Why did you become interested in gender equality issues?

Question

Was there a particular moment or something specific that made this an important issue for you?

Answer 1

I honestly couldn't tell you. It just popped into my head one day and never left.

Answer 2

I honestly think this as the most sought after and most time and energy spent place on Yahoo Answers.  Hence I see there is a potential to make money here.  I want to study the system before I formulate the business plan and methodology.  There was no particular moment or something specific that made this an important issue for me.  I see a crowd and now I am inside the crowd.  Thats all.

Answer 3

Simply I feel that feminism is a grave threat to gender equality.

Answer 4

A few years ago, I was noticing the amount of anti-male commercials on TV and I thought it was just a fad.  Not only did it not pass, but the commercials got more and more sexist and I wondered why.

So I looked around the internet to see if others were upset about it which led me to read a lot of feminist blogs, websites and articles.

My jaw hit the floor.

Were they SERIOUS?

Did they really believe all of those things about men?

I started to devote hours a day reading up on feminism.  I tried to find some semblance of "balance" or logical explanation of why laws have to be slanted against men to help women.

Needless to say I never found the balance or reasonable explanations.

An important day for me was when I stumbled onto the ifeminists website and the iwf website.

Here I found groups of ex-feminist women that had the exact read on feminism that I'd developed through my research.

They were extremely critical of the anti-male bias and hypocritical nature of mainstream feminism.

Educated and intelligent women that left feminism because it was harmful to society and anti-male.

The world made sense again.

Answer 5

I honestly think that both men and women have their place.  I would much rather cook meals and raise children than break my back working a 60 hour week.

Honestly.. why do you think we were made so differently?

Answer 6

My work puts me into contact with a lot of young men who seem to be marginalized and disenfranchised from contemporary society.  It seemed to me that the increasing prohibition against traditional male roles and traditional notions of masculintiy was causing serious problems for male role identity, particularly since there was not a lot of models for updated means to express masculinity.  So, I started looking into how men learn to be men and how the apparent devaluing of masculinty was affecting men, young and old.  What I found was a lot of angry men, who view themselves as being usurped by "feminism" but not a lot of proactive solutions on either side.  (THis place (GWS) brings out the polar extremes of the issue, but sometimes you find thoughtful and interesting folks asking and answering thoughtful and interesting questions.)  So, no, there was no "aha" moment, it was more of an evolution and a desire to provide my son with a schema for being proud of the fact that he is male.

Answer 7

I was lucky - married with three kids but with a husband who always encouraged me to go out to work then to go on and get an education -

There was an absolute feeling in the  mid sixties that 'Its time'  - we'd been educated then thrown out of any decent chance of any interesting  job ,

No way women could leave their husbands even if he was nearly killing them

No chance of buying a house without a husband. The banks didnt recognise women as proper living people.

In the early 1970s in Adelaide one woman killed her husband who had previously raped and sodomised her two eldest daughters then began on the youngest when she was thirteen. She had no other way of getting away from him.  When she was sentenced as though she was a fully criminal murderer, the next day there were tremendous angry gatherings and for the following month  the outcry grew bigger and bigger.  More people got drawn in, politicians took sides,  people argued fiercely in work places.  

It was by no means the beginning of feminism in Adelaide ( a factory inspector in the 1890s called Agnes Milne had worked against Sweated labour') but it was the tipping point .

A bit later we were able to put on a graduate diploma in Womens Studies and doctors, lawyers, politicians, full time housewives,  came as students, taught us a great deal

Answer 8

no... not per se.

my mother doesn't consider herself a feminist, but ought to be it's poster child.  she has been discriminated against in every possible way.  denied credit because she's a woman.  denied specific classes because she's a woman.  denied equal pay for equal work because she's a woman.  even denied the opportunity to dress the way she wanted because she's a woman.

hard to ignore really...

Answer 9

To overly simplify it, I got tired of hearing about how bad men are and seeing the hypocrisy of the so many women who want "equal rights," but also want the old special treatment women got for being put on a pedestal in the old days.  Also, it does concern me how women are treated in some parts of the world.

Answer 10

I would say it was when I hit my teens. Until that point, it made absoulutly no difference in my life as a girl. I helped Mom with the "girl" things, and helped Dad with the "boy" things.

When I left home, I noticed that I was expected to act in certain ways because I was female. It just never dawned on me that my gender would be an issue.

Answer 11

They (Gender issues) affect me, from school to family. I can easily relate to everything here, as it does happen. My parents played a big role in influencing my opinion.

Something specific? Not really, but the handwriting and marks issue in my school which I mentioned before got overboard, and that really got me riled up! I had kept shut all along because women in India were at a disadvatage, but that was the last straw! But there is a reason I avoid issues of feminism in India, as the urban and rural scenarios are very different. I spend most of my time dissing feminists in the west.

I didn't even know there was a GWS section in Y!A before my Math contact ksoileau (unintentioanlly) made me aware of it. Before that, I was in Math, Wrestling, and Soccer (UK Premier Leagues).

If I'd known before, I could have poisoned so many other people's minds! (LOL!)

EDIT: Sure, Jim.

It's bedtime here, so to cut a long story short, girls got more marks for the same answers, and only boys' handwriting was criticized, though I know some girls with two left hands.

EDIT: I can elaborate now.

Well, once I was called up to check the teacher's totalling in Social Science (some class test). I was astounded to see that the girls got 'phantom marks'. My totalling was accurate (checked it twice), and was always nearly 5 marks less than what was put in the mark box. I told her that, and the blatant cheat actually added marks in some wrong answers and told me: "Fixed now, isn't it?" I could do nothing, as I had no proof. Luckily, those marks don't count towards the Board Exams, which I was glad I did well (Heart was in mouth, May 27)

And handwriting. Boys were the favourite punching bags for that. I could barely read a few girls' writing (two left hands, like I said), but they were spared the shame. I doubt my marks in the Boards would have been so high if I had two left hands. They are corrected by neutral examiners in some other state who don't know (and don't care) who I am and how I write.

Answer 12

Because I know that gender differences don't exist, when I started studying spychology I became very interested at peoples bizarre views and the prejudism they have.