Why "fun feminism" should be consigned to the rubbish bin

[Nyac]

article by Julie Bindel in the New Statesman.

www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-staggers/2011/08/fun-feminism-women-feminist

Quote:

"We need to bring back the radical edge to feminism, and do away with any notion that slutwalking, lap dancing, sex working or Burkha-wearing is liberation for women. If men like a particular brand of feminism, it means it is not working. "Fun feminism" should be consigned to the rubbish bin along with the Lib Dem party."

Agree with Julie, that it's extremely irritating to see a bunch of interlopers attempting to elbow their way in and co-opt feminism, redefining it to suit patriarchy's needs. I've even seen people who support patriarchal institutions like marriage, BDSM or the sex industry calling themselves radical feminists. There is so much misunderstanding and misinformation about feminism out there that people feel like they can grab what they like without making an actual political commitment or any kind of challenge to the patriarchy.

Really liberal feminism (the old kind, not the sex industry supporting kind) and radical feminism are the only kinds of feminism that have ever effected any kind of positive change for women. They need to be reclaimed and supported, not erased by third wave non-feminist feminism.

She's right about the lib dems too. :D Or maybe they are in the same boat and need some classic liberals to reclaim their party from the Tory party's whipping boys.

You seem to be taking all this very personally sausageeggbacon.

I don't consider myself to be the sort of women who drives feminism forward by being a radical cutting edge feminist, but in no way do I think Basil's comment suggested that I can't think for myself.

I'm no Dworkin or Jeffries or MacKinnon. But I can read their work and think about it and discuss it and see how it fits into my life. And I'm glad that there are women who push boundaries, propose a different perspective and help me frame my own thoughts, I consider Bindel to be one such woman.

We can't all be important feminist thinkers but we can all be foot soldiers .

I will stick my neck out here, we need to examine history and the material conditions in which humanity has developed. We have developed in stages and those stages are related to both material conditions and in response to advances in production and the means of production. Women are not immune from this and the conditions and freedoms of past generations were stripped from women of different classes at different times according to the means of production. Just as the means of production and the profit imperitive and changes in technology in western society have brought about more freedoms, many women have been able to take advantage of this but just as many haven't. ie women from disadvantaged social, racial groups and women who are economically disadvantaged syphoned off into the sex industry, people trafficking etc...

As an example the conditions and freedoms of women in the medieval period were such, mainly because there had been divisions of labour much earlier, when men started to cultivate the land and domesticate animals. It meant the role of women became more closely tied into producing children. Children were need to work the land to create the surplus, which created the wealth on which men continue to use to dominate women. It isn't driven just by biology but from historical changes to the means and ownership of production with society. The church acted as a tool to opress women but also to impose capitalistic forms of production and the supporting family structures on different groups around the world. Read up on church missionaries! it isn't as simple as pointing a finger and saying, well that is the patriarchy.

When we look back over history we need to use that knowledge to move forward and we need to reassess the tools we will use according to what the threat is. What is the greatest threat to women? Class and we are a class within a class and a class apart, and the threat now has been historically determined.

www.isreview.org/issues/02/engles_family.shtml Interesting reading here from a feminist writer and academic Sharon Smith.

"A burkha does literally dehumanise a woman"

it is not the sum and total of body parts that maketh the person but their mind and their individual human experience.

Beachcomber sorry by saying only radicals have ideas I see that as an attack on every woman who does not hold radical views. I really wanted to get this board and MNHQ on board with campaigning more about FGM but as I am not a radical obviously I am not going to bother. Sweeping statements tend to drive away a lot of foot soldiers before they even start.

Sausage, do not be put off. We are not all radicals but equally so we are not all liberal or "sex positive" I personally think we need to be more open and more welcoming of all women but then I see feminism as a class struggle as well. We are all different, we all add something to the argument and all arguments are valid.

I would love to see all arguments being valid but look how some people word things here. Prison, all non radicals, all I see is a group who want things as they see them with no room for compromise or for acceptance that we are all different. Mini sorry just that rather than becoming more active I feel like saying what's the point and not bothering. Which is probably why the patriarchy loves radical feminism and publishes it in the New Statesman. Divide and conqueror and best yet the division is being done by the people who claim they want to break the chains of power.

at this teenage level of debate.

Sorry but ffs, to say that I'm attacking all women for not being radicals, when what my statement was was this:

"All movements are driven by the radicals .... without radicals there are no ideas"

is just plain silly. That statement is demonstrably true. Go and look at the great radical movements of history. Christianity, Islam, the Enlightenment, Anti-racism, anti-colonialism, feminism, universal suffrage, socialism, environmentalism... I could go on and on and on. There isn't a single idea in history that hasn't been influential and important, which wasn't radical.

It is just histrionic to take that as a personal attack.

Perhaps Basil will clarify but I didn't read her comment as meaning only those who identify as radical feminists can have ideas.

Rather she said that in all movements, it is the people who push boundaries of thought who move things forward - people like this are referred to as radicals no matter what the movement (as in radical change, radical thought, radical solution, etc - radical is a word that is applied to all sorts of movements, not just feminism).

I am a radical feminist but I do not consider myself to be a radical thinker, I'm pretty sure Basil doesn't either, nor does anyone else in the feminist section (although Bidisha does post here sometimes and she is pretty mega). I do not take offence at the notion that I am not a great feminist thinker who will bring original thought and creativity to the movement. I'm just glad that such women exist and share their thoughts.

You do seem rather determined to take offence however - it seems a shame to let a general comment that contained nothing about you personally affect your desire to start up a campaign against FGM.

X posts with Basil.

In terms of radical, lots of ideas start of as radical that later become mainstream. For example, women getting the vote or equal pay. Both were incredibly radical at the time and the women and men campaigning for it were dismissed as extremists.

And I didn't say non radicals don't have ideas.

I said without radicals, there are no ideas.

Perhaps this needs qualifying for those with a fragile ego. What I mean by this, is that there are ideas, but they're not particularly new or challenging ones. They don't take things any further on.

A good example of this is the Liberal Party. In the last century, they have basically been slowly dying. Partly, this is because there is no radcial thought in the liberal party, they haven't had any ideas to take forward the raison d'etre of the party. They grew out of an incredibly radical movement - the Englightenment - which became so mainstream and comfortable, that when a new radical movement came along - socialism - and a new political party came along, the liberal party were simply blown out of the water. In contrast the Tory party managed to survive and the reason it has done so, is because it has been re-invigorated every generation, with radical thought. I don't like them, I hasten to add, I'm merely pointing out the dynamic. Without radicalism, a movement becomes stagnant, part of the establishment or just irrelevant. That's the point I'm making, which appears to be so bloody offensive.

Sorry crap PC with v. cslow connection so keep x posting

And what Beachcomber said.

"at this teenage level of debate.

That is bringing age and class, education and or perceived differences into the equation and is as such a discrimination in itself. It isn't necessary because we do not know anyones age, qualifications, race, gender, background or class, nationality of sexual preferences. Even if we did, it does not invalidate their opinion.

My point is that sausage is behaving like a stroppy teenager, not that she is an actual teenager.

HTH

I don't doubt what you are saying but we must not discriminate on any basis because women are also a class within a class as well as a separate class.This means we all have very different material life experiences, we come from different races and cultures and different socio-economic backgrounds etc,,,,,,,this is what makes us all different but of equal worth, not necessarily of equal means.

What are you talking about Minima?

I seriously have no idea wht your last post was about. It's a generalised truism, who is going to disagree with that? But what point are you making?

And also, what is the relevance of "we must not discrimate" in this thread?

Sorry, discriminate.

If you read all of my posts, you'll find they have a cohesive theme, which is that we should look beyond the linear argument of cause and effect. (patriarchy or capitalist class) The prevailing threat and culture here is capitalist and neo-liberal, why else would some women work in the sex industry? Men are not just men, just as women are not just women. We are much more than the sum and total of body parts, we are different in many ways, one obvious one is social class as defined by basic economics, another is race as defined by colour, another would be gender as defined by cultural norms. Unless we acknowledge that people are made up a complex and interwoven set of values and experiences we will always fall into the trap of thinking that men are violent (patriarchy) because of biology and we will always make value judgements about other aspects of what make people human and whole.

If you really want to stop discrimination of women you need to stop discrimination of all women of all races and cultures within a frame work of accepting differences. You also need to understand that women are a class apart but we also experience life as a class within other classes, ie working class or middle class, different cultures etc,,,,,

Minima, rad fems know and acknowledge all that. It's sex-industry-positive feminism that seems clueless about it.

I agree Basil, which is why we have to accept differences but unpick the mechanism that consigns some women to lower socio-economic work including work within the sex industry.

I can acknowledge that Radical feminists will argue that the patriarchy is responsible for all harm to women, I am a marxist feminist and whilst we share much in common, I don't even believe that patriarchy is the cause of violence towards women. Class is the main problem because women experience harm on several levels along the lines of socio-economic class and culture, race and religion. The real bogey man is not the patriarchy but the form of production and exchange between all people of all sexes and all social groups.

An example of marxist feminst thinking is to be found within the study of anthropology as well as sociology and history. Radical feminism seems to try to re-write historical fact and think in linear cause and effect ways. Two opposites without a dialectic, which in turn means a state of constant struggle rather than an over throw of power.

Radical feminists insist on saying that biology alone is the main problem, a simple division between male and female, it also tries to assert that women and men have fewer differences ie no difference in brain aetiology. The two are in direct contradiction to each other. The argument does not stack up.

Radical feminists do not say biology alone is the problem.

I don't know why you think that.

"A burkha does literally dehumanise a woman"

When the Jews were made to scrub the streets and shave off their beards it was done to try and dehumanise them, to make them less than human. When they were marched to the gas chambers were they less than human? No, but the conceptualisation and the thought that they were less than human allowed the perpetrators of that oppression to see them as less than human to justify their actions. Which is why clothing and body parts alone does not either convey humanity or take away from being human.

So what is the argument? What is the patriarchy? Why do men dominate women?

But that's the point Minima - clothes do not detract from people's humanity, of course they don't. But they most certainly detract from or influence the perception of their humanity. So wearing a burkah in a society where men and women are totally equal and men wear them for the same reason and with the same frequency, in the same numbers as women - no biggie, no problem at all. Women selling sex as a commodity when they would get the same money shelf stacking at Tesco and where men sell sex to women in the same numbers as women - no biggie again.

But we don't live in that society, we live in the one we've got.

Also if you assert that class is the main problem, you are ignoring the "class within a class" issue that you referred to earlier on.

We could solve all the class issues tomorrow and you'd still have the issue of women being the sex class, the boring invisible unpaid domestic labour class, the child-rearing class, etc. Which an awful lot of lefty-boys seem suspiciously complacent about.