I'm disassociating from 'radical'

[garlicbutter]

Not really expecting anything here (though this board often surprises me!) but I woke up with a fierce urge to write this post, so may as well go with it.

Self-declared radical feminists used to scare me - and piss me off. They were the ones who sneered at my friends & me for wearing fashionable clothes and makeup. Most of them seemed a hell of a lot quicker to anger than to rational debate. I wasn't that bothered - I was doing plenty for feminist causes, makeup notwithstanding. I just didn't call myself "radical".

A few decades along, I noticed everyone was saying "I'm not a feminist but ..." all over again. There was stuff going on in the media that I considered retrograde for women, and some spokeswomen seemed to be touting pornification and surrender as feminist values. By contemporary standards, it seemed, I was radical!

So I did a bit of reading, and asked on here, and it turns out I'm a rad fem. But it rankles. This is why: Either you're a feminist or you aren't. Either you strive for real gender equality or you don't. There's no need for the 'radical', it's a tautology.

The radical thing is also beginning to strike me as a sorority (not a sisterhood). It feels like the kind of society that's good for teenagers: an us-against-the-world, nobody-truly-understands, same-thinking, catchphrase-sharing, sycophantic sect. Unless we are teenagers, we should have grown up by now and reached out to the world we live in (and wish to change.)

So I'm a feminist, no adjectives required.

This isn't meant as a challenge or anything, but I wanted to post it since so many visitors come away from this board scratching their heads about radical feminism. I'm not saying I know a whole lot about it - I've not studied Feminst Theory or sociology - but I am a long-time feminist activist. Here's my take on it.

[garlicbutter]

Yep. Recent posts on the slutwalk thread have given me the nerve to mention male violence against men, too. With regard to aggression, the problem is that large minority of men feel entitled to forcefully impose themselves upon others. Because these men tend to see women as less than men, they tend to do it more to women. The underlying problem, though, applies to men, women and children (and pets, probably.)

[aliceliddell]

Leningrad - agree it's important to have somewhere to say these things. I notice the frequent mention of shame following sexualised violence; these debates move from our own internalised problem to a political analysis. Thanks to all who shared those painful experiences, you are helping all of us.

[garlicbutter]

Am still reeling from the archdeacon story Has he been disciplined now?

[Beachcomber]

SGM that is a terrible story. I have a friend who was sexually assaulted by a priest.