I read meara's "it seems to frame feminism in a bad light" as based on common understanding of the term

Ah, okay. Well, then it's meara who's misunderstanding me, because I'm referring about the specific definition here that I mentioned earlier.

the appropriate thing to do/say as a (helpful/ally/supportive) man would be "I am not a woman, but I support feminism"

But I'm not a man. I'm a woman who doesn't want to ally herself with a movement that's defined itself to explicitly exclude men.

I'm not sure I'm going to make it through this week without this project making me cry tears of frustration.

I don't think the movement has every defined itself in that way. I'm sure there are women who are part of the movement who do, but I can't imagine there are many of them.

Then you could say "I support a feminist movement that includes and welcomes men". I don't think the definition you're referring to is super common, and is certainly not one that most people would associate with the phrase "I'm not a feminist, but..." which is very common from women, but mostly in a "I don't like those strident activists that seem to be all about lesbians and abortion" kind of way.

Anatomical Heart Necklace

I want this one, because it's a locket: [link]

Also, I cried at work AGAIN today. I think it's because my boss is nice and our weekly meetings are at 11, so I'm at a low ebb pre-lunch. So I moved the meetings to the afternoons.

I don't think the movement has every defined itself in that way

I don't think there is a "the movement". There are many movements.

Then you could say "I support a feminist movement that includes and welcomes men". I don't think the definition you're referring to is super common

Okay, I'm being really unclear. I'm talking about those people, to those people. I don't see why I'd have to define it to them. I'm saying I'm not a feminist like they're a feminist. I'm not talking about or to "most people". I specified the population intersection upthread, and it's them I'm still referring to, wondering if they exist, if there are people restrictively defining feminism yet objecting to people using that phrasing to except themselves from it.

The general population was never an issue. I'm only talking about the people I'm talking about.

I'm very confused. You're talking to someone who says "men can't be feminists" and you're saying "I disagree with your definition of feminism", what's wrong with then saying "I suport a feminist movement that includes men"? I mean, they aren't going to magically AGREE with you, but they should know where you stand.

If you want magic arguments to make someone agree with you, I can't help you there. Trying to consolidate feminism to one definition/movement is waaaaay beyond my scope.

thing is, there are all sorts of feminism: radical, womanism, conservative - so, as Fred Pete put out there, it is difficult to know what kind of feminism you are talking about when you say "men can't be feminist."

In a class I taught years ago, I mentioned that the concept of men being feminist is somewhat controversial. Because of the perspective of being an ally and not having the lived experience. Thing is, it can be difficult to fully experience the negative aspects of being a woman if one can be privileged whenever anyone chooses.

In this way the radical feminists (who focus on patriarchy as a system of power, not only women being equal to men) believe that men who are part of the patriarchy can't really be feminists.

This is my pithy summary. I hope it is understandable.

ita !, maybe the approach would be to talk about what you think feminism means. How would you define the word? And how are they defining it?