Feminist Choice

[Blistory]

Not a TAAT but prompted by one.

I know that most posters on here despair when people use the I exercised a choice and the fact that I did so itself is feminist, therefore what I did was a feminist act line of reasoning but can making a choice to do something that either is against women or comes from a tradition of oppressing women ever be a feminist choice ?

So on the marriage thread for example, can choosing to use your husband's surname ever be hailed as a feminist act ? So if you know that the tradition behind it is not at all supportive of women, can it really be reclaimed by women as a positive or does the history of how it arose completely wipe it out ?

Trivial example I know but there seem to be so many everyday things that stem from horrible woman oppressing traditions or that have evolved recently to objectify women that I can't see how any woman who has seriously thought about these things can ever call their choice a feminist one. It's a choice, yes, great, but even feminists do anti feminist things.

What am I missing or is this feminism lite that I just don't get ?

As usual, I entirely agree with Buffy.

And yes, liberation leads to more, better and fairer choices. Of course it does, but the context within which those choices are made is about having real control over one's life.

Such as in abortion, and the 'right to choose' as already mentioned on this thread. For women to have real and meaningfull reproductive rights, the right to choose is only part of the picture. It is an important part, of course, but the other parts are just as important. Such as societal pressure, attitudes and expectations, the influence of religous instituions, the influence of the instituion of motherhood, a women's personal circumstances and relationship with the father of the baby, and so on.

Having the actual right to choose enshrined in law is only the beginning. Look at some states in the US where women officially have the right to choose under federal law, but do not have local access to a clinic that performs abortions because state law is (purposely) so restricitve as to which establishments can perform abortions.

These women have the right to choose but they do not have control of the circumstances within which they try to exercise that right. Choice is not enough, we need control. Which of course means we need power.

I do find the concept of "choice" problematic when it leads to outcomes that are apparently harmful to those making them, such as the "choice" to be a porn star or a sex worker. Actually I don't believe that those particular choices are made in a societal vacuum, since many socio-economic factors enter into the "choice" to sell sexual favours or visual services, but I cannot and must not deny women the freedom to make a proper choice. I do believe that the basic reasons why women "choose" to enter sex work should instead be addressed- education, earning potential etc. Even after women have achieved equality (still a long way off imo) , I think that there will still be candidates for sex work and porn. But maybe those women will have had more freedom to arrive at that choice. And it would be crass to deny anybody choice on the grounds that they are making what I might view as the "wrong" choice.

We are still in a transition stage to equality (and have come a long way in the last decades) but there is still far to go, especially wrt women with children. Even women without children (especially of child-bearing age) do not have entirely the same employment opportunities as men.

Buffy "I find it confusing the way that people conflate the observation that being a porn star or sex worker is a) harmful to women as a class because it perpetuates that idea that we are objects that can be bought and sold and b) often directly harmful to the women concerned with denying these women their choices."

Thank you so much for this - a one sentence explanation that's so beautifully clear.

As well, much of feminist discourse around prostituion is about the men's choices. The punters, the pimps, the traffickers and the boyfriends choices. Their choices are the real issue.

Choice alone is a very limited concept for women - we are born into the lower status position of a gendered binary hierarchy. None of us chose our biological sex and none of us chose that hierarchy. We start out from a position of lack of choice - what we do from then on is make the best of it depending on the hand that fate deals us.

I have been thinking quite a lot recently about the choice to have children and what a completely different choice it is depending on if you are a man or a woman.

It's why I also find the concept of equality flawed WRT to women's rights (although I think it works reasonably well in other movements such as civil rights). We need to be more specific: equal status is what we aiming for surely (which IMO is the same as liberation from male dominance, liberation from the gender hierarchy).

Yes to that Buffy.

To talk about choice, without acknowledging that the same choice is different, depending on whether it is made by a woman or man, is to ignore society. We don't choose to be the ones that carry and birth babies. What is chosen is the social organisation within which we are the sex that makes the babies - just it isn't chosen by women.

If you have a couple of hours spare Choice Feminism and the Fear of Politics looks like a good read. Needless to say I haven't read it all...yet, but from the abstract:

^"Choice feminism is motivated by a fear of politics. It arises in response to three common criticisms of feminism: that feminism is too radical, too exclusionary, and too judgmental. In response, choice feminism offers a worldview that does not challenge the status quo, that
promises to include all women regardless of their choices, and that abstains from judgment altogether. Moreover, it enables feminists to sidestep the difficulties of making the personal political: making judgments and demanding change of friends, family, and lovers. Yet
judgment, exclusion, and calls for change are unavoidable parts of politics."^

Not sure if I agree with all of that - especially about judgements. I try not to judge women who make choices within a limited (and often misogynistic) framework. I am, on the other hand quite happy to judge men who make choices that further women's oppression.

^"In 2005, Linda Hirshman coined the phrase “choice feminism” to name the widespread belief in the U.S. that the women’s movement has liberated women to make whatever choices they want. As she describes this view, “A woman could work, stay home, have 10 children or one,
marry or stay single. It all counted as ‘feminist’ as long as she chose it.”3 For Hirshman, this insipid celebration of any and all choices a woman might make undermines feminists’ capacity to engage in political critique."^ Interesting. I wonder whether this is where the rise for choice feminism arose?

'Blistory, if taking your husbands name is not a feminist act what of the reverse? Are women who keep their surname performing a feminist act?'

I kept my name because it was my name and I liked it. OH reacted like DadWasHere, saw it as my choice. At the time, in the mid-80s, it was seen as a feminist thing to do.
A truly Feminist act would be to throw of the shackles of being owned by your father, refuse the tyranny of being owned by your spouse and give yourself a new name altogether. One you had chosen for yourself.

One thing I've noticed a lot is men saying they don't mind what choice a woman makes. And while men 'don't mind', individual women will make anti-feminist choices to fit in with society because they feel they should. I think that until men actively sway women towards feminist choices, the status quo will prevail.

Name is a tricky one because women are brought up with the expectation that they'll change their name upon marriage (who here didn't write 'Mrs X' in the margins of their school books??) and so 'not minding' is ingrained from a young age.

I'm not sure I understand the concept of a feminist choice when it comes to one's personal life. As the posters above have demonstrated, there are lots of factors that influence decisions like whether to change one's name on marriage, some political and some personal.

For instance, I would describe a woman deciding to be a SAHM while her children are little as making neither a feminist or an anti-feminist choice... and the same with a woman working full time while her children are little. People make these sort of choices in the perceived best interests of themselves and their families rather than with political aims at the forefront of their minds, surely? These decisions are made within the framework of a patriarchal society and I don't see the use of picking them apart individually.

If someone proclaimed herself to be a radical feminist while removing all body hair it's fair enough to query the discrepancy - but generally speaking I don't see the point of judging choices one way or another. It just distracts from analysis of society as a whole.

Would be interested to know what other posters thought on this.

That does look interesting scallops, although like you, I'm not happy with the judgements bit. She seems to have done what a lot of people do which is misinterpret what Hanisch meant when she coined the phrase 'the personal is political'.

It doesn't mean judging women's choices to see if they meet some feminist standard and that if everyone gets with the programme and stands up to oppression we'll have this patriarchy thing licked in no time.

Rather it means what you have articulated MooncupGoddess - These decisions are made within the framework of a patriarchal society

mindthegapuk.wordpress.com/2008/01/27/the-personal-is-political/

First, it’s important to note that the phrase ‘the personal is political’ manifestly does not mean that everything a woman does is political or that all her personal choices are political choices. In feminist terms, the ‘personal is political’ refers to the theory that personal problems are political problems, which basically means that many of the personal problems women experience in their lives are not their fault, but are the result of systematic oppression. In this respect, Hanisch is drawing heavily upon Marxism – the focus is off individual struggle and onto group struggle.

The theory that women are not to blame for their bad situations is crucial here because women have always been told that they are unhappy or faring badly in life because they are stupid, weak, mad, hysterical, having a period, pregnant, frigid, over-sexed, asking for it etc. The personal is political proposes that women are in bad situations because they experience gendered oppression and massive structural inequalities.

I think as well as being neoliberal, choice is also the darling of consumerism and an ideology that says we are all individual participants in a "market" of life. We use the same word "choice" for buying jam or shampoo that we use for having children, stepping back from work because your DH is not pulling his weight, staying with an abusive DH, being drawn into prostitution, as if we each have a buffet of all the options in front of us. As well as looking at societal structure and expectations, we need to look at options to critically analyse the meaning of choice.

I think there are different levels of judgement at work. I agree with those who are uncomfortable with the promotion of women judging women and it reminds me of lemon-sucking aunties and mean girls at school. But in the paper (and this is borne out by my experience) the author talks about young people looking only inwardly

As my colleagues confirm, it is in our classrooms, where students profess strong views on controversial feminist issues, yet refuse to apply them to others, saying, “but that’s just my personal opinion.”

Taken too far, non-judgement can lead to disengagement with politics and society and bringing everything back to an individual level. This can create a vacuum where damaging voices are given free reign to promote harmful policies for women because of a fear of being perceived as judgemental. Brooke Magnanti springs to mind here. I find her views and "work" pernicious, selfish and harmful to women. Women being silent about this and refusing to judge her amplifies her voice and the harm she causes.

Need to go offline for a day or so but thank you to everyone who has posted so far and for the additional reading material. Food for thought.

I think neoliberals usually seem to be more interested in the quantity of choices than the quality of choices.

Unfortunately, for many people, some apparently free choices are actually dilemmas in which a person must choose between something they don't want and another thing they don't want e.g. a choice between prostitution or poverty. I think it is significant that we often hear neoliberals praising the "free choice" of prostitution while they condemn the "free choice" of poverty.

I see what you mean about disengagement FloraFox, but I'm still uncomfortable with judgement.

Maybe it comes down to the meanings individuals apply to words, but having struggled with this for a while, I know I am happy with 'analysis' rather than judgement. It takes the sense of judging an individual person out of things.

If I take your example of Brooke Magnanti - I agree with you, I too find her views and work pernicious and harmful to women. I have no desire to judge her though - rather to analyse her actions and why she has done what she has. It cannot be coincidence for example that her father used prostituted women and introduced her to them. Perhaps her actions are selfish, perhaps they are self-preservation - or both. Who knows.

And I say that as someone who finds her opinions abhorrent. However, it isn't Ms Magnanti herself who does the real harm to women - it is misognyistic media, publishers, society etc that do the damage by holding her up as the happy hooker to end all happy hookers and as an example of why feminists should STFU. She is being used. They don't give a shit whether she is healthy or happy - they just want to hold her up in the limelight whilst she continues to spout misogyny and internalised sexism. If she did an about turn and voiced horror and distress about prostitution, as so many (unheard, unknown) exited women do, they would drop her sharpish and probably start attacking her.

2. Feminism denies women agency. This is really starting to fuck me off. How, exactly, does feminism do this? Do people who try and use this argument to shame feminists into shutting up actually understand what cultural and social norms are and how they work? I suspect that either they don't or they are misrepresenting them deliberately in order to win a debate. Yes, DWH I am looking at you, but I don't think you're the only one who does this.

I never said that feminism denies women agency, its not my view at all. My view is that feminism has a big chip on its shoulder over agency. Sections of feminism polarise agency and both extremes are unhealthy and marginalise the movement to future generations of women. From some in sex positive feminism so obsessed with agency they would hand out awards to actresses in S&M porn films simply because they personally enjoy the association between pain and arousal to some in rad fem where men must always be seen to hold as much power as possible because that provides a good reason to forgive women for having the limited personal agency rad fem projects on them. IMO one glorifies choice and the other denies every choice but its own

Beach, interesting distinction between judgement and analysis, thanks.

In terms of Magnanti I agree with FloraFox

Its all very interesting but I dont think its about analysis Vs judgement at all, because rationalising 'She is being used.' is 100% judgement. Its just one that conveniently minimises her own agency and therefore extends sympathy, because who would judge a puppet used by puppeteers, especially powerful male ones in a culture of patriarchy where its, ipso facto, on them that judgement should fall?

Do you think Ms Magnanti would be as well known as she is, if she didn't glamourise prostitution/misogyny DadWasHere?

Of course she is being used.

I don't think she is a puppet however and she certainly appears to me to be exercising agency.

Do you think "secret dairy of a call girl" would have made it onto mainstream television in Iceland? Or Sweden?