Equality in Sport and Fiction

Sports

The Olympics doesn't have a special events for white runners or black swimmers, even though very few are good enough to compete at the top level, because any special consideration there would be condescending and racist. Yet we have special events for female runners and female swimmers. Even female rifle shooting is segregated.

Sex-segregated sporting events are condescending and sexist and any calls to make women's sports receive identical coverage and money are more condescending and sexist still. We do not give athletes money, public attention and accolades because they try hard, we give them because they perform well. A person's gender shouldn't give them special treatment and compensation when they do not perform as well as others.

The lack of investment into female sports is a non-issue here. Female 100m sprinters are not being held back because of a lack of investment, but because of physiological differences between men and women. It is not even the case that male runners always receive more investment; eg. where a country has no male runners good enough to compete, they will invest in their female ones in order to win medals there. But they still will not be as fast as their male counterparts.

Fiction

A lot of our popular fiction features heroic archetypes. Usually male ones.

While I enjoy fiction featuring female heroes, I cannot blame anyone for producing fiction with a male hero. This is simply our fiction reflecting reality.

Think about the jobs where our heroes come from: law enforcement, soldiers and so on. All high-risk and physically-demanding jobs that fewer females choose to enter in the real world too.

Real world exceptions certainly exist too, even historical ones, but we already have a far higher proportion of fictional female soldiers than real ones. Insofar as fiction serves as an inspiration to people, we already have examples. Any attempts to artificially increase this proportion, through censorship, shaming or aggressive lobbying, would be condescending and sexist. Any lobbying and shaming should be directed at changing the unequal reality, rather than the mirror which is merely reflecting it.

Artists should feel free to create whatever fiction they wish, and consumers should be free to view what they wish. While female heroes are great and will continue to be successful, the overall preponderance of male heroes is not sexist, it is simply a reflection of real life.

If more women are allowed and choose to enter high-risk and physically-demanding jobs, and live and die in heroic ways, I believe this will change. But even then, most fiction with a historical basis or fiction that relies on the hero to be extremely physically capable will have to be fantastical if it is to have a female hero. A knight in full-plate armour wielding large weapons with ease is still less fantastical as a male, purely because of historical and physiological facts.

History of Gender Roles

It is often claimed that women were oppressed by men in the past. While history shouldn't inform our modern policies anyway, I feel this isn't quite right.

In the past, most of the population were oppressed to some degree, men and women. There wasn't a whole lot of choice, opportunity or social mobility, regardless of sex. Gender roles were certainly stricter, but was a woman's gender role more oppressive than a man's gender role.

Rights and expectations

Women were expected to care for their family and home, including raise children. To allow them to do that they had the right to expect their partner to provide for them and protect them.

Men were expected to provide for and protect women and children by working outside the home. To allow them to do that they often had the right to education or training and to make decisions for the whole family.

But those are broad strokes. What were the implications of this?

Violence and health

35,000 people were killed in witch hunts throughout Europe over a 300 year period, and around 75-80% were women 28,000. This is a terrible number, and it staggers my mind to think of the loss. But unfortunately, such atrocities weren't rare, only the fact that the target was mostly female was rare. A single war during that period could claim the lives of millions of people, and there were many many wars. And in each one, a 90% male casualty rate would be conservative.

Even if a man was fortunate enough to avoid being called up to war, his job was almost certainly more dangerous and unhealthy than working at home. Without modern technology, even constructing a building involved massive risks and health hazards.

The deaths and suffering of all those men are not negligible. If gender roles are to be considered oppressive, then I think we must accept that the expectation to place yourself in danger is among the worst.

Access to education

Certainly, though we do have exceptions throughout history, women were typically far less trained than men and this should be explained. Now, this could be because women wanted to train, but they were rejected. Or it could be because they weren't expected and required to train, and had no need to, so they just didn't apply. Though I'm sure both scenarios occurred, I believe the latter to be predominant.

And certainly I don't believe this was as likely as the mirrored scenario: how many men were forced into training so they could perform arduous and dangerous jobs for the benefit of others when all they wanted was to stay at home with their family? And if you believe men were never forced then there is a single word for you: conscription.

While neither gender had many options about education, I cannot help but sympathise more with people who were forced to work hard than those who were perhaps forced to be a bit bored, but relatively safe and provided for, at home.

Domestic abuse and rape

There is no evidence to suggest wife beating has ever been tolerated in the western world, at least for the last couple of centuries, despite the popular myth that it has (such as the so-called 'rule of thumb'). And there is plenty of evidence to suggest that sexual assault was widely considered among the most severe offences. 

Exceptions certainly exist, but they were exceptions to a wider rule and were most likely condemned by their neighbours as unjust in their own time too. Heck, sexual assault has caused wars.

Conclusions

In the history of the western world, there have been sections of society which were actually oppressed, but women particularly? Let's compare. Can you imagine a white slave owner saying "blacks and children to the lifeboats first!"? Or can you imagine white slave owners being conscripted and volunteering to fight in a war for the sake of their black slaves? Or white slave owners working long hours, in dangerous conditions, just to keep their black slaves happy and in good clothes?

If you can't, then I don't believe men truly oppressed women.

Traditional gender roles are definitely oppressive and no one should be forced into them, but the belief that men were enforcing these roles for their own benefit is ludicrous, and insulting to the millions upon millions of men who gave their lives for the women they loved and provided for. They weren't oppressors, they gave everything they had, and far more than ever should have been expected of them.

Why not just call yourself a feminist?

One of the founding tenants of feminism is the strive for equality, and for many this includes the gender neutralising of language to avoid perpetuating gender roles. And so now we have 'police officer' and 'chair' instead of 'police man' and 'chairman'. At least in those cases, I'd say it's not awkward, it's technically more correct and it's just more inclusive, so I support it.

So, hopefully you'll understand why I don't want the label I use to represent the strive for equality to be named after just one sex. 'Gender egalitarian' is a more neutral, inclusive and technically correct term. 

'Feminism' sounds like a women's advocacy movement, and that is not a bad goal. Men's advocacy, or Men's Rights Activism (MRA), is not a bad goal either. Hopefully of course, both groups also believe in gender egalitarianism too, but unfortunately that is not necessarily the case. A women's or men's advocacy group could easily advocate for their group in a way that is unequal for society. And of course, many have.

At the very least, insisting that the fight for gender equality only be called 'feminism' seems to exclude even the possibility that men could face problems because of their gender, the same way 'police man' seems to exclude the possibility of female police. And so while I don't want to insist others use it differently, that's why I avoid using it with that meaning myself.

Whuh?

This blog's purpose

This blog is here to talk about issues of gender equality, from a gender egalitarian's perspective.

If you also wish for equal treatment and opportunities for everyone regardless of gender, then you are a gender egalitarian. You might also be an advocate for men or women too, in which case you might call yourself a men's rights activist or a feminist, but you're still an egalitarian.

Ultimately of course, the label is only a label, and I really don't mind what people call themselves, but I think it's best to be clear about what I mean by the words when I use them.

... I admit I also just really like the sound of the word; 'egalitarian'.

About me

To get some sense of my perspective, although I was educated as a women's advocate at University, I'm now actually a men's advocate. And I don't see those two things as contradictory, but rather as complementary.

We're all egalitarians here, so we're all fighting for the same thing. Hopefully we can do that constructively without paying too much attention to the crazies.

To any feminist who might be reading

If this has caused offence, please consider, that I am not a monster. I am not against women. I am only against inequality.

Since you are against inequality too, then already we agree in principle.
 
While I no longer claim to be a woman's advocate or feminist, that is only because I am not personally promoting women's issues any more. Many other people do that fine work already.

It is my belief that we cannot address the problems of gender equality by only focusing on the problems experienced by one gender. And so all the while women's issues have the bulk of public and political attention, I shall be working to raise awareness of issues affecting men. I shall be a men's advocate until such time I feel those issues are being addressed. And I can go back to being lazy.

I am certainly not against women's advocacy itself. I am glad that so many people speak out for women. While I believe that we can help women more if we are more honest and critical about some of those voices, I recognise that women do face problems and I am glad that people are speaking out for them.

Nor do I wish to blame women for the problems facing men. Just as I resent the feminist literature that blames men for the problems that effect women, I do not claim that one half of society is responsible for designing all of society. I believe most of these problems arose without malice or intent, simply because of who we are as a species. And I believe fixing them is a simple matter of re-evaluating what we otherwise take for granted.

And ultimately, I do not believe helping men will damage women. In fact, I think it will help.

So, sincerely, I hope we can find as much common ground as possible, and we can give and take criticism of each other purely as criticism, not hatred.

To any MRA who might be reading

The movement is growing, and that's great, but it also means we can't always cling to our abused underdog status too strongly. I believe reaching out to people in other groups, even ones with as dubious a history as feminism, even if many feminists are actively hostile to even discussing men's issues, is necessary if we're to effect any big change in society.

I'm certainly not saying that you need to do this too, of course, but it's what I believe I must do.

After all, if no one had reached out to me, I wouldn't be a men's advocate now.