Bender: You're no femputer. You're a fembot.

Femputer: It's true. I disguised myself as a femputer so I could rule the Amazonians.

Bender: But why?

Fembot: Why? Why? I came here from a faraway planet-- a planet ruled by a chauvinistic manputer that was really a manbot. Have you any idea how it feels to be a fembot living in a manbot's manputer's world?

Bender: What?

My caricature stereotypes are so much cooler. I prefer to envision rabid man-hating feminists as feminazis: the unspeakably evil women who walk around in Gestapo outfits with jars of stolen testicles. They talk nice about this thing called "feminism" but everybody knows it's a conspiracy to send all men to concentration camps for mandatory castration. Oh, and they're all lesbians who tote pink glocks!

Fembots just make me think of Austin Powers. Boooring!

I was flipping through this issue of Marie Claire last night--a HUGE mistake. Another gem is their bit about the Bourne Ultimatum which goes something along the line of "It makes us nostalgic for the days when Slavs were the bad guys and you had to worry about homicide, not suicide."

norbiz: It'll be death by snoo-snoo for you!

Ha ha ha! Marie Claire's circulation must be in trouble, since they've reverted to making up problems to sell magazines.

Yeah, being the proud owner of a pair of ovaries means I live to serve. No free time, no space, it's give give give all the time. Wait! That makes me a typical weak female doormat!

Ok, no, I know what I want, am worldly, educated, and have been hurt in the past, so I don't rush into anything. Wait! That makes me a fembot! Unavailavble frigid hell bitch! MOO HA HA.

Oh, it's too rich. It really is.

At work, I'm probably considered one of these people. I don't talk about my boyfriend, I don't get all weird about weddings, and I don't get upset and cry when there's a problem. I guess that makes me a fembot.

Except that I've been struggling with clinical depression for YEARS and have many, many low days. Maybe Marie Claire should shut the hell up and leave women like me alone. They don't know what our lives are really like.

Now, I think I'm going to go home and cuddle with my boyfriend. Because I would NEVER be so rude and insensitive as to tell him to "lose the skirt" when he's being affectionate. (If I don't feel like cuddling, I will tell him politely, like a mature adult.)

Women are different; they have different personalities. Just 'cause there's a woman in her office who doesn't blab about romance or babies doesn't mean it's a "backlash" against anything. People have different personalities! Some women aren't the cuddly, affectionate type. It has nothing to do with feminism. It's entirely possible to be unemotional and not a feminist. Feminists are not all alike! Arg, sorry for the rant.

Hmmm, I think I'm a fembot. I'm very cool, collected, I don't fluster easily, I'm very smart, and I rarely cry at all and never in public.

Then again, maybe I'm just a very private person who doesn't like the world at large to be privy to my every feeling and emotion. And when I am in private with people I love and trust, I do relax and cuddle or shit-talk my ex for being a bastard or whatever. I mean damn, just cause I don't cry because the soda machine gave me diet coke when I pushed the button for regular doesn't make me not human.

I must be a fembot. A few weeks ago at work, one of my (male) coworkers brought his newborn daughter to work, and the (female) office administrator was gushing over her and brought her into my office so I could have a look. The office administrator said to me, "Isn't she cute?" and I said, "I dunno, she looks like a baby to me..." (She said, "You're not a baby person, are you?" Heh. Understatement of the Year Award to the OA!)

All I can say is, Cool! I've been wanting to have my consciousness uploaded to a computer for ages now. I get to be a fembot and I don't even have to die first?! Awesome! *grin*

Hmm. Projection, much? The thesis of her article seems to be "I struggle to feel anything and have shut out the people who care about me. All women who superficially act like this must be the same!"

I am not an emotional person. I don't cry easily, don't gossip, and vastly prefer analyzing over emoting. This is just how I'm built. I've also worked in a tough industry that requires stoicism and crisis management, so I'm good at "packaging" my stress and feelings in order to deal with them later.

But I DEAL with them, later. I am able to relax and communicate openly when I'm with my husband and best friends. In my private life, I'm receptive and affectionate--but that's my private life. There's a difference between "keeping the whole world at a distance" and "carefully choosing your inner circle".

So she struggles to feel, to be sensitive, to communicate openly. That's her problem, not ours. It would be far more responsible if she would get some therapy, rather than write any article labeling other women as "cold-hearted fembots".

From the article:

"Even offscreen, our sex symbols are playing against touchy-feely type. Angelina Jolie admits she sees no real benefit to crying. Scarlett Johansson believes that monogamy may not be natural. And Brooke Shields reveals she needs regular time-outs from her kids"

What the hell do the last two examples have to do with the theory that women are less "touchy-feely" today than they were 17 years ago?

NOTHING.

You know what this really is? It's not so much an attack on women or on feminism as it is on rationality. It's yet another ridiculous example of a ridiculous theory: the Cartesian mind-body dualism.

There's no such thing.

Emotions come from our brains. Rationality comes from our brains. Our brains are part of our body. We are all both emotional and rational. Our emotions influence our rational decision making as well as our seemingly irrational decisions. Much so-called emotional, irrational behavior can be explained by the values and experiences of person doing the behavior.

Many people are MOST passionate about the things they are also most rational about. Emotions and reason often work together.

Men are not more rational than women.
Women are not more emotional than men.
We're just told that's the way it is. And we've been lied to.

Moreover, it's perfectly rational for women to be emotionally guarded. Why should women let their guard down for men when men have shown time and time again how they'll just use, abuse, exploit, and hurt women?

What a weird article. She starts out saying there's a new "breed" of women that's emotionally guarded. Then she explains how she is one of those women, without any explanation as to how she got there. Well, I've got the answer and it's pretty simple. She's an introvert.

Oh I hate these kind of articles. I'm a female in my mid 20's, I love babies and children, love romance movies, like to cuddle and even enjoy the occasional flower bouquet. I'm also educated, love my field of work, enjoy sex as much as, if not more than, my partner and am fairly cool, calm and collected in most situations. So what does that make, a third gender not otherwise specified? Women all have different personalities, just like men do. Shocking, I know. I really wish people would think instead of publishing this garbage.

I'm a female in my mid 20's, I love babies and children, love romance movies, like to cuddle and even enjoy the occasional flower bouquet. I'm also educated, love my field of work, enjoy sex as much as, if not more than, my partner and am fairly cool, calm and collected in most situations.

Mid/late 20s female, likes to cuddle, likes flowers, into abstinence. Loves engineering, law, and sports. Babies make me cringe. Not really into children, either.

I guess I'm also the unspecified 3d gender.

I think it is just indicative of how deeply ingrained the idea of women as the more emotional, nurturing sex really is, even for other women. Women live very different lives than ever before and I think that makes many people extremely uncomfortable and historically speaking, it has been a very rapid social change. More choices for women in every aspect of their lives has resulted in less certainty about the traditional sphere of wifehood, motherhood and the family and we have not yet come far enough along this journey to have truly embraced the idea.

Maybe I read the "tone" of the article differently, I wasn't offended by it and as for "fembot", well, aren't we used to the media labeling the newest "trend" as something more important than it really is?

While it may be all well and good for women to be "emotionally unattached" and more like a "man" at the workplace, that does not make this state of mind healthy or desirable. Why should we strive to be as emotionally stunted as most men?
In my opinion, if you are "turning off", you are missing out on a huge chunk of life. Yeah, it's a bitch sometimes - what with the pain and heartache - but there is also a flip side. By becoming a "bot", you can miss out on the great satisfaction and fulfillment that can come from meaningful human relationships, not from climbing the corporate ladder.
Furthermore, I don't think a "fembot" is the same thing as a "feminist." Feminism is about universal equality and being sensitive to the needs of others. This obviously doesn't mean being overly emotional, or "mushy", if you will, but it does mean being in tune to others' emotional states and not "turned off."

" Of course, we guess the fact that this very article stirred up so many emotions confirms our true nature."

What true nature? That we're all irrational and crazy with our lack of emotional control; that any appearance of stoicism in the public eye is just charade?

I can only speak for myself, but in my relationship, my boyfriend has almost as many irrational, emotionally driven outbursts as me. Granted, his vocabulary is bigger, but often it's coming from the same place. I've found that when either of us does this, the other has to take the volume down by playing the rational one, and just as often as not, it's me.

So there's some personal fembotism for you. I call it calming down and thinking. I didn't know it was some sort of syndrome.

It's because all non "fembot" women are irrational cry-babies who are slaves to their emotions. Duh! You all didn't know that?

/sarcasm

I'm pretty sure I'm a fembot too, even before that term was coined (and it always makes me think of Futurama, and I like that show^^)

I think "Fembot" and "Feminist" are two different things, but I don't think you have to choose between the two. I'm a feminist but I definitely have fembot-like qualities.

interrobang, my response when people try overly hard to make me gush over babies (which I think are fine, maybe I'll want one someday, maybe not, eh, I'm just not particularly impressed by them, but hey, more power to those who love 'em, etc.) is to say "eh, I'm more of a dog person, really." Heh.

I agree with one small point in this article: I think people in general, men and women, have gotten colder, and yes, it is a cyclical thing, at least to the extent that the average person's emotions follow the fashion. But feminism has nothing to do with it. That's just ridiculous.

And since everybody else is doing the meme, I'll play too: I'm affectionate, love babies, love to cuddle, knit, laugh, cook/bake, babytalk to my dog, wear hot shoes/makeup; but, at the same time, I curse a lot, don't smile much, refuse to dumb down when talking to guys or laugh at stupid/rude jokes, am bored spitless by stuffed animals, don't need a lot of fuss on Valentine's Day. Oh, and I love sex as much if not more than blah blah blah. I have no idea what all that makes me.

Babies make me cringe.

Whaaa? I'd never expect you to say such a thing, Oenophile. Not trying to start shit, but I'd have thought you'd be all about the babies.

Law Fairy, that's how I react to babies too! "Yeah... that's nice. Any doggies around?"

Yeah, I like doggies and kitties :D. Babies are kinda... creepy. Can I be the 47th gender or something? ...and, "Fembots". Jeez... what a stupid made up name. lol, whatever

Being an avid science fiction reader, I think that the real fembots (as opposed to regular robots, which would be androgynous, or "default masculine") would be programmed to appear to have emotional responses, so as to make their human users more comfortable.

So a fembot, when presented with a baby picture, could smile and coo, "Oh, so precious! You're very lucky", and the new parent, wanting these reactions to be real, would believe them so. On the other hand, the same fembot might have no idea what to do if presented with an actual baby.

Come to think of it, there are already people like this today.

To be fair, SarahMC, Oenophile's made it clear on previous threads that she intends to remain childfree. Hence the abstinence now and the tube-tying ASAP.

I think this is quite interesting in terms of the rise of popularity in psychology and personal analysis, and the increasing value placed on the confessional. For example, my boyfriend seems to think I am not truly expressing myself if I do not cry. I personally hate to cry, it never makes me feel better, only worse. As a result of this I feel that I am made to feel like something has really gone wrong for me somewhere in the past, because I can't even enjoy a cry. But you know what? That is just not how I express myself, and I would rather avoid it at all costs. I CAN have emotional depth without a great revelationary weeping sesh.

Just wanted to add that that kind of "confession", the problem page letter, is the kind of thing that mags like marie claire take as a universal truth or right, so it's not really surprising that they think anyone who doesnt want to do that is a little bit odd.

This has so many problems I don't know where to start.

Firstly, in the interest of full disclosure, I am and always have been a person who meets their definition of a fembot. Not interested in "romance" (flowers, jewelry, other people paying money for my company), hate to cry, pride myself on my emotional control, don't really give a shit what men think of me, don't really give a shit what women who aren't my friends think of me, and so forth.

But I am appalled by the use of the term "fembot" to apply to such a person, because a bot is a programmed device! Bots, or robots, are programmed by other people, for other people. If they have a sense of self, it's hard won and with great difficulty, because they have to overcome their programming. Robots aren't "unemotional and logical", they are devices created for the benefit of others. *I* am self-centered and self-focused, the subject of my sentences, the center of my solipsistic little world. I am not a device created by others. A "fembot" would be a woman who behaves like the patriarchy has programmed her to, without regard to how it impacts her personally -- thus a young woman who is obsessed with how men see her, or a slightly older woman obsessed with babies -- in other words, a totally stereotypical woman. Exactly the opposite of what this article suggests. I despise using a term with "bot" in it for a person who is self-focused -- a bot has no self. A fembot is a Stepford wife, not a woman who's out for herself in the workplace or her romantic life.

Secondly, unless average men are manbots, the use of "fembot" to refer to a woman who has stereotypically male attitudes about emotion is absurd.

And thirdly, women in the workforce have *always* been calm, cool and emotionally unavailable, just like the men, because that's professional behavior! In fact I would argue that women who wanted careers used to have to be much more cold and reserved than they need to be now in order to get ahead. Why did someone note that women are behaving like professionals in the workplace and decide that this applies to their personal life in any way? Or that this makes them robotic in any way?

An excellent point, AlaraJRogers. Folks have brought up a number of converging points.

In our culture, rationality, authority, and personal agency are considered to be in opposition to warmth and emotionality. The former are considered masculine and the latter feminine. There is also an imbalance on the value placed on these “masculine� and “feminine� traits. It makes sense that women conforming to a “masculinized� workplace would outwardly express “masculine� traits. In particular, young women, who are striving to establish themselves and be valued for their abilities, would be likely to convey a cool, rational, detached demeanor.

It is also possible that rejecting warmth and emotionality in favor of cool rationality is a step on the path to one’s personal, authentic gender expression. Young women, in particular, might be expected to experiment with how they express themselves, since they are in a new position of responsibility with some semblance of authority and autonomy. Perhaps the pendulum needs to swing on a personal level so that individuals can reconcile for themselves what the culture cannot: that one can be emotional and rational, warm and agentic simultaneously. Heck, perhaps unemotionality is an authentic and abiding gender expression for some women. There is more than one way to be a woman in the world.

The article could be retitled, “Let’s Look at Valid Ways in which Young Women Cope With Partiarchy and Reframe Them as Female Pathology.�

(Note: Although I acknowledge that my culture construes traits and behaviors as inherently masculine or feminine, I do not endorse this construal.)

Interestingly, cnn is running this story: http://www.cnn.com/2007/LIVING/worklife/08/02/angry.men.women.reut/index.html which gives a very good reason why some, if not most women try to keep it contained at work: it costs you money if you don't, silly!

I'm so glad Feministing has posted this tragic article! This piece is frighteningly similar to several articles I read in Cosmo more than a year ago, before instituting my very own Feministcot. Cosmo has, on several ocassions referred to smart, strong women as b*tches and now Marie Claire is calling us Fembots! Apparently any woman who is not a dependant, blubbering mess is some new breed. I wrote to Cosmo but never recieved a response, so hopefully when I write to Marie Claire, I will hear something back!