Confirmation: I am slightly feminist

I personally find the conversation between my guy friends during a hockey game, out for drinks, or playing Call of Duty (yeah I said it), the most interesting and revealing about attitudes young men have in regards to women.

I think before I discuss what I said to my friends about their attitudes to women, it's important to understand my views on women and why I truly am, partially feminist. It should be duly noted that my close friends would already know this and others who do not know me well may be partially shocked. As a fairly dominant person, confident in myself and in the views of my ex-girlfriends, "overconfident", I have no qualms in saying that I thrive on women that are similar to myself - confident, in control of themselves at all times, and are comfortable being single and themselves without relying on a man to survive. The expression I like because it is so accurate and perfect for what I envision the most resilient of women is, "A woman who will settle for the right person, but won't be afraid to live without that person." I think women are powerful but yet under appreciated, underpaid, and dismissed far too easily. While I won't discuss all of these points, I'll drive a few of them home.
One side of me may appear to be the Duan Juan/Tucker Max of this generation which generally disregards the essential traits women bring to the equation - such as the creative, personal and affectionate characteristics that men seem to lack, the intellectual, diverse, and goal driven drive to succeed, and even the less aggressive, soothing behavior that acts as a calming effect in situations such as at the negotiation table. Even when situations like last Friday arise, when a girl suddenly becomes super submissive and turns me right off, still matter to me because I can understand where the girl is coming from. This girl asked me, "Tyler, what can I do to make you see me more? Even if we could spend only one hour more a week, I would love that - doing whatever you want." I looked at this girl differently after that, I mean, here she is, this beautiful and nice, twenty something year old girl, who became so emotionally invested into me and way too caught up and she doesn't even know me very well. Women are like that, more emotional (not always, as I am quite the emotional person myself), and sometimes, way too submissive -  not that there is anything entirely wrong with it, but have some confidence!
However, in nearly all studies, the male of the human species appears more aggressive than the female; this conclusion is strongly supported by ethological studies of mammalian behavior, particularly primate behavior, and by the common observation that there are more men than women in armies, physically violent sports, and criminal penitentiaries (CBMW 49). What separates myself now from someone else, is that I feel men use women in today's world, to satisfy themselves. Pure selfish behavior, where man believes they are the stronger sex and justifiably thus deserve to abuse the weaker sex, by using them in whatever way, whether it is emotionally, physically, or even sexually. The Girl with the Red Dragon Tattoo, by Stieg Larsson, is a great book that exemplifies these points further. It shows women in situations where they are vulnerable of abuse, being abused. This book and others like it, truly make me very angry. I find it despicable and revolting when women are used to be exploited by men - how dare men take advantage of women when they can? What gives them that right? Women are treated as sex objects in today's culture, and treated as slaves by many religions - the Koran itself is disgusting in how it delegates women to below men (two women have to have the same opinion to be considered equal to one man). The list goes on, and my fingers here, typing up this, are shrieking furiously in anger at what I consider total injustice by men throughout the centuries, starting with prostitution. Don't even get me started on why I believe prostitution should be entirely illegal, none of this legalize it for the safety of the 'sex workers' nonsense; it's an industry based on exploiting women. While I won't go as far as supporting entirely feminist movements that attempt to promote more rights to women than to men, I definitely believe in the majority of feminist arguments that detail why women do not have the same equality as men.

As my guy friends began talking about this "smoking broad they slammed last week," I stood up. They all kind of looked up from the hockey game at me. "Guys," I said, "We're better than this. And we all know it."
They all kind of stared at me, and one of them kind of awkwardly laughed.
But they knew.
No more.