"New" Feminism

I am becoming more and more confused with the current and more modern strain of Feminism that has manifested itself in the last several years. Can someone explain it to me? I have seen serious discussion; comedy and just light hearted banter lately revolve around a new form of Feminism, a type of which I was not familiar. As a man, I am all for women’s rights, equal pay for equal work, reproductive rights… I am sure I missed something, but you get my point. As a Liberal, I do believe women should have equality.

What I am speaking of is the new outcry from women that they face a “sexual gauntlet” every day of their lives when dealing with men. That each day spent in the company of a male is a day of threat, likely violence, constant harassment, ogling, and assault in many forms, innuendo, boorish behavior and abhorrent sexual advances at any given moment. In the next breath you may hear the same woman decry the fact that she doesn’t feel pretty, wanted, needed, loved, sexually or physically “blessed” as she perceives her female counterparts to be, and would like all of that to change immediately as well. You may hear her talk about “50 Shades of Grey” or “Twilight” as if she were about to have an orgasm in front of you, but make mention of her actions, and you are a letch or misogynist.

I am becoming more and more confused at how a gender can want to be attractive, but not want to be told. Why go through the motions of getting up, showered, dressed and made up if you do not want attention? Why attest need for good sexual relations and to be desired, but protest when that desire shows itself in a male’s approach to you. The Sexes are sexual in nature, all studies show it to be true, but WOMEN reserve the right to turn down. Yet as a man, if I see something in you, be it physical or not, am I to keep my mouth shut until you decide you want me? Men would be terminally alone if life worked in that manner, and women would be more hateful than they ever were.

I also am getting confused about the “we don’t need your help” types in all of this. Guess what: you do need my help. You need sympathetic men to your cause or you will get nowhere. How did the ERA work without male support? Suffrage? Didn’t Hobby Lobby just get their way in lieu of YOUR wants and needs? Yeah, please stop acting as though you can go it alone, we need you and you need us. Without each other we all die as a species.

Can someone please explain this to me?