Tuesday, June 13, 2006

Feminism Is Not A Fucking Dating Service

This whole "nice guy" thing is really making the rounds on the internets.

What's a poor, well-meaning young male to do?

The thing is, Pete continued, I don’t think girls want feminist guys! You know that whole thing where girls aren’t into nice guys but would rather have bad boys? It’s like they say they want one thing, but in reality they want another. If I want to meet girls and have fun, I have a lot more success when I don’t try and be pro-feminist. I mean, why should I be more feminist than the women around me?

And, as we all know, feminism isn't about being a decent human being and adhering to ideas of basic human rights. It's about getting laid.

McBoing gives our intrepid hero some much better advice than Hugo's gentle chortling about how difficult it is to be nice and get laid.

Nice guys do get laid. Trust me. But that's got nothing to do with feminism.

I could tell you that I really wanted to be a smart, strong woman, but men just aren't attracted to strong, smart women. So it wouldn't be in my best interests to be strong and smart, cause then I wouldn't get laid. So I'd make myself less of a person in order to make other people feel better?

People would tell me I was nuts.

And smack me upside the head.

Not chortle coyly.

5 comments so far. What are your thoughts?

Anonymous said...

What irritates me is this bullshit line about trying to be what someone else wants.

What the hell ever happened to just being yourself and letting the chips fall where they may?

David Moles said...

What the hell ever happened to just being yourself and letting the chips fall where they may?

Did that work for you when you were twenty? If so, more power to you, but a lot of the rest of us didn't even know who we were at that age.

Maybe I'm reading it wrong, but I'm not seeing all the nasty enabling shit in Schwyzer's post that McBoing's seeing. I'm just seeing a student who's not getting everything he should be getting out of what's actually damn useful advice.

Feminism is not a dating service, but college is. Look, apologies to any twenty-year-old guys in the audience, but as a former twenty-year-old guy: twenty-year-old guys are not clear thinkers where sex is concerned. And if you're a twenty-year-old guy and you're not getting laid, that's probably a lot more important to you than being a good human being.

Which, if you're the sort of person that likes to think you'd like to be a good human being, is going to cause trouble.

Schwyzer's giving the guy a way -- even if the guy's not taking it -- to think of feminism and his personal problems as separate issues, and to stop blaming the latter on the former. I really don't see how that's not a positive step.

Kameron Hurley said...

I think Hugo generally has good advice, and there was a lot I agreed with in the post (particularly the bit about "confidence" as opposed to "badness" being sexy). At the same time, I do agree with McBoing that Hugo got a little too smug and good-old-boy ha ha at the end.

I like the work he does. His heart is in the right place.

But you know what? I was a freakin' ball of hormones at 20 and jumping all over my opportunities, but I didn't have to compromise my core belief systems in order to get laid.

Sure, I thought I might: everyone feels that way. But I'd like a message of "You know what, it's important to be yourself: a good, confident person," message to a "ha ha boys will be boys at 20" message.

David Moles said...

Or, it's important for you to be a good and confident person and for that good and confident person to be the real you. But, even though the smugness is deeply unattractive, I think the rest of Hugo's approach is a lot more likely to get the kid there than just telling him what kind of asshole he is.

But I know we're on the same side here and you're not actually advocating that in any way, plus I'm kinda hung over and oxygen-deprived, so I'm going to stop treating this as an argument. How 'bout that Christopher Priest?

Kameron Hurley said...

Ah, David, you're great.

Yea, I don't think we're having an argument so much as a discussion about approach and tone.

Will address this more in email later today when I pretend I have a Real Job.  

Posted by Kameron Hurley