#feminism is the radical idea that women are equal to men

[isawthismeme]

I want the same for them.

[rad-enby-tirf]

I have some points and some questions for radfems who are not trans inclusive. I say these and ask these in good faith, I am open minded, willing to hear well educated, thought out points.

If the goal is for women and men to be equal, or for gender to not matter, why is the idea that anyone can identify as anything a bother?

Reproductive rights should be fought for 100%, and it doesn't matter how the women this affects identify.

Going off the above points, I know I'm female, but I identify as nonbinary. It just feels right. I've tried to just shun gender all together and just be like "I'm a woman and there's no wrong way to be one so I'm going to do what I want with my body :)" but I still felt very unrelated to, othered and outcast by other women. I felt like I had to mask myself or change myself to be accepted. I just couldn't vibe with them or relate to them like I can with other nonbinary people especially afab enbies. Is it because of social norms and pressures? Maybe! but...why does it matter?

The porn and sex work industry harms women disproportionately and I will forever hate pimps and johns and anyone who thinks that sexuality should be purchasable yes but I want to point out that the porn/sex work industry also glorifies and sexualizes hateful slurs and stereotypes of other minorities, including trans individuals who also shouldn't be objectified or whose sexualities be seen as something you can turn into a commodity. Gender diverse individuals also seem to be victim to more violent acts in these industries as they feel they have to to get anywhere in them. Why not include trans people in radical feminism???

[transfaguette]

I ask this in good faith, but how is it that so many transmascs hate the idea of (trans inclusive) radical feminism so much? All I know it does is liberate everyone from the evils caused by cis men and the patriarchy.

Well first I would say this isn't an opinion unique to transmascs, but thats the circle I orbit so I understand where that perception comes from.

The problem is that you really can't excise the problematic elements of TERFism simply by removing the overtly transphobic parts.

Radical feminism, both trans exclusive and "inclusive" hinge on the idea of Men (sometimes cis, sometimes not) are perpetrators and Women (and sometimes, vaguely, some* non-women)are victims. Putting aside the individual capability to cause harm which is easy enough to debunk, even on a societal level this is not telling the whole story. The Patriarchy is a system of societal control and allotment of power, and it aims to control everyone, men included. Most men, all but the most powerful in society, which is capitalist, christian cishetero white men, have the patriarchy weaponized against them!

"Cis men" as a class, as individuals, don't cause evil. They are just human beings. Human beings with equal capability to love and nurture and fight for what is right. Which is the other problem with radfeminism, is that it seeks to strip away this humanity from the people around you, and isolate you. and like...what is a cis man, anyway? Like I know the answer seems obvious, but at what point does "cis man" end and "nonbinary person" or "trans person" begin? What elements of cis-manhood cause evil? Where does that "evil" go when someone transitions or no longer identifies as a cis man?

This is, I think, the fundamental problem of "trans inclusive" radical feminism. In continuing to divide the world into Evil Men and Good Women, you STILL impose a system of gender essentialism in a way that does not coalesce with the ideas of queer liberation. A nonbinary person can be a cis man one day, come out as nonbinary and change nothing else about their life from that point. What then? Are they no longer evil? Were they ever evil? How do you even being to decide that without just using the same trans exclusive rhetoric you're supposedly fixing, anyway? And I'm not even getting into the impact this has on trans men, because we are put in this position of being a marginalized gender and victims of misogyny but also placed in this position of privilege due to being men that is not accurate to reality. And sure, maybe you can remedy that by always specifying cis men, but many TIRFs don't see that as a flaw of the ideology, anyway. They Do think trans men are gender traitors and Do think we inherit some sort of evil power the moment we become men.

And there is much, much more to be said on the topic of radical feminism and its pitfalls. These are just the broad points. The dehumanization of Cis Men as a class is not simpatico with queer liberation and it just never will be. It is a good question worth asking, because it can seem good on the surface unless you know what to look for.

[brazenautomaton]

Do you differentiate between ideologies like radical feminism and the feminist movement you describe? Not asking from a hostile poise, just curious

I detailed that pretty clearly.

There are "radical feminists" who openly hate men. All feminists accept the ideas and worldview that lead to "radical feminists" openly hating men, and no matter how many times they insist "but those aren't real feminists" they are acting on the same principles to the same ends, and will always shelter and cover for those "radical feminists" because it can't bring itself to say they're wrong.

It does not matter how many of them are "for real equality" and it does not matter how many times they claim that the obvious psychopaths they cover for are "not real feminists." Feminism is an ideology that says "here is how to be for real equality! everyone who is for real equality, believe these things!" and gives you a worldview that utterly despises men and wholeheartedly embraces sexism.

and "radical feminism" isn't just harmful because of how much it hates men. "radical feminism" is basically an ongoing hate crime against women. if the reason hate crimes should be punished more harshly is that they lead to members of the targeted group living in more fear, feminism constantly lying about how much danger women are in and how much of a threat men pose to them is a sustained campaign of terrorism. the "man or bear?" thing is an indictment of how deranged feminism is and every single feminist justification for it digs the hole deeper. they spread lies that cause women to live in fear in order to gain power, because they can point to that fear and say "look look see how afraid women are you have to give us more power."

all feminists do this, even the ones who are for "real equality." the ones who say "those aren't real feminists, not all feminists are like that" will still turn around and say that women are constantly imperiled by men, that women should feel overwhelming fear of men, that women's lives should be defined by the fear of victimization, and that it is the responsibility of men to use their agency to make women safer. any feminist who disagrees with this is instantly excommunicated. they may think they are working for "real equality" by trying to reduce the threat men pose to women but it doesn't matter what they intend when their entire worldview is made out of man-hating sexism.

[genderkoolaid]

https://thenewinquiry.com/on-hating-men-and-becoming-one-anyway/

found this beautiful article written in 2019 which sums up so so much about transmisandry and the dilemma of trans men, where they’re grouped with the perpetrator class even though they’re equally vulnerable

OHHH kissing you this article is so fucking good. 100% gonna post some quotes from it. I love how this is written & its a really good explanation of how "trans-inclusive" radical feminism & radical feminist ideas fuck over transmascs in a unique & painful way. Like!!:

But trans men’s manhood is inseparable from our transness, and the relationship between trans men and cis womanhood can’t be accurately understood by separating trans status from gender in order to claim we’re oppressed by one but not the other. The day-to-day operations of gendered power in our lives make no such distinction, and while theories of intersectionality are often invoked to defend such claims, the idea that these “axes” can be neatly separated relies on the exact additive conception of oppressive power relations that intersectionality was invented to disprove. In the critique where she coined the term, Kimberlé Crenshaw argues that Black women are frequently excluded from antidiscrimination case law, feminist theory, and anti-racist politics precisely because their experiences cannot be reduced to the sum of racism and sexism. She references the case of DeGraffenreid v. General Motors, in which five Black women plaintiffs were denied consideration of their Title VII claims because the discrimination they experienced was particular to Black women rather than all Black people or women of all races. Because each form of discrimination was treated as a “discrete set of experiences” in this case rather than part of a multidimensional whole, “the boundaries of sex and race discrimination doctrine [were] defined respectively by white women’s and Black men’s experiences.” In reality, however, Black women relate to power differently from either group, and their experiences cannot be understood by combining the experiences of oppression each have. Similarly, trans men’s relationship to gender cannot be understood by adding the privilege of maleness to the oppression of transness; the interaction between these axes substantively transforms both such that it generates an experience qualitatively different from either alone.

He even discusses black trans men&mascs experience with gendered racism & how exorsexism play a part in this. Read this article.

(Although it is fun how he talks about Tumblr in the past tense, like its a ghosttown. My friend we are still doing "do trans men experience misogyny" discourse here lmao)

[tommyssupercoolblog]

How to spot TERFs (and radical feminists in general):

IT'S NOT JUST ABOUT MISGENDERING AND TRANSPHOBIA. SPOT IT FROM THE ROOT!!!

A TERF or TIRF-

Believes men are inherently both strong/powerful and cruel (either from birth (TERF) or transition (TIRF))

Believes women are inherently weaker and more fragile than men physically (either from birth (TERF) or transition (TIRF)

Believes men are inherently sexual aggressors who have high sex drives and can't control themselves, and that this is why rape happens. (either from birth (TERF) or transition (TIRF)

Is anti-sex work

Is against co-ed sports, and usually other co-ed spaces as well (either by sex (TERF) or gender (TIRF))

Believes that men cannot be feminists or genuinely care for women in a non-sexual way (either by birth (TERF) or transition (TIRF) because of beliefs one and two

Generally treats men and women like they are different species

Is either actively hostile and exclusionary towards intersex people or "politely ignores" them, because it is central to their worldview that everyone is either an oppressed woman or oppressive man.

TERFS specifically will also:

Believe that transmasc people are either traitors or self hating women

Believe that transfemme people are predators

Believe that nonbinary people don't exist

Usually be against cross dressing and drag, as well as champion the idea of traditional gender presentation.

TIRFS will:

Usually add on some qualifier about identity to loosely include trans people

End up aligning nonbinary people either with women or according to their sex anyway to remain in the "inherently oppressive vs inherently oppressed" worldview

Still be aggressive towards transmasc people, although now it's because they count as men now and men are evil

Sometimes be less hostile to gender nonconformity, sometimes not. It depends on the individual.

This is because Radical Feminism ISN'T about trans people. Trans people are only a group it hurts. Radical Feminism is about the idea that men and women are inherently different, and men are inherently dangerous to women. That is WHY TERFS are transphobic!!! And even in cases of Trans-Inclusionary-Radical-Femenists, they believe the same ideas, just for gender identity; they believe that trans men are inherently different from and dangerous to women, and that trans women are inherently different from and in danger because of men.

Radical Feminism is the idea that the patriarchy and sexism is baked in, unavoidable like the laws of gravity, and that feminists can only reduce damage. It is, ironically, incredibly anti-femenist. To the radical feminist, there is no such thing as an equal future- gender equality is unachievable. The best future a radical feminist can imagine is a sexist, patriarchal world, but with some women-only safe zones to flee to. Or, alternatively, genocide. Either way, shitty.

[sag-dab-sar]

⚧️ The Gods & Gender ⚧️

Discussing Trans-Exclusive Radical Feminism and the views of the Gods is not "speaking for the Gods,"—it is looking at facts and information and drawing completely reasonable conclusions that squarely put the foundations of trans-exclusion in opposition to the Gods.

(definitely not audio proof read, sorry for the dyslexia)

🌿Aphrodite & Venus🌿

Aphroditos (or Aphroditus) is Aphrodite with male characteristics including a penis and/or beard.

A cult of Aphrodite included a bearded Aphrodite at Amathus, Cyprus on a high cliff temple. [Wikipedia citing Macrobius, Saturnalia III]

Her relationship with bisexuality (referring to being dual sex not sexual orientation in this paper), androgyny, and transvestism is also documented in Cyprus:

— Aphrodite in the Theogony by William Sale in Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association Vol. 92 X

(Sorry for the shitty screenshot JSTOR did not want to work with me)

This worship of Aphrodite with a penis was also seen as equal to Venus:

There's also a statue of Venus on Cyprus, that's bearded, shaped and dressed like a woman, with scepter and male genitals, and they conceive her as both male and female. Aristophanes calls her Aphroditus, and Laevius says: Worshiping, then, the nurturing god Venus, whether she is male or female, just as the Moon is a nurturing goddess. In his Atthis Philochorus, too, states that she is the Moon and that men sacrifice to her in women's dress, women in men's, because she is held to be both male and female." — Macrobius (c. 400s AD), Saturnalia 3.8.2

🌿Hermaphroditus🌿

There is also the "intersex child of Aphrodite & Hermes" named Hermaphroditus.

I have seen many use Hermaphtoditus as an excuse to wipe away the Goddess Aphrodite with a penis that the ancients worshipped. Which doesn't even make sense because I hate to break it to you— Hemaphroditus also opposes TERF ideology by its nature. A God existing as bisexed/dual-sex/bigender (however you'd like to word it) negates the idea that the Gods somehow support the ridged biological essentialism and gender binary that TERF ideology necessitates.

There are different accounts of Hermaphtoditus' creation but one, Ovids, tells of him merging with a nymph and then asking his parents to make the water transformative causing men to have thr effeminate bodies like women:

Her prayer found gods to hear; both bodies merged in one, both blended in one form and face. As when a gardener sets a graft and sees growth seal the join and both mature together, thus, when in the fast embrace their limbs were knit, they two were two no more, nor man, nor woman--one body then that neither seemed and both. So when he saw the waters of the pool, where he had dived a man, had rendered him half woman and his limbs now weak and soft, raising his hands, Hermaphroditus cried, his voice unmanned, ‘Dear father [Hermes] and dear mother [Aphrodite], both of whose names I bear, grant me, your child, that whoso in these waters bathes a man emerge half woman, weakened instantly.’ Both parents hears; both, moved to gratify their bi-sexed son, his purpose to ensure, drugged the bright water with that power impure." — Ovid, Metamorphoses 4. 28 ff (trans. Melville) (Roman epic C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.)

🌿More on Aphroditos vs Hermaphroditus read @theoi-crow's excellent post about them here.

Also some lovely statues:

Marble copy statue from a fresco at Herculaneum, Italy. X (left)

Statue from Pergamum, Turkey. X (center)

Statue from Nymph Sanctuary in Lacori, Italy X (right)

Statue from Pompeii, Italy X

🌿Inana & Ishtar🌿

From a hymn to Inana

To open up roads and paths, a place of peace for the journey, a companion for the weak, are yours, Inana. To keep paths and ways in good order, to shatter earth and to make it firm are yours, Inana. To destroy, to build up, to tear out and to settle are yours, Inana. To turn a man into a woman and a woman into a man are yours, Inana. Desirability and arousal, goods and property are yours, Inana. Gain, profit, great wealth and greater wealth are yours, Inana. Gaining wealth and having success in wealth, financial loss and reduced wealth are yours, Inana. Observation (1 ms. has instead: Everything), choice, offering, inspection and approval are yours, Inana. Assigning virility, dignity, guardian angels, protective deities and cult centres are yours, Inana. — A Hymn to Inana (Inana-C) ETCSL 4.07.3 in Lines 115-131.

This shows:

Inana has the power to change a person's gender/sex .... which means people can change gender/sex

This is listed among other normal things such as journeys, wealth, settlements so on. Suggesting that it wasn't super special, it was a part of Sumerian society that Inana was given power over.

This was written by Enheduanna High Priestess of Nanna, Ur's city God, and Inana. Inana was a popular Sumerian deity and Enhenduanna's father, Sargon of Akkad's, personal deity was Ištar. One of Enhenduanna's goals as a priestess was to conflate the popular Sumerian deity Inana with her father's Akkadian personal Goddess Ištar. Then raise Inana (and thus her father's personal Goddess Ištar) to an extremely high place in cosmology and explain just how much control she had in society— including over sex/gender.

Also from @sisterofiris's post on Inana's queer priests here.

🌿Nanaya🌿

In later times Inana/Ištar was equated with Nanaya but in earlier times they were worshipped side by side as separate deities. While Inana's hymn gives her rule of gender, a Nanaya hymn has her directly declaring she has breasts in Dadumu and a beard in Babylon. Leick also mentions here that Ištar was worshipped in both genders.

—Dictionary of Ancient Near Eastern Mythology by Gwendolyn Leick. Page 125.

🌿Asūšunamir with Ereškigal🌿

In Ištar's Descent (not Inana's) Ea's plan to distract Ereškigal and get her to bring Inana back to life is to make a beautiful being. Ea makes an incredibly beautifully brilliant being that's mere aesthetic presence will make Ereškigal happy and let her defenses down. And Asūšunamir's beauty works..... and he is an eunuch, an effeminate male, potentially queer from the ancient's eyes. And yet he is so beautiful he distracts a Goddess.

— The Ancient Near East and Anyhology of Texts and Pictures, edited by Pritchard. Ishtar Descent translation by E.A Speiser. Page 80.

🌿Eštan / Ištanu🌿

The Anatolians (Hittite in particular) loved to both mix deities and keep them entirely dependent like 8 solar deities and 50 storm Gods. But sometimes Hittite, Hurrian, Hattic, Indo-European, Mesopotamian all meld together making the identification of gender ambiguous or even interchangeable.

Eštan is one example (who has numerous equatings):

—A Handbook of Gods and Goddesses of The Ancient Near East by Frayne & Stuckey. Page 105

You can also learn more about the Ištanu and the Sun Goddess of Arinna and her gender from @sisterofiris in a post here.

__

I'm sure there are more! But this was my quick round up and sources I could put together. To all the trans & non-binary polytheists out there, you aren't abnormal and the Gods see you for who you truly are.

Edit: Want some more? Learn about the feminine qualities of Apollo

[cuubism]

Hey just wanted to say you're not a killjoy at all, you're actually absolutely correct

Thank you, I wish I didn't have to be 😔 I wish we lived in a world where gender equality was so long solidified that we could make silly jokes like that and not have it inadvertently feed into real world misogyny. I could see a world where women's inequality was so far in the past that 'ugh i wish i could just have someone else pay for everything' could be a funny #relatable 'we all hate working' kind of joke because everyone understood we don't actually want dependency. But that's not this time period when so many people genuinely believe that a woman's place is only in the home, and when young women might see that joke and believe that giving up their independence is a good idea or that women fighting for the right to equality in employment was a mistake. It inadvertently feeds into the rising tide of misogyny and points people towards those "traditional values" influencers that really push the idea that women should (god i hate the phrase "women should") submit to men and that their only valid life path is being a wife and mother. Especially when algorithms tend to push people down alt-right rabbit holes, like, even my insta feed is full of trad wife fundamentalist christian content because I hate watch it and then the algo feeds me more 😂 that's on me really I should just block all those accounts.

I mean, I sympathize, I hate my job sometimes too, I think everyone would like to have a life where they didn't have to work 40+ hours a week and had more leisure time. Unfortunately we live in a world where money by and large equates to freedom. So my go to complaint isn't wow I wish I had no life choices and was dependent on a man for my livelihood! when I'm irritated about work 😂

A lot of the content made by younger women online recently seems kind of regressive in its approach to gender roles, "i can't do this i'm just a girlie" and so on (I'm aware it's a joke, but oftentimes stuff starts as a joke and then reaches people who don't see it as one), and I worry about us backsliding. I'm concerned by young women idealizing the Trad Wife lifestyle, not knowing their history and how dangerous a position it puts women in. I'm concerned by the 'stay at home girlfriend' trend, possibly MORE dangerous for how it lacks even the meager property and alimony protections of marriages. I'm concerned by the increasing gendered political divide and radicalization of young men, the way misogyny has become more and more virulent and loud and normalized over the past few years. The way women's rights are being rolled back with even more restrictions being pushed by the Right in an attempt to hold onto power and maintain their hierarchical worldview.

We need feminism more than ever right now, and additionally I think we all need to reclaim it from radfems and terfs. The word has become too associated with them, to the point I fear people are afraid to call themselves feminists for fear of it being misinterpreted, and I'm sick of it, why should terfs get to define it? Especially when our rights in society are all entwined. Reproductive rights--an issue that doesn't solely impact women but does disproportionately affect women--arises from the same root issue of fundamental bodily autonomy as does trans rights. Moreover the existence of trans and nonbinary people reinforces gender equality because if gender and sex are malleable, not fundamental and binary, then upon what basis is the oppression of women? How can one claim that women are less than men, or that women and men 'should' hold such and such roles when even the role of 'woman' or 'man' is not discrete. I hope terfs can come around to seeing that.

I don't believe in policing people's online activity unless it's like actually threatening hate speech, so I'm certainly not going to tell them they can't joke how they want. I just hope they think about why that's where their mind goes when they don't want to work, instead of wishing that society didn't work people to the bone, that people had more leisure time, that jobs were better and more meaningful etc. I hope they think about the women around the world who are still denied education and denied the right to work and forced to depend on their family or husband with no freedom or autonomy, and how much work it took women in the past to even get where we are, and how much there still is left to do.

[foxfairy06]

Okay asking in good faith, But how are you transmed and non binary?? Won't terfs just keep dehumanising u calling you a Troon or tra regardless?

Ok so!

Transmedicalism is the idea that transness is not a choice, because trans people experience this thing called gender dysphoria (which can be any incongruence but some people's definition varies), which is caused by something neurologically different between trans people and cis people of the same assigned sex.

If you believe that being trans is not a choice, you're a truscum, and if you think there's a biological reason people are trans, you're a transmedicalist.

We believe that trans people are their gender just as much as cis people are, because gender is a neurological variation of how we view our own bodies.

TERF means "Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist". They believe that trans people are not their identified gender, but their assigned sex at birth, and that trans women should not be represented in feminism, because they classify as men. Which is inherently opposite to transmedicalism, because they do not believe that trans people are inherently their gender or that trans people have any biological cause. They think being trans is social, which is something all transmeds disagree with.

TERFs dehumanize me regardless of wether or not I'm a transmed. I'm not a transmed because I want to appeal to terfs or the right, if I wanted to do that I would be a tucute because tucute ideals more closely match that of TERFs and the far right. The spaces I'm involved with are all staunchly anti-TERF.

I'm least dehumanized by transmedicalists. Less than tucutes, the mainstream lgbt community, TERFs, transphobes, and any other group. Because transmedicalists are the only group who always view gender as inherent in both trans people and cis people. Your idea of what a transmedicalist is with "troon or tra" is a very small minority of people who claim the transmedicalist community, and most of those people don't hold the beliefs necessary to qualify as a transmedicalist. They would qualify as TERFs, which are by definition the opposite of a transmedicalist.

I'm a transmedicalist because all of the current research on gender and neurology seems to provide significant evidence for that ideology, and there is no real evidence that gender (not gender roles, expression, or presentation) is a social construct, or in any way equal to roles, expression, performance or presentation.

I'm a transmedicalist in a way, because I'm trans/nonbinary and because I believe in science for the evidence, not for the opinion pieces people write about that evidence.

[haggishlyhagging]

Radical feminism remained the hegemonic tendency within the women's liberation movement until 1973 when cultural feminism began to cohere and challenge its dominance. After 1975, a year of internecine conflicts between radical and cultural feminists, cultural feminism eclipsed radical feminism as the dominant tendency within the women's liberation movement, and, as a consequence, liberal feminism became the recognized voice of the women's movement.

As the preceding chapters have shown, there were prefigurings of cultural feminism within radical feminism, especially by 1970. This nascent cultural feminism, which was sometimes termed ‘female cultural nationalism’ by its critics, was assailed by radical and left feminists alike. For instance, in the December 1970 issue of Everywoman, Ann Fury warned feminists against "retreating into a female culture":

“Like other oppressed [sic], we have our customs and language. But this culture, designed to create the illusion of autonomy, merely indicates fear. Withdraw into it and we take our slavery with us. . . . Furthermore when we retreat into our culture we cover our political tracks with moralism. We say our culture is somehow "better" than male culture. And we trace this supposed superiority to our innate nature, for if we attributed it to our powerlessness, we would have to agree to its dissolution the moment we seize control. . . . When we obtain power, we will take on the characteristics of the powerful. . . . We are not the Chosen people.”

Similarly, in a May 1970 article on the women's liberation movement in Britain, Juliet Mitchell and Rosalind Delmar contended:

“Re-valuations of feminine attributes accept the results of an exploitative situation by endorsing its concepts. The effects of oppression do not become the manifestations of liberation by changing values, or, for that matter, by changing oneself—but only by challenging the social structure that gives rise to those values in the first place.”

And in April 1970, the Bay Area paper It Ain't Me, Babe carried an editorial urging feminists to create a culture which would foster resistance rather than serve as a sanctuary from patriarchy:

“It is extremely oppressive for us to function in a culture where ideas are male oriented and definitions are male controlled. . . .Yet the creation of a woman's culture must in no way be separated from the political struggles of women for liberation. . . . Our culture cannot be the carving of an enclave in which we can bear the status quo more easily—rather it must crystallize the dreams that will strengthen our rebellion.”

But these warnings had little effect as the movement seemed to drift almost ineluctably toward cultural feminism. Cultural feminism seemed a solution to the movement's impasse—both its schisms and its lack of direction. Whereas parts of the radical feminist movement had become paralyzed by political purism, or what Robin Morgan called "failure vanguardism," cultural feminists promised that constructive changes could be achieved. To cultural feminists, alternative women's institutions represented, in Morgan's words, "concrete moves towards self determination and power" for women. Equally important, cultural feminism with its insistence upon women's essential sameness to each other and their fundamental difference from men seemed to many a way to unify a movement that by 1973 was highly schismatic. In fact, cultural feminism succeeded in large measure because it promised an end to the gay-straight split. Cultural feminism modified lesbian-feminism so that male values rather than men were vilified and female bonding rather than lesbianism was valorized, thus making it acceptable to heterosexual feminists.

Of course, by 1973 the women's movement was also facing a formidable backlash—one which may have been orchestrated by the male-dominated New Right, but was hardly lacking in female support. It is probably not coincidental that cultural feminism emerged at a time of backlash. Even if women's political, economic, and social gains were reversed, cultural feminism held out the possibility that women could build a culture, a space, uncontaminated by patriarchy. Morgan described women's art and spirituality as "the lifeblood for our survival" and maintained that “resilient cultures have kept oppressed groups alive even when economic analyses and revolutionary strategy fizzled.” There may even have been the hope that by invoking commonly held assumptions about women and men, anti-feminist women might experience a change of heart and join their ranks. The shift toward cultural feminism also suggests that feminists themselves were not immune to the growing conservatism of the period. Certainly, cultural feminism's demonization of the left seemed largely rooted in a rejection of the '60s radicalism out of which radical feminism evolved.

-Alice Echols, Daring to Be Bad: Radical Feminism in America: 1967-75

[women-throughout-history]

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft was a trailblazing writer and passionate advocate for women’s rights, whose ideas were far ahead of her time. Her most famous work, ‘A Vindication of the Rights of Woman’ is considered to be one of the earliest texts advocating for gender equality, making her a key figure in the history of feminism. She argued that women, like men, are rational beings and deserve equal education. This belief stemmed from the idea that for society to progress, both men and women need the tools to contribute intellectually and socially. Born in 1759, Wollstonecraft didn’t come from a wealthy or influential family, but her personal drive and intellectual curiosity pushed her to become a self-educated thinker, reading texts such as the Bible, of ancient philosophers, Shakespeare, and Milton. At age 24, she started a girls’ school with her sisters and friend, Fanny Blood, in Newington Green, which played a crucial role in shaping her ideas about education and equality. Her first work, ‘Thoughts on the Education of Daughters’ (1786), laid the foundation for her later writings on women’s liberation. She firmly believed that if women were denied the same education as men, society would suffer as a whole. Wollstonecraft’s life was marked by her fierce independence. As a writer in London, she became part of a group of political radicals known as the Rational Dissenters. Her social circle included figures like William Godwin, whom she later married. Living through the tumultuous French Revolution, she closely followed the Enlightenment’s emphasis on reason and political liberty, principles that greatly influenced her work. Her ‘A Vindication of the Rights of Men’ (1790) was a response to Edmund Burke’s critique of the revolution and aristocracy. It set the stage for her later arguments for women’s equality. In 1794, she had a daughter, Fanny, with American entrepreneur Gilbert Imlay, but their relationship ended in heartbreak. She attempted suicide twice, first in May, then in October 1795. Wollstonecraft eventually found happiness with philosopher William Godwin, with whom she had her second daughter, Mary Shelley—who would go on to write ‘Frankenstein’. Sadly, Wollstonecraft died shortly after giving birth in 1797. Despite her short life, Wollstonecraft’s legacy is enormous. She laid the groundwork for future generations of feminists, emphasising that women deserve the same educational and intellectual opportunities as men.

Mary Wollstoncraft’s Writings: A Vindication of the Rights of Women Thoughts on the Education of Daughters

[dailyanarchistposts]

A.3.5 What is Anarcha-Feminism?

Although opposition to the state and all forms of authority had a strong voice among the early feminists of the 19th century, the more recent feminist movement which began in the 1960’s was founded upon anarchist practice. This is where the term anarcha-feminism came from, referring to women anarchists who act within the larger feminist and anarchist movements to remind them of their principles.

The modern anarcha-feminists built upon the feminist ideas of previous anarchists, both male and female. Indeed, anarchism and feminism have always been closely linked. Many outstanding feminists have also been anarchists, including the pioneering Mary Wollstonecraft (author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman), the Communard Louise Michel, and the American anarchists (and tireless champions of women’s freedom) Voltairine de Cleyre and Emma Goldman (for the former, see her essays “Sex Slavery”, “Gates of Freedom”, “The Case of Woman vs. Orthodoxy”, “Those Who Marry Do Ill”; for the latter see “The Traffic in Women”, “Woman Suffrage”, “The Tragedy of Woman’s Emancipation”, “Marriage and Love” and “Victims of Morality”, for example). Freedom, the world’s oldest anarchist newspaper, was founded by Charlotte Wilson in 1886. Anarchist women like Virgilia D’Andrea and Rose Pesota played important roles in both the libertarian and labour movements. The “Mujeres Libres” (“Free Women”) movement in Spain during the Spanish revolution is a classic example of women anarchists organising themselves to defend their basic freedoms and create a society based on women’s freedom and equality (see Free Women of Spain by Martha Ackelsberg for more details on this important organisation). In addition, all the male major anarchist thinkers (bar Proudhon) were firm supporters of women’s equality. For example, Bakunin opposed patriarchy and how the law “subjects [women] to the absolute domination of the man.” He argued that ”[e]qual rights must belong to men and women” so that women can “become independent and be free to forge their own way of life.” He looked forward to the end of “the authoritarian juridical family” and “the full sexual freedom of women.” [Bakunin on Anarchism, p. 396 and p. 397]

Thus anarchism has since the 1860s combined a radical critique of capitalism and the state with an equally powerful critique of patriarchy (rule by men). Anarchists, particularly female ones, recognised that modern society was dominated by men. As Ana Maria Mozzoni (an Italian anarchist immigrant in Buenos Aires) put it, women “will find that the priest who damns you is a man; that the legislator who oppresses you is a man, that the husband who reduces you to an object is a man; that the libertine who harasses you is a man; that the capitalist who enriches himself with your ill-paid work and the speculator who calmly pockets the price of your body, are men.” Little has changed since then. Patriarchy still exists and, to quote the anarchist paper La Questione Sociale, it is still usually the case that women “are slaves both in social and private life. If you are a proletarian, you have two tyrants: the man and the boss. If bourgeois, the only sovereignty left to you is that of frivolity and coquetry.” [quoted by Jose Moya, Italians in Buenos Aires’s Anarchist Movement, pp. 197–8 and p. 200]

Anarchism, therefore, is based on an awareness that fighting patriarchy is as important as fighting against the state or capitalism. For ”[y]ou can have no free, or just, or equal society, nor anything approaching it, so long as womanhood is bought, sold, housed, clothed, fed, and protected, as a chattel.” [Voltairine de Cleyre, “The Gates of Freedom”, pp. 235–250, Eugenia C. Delamotte, Gates of Freedom, p. 242] To quote Louise Michel:

“The first thing that must change is the relationship between the sexes. Humanity has two parts, men and women, and we ought to be walking hand in hand; instead there is antagonism, and it will last as long as the ‘stronger’ half controls, or think its controls, the ‘weaker’ half.” [The Red Virgin: Memoirs of Louise Michel, p. 139]

Thus anarchism, like feminism, fights patriarchy and for women’s equality. Both share much common history and a concern about individual freedom, equality and dignity for members of the female sex (although, as we will explain in more depth below, anarchists have always been very critical of mainstream/liberal feminism as not going far enough). Therefore, it is unsurprising that the new wave of feminism of the sixties expressed itself in an anarchistic manner and drew much inspiration from anarchist figures such as Emma Goldman. Cathy Levine points out that, during this time, “independent groups of women began functioning without the structure, leaders, and other factotums of the male left, creating, independently and simultaneously, organisations similar to those of anarchists of many decades and regions. No accident, either.” [“The Tyranny of Tyranny,” Quiet Rumours: An Anarcha-Feminist Reader, p. 66] It is no accident because, as feminist scholars have noted, women were among the first victims of hierarchical society, which is thought to have begun with the rise of patriarchy and ideologies of domination during the late Neolithic era. Marilyn French argues (in Beyond Power) that the first major social stratification of the human race occurred when men began dominating women, with women becoming in effect a “lower” and “inferior” social class.

The links between anarchism and modern feminism exist in both ideas and action. Leading feminist thinker Carole Pateman notes that her “discussion [on contract theory and its authoritarian and patriarchal basis] owes something to” libertarian ideas, that is the “anarchist wing of the socialist movement.” [The Sexual Contract, p. 14] Moreover, she noted in the 1980s how the “major locus of criticism of authoritarian, hierarchical, undemocratic forms of organisation for the last twenty years has been the women’s movement … After Marx defeated Bakunin in the First International, the prevailing form of organisation in the labour movement, the nationalised industries and in the left sects has mimicked the hierarchy of the state … The women’s movement has rescued and put into practice the long-submerged idea [of anarchists like Bakunin] that movements for, and experiments in, social change must ‘prefigure’ the future form of social organisation.” [The Disorder of Women, p. 201]

Peggy Kornegger has drawn attention to these strong connections between feminism and anarchism, both in theory and practice. “The radical feminist perspective is almost pure anarchism,” she writes. “The basic theory postulates the nuclear family as the basis of all authoritarian systems. The lesson the child learns, from father to teacher to boss to god, is to obey the great anonymous voice of Authority. To graduate from childhood to adulthood is to become a full-fledged automaton, incapable of questioning or even of thinking clearly.” [“Anarchism: The Feminist Connection,” Quiet Rumours: An Anarcha-Feminist Reader, p. 26] Similarly, the Zero Collective argues that Anarcha-feminism “consists in recognising the anarchism of feminism and consciously developing it.” [“Anarchism/Feminism,” pp. 3–7, The Raven, no. 21, p. 6]

Anarcha-feminists point out that authoritarian traits and values, for example, domination, exploitation, aggressiveness, competitiveness, desensitisation etc., are highly valued in hierarchical civilisations and are traditionally referred to as “masculine.” In contrast, non-authoritarian traits and values such as co-operation, sharing, compassion, sensitivity, warmth, etc., are traditionally regarded as “feminine” and are devalued. Feminist scholars have traced this phenomenon back to the growth of patriarchal societies during the early Bronze Age and their conquest of co-operatively based “organic” societies in which “feminine” traits and values were prevalent and respected. Following these conquests, however, such values came to be regarded as “inferior,” especially for a man, since men were in charge of domination and exploitation under patriarchy. (See e.g. Riane Eisler, The Chalice and the Blade; Elise Boulding, The Underside of History). Hence anarcha-feminists have referred to the creation of a non-authoritarian, anarchist society based on co-operation, sharing, mutual aid, etc. as the “feminisation of society.”

Anarcha-feminists have noted that “feminising” society cannot be achieved without both self-management and decentralisation. This is because the patriarchal-authoritarian values and traditions they wish to overthrow are embodied and reproduced in hierarchies. Thus feminism implies decentralisation, which in turn implies self-management. Many feminists have recognised this, as reflected in their experiments with collective forms of feminist organisations that eliminate hierarchical structure and competitive forms of decision making. Some feminists have even argued that directly democratic organisations are specifically female political forms. [see e.g. Nancy Hartsock “Feminist Theory and the Development of Revolutionary Strategy,” in Zeila Eisenstein, ed., Capitalist Patriarchy and the Case for Socialist Feminism, pp. 56–77] Like all anarchists, anarcha-feminists recognise that self-liberation is the key to women’s equality and thus, freedom. Thus Emma Goldman:

“Her development, her freedom, her independence, must come from and through herself. First, by asserting herself as a personality, and not as a sex commodity. Second, by refusing the right of anyone over her body; by refusing to bear children, unless she wants them, by refusing to be a servant to God, the State, society, the husband, the family, etc., by making her life simpler, but deeper and richer. That is, by trying to learn the meaning and substance of life in all its complexities; by freeing herself from the fear of public opinion and public condemnation.” [Anarchism and Other Essays, p. 211]

Anarcha-feminism tries to keep feminism from becoming influenced and dominated by authoritarian ideologies of either the right or left. It proposes direct action and self-help instead of the mass reformist campaigns favoured by the “official” feminist movement, with its creation of hierarchical and centralist organisations and its illusion that having more women bosses, politicians, and soldiers is a move towards “equality.” Anarcha-feminists would point out that the so-called “management science” which women have to learn in order to become mangers in capitalist companies is essentially a set of techniques for controlling and exploiting wage workers in corporate hierarchies, whereas “feminising” society requires the elimination of capitalist wage-slavery and managerial domination altogether. Anarcha-feminists realise that learning how to become an effective exploiter or oppressor is not the path to equality (as one member of the Mujeres Libres put it, ”[w]e did not want to substitute a feminist hierarchy for a masculine one” [quoted by Martha A. Ackelsberg, Free Women of Spain, pp. 22–3] — also see section B.1.4 for a further discussion on patriarchy and hierarchy).

Hence anarchism’s traditional hostility to liberal (or mainstream) feminism, while supporting women’s liberation and equality. Federica Montseny (a leading figure in the Spanish Anarchist movement) argued that such feminism advocated equality for women, but did not challenge existing institutions. She argued that (mainstream) feminism’s only ambition is to give to women of a particular class the opportunity to participate more fully in the existing system of privilege and if these institutions “are unjust when men take advantage of them, they will still be unjust if women take advantage of them.” [quoted by Martha A. Ackelsberg, Op. Cit., p. 119] Thus, for anarchists, women’s freedom did not mean an equal chance to become a boss or a wage slave, a voter or a politician, but rather to be a free and equal individual co-operating as equals in free associations. “Feminism,” stressed Peggy Kornegger, “doesn’t mean female corporate power or a woman President; it means no corporate power and no Presidents. The Equal Rights Amendment will not transform society; it only gives women the ‘right’ to plug into a hierarchical economy. Challenging sexism means challenging all hierarchy — economic, political, and personal. And that means an anarcha-feminist revolution.” [Op. Cit., p. 27]

Anarchism, as can be seen, included a class and economic analysis which is missing from mainstream feminism while, at the same time, showing an awareness to domestic and sex-based power relations which eluded the mainstream socialist movement. This flows from our hatred of hierarchy. As Mozzoni put it, “Anarchy defends the cause of all the oppressed, and because of this, and in a special way, it defends your [women’s] cause, oh! women, doubly oppressed by present society in both the social and private spheres.” [quoted by Moya, Op. Cit., p. 203] This means that, to quote a Chinese anarchist, what anarchists “mean by equality between the sexes is not just that the men will no longer oppress women. We also want men to no longer to be oppressed by other men, and women no longer to be oppressed by other women.” Thus women should “completely overthrow rulership, force men to abandon all their special privileges and become equal to women, and make a world with neither the oppression of women nor the oppression of men.” [He Zhen, quoted by Peter Zarrow, Anarchism and Chinese Political Culture, p. 147]

So, in the historic anarchist movement, as Martha Ackelsberg notes, liberal/mainstream feminism was considered as being “too narrowly focused as a strategy for women’s emancipation; sexual struggle could not be separated from class struggle or from the anarchist project as a whole.” [Op. Cit., p. 119] Anarcha-feminism continues this tradition by arguing that all forms of hierarchy are wrong, not just patriarchy, and that feminism is in conflict with its own ideals if it desires simply to allow women to have the same chance of being a boss as a man does. They simply state the obvious, namely that they “do not believe that power in the hands of women could possibly lead to a non-coercive society” nor do they “believe that anything good can come out of a mass movement with a leadership elite.” The “central issues are always power and social hierarchy” and so people “are free only when they have power over their own lives.” [Carole Ehrlich, “Socialism, Anarchism and Feminism”, Quiet Rumours: An Anarcha-Feminist Reader, p. 44] For if, as Louise Michel put it, “a proletarian is a slave; the wife of a proletarian is even more a slave” ensuring that the wife experiences an equal level of oppression as the husband misses the point. [Op. Cit., p. 141]

Anarcha-feminists, therefore, like all anarchists oppose capitalism as a denial of liberty. Their critique of hierarchy in the society does not start and end with patriarchy. It is a case of wanting freedom everywhere, of wanting to ”[b]reak up … every home that rests in slavery! Every marriage that represents the sale and transfer of the individuality of one of its parties to the other! Every institution, social or civil, that stands between man and his right; every tie that renders one a master, another a serf.” [Voltairine de Cleyre, “The Economic Tendency of Freethought”, The Voltairine de Cleyre Reader, p. 72] The ideal that an “equal opportunity” capitalism would free women ignores the fact that any such system would still see working class women oppressed by bosses (be they male or female). For anarcha-feminists, the struggle for women’s liberation cannot be separated from the struggle against hierarchy as such. As L. Susan Brown puts it:

“Anarchist-feminism, as an expression of the anarchist sensibility applied to feminist concerns, takes the individual as its starting point and, in opposition to relations of domination and subordination, argues for non-instrumental economic forms that preserve individual existential freedom, for both men and women.” [The Politics of Individualism, p. 144]

Anarcha-feminists have much to contribute to our understanding of the origins of the ecological crisis in the authoritarian values of hierarchical civilisation. For example, a number of feminist scholars have argued that the domination of nature has paralleled the domination of women, who have been identified with nature throughout history (See, for example, Caroline Merchant, The Death of Nature, 1980). Both women and nature are victims of the obsession with control that characterises the authoritarian personality. For this reason, a growing number of both radical ecologists and feminists are recognising that hierarchies must be dismantled in order to achieve their respective goals.

In addition, anarcha-feminism reminds us of the importance of treating women equally with men while, at the same time, respecting women’s differences from men. In other words, that recognising and respecting diversity includes women as well as men. Too often many male anarchists assume that, because they are (in theory) opposed to sexism, they are not sexist in practice. Such an assumption is false. Anarcha-feminism brings the question of consistency between theory and practice to the front of social activism and reminds us all that we must fight not only external constraints but also internal ones.

This means that anarcha-feminism urges us to practice what we preach. As Voltairine de Cleyre argued, “I never expect men to give us liberty. No, Women, we are not worth it, until we take it.” This involves “insisting on a new code of ethics founded on the law of equal freedom: a code recognising the complete individuality of woman. By making rebels wherever we can. By ourselves living our beliefs . … We are revolutionists. And we shall use propaganda by speech, deed, and most of all life — being what we teach.” Thus anarcha-feminists, like all anarchists, see the struggle against patriarchy as being a struggle of the oppressed for their own self-liberation, for ”as a class I have nothing to hope from men . .. No tyrant ever renounced his tyranny until he had to. If history ever teaches us anything it teaches this. Therefore my hope lies in creating rebellion in the breasts of women.” [“The Gates of Freedom”, pp. 235–250, Eugenia C. Delamotte, Gates of Freedom, p. 249 and p. 239] This was sadly as applicable within the anarchist movement as it was outside it in patriarchal society.

Faced with the sexism of male anarchists who spoke of sexual equality, women anarchists in Spain organised themselves into the Mujeres Libres organisation to combat it. They did not believe in leaving their liberation to some day after the revolution. Their liberation was a integral part of that revolution and had to be started today. In this they repeated the conclusions of anarchist women in Illinois Coal towns who grew tried of hearing their male comrades “shout in favour” of sexual equality “in the future society” while doing nothing about it in the here and now. They used a particularly insulting analogy, comparing their male comrades to priests who “make false promises to the starving masses … [that] there will be rewards in paradise.” The argued that mothers should make their daughters “understand that the difference in sex does not imply inequality in rights” and that as well as being “rebels against the social system of today,” they “should fight especially against the oppression of men who would like to retain women as their moral and material inferior.” [Ersilia Grandi, quoted by Caroline Waldron Merithew, Anarchist Motherhood, p. 227] They formed the “Luisa Michel” group to fight against capitalism and patriarchy in the upper Illinois valley coal towns over three decades before their Spanish comrades organised themselves.

For anarcha-feminists, combating sexism is a key aspect of the struggle for freedom. It is not, as many Marxist socialists argued before the rise of feminism, a diversion from the “real” struggle against capitalism which would somehow be automatically solved after the revolution. It is an essential part of the struggle:

“We do not need any of your titles … We want none of them. What we do want is knowledge and education and liberty. We know what our rights are and we demand them. Are we not standing next to you fighting the supreme fight? Are you not strong enough, men, to make part of that supreme fight a struggle for the rights of women? And then men and women together will gain the rights of all humanity.” [Louise Michel, Op. Cit., p. 142]

A key part of this revolutionising modern society is the transformation of the current relationship between the sexes. Marriage is a particular evil for “the old form of marriage, based on the Bible, ‘till death doth part,’ … [is] an institution that stands for the sovereignty of the man over the women, of her complete submission to his whims and commands.” Women are reduced “to the function of man’s servant and bearer of his children.” [Goldman, Op. Cit., pp. 220–1] Instead of this, anarchists proposed “free love,” that is couples and families based on free agreement between equals than one partner being in authority and the other simply obeying. Such unions would be without sanction of church or state for “two beings who love each other do not need permission from a third to go to bed.” [Mozzoni, quoted by Moya, Op. Cit., p. 200]

Equality and freedom apply to more than just relationships. For “if social progress consists in a constant tendency towards the equalisation of the liberties of social units, then the demands of progress are not satisfied so long as half society, Women, is in subjection… . Woman … is beginning to feel her servitude; that there is a requisite acknowledgement to be won from her master before he is put down and she exalted to — Equality. This acknowledgement is, the freedom to control her own person. “ [Voltairine de Cleyre, “The Gates of Freedom”, Op. Cit., p. 242] Neither men nor state nor church should say what a woman does with her body. A logical extension of this is that women must have control over their own reproductive organs. Thus anarcha-feminists, like anarchists in general, are pro-choice and pro-reproductive rights (i.e. the right of a woman to control her own reproductive decisions). This is a long standing position. Emma Goldman was persecuted and incarcerated because of her public advocacy of birth control methods and the extremist notion that women should decide when they become pregnant (as feminist writer Margaret Anderson put it, “In 1916, Emma Goldman was sent to prison for advocating that ‘women need not always keep their mouth shut and their wombs open.’”).

Anarcha-feminism does not stop there. Like anarchism in general, it aims at changing all aspects of society not just what happens in the home. For, as Goldman asked, “how much independence is gained if the narrowness and lack of freedom of the home is exchanged for the narrowness and lack of freedom of the factory, sweat-shop, department store, or office?” Thus women’s equality and freedom had to be fought everywhere and defended against all forms of hierarchy. Nor can they be achieved by voting. Real liberation, argue anarcha-feminists, is only possible by direct action and anarcha-feminism is based on women’s self-activity and self-liberation for while the “right to vote, or equal civil rights, may be good demands … true emancipation begins neither at the polls nor in the courts. It begins in woman’s soul … her freedom will reach as far as her power to achieve freedom reaches.” [Goldman, Op. Cit., p. 216 and p. 224]

The history of the women’s movement proves this. Every gain has come from below, by the action of women themselves. As Louise Michel put it, ”[w]e women are not bad revolutionaries. Without begging anyone, we are taking our place in the struggles; otherwise, we could go ahead and pass motions until the world ends and gain nothing.” [Op. Cit., p. 139] If women waited for others to act for them their social position would never have changed. This includes getting the vote in the first place. Faced with the militant suffrage movement for women’s votes, British anarchist Rose Witcop recognised that it was “true that this movement shows us that women who so far have been so submissive to their masters, the men, are beginning to wake up at last to the fact they are not inferior to those masters.” Yet she argued that women would not be freed by votes but ���by their own strength.” [quoted by Sheila Rowbotham, Hidden from History, pp. 100–1 and p. 101] The women’s movement of the 1960s and 1970s showed the truth of that analysis. In spite of equal voting rights, women’s social place had remained unchanged since the 1920s.

Ultimately, as Anarchist Lily Gair Wilkinson stressed, the “call for ‘votes’ can never be a call to freedom. For what is it to vote? To vote is to register assent to being ruled by one legislator or another?” [quoted by Sheila Rowbotham, Op. Cit., p. 102] It does not get to the heart of the problem, namely hierarchy and the authoritarian social relationships it creates of which patriarchy is only a subset of. Only by getting rid of all bosses, political, economic, social and sexual can genuine freedom for women be achieved and “make it possible for women to be human in the truest sense. Everything within her that craves assertion and activity should reach its fullest expression; all artificial barriers should be broken, and the road towards greater freedom cleared of every trace of centuries of submission and slavery.” [Emma Goldman, Op. Cit., p. 214]

[mrhaitch]

hi mr. haitch! just wanted your advice on some...boy advice. sort of.

i've been thinking lately about standards/requirements i would like in a partner, particularly if they were male. i think that if i ever have a boyfriend and date again, the bare minimum should be that he should identify as liberal/agree with me on a few things that i feel like every decent human being should believe in. for context, i'm american, and the main thing that makes me believe this is the idea of being pro-life vs. pro choice. if he doesn't think i should have my bodily autonomy, should i even be dating him? having kids with him? what if things go wrong during the pregnancy later in the term? would he want me to die, just like that woman did in georgia?

i know this is veering into politics, but i was asking this not to ask for your opinion on "being liberal vs. being conservative" but rather "xyz belief that i'm not sure i should be so strict on." i understand people have room to grow, particularly young men who are exposed to a lot of...things and radical ideas from a young age. this isn't to say that i don't want someone who disagrees with me, but i think in american politics there's a lot of things the right believes in that harm women, and consequently me.

so, the gist of what i'm asking is that do you think that young men (who are in college/in their twenties) grow in that regard? or do you think that, if from the get go that they believe in such things that i shouldn't waste my time?

i'm trying to keep this short (and failing horribly), but what really formed my dilemma is that i have a best friend (who is male), and he's a very nice person. became friends with me when i was not favorable with his friend group, i was chubbier, and he's the one who's helped me improve myself. still is friends with me even though his "bros" make comments about our friendship. we have insightful conversation and he's rare in the way that he actually sees women as people and recognizes the men who don't (his friends, who he's not really friends with because he recognizes that they suck). he's a decent human being, something not a lot of young men are.

however, he sends me content like "equal rights means equal fights," dark humor about feminism, interacts with onlyfans bait accounts, makes jokes about toji fushiguro from jujutsu kaisen (who has become sort of an icon for the incels who clearly have not watched the show) abusing all of his wives. a lot of young men think that just because he's muscular, tall, and powerful, he abused his wives and other typical woman-hating stuff. which is hilarious and horribly mischaracterizing but i digress. is this someting he'll grow out of and recognize as things that you shouldn't joke about?

as always, please feel free to ignore this ask if you think the mention of politics is something you don't want to discuss. i would understand. i would totally ask my dad about this, but he's conservative himself and my parents don't have the best relationship either. i hope you and haitch have a great day!!

Oof. Okay, my answer has some caveats to it so if you're hoping for something cut and dry then you may be disappointed.

Do I think boys with this kind of attitude can change? Yes. I have to believe that or my job would be pointless. Many of my students are male (in fact the overwhelming majority) and many of them hold views I would deem questionable if not outright bigoted. It's not necessarily my place to change their mind, but I do take it upon myself to find ways to challenge their thinking - albeit gently as these students have a tendency to become violent or start riots if they encounter too much opposition.

Case in point: the other day two girls in one class were talking about their experiences of creepy older men catcalling them on the way to school. We were talking it through, and a boy piped up with statistics about men's mental health and suicide rates. This boy is severely autistic and has an inclination towards what I think of as reddit-bro positions. I talked to him about it, gently, explaining that men's mental health is a pressing concern - but it wasn't what we were talking about. I then talked to him about it in greater depth, at a later point in time.

On another occasion some of my students complained that Pride Month overlaps with Men's Mental Health Month, and proceeded to argue that 'the gays don't care about men's mental health'. There have also been incidents where groups of boys have been loudly discussing how rape allegations are almost always false and women are liars, that kind of thing.

Now - I have to believe these boys can change or I'm wasting my time. But I'm also just their teacher, and at the end of the school day they are no longer my problem. Being in a relationship or close with them is a different ballgame entirely and you could be exposing yourself to harm.

Your friend may well outgrow this worldview, but it's something he has to do himself. Similarly for all men, really. If they can't talk themselves out of violent or derogatory views on women, women's health and wellbeing, and all of the other shit that goes with them - they should not be pursuing women romantically or sexually.

Fundamentally it's your call. They might grow out of it, but they might not.

[limeade-l3sbian]

Why radfems think the weakest cis man can overpower the strongest cis woman? That whole idea seems super antifeminist to me, like back when I was in school it was a huge feminist thing for girls to join the boy's soccer team because, surprise, they were equally good, you guys suddenly regressed to "women are weak and delicate actually and cannot compete with men"

You'll have to give me your citations on when that got said. But it's bullshit, so you won't.

If you are referring to the biological differences between men and women that, in some arenas of competition, men will biologically have the advantage? That's not calling women weak. That's acknowledging the differences. There are also a number of areas where women dominate men. And there are also areas where men and women are equally matched. Is it sexist of me to acknowledge that women produce more fat than men? Should I go blow up a research lab because some random anon thought girls and boys playing soccer together in school was the be all end all of feminism? Lmaoo

I'm going to need you to read ONE serious piece of radical feminist literature before you come to me with this bare bones "checkmate terfs" bs lmao

[genderkoolaid]

the transandrophic talking point of like. "trans men/mascs were socialised male so are just as misogynistic as cis men" is so confusing to me, because they say the exact same thing about trans women/femmes? that they were also socialised male? which is so weird how they seem to think just any trans person has male socialisation, i cannot figure it out at all

The key thing here is that the people who say transmascs were socialized male aren't the same people saying transfems were socialized male, although both tend to be radical feminists or have beliefs that align with/are influenced by radical feminism.

Trans-exclusive radical feminists divide people into a binary by sex, and say that socialization occurs only along the lines of sex. If you are of the male sex (which includes any intersex people they decide are "really male," with little to no nuance), then you were socialized male. If you are of the female sex (see above), then you were socialized female.

Trans-inclusive radical feminists divide people into a binary by gender. They view socialization is more of an internal process- if you are a man, then you were always a man, and you internalized the socialization people raised male received regardless of whether you realized it or not. Similarly, if you are a woman, you were always a woman, and you received the socialization of people raised female.

What both have in common is the idea that socialization is a simple binary, and that the effects of socialization stay with you forever, unchanged. If you were socialized male, then you are forever tainted with misogyny and male chauvinism. The most emphasis is put on "male socialization" in discourse because the idea is, if you were socialized male (and therefore eternally and essentially Male), then you are a privileged oppressor. This is why it's a good way of targeting other people within a radical feminist framework- to be oppressed (woman) makes you part of the in-group, deserving of having your issues addressed (which is why there is an obsession over "protecting womanhood from invaders"), while being an oppressor (male) makes you part of the hostile out-group who can neither be trusted nor in genuine need of help. Trans people, being socially placed in-between and outside the cisbinary, will be placed into whatever group is most useful for the patriarchy at any given time while also being denied actual acceptance into either (check out transunity theory for more on that).

With TIRFs, the root of the ideology is that, by saying that trans women experienced female socialization, they are defended from transmisogynist TERFs who insist they are male oppressors. The idea is: if trans women are essentially female, and experienced female socialization, then they have equal claim to female oppression & trauma. This is a noble goal, because trans women are oppressed by misogyny and should have their oppression as women recognized.

The problem is, this radical feminist framework is inherently cissexist. It is a static binary which bases itself entirely off of cis gender relations. It asserts that all trans people must have an experience which fits in with either experiences of cis women or cis men; there is no room for discussing the ways that trans people have more in common with each other, or how hatred of people who are clearly outside of the cisbinary affects gender relations. So even though TIRFs are "trans-inclusive," their only concern is reproducing transphobic radical feminism but in a way that supports trans women. It insists its pro-trans men because it doesn't misgender them as women. But where TERFs erase the "man" part of trans men, TIRFs erase the "trans" part.

Gender socialization does exist, in that people are perceived in a certain way and are treated uniquely based on that perception, and that shapes how you think about yourself and others and your place in the world. But it is far from binary and static. So many different things can affect how your gender is perceived & how you are treated as a result, and that can change from person to person as well as over the course of your life. The idea that anything relating to gender/sex is static and binary is cissexist, and any movement that claims to seek trans liberation must deconstruct that cissexism and interpret gender relations from a trans-centric lens.

[olderthannetfic]

26514299393196032/ I dunno, I think we have a lot more of a nuanced view of gender norms now rather than the radfem idea of male privilege. Like, a lot of trans people have talked about their experiences and I think that has supplanted the "women as oppressed class" in a lot of people's minds - That is, both gender roles have a set of societal expectations, and viewing it exclusively as Privilege Men vs Oppressed Women discounts the various issues that men face and the benefits of womanhood. As a trans-or-GNC person myself (...It's complicated,) I have absolutely felt trapped in a male role before my transition - the prospect of endless drudgery in work as my only out, the limitations of self-expression, the way men are viewed as someone who can be killed and it is less of a deal. And I know of the homelessness gap and how men face much harsher jail sentences and other such institutional inequalities. On the flipside, once I began presenting as a woman people became more concerned for my well-being passively, and were willing to go out of their way to assist me. I was also no longer trapped by the societal expectation that my role was to earn money. This is not to discount the very real issues which effect women, but I think the inequalities between genders is much more nuanced and complex and I think more people are realizing this. Certainly, a rich and powerful man has vast and considerable power far beyond most - But I think the average man is as confined by the circumstances of their birth as the average women, and has advantages and disadvantages in specific situations. It is also worth noting that the traditional definition of Radical Feminism IS the belief in patriarchy theory - That is, the belief that society has been historically set up for the benefit of men at the expense of women. Other schools of feminism which emerged earlier tended to focus on feminism as being about women's individual choice, women's rights, or equality rather than the belief in a patriarchy which must be dismantled. By definition, Patriarchy Theory is a Radical Feminist concept

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