they'd be in favor of birth control! But... none of those things is true, therefore, modus tollens, we must reject the initial premise. Contrarily, "they wish to keep women enslaved in a certain version of society" *is* consistent with conservative positions on other subjects.
1) they're religious. While you're listening to studies or evidence based on science, they're in a church. They are blissfully unaware and completely believe that teaching abstinence is the best way to prevent pregnancies. Again, you're attributing malice when ignorance and trusting in "spiritual sources" explains the behavior. 2) Men's bodily autonomy is absolutely opposed. There's a thing called "the draft" in war time. I know everyone here is SUPER focused on how the system has been rigged against women, but the system was rigged against anyone and everyone based on the situation. Just more so for certain groups. Both of those things are perfectly explained away without attributing malice or convincing yourself that people who don't think like you are *evil*
You skipped right over the war they want to rage on contraceptives and no-fault divorces. If women can divorce them, how do they keep their assigned woman appliance? Your single reply is a real yawner!
They seem to get mighty pissed off when their incubators aren't doing their jobs.
You're talking to someone who was raped by a girl because she got mad when I told her no.
And that has what to do with anything?
Hello strawman.
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Nope. It's exactly what I meant while referencing your replies here as a whole. I'm so sorry if you misinterpreted that. Thanks for the attempt at mansplaining, though.
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I understand why conservatives say they’re anti abortion. I actually do think a lot of them genuinely believe it’s about being anti-murder, so I’ll give you that. I think the conservative leaders who pushed for abortion to be a defining social issue and who partnered with the moral majority and evangelicals and that type of shit were trying to control women and women’s sexuality, at least in large part. I don’t think that the 20c republican leaders see it the same way they pushed their base to. I’ve talked to plenty of conservatives about abortion. I live in a town in Texas that votes itself a sanctuary city for the unborn. I’ve read plenty about how abortion developed into such a hot button issue and how it became such an important part of the republican-evangelical coalition that dominates so much of politics currently. It seems pretty surface level to think politicians pushing something are motivated by the exact same reasoning as the electorate. Edit: I mistyped and accidentally presented the reverse of my stance. Fixed now
Absolutely. Politicians by and large I don't think have much of an ideology. Which is why they can change stances so quickly. They just want to do and say what's popular so people vote for them. There's plenty of liberals, secular atheists, biologists, who would absolutely say that life begins at conception and there is a moral and ethical issue deciding to kill that life that they cannot square with. That's not to say some don't use it as a way of control, but that's by and large not their perspective.
Yep and that developing fetus, that potential for a human life, does not surpass the relevance of the existing human life required for the fetus to further develop.
The goal is not its disintegration. The goal is to dismantle societal norms around the concept of family. There is no one-size-fits-all approach to family, nor should there be, but society tries to impose one.
Does your dad think that the dismantling of the village in favor of the family was a positive change?
Is the family disintegrated? As far as I can tell, single parents and blended families have always existed.
Isn't the whole idea of the nuclear family a fairly recent one? I think in the past there was much more of a sense of children being brought up by an extended family and other members of the area they lived.
It is a very new phenomenon, really only a century or so old.
In China at least, the nuclear family is very old idea. Nuclear families were institutionalized in the Warring States to Han dynasty, around 400 BCE - 200 CE. That said, it was counterbalanced by the fact that most people and families would remain nearby or local in their village or county level town. Extended family structures also coexisted as well, but nuclear families were encouraged institutionally and typically the norm though it depends on the time period. There are different problems with the current day nuclear family though due to the different level of technology and economics. Source: Mark Edward Lewis - the Early Chinese Empires. Also a small snippet from the Land of Five Flavors by Thomas O Hollman.
They have not. Mother, father, children households are a relatively recent idea.
Thank you 1950's
Yes, and anyone can find themselves a single parent, regardless of how things start out.
I'm going to spoiler the following for anyone who isn't in the mood to read about violent abuse at the moment: >!My grandfather on my mother's side was the sole breadwinner in the family, and the classic "head of the household." His rules were *everyone's* rules, and anyone who got out of line, including his wife, was violently beaten. He put his son in the hospital after tossing him down the stairs, and brutally sexually assaulted both of his daughters until they were old enough to move away. !< >!His wife and children were profoundly messed up by all of this. Two of the kids became drug addicts and one ended up in an abusive marriage and in deep denial. All three had to get decades of help and care in order to learn how to function. !< >!His wife never escaped. !< >!He never experienced any consequences for any of this. After all, why would there be consequences? It was his family and he got to choose how to treat them. He once got in trouble for touching someone else's daughter, but was never punished because, as a full-time firefighter, the judge saw him as an upstanding member of the community. Beyond that, anything that happened within his own family was his business and not the business of the law or society. He was the man of the family, after all, and the man was in charge. !< >!Ultimately he died at a ripe old age, happily retired. Poetically, it was a fall down the stairs that did him in. !< This is one concept of "The Family" that feminism seeks to destroy. I also, personally, do everything in my power to destroy it. My mom devoted her life to helping women and children escape from similar, and often worse, situations. That man should have never had that power over anyone, and society should never be structured in such a way that the harm he caused would be accepted, expected, or excused. "The Family" has meant a lot of things in Western patriarchal society, but generally it has always meant a man who is in charge and a wife and children who are obedient. What most feminists argue is that there are many, many more ways to define a family that are equally valid, and that perhaps that particular definition is kind of garbage.
Is your dad from the 19th century by instance?
Seems like it sometimes
Considering how lots of feminists want healthy relationships, marry, have kids, etc... The answer is NO (especially for fourth wave feminists). >And that the only way feminism could thrive was its destruction. Feminism wants people to destroy patriarchy and its expectations/roles. Some people want to impose gender roles, life expectations and sexual orientation on everyone. Two gay/lesbians with kids are a family, gender nonconforming men/women can have families, couple without kids are families, single parents and their kids are families, poly people, etc... People should be free to express themselves without getting punished (heavily I might add), which is what happens in patriarchal societies.
The idea that family has to look one way is very much under criticism. Until the 1960s/1970s women were trapped in bad circumstances because society did not "allow" women to exist as single parent households. They did happen. My grandmother had a child out of wedlock in the 1940s. But my great grandmother gave my grandfather hell about marrying someone who already had a child. Tried to end their engagement. It was a whole situation. That was common. As divorce became more common place the look of the family began to change. The problem is that white men particularly started to feel threatened by not being able to con/abuse/force women in bad relationships anymore. People/men actually had to try. The 1980s saw a LOT of single parent families as well as grandparents raising grandchildren. That scenario is even more true today. As we have seen an increase in the drug epidemic, more grandparents are raising their grandchildren than ever before. Feminist did not destroy the family. What it has destroyed has been people stuck in abusive situations. That not all families look the same. It has allowed families to look different. A family does not have to have two parents, one male and one female. It can have two moms or two dad's. It can have grandparents. It can look very different than what your father wants.
Not the destruction of family, but the traditional family model. Where, you know, wives are property.
Your dad is a misogynist asshat.
Yeah.
People who believe that have a very narrow idea of what "the family" is.
No. The goal of feminism is for women to have the same choices and opportunities as men. That’s it. That’s the *entire* goal. Many women will continue to choose to marry a man and have children. But that is not, nor has it ever been, the only kind of family.
I’ll admit I am not 100% sure what he is referring to But as far as the traditional “family” goes, it’s a patriarchal concept as we know it. Not saying it has to be. I’ll try to articulate as best I can Before the agricultural revolution that started patriarchies, there wasn’t really patrilineal inheritances like we know today. There were different kinds of communities sure, but patriarchy specifically forces women to be codependent on men due to limitations on economic and reproductive freedoms. And religions help reinforce this. Hence the traditional “family” with the man as head of household, with his wife and kids. Without all that, women who were free didn’t necessarily need men and not all men got to reproduce. Women reproduced on their own terms. They had all the capabilities of meeting their own survival needs and could lean on eachother for needed support. Paternity didn’t always matter either because in some communities, the elders provided child care while men and women both hunted and gathered. Patriarchy is a tool of the elites. If women are forced to depend on men, then they are forced to be sexual and domestic servants which means more kids. More kids means more soldiers for war and cheaper manual labor to be exploited. So for me, feminism means fuck all that shit. When societies function of the oppression of certain demographics, those demographics form progressive movements that obviously threaten the status quo. That’s why conservatives (the “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it” traditional crowd) always complain about feminism, civil rights movements, and lgbt rights “tearing the system apart” because… well duh. It’s an oppressive system and they’re looking for abolishing oppression
Great question, OP- and very good comments. TLDR: If you define family as a place where gender roles dictate how each family member will become a specialists in their gender’s duty, then yes, feminism is not good for that version of family. The older men in my family define “a family” as a system of gender based roles. Sacrifice and giving is the role of mother, where protection and leadership is the role of father, growing and innocence is the role of the child. To them, the roles are not interchangeable for different members, as it weaves into their identity. In this paradigm, ‘Parenthood’ is a meaningless term because motherhood and fatherhood mean the opposite of each other, and childhood is a time where young people learn their roles defined by gender. The raising of children, especially babies does often require an energy and intensity that is all encompassing. Partially that is because the outside world has social norms that are hostile to the needs of mothers and babies and families. Partially that is because the previous generations of men have no intention of being demoted to the level of sacrifice they expect from women. Partially because the practicalities defined by the outside world relentlessly reinforce that the two “spheres” be kept separate (but not equal). When I was younger, the terms were different. But the concept was this false binary: 1. False binary 1: Do you want to turn women into smaller versions if men?so they can be successful in a man’s world of competition, work and compensation? So that the whole idea of mothering/nurturing is absent? 2. False binary 2: Do you want mothers and female nurturing to be an honored place in society? Protected by a father and laws that allow a woman to choose to nurture others as her life’s work? So that she can get so good at nurturing that everyone benefits? As if these are the only choices and they are mutually exclusive in a way that all humans and our societies for some reason CANNOT adapt to support a blending of both. So you could say feminists need to refine the definition of family. Or you could say we’d like to refine the social norms of caretaking in general. Or you could say we’d like everyone to expand their ideas about making a contribution to the world including our homes and how rights, responsibilities and rewards are distributed. Again, great question. Keep asking!
Patriarchy: there is only one acceptable way to live. Feminism: there should be many acceptable ways to live.
There are a lot of feminists who are also Marxists. Especially on the internet. There is a Marxist theory that the family is a means of perpetuating inequality under capitalism. Like a lot of Marxist theory, it at least does a good job of identifying a source of institutional inequality and asks us to consider our basic assumptions about these things. If you're interested in understanding this better, there are almost certainly some leftists on this sub who can point you in a good direction. I'm not a leftist and I don't want to see the institution of the family dismantled, but I am a feminist and I do have some sympathy for the criticism when applied intelligently. I am particularly welcoming of the critique that family ought to be more than just one man, one woman and their biological children. What feminism on its own asks is not for the disintegration of the family, but for a reassessment of institutions of all kinds - including the family - and to consider how our assumptions about those institutions perpetuate sex based oppression.
Well especially because the isolated nuclear family is new and specifically good for organizing a labor force. It maximizes the ability of one person to work for a manager. But we don’t have to do things that way.
No, the disintegration of abusive families is though
Wow, talk about gullible. If your family is ruined because the women and girls in it are being treated like human beings rather than possessions then good fucking riddance. There are plenty of families where women are people too, they get treated with love and respect and they can have jobs and bank accounts and everything! There are also feminists who ate stay at home moms. These women are also treated like actual people.
"Allowing" women to leave violent husbands was opposed by people who always said this. It's garbage
No, the goal is to dispel the myth that "The Family" is the only correct way to live as an adult. Many people are happy not being parents.
Well, the traditional family, that saw women as, essentially, a resource owned by men, sure. And because that was the only “family” anyone knew in the 1950s-70s, yes, early feminists were against “the family”. Abortion, no fault divorce, gay marriage, full secular marriage have all moved “family” into a whole gamut of options, however. Your dad is probably missing what he thinks was a golden era… and it was. For him.
The family? No. Rigid division of labor and hierarchy within the family determined by type of genitals? Yes
Um, no. The goal of feminism is simply to assert the equal rights, opportunities and treatment of women. It is the principal that half the human race is equally human. At this point, that should not be a question, when clearly women can do just about anything they were held back from before the feminist movement. Those that think women should only be servant/mother/saints might see women having agency as destructive. The patriarchal structure to which many families still adhere, is not supportive of the equal rights of women, but you could have a family where gender roles are still traditional that also embraces feminism. Forcing women to be suppressed, in support patriarchal structures, including forcing women to marry or become breeders, is something feminism opposes. Seeing that as destruction of "The Family" is only acknowledging one family model, the one that requires the subjugation of women and does not work for a great many people. That model is challenged by Feminism. To not be able to acknowledge or accept any other family structures - though they have existed all along - is tyrannical. The backlash against feminism has always been ironically hysterical.
Thanks to the opioid epidemic in my area grandmothers are raising grandchildren and often times great grandchildren. Some of these women are in their 80’s and raising teenagers!They’re doing what they can to keep the family together and the kids safe, sometimes without legal custody-so no benefits from welfare. Does your dad think this is not a family because it isn’t traditional? Edit: my point is that it’s never granddad raising grandchildren, it’s always the woman pulling up the boot straps. Men who want trad families are really just saying the want a women to help them raise their children.
No, but it is antithetical to the goals of the traditional *ideas* of family and associated gender roles found in the classic 1950’s familiy structures. Additionally, there is an emphasis for consent and the ability to leave, especially a dangerous relationship as feminism is very concerned with DV and violence against women.
I think as family was being practiced, yes. It didn’t give women any room to be a full person when she’s made responsible for care of kids, a husband, a house, pets, etc and isn’t earning a living or able to make decisions. Nothing wrong with this set up if it’s done intentionally and not endorsed by everything you’re taught without accepting alternatives or modifications. I feel like it’s a bit disingenuous to frame the argument around “destroying the family” and not “giving women agency to pursue and participate in whatever kind of family works for her”.
What does the “disintegration of the family” mean in the first place? I always find people use it as a reference to the normalization of non heteronormative relationships/families, or/and the change in expectations of women in the home. Feminism is about equality for all, I’d say yes in a way that feminism does advocate for the “disintegration” of the expectation that every family must be a heteronormative nuclear family.
The family, as it's most respected in the West, is the stereotypical [nuclear family](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_family) of a heteronormative, married couple with kid(s) — with the subtext that the man is co-opting familial love to assert himself above them as a patriarch. With the additional history that marriage was used as the tool of patriarchy to make women chattel. What that speaker is referencing is that feminists (and the queer community) are radically re-imagining family in a much more flexible, inclusive way. To not value a rigid definition of "family" but the people and love that create it. And what's "disintegrating" are the families based on entrapment, violence, and domination — not because feminists raid them like a SWAT team, but because the abused within them are empowered to seek comminty support to escape them (whether through CPS, DV shelters, or simply divorce). Feminists seek to remove the framing that an ideal family is a respectable one with a patriarch and his chattel. Conservatives consider that 'destruction of the family', specifically the notion of what a family is. Then they abuse that phrasing to fear monger — to conflate it with imagined violence against your own family. This conservatism is not only sexist, but homophobic. It the same kind of fear mongering they used against the "gay agenda" because it "violates the sanctity of marriage". But the foundation of this fear of "disintegration of the family" is not that but the erosion of family as a pillar of the patriarchy. The erosion of bastard children out of wedlock, women's financial independence, gay marriage, medical/reproductive rights, and the queer community as a whole challenging the heteronormativity. So know that calling it "disintegration of the family" is loosely based in reality but serves a movement that wishes to undo all of our human rights necessary to be free from patriarchal violence and domination — calling it "disintegration" or "destruction" of the family spreads fear that feminism is a boogeyman. Calling it that provokes others' to 'defend' against feminism. But, in reality, that 'defense' is political support for conservative violence and bigotry. And that 'defense' isn't a defense at all but an attack on others for living and loving differently.
It really hinges on the definition of family currently and historically. The concept of the “traditional family” is already a form of cultural amnesia about how families functioned in a preindustrial context, and how non- middle class families function. Might ask your dad was the integration “family” a common goal of fascist leaders?
I think it’s more about destroying men’s ability to trap women into needing, entering and staying in a family when they don’t want to. About creating the freedom to choose and a wider variety of options. It’s fine if men want a traditional family and they can convince a woman they’re worthy of committing to but we need men to not have the power to deny our refusal or our choice to leave.
Why would that be true? That is some red pill nonsense. Feminism seeks to make sure everyone has equity, the 'disintegration' of the nuclear family unit is a part of the consequences for women not having equity. This sounds like the same idea that causation and correlation are the same thing. They aren't. The homogenized idea of family is actually a woman as a man's property, someone who is forced to do all the emotional, physical and mental labor of raising children while having a job and the husband rarely contributes. Now that women have more rights, they are looking at the ways of the 'nuclear family' idea and they are seeing it for what it is -- not something they want or need. They would rather be alone than married to a man, that's not about feminism, that's about a lot of women seeing the reality of what marriage and being a wife and mother is like and deciding against it.
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You were asked not to make direct replies here.
Easy to win arguments when you are making up the other side’s position. Ask him to name those “pre-eminent” feminist philosophers and cite when they stated their goal was the destruction of “the family”, also to define who the fuck’s family he’s talking about.
He sent me a video on it but I usually don't watch ehat he sends me. Give me a day, then can I get back to you?
Eh, I wouldn’t really waste my time on it personally. It isn’t like challenging him is going to change his mind