First off, from their point of view, both Jessica Valenti and Bell Hooks agree that feminism is a movement which tends to be seen has anti-men and promote hating men. From Bell Hooks point of view, she promotes her ideas in a more passive way when taking about how feminists are viewed and portrayed by the media. While Jessica Valenti show a more antagonistic approach of how the media sees feminist as evil ugly women. From her point of view the media try to take the light of the issue and divert the attention to how feminist look. Saying that, both authors do agree that men don’t necessarily see feminism for what it is, they rather have taken their opinion from a “third party source” like the media who constantly make fun of the idea. For both these authors, feminism is the future, it’s an idea which should have come to fruition a long time ago. But due to mens fear of losing power, the subject as become a topic which isn’t being taken seriously anymore. For them becoming a feminist would mean to end the current structure which only allows one ground of individual to profit off the other.
Secondly, from my perspective, a feminist is somebody who believes that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities. It’s essentially the theory of having political and economic equal no matter the gender. But lately feminism has become a unpopular word due to the negative connotations attack to it. For example, being anti-men. Therefore, most people see being a feminist as being a negative person. The definition I had of what is a feminist hasn’t change after reading the essays because although the reading provides more details about the subject, the core message didn’t change. Which is why I think that idea of feminism needs the be revamped and give a new look to what feminism is without the old negative stereotypes.
In Bell Hooks essay, the section where she speaks about male privilege mainly due to patriarchy really made me think about how evident her point is. It very true that most men benefit from the established regime and do have what she called a passive role when it comes to supporting patriarchy. Finally, the research I did for both authors didn’t change my perspective on their article because from Bell hooks point, we can see that the tries spread her message with a more educative tone and Jessica Valensti tries to showcase her opinions with a more antagonistic approach.
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