Response to Krouse blog

How have you tended to define feminism in your own life, and how does thinking about feminist theoretical perspectives and approaches affect your personal definition?

Before defining what a feminist is in class, I feel ashamed to admit that I thought feminist were a little extreme. Not necessarily, man hating females but I thought of them as being inconsiderate of men's feelings, attacking men as individuals and not looking at the problem as a whole. When I sit in on the class and we talk about feminism I feel as if some of the males in the class are hesitant to say anything. They probably feel like its really not their place to talk about feminism and how women are discriminated against. When Krouse talks about masculinist discourse, I wondering if some of the males feel ashamed to be part of it, when they really shouldn't.
I don't think men are the only ones to blame for these social norms, women are partially to blame for assumptions about them. For example, the women Bennet family in Jane Austen's, Pride and Prejudice are so obsessed about getting married. And Austen's makes a point to view Mrs. Bennet as being ridiculous. Mrs. Bennett cares more about marrying off her girls than Mr. Bennet does.
A lot of the time I feel like some people get carried away with the idea of feminism. And end up portraying women negatively. For example, when I was in first grade, my best friend, Ariel came up to be and say "I'm a dyke". I was like, "what's that?" She said, "it's a feminist." Still not knowing what that meant I asked her to explain. And her reply was, "it's someone who hates mean men and believes in womens rights." Ariel even went up in front of the class saying how proud she was to be a dyke. And it wasn't until a few years later I actually understood who offensive and politically incorrect the word "dyke" is. I remember her telling me that she heard the phrase in the movie. This just proof thats main stream society doesn't understand the definition of a feminist.
Their ideas of a feminist are misconstrued and manipulations of society. They do not even care to understanding what feminism represents. Especially in today's society. Our generation has really taken a step back in the feminism movement. You have people like Jessica Simpson, who has millions of young impressionable fans, that think acting dumb is cute. All the great feminist icons seemed to have vanished along with all that feminism stands for. Even when we look at Hilary Clinton, during the liberal debate she got misinterpreted and couldn't answer a question with a straight answer. The next day everyone was giving her shit for it and her comeback was, "oh, they're are just picking on me because I'm a women." When she should have owned up to her answers and lived with its consequences.
In Krouse's blog she discusses the mascilinist discourse which is the bases of patriarchal principles. Krouse states, “They are supposed to keep the home fires burning while men go off into the public world to do great things. “Masculinist discourse” keep women in their place, a place in which they are mothers and sisters and wives and daughters – in which they are defined exclusively through their relation to men” (Krouse). Women have passive position and only through men are they defined. I take a radical feminist perspective, in which we need to deconstruct the system to gain an equal balance between the sexes. We need to change the way in which people view femininity and get rib of this masculine discourse which ties us to a patriarchal structure.