Talk:Equity feminism

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[edit] Mainstream

I think it's horribly problematic to refer to non-CHS style feminism as mainstream, as I also explained on the CHS talk page. Even if we could come up with a good definition of mainstream and figure out what varieties of feminism are really "mainstream," CHS specifically calls equity feminism "mainstream." If it seems important to you, I can find a citation for that. So even if labelling one of competing views as mainstream isn't inherently POV, in this case it comes down to taking sides in an ongoing debate that should be being represented somewhat objectively in this article. So I added the qualification "academic" before feminist theory, since she has a thing about academics being gender-oriented, so it would still be considered mainstream within academia, according to CHS, I think.

My use of "popular" before feminist movement may be wrong. I like the use of feminist movement over feminism, but I think adding the qualifier popular makes it sound more about beliefs of groups than a kind of objective feminism. But I'm not attached to the word if somebody thinks it's ill-chosen. NickelShoe 19:03, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

Okay, I think this is better. I went back to mainstream feminist theory and feminist movement, because I think CHS would agree she's out of the mainstream there, but added a sentence about how she considers herself in the mainstream for the general female population of the US. Hopefully better? NickelShoe 17:37, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] List of "equity-feminists"

Is this list accurate? Can someone show sources or links which show those women listed using "equity feminism" to describe their own kind of gender politics? I know Cathy Young, Camille Paglia, Wendy McElroy and Hoff-Sommers identify themselves as equity feminists, but Wendy Kaminer, for instance, who is listed as an "equity feminist", does not. In fact, Kaminer has made fun of dichotomy between "equity feminism"/"gender feminism" and expressed profoundly negative views and criticism about some of the above-mentioned names.[1] Because of that, I'm going to remove her name of the list and suggest that those who can provide the links demonstrating that those ladies identify themselves as equity feminists, please do it. 201.50.205.28 07:30, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

The list comes from a discussion of equity feminism vs gender feminism by steven pinker. Most of them are accurate, even if this one isnt.--Urthogie 15:58, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] merger proposal

At the moment I can't find very much on Equity feminism. There are discussions of Hoff Sommers's term and some that use it to describe groups of feminists but is it enough to warant its own article. I feel this would be better in the Christina Hoff Sommers article. This is still really a neologism - I'm saying that knowing the term is used in academia and feminist writings but I'm weighing that against the amount of notability it has - for the moment it could go quite happily into the Hoff Sommers page. Does anyone have any views?
BTW I'm the one who merged gender feminism there for similar reasons (but that term has less academic writing about it than Equity feminism has)

This is a list of notes on it in books & articles:

  1. a mention on page in the intro to Third Wave Agenda: Being Feminist, Doing Feminism - explaining that this is a definition coined by CHS
  2. The book Gender vs. Equity Feminism (found in a google scholar search)
  3. Jstor article about Feminism and the European Community [2]
  4. An article mentioning that its a CHS term by Z magazine [3] (not really a WP:RS)
  5. A review of Who Stole Feminism (critical of CHS) on Jstor [4]

--Cailil talk 19:21, 7 August 2007 (UTC)


Please, NO merger... I googled "equity feminism" to understand a letter to the editor on Salon.com... I got a nice article on "Equity Feminism" here on Wikipedia. It answered my questions and offered ways to go on from here. I would not have liked to be steered to a CHS article... It is notable enough so that I needed to look it up. People are using the jargon and it deserves a life/entry of its own at this point I'd say... Thanks, Emyth 18:00, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for your comments Emyth. As I see it there are only two options for the article - either it gets expanded using reliable sources or it gets merged into Christina Hoff Sommers. As far as I can find in my trawl through a number of academic sources the term is inextricable from Christina Hoff Sommers. She coined it. She defined it. Its her neologism, and it is (at least in the references I've found) used with constant reference to her. So unless Equity feminism has a number of sources that show it is notable enough for its own article - it may need to be merged. Thanks again for your comments Emyth - if you can help improve this article in any way it'd be great--Cailil talk 19:01, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
Scholar.Google yields enough fodder to suggest that "equity feminism" is being used as proper jargon, a "term of art" so to speak in feminist dialog. I repeat that I needed to know what it meant and turned to our Wikipedia for help... An article on Christina Hoff Sommers would NOT have been a satisfactory answer to my question. I suggest that it doesn't matter if it is a "neo-logism"...I still needed a proper definition/explication for it in order to pursue my intellectual course. Yes, CHS should be mentioned in the article, but we don't merge The Declaration of Independence with Thos. Jefferson just because he wrote it, do we? Yet we could equally say that they are "inextricable"... Other scholars are using the term... It has a life of its own now. Emyth 23:16, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
Emyth, I see your point, but I am yet to see a reliable source that uses either "Gender feminism" or "Equity feminism" without referencing and explaining Sommers' use of the terms. If you are interested the merger proposal has changed. We are now considering merging gender feminism and equity feminism into one article (see below)--Cailil talk 23:35, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] gender feminism should be placed on a different page

this is a bio page for hoff sommers, gender feminism is a theory that stands on its own merits. Gender feminism encapsulates the concept of feminist movement for the benefit of one gender, and there is no other term for this. The word misandry does not describe a movement. Equity feminism and gender feminism are dual concepts, and the dual page for equity feminism should be present. IMHO. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.112.206.246 (talk) 23:59, 1 September 2007 (UTC) perhaps gender feminism and equity feminism could be on one page as they are dual terms that describe the before and after picture of the transition in feminism described by Tammy Bruce Hoff Sommers and others. 70.112.206.246 00:15, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

The point is 70.112.206.246 that the terms are not movements like Marxist feminism or ecofeminism are. They are constructions defined and coined by Hoff Sommers. when used they are used with reference to Hoff Sommers. So far as I can see nobody is going around calling themselves a 'gender feminist' - CHS and people quoting her call other feminists gender feminists. I can't establish using reliable sources how either of these terms are notable enough for their own articles yet. The terms may become more notable over time but as it stands the notability of these terms is still bound-up with Hoff Sommers--Cailil talk 14:32, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
Why would a page for a term have to be related to a movement? Surely that is not a Wiki rules, :-), as there seem to be a lot of exceptional entries already. To see many uses of the term 'gender feminism' without mention of Sommers go to altavista and type in advanced search for gender feminism, and exclude the word sommers. You will find the term is in common use on its own accord, in many discussions that are not reviews of Hoff Sommers work, nor for that matter even mention Hoff Sommers. (I suggest altavista instead of google in this case, as google matches phrases with embedded punctuation). Gee, and at least a copule of these results are from Wikipedia pages! Also check out http://sillyseattle.blogspot.com/2005/03/equity-vs-gender-feminism.html which is a colloqual debate of gender versus equity feminism (a link to a sommers related site is given in this article). http://open-encyclopedia.com/Feminism mentions gender feminism as a subtype of feminism with no mention of sommers. A similar excercise could be undertaken for equity feminism. Nope, the geni is out of the bottle, and it makes sense to have a page for these terms. Though I think gender feminism and equity feminism should be on the same page together. Dimitrisdad 21:03, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
Reliable sources Dimitrisdad. Blogs aren't reliable sources - see WP:RS. In all the reliable sources I can find both gender feminism and equity feminism are mentioned with reference to Sommers. BTW open-encyclopedia like Wikipedia is not a reliable source.
To answer your question "Why would a term have to be related to a movement": this isn't actually my point. The issue for me is that equity and gender freminism are "are constructions defined and coined by Hoff Sommers" Sommers is partly notable for coining these terms, these terms are notable because she coined them. The existence of these terms is bound-up with her - just like Isaac Newton and his laws of motion.
Let me be clear, I'm not opposed to there ever being separate equity and gender feminism articles. It's my position that when there is enough notable coverage in reliable sources and when this is added to WP then the Equity feminism and Gender feminism articles can be reopened. This is about bringing articles into line with 2 policies WP:BLP (ie why is Sommers notable) and summary style. This is the situation with Isaac Newton and his laws of motion. When the section has enough coverage it deserves gets its own article but when it lacks significant coverage (or until reliable sources examine the term independent of its originator) it remains a section (see the guide to writing better articles).--Cailil talk 21:51, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
I'm reading over this last reply above and trying to pull out the parts I can 'grock' and can not. The can not's are probably easier. The Newton and laws of motion example is perhaps a worth while analogy. Newton like Hoff Sommers was a researcher. The four laws of motion is part of the fruit of Newton's research, like Hoff Sommer's theory of a Freire like supremacy transition in feminism. In both cases the researchers were not alone in their observations or even attempts at formalizations, but perhaps gave the most cogent descriptions. However, the conclusion that the laws of motion are only discussed in biographies on Newton is simply false. It is much more common for the laws of motion to be discussed in texts on physics, and for biographies to not go very deep into math and physics. Most biographies and overviews of work do not assume that the reader has mastered the works of the subject. If we were to follow this analogy, gender feminism and equity feminism would be discussed on one page, and that page would provide a reference note to back to the Hoff Sommer's page, and vice versa. On point about the “blog”, and wiki page notes were not intended to be a formal literature citings, but rather to show what is in common usage. As you can see there are many. Earlier post gave me the impression that usage of the terms outside the context of discussion Hoff Sommers was a salient point in making a decision about whether the terms should have their own page. The metric of common usage is not an unusual one given the nature of Wiki, and indeed in a country that does not have formal language review board, so I wasn't surprised that it be suggested. However, among the altavista results were formal citing. I also highly disagree with your point in the last reply that the terms “equity feminism” and “gender feminism” are only notable because Hoff Sommer's coined them. There is a vibrant cultural debate going on about feminism having gone too far. These terms are important because they encapsulate this debate. You might note, one competing term for “gender feminist” is for example “femi-nazi”. There may be another principal at work here. As another principal, there is a metric in academia for determining if a person's work was important, and that metric is if others are using the work. By making the argument that central thesis of “Who Stole Feminism” - one of feminism transitioning from “Equity Feminism” to “Gender Feminism” - can't stand on its own, but rather is only associated with Hoff Sommers, and has gone no further, you are essentially making the argument that the thesis is unimportant (intended or not). I.e. not being used by others. That is poppycock. Dimitrisdad 21:18, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
Dimitrisdad, whether or not you agree with me please refrain from incivility. There is really a very simple test for your points. reliable sources. My point is simple. I can't find any sources that use these terms without explaining them through Sommers. That doesn't mean there aren't any - if you can find any please post them. Again let me restate that I'm not opposed to there ever being separate articles for Gender feminism and equity feminism but at the moment there just isn't enough coverage of them to warrant it. If that coverage comes in the future then their own articles could be reopened--Cailil talk 21:28, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

some comments stricken, see my suggestion below--User:Cailil, 00:33, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

For clarity I should respond to two points.
1)"I also highly disagree with your point in the last reply that the terms “equity feminism” and “gender feminism” are only notable because Hoff Sommers' coined them" - this is not my contention. They are partly notable because she coined them, just as she is partly notable for coining them.
2) your response to my Newton analogy is accurate. I'm making a point about the structure of wikipedia articles and categories - which is perhaps a bit esoteric for a new user. Have a look at WP:SUMMARY for a good explanation of how articles and categories are structured on wikipedia.
Another note: in response to "By making the argument that central thesis of “Who Stole Feminism” - one of feminism transitioning from “Equity Feminism” to “Gender Feminism” - can't stand on its own, but rather is only associated with Hoff Sommers, and has gone no further, you are essentially making the argument that the thesis is unimportant" - I'm not actually saying this. What I'm saying is that I have not found reliable sources discussing these terms independent of Sommers. Its a wikipedia policy issue. There needs to be notability for a topic - I'm not claiming these terms are non-notable, rather that their notability is still growing.
If we are deadlocked on this Dimitrisdad, and I respect your position, we could go ahead with your suggestion and merge gender feminism and equity feminism into one article. If we did that what would you suggest we call such an article? There are other options such as merging them into an article on Who stole feminism? but I do think an article for the terms themselves would be preferable to this--Cailil talk 21:58, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
What to call such an article... I have been trying to find some time to put more thought into this question, and perhaps if the article could be improved. Let me think out loud a bit. The thesis of transition in feminism is not unique to Hoff Sommers, rather she just wrote one of the more articulate and outspoken pieces on the subject. Tammy Bruce of course wrote “The New Thought Police”, making the argument that feminism has been usurped by those with political views that are independent of an equity feminist, first wave feminist, view. Then there is the first wave / second wave feminism terms due to, can't remember at the moment. Even Gary Trudeau in Doonesbury noted the feminist movement has come to fruition. As he points out in his strip, the younger generation just isn't that interested. That right wing entertainer who likes to incite emotional and personal critiques, who's name is unspeakable by civil writers, coined the repugnant term “femi-nazi”. Of course, SCUM is an old militant group that has always angrily come out against men and whose adherents seem to desire to deserve the unspeakable person's term for them. Then there is the watered down version in Naomi Wolfe Fire with Fire, with her call for a transition to Power Feminism modeled upon the Malcom X's Black Power movement. She makes the thesis that it is time to change. Personally I shutter at the philosophical twist in that one. Muslims are not exactly known for a keen sense of feminist ideals – but she wrote it all the same, and people bought it with four editions printed. .. It seems that the transition has more to do with knowing when enough is enough rather than any particular plank. Actually, though, this is all old political science theory stuff, with Paulo Freire having outlined the trends of a struggle becoming a supremacist movement a long time ago. The personalities that are good at organizing and inciting action often do not react appropriately as a movement becomes successful. The goal of an equal rights movement should be for the need for the movement, and the movement itself to disappear [Freire]. Perhaps what would be interesting is a page that talks about transition theories in feminism in general. It seems that all camps of feminists appear to say that something has happened. This might take some research and thought to come up with an article. Perhaps a name would be something like, “Transition Theories in Modern Feminism” that would mention Freire, describe first wave and second wave feminism as well as equity and gender feminism, and might throw in a list of changing challenges, changing goals, and changing frontiers, as feminist view them. Though there have been changes in the West, this isn't the case world wide. Perhaps these thoughts will crystallize into an outline, though I'm a little apprehensive about putting too much time into this if there is no chance it will end up as a wiki page. Other titles, “Phases in Feminism”, “The Evolution of Feminism”. Hmm, that last one has the nicest ring I think. Dimitrisdad 19:32, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

(out dent) While interesting, that would be replicating History of feminism which is looking at the history and development of feminism, and multiple views on it. Putting notes about them into that article would be a good idea but I think something more specific needs to be done for Equity and gender feminism. A temporary solution would be to merge Gender feminism here. The page could be renamed at a later date. What do you think?
Just on a matter of site policy, while I do appreciate the explication of your thoughts Dimitrisdad, there are elements to your comments which are soapboxing. Comments like: "Muslims are not exactly known for a keen sense of feminist ideals – but she wrote it all the same, and people bought it with four editions printed" aren't acceptable on wikipedia - see WP:TALK--Cailil talk 22:26, 6 September 2007 (UTC) A further note: What about a merger to Individualist feminism?--Cailil talk 21:45, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Cailil, I think you are right in that what we are describing here is the same that is described in the history of feminism page when it describes 'first wave' 'second wave' and 'third wave'. 'Third wave' was not very well defined, and that page doesn't attribute the terms to their author, it should. Indeed 'third wave' is not very well defined among feminists. Clearly Naomi Wolf with the proposal for Power Feminism, McElroy's individual feminism, and Hoff Sommers observation of gender feminism, Tammy Bruce's observation about Thought police, and popular complaints of an emerging misandry movement in feminism by men's movements and certain popular right wing commentators are explanations/interpretations of what 'third wave' feminism is. It seems they should properly be mentioned in the history of feminism in modern times, where clearly the movement is struggling to reinvent itself with many voices contributing to what this reinvention should be. If it doesn't go into the history of feminism, then we instill the interpretation that there is a "mainstream" feminism that is described in your plain old feminist history page, and a "feminist counter culture" which is not in the mainstream, and then you put all the terms and interpretations of this so called third wave by McElroy, Bruce, Sommers, et al. on that page. But what neutral metric would one use to determine what is mainstream and what is not? (Who wrote that book which claims that the most sexist group is in fact women? .. it seems like a really bad idea to open such a debate.) How about a feminist history page that goes through all the usual stuff, and then introduces the theories of historical analysis at the end. IMHO that is the proper place for both the 'waves' and 'equity/gender' 'unification/supremacy'(general political). Another concept would be to have a separate page for such a section, "Modern Interpretations" perhaps. Dimitrisdad 00:51, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
I like what you're syaing about putting the historical frames at the end of History of feminism. But due weigh needs to be given to the more widely used/accepted terminology. Books about the history of feminism don't include what you're calling "equity/gender' 'unification/supremacy" yet. A section explicating and wikilinking to the views about them would be fine for that article though (see the way I structured the section on postmodern feminism for an example of what I mean). The way Wikipedia judges the mainstream is reliable sources - the mainstream is where the most academic sources have a consensus. There are at least 3 seperate issues with what we've been talking about. 1) is Equity feminism and gender feminism as terms, 2) is feminist history and 3) is the mainstream. I'd like to resolve the first issue first. If you agree I think we should move the section on gender feminism from Christina Hoff Sommers to here and write a short lead paragraph explaining both and where they came from.
The feminist history page is a massive problem, for different reasons - mainly its scope and lack of proper referencing. But that I think is an issue for the wider clean-up of category feminism that I'm trying to do. (the problem being that many articles have duplicated the same work and so they need to be laboriously brought into line with WP:SUMMARY)
The issue of the mainstream is really site policy but I would also just remark that for example Sommer's terms, gender and equity feminism, are not used in Europe - I don't think her analysis extended to Europe either - so it is very difficult to use a term that has meaning in a specific setting (North America) and then apply it as a mainstream of a global movement.--Cailil talk 13:15, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
I had a thought over breakfast this morning (spare cycles dedicated to wiki ;-) I think a page of "feminism is today" or a variation on that would work well. This would document the views of various pundits and would be leaders on status and direction. On such a page there could be a first point on third wave feminism and what the 'mainstream' ;-) is talking about, a second point perhaps on ifeminism, a third point on CHS, a fourth point on perhaps on Tammy Bruce. I think it would not be complete if it did not also talk about the movement's concentration on the third world. Others could document their icons of significant following by adding to the list. This said, I am not opposed to your suggestion above, i.e. moving gender feminism to here and having a lead paragraph. Your comments about Europe are interesting and I was having some parallel thoughts about feminism in France, and other parts of Europe, which has always had a different character than in North America. This also reminds me of South America countries, and Indian, both of which have had female presidents. The former being very interesting in the context of machismo. I recall some of the statements by Thatcher on feminism .. but I digress and wouldn't want to be accused of soap boxing or the like;-) The point being it also looks like to me that there is much opportunity for authors outside the U.S. to contribute that history page, and to and to a 'feminism today' page. Dimitrisdad 15:45, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
I don't want to dismiss your idea because I think its good and I think I know a space where it would fit in with WP policy. While an article on what you're saying would be original research by synthesis including something like this in History of feminism and in the section called contemporary_feminism in the Feminism article would be a good place for this--Cailil talk 00:32, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
Well, that sounds like an agreement. Perhaps you could clarify your comment about original synthesis? Suppose there was an article called 'Contemporary Feminists Theories', and under that article it had sections, “Third Wave Feminism” listed come sitings and gave a summary, “Power Feminism” listed some citings perhaps provided quotes from Wofe, “iFeminsm”, “Gender Feminism”, “Thought Policing” (former NOW president's Tammy Bruce's book). How is this original synthesis? “The Third Wold Challenge” “Anti feminism” (the current Hoff Sommers article references this already) .. there are probably a half dozen more. Certainly these are Contemporary Theories so we can't be drawing that conclusion. What is being synthesized here? There is a complaint that the history of feminism page is too long already. Also, it is not necessarily appropriate to call contemporary views history, as there has not yet been an academic filtering process applies to them relative to their importance in affecting thought. What would be original synthesis would be leaving out a significant contemporary theory on the grounds that it is not mainstream. About your meter stick for mainstream above, I would have to take some issue. A standard reference is, for example, mainstream, though it has only one citation. Not all citations are equal. There would have to be some weighting applied.Dimitrisdad 19:30, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

(outdent) On the mainstream weighting - have a look at WP:UNDUE - this is the policy which covers what I'm talking about. To clarify my point about synthesis while I agree that these are contemporary feminist approaches it is considered original research to link ideas that have not already been linked in a notable reliable source. This would make an article for this idea problematic from a policy point of view, whereas if written carefully a section in Feminism or the History of feminism would be okay. I wouldn't have the same objection to putting this into History of feminism that you do. History can mean the story of as much as it can mean the past--Cailil talk 20:52, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Well Ok, then put it in the history of page, FYI here is a citing to the use of 'Gender Feminism' that is not linked to specifically to Sommers and is used in the title of McElroy's book: Sexual Correctness: The Gender-Feminist Attack on Women Dimitrisdad 22:03, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] merger

Just a note to say that Gender feminism has been merged to this page. I recommend that this article's title be changed to Equity and Gender Feminism since that's what's covering now.--Cailil talk 18:05, 29 September 2007 (UTC)