Radical Feminism

Maybe I'm being a bit thick, but can some one explain this "all women should be lesbians" stuff.

I'm straight. No matter how extreme or radical or militant my feminism became, I'd still be straight. That's because I'm straight. I'm not sexually attracted to women. I like men. That's never going to change. I think it's to do with me being heterosexual.

Do they mean I should live a lie and have a lesbian lifestyle for political reasons? Or just abstain from sex so as not to involve men in my life?

I think you're right about the colonisation of liberal feminism Beachcomber, which is another reason why I feel more at home within radical feminism these days (as someone somewhere else is fond of saying, my feminism will be about women or it will be bullshit).

I also had a "peak lib fem" experience a few years back where a male colleague (a self-proclaimed 'feminist') accused me of being "essentialist" for pointing out that female and male biology are fundamentally different If only the word "mansplaining" had been in my vocabulary back then

I may just be out of the loop of classical liberal feminism, but it appears to me that it has been much colonized by queer politics/postmodernism/sex positivism, etc. All of which are male dominated and represent the male perspective.

Which is a damn shame because classical liberal feminism used to be about making space for the female perspective and eroding a system based upon the male perspective.

I actually think that there is more confusion nowadays as to what liberal feminism represents. I suspect a lot of people think that liberal feminism is "everything that is not radical" - which of course is false.

For example classic liberal feminism objects to prostitution on the same grounds as radical feminism - that it is a sexist and gendered institution which acts as and reinforces barriers to gender equality/freedom.

Also classic liberal feminists are IME troubled by patriarchal gender values as expressed by queering and or transgender politics. That is not to say that they are unsympathetic to the plight of individuals, rather that, similar to radical feminists, they are concerned that there is an additional (male defined) aspect being added to the (male defined) social construct of what a "woman" is considered to be in male dominated society, and that this addition is neither representative of an actual female perspective, nor helpful to women - quite the contrary, it is restrictive and highly conservative.

I identify as a radical feminist in that I want to tackle the root cause of the structural inequality that women experience. I also believe that sex and gender are two different things.

Although I have identified as a feminist since I was a girl (pre-teens), thanks to being raised to think about these issues by my mother, my position has certainly shifted as I've got older (now 41). In my 20s I was definitely more of a "fun" / lib fem with a dash of (bleurgh) "sex positivism". Now I look back on that position and see it for what it was - an insecure young woman wanting her feminism to be acceptable to the men around her.

Now I am wiser and old enough not to be concerned with gaining approval from men for my beliefs

I also miss Dittany (but I'm pleased to see you back SM).

Also want to say that I personally am pretty relaxed about people identifying/presenting as they wish. I have no issues whatsoever with anyone who steps outside the box of what is considered normal or usual in our society. I wouldn't dream in a million years of being mean to a woman / man who used to be the opposite sex (not trans / cis - just people) and really the idea of calling someone by male words when they have made it clear they are female, for example, is just awful. And patriarchal. Who is it who really gives gay / not macho / trans kids hell in school? And in work? It's blokes isn't it. It's most definitely not feminists.

I had an enlightening time on a course at work recently about equality type laws. There was a mix of male / female and white / non white. Everyone got exactly what they were talking about straight off apart from the white men. Most of them also got it after a while, apart from one. I looked around and thought, well ALL the women get it, including the young graduate ones, all of the non white men get it. Just the white men struggled with one refusing to accept anything at all. It was illuminating, really. I got a lot out of it including explaining to two very earnest young white chaps why actually saying X and doing Y might make women feel uncomfortable

Rad fems do not support the lie that there are happy hookers etc (they cannot look an exited woman in the eye) or that men can "become" women (and so they are vilified for being transphobic but there is a lot of sense there if you are not too easily offended- can't be arsed to open that can of worms). But mainly I think that rad feminism is feminism proper because it rejects all this patriarchy conforming man pleasing behaviour that liberal feminism likes to call "empowering" and liberal feminism spends a lot of time saying "check your privilege" which derails from the real issue that women are considered objects and 2nd class people.

DGR site = fab.

Thank you grennie.

I agree with grennie.

Gender identity is a really rough subject for many feminists. I don't "identify" as cis. I don't "identify" as "feminine". I don't actually "identify" as "woman". I'm just a person. If gender is all that matters, then my sex is not female. But I am female, I was born female, I have been treated all my life as female, often to my detriment. The appreciation that there are things that happen to females because they are identified as female at birth is important, and is in no way taking a pop at trans people. If we say that people are only their gender - well I'm a bloke, I guess. But physically, I am very "feminine". And that's OK to me - I think it is OK for people not to conform to very constrained views of what they are based on their genitalia.

Otherwise what is someone like me? I was born and raised a female, with all that entails. My appearance is very "feminine" - not something I would change, or could really. The things that I enjoy, my approach to sex, the way I feel about my children, loads of things, are all stereotypically male.

So I don't "identify" as cis, as that would be to identify as feminine, female, surely.
I don't identify as trans, I don't feel a need to change my body or how I am.

What am I, under the new code?

Hmm. I believe changes can be made within the current structure, so thought i was a liberal feminist . But I certainly agree with the "as a class" approach to analysis.

To be fair, I just consider myself a feminist except when specifically asked to distinguish.

Do not consider that pro-prostitution is a libfem viewpoint - with Blistory on that one.,

Grennie I don't think of myself as a radical feminist but when individual issues come up, I generally agree with the radical feminist position on it. What do you think is a good overview of radical feminism?

oooh good stuff beachcomber

grennie I know there is stuff there, and I even set up a facebook in one of my old MN names to join with them, but TBH I don't really "do" facebook. My computer time is spent on MN. BBC and reading fanfic

I think one the key aspects of radical feminism is that we identify women's struggle as being one for liberation (from female oppression/male supremacy) rather than being for equality (which radical feminists analyse as being unobtainable and a fundamentally flawed concept within patriarchal society).

Oh hello SM, nice to see you again.

I dunno, I think it is useful to put a name to significant ideological divides (whether in feminism or any other political ideology). But probably the majority of feminists (including me) don't explicitly identify as either radical or liberal feminists and that is absolutely fine.

Really interesting thread, I'm learning a lot here.

But I do like the interpretation of it as "extreme feminism" that I've seen it often referred to as a slur - people fighting for "extreme equality"

radical feminism is a false divide,another tool to divide by creating false ideological split
I've seen radical used as an insult in same way liberal is used as slur too
imo,there are wide range opinions and we don't need to agree or divide in false constructs