Feminism and Humanism

Warning: this post only briefly touches on music themes.

Fundamentally, feminism derives from humanism. It is a subset of humanism. Gay rights would be another example. But feminism addresses something more specific than humanism does. Feminism addresses a social bias, or many small social biases.  Were there no bias, there would be no need for feminism. But, unfortunately, we are far from that ideal, and feminism is quite relevant

Personally, I don't often advertise myself as a feminist. I prefer to be silent on that, and let my actions speak louder than words. My wife calls me a feminist, which is the way I prefer it. I don't promote myself as a feminist, but women who know me well do. I feel like if I promote myself as a feminist, that is a lot to live up to. Like "oh do you go to rallies?" no. not really.

I treat women with respect. And when I see things in society that are biased against women in a fucked up way, I point it out. I might get visibly upset about it. I try to be conscious subtle biases in my own mind as well.

A quick story.. I was a the Sleater-Kinney show in New York City at Irving Plaza in December 2015. After waiting is a line around the block people were asked to queue up into two lines, his and hers. Well, with the demographic at a Sleater-Kinney show, this did not result in two equal line. Guys were able to shoot to the front of the line, and women who were near the front were now behind. In the
male line myself, I tried to stall. I was ordered to go ahead. I continued to stall until dumb-asses started passing me by. Tall dumb-asses. This upset me. If you've been to a Sleater-Kinney show, you probably know fans are competitive for real estate near the stage. It seems the guys could at least wait until the people (women) who were in fuckin front of them before had entered. And then also consider that a lot of us are taller. I'm 6 feet tall. At most Sleater-Kinney shows I can be two or three rows back and still feel like I'm near front because I'm taller than most of the people in front of me. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to be at the back, but one or two rows in front of me are ok. This upset me, not just because the venue had a fucked up practice, but more so because my SK brethren did not side with me. I felt like some one was not paying attention.

When you look, you see things like this all around. One common instance is the work place.
I'll digress for a moment on that. I work in an office space. I try to be conscious of the subtle biases that can make the work environment hostile, or at least, less friendly, to those around me. For example, I try not to think about a female manager as "agressive" or "witchy" for the same behavior that would be strength in a man. I see this sometimes. Female executives walk a tight rope.. to be competitive with their peers, and not be "shrill" or "pushy", or, my pet peeve, "bosy". Sometimes, office-place banter rubs me the wrong way, like I hear a joke and think "was that subtle
homophobia?" and sometimes I can diffuse that by throwing in the old Seinfeld line "Not that there's anything wrong with that". As in, "yea, she's a competitive manager.. not that there's anything wrong with that." When I'm conscious of things like this, I view that as feminist thought. A humanist may or may not think that way, depending on her level of awareness. Feminism then, for me, is about awareness. It's about exposing this sort of bias and challenging people to think bigger. In some cases it also means calling myself on my own biases (yes, I have those too).

And then there are not-so-subtle biases. There is an obvious need for more women in positions of political power and in science, technology, and math fields. So I think we need special programs that help women develop those skills from a young age. I've written elsewhere about the biases I see in rock'n'roll. So I think a rock camp for girls is a good thing.

I'm not in favor of feminism against men. I don't think many real feminists are (probably none).
I'm a straight white boy myself, so I benefit from a lot of the biases in society. In fact, I can go further then that, I personally am: male, white, heterosexual, cis-gendered, middle-aged, able-bodied. I'm even tall and right-handed. Sometimes I feel like that puts me in a position where I should speak up. Like, it shouldn't always be the minority group that has to speak up for themselves. Sometimes, the rest of us, those who admittedly benefit from the inequality, should speak out and say "that's fucked up."

If, for example, gay people want to speak up for their right to marriage, then certainly, they should. But they shouldn't have to, or at least, they shouldn't be the only one. The rest of us too should speak "that's fucked up. not ok"

The part that is feminism is the recognition that there is currently a flawed playing field and the willingness to take action to address that. Humanism will get you to this point also, but there are two more steps, which are recognition and action. Once you get to that point, I would argue that the word "feminist" applies. If, on the other hand, you feel like the word is too loaded, or too vague, or if you prefer the word "humanist" I would not fault you for that. In some ways I do the same myself

so on humanism then..

I do claim to be a humanist. that is my go-to answer if people ask about religion (this doesn't happen often, but it does happen, especially when I used to live in the south-eastern USA.) Humanism for me means simply that I start from a premise of human value, and derive beliefs from there. I joke that humans may be lower than gods, but at least I can prove humans exist. If you accept the premise of human value, then it follows that care for the environment is important, because the fragile
ecosystem of planet earth is humanity's only home. I embrace the human experience, for better and for worse, and I pursue the better, seeking to reduce the suffering. that doesn't have to stop with humanity, I think basic human decency also reduces unnecessary suffering for life in general, including animals.

When I talk about humanism, it is a core principle of a larger world view, and "humanism" is a handy verbal handle to put on an otherwise abstract concept. I also reserve the right to define what humanism means to me, because that is a diverse philosophical school of thought, and I don't endorse it all.

From humanism stems feminism, and other "isms" you could name. Gay rights are human rights. But there IS a need to call out gay rights specifically, because there are specific biases in our culture and our laws.

If I'm offered humanism as an alternative to feminism, I might take issue with that. That can marginalize the importance of awareness. As an analogy, if you say the slogan shouldn't be "black lives matter" but rather "all lives matter." ..that seems true on the surface. But the problem is it marginalizes the fact that we do have systematic legal discrimination against black lives, that, unfortunately, all too often results in the loss of life. If you want to stick with the generic
concept of humanism at the exclusion of feminism, then I would argue that you are not seeing the pattern.

Yes, it would be nice if there were no role for feminism. If all we had to say was human rights and dignity for all. where all means all. But as long as these basic inequalities exist, feminism and similar ideas remain relevant.