Can straight men, who need women for sexual gratification, really be feminists?

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I don’t know who asked this question, but I’m going to answer assuming that it’s a guy. Forget about the silly sexual gratification bit, I want to examine what it means for a guy to call himself a feminist.

Sure, go ahead, call yourself a feminist. Why not? You’ve done some soul searching and agree with all those things feminists say about institutionalized sexism.

But are you really a feminist? Does this stuff really affect you? Are your career prospects affected because you don’t easily fit in with male-driven business culture? Do you really feel what it’s like to be cat called in the street?

Why do you feel the need to apply the feminist label to yourself? Sit down, do some soul searching on that question. Because it’s really important and digs down to the very heart of, not just feminism, but of all social struggle.

It’s the females that are struggling, not you. And their success directly translates into a less-privileged position for yourself. Sit down and ask yourself if you would make life harder on yourself in order to allow others more opportunities. Let’s assume the answer is yes. How much harder?

Would you be willing to go out of your way in order to reduce your privilege? To march for the rights of someone that’s not you and who you probably don’t understand all that well? To spend oodles of time on forums and at meetings coordinating your efforts? For a community of people that, for very good reason, is going to be suspicious of your intentions?

Do you know the philosophy and the lingo? Do you know what intersectional feminism is and what the major objections to it are? Do you know the history of feminist acceptance of transsexuals? Do you know who the main anti-feminist public figures are and what the community’s approach to handling them is?

These are all things I’m aware exist, because I’ve come across interesting articles referencing them, but don’t know what they are. Well I know what intersectionism is but not the finer points of the debate. In order for me to really know about them I would need to make feminism a much bigger part of my life than it is. And the brutal reality is, there’s only so much time in the day for me to spend on things. And I have to put myself first.

All of these things conspire to make me realize that I really shouldn’t call myself a feminist. If women want to call me that, fine, but I’m not the focus here, they are.