Men’s “token torturers” in feminist spaces

[EatsBrainsAndLeaves]

"Where men can?t reach women because the space is women-only, these women, most of whom are deeply damaged, serve as the perfect Trojan horses and cannon fodder for the destruction of feminist spaces. To use Mary Daly?s term, they are men?s ?token torturers? in feminist spaces, doing men?s dirty work of demolishing women?s capacity for resistance.[18]

In most cases, pseudo-feminist (masculinist) practices or ideologies are the perfect terrain for such abusive behaviours because they give both the sense of legitimacy and individual rationalisation for them. Token torturers within feminist or women-only spaces almost always justify their continual acts of women-bashing with male-identified ideologies disguised as feminism, and some may be more obvious than others. This is particularly true for pro-prostitution positions, BDSM practices, pseudo anti-racism, intersectionality, male-centric anti-capitalism or leftism, focus on male institutions or law, queer theory, butch-fem ideology, radical lesbianism, and the ?phobia? ideologies (Islamophobia, etc.)."

-- Féministe radicale francophon

Daly has always been apt to say some rather strange things. (first thoughts) will now read the whole thread.

I have just had a read of the WOC blog, really interesting thank you KRITIQ.

Although I agree that some women are oppressed in multiple ways, race, class & sex, I still question where this oppression originates from. Unlike radical feminists many of whom think the original oppression from which all other forms spring is sex, I think it's class.

Reading the WOC blog the writer talks about the women's movement in the seventies, headed up my mainly educated middle class white women who left their children in the care of exploited working class black women. Why were these black women exploited for their labour.....because they were working class. Why are black women working class and not middle class intellectuals? because they chose not to study or because of their colour? does the colour of someone's skin dictate their ability to be educated?

If you consider the slave trade in terms of the historical materialist analysis you conclude that the inequality was rationalised after the economic inducement to employ free labour. It was a purely capitalistic/materialistic thing which was then rationalised through racism and bigotry which would make the inequality seems entirely justified. Britain depended upon cheap cotton, the american's supplied it on the back of free labour. If the WOC were/are exploited by their white sisters, the basis for this exploitation and inequality is class first, race second.

This is the FWR chat section, non?

Wouldn't the test of that be whether a rich, high-class, black man suffered prejudice, Minx? All other things being equal ... I'd posit that Obama faces an additional obstacle in his skin colour; bigger than the obstacle faced by a white man of lesser status. I think this but am not sure. It must have been discussed at length.

Instead intersectionality is used to argue - there are all these different oppressions class, race, fat oppression, etc that mean everyone is oppressed in a different way. So it is anti feminist because it fails to recognise how men as a class oppress women as a class - which is basic feminist theory.

To me, those two sentences just don't hang together. You can believe everyone is oppressed in a different way and also believe that men as a class oppress women as a class. I don't see any tension between those two positions.

And Mini, I see what you're saying, but your post glosses over the very deep and genuine hatred that many people have for people of other races which often motivates them to terrible acts of discrimination. You can't explain that away using class.

I know it's not what you're saying Mini but your post reads as if you don't think racism exists/is a big issue.

does the colour of someone's skin dictate their ability to be educated?

Their ability, no. Their opportunity, sometimes very much so.

There is no reason that working together with other anti-oppression movements makes one antifeminist, nor is there a contradiction between seeing discrete vectors of oppression and the male oppression of females. This is the same issue as "kyriarchy" vs "Patriarchy": using the word kyriarchy does NOT imply that the classical understanding of patriarchy, men as a class oppressing women as a class through the institutions of society, is false. It only extends the understanding of privilege and power beyond gender to other important issues. Thus, even rad fems do not need to reject intersectional theory.

For example, I was discussing parents' rights on another thread: a white [color privileged], upper middle class [class privileged], professing Christian [religion privileged] female deputy head teacher at an all GIRLS school was providing a secret service where pupils could discuss their sexual development, relationships & experimentations in detail without the parents being told anything. This anti-parent policy not only subverted the families of adolescent females and denied them the right to know (thus being misogynist) but the school had an intake of mainly girls of colour, Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs and minority evangelical sects of Christianity. The parents had little choice as most could not afford a private school and were largely working-class unlike the "sophisticate" who was keeping secrets from them.

So there was racial, religious, class AND sexist oppression going on all at once in an anti-parent, anti-family context.

This is why intersectionality can NEVER be ignored.

I agree Obama as an educated black man still faces huge discrimination on the grounds of colour but this is because we have complex social systems born out of materialist causes, we are socialised by those materialist causes, just as a stated with the example of the slave trade. This is the cause of this deep and genuine hatred. It's evolutionary because if you consider early human development you find that we had to very quickly elicit information about other tribes, based primarily on sight, so we would know if someone was of our kin by the way they looked. We would know if they posed a threat. Did other tribes always pose a threat? Yes they did. With scant resources and a need to survive all new comers were treated with suspicion. When we raped Africa of her resources (just as we do now) we found that justification must be made to exonerate us. We proposed that the black man did not have the education or technology (we were right!) we proposed that he was a lesser being (we were wrong) but the guiding motivation is always materialist.

We probably have the technological means to free women from the biological enslavement of reproduction and the technology to feed the world but we choose not to because our social consciousness is always somewhat behind our technological development BUT is eventually shaped by those material forces. Socialisation and the complex social hierarchies we have developed are because of our need to eat and reproduce, when we have mastered how to do this without squabbling over scant resources we will have the conditions in which all inequality can be overcome IMO

Feminist women of colour and womanists DO acknowledge the impact of class, as well as racism and sexism in sustaining the oppression of women of colour and yes Mini, the points you raise are relevant to the foundations of this.

What I can't quite follow is why there is even the need to debate which form of oppression is the greatest, the first, the most pervasive or the most damaging. Seeking to elevate one form of oppression above others will immediately alienate those who don't "fit" the definition neatly and sends the message to those affected by multiple forms of oppression that some aspects of their experience are not so important as others.

So, for example a white, working class, trans woman, a Black, working class, well-educated man and an Asian, disabled, working class Lesbian will all experience discrimination and marginalisation because of their class identity. However, other aspects of their identity mean they will experience a mixture of disadvantages and privileges and their experience of that will be pretty subjective. Addressing just the class aspect - smashing capitalism, will not automatically make any difference in their experience of those other forms of oppression. Ditto if we only address the sex/gender aspect.

Surely if we pan out, we can see that many versions of the same mechanisms of oppression are used against people who have various different characteristics for the purpose of maintaining the status quo. I think we have a lot better chance of toppling the structures and mechanisms that perpetuate oppression if we work together, rather than squabbling about who's got it worst or scapegoating other groups of folks who experience oppression (which I think sometimes happens with some anti-capitalist men's ire towards women and some radical feminists seeking to invalidate the experience and even existence of trans women.)

Eldritch and Extro make an important point here. Acknowledging and wishing to address the wider mechanisms of oppression doesn't not mean a dilution of feminism, or any other movement for liberation of an oppressed group.

Wot KRITIQ said again. And Eldritch and others.

What I can't quite follow is why there is even the need to debate which form of oppression is the greatest, the first, the most pervasive or the most damaging.

Ah, the Oppression Olympics crew. Gold medal for derailment is what I give'em. What does motivate them except narcissism and the belief their lived experience matters more than that of any other human being (or has more explanatory power in relation to structural injustice)

Not this again!

Thank you KRITIQ for doing the heavy lifting here.

O.P the feminism you're espousing throws women under the bus if they don't fit a very narrow definition and have certain concerns. It is exclusionary and belittling to women (ironic, huh).

You have no right to dismiss prejudices that you have never actually experienced.

I am a feminist.

Extro because in some contexts there are privileges attached to being Most Martyred.

It's used to deflect criticism from actual behaviour and undermine the validity of the critic.

Doesn't have to be structural - plenty of it going on at the personal level as people build narratives to excuse their affair, their drinking, their failure in whatever. But it works at the macro level as well.

What OrangeKipper said

I guess what I am trying to say is that I agree that some women suffer multiple forms of oppression and indeed some privilege in relation to others. I think that making radical feminism an elite enclave of "real" feminists and excluding others is wrong.

In relation to my questioning which original form of oppression, this has much more to do with how we re-engage with the wider liberation movement, which I think is important. I don't think feminism will bring about changes to all other forms of oppression. What is the thing that unites all oppression, is this the same thing that can unite everyone in finding solutions. I am a feminist and if my feminism is not of the Daly variety I'm happy to stay on the outside!

I think it is an interesting quote and certainly I have come across similar behaviour in elements of prostitution hierarchies.

I'm a bit surprised by the hostility with which the OP seems to be being received

Orange, I've experienced that to - the idea that because one experiences oppression in one way, it gives carte blanche to say and do things that are oppressive/excluding to others. Does it perhaps partly stem from a fear that by acknowledging one's own privilege, it will somehow diminish the significance of the oppression one faces in another sphere?

As always GothAnne - clear and to the point on this one!

I believe it was on a blog that I can no longer find that I found a succinct and sobering comment from a working class woman of colour about her despair when urged by predominately white, class privileged feminists to "get behind the feminist cause" and set aside concerns about racism, classism and other forms of oppression because these are divisive or water down the message. She said that these feminists were asking her and others to put all their energies into fighting for the rights of those women who are already the most privileged amongst women, with no guarantee that the other factors that enforce their oppression will ever be dealt with. This is another variation on what Goth Anne refers to as the "throwing under a bus."

Beach, I don't think the OP here has had a rougher ride than many who make contentious points in this discussion forum. The opening post (the op hasn't offered a citation, but she hasn't said she disagrees with the content) refers to a whole range of feminists as "pseudo-feminists," which in itself is likely to get folks' backs up. Eats then goes on to state specifically that intersectionality is "anti-feminist," and includes (imho) a very weedy statement on, "oh yes, of course racism is bad but not the big deal that sexism is so get your priorities right sister!. So, I don't think one should be too surprised that these views haven't been welcomed by all with open arms.

Also there has been a nice air of consensus round these parts of late and some very interesting feminist discussions elsewhere on MN, the last thing we need (IMHO), is another round of Feminist King of The Castle.

There are some very good deconstructions of, for example, why rebranding prostitution as sex work is anti-feminist, but they don't involve "ex-communicating" other feminists.

I have seen "intersectionality" used to obscure male-dominance; it's the same kind of thing as 'but what about the menz' - ie, putting feminism at the bottom of the heap - except far more dishonest.

Obviously lots of people use the theory in the way it was intended to be used, but that doesn't stop the many anti-feminists hijacking it for their own purposes. The women who I've seen use it in an anti-feminist way have tended to be privileged in terms of race and class, interestingly.

You have no idea of my ethnicity actually.

The quote doesn't refer to "pseudo-feminists" (which would be people).

It refers to (and I quote!) pseudo-feminist (masculinist) practices or ideologies.

Two rather different things.

It could be interesting to explore what "pseudo-feminist (masculinist) practices or ideologies" are and how they manifest.

I agree with what ArmyOfPenguins says about the hijacking of intersectionality as a concept.

Is that a response to me EBAL? I was referring to women who use intersectionality to minimise the importance of feminism. They often seem to be very privileged.

No it wasnt Army. And yes I have noticed the same tendency. In fact as a group radical feminists seem to suffer many many more disadvantages such as race, class, disability, etc, than your average group of woman. I think because there are no figureheads, the public radfem most know are academics and this presents perhaps a very inaccurate picture of who radical feminists are.

Is this where the quote was taken from Eats?

Where men can?t reach women because the space is women-only, these women, most of whom are deeply damaged..........
radicalhub.com/2012/08/09/sisterhood-in-application-part-one/

Third para from the end. I have linked it just in case anyone should like to read it.

Just because concepts can be hijacked, doesn't mean they are not valid or important.

However, if this is just going to turn into "It's hard out there for a radfem", then just say and we'll leave you to it.