So You Want To Defame "Liberal Feminism"?

That's cute.

I mean, really. Talking about the suckiness of feminism? Never been done before!

However, I suggest that prior to accusing an entire movement of being a hate group, one would be able to make a much, much stronger argument by:

     a) Providing actual examples, quotes, and instances of actual members of the alleged "hate group" engaging in hateful rhetoric or actions; and

     b) Reading actual blogs, articles, and books written by actual members of the alleged "hate group" so one actually knows WTF one is talking about.

Unfortunately, conservative, anti-feminist blogger "Euripedes," a dude who claims to be a "history and political science professor" does neither.

And, if you peruse his blog for 20 seconds, you will find that this tactic of Making Claims Without Supporting Evidence While Possessing Total And Utter Confidence That His Readers Are Trembling Undergrads Who Will 100% Take His Word On Things is, you will find, a common strategy utilized by the professor.

Observe, "Euripedes" in action, setting up his "Biggest Hate Groups In America" article:

"Modern liberalism bases its ideology in large part on the concept of oppression. The ideology grew up out of a desire to protect oppressed classes of people in order to enfranchise them into society. One such class distinction started with the Marxist concept of the proletariat, or, in modern terms, 'the poor.' Blacks and women as oppressed classes were included. Stemming from the successes of the civil rights movement, other classes formed: homosexuals, animals, and even the earth itself. All tried to create special legal protections in order to achieve that most elusive of Marxist liberal ideals - equality of outcomes."

This paragraph, dear readers, is a true marvel, isn't it?

Animals, "even the earth itself," all formed and tried to create "special legal protections" for themselves. 

It's like, if dude says "proletariat" and "enfranchise," he thinks those words will be fancy enough to render invisible the fact that the rest of the paragraph is logically absurd, incoherent, and not at all a realistic, nuanced representation of history, liberalism, or any of the social movements referenced therein.

The intellectual immaturity continues, when "Euripedes" begins defining the Biggest Hate Groups In America (dun-dun DUN!) while of course not supporting his contentions with actual evidence.

Natch, we're on it ya'll:

"Liberal Feminists
Apparently there is no duplicity when a conservative woman is maligned. Think of the public destruction of Sarah 'I can see Russia from my house' Palin, Michelle 'crazy eyes' Bachmann, Laura 'talk slut' Ingraham, and recently Ann 'never worked a day in her life' Romney.

I watched, along with the rest of America, as Sarah Palin was systematically excommunicated from the true believers, ostracized from mainstream America, and slandered as an object of derision across the news and entertainment media. Modern feminism no longer defends the rights of women. It only defends the rights of women to have abortions and to adhere to liberal doctrine. Women with beliefs other than modern liberalism need not apply.

Is there any more proof needed to show that liberal feminism is a hate group?"

Obviously not, "Euripedes." CASE CLOSED!

LOL, I love it. The overconfidence of the ignorant never fails to entertain.

Dude cites no actual feminists doing any of these hate-y things, vaguely references some people somewhere being mean to conservative women, but somehow thinks he's just given the world a shut-and-dry case against "liberal feminists."

Look. I read feminist blogs. A lot of them. I can think of no major or minor feminist blog that I've seen that has engaged in misogynistic or sexist attacks on any of the women he has mentioned. Do we criticize them? Hell yes. But, from feminists, this criticism has, for the most part, not been sexist or misogynistic.

Sexism and misogyny, for those who actually talk about the topics on a regular basis and not solely when one is "concerned" about the topic for purposes of bashing feminists, is a serious problem for all women in politics. Liberal, conservative, progressive. That's why many feminists, myself included, have defended the women "Euripedes" names against the sexist and misogynistic attacks leveled against them even though such women rarely have our backs, are often anti-feminist themselves, and who actively work against the rights of other women.

Had "Euripedes," and the other anti-feminist know-nothings who trot out this meme on a near-daily basis, actually read feminist blogs, he and they might know that.


Instead, dude makes the common ignorant mistake of (a) conflating liberalism, a male-dominated non-feminist and often misogynistic political movement, with feminism, and (b) thinking that feminism, and feminism alone, is responsible for anything mean, sexist, misogynistic, and degrading that happens to the women who count (ie- conservative women).

So, yet again, I'll repeat.

The biggest failing of anti-feminists isn't that they're assholes, which indeed many of them are, it's that they so utterly fail at understanding or even trying to understand that which they loathe.

FAIL.