Do you have male feminists in Poland

[pieter]

Dear fellow Forum folks from Poland,

Since the 19th century, men have, taken part in significant cultural and political responses to feminism within each "wave" of the movement. This includes seeking to establish equal opportunities for women in a range of social relations, generally done through a "strategic leveraging" of male privilege. Feminist men have also argued alongside writers like bell hooks, however, that men's liberation from the socio-cultural constraints of sexism and gender roles is a necessary part of feminist activism and scholarship.

Parker Pillsbury and other abolitionist men held feminist views and openly identified as feminist, using their influence to promote the rights of women and slaves respectively.


Parker Pillsbury (September 22, 1809 – July 7, 1898) was an American minister and advocate for abolition and women's rights.

Pillsbury helped to draft the constitution of the feminist American Equal Rights Association in 1865, he served as vice-president of the New Hampshire Woman Suffrage Association. In 1868 and 1869 Parker edited Revolution with Elizabeth Cady Stanton.

Throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the majority of pro-feminist authors emerged from France, including François Poullain de La Barre, Denis Diderot, Paul Henri Thiry d'Holbach, and Charles Louis de Montesquieu.


Charles Louis de Montesquieu

In Western Europe and the USA today you have a lot of female Feminists, but also some female supporting male feminists. Do you have the same phenomenon in Polish cities and towns?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Men_in_feminism

Maybe Jaga, or Polish visitors, members or Polish Americans with knowledge, information, and access to Polish press/media can answer this question.

Why do I ask this. Answer because I saw the phenomena of the mass Black marches n Poland (Pro-Choice) and I read about political initiatives like Razem and the Feminist Initiative (Polish: Inicjatywa Feministyczna, IF) is a Polish political party advocating for women's rights.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Razem / partiarazem.pl/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feminist_Initiative_(Poland) / inicjatywafeministyczna.pl/

Cheers,
Pieter

[Jaga]

Pieter,

interesting subject. women need men in order to get equal rights. I would add Boleslaw Prus, famous Polish writer to this group. He wrote the book "the new Woman" that presents women problems in the aspect of the XIX century society.

I just watched today a movie about Ruth Ginsburg entitled: RBG. It was shocking for me to learn that in the 50s there was a limited number of seats at the universities for women. They were considered to take jobs which were just for men.

[pieter]

Jaga,

Interesting reply. I the Netherlands I know the feminists Aletta Jacobs, Joke Smit, Hedy d'Ancona, Anneke Goudsmit, Annelien Kappeyne van de Coppello, Sylvana Simons, Anja_Meulenbelt and Ayaan Hirsi Ali. But few outspoken men. Most often male feminism comes together with class struggle, social justice struggle, anti-fascist action, the Free Palestine movement, anti-racism and socialist or liberal goals.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aletta_Jacobs
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joke_Smit
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedy_d%27Ancona
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annelien_Kappeyne_van_de_Coppello

Contemporary Dutch feminists:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvana_Simons
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anja_Meulenbelt
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayaan_Hirsi_Ali

Cheers,
Pieter

[pieter]

Some interesting links:
politicalcritique.org/cee/poland/2018/new-polish-feminists-sawka/
www.academia.edu/20837911/The_feminist_movement_in_poland
www.academia.edu/4926731/Polish_Feminist_Movement_and_One_of_Its_Activists

The limitation of feminism as a broader movement in Poland is related to the fact that most of activists remain closed within big cities and academic centres.

It is easier to be feminist and attend meetings and discussions in the cities. But the problems likedomestic violence, unemployment are very much actual also in small towns and villages.

There are distinct difficulties within Polish feminism. An activist who lives and works in Kraków sees distinctions between organizations located in capital city – Warsaw - and the rest of the country.
Like in everyother field, Warsaw-situated organizations have better access to media and politics. She believes that also general interest in feminist issues is wider in Warsaw than in other Polish cities. But this is also Warsaw’s organization responsibility to “be there”, to be involved directly in all the processes that take place in the capital city, to be constantly updated and to update others.

Thus, it may be so that ‘Warsaw' sets agenda and shows directions. The Krakow feminist activist states there isno common strategy for the movement. There are many visions within the main organizations in the country that differ from each other which often results in conflicts and that undermines the movement coherence.

This diversity may be both enriching for the movement and be its’ curse. In such situations the garnering of broader social support is much more difficult.

Another problem for the Polish Feminist movement is the weakness and polarization in the Polish left. In Poland like in some other European countries the conservative right, national populism and the center right are strong and the center left and left are very weak or weakened.

Feminism is often supported by left leaning progressive center left social liberals, liberal democrats ( Nowoczesna ), social democrats ( Sojusz Lewicy Demokratycznej ), socialists ( Unia Pracy and www.naszpps.ppspl.eu/ and partiarazem.pl/ ) and green party people ( Partia Zieloni , pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partia_Zieloni , partiazieloni.pl/en/ ).

The fact that Feminism is supported by the left and center left is not a typical Polish phenomenon, but the same in Western-Europe, the USA and Canada. Ofcourse there are also cases of center right, secular liberal conservative feminism and feminists, libertarian feminists and simply right leaning feminists, but these form the minority.

A Dutch example of the latter was Annelien Kappeyne van de Coppello of the center right, Conservative liberal VVD (People's Party for Freedom and Democracy) party. ( en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annelien_Kappeyne_van_de_Coppello )

But in general support for Feminism comes from the leftwing political parties Socialist Party (SP), GroenLinks (GreenLeft, the Dutch Greens), the Dutch (Social democratic) Labour party (PvdA) and the center left to centrist Democrats 1966 (D66).

In Poland today due to the polarization, the fact that Poland is a rather traditional, conservative and old Fashionate Roman-Catholic society and thus a patriarchal society, the Feminist counter forces will be stronger than in the more liberal, progressive and secular Netherlands in particular and Western-Europe in general.

Opposition to Feminism comes from both men and women. Some women in the Netherlands and Western-Europe (France and Germany) are concerned about what they call 'the damage' feminists cause to male-female hetrosexual relationships, in the sense that 'in their view' men can't be men anymore when feminism becomes to strong and dominant. These women also say that Feminists threaten the feminine nature of women, by making them more or too masculine. Sometimes I (Pieter) view more female opposition against feminism than male opposition against feminism in Western-Europe.

I also view that there is little solidarity between women and a lot of competition, stuggle, revulsion (disliking) between women. On several occasions in the Netherlands I heard women say to me: "I prefer working with men in staid working with women. Women are vicious, cunning, shrewd, scurvy and are engaged in psychological warfare with each other." This is not something I invent over here Bonobo and Jeanne. This is what I heard from female colleagues in various jobs I had, from Female friends and what I read in Dutch newspapers and magazines.

Even some disappointed old Dutch feminists spoke about it to me. Our so called feminist sisters often stabbed me in the back.

Still, Bo and Jeanne, I know very good, fine and honorable Dutch feminists like Annelien Kappeyne van de Coppello, which was a very fine State Secretary of the First Lubbers cabinet. Other great Dutch feminists, were and are politician, European Commissioner for Competition and businesswoman Neelie Smit-Kroes; Labour politician Hedy d'Ancona, and Queen Máxima Zorreguieta.

Maybe Bonobo and other Poles from Poland could tell more about Feminism in Poland?

Cheers,
Pieter

[Jaga]

Pieter, I wish we would not need feminists, but we have to until we have inequality. Sometimes men are the victims of the stereotypical views, for instance they were not entitled to receiving benefits for taking care of the babies.....
On Saturday I watched the movie about supreme court lawyer Ruth Bader Ginsburg and her struggle at the academia, when only 20% of seats could be taken by women. Women were asked - why they take seats which should be for men....

she defended many cases related to inequality where men were not even aware that there is such an issue

[Jaga]

Pieter,

I also believe that the feminism may have different "shades" in different countries and cultures, since there are different aspects which need to be solved.
For instance the issue of not equal pay, or abortion rights may be bleak compared to women not having rights to own the properties or girls forced to be married by the age of 14 in some third world countries.

[pieter]

Jaga,

I like your answers and agree with them. Ruth Bader Ginsburg is and interesting woman and no doubt a good supreme court lawyer. Feminism has different "shades" in different countries and cultures for sure, becaue the social-economical, financial, cultural, political, religious and man-woman relationship differs per country. Feminism for sure will be different in Poland than in my Netherlands or Karls Germany or Denmark. Feminism in Poland will also be different than for instance in the USA, Candada, United Kingdom, Australia or the more secular Czech Republic.

The situation of girls and women in the Third World should be improved by Human rights commissions, development aid and micro credits to make poor women in development countries financial independent. The Dutch queen Máxima is a member of the Committee for Enterprise and Finance, which succeeded the Microfinance Council in 2011. The Queen is committed to extending the reach of various financing opportunities, both through coaching and by providing credit for new and existing small businesses in the Netherlands. She also works to increase the number of women entrepreneurs and the scope they have to expand their businesses.





Cheers,
Pieter