I find myself at a crossroads of upapologetically defining myself as a feminists to most - while other feminists wagging a finger at me telling me i'm not a real feminist because I have come to have a rabid dislike for much of what feminism manifests itself into online.

I do think as far as the GOP and religious zealots go - they do see feminism and gay rights as an attack on traditional families. They see the erosion of roles as a bad thing. And i can see why they see that. Because when the expectation for those roles erode, there's this ...silent opposite expectation that women should be shunned for willfully adopting those traditional roles. The choice to be "empowered" or to be traditional isn't as free as feminist make it out to be. They can be just as judgmental as the type of Christians who throw their daughter's purity balls.

People act like being a house wife and a mother is a "respectable choice" in open debate - but we all know the reality behind making that choice. That people who call themselves "feminists" will often look down on you like you're wasting your life. That you're squandering opportunity that has been fought for you to take advantage of. And ..that's bullshit. Same thing for folks who find that traditional (to exploitative levels even - like say in BDSM) roles regarding sex isn't a valid "choice". It's hushed, but it's their hanging in the air at all time.

All in all? yes - there's a "war on women". Just look at how abortion clinics are being targeted, how the GOP slut shames women advocating for birth control insurance coverage.

Internet-feminism is a joke. SRS, Tumblr, the whole lot of it. I don't want to be one of those bro's going "it's third wave feminism" because i believe in some of those tenants - but it's this first world, white privileged application of it. Internet feminism is a bunch of progressives trying to out-progressive each other online from their comfortable dorm rooms or parent's mcmansions, tone policing, micro-analyzing every word and sentence everyone says in search of the perfect "trigger" or slightly un-pc terminology so you can claim that person isn't a "real" [ feminist/social-justice-type/progressive/liberal].

It's just allies, not uniting over something pragmatic to affect systems of power ( cultural or otherwise), but nitpicking each other to take each other down a peg, turning outrage not into effective action - but into passive, online, slacktivist recreation and gossipy blog battles. It's a battle of egos. It's using "social justice" as a bat to clobber people with so you can posit yourself as something noble and "more moral" than everyone else. It's often used as a tool of elitism by people who never go out and actually interact with flesh and blood people, scoring points behind screen-names on the internet.

If i call myself an "idiot" for misplacing my keys this morning - then i'm literally Hitler for being "ableist".

And while there's a reality behind micro-aggressions, and not telling the offended what they have a right to be offended over - the reality of that means everyone has to always walk on an increasingly complex minefield of bullshit to hopefully, possibly maybe not "trigger" someone. There has to be a line where pragmatism kicks in. We are not automatons and we can't possibly know what could trigger or be a micro-aggression for literally every person on this earth. And being made out to be a piece shit for stepping over a line here or a line there is fucking dehumanizing, it doesn't build bridges, it doesn't win people to your cause.

While I despise MRAs, Redpillers, (while sharing care for some MRA issues - like circumcision or child custody), and i despise this whole false equivalence between rape and false rape accusations - i don't agree with feminists about drinking and sex. Yes - there are predators who wait for a woman to get more drunk and they take advantage. Yes, consent with drinking is tricky for either the painfully unaware or the wicked - but plenty of people have consenting sex after a few drinks and it's not rape. I can recognize when someone is unable ot make a choice, or to say admit that choice is cloudy and i should pass, or when we did something willfully to let our inhibitions down a bit together and as someone who has saved friends from being raped when too drunk to stand - i balk at the accusation that i'm a rapist b/c me and my wife got shit faced and boned a few times.

I balk at sex-negative feminists as well.

And while I support the body acceptance movement in their motions to deter bullying about body type - i disagree that "fat can be healthy" and i will not have my personal preferences in what i find attractive to be shamed.

And while I admit - sexuality is fluid and gender is not a binary - for MOST people... it's a pretty straight forward thing. And again - while people shouldn't bully or be bigoted towards gays and trans and bisexuals - it's simply not important for people to immerse themselves in that reality and fully flesh out sexuality and gender to that academic level, to understand it at that level when it doesn't apply to them. Transgendered people are what? One in like 10,000 people ? Education and awareness is important to protect these people from being bullied, beaten, made homeless, and whatnot. But exactly how infinitely small does a demographic have to be for society to not change things like say... bathrooms? How small of a demographic is too small for society to not change certain normative behaviors to compensate for them? Again - is there a pragmatic way to look at this?

The problem with online social justice is you become beholden to the furthest extremes of that view point. No matter how far left you go, it's never far enough.

Which is hilarious considering off the internet - the left, for all intents and purposes - is dead. The "liberal" party is centrist, capitalist and war mongers. Unions are a thing of the past - except for teachers and police officers. Democrats, for hte most part, keep poverty issues on the back burner. The only two roads the left is making gains on is gay rights and slowly on environmental issue. Too slowly.

But who cares? WHo cares if it's dead in the real world when you can write your tumblr blog about how being obese is beautiful and how talking about the master/slave relationship on old computer hard-drives "triggers" your racial micro-aggressions.