Quote Originally Posted by it-ogo View Post
Then don't you think that "feminism" is improper word for what you describe. The word itself contain a reference to women and that is all. The best term for equality of rights is "equality of rights". The best term for being kind and respectful to each other is "being kind and respectful" - and it is not the same as "equality of rights". Putting everything good together and mark it as "feminism" looks more like PR action rather than proper definition. You know there was a widely broadcasted slogan in USSR: "Партия - ум, честь и совесть нашей эпохи." "(Communist) party is the intellect, honor and conscience of our age." So if you also have some intellect, honor and conscience you are a communist by default even if you never listened the word "communism".

But in fact by claiming you are a feminist you just support the brand - and all those people who did different things (good and bad, smart and stupid) in the name of feminism rather then "equality of rights", "being kind and respectful" or whatever. As for me after reading press I have an impression that nowadays (unlike in the first two thirds of XX century) in the name of that brand bad and stupid things are being made more often than good and smart ones.
I understand what you're saying IT-ogo, but the problem is that you are completely cutting off the roots of feminism and why it arose in the first place. Feminism did not come to exist because men were being oppressed. It came to be, and remains, because women were and are oppressed by men. The fact is that feminism IS about equal rights, and anyone who calls themselves a feminist should understand this. I don't know what bizarre brand of feminism has made its way to Russia and caused all men everywhere to despise the very word itself, but the feminism I embrace has nothing to do with women being "superior" and everything to do with women being "equal."

I tell you what: On the day when women actually have achieved equal rights everywhere in the world, maybe we can stop calling it the "feminist" movement but until then, that is what it is, because that is how it started.