Do Be a Feminist

Why sex differences strengthen the case for feminist movement

Bryan Caplan

wrote “Don’t Be a Feminist: A Letter to My Daughter” as the title essay of his 2022 book of the same name. His argument is relatively simple and I don’t disagree with much of the particulars, but I do disagree with his conclusion that a feminist movement is unhelpful in the western context.

He starts by noting that while many feminists when asked will define feminism as something along the lines of “a belief that men and women should be treated equally” this definition fails to effectively distinguish feminists from non-feminists. Most people, feminist-identified or not will agree with such a statement. One response to that is to say “well they’re feminists too then, they just don’t know it”. But to the degree that we think there’s something that determines who does and doesn’t identify as a feminist, this definition doesn’t do much work in helping us understand what that thing is. So, he considers what beliefs actually demarcate self-identified feminists from everyone else and concludes that it seems to come down to a feeling that society is “unfair” to women.

As he points out, it’s not trivial to show that modern western society is unfair to women. While women are underrepresented in high status economic and political roles they’re also underrepresented among the lowest status segments of society. One way to see this is to reflect on how much more rare it is for someone to say a woman is a “loser” relative to a man. This is partly because it’s harder for women to be losers given their higher innate value from a biological reproduction perspective, but also because, however you define it, there really are more male losers. There are also specific ways in which men are at a disadvantage, many of which form the basis of men’s rights groups, such as being:

• over represented in dangerous occupations

• subject to conscription in many countries where women are not

• disadvantaged in terms of child-custody laws

• more likely to be victims of violent crime

• more likely to commit suicide

• … etc.

The radical feminist response to this line of argument, which I’m somewhat sympathetic to, is to say “yes, men are at a disadvantage in those ways, but most of those examples are the result of living in a patriarchal culture, and patriarchy hurts men and women.” In other words, men work more dangerous jobs and are subject to conscription because patriarchal values tell men they have to be brave and strong and provide for their families, even if they don’t want to. And as a result of those values men are less likely to feel comfortable talking about emotional problems which in the extreme case makes them more likely to commit suicide.

And Bryan Caplan might respond that “sure, some of these differences are a result of cultural values, but also a lot of those values are downstream of sex differences.” Right. I really don’t think you need to believe that women are treated unfairly by society in order to believe that there’s a positive role for feminist movement. Counterintuitively, I think a belief in sex differences actually strengthens rather than weakens the case for feminism, albeit a feminism with different aims than the popular contemporary feminism that Bryan is mostly reacting to.

I think feminist movement has at least two justifiable reasons for existence:

First, is to protect the freedom for women to choose the type of life that they want. Even if the “average woman” might prefer a life where her contribution is tilted towards child-rearing and domestic work and tilted away from economic production outside of the home relative to the “average man”, women are a heterogeneous group and not all women will be satisfied with such a role, no matter how much status we accord to it.

Second, is to advance the interests of women as a group. And this is where sex differences come in. If we assume that men are more risk taking and status seeking and that the “average woman” might prefer a life where her contribution is tilted towards child-rearing and domestic work and tilted away from economic production outside of the home relative to the “average man” we should expect that women will continue to be underrepresented in positions of political and economic influence.

While I acknowledge that women are not a monolith and that there’s a variety of “women’s interests” there are also commonalities, in particular among the needs and values of mothers. And men appear to systematically underweight these issues. In addition, social norms can be differentially beneficial to each gender, and part of the role feminism has played as a movement was to make the case for pushing norms in a direction that serves the needs of women.

Given all this I think we need loud and disagreeable but otherwise gender conforming women (in addition to the generally more gender non-conforming women that are drawn to feminism) to help identify and communicate the issues that are most relevant to women through a feminist movement. And we also need this movement to continue to support the freedom to choose atypical lifestyles for gender non-conforming women (and men!). So… Do Be a Feminist!