Choice

Freedom of choice is a broad term and includes several ideas associated with feminism (such as reproductive choices), but it has a couple of specific usages in geek circles which defend sexism:

• that low numbers of women in geek activities are simply a matter of women exercising freedom of choice as to their career and hobbies and that no one should criticise such choice, since it is an example of the goals of feminism that women be able to freely choose careers
• conversely, that sexism in geek activities is not a problem because complainants could choose to avoid that conference/hobby/person in future

The two arguments oppose each other: the first says that there are simply less women geeks because of prior choice, the second that there should be less women geeks (or feminist geeks of either gender) in many areas because they should be avoiding communities that they don't like, rather than trying to change those communities.

Choice feminism

The term "choice feminism" is sometimes used as shorthand for the attitude that women should be able to make any choice they want, and that doing so is automatically feminist. For example, "I'm a woman and I choose to be a stay-at-home mother. It's my choice, and I made it freely, therefore it's feminist." Or to give a geek example, "I'm a woman and I choose to cosplay Slave Leia."

Choice feminism is sometimes criticised for failing to take into account the complex social pressures in place when people make choices. Choices are not made in a vacuum, and some choices women make can feed into or support anti-feminist ideas in the larger world. Unfortunately, it can sometimes be hard to differentiate criticism of an individual woman's choice from criticism of the wider social context of her choice.