'What does feminism mean to you' - A reaction to Emma Watson's Speech.

On September 20th 2014, Emma Watson, U.N. Women Goodwill Ambassador, delivered an important speech on feminism which received a lot of media attention. Her speech announced the launch of HeforShe,a campaign aiming to include men in the issue of
gender equality and break the stigma associated with the word feminism. It prompted us to ask our community, "What does Feminism mean to you?"

[mandyschmidt]

If feminism was a movement for men and women, what's the point of having it in the first place when it supposedly addressed both sexes, the only biological sexes. That would mean neither is oppressed.

[goondocksaints]

Her speech was about 13 minutes long, and she spent about 30 seconds talking about men's issues. The only two men's issues she mentioned were that men commit suicide because they are not 'allowed' to show their emotions. Showing emotions wouldn't even crack the top 50 of issues that matter to men. And suicide has little or nothing to do with being able to show emotion. If she wants to convince men that she cares about their issues, she shouldn't simply guess what she thinks those issues might be. To men, it sounds like she's saying that the solution for men is to behave more like women. She should have asked men what issues actually are important to them. Imagine if a man made a speech of the same length where women's issues were little more than a footnote. Now imagine that footnote was something that barely mattered to women. Even when she wanted to seem interested in men's issues, she spent about 4% of the speech discussing men's issues in a speech about equality. If that's the closest to equality that she can get, you'll forgive me if my response is "Thanks, but no thanks." She spent at least ten times longer discussing what men should be doing for women, that speaks volumes. In other words, what men need is barely a consideration, but what men can do for women is a top priority - in the name of, you know, equality.

[JuicyCharon]

Unfortunately, not everyone just listens to what people say something is. We define things empirically. Feminism believes that men and women should be equal (I'll give you that) but it's the movement to advocate equality for women equal to men. Therefore to be a feminist, you must first believe that men and women are not equal in society. So when you say that feminism is advocating for equality and therefore you should be a feminist, you are misquoting your own movements definition. This is the reason why feminism does not support any Men's issues because it's not what the movement it about. If we observe what feminism has done for men, we'd find next to zero things that it has done to help men. 

[petegiant]

If feminists are all about the rights of everyone. Why are most so against people who feel most comfortable with traditional gender roles and actively push both sexes away?

[TheAtheistGamer]

feminism is a good as getting a kick in the balls. i would point out all the flaws on feminism but i doubt i could change anyone minds. 

[stevelalancette]

At 3:53... '' We have a very patriarchal society...''. Mam... come here in Québec, you'll see a tremendous world different from your statement. And by the way... take the liberty to look at our significative numbers... abortion numbers, mariage numbers, suicide numbers, money spent by our gov to women organizations and other. IF Québec was a country... we would be the most single people in the worlds (56% in 2011 of all adults). Children have almost 4-5 parents each. Go in the very detail of our PATRIARCHAL society!!!

[darksoul]

How can you say you want equal rights (for women obviously) when in fact women have already all the rights and even more than men? I wanna know when men finally start to fight for the same rights that women already have:

Will they ever have the right to refuse the draft without any consequences and still have the right to vote? Women got the right to vote for free without any duties - they got it handed to them. Isn't that unfair? So for me it always sounds ridiculous that women got the right to vote - they didn't earn it, they didn't have any duties or responisbility like men who only get the right to vote when they sign the draft.

Will they ever have ANY reproductive rights? Right now a man has no reproductive rights at all. A fathers can't choose parenthood like women can.


Will they ever be protected from genital mutilation like girls are already?

Will they ever get the same low prison sentences as women?

Will they ever be seen as equal capable of being a good parent when it comes to a divorce as women are seen as? Right now when it comes to a divorce it's more than just likely that the woman gets the child simply because she's the mother.

Will the definition of rape ever include males as well? Right now the definition of rape only includes the penetration of any orifice with any object. Obviously that's not how most men are gettin raped by women.

I'm gettin really sick of all this "We fight for women's rights" crap when they already have the same rights as men and even more. Yet they are bitching about that in Europe and the US and NOT A SINGLE FEMINIST talks about said issues mentioned above let alone all the double standards for men and women.


And then this patriarchy bullshit. How often does it need to be debunked as bullshit? Get some fuckin reality.

[sergioserranoayvar]

Hypocrisy . This movement want emasculated man