<html> At 04:33 PM 11/28/2001 -0500, Carrol wrote: <blockquote type=cite cite>To what extent has feminism (various definitions) ever enjoyed majority support among women in the U.S.? Haven't many women in the U.S. felt (and don't many still feel) that feminism is an attack on _their_ identity?</blockquote> On the one hand there is the "feminism" that arises simply as a fact of existence under capitalism: that is, 1) the notion that we are all equal/interchangeable individuals operating in a free market in which we rise/fall to our proper value. 2) the social burden of raising, educating, caring for the children/elderly is the problem of individuals, not of society So far as I can see, this definition of feminism is simply a way of dismissing the social problem of nurture and culture -- of unloading this burden (as always) on women, who are traditionally and biologically bound to these duties, and who, as a result have to do this work for nothing and invisibly. This, in contrast to the more traditional order in which women were allowed to do only this work but which allowed the work to be visible and socially recognized. I think this is the "feminism" that most U.S. women react against and do not identify with. But, as I mentioned before, this problem is different than the problem of "feminism" in colonial countries where "feminism" is imposed from above and where it is taken as just more evidence of the native's inferiority. Joanna B. </html>