This is unfortunately not true, and should not be taught....
Modern Feminism is Necessary
Well it's unfortunate that this debate is coming to an end, but I had fun. Finally a decent debate with a feminist. So thanks :) But let's get back to business. Gender Roles I hate this term, and I hate how people want it abolished even more. Men and women are biologically different, and tend to do things that most of their gender tend to do. Nobody is "forcing" men or women to do something that most men or women, respectively, do. The reason we slightly encourage it is because that's what makes everybody happy. Almost every single woman I know would rather stay home and raise her child than continue working and stay away from her child, while it's the exact opposite with almost every man I know. Now I know this is anecdotal, so here's a graph from a feminist blog [1] that tries to spin this into something else, but the numbers don't lie. Women would rather stay at home or work part time even if money weren't an issue, whereas men would rather work full time. THIS IS NOT A BAD THING. It just shows that women PREFER one thing, while men PREFER another. I understand that this is a little bit off-topic, but it's still a non-issue that feminists like to bring up and claim they're being mistreated, while it's simply women's choices to do something over men. Feminism is attempting to stop women from doing something they want to do, because they're terrified of the term "gender role." Nobody can do what the majority of their gender does because... well, no good reason. Alright, back to sports. You don't want to stop pushing boys to be athletic. That's great, neither do I. I'd like to take this a step further and say that boys and girls are equally represented in physical education classes, and neither one is currently being pushed harder than another. Although men tend to be biologically more athletic than women, this isn't even looked at anymore. So if anything, there are no gender roles when it comes to school and physical education. In addition, I see that you accept the fact that boys are picked on when they aren't athletic enough. So I have a solution. Instead of throwing feminism at it, and expecting every single person on Earth to "find the error in their ways," how about as well as teaching people to be nice (something that doesn't require feminism), we ensure boys (and girls) are athletic enough to either a) not be picked on, or b) stand up for themselves if they are. To say "with feminism, everyone is happy" is unfortunately an incredibly unrealistic and impossible-to-achieve goal. Again, one more reason I believe feminism to be detrimental. Much like my argument about the slutwalk being detrimental to the safety of women by taking all responsibility off women, feminism (as you'd like to see it) is detrimental to boys, by taking all responsibility off them to stay in shape and be able to defend themselves. Feminists assume that by saying "hey, read about feminism," all bad people in the world will magically disappear. This is unfortunately not true, and should not be taught. "Not All Feminists" Have you heard of the hashtag #NotAllMen? The hashtag is feminists' way of making fun of men who simply point out that not every man acts the way some women and feminists believe they do, which is a valid point. But feminists have decided to chastise men for simply pointing out that the woman/feminist is wrong when she makes a generalization about men. And now you're doing the same. Let me take an excerpt from a feminist article saying how ridiculous saying "not all men" is, and replace that phrase with "not all feminists." [2] It's defensive bullsh*t that doesn't really do anything but prove the bearer of Not All Feminists is more concerned with saving face for themselves than, you know, actually acknowledging the concern that another person is expressing. I understand that not every feminist hates men, or not every feminist doesn't understand the statistics of average earnings or sexual assaults or typical education by gender etc. I understand that not all feminists are the same, and not all are bad. However... the face of feminism is what is most commonly seen. So when your (possibly your) good friend Julie Bindel, who is pretty popular in the feminist community, with 13,000 followers on Twitter [4], claims men should be put in concentration camps [3], it says something. And it doesn't matter that not all feminists agree with her, what matters is there are a large number of feminists (and normal people) do agree with her, and non-feminists take note of that. You can say "not all feminists," and I'd happily agree with you, but keep in mind, when men did the same thing, about their gender even, not even their ideology, they were ridiculed and chastised by the very people you share an ideology with for doing so. "All those women are radicals" It's very easy to just say "see all those examples you provided of feminists doing detrimental things to the whole of society? Yeah they don't count." Unfortunately though, we are talking about the necessity of feminism, and when those women are a huge part of feminism, I can't do anything but bring them up to explain how unnecessary feminism is, or at the very least, how poorly tens of thousands of feminists represent the movement. With all that being said, why is it so hard to not call yourself an egalitarian? When you agree with me that there are a lot of feminists who are just bad people, for lack of better words, wouldn't it make more sense to associate yourself with a group that is not known for having radicals, and is known for helping women and men equally? Just a thought. "There will always be men who rape." This is true. And you, one feminist, disagreeing with practically the foundation of the entire current feminist movement (the slut walk), unfortunately has very little impact on the entire feminist movement and the necessity of it. Feminists only help women I'm glad you can see that there aren't any feminist groups that try to help men. So this contradicts what you said earlier to a degree, although you did say helped and not helping, so that's fair enough. However I have a big problem with your next statement. "...the examples you gave were not very good ones and not really issues that need protesting for." The examples I gave are as follows, word for word: "Men are more likely to be murdered, assaulted, robbed, homeless, commit suicide, get injured at work, and many more." If you think rape is an issue that needs addressing, and getting killed isn't, then you fall into the category of why feminism is detrimental to society. Because you're doing two things. You're a) saying a problem that primarily affects women is more important to address than an issue that affects both men and women, and b) you're saying rape is the most serious type of crime. Now I'm not doubting the severity of rape, but my main point is that you (and almost every other feminist) claims they're for equality, yet only protests against the issue that primarily affects women. Not the issues that equally affect both men and women. But like you said, feminism is feminism for a reason, and does only combat issues that primarily affect women. However like I've said before, feminism and feminists are doing this in the wrong way. Female Privilege So because this is my last round, I'd like to bring up female privilege. I'm not doing this because I want to show that women have it better than men, I'd like to simply show that there is no need for feminism, as women aren't treated worse than men, aren't oppressed, aren't held back, etc. I don't have a hell of a lot of room left, so I'll bring up some major points and provide links and pictures so support the ones I haven't covered. From an early age, men will be told to never hit a woman, yet if a woman were to hit a man, she would not receive even close to the social penalties that a man would if he were to hit her. Women are not required by law to join the military draft if the country were to go to war. Women will receive more help when they are in need, or even when they are not, than men. If a disaster were to strike, women would be among the first to be saved, giving the impression that a woman's life is more valuable than a man's. The social pressure is on a man to pay for the majority of things a couple does together. Any accusation a woman makes on a man will be taken seriously right off the bat and will, at the very least, be investigated. The qualifications for women to join the military is less than that of men - something arguably detrimental to women's safety. If a woman doesn't get a job, it's not because she isn't good enough, it's because of sexism. If a man doesn't get a job, it's because he isn't good enough. A woman will most likely not be charged with or accused of sexual harassment if she were to act inappropriately toward a man, whereas a man could easily lose his job and reputation if he were simply accused of doing the same toward a woman. Here's a few more - [5], [6] And you're trying to say that feminism, a movement suggesting that women aren't treated as well as men, and is trying to "grant women equality," is necessary? I'm sorry, but looking at the above lists, and taking into account the lack of evidence supporting any feminist claims, it's pretty hard to say women aren't treated equally to men. It's pretty hard to say a movement is needed to provide equal treatment for women. It's pretty hard to say women are at a disadvantage. It's pretty hard to say feminism is necessary. Thanks! Sources [1] http://sites.psu.edu... [2] http://jezebel.com... [3] http://www.infowars.com... [4] https://twitter.com... [5] https://mensresistance.wordpress.com... [6] http://www.feministcritics.org...