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When any agenda is hatched, it primarily nests a cause- a cause which serves some good to some person or community. The agenda may hold genuineness and necessity to the people it serves but can be evil to those who are ignored. As the agenda proceeds, it matures and starts to accomplish some of its goals. People working for the agenda form organizations and groups. It starts gaining popularity amongst its beneficiaries and vindicators. With popularity come fame, power and money.
When money comes and keeps on coming, it makes a deep psychological impact on people such that people crave for more and more. If earned by working hard and thereby making an impact on the society, it can always be justified. But some people make (not earn) money by befooling others by projecting different kinds of lies. This holds true for some agendas as well- when money comes and comes to make the cause happen, the original cause is lost and money in itself becomes the new cause.
Most of the organizations have proved to be corrupted with flow of time and money. When independence, the original motto, of Indian National Congress (INC) was achieved in 1947, its protagonist Gandhi wished to dissolve it on the pretext that it would be corrupted over time. However INC continued to function and still does. The whole of India knows what it turned into and how corruption was main ally of it. Not listening to Gandhi not only impaired Congress as a party but India as whole.
Some organizations however have agendas which look too fascinating on papers. The people with such new ideas provide with a manifesto which creates delusion inside the people’s mind and make them dream of utopia. Such ideas look moral and fair inside of dreams, but they have an evil behind the curtains. However with time this evil curtails the idea and overpowers it. This emerges into misery and anguish and eventually towards protests and dissents. Since the original protagonists in the meantime have usurped power playing on people’s emotions, they have everything- their power, money and image- to lose now.
To continue the movement, new agendas and ideas are signed up. Organizations look up for new agendas for the sake of continuing. On the similar lines, a movement for a very noble cause in the west- to grant women voting rights- is one of the most controversial ideas today. Known as 3rd wave feminism, it has been getting backlashes from many conservative and libertarian organizations in America. However in many European countries like Sweden, Germany etc it has become even more powerful.
Feminism is NOT Equality-
How many times we have seen people saying ‘ohh! Feminism is for equality and that’s why I support it.’ This is still a very popular apologia for supporting feminism however it is no longer true. If someone supports equality he/she must call himself/herself egalitarian. If you support equality of genders, it is well justified but it is not feminist. Maybe your version of feminism is equality but apparently it is not the mainstream version.
A significant example proving this point is when India passed the new rape law called Nirbhaya law the government wanted it to be gender neutral law in which even men/boys could have reported sexual assault but the government was forced to take it down because of feminist lobbies. The reason given by feminist lobbies were as absurd as that if the law would be gender neutral then women will face difficulties reporting it [1]. Even the government couldn’t force gender neutral version possible because it didn’t want to be portayed as anti-women.
Whereas in the western world- the world which has faced 2 waves of feminism before- the people are more skeptical of feminists. In the USA only 18% people classified themselves as feminists whereas 82% believe in equality [2]. The figures in the UK are more soothing- only 7% consider themselves feminists but 86% wanted equality.[3]. There haven’t been any such surveys in India but as far as I have experienced, people claim themselves feminists and at the same time believe in equality. This might be because India didn’t face 1st and 2nd wave feminism and people do not really know about what feminism actually was and what it has turned into. People tend to take feminism for the original-theoretical definition and blindly believe in it.
The Self-victimizing Attitude and Fallacies-
In an entitlement context, all sorts of ‘gaps’ and ‘disparities’ automaticallybecome ‘inequities’ and a reason for lashing out at others, instead of improvingyourself. – Thomas Sowell
After voting rights were granted to women, feminism continued moving on on the pretext that women were oppressed by patriarchy. To make sure patriarchy exists they fabricated new myths and drew new conclusions based on those myths. For example- decades old myth they propagated was about gender wage gap. Though no economist takes it seriously, this myth has been by far their political tool.
The data they show on how much a woman makes on a man’s dollar doesn’t account for the difference in professions, the difference in working hours, the difference between wages and salaries and the productivity as individual. For example in a study done by Dr Thomas Sowell in the USA with doctors, it was observed that young male physicians made more money per year compared to
young female physicians but male physicians worked 500 hours more than female physicians per year. Apparently they ought to make more money.
In olden days when heavy machinery didn’t exist and most physical work used to be done by manual labor, men had comparative advantage over women due to their higher physical strength. This higher strength is due to nature and not patriarchy. Women were in disadvantageous situation in mines, farms, construction work and transportation work. So one day of their effort used to be less than a man’s effort for the same time which translated into lesser profit for the firm and hence lesser pay for women.
Other factors like preference of professions also isn’t considered. Women mostly dominate in fields of teaching and nursing whereas men choose to work in riskier hazardous jobs which apparently pay higher than safer jobs. Men work more hours than women. Women choose to go for more work-life balance. Women at a time have kids and sometimes prefer to work part time. Therefore there is a significant difference between earnings of women with and without kids.
Most of the facts that feminist lobbies in the media concealed that it was established in 1973 in the US that women who worked continuously since their high schools through their thirties earned slightly more than men.[4] Even today women in 30s earn more than men both in US [5] and UK [6] for similar kind of jobs. This higher pay can be attributed not to biases against men but to better productivity, educational qualification and negotiation skills.
And if any businessman has to pay low to a woman for similar work with same productivity, he can hire all women. And if he doesn’t he will have to pay an extra cost for discrimination against women, apparently resulting in forfeiture of his profits. There is no need for any law to ensure equal pay- his losses will automatically make him leave the market or to take him anti discriminatory actions.
Another myth propagated both in US and India is about the rape culture. To say Indians are inherently rapists is the new fad among feminists. The news of one single rape in India is broadcasted in international media which stains the whole image of India. The extent of this stain is such that a boy from India was denied internship in Germany because he belonged to the country of rapists. [7]
The allegations of all men being rapists should not be wholly credited to foreign media but also to our own government. Inside the Delhi Metro, there are placards displaying that there are not many men in Delhi because they harass women. To say that most men in Delhi are serial molesters is like rolling in the mud. If every other man is a rapist, I wonder how people in Delhi are living without any civil war.
Again these allegations overlook the basic facts which are not so difficult to obtain in this age of internet (which feminists want to censure because it is not in their favor which I will come later on). Five minute of browsing can lead you to know that India ranks 94th in per capita rapes with just 1.8 rapes per 100,000 people.[8]. As far as Delhi is concerned, statistical data reveals that most-78% rape cases filed in Delhi are fake. This figure has gone up after the passage of Nirbhaya law according to which a man can be arrested on the premise that women can’t lie. Even a court sentence ruled that Delhi bears the tag of rape capital due to fake cases.[9]
The similar kind of mechanics are used by feminist groups in the USA. Their claim that 1 in 5 women are raped in college campuses is nothing more than a hoax. A simple calculation I made showed that if this were true, there would be more rapes inside college campuses than the whole country. Campus rape culture is the real hoax. These kinds of hoaxes not only hamper men but also terrorize prospective women who are going to join colleges.
Inequality of outcome doesn’t mean any kind of oppression. Many countries, in order, to ensure equal representation across parliament, company boards, jobs etc have passed reservation laws. Many universities and countries provide scholarship not on the basis of scholarly character but on gender which even demeans the word scholarship. They claim this will give equal chance to women to overcome hurdles they face. However though they never tell what kind of hurdles women face which others don’t. Maybe some women face disadvantageous conditions, this doesn’t mean collective justice against no injustice has to be provided. Moreover, these types of affirmative actions always lead to degradation in quality of the work.
For example a feminist columnist argued that criterion for STEM must be cut down to encourage more women participation.[10] That feminist either believed that women cannot pass a tough test or she was okay with undeserving female candidates occupying the seats than deserving male candidates. Or maybe she doesn’t respect choices women make in their careers. Moreover she might not know that women have 2-to-1 advantage of getting hired for STEM jobs [11].
The new trend of these feminist groups to demand safe spaced is again depressing. Asking for a space in universities where nobody dares to question you means you cannot defend your stance. And if you are not tolerant to others’ ideas then there is no need to join universities. You can better sit back at home and nobody would impeach your private ideas there.
The following words sum up the issue-
The misconceptions of yesterday do not die easily; they usually end up comprising the conventional wisdom of today. – RW Grant
From noble cause to political theology to vindictive cult-
A claim for equality of material position can be met only by a government withtotalitarian powers. –Friedrich Hayek
A religion or cult doesn’t give you right to question it and its god. All you can do is to sit back and believe what is written or keep your views private. If you dare to question it, you will be charged with blasphemy and put to death in many countries. Due to this unquestionable authority of religious organizations for centuries people were forced to believe that earth is flat. If you question it harsh
consequences will follow not because of god but because of self appointed practitioners.
Similar events occur in any communist and socialist societies owing to their unquestionable authority. Millions of people have been killed because the people in government tried to regulate the behavior of people. Stalin, Mao, Hitler etc had communist/socialist roots which aimed on concentrating social justice against no injustice over individual freedom. In case of both- religion and communism, extreme propaganda with loads of censorship is required.
More or less the same thing is happening to feminism with time. You dare to question feminism, you will put behind bars. The rise in radical version of feminism doesn’t give a heed to personal freedom- be it for women. When late Mr Christopher Hitchens was interviewed by a feminist reporter he claimed that women must have the choice to work or not and it is not compulsory for them to work. Guess what! He was labeled sexist for his views by the feminist reporter.
Feminists have been so much obsessed with gender diversity in different occupations but diversity of ideas is treated with contempt. Several voices by conservative opinions have been silenced from internet and universities. Censorship of ideas and speech has been demanded by such groups. A recent case can be observed when the voice of Milo Yiannopoulos was silenced from UC Berkley by breaking riots and damaging property.[12]
Several requests to demand safe spaces across internet aren’t new. In Canada a man was charged for disagreeing with a woman on Twitter [13]. During his trial period the court granted him bail on the condition that he would not use internet. Basically he was silenced from raising his voice over internet. He had to spend a lot on legal proceedings and thanks to many conservative voices, this case was highlighted and fundraising was done. The basic question arises: is it fine for someone to get offended online and put someone behind bars till no physical harm or threat wasn’t there!
The age of internet is probably the worse for authoritarian ideologies, for people can see what’s going on without falling for their propaganda but our feminists are a step ahead- they want to censor internet as well. Feminist lobbies at the UN wanted to censor internet to save feminists’ feelings.[14] This proves feminists are receiving backlashes from across the internet.
Keeping alone censoring, they even come to rioting on petty issues. The biggest blow on their face was when Mr. Donald Trump won the election. Feminists organized protest marches even when him becoming the President was decision of the voter system, and not patriarchy. In the march feminists resorted to violence or justification of violence against the President. A prominent feminist singer Madonna said that she would blow up the White House.[15] No matter how much they label Mr. Trump as intolerant, their actions reveal they are the biggest of intolerants and hypocrites.
Ohh on hypocrisy, the officials of the self proclaimed world’s first feminist government- Swedish government- put on hijab while visiting Iran. On one hand they talk about empowering women and on other hand they put on hijab which is a symbol of oppression of women. [16]
An Indian actress’ claim that the person who isn’t a feminist is not a good person is again a sign that she is wary of intolerance of ideas- another example of feminism becoming a cult. [17]
The new trend of feminists have lead not only men but also women to misery. Glorification of adoption of an unhealthy lifestyle against fat shaming, forcing women to take career option they don’t want by influence and coercing them to become men is making them loose all their happiness. In fact the happiness levels of women have gone down with every decade and perhaps will continue to do so ifthe level of feminism keeps on rising. To conclude with facts I can say that women were much happier under patriarchy than under feminism (I don’t know if patriarchy exists but for their comfort let’s assume it does)
The rise of internet and pro-freedom voices make me optimistic that feminism is a gone cause like communism. They replying pro-freedom protagonists with contempt and violence is a symbol they are getting more and more impatient. Many feminists’ news outlets like CNN had to close their comments section so that people don’t read what others think of CNN. People in west are denouncing feminism with some exceptions. Mostly the leftover feminism will be dissolved the time media –which is still feminist- will denounce it. The rise of social media will perhaps overpower mainstream media one day and it will be gone.
A society that puts equality before freedom will get neither. A society that putsfreedom before equality will get a high degree of both. –Milton Friedman
Suggestion:
Let’s not delve into the idea that men and women are equal. We are not equal and can never be! We are biologically different and we should be synergistic. Let’s respect the difference we have and turn the society the way it must be. In order to bring equality please don’t try to become men.
All the movements for equality in many countries have failed in the course of history because they take human freedom as contempt thereby becoming authoritarian and unquestionable.
Take great people with great deeds as your ideals without paying a heed to gender/color/race/caste/religion of that person. I have seen many people supporting Hillary and Indira Gandhi because they were women. However if you want to see women only as your godfather, go for great women like Margaret Thatcher and Golda Meir who advocated and fought for freedom. There is no need to go for dictatorial women like Indira Gandhi or miserable ones like Hillary Clinton.
Human civilization is not something achieved against nature; it is rather the outcome of the working of the innate qualities of man. –Ludwig von Mises
References:
[4] The fact that women who worked continuously earned slightly more than men who did the same is from page 103 of "The Economic Role of Women," The Economic Report of the President, 1973,published by the U.S. Government Printing Office.
