Is feminism a left-wing thing?

[HirplesWithHaggis]

Inspired by a comment (is it the done thing to name the poster? I assume not, but it would be giving credit for inspiration/thought-inducing rather than slagging her) on the AI thread, that she is not a left-wing feminist; fair enough, we all self-define.

But I had kind of always rather assumed it was/is, perhaps because I've been vaguely lefty and always feminist (apart from moments here when I've been told that I'm not a feminist because I'm not radfem) for about 40 years now. Am I totally out of date?

Roy, your post makes no sense.

And Socialist Feminists.

And Labour Feminists.

Plus I think a lot of left wing types think the cause of economic equality for men everyone is more important than the oppression of women. That's the situation where you get told that pointing out feminist issues is 'not helpful'. The rape allegations in the SWP is a good example of this kind of thing.

As the thread about lefty men firmly established!

I would say the rejection of the patriarchy is anarchic.

And anarchy, with no state, is the opposite of left-wing.

I happen to totally disagree with all of Carol's posts on this thread. Right wing as choice? Left wing as restrictive of choice? For me, choice politics means choice for those who can afford it or who are otherwise able to take advantage of it, whereas those who can't have to take the dregs. Choice only really exists if you are in a position to take advantage of it. It's the left wing's support structures that enable those who wouldn't otherwise have it gain that position.

Right wing as less entrenched, so that 'individuals and groups can overcome their specific circumstance'? There will always be inequalities? The aim of the left wing is to reduce inequality as much as possible in the first place, and provide support structures for those who hit unlucky patches so that they can climb out and overcome much more easily. Without those support structures, some inequalities cannot be overcome, not without a huge dose of sheer luck.

Right wing removes structure and therefore structural disadvantage? What structural disadvantage possibly compares to the basic one of not having any money in a world where everything costs? Providing support structures and redistribution networks is what it says - redistributing the basic requirement of capitalism to create inequality.

Nothing ever runs perfectly well, and probably we need balance in all things. Britain has swung way too far to the right, with both extreme income inequality, a tendency to creation of an oligarchy, and reducing redistribution. There is a reason why we have a right-wing government and are the most unequal state in Europe. The two are very closely linked. European countries on the whole are more socialist oriented and are more equal. Don't quite know how you're going to dispute that empirical observation.

"redistributing the basic requirement of capitalism to create inequality. " - I mean, since that's not clear, capitalism requires inequality and we need redistribution to offset that tendency. Look at Victorian period in the early days when everything was private and the human misery this created among the poor - slowly we started providing left-wing support structures to offset it and slowly the gap reduced. Now, for the last 30 years or so, those structures have been reduced and the gaps widen again.

capitilism does not create inequality, people are born unequal. Some people have more of whatever is valuable (and this changes over time and between groups) at birth. Capitalism without barriers allows people to create the best of what they have.
Total equality cannot be achieved as people are fundamentally selfish and overvalue thier abilities. People will play the system to 'get more out' than they put in, either because they can or because they are 'worth it'.
This leads the Left down a compulsion and force route, condeming society to a worse overall and individual position than capitalism, as can be seen in all socialist countries.
When I talk about selfish, this will vary by each person, but even the most ardent socialists are not talking about sharing UK wealth with Africa to equalise living standards, so inherently selfish.
The best route out of poverty, even for the poor, is trade, as demonstrated in the UK, western europe and US and more recently by China. One of the things preventing growth in Africa, is European import duties designed to protect European workers and European farm subsidies which mean UK grown sugar can be dumped on the African markets and sold cheaper than local sugar.

People are born unequal... in unequal societies, or in the unequal distribution of world wealth that dates back to colonialism. In more equal societies, eg those that are right now in existence on the continent, people are born more equal. It's often been observed that there is no correlation between the wealth of a country's natural resources and the wealth of its people, something else is going on. Maybe we can't get a perfectly equal world - but we can sure as hell get a lot closer than this. Do you want to dispute that we're the most unequal country in the EU, and that those who are more equal include both richer and much poorer countries?

People are fundamentally selfish - that old argument. I have a more nuanced view. People are not fundamentally anything, their actions will depend on the way they've been socialised and the specific context they're in. They do not, even in our system, necessarily play the system to take more out than they put in. Most people want some value in their lives, and for most that will include being economically independent and occasionally helping others through a bad patch. Those for whom economic independence is a pipedream thanks to the kind of crappy low paid work available will disconnect from that economic reality, seek value elsewhere, and have nothing to thank the current economic system for.

The best route out of poverty is trade. No, not primarily - first you need something to trade. You need to produce. The lack of interest in production is one of the many problems with neoliberalist economic theory.

The problem of Africa, I'm not that familiar with that continent, I think it has a whole host of problems. I support fair trade over free trade myself and giving people a fair price for their production, else within an unequal world power structure you will get exactly the sort of capitalist inequality you describe. Odd how the right wingers want protective structures when it's convenient for them.

Buffy has a very good point. We are destroying the environment by using up all of its resources to push this economic model. We need to be more sustainable.

"but even the most ardent socialists are not talking about sharing UK wealth with Africa to equalise living standards, so inherently selfish."

Actually this issue has been raised, the Green party mention it. Ultimately it benefits us to share our ill-gotten gains a bit better, if only to help stop the current immigration crisis and prevent a worse when the ecological/ social problems really start to hit. I don't like all this vitriol over economic v 'genuine' migrants, I can't fault anyone who can't feed their kids in place a wanting to move to place b where they can. When people are happy where they are in their own homes they will stay there. Plus we owe them historically. The power structures created in the African chaotic vacuum would appear to be a blocker though.

Erm... sorry for derail, these are my hobby horses.

Capitalism actually reduces the impact on the environment - the west is much cleaner and environmentally sound than 100 or 200 years ago, despite continued growth.

I am not into protective structures, the Left use far more of those than the right.

Why fair trade? Who decides the fair price.
One example, I pay £2 for a coffee in a chain. This uses 14g or 0.5 ounces of coffee. Green coffee bean range from 87 cents to $1.30 a lb, so the green beans cost about 2 pence. Is it fair for the framer to get 1% of the price, or even 2% if you double the pay to the farmer? No-one knows unless you have a free market.

The EU imports 45,000 tonnes of green coffee, and 700 tonnes of roasted coffee due to 7.5% import duty on roasted coffee vs 0% on green coffee. This is designed so the value added roasting, raising the price from $1/lb to $8/lb is done in Europe. This condems the growing nations by preventing value added activities and makes things more expensive for a UK consumer as he has to pay European rates for roasting.
Removing EU import duties and supporting roasting plants in farmers co-operatives would do far more for farmers wealth and save UK money than fair trade.

"Capitalism actually reduces the impact on the environment"

I actually don't know what to say to that, it is so blindingly delusional.

Are you saying Russia and China under communism were better for the environment than the West or US?

I think that is a more complicated issue than simply capitalism v communism. A system that stresses communality certainly has the potential to be more environmental than one stressing individualism and shipping crap around the world for its own sake. I'm also not sure to what degree China is still operating as a communist structure on the world market. The west being cleaner and more environmentally friendly now is simply because we have exported our dirty manufacturing to China, in line with capitalist theories, which has happened because of global capitalism and the relatively low environmental protection. But I'm being pulled away, have spent far too long on here today I'm told.

V v quickly before my dh rebels - you're setting up a false dichotomy, there are alternatives to either capitalism or communism, I'm not suggesting we all turn to communism.

We are not cleaner and more environmentally friendly in the west than 100- 200 years ago, that is a laugh.

They may have been maginal politically, but there was huge inefficiencies in the communist system which created much larger environmental damage for a much smaller economic benefit. This has nothing to do with exporting manufacturing (which is a more recent thing).

One example of the improvements in the environment is the Thames. Whilst this shows UK rivers are cleanest for 100 years.

Specifically capitalism drives improvements in production and manufacturing to reduce costs. Excluding labour costs, most costs are material inputs and waste, so minimising these is very important in capitalism, not so much in a more collective political system.