Part of the thing here, & it's a point feminists make, generally, is to do with who is doing the doing. It's men waging war, men doing the killing. Of course, you can find exceptions - Eleanor of Aquitaine was pretty feisty - but overwhelmingly men were active, women passive.
So, for example, if you look at say Saudi Arabia, the freedom of women is hugely restricted (they can't drive, for example - though that might be changing). The vast majority of Saudi men will think this is okay, because it's all they know. It's what they've been taught.
-
-
And these patterns of behavior & belief are reproduced generation after generation. In this sort of context, it makes sense to think of men and women as classes (having certain kinds of things in common, certain interests, patterns of behavior, rights, beliefs, etc).
-
However, it doesn't mean - and this again is your point - that the Saudi man who thinks women should be able to drive is morally responsible because many other men think differently. He's not contaminated by the guilt of other men (though the complication is he might benefit).
-
In fact, I'd go as far to argue that it's not clear that Saudi men, in general, are immoral because they uphold an immoral system. They don't know any better. Effectively they've been indoctrinated into the system.
-
TLDR: Sociologists tend to think in terms of structures of behavior, reproduced generation after generation. They're operating at a higher level of abstraction than that of individual people, and aren't really in the business of making moral claims about people's behavior.
-
I realize that's all quite complicated, but it is a complex issue. It's the sort of thing that keeps theoretical sociologists in a career, and philosophers musing through the night.
End of conversation
New conversation -
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.