'Germaine Greer can no longer be called a feminist'

I can't take Greer seriously after her creepy little book.

Oh, I see it’s called ‘Women for life on earth: The Inevitability of Ecofeminism‘. Ha! I’d have said that back in the 1990s but I’m not seeing any sign of it. It’s sold out anyway.

I’d book for the London one, but I don’t really want to hear about bugs, marvellous though they are.

I agree Walkingdead and it's not her responsibility to educate, or to put forward the same views again. I know what she could do if people listened, really we need to protect her and promote new radfem academics. How do we do this though?

theaveragewife

Well she's been completely hammered by that particular band of feminism, so I can totally understand why she wouldn't want to talk about it.

I went earlier in the year, I love her, her books and her thoughts on the trans movement - so expected some discussion on this, even mention of the no-platforming.

Unfortunately what I got was a discussion on bugs of the rainforest, which as riveting as it was, was not the reason I booked tickets. I can understand why she locks herself away, and perhaps why she doesn't want to discuss this any more, perhaps we all need to take forward some of her ideas.

Damn, just checked DS' half term dates, and Greer is talking the week after :-(

I'm going on my own too! waves

Is anyone else going to Manchester on the 24th Feb??? I will be going on my own and bit apprehensive.........

She's also speaking in London (Blackheath Halls) on the 23rd November. I'll be booking tickets !

When they tell me that black lives matter should center Racheal Dolzeal then I will believe that maybe I was wrong. But I don't see that happening.
But but...thats different. So I am told When I ask how that is different, I am told to educate myself. So still none the wiser on how its different to males demanding feminism centres them

cuirderussie

I might go too! I'm quite sure there will be many trans activists there!

On that note I have just booked a ticket to Germaine Greer's talk in Mànchester in February!

I do not agree with Germaine Greer about a lot of things. Actually I’d queue all night to debate with her about some things, then I’d probably end up agreeing with her.
I think (not that I’ve earned the right to have my word taken) that people being people (as in not flawless) in kinda the whole fucking pillar of fair society.
And I’m sure that if when pushed the young woman would say she can’t agree with Greer because her hair is grey and wrinkles visible. And she should be pushed to say that publicly so when she’s an old white woman she realises she talked a lot of shite

Surely he's being ageist? Old people have a voice too!

Ageism. One of the last acceptable isms, even though it's a protected characteristic.

It's more like some crazy game of rock, paper, scissors, lizard, Spock, platypus, artichoke.

The "old, white woman" comment is infuriating.

Criticising Greer because she is white = massive privilege-checking virtue-signalling bonus points! "Old" and "woman" tacked on adds the necessary air of disgust not provided by the word "white". Whereas if she'd dismissed someone's because they were "just a young black guy" she'd be crucified. In that scenario, "black" = OMG racist, as the overriding factor. In fact "guy" and possibly "young" may actually confer an advantage in terms of people giving a shit; certainly no privilege-checking bonus points are awarded for pointing these things out.

I loathe the way their is a hierachy in activist circles, amongst the very people who claim to care about this stuff. And the related trading off of one "ism" against another (eg. middle class males who champion the rights of the masses, freedom for the working class blah blah, until a member of the working class says something they don't like and suddenly they're the Great Unwashed again...) It's like a weird rock-paper-scissors with identity.

I think trans trumps everything. The only thing in identity rock-paper-scissors that might flag up the madness to the political left is if it conflicts with black men's rights somehow.

One of the many lovely things about seeing Greer speak this year was the number of young women in the audience.

💛GG

I adore Germaine. I obsessively read her books as a teenager and I fully credit her for my having enough savvy to continue being passionate about radical feminism through the murky waters of liberal feminism gaining popularity as I grew into my twenties.

That rings depressingly true SomeDyke. Sadly also true that Greer and colleagues won't be with us forever. When they're gone it will be even easier to dismiss them.

What really bugs me is that Stonewall supposedly 'apologised' for doing stuff wrong. That Joanna Russ apparently recanted as it were for saying the wrong things about transwomen in one of her Sci-Fi novels (The Female Man). This isn't just criticism, or views evolving naturally, it's taking something someone said 30-40 years ago and expecting them to recant, apologize profusely, or else be forever not just ignored but reviled. We have Inga Muscio and her book 'Cunt' that I read recently, where she does a similar thing in the afterword to the second edition. Of course, those like Germaine and Janice Raymond who refuse to recant, or issue profuse apologies and cover themselves with sackcloth and ashes and seek forgiveness from the TRAs, they are forever damned, their works to be misfiled, denounced and (hopefully) forgotten, removed from the libraries and course reading lists.............

Hopefully they'll all die soon and their hateful views will die with them................They are all old women after all!

It's the basic "divide and rule" concept. Depressingly enough it seems to be working.

Yes! Agree SomeDyke, good post.

If you disparage what older women say and do you can erase their contribution to feminism and rewrite it (in your image).