十種對女權主義的誤解(上)

Are you sitting comfortably? We don't wanna shock you, but we're here to talk about the F-word. No, not that one. We're gonna talk about feminism.

你正很舒服地坐着嗎？我們並不想嚇到你，我們只是想聊聊F開頭的詞。不，不是那個詞。我們要談的是女權主義。

That shocked gasp at the back there pretty much sums up how people are feeling right now. Feminism today is a lot of things, many of them controversial. It's a rallying cry. It's a dirty word. It's something angrily chucked around on Twitter. It's a focal point for resistance against a world that's lurching rightwards.

從後排傳來的那種震驚的吸氣聲差不多已經說明了人們現在的感受。當下女權主義代表很多事物，而其中的許多飽受爭議。女權主義是戰鬥口號，也可以是一個髒字。女權主義被在推特上帶着憤怒地轉來轉去。女權主義是對抗一個有右傾傾向的世界的焦點。

At least, that's what you're probably hearing. And we can't blame you; talk radio, social media, and angry people in the streets are all combining to portray feminism as something uniquely crazy and/or threatening. But the truth is a little… different. Go digging beneath the headlines, and you'll discover that feminism is so much bigger, so much more complicated, and so different from what you likely expect.

至少，那很可能是你正在聽到的。我們不能責怪你。廣播談話節目、社交媒體、大街上憤怒的民衆合力將女權主義塑造成十分瘋狂而且（或者）十分兇險的事物。然而事實有點……不大一樣。透過那些頭條來看，你就會發現女權主義是如此宏大、如此複雜，而且和你所能預期的如此不同。

10. It Means Always Voting for the Woman

10. 女權主義總會爲女人投票

There's a misconception that feminism means always standing by a woman, no matter how flawed she is. The 2016 US election demonstrated this fallacy. Pretty much everyone in both the Dem and Republican parties assumed feminists would automatically vote for the first major female presidential candidate in history. Seems a no-brainer, right?

另一誤解是女權主義意味着永遠支持女性，不管她有多少不足之處。2016年美國大選駁斥了這一謬誤。差不多共和黨和民主黨中每一個人都認爲女權主義者會自發爲歷史上第一個重要的女總統候選人投票。似乎無需動腦，對嗎？

Not quite. As pumped as many feminists were that a woman got a major party nomination, that didn't mean they had to like her. Feminists aren't unthinking automatons programmed with 'female good, male bad'. For many, wanting Hillary to win because she was a woman made as much sense as you wanting Jeffery Dahmer for president because he was Christian.

其實不然。很多女權主義者說一個女性得到多數黨提名並不代表她們非得喜歡她。女權主義者並不是不思考的機器人，被編排了“女人好，男人壞”的程序。對於很多人來說，因爲希拉里是女性就希望她贏就和你想讓傑夫瑞·達莫當總統僅僅因爲他是個基督徒是一個道理。

Despite what the pundits said, this is basic common sense. Plenty of feminists were gladdened that a woman was nominated, but simply felt the GOP was better equipped to deal with more pressing issues. Equally, even some liberal feminists felt that Hillary was a bad candidate who would be a bad president, despite appreciating the milestone of her nomination. At its heart, feminism is about empowering women to make up their own minds, even if (or maybe especially if) those decisions go against perceived orthodoxy.

不管學究們說了什麼 ，這是一個基本常識。很多女權主義者會因女性被提名而感到高興，但認爲共和黨更有能力解決當下緊迫的問題。同樣，甚至一些自由派的女權主義者認爲希拉里是很糟糕的候選人，也不會是個好總統，儘管他們也爲女性被提名這樣一個里程碑感到欣喜。本質上，女權主義關乎賦予女性自決的能力，即便（或者尤其是）那些決定會與既成的正統背道而馳。

9. It Means Liberalism

9. 女權主義等同於自由主義

Ask most people to picture a feminist, and they'll conjure a young, cosmopolitan, college-educated millennial girl who holds social views and economic positions somewhere to the left of Lenin. While these people definitely exist, they're also far from the whole story. For every feminist with a poster of Bernie Sanders adorning her wall, there's another out there with a pro-life poster stuck to hers.

讓大多數人描述一個女權主義者，他們會想象出一個年輕、世界主義、受過大學教育的千禧年女孩，內心秉持的社會觀點和經濟立場靠近列寧的左派。儘管這些人也存在，但他們遠不能代表全部。對應着用伯尼·桑德斯的海報裝飾的牆壁的女權主義者，也有另一些女權主義者的牆上則張貼着反對墮胎的海報。

Despite what social media would tell you, there are plenty of feminists out there whose social views line up more closely with Ronald Reagan than they do Elizabeth Warren. The Texas-based New Wave Feminists group, for example, are staunchly pro-life and anti-abortion. Then there's the Empowered Women group, a vast, business network with a core belief in political libertarianism and the value of open markets. Neither of these is small groups, and they represent just a fraction of the right-leaning feminist groups out there.

不管社交媒體過去怎麼告訴你的，有很多的女權主義者，與其說他們的社會觀點接近伊麗莎白·沃倫還不如說接近羅納德·里根。比如說，得克薩斯州新浪潮女權主義堅定地反對墮胎。還有“權利女性團體”，一個龐大的商業網，核心理念是自由意志主義的政治哲學和公開市場價值觀。兩者都是不小的團體，代表了右傾女權主義的一部分。

At its heart, feminism just means believing in equal rights for women. You don't have to be particularly liberal to accept that. As the multitude of different feminist groups show, you can be conservative and feminist, libertarian and feminist, or even Communist and feminist without compromising your core beliefs.

女權主義本質上僅僅意味着相信女性的平等權利。承認這一點，你不必特別開明。正如衆多不同的女權主義團體所展示的，你可以是保守主義的女權主義者，可以是自由主義的女權主義者，甚至同時是共產主義者和女權主義者，而不必妥協自己的核心價值觀。

8. It's Only for Women

8. 只有女人才能支持女權主義

By now, you've probably noticed that this article has gone out under a male byline. Yup, the dribbling writer-monkey we selected for this piece is undeniably male. Some of you might be surprised by that. Doesn't the name 'feminism' kinda intentionally exclude men?

至此爲止，你很有可能已經注意到這篇文章是男性署名。沒錯，我們爲這篇文章選定的作者無可置疑是一位男性。有些人可能會感到驚訝。難道女權主義這個名稱不是有意排除了男性嗎？

We politely disagree. Believe it or not, there are plenty of men out there who identify as feminists. And only around 0.01% of them are doing so in the hopes of getting laid.

我們禮貌地表示不同意。不管你信不信，有很多男人認爲自己是女權主義者。他們當中大約只有0.01%這樣做是爲了和人上牀。

Now, before we go any further, we should point out that this is a total minefield, even for people as brainy and all-round awesome as we are. There are a ton of articles out there by female feminists arguing that male feminists are often jerks who are hijacking their movement. In other words, that getting a male writer to cover feminism when there are plenty of female writers out there is like personally punching Emmeline Pankhurst in the face.

現在，在我們繼續探討之前，應該指出這是一個雷區，即使對於像我們這樣聰明又多才多藝的人來說也是如此。女性的女權主義者已經寫過很多文章，力圖說明男性女權主義經常是綁架她們運動的混蛋。換句話說，已經有了很多的女性作家，還要讓一個男性作家涉足女權主義，就像是在埃米琳·潘克赫斯特的臉上打了一拳。

We can't deny it's potentially an odd look. But then, that's the beauty of feminism. It doesn't just appeal to women. Just as whites marched with Martin Luther King back in the day, there are plenty of men who genuinely give a damn about women's rights. And, luckily for them, a good number of feminist groups are actively welcoming to them. Every man has a mom, a sister, a girlfriend, a female friend who he'd never want to see discriminated against because of who she is. To paraphrase Emma Watson's famous 'He for She' speech, gender equality is an issue men should care about, too.

我們不能否認那可能是挺奇怪的畫面。但那正是女權主義的魅力。它不僅吸引女人。就像白人曾經與馬丁·路德·金一同遊行，也有很多男人真心在乎女性的權利。幸運的是，有很多女性主義團體積極地歡迎他們加入。每個男人都有母親、姐妹、女朋友、女性朋友，不想看到她們因爲性別而受到歧視。改述艾瑪·沃特森著名演講《他爲她》裏的話，性別平等也是男人應該在乎的問題。

7. It's Against Men

7. 女權主義對抗男性

This one sorta links to the point above. People whose only brush with feminism comes via Twitter might assume feminism means screwing over men. It's kinda in the mission statement, right? At the very least, feminists are presumably indifferent to men's issues.

這種誤解和上一點有些聯繫。那些只是通過推特瞭解女權主義的人可能認爲女權主義就是要搞垮男性。這似乎是使命宣言的一部分，對嗎？至少可以說，女權主義者可能並不關心男人的問題。

Not quite. Over the years, feminists activists have gone out of their way to target inequalities that affect men. What's more, they've succeeded.

並不盡然。在過去的幾年中，女權主義活躍分子已經不怕麻煩，將涉及男性的不平等問題視爲奮鬥目標。更重要的是，她們已經取得成功。

Only a few short years ago, if you were male and got raped, the FBI weren't interested. Their definition of rape only included offenses against women. As anyone who lives on planet Earth is aware, men can and do get sexually assaulted (admittedly at a much lower rate than women). It was only after a feminist campaign that the FBI began logging statistics on male rape, too. Then there's the whole 'assault in the military' thing. Several of the groups for male survivors directly grew out of feminist support networks.

僅僅是幾年前，如果一個男性被強姦，聯邦調查局不會感興趣。因爲他們對強姦的定義限定於對女性的侵犯。全世界的人都知道，男性可能而且也確實會受到性侵犯（毋庸置疑概率比女性要低得多）。僅僅在女權主義運動之後，聯邦調查局纔開始錄入男性強姦案的數據。然後纔有“軍隊中的性侵犯”事件。幾個男性倖存者團體直接產生於女權主義支持網絡。

Then there's the whole, big picture issue. At its heart, feminism believes that the lives of men and women will both be improved by overturning patriarchal culture. You may well disagree with that assessment. But that doesn't change the fact that it comes from a sincere desire to help men, too.

然後有了整體的圖景問題。本質上，女權主義推翻男權文化既可以改善女人的生活也可以改善男人的生活。你可能不大同意這個論斷。但這種論斷確實來自要幫助男性的真誠願望。

6. There is Only One Kind of Feminism

6. 只有一種女權主義

A big problem with how people view feminism is that they see it as one large, monolithic thing. But this is like saying the US, Singapore, Sweden and Norway are interchangeable as they're all capitalist democracies. Feminism has as many different flavors as your local Walmart does breakfast cereals.

人們看待女權主義一個很大的問題就是，他們把女權主義看成一個龐大的整體。這就像說美國、新加坡、瑞典和挪威可以互換，因爲它們都是資本主義民主國家。女權主義有不同的口味就像當地沃爾瑪超市裏的早餐麥片。

Over the years, feminism came in at least three distinct waves. So, you have First Wave feminism, which is from the suffragette era and is concerned with stuff like votes for women and equality before the law. Then you have the Second Wave, which focuses on stuff like domestic violence, rape in marriage, sexual exploitation and hidden abuse. Finally, you have the Third Wave, which explicitly believes there are as many feminisms as there are women, and that black women, lesbian women, Asian women and so-on all have different experiences. There might even be a Fourth Wave, depending on who's counting.

多年來，女權主義至少歷經了三波浪潮。第一次女權主義浪潮，源自婦女參政論時代，關心女性選舉權以及在法律面前的平等。然後第二次女權主義浪潮，焦點在家庭暴力、婚內強姦、性剝奪及隱性暴力。最後第三次女權主義浪潮，明確相信女權主義者和女性一樣多，相信黑人女性、同性戀女性、亞裔女性等等都有不同的經歷。也許會有第四次浪潮，取決於誰在計算這個數字。

Although these waves are 'historic', they're still a handy guide for figuring out what type of feminism a given person believes in. So, someone may identify more with the 3rd wave, whereas someone else might feel the concerns of the 2nd wave are more relevant to her; with each of these waves having additional sub-divisions within them. In short, feminism is no more monolithic than Christianity, conservatism, liberalism or Doctor Who fandom.

儘管這些浪潮都是“歷史性的”，還是爲區分某個既定的人相信哪種女權主義提供了便捷的導向。所以，某些人可能認同第三次女權主義，而其他人會覺得第二次女權主義和自己更相關。而每一次女權主義浪潮內部還有分支。簡而言之，女權主義和基督教、保守主義、自由主義或者《神祕博士》的影迷一樣，不是一個統一的整體。