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Small-Scale Question Sunday for January 28, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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I want to eventually get some grasp on feminism as a whole. While I can find pro-feminist writings and arguments easily, I find myself unable to find anti-feminist arguments of a suitable quality.

Therefore, I'm asking for recommendations on anti-feminist arguments, books, etc. Ideally, these should be as evidenced, charitable, nuanced, etc. as one would expect from the older SlateStarCodex posts. They don't have to be perfect, but I'm going to be less engaged with someone trying to tell me the feminists are all stupid or evil or some combination of the two.

What's feminism to you?

There's rather a gap, for instance, between arguing that women are already adequately represented in the workplace, and arguing that a woman's place is in the kitchen, to use employment as an example (but similar contrasts could be done elsewhere).

Some possible arguments you might see:

The sexual revolution is harmful to women (see Louise Perry).

The pay gap is mostly due to their own choices—choosing lower paying jobs, fewer hours, less distasteful jobs, having lower ambition/competitiveness on average, etc.

More egalitarian countries have larger gender segregation, hence lack of women in an area does not equal discrimination.

In practice, we focus on careers over motherhood, resulting in women passing their fertility window, before they realize that they're out of time.

We're already inclined to care more about women than men (see, e.g. Richard Hanania on women's tears and the marketplace of ideas, though I'm not sure to what extent he meets your nuanced/charitable thresholds), so focusing on them further doesn't help.

Male norms in the workplace are more productive, even if less welcoming to women, so we should try to endorse male norms.

In practice, feminists are not sympathetic to men, or see things in too zero-sum a manner.

Divorce/alimony/child support are unfair.

A majority of those in college are women, already.

There are far more female-only spaces than vice-versa.

Women live longer, are healthier, are less likely to commit suicide, etc. so the attention should lie elsewhere.

Presumption of guilt in sexual harassment cases is unwise.

Marriage is good.

TFR's too low.

Women voting is bad (maybe because they value sounding nice over good policy, or something)

There are more important things than independence and self-sufficiency.

Gender norms match innate tendencies.

Women are physically weaker, and more likely to quit/become pregnant, so it makes sense capitalistically for employers to prefer male workers.

I don't endorse all of these, I think some are probably contradictory, and I'm sure there are more arguments out there, but these sorts of things are worth being aware of. As I said, what you mean by feminism is relevant. It's of course possible to be a feminist in one respect, but not another.

Sorry for the lack of actual recommendations. I suppose there were a few Scott posts that were somewhat anti-feminist (at least, as it actually exists in practice).