#classism in radblr

[selkie-on-land]

Self diagnosis is okay. We all have heard about self diagnosis autism but for weird reasons, well no let's be fair, for ableist reasons it's only when it's about autism that it's not okay. Especially from allistics.

The allistics that screams and cry a river if an autistic person is not professionally diagnosed but they don't have a problem if they do it too. If they are the one doing it, it's perfectly fine and not even seen as self diagnosis!

Example : everyone is self diagnosing themselves a cold, Flu, gastroenteritis etc.

When allistics does this, it's not even considered to be something significant enough to have a name or label on it.

But if an autistic person does this then they are evil attention seeker.

This is typical ableism, autismophobia, misogyny and classism.

It's because we as humans recognise what we are going through, and that what we are going actually is something significant enough to be named that we can and do seek help from other. It's not a bad thing, and also it'd literally a human trait. It's thanks to this natural behaviour that we continue to exist and adapt as a species. And not just human, it's something that ALL the living being are doing.

If you don't understand why this speech of ''self diagnosis autism is not and never valid'' is deeply harmful and discriminatory (I'm guessing you're not a radical feminist if you believe this) I will develop it :

It's ableist and autismophobic because the only exception where it's apparently fundamentally wrong and evil to do so it's when it's an autistic person doing it.

It's misogynistic because of the medical misogyny where the female body is not study or even considered worth to be included in all the medical and health industry, studies, fields. The average age for autistic girls to be diagnosed is in their fourties at most. And not because they are finally by some sort of miracle considered as human beings but because their boys/sons are diagnosed and it's suggested to be ''tested'' because it's genetic. While the average age for boys to be diagnosed is before the age of 7. And autism is a neurodevelopmental and hereditary disorder. Meaning it's there since the beginning of the formation of the nervous system and the formation of the brain. It's already autistic before even being a baby. A lot of autistic women are even diagnosed in their GERIATRIC YEAR! When a lot of autistic men are diagnosed AS BABIES !!! And as the usual, like for ALL the medical conditions, the only trait, aspects, symptoms etc that are teached, studies etc are the one of the male bodies. That's why girls and women are dismissed in medical care, why girls and women are dying of late stages cancer because it's labelled as stress or female condition instead of cancer, that's why we are having heart attacks and stroke also dismissed and even denied because we don't experience similar symptoms and because we are just seen as dolls so we obviously don't have a physiological body.

Also because in my country (France) the ARC (Autism Resource Center), there is one in every state, you can't go to a center from a state you don't live in, there are here to assess autistic person, they are supposed to be the most updated about autism. There are the main specialists, and there are part of the institutions (not sure it's the proper way of saying it, we have universal health care and it's similar to the hospital, it's included). And you know what? More than half of them are denying access for girls and women. MORE THAN HALF OF THEM FORBID THE ENTRANCE OF THE CENTER TO GIRLS AND WOMEN. They also are not updated and have knowledge as if they were still stuck in at least the 1990's for the most updated ones.

It's classist because it coats A LOT of money and ressources. If you can't go to an ARC, there is still the liberal psychiatrist and psychologist, but same shit. They are deeply misogynistic, classist, elitist, ableist as hell. The psycho have more knowledge, they are usually the one that would have formation about autism but since they are not doctors they cannot diagnosed, so they are the one that are doing the assessment and tests, they then does the pre diagnosis (if there is one) and then you have to find a doctor that recognises autism as something real (yes this is where we are in France, Belgium and Switzerland), if you are lucky enough to find one, after some time maybe, the doctor can confirm the analysis of the psychologist and it's then called a diagnosis. Even though most the time they don't even have the slightest formation about autism they have no idea of what is written in the analysis. And ALL of this process is extremely expensive. Only the psychiatrist are covered by our health care system and even if you are covered and don't need to pay, as +85% of them are bourgeois and rich, they are not accepting the insurance you have and will force you to pay them 4 times or even more what you were supposed to pay. And this is IF they tolerate that you are poor and grant you an appointment, which is also extremely rare as more than half of them turn you down the minute they learn about your health insurance covered by the government because you are too poor to have one otherwise. This is just the appointment, all the multiple tests and analysis can coast thousands of euros each appointment. And since we are already disabled we are extremely poor and vulnerable (unless born rich).

So yeah, unless you're extremely wealthy and a boy, having an ''official'' diagnosis is almost impossible.

So the only option left is self diagnosis. And thanks to this we can accommodate ourselves and stop damaging our brains trying to force ourselves to be something we are not. Because yes, being forced to mask, being abuse your entire life for what you are at your core, and sexually abused if you're a girl, cause brain damage. PERMANENT brain damage.

(poll 1/2)

take "valid" to mean that the person can speak on their experiences as an autistic person, speak on accessibility as a disabled person, etc., with the weight that someone professionally diagnosed can. And that they otherwise should be treated the same way as someone with a diagnosis when possible (accommodations).

-🐌

[hadesoftheladies]

"lol im not a feminist. it's not that deep bc women aren't oppressed anymore. it's not like medieval times. stop making this a gender war." lemme guess, upper-middle class?

[womenaremypriority]

When people go like “if women don’t want to be raped, they should avoid wearing certain things and going into shady areas.” And of course that’s awful for many reasons we all know, but also.. there are women who live in poorer areas. What about them? Can they not go to work or go get some fresh air? Because so often I hear people say this sort of thing and sometimes it seems like they forget women also live there. It’s an individualist, rapist mindset and also very classist.

[homeiswherethewitchcraftis]

Dear radical feminists

Y'all need to stop calling women "maids" as an insult, especially when directed at homemakers

You guys preach Financial Independence and when women talk about how they prefer to stay home you call them Maids making fun of one of the more common ways for women especially traditional women to become financially independent. In times when I couldn't stay home with my children and I wasn't getting enough babysitting jobs I was a maid because it was work that I enjoyed and needed to be done I worked for myself and was able to make money for my family. It's something I can pick up and drop as I need working independently as a cleaning lady or I can go and work at a hotel as a maid it requires minimal skills and always needs to be done so there will always be jobs available.

It honestly just comes off as hateful especially when it's combined with the other classist anti-poor rhetoric that comes from a lot of radical feminists

[rantingcrocodile]

there’s something intriguing about radblr showcasing misogyny at bi women speaking out their discomfort the moment we decided that we deserve respect. does this disturb your peace? is it making you uncomfortable that we are angry? miss croc (beloved) here is laying out the rules most biphobes follow, it bothers you enough to make witty comments? surely if bi women demand respect and your immediate response is refuting with 3 billion resources, then you truly don’t respect them even as feminists?

I think that there are great individual women in this space and great individual posts that circulate this space. I think that the pdfs shared are incredibly useful, as are quotes, as are general discussions that are entirely about feminism.

I was incredibly naive when I came to this space simply to vent. I genuinely thought that most here (aside from the newest of newcomers) understood the theory, updated it in their own heads and genuinely cared about other women. That the vent posts were just venting.

This space and other feminist spaces are broken beyond repair, to be quite frank. Libfem spaces prioritise men and shy away from critiquing the broadness of patriarchy to cling to individual choice and free will, whilst radfem spaces hate individual choice and free will whilst encouraging tiering and hatred of other women, ironically still obsessing over men.

I've talked this through a lot with different friends to get their perspectives, and there was one who said something incredibly poignant that I'll paraphrase.

If you have a religion, and you can interpret that religion in a good way, but there's a majority of others who interpret it in a hateful way, then saying, "but this religion can be interpreted in a good way" doesn't really cut it. There is something about that religion that is pulling in a certain kind of person that sees the hateful and can't see the good. You, seeing the good and disavowing the hateful, are the outlier. You're the one that doesn't belong.

When the norm in radical feminist spaces is to sneer at other women suffering under the patriarchy as "handmaidens," to dogpile minors with weird pronouns who are too young to really understand sexuality, to hate bisexuals, to deny that WOC have specific issues because that isn't the same as in the Anglosphere but jump to use WOC's issues as an excuse to hate MOC, to tier feminist women, to moralise sexuality, to claim to care about TIFs and then laugh at and abuse them constantly, to ignore ableism and classism, to ignore all kinds of bigotry depending on when it suits, to be hypocritical and hateful and misogynistic all the time, and when there is no pushback against that, where the hatefulness is what's popular and everyone just ignores it all and allows it to continue aside from a small number of women who are horrified by it, then what's radical feminism? The majority of hateful women, or the few that aren't?

What's most heartbreaking of all, at least to me, is just how much theory, in its purest sense, is entirely correct. The interpretations of statistics, the general thought processes, the out-of-date thinking that can be easily updated with more modern understandings, and literally none of my political stances have changed.

At the end of it, I just keep circling back to: do I want to be associated with that hateful group of people? Or would I rather simply be an actual feminist and leave the hateful to their own hateful devices while continuing to try and do my own good supporting women and helping build bisexual class consciousness with other, likeminded people?

What broke me, finally, was seeing Kathleen Stock come out with the same biphobia that plenty of radblr believes. It's not just a radblr problem. It's not just a few biphobic individuals in the real world. That's a radical/gender critical feminist problem. And if you're supposedly a "feminist" that understands class analysis and then still go out of your way to blame an oppressed group for the actions of an oppressor group, and other "feminists" happily agree with you like it's obviously true, then that's not a part of "feminism" that I want to be associated with.

So I know that I'm an actual feminist, I know my friends are actual feminists, but I've come to the conclusion that "radical feminism," whilst ironically being the current closest thing to fighting for women's liberation, is at the core, anti-woman and will never achieve women's liberation.

I wrote a post a fair few months ago that I think about a lot, where too many radfems genuinely believe that the anger and bitterness and violence of the suffragettes won the right for women to vote, holding them up as the standard, and pretending that that's all that happened. And where I once thought that was historical ignorance, it really is just a case of, "We want an excuse to be as hateful as possible and pretend that we're The Only Real Feminists, and only women who have This Label or behave in This Specific Way are worthy, and the rest are worthless handmaidens," while somehow simultaneously believing and proclaiming that they care about all women.

It's just a lie. I don't know what specific part of the ideology is so broken that it has so many hateful, bullying women flocking to call themselves "radfems," but I can only suppose that it has something to do with the idea that they can feel absolved of all their "crimes" and internalised misogyny to blame men and not have to do self-reflection, while refusing to offer the same for women who used to be in their positions, or in similar positions as they used to be, etc.

Feeling "superior" and having someone else to blame is a hell of a drug.

But that's just not me. So radblr can fuck itself, and every "feminist" who has seen misogyny and bigotry and harassment and dogpiling of minors and joined in, or who have simply looked the other way, then they should feel ashamed, honestly. We all have off days, but this is... I'd rather be an actual feminist with a handful of other loving, caring, intelligent women than have the cruel, thinnest-of-ice "solidarity" with radblr on the condition of silence.

[wokestonecraft]

so I had a free afternoon and decided to watch the “how terfs misunderstand the handmaid’s tale’ video, and I have couple of thoughts about it. 

The primary argument hinges on the idea that terfs claim that TiMs would be the wives, and that terfs don’t recognize the wives as being oppressed as women, and equate them as oppressors

Now, I’m not saying that some self identified “terfs” haven’t made those arguments, but it’s not one I’ve seen before on radblr or other radfem spaces I personally frequent, and really goes against what radfem analyses. Most radfems take the position that transwom*n would be executed as gender traitors in Gilead, along with gay men and women, but some trans wom*n would likely abandon the trappings of femininity and simply go back to being gender conforming men, and transm*n would be treated like any other women, stripped of rights and consigned to second class citizens

He also justifies any threats of violence against radfems by tras, as coming from a place of understandable anger, but then says that it only furthers the terf cause since terfs can then use it as justification for their opposition of the transgender movement. But still, he places radical feminists in a place of power over TRAs, which doesn’t seem to be the case, considering the rapid speed at which sex based protections for women are being overturned in favor of gender based ones. 

There was a lot of condescension towards radical feminists in this video, as we are dismissed as only focusing on the role of reproduction in women’s oppression, and ignoring any other factors like race, class, and sexuality, and see women as the only victims. Which raises my eyebrows, since radical feminism has a long history of overlapping with movements for the rights of people of color and for gay men and women, along with acknowledging class issues.(not that there aren’t problems with racism and classism, but it is generally acknowledged that liberation for women means ALL women, not just one class or race.)

There were the same arguments that terfs idolize women’s biological capabilities and ignore women who are infertile, intersex, or have any problems with their bodies, and obsess over our ovaries and uteruses. Again, I know that there are indeed radfems and other feminists who do focus their spirituality around ideas of the female body and creation, but this is not by any means universal from radfems, and it usually comes from a desire to act against all the shame and senses of inferiority women face around their bodies pushed on them by patriarchal religions. I’d note that the poem he cites about a woman who writes about bleeding on her period as a spiritual experience, references the oppression of women by the Catholic Church, where women are banned from the priesthood, and have long been marginalized as second to men, temptresses and “dirty,” especially when sexually active. Maybe radfems celebrate the female body, in all it’s forms, because so many of us were taught for so long that our bodies were less-than, and impure. And I also think its a misreading of what radfems aim for. We are women because we are female, but being women doesn’t define our personalities, our strengths, our limitations, or anything like that, and in an ideal world, a person’s sex wouldn’t matter in how they are raised or treated by society. 

He also says that transwom*n have fought for the rights of all women, and cites Martha P. Johnson????? A self identified gay man who did drag, and was involved in LGBT activism??? Not exactly a “feminist” icon, if a cool person all around. The evidence for transwom*n fighting for the rights of “all” women remains sparse on the ground, while there are plenty of feminists from all races, countries, classes, and sexualities who have made strides on behalf of all women, from Audre Lorde to Nawal el Saadawi, Mary L. Bonauto and, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. 

He ultimately concludes that tras and radfems are on the same side against the patriarchy, and we should work together to defeat it. I note that it is radfems who must capitulate to the other side, that we are the foolish misguided ones who must give our movement over to “transwom*en of color” who have done so much for us. Already, the role of lesbians have slowly been erased from the history of gay rights, and now we are seeing women pushed out of feminism itself. 

[rf-times]

Yeah, I think a major problem along with blocking racists, and considering classism, radfems could also work on not coddling abusive women. Like pro-life women and female misogynists. Also homophobic TIF's. Cause if you criticize a TIM, you should criticize a TIF. A straight girl thinking she is a gay man can only be harmful to gay men.

I personally haven't seen too many pro-forced birth women coddled, but I agree about the misogynists, an alarming number of self proclaimed radfems will still use b*tch and c*nt and other demeaning language to insult women and are like "uwu when I call women I dislike c*nts I'm reclaiming it." Along with other unapologetically misogynistic beliefs. Then there's the radblr orbiters who are misogynistic and when called out on it half a dozen people jump in to say "They're not radfems so you can't hold them to radfem standards!" And yeah TIFs shouldn't be given a pass on their homophobia.

[wild-wombytch]

Respectfully middle-class people know as much about poverty as men know what it is to be women.

You can't erase people who are actually poor by putting 65k/year people in the same bag as people who live in a house with literal holes on the walls, asbestos in the floor, who sleep on a bedless 35yo mattress found in a dumpster and have lived with literal starvation and homelessness. Who think buying super glue to fix their shoes is a luxury and resort to using their grandma's dusty sewing threads to fix the soles. Who still handwash their laundry. Who can't cook most food because they don't have a oven. Who live without heater all winter long in a house so poorly isolated that there is mist coming out of your mouth in the morning. Who as 6yo grew up with underwear worn out to the point of being rags. Who didn't pursue higher studies because of the cost. Who can't pay their parents' funerals and no they won't be able to take care of their parents when they age. Who don't have a driving license because of the cost. Who couldn't buy menstrual products in a all-women house during covid. And that's in a first world country and for those lucky enough to have a roof on top of their head and a mattress at all.

Like what the actual fuck? Unless there's some heavy cultural context I don't get (but I don't think so cue to the 17k comment), literally how are you the same category of poor when you own your house, have a car (new? That you send to car wash?), sometimes have two incomes and/or ma and pa backing you up financially, and so on? We clearly don't have the same problems if the middle-class obsession is to whine about how poor they are while shitting on actual poor people.

I used to follow tepkunset back in my TRA day and legit I still have more in common with her and more respect for her than people whining about having 65k and dismissing poor people. In what world are you living? 3 months before being homeless if you lost your income today? You know some people even with their income can't pay the rent, right? You know some people work while being homeless, right?

The only ones seeing a whole class as an enemy are the same who makes middle-class and poverty meaningless and tell us to look elsewhere but not critically look at them. And by doing that, you refuse to see your privileges in comparison to others. Heavens forbid we see privileges for what they are. Don't call the naked emperor naked if it makes the emperor feel bad. Do you all note that nobody even called you rich? You are literally attacking someone with less privileges than you on a strawman because of victim mentality. You cornered tepkunset out of nowhere because you are so protective of being called poor and unprivileged instead of standing with her saying everyone should have a minimum of 65k and fight in that sense, which would have actually been constructive and uplifting. Tepkunset is ALSO a nurse and essential worker (or was back in the day). And she takes care of two people! Can you fathom that some peeople do the exact same as you do, except with more hardships and still make less money and still have shittier situations? But why find solutions and listen to others who have less and uplift them when you can make a piss contest out of it every time we point out the discrepancies betweenways of life that are practically aliens to each others at this point.

If I got a penny every time a middle-class people came crying on my shoulders about how they can't even pay a cinema ticket these days or go in vacations outside of the country or "womp womp we can't live with two 6k incomes a months, life is hard :'(" ...I'm sure I'd be able to talk about my dental care without laughing. You don't need to be a CEO billionaire to have privileges over otther people.

One day I swear I'm gonna charge a zoo trip in my fancy poor person social housing with no toilet seat, with the authorization to sleep on the floor for a fee so some of you can say you have seen one poor person in your life and can say "eww is that a slug on the floor and water from condensation?" once in your life. This conversation is nuts. I can't even wrap my head around this. Let us eat cake, I guess.

By the way, compost the richs, it's better for health and the planet and you can grow more foods out of them. Maybe make it so classes like gender disappear and everyone has basic needs met.

We ask your questions so you don’t have to! Submit your questions to have them posted anonymously as polls.

[radfem-gossip]

[[for people who supposedly hate idpol, gs love to use it to defend goldstarsappho. i dont think she deserves things like death threats but shes objectively a shit person and no personal tragedy or fact that she’s a brown refugee lesbian will change that]

And what did she do besides saying lesbians don't like dick? Seriously show me with screenshots what did she do or say to make you claim she's "objectively a shit person" because this is really starting to sound like a genderhair saying lesbians deserve to be sent rape threats if they're terfs]]

She didn't do anything. People are just mad because she didn't validate radblr "lesbians" who came out as lesbians after being in radfem circles for a while and decided their previous relationships with men were just "comphet". Most radblr lesbians are fauxbians who think lesbianism is the most inherently feminist orientation and do all kinds of mental gymnastics to delude themselves into thinking they're lesbians and their prior relationships with men weren't real, so she got a lot of radblr's rage directed at her from people who feel insecure in their lesbianism because deep down they know they're osa. Like gendies, they spiralled into misogynistic homophobia (with a sprinkle of racism and classism thrown in) when an actual lesbian wouldn't behave like their orientation is the same as hers.

.

[haemosexuality]

Radfems really b forgetting we not only live in a patriarchy, but in a white patriarchy huh

This also applies to classism, as we live in a capitalist society, and bc classism is heavily tied to racism as well. So many of yall on radblr arent living in a third world country, or a country where most of the population is black/mixed, you dont know what its like. Even outside of the context had in mind when making this post, yall forget to take class and race into account even when talking about women

the post itself isnt bad, its some of the additions that are. the post is talking about rape in the military and prostitution, and prioritizing females.

its jist when you ignore that black and poor men also are oppressed, or act like its a "lesser oppression" or something

[selkie-on-land]

This 👆👆👆 is crucial!!!

I don't want to hear your ''feminism'' if you actively talk over and mock disabled women when we ask you not to be ableist in feminist spaces.

I don't want to hear your ''feminism'' if you actively talk over and mock poor women and women from other economic classes when we ask you not to be classist in feminist spaces.

I don't want to hear your ''feminism'' if you actively talk over and mock bisexual women when we ask you not to be biphobic in feminist spaces.

i don’t want to hear about ur “feminism” if u actively talk over & mock woc when we ask u to not be racist in feminist spaces. i don’t want to hear about ur “feminism” if u actively talk over & mock lesbians when we ask u not to be lesbophobic in feminist spaces. one crucial aspect to achieving female liberation is first forming female class consciousness and solidarity, and racism & lesbophobia get in the way of forming global female solidarity. yes this is still the case even when u pretend ur racism only selectively applies to men

[selkie-on-land]

THIS!! 👆

Also, it stand from a very very privileged place! There A LOT of countries where just kissing the cheek of a girl if you're one can get you in jail or worse. There are literally at least 67 countries in the worlds who don't allow homosexuality where you can face jail, rape or death sentence for being SSA. And this also deny the fact that girls and women are trafficked, child brides etc. In the entire world there are more girls and women who doesn't have the autonomy over their own life than the ones that does. And this even in so called developed countries and western world. The only way for you to be as free and to gatekeeping it this hard just show your class privileges and Class contempt. Not being able to love freely doesn't erase or change your sexuality. Or maybe you believe that sexuality is a choice ? How can you be a radical feminist, who stand for every women and girls in the world and at the same time downgrading every lesbians girls and women for not being as privileged as you are ? How self centered is this !?

Also the claim that it doesn't exclude victims of abuse is your exception definition. +95% of the time it's explicit that it indeed don't include victims. The common definition (that I've seen from lib or rad) is who never have been intimate with another dude and yes if you kissed one boy because you were pressured by classmates to kiss when you were 12 then you're not a lesbian.

Beside, it's a very recent term that was only created as a joke and not that serious.

Lesbians only, how do you feel about the “gold star” term? Meaning a lesbian who hasn’t been with a man in the past, reply with opinions!

I think it’s good (I am one)

I think it’s good (I am not one)

I think it’s okay (I am one)

I think it’s okay (I am not one)

I think it’s fine but unnecessary (I am one)

I think it’s fine but unnecessary (I am not one)

I dislike it (I am one)

I dislike it (I am not one)

I haven’t heard of it before

Not a lesbian

I love the label sm because gold star lesbians are in fact the only lesbians since lesbians can not consensually date or have sex with men (and non-consensual experiences don't make you not one). bisexuals roleplaying as lesbians really hate it because it's a label they can't appropriate. Anyone who is answering as a "non-gold star lesbian" you are in fact not a lesbian. love you all gsl <3

I was going to take out the "i am one/I'm not one" since its redundant but i want to see how many bisexual larpers answer.

-🐌