I've always wondered why feminism so often has so many negative connotations. It seems to me that one reason for this stigma is that feminists and "man haters" have been boxed together to become one and the same. Perhaps what is needed in order to destigmatise feminism is greater recognition of the social constructionism of men (or all genders) in patriarchal society and an understanding of "gender as a structure of social relations, a system of material practices resulting in material inequalities" (Connell 2002, p. 94) in opposition to seemingly widely held views that feminists generalise men to be the sole cause of women's oppression. Unfortunately it is the negative and extremist memories of feminism that seem to linger in people's minds for the longest. Who wants to claim to be a feminist if in doing so they are risking being accused of something else altogether?
I saw this article today, in which Elle Hardy claims that feminism values equality over opportunity and choice. What I'd like to ask is, in what way is the fight for equality not also a fight for greater opportunity and choice?
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