When did feminism go completely crazy?

[Katie Boundary]

The feminism that I read about in history books sure does look different from the feminism of today. It used to be about ending sexism. But at some point, it morphed into a twisted religion of trigger warnings, safe spaces, privilege-checking, and ruthlessly censoring and slandering anyone who dares to question the dogma. The zealotry has reached the boiling point in recent years.

First, we had Gamergate, a huge rotting cesspit of an argument that started out as a legitimate criticism of the incestuous relationship between journalists and developers in the video-game industry, then expanded to include censorship of the discussion on platforms like and Reddit, then got derailed by feminists who tried to make it about "misogyny" in response to the hijacking of the hashtag by misogynists who had nothing to do with the actual Gamergate people. To this day, the Wikipedia article on Gamergate covers less than 10% of the relevant information, and it just happens to be the same <10% that supports Zoe Quinn's side of the story, thanks to left-wing activist moderators who have the article in a deathgrip.

Then we had Shirtstorm, a scandal so insane that it proved Poe's Law and even prompted a backlash from famous feminist Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who said "We must reclaim and retake feminism from our fellow idiotic women.".

Now we have this Calgary Expo thing. For those who don't keep up with outrageous stories involving feminists and MRAs, here's the short version: the Honey Badgers, a group of mostly-female comic book artists who have a habit of calling out modern American feminists on their nonsense, set up a booth at the Calgary Comic and Whatever Expo that mostly sold merchandise related to their webcomic, Xenospora, but also had one poster that said "Stand Against Censorship" with a symbol on it that some claim was "the Gamergate logo" (even though Gamergate doesn't actually have a logo). At one panel, titled "Women into Gaming", a member of the group asked for permission to answer a question related to feminism and the MRM, which the panel granted her. The panel ended politely and without butthurt. However, it wasn't long before the Social Justice Tumblrweeds smelled blood in the water and began fabricating complaints of harassment, and the Honey Badgers were banned from the event based on no evidence, with no opportunity to present their side of the story, face their accusers, or appeal the decision.

So my question is, what the hell happened to feminism? When did it change from a respectable civil rights movement to a religion as ridiculous and pernicious as Scientology? Can it be saved, or has it passed a sort of sanity event horizon?

 

[Arwon]

I have literally no idea what we are meant to be discussing here. It's like every other word of the OP should be in scare quotes.

 

[JollyRoger]

To answer the thread title - when MRAs got involved.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

This should be good.

Short.

But good.

 

[Arwon]

Oh hang on hang on wait. Is this a concern troll? Are we being concern trolled here?

 

[gay_Aleks]

Katie Boundary? Whose alt is this?

 

[JollyRoger]

I don't think it's one of my alts.

 

[Birdjaguar]

I think that the change began with the rise, in the 1990s, of "political correctness". PC invaded our language and culture and has reshaped how we talk about things. In doing so many of the gains it provided for have been lost elsewhere inn our ability to express ourselves and carry on a conversation with others.

Here is a bit from Wiki:

Spoiler :

1990s
The term "political correctness" in its modern pejorative sense became part of the US public debate in the late 1980s, with its media use becoming widespread in 1991.[13] It became a key term encapsulating conservative concerns about the left in academia in particular, and in culture and political debate more broadly. Two articles on the topic in late 1990 in Forbes and Newsweek both used the term "Thought police" in their headlines, exemplifying the tone of the new usage, but it was Dinesh D'Souza's Illiberal Education: The Politics of Race and Sex on Campus (1991) which "captured the press's imagination".[13] "Political correctness" here was a label for a range of policies in academia around supporting multiculturalism through affirmative action, sanctions against anti-minority hate speech, and revising curricula (sometimes referred to as "canon busting").[13][14] These trends were at least in part a response to the rise of identity politics, with movements such as feminism, gay rights movements and ethnic minority movements. That response received significant direct and indirect funding from conservative foundations and think tanks, not least the John M. Olin Foundation, which funded D'Souza's book.[15]

In the event, the previously obscure term became common-currency in the lexicon of the conservative social and political challenges against progressive teaching methods and curriculum changes in the secondary schools and universities (public and private) of the U.S.[16] Hence, in 1991, at a commencement ceremony for a graduating class of the University of Michigan, the then U.S. President George H.W. Bush spoke out against: "... a movement [that would] declare certain topics 'off-limits', certain expressions 'off-limits', even certain gestures 'off-limits'..."[17]

Herbert Kohl (1992) pointed out that a number of neoconservatives who promoted the use of the term "politically correct" in the early 1990s were actually former Communist Party members, and, as a result, familiar with the original use of the phrase. He argued that in doing so, they intended "to insinuate that egalitarian democratic ideas are actually authoritarian, orthodox and Communist-influenced, when they oppose the right of people to be racist, sexist, and homophobic."[5]

Mainstream usages of the term politically correct, and its derivatives &#8211; "political correctness" and "PC" &#8211; began in the 1990s, when right-wing politicians adopted the phrase as a pejorative descriptor of their ideologic enemies &#8211; especially in context of the Culture Wars about language and the content of public-school curricula. Generally, any policy, behavior, and speech code that the speaker or the writer regards as the imposition of a liberal orthodoxy about people and things, can be described and criticized as "politically correct".[18] Jan Narveson has written that "that phrase was born to live between scare-quotes: it suggests that the operative considerations in the area so called are merely political, steamrolling the genuine reasons of principle for which we ought to be acting..."

Its origins are apparently with the far right, but I think it has undermined our ability to communicate.

 

[gay_Aleks]

That's exactly what the man to whom the alt belongs to would say.

 

[JollyRoger]

I think that the change began with the rise, in the 1990s, of "political correctness". PC invaded our language and culture and has reshaped how we talk about things. In doing so many of the gains it provided for have been lost elsewhere inn our ability to express ourselves and carry on a conversation with others.

Here is a bit from Wiki:

Spoiler :

1990s
The term "political correctness" in its modern pejorative sense became part of the US public debate in the late 1980s, with its media use becoming widespread in 1991.[13] It became a key term encapsulating conservative concerns about the left in academia in particular, and in culture and political debate more broadly. Two articles on the topic in late 1990 in Forbes and Newsweek both used the term "Thought police" in their headlines, exemplifying the tone of the new usage, but it was Dinesh D'Souza's Illiberal Education: The Politics of Race and Sex on Campus (1991) which "captured the press's imagination".[13] "Political correctness" here was a label for a range of policies in academia around supporting multiculturalism through affirmative action, sanctions against anti-minority hate speech, and revising curricula (sometimes referred to as "canon busting").[13][14] These trends were at least in part a response to the rise of identity politics, with movements such as feminism, gay rights movements and ethnic minority movements. That response received significant direct and indirect funding from conservative foundations and think tanks, not least the John M. Olin Foundation, which funded D'Souza's book.[15]

In the event, the previously obscure term became common-currency in the lexicon of the conservative social and political challenges against progressive teaching methods and curriculum changes in the secondary schools and universities (public and private) of the U.S.[16] Hence, in 1991, at a commencement ceremony for a graduating class of the University of Michigan, the then U.S. President George H.W. Bush spoke out against: "... a movement [that would] declare certain topics 'off-limits', certain expressions 'off-limits', even certain gestures 'off-limits'..."[17]

Herbert Kohl (1992) pointed out that a number of neoconservatives who promoted the use of the term "politically correct" in the early 1990s were actually former Communist Party members, and, as a result, familiar with the original use of the phrase. He argued that in doing so, they intended "to insinuate that egalitarian democratic ideas are actually authoritarian, orthodox and Communist-influenced, when they oppose the right of people to be racist, sexist, and homophobic."[5]

Mainstream usages of the term politically correct, and its derivatives – "political correctness" and "PC" – began in the 1990s, when right-wing politicians adopted the phrase as a pejorative descriptor of their ideologic enemies – especially in context of the Culture Wars about language and the content of public-school curricula. Generally, any policy, behavior, and speech code that the speaker or the writer regards as the imposition of a liberal orthodoxy about people and things, can be described and criticized as "politically correct".[18] Jan Narveson has written that "that phrase was born to live between scare-quotes: it suggests that the operative considerations in the area so called are merely political, steamrolling the genuine reasons of principle for which we ought to be acting..."

Its origins are apparently with the far right, but I think it has undermined our ability to communicate.

Well yeah, we can use the PC term MRA here, instead of being more frank, but infracted.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Its origins are apparently with the far right, but I think it has undermined our ability to communicate.

How long has it been since anything really bad originated with the far left? Anyone remember?

 

[Farm Boy]

That youtube guy is tweaking the hell out over an article written by a couple randos on the internet.

 

[JollyRoger]

How many MRAs does it take to change a lightbulb?

Well what are feminists doing to campaign against the dark and its disproportionate effect on men?

 

[gay_Aleks]

How long has it been since anything really bad originated with the far left? Anyone remember?

USSR? Eastern Europe?

 

[BvBPL]

Lock up your sons and head for the hills, dem womens got opinions!

 

[Farm Boy]

And they're just as dumb as we ever were. But is that really news?

 

[gay_Aleks]

Lock up your sons and head for the hills, dem womens got opinions!

I have a distinct feeling that this is not helping.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

USSR? Eastern Europe?

For some reason I always associate autocratic rule and military domination with the right, not the left. America has perhaps been through some sort of reversal process.

 

[Farm Boy]

The Great Leap Forward doesn't seem like a shining beacon of non-rightness either. Though I think they're mostly done with dressing it up by this point.

 

[JollyRoger]

16 ounce sodas and sticks no thicker than our thumbs. Too much regulation.