Women Against Feminism is an informal movement of women sharing equal ideals with antifeminists in rejecting

feminism Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...

. Using #WomenAgainstFeminism, the hashtag is normally accompanied by a "

selfie A selfie () is a self-portrait photograph, typically taken with a digital camera or smartphone, which may be held in the hand or supported by a selfie stick. Selfies are often shared on social media, via social networking services such as F ...

" style photo, holding up handwritten posters stating reasons why they disapprove of modern

. Most of the posts begin with the statement, "I don't need feminism because", followed by their reason(s). The supporters of this movement primarily use social media platforms such

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

and

Tumblr Tumblr (stylized as tumblr; pronounced "tumbler") is an American microblogging and social networking website founded by David Karp in 2007 and currently owned by Automattic. The service allows users to post multimedia and other content to a sho ...

, while campaigning on sites such as

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...

Instagram Instagram is a photo and video sharing social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. The app allows users to upload media that can be edited with filters and organized by hashtags and geographical tagging. Posts can ...

, and

YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...

to advocate their views.

Origin and content

The Women Against Feminism campaign began on Tumblr in July 2013, presumably in response to the "

Who Needs Feminism ''Who Needs Feminism?'' is a social media photo campaign started by students at Duke University in 2012. The campaign attempted to shed light on misconceptions about feminism and to explore the continued need and relevance of feminism in today's ...

" campaign.Smith, Michelle,
Actually, women, you do need feminism
, ''

The Conversation ''The Conversation'' is a 1974 American mystery thriller film written, produced, and directed by Francis Ford Coppola and starring Gene Hackman, John Cazale, Allen Garfield, Cindy Williams, Frederic Forrest, Harrison Ford, Teri Garr, and Rober ...

'', 18 August 2014 Wente, Margaret,
Women against #WomenAgainstFeminism
, ''

The Globe and Mail ''The Globe and Mail'' is a Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of approximately 2 million in 2015, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on weekdays and Saturdays, although it ...

'', 9 August 2014 According to the BBC, the movement is an online community that use social media to brand '

Feminism Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...

' as a 'toxic' movement. Following on the original creator of the Women Against Feminism Tumblr page is an American woman who has chosen to remain anonymous because of online harassment and backlash she has faced for her ideas. Furthermore according to , the campaign gathered steam in July and August 2014, when several prominent columnists and bloggers brought media attention to it. A September 12, 2017 post to the Women Against Feminism blog titled "What is Feminism?" maps out the arguments of the blog's supporters. Community member and writer Jinna states "If Women Against Feminism were asked if they believe men and women should have equal human rights and equality before the law, the answer would be a resounding 'Yes'". The blog raises issue with the modern practice of feminism rather than the fundamental definition of feminism for the reason given that "3rd wave feminism is not feminism". It argues that as long as men and women are equal before the law, feminism is unnecessary, fosters

misandry Misandry () is the hatred of, contempt for, or prejudice against men. Men's rights activists and other masculinist groups have criticized modern laws concerning divorce, domestic violence, the draft, circumcision (known as genital mutilation ...

, and distracts from men's rights issues.

Response

The response by the media, social commentators, and feminists has included support Young, Cathy,
Women Against Feminism: Some women want equality without anger
, ''

Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe'' is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, and has a total circulation of close to 300,000 print and digital subscribers. ''The Boston Glob ...

'', 2 September 2014 and criticism.Martin, Heather,
"Women Against Feminism" Misses the Point: Why No Woman (or Man) Should be Against Feminism
, ''

HuffPost ''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...

'', 4 August 2014 As of 19 August 2014, the campaign's Facebook page had garnered 21,000 likes.Lindberg, Helle,
Nu går kvinder selv til kamp mod feminismen
(Women Themselves Now Battle Against Feminism), '' TV 2'', 19 August 2014 Supporters say modern feminism has gone astray in some ways and cite examples such as radical feminists not supporting

trans women A trans woman or a transgender woman is a woman who was assigned male at birth. Trans women have a female gender identity, may experience gender dysphoria, and may transition; this process commonly includes hormone replacement therapy and so ...

and saying things such as, "anyone born a man retains

male privilege Male privilege is the system of advantages or rights that are available to men solely on the basis of their sex. A man's access to these benefits may vary depending on how closely they match their society's ideal masculine norm. Academic studi ...

in society, even if he chooses to live as a woman", and related complaints that some feminists exaggerate women's problems while ignoring men's problems. Also cited was the

abortion debate The abortion debate is a longstanding, ongoing controversy that touches on the moral, legal, medical, and religious aspects of induced abortion. In English-speaking countries, the debate most visibly polarizes around adherents of the self-describ ...

and the argument that women have suffered as a result of a feminist culture that promotes casual sex as empowering.Riley, Naomi Schaefer,
Scenes from the feminist implosion
, ''

New York Post The ''New York Post'' (''NY Post'') is a conservative daily tabloid newspaper published in New York City. The ''Post'' also operates NYPost.com, the celebrity gossip site PageSix.com, and the entertainment site Decider.com. It was established ...

'', 4 August 2014 In an op-ed for , Margaret Wente supports Women Against Feminism, saying she believes modern feminism has become a belief system that presents a distorted view of reality based on

and victim-culture, and she questions the existence of

rape culture Rape culture is a setting, studied by several sociological theories, in which rape is pervasive and normalized due to societal attitudes about gender and sexuality. Behaviors commonly associated with rape culture include victim blaming, slut-s ...

. Critics say the young women involved in this campaign do not appear to know what feminism is and are arguing against an imaginary foe using

straw man arguments A straw man (sometimes written as strawman) is a form of argument and an informal fallacy of having the impression of refuting an argument, whereas the real subject of the argument was not addressed or refuted, but instead replaced with a false o ...

. A commentator from writes: "Most of the posts include some reiteration of the central misunderstanding about feminism, that a core belief of feminism involves hating men." A commentator from wrote, "being anti-feminism is like being pro-

apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...

, or a big fan of social injustice, but no one would think it's cute to hold up a sign saying that.", while independent researcher Mackenzie Cockerill states that " global culture of misogyny is growing and flourishing thanks to the internet and its unprecedented potential for connecting people and their ideas." Commenting on the campaign, Anette Borchorst, professor and researcher in sex and gender in the Department of Political Science,

Aalborg University Aalborg University (AAU) is a Danish public university with campuses in Aalborg, Esbjerg, and Copenhagen founded in 1974. The university awards bachelor's degrees, master's degrees, and PhD degrees in a wide variety of subjects within humanities ...

, stated that "there have always been disagreements and debates within feminism and those debates help to advance the movement." She added that, "Feminism has always generated debate among women and it is difficult to imagine a feminist world-view that everyone can agree on." Beulah Maud Devaney's September 2015 column on ''

openDemocracy openDemocracy is an independent media platform and news website based in the United Kingdom. Founded in 2001, openDemocracy states that through reporting and analysis of social and political issues, they seek to "challenge power and encourage de ...

'' compares Women Against Feminism to the history of women's opposition to feminism dating back to the late 1700s, suggesting that a modern anti-feminist campaign will be just as ineffective in combating the feminist movement as preceding efforts. Devaney asserts that Women Against Feminism mainly represents the view of privileged women who want to maintain the status quo and are, thus, deliberately misrepresenting what feminism stands for. According to Devaney, "As intersectional feminism becomes more popular it is, sadly, to be expected that some white, straight, cis first world women will see the emphasis on their own privilege as an attack. In a similar way feminist calls for a more inclusive beauty standard and appreciation of multiple body types can be read as an attempt to undermine the received wisdom that 'skinny white girl' is the ideal aesthetic." Devaney adds that Women Against Feminism has failed to stem public support for the feminist agenda, that its influence is minor, and that its arguments are "easy to dismiss." Devaney concludes, however, that the anti-feminism it represents deserves closer examination.Devaney, Beulah Maud,
The overlooked history of women against feminism
, ''

'', 21 September 2015 In October 2015, Angela Epstein mentioned the blog in an editorial criticizing feminists for being unpleasant to women who disagree with them. Epstein argues that feminists have lost their cause and are fighting unnecessary battles and overplaying issues such as women's "self-imposed

glass ceiling A glass ceiling is a metaphor usually applied to women, used to represent an invisible barrier that prevents a given demographic from rising beyond a certain level in a hierarchy.Federal Glass Ceiling Commission''Solid Investments: Making Full ...

". Recounting her experience of receiving insulting messages after sharing her stance on modern feminism with BBC News, she states, "I don't expect all women to agree with me. But there are many who do. Look no further than the proliferation of websites such as Women Against Feminism."Epstein, Angela,
Why are feminists so unpleasant to women?
, ''

The Telegraph ''The Telegraph'', ''Daily Telegraph'', ''Sunday Telegraph'' and other variant names are popular names for newspapers. Newspapers with these titles include: Australia * ''The Telegraph'' (Adelaide), a newspaper in Adelaide, South Australia, publ ...

'', 13 October 2015 Recent works such as Oana Crusmac's ''The Social Representation of Feminism'' within the movement "Women Against Feminism" argues that social representation of feminism within WAF is not based on lack of information, but rather on a stereotypical understanding of the concept. Crusmac's work also argues that "WAF contributes do not quality as post feminists" as "While post-feminists can be easily identified and characterised by the already famous expression "I am not a feminist, but...", WAF contributes categorically reject any feminist resemblance and instead prefer either to be labelled as "humanist" or "

egalitarian Egalitarianism (), or equalitarianism, is a school of thought within political philosophy that builds from the concept of social equality, prioritizing it for all people. Egalitarian doctrines are generally characterized by the idea that all hum ...

", either to be strong supporters of the traditional

gender role A gender role, also known as a sex role, is a social role encompassing a range of behaviors and attitudes that are generally considered acceptable, appropriate, or desirable for a person based on that person's sex. Gender roles are usually cent ...

s.' Cursmac's research also reveals that social representation of feminism in the on-line group WAF has "numerous common elements with the way the second wave was stereotyped by the 80s media backlash against feminism, such as: feminism is an ideology that demonises men and does not wish equality (which is a goal already accomplished), but special treatment and privileges for women, thereby ignoring the individual contribution in shaping success or decision making. Moreover, in the same direction in common with the negative illustration of the 80s, feminism is seen as a threat to family and womanhood, and as a promoter of promiscuity."

Origin and content

Response

See also

References

External links