I've been studying gender and women's issues for a few years now, and there's something I've noticed that tends to come up as an issue when people try to have a discussion over this subject. Now, when there was the first wave of feminism and the second wave, it was a lot clearer to see what the goals were. We wanted the right to vote, we wanted better wages, etc. Third wave feminism, however, either doesn't have a specific goal or has a whole lot of them. Modern day gender issues are being discussed all over the place in all kinds of ways. We have various feminist groups that have different ideas on what feminism is and we have various groups for men that have their on take on these issues. There are women who don't believe feminism has anything good to offer the world, that it's the cause of all the modern day family issues we face in the United States (high divorce rates, delinquent teens, etc). There are those that think the only way a woman can be a true feminist is by becoming a lesbian and removing all connections with males in her life. These ideas have some merit-- although I don't think it's reasonable to just insist all hetero women to turn lesbian since I'm not of the opinion that it's a choice we can make-- but these ideas all scrambled together in one era makes for a heck of a lot of confusion amongst men and women. It's why there's such a stigma attached to the mere word "feminism", we can't often say that word with someone else assuming that we hate men and don't believe in shaving.
So this issue of having so many contradicting, scrambled opinions means that those who aren't aware that not all feminists share the same opinions will assume that one man-hater means they're all man-haters. So when the time for discourse arrives you have men and women pitted against each other with men becoming increasingly defensive and women trying very hard to clarify they're personal stance without adding to the already existing view that women as a whole are unable to agree or be organized on any matter. Not that I think we are able to agree, although I do think we can be organized. I don't think we need to agree, and I think others need to see that as well. As a woman, my feminist concerns aren't going to be the same as another woman all the time, in every situation. We might even agree on everything except prioritizing. She may think it's more important to focus on women's issue in the work place whereas I might find that my time is better invested in women's reproductive rights. There's also the same issue with men, with those who feel that it's true, they hold the privileged position in this binary, whereas others feel that they were being emasculated or that they are now included as targets of advertising in which they are being told that they need to look buffer and thinner in order to be of any worth (note emerging terms such as "Manorexia").
I think all these grievances with society on each gender's side have a very complicated background and source, and I don't think it's easy to really discusss any of these but I think it's important to be aware of that fact. Too many people, it seems to me, see gender issues as being very black and white. Us against them, one side being right and the other side being absolutely wrong. The gender issues are ridiculously layered, it isn't as easy as saying, "This is the issue, this is the group at fault, and this is how you solve the problem". I have had too many instances in which men particularly feel that once I'm talking about feminism I'm directly attacking them, when in reality I feel women are just as much to blame for the issues we have today as men are, and I don't ever automatically assume that the man next to me sees me as an object rather than a human being. We need to take the time to stop ourselves from assuming we know what the person next to us thinks on these issues and simply ask what this person's stance is. Then we can find common ground, if there is any and I bet there is in most cases, and then work up to discussing the things we disagree on. Without that process we all end up talkiing over each other, disagreeing left and right without fully comprehending, and then getting nowhere in the end.
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