Do you think it is necessary to have good analytical and critical thinking skills be a feminist?

[QuentinSummers]

Lots of current "feminist" thinking seems not feminist at all and I wondered if it's because people are not abe to apply critical thinking skills to arguments like "Any choice a woman makes is a feminist choice".
Wondered what you all thought?

I would more say that feminism is more about what second wavers call "consciousness raising" than about critical thinking skills.

How one's consciousness is raised will vary from woman to woman. For some it might be through reading and critical thinking for others it won't be. Feminism is a grass roots movement about women's real lives and experiences - the lives are what make the theory but you don't need to have read the theory because by being a woman you have lived it.

I think it was Catharine MacKinnon who said (something like) feminist theory being an observation of women's lives in society and not a theory about those lives. The theory isn't there to tell women about their lives but as a tool to tell men and society about our lives from a perspective that does not comply with status quo thinking (AKA women as lesser/other).

Women aren't encouraged to examine our place in society - being a feminist IMO involves being rebellious and resistant. Book learning and critical thinking can be useful tools in that rebellion but I think righteous anger is key and that comes from within and in sharing with other women, which to me, is what consciousness raising is about.

Very interesting posts about your dad, prawn :)

Vaguely related story... My nan had an abortion shortly after they were legalised. It's not common chat or anything, but has never been a secret. My mum (teenage gf of her son, not her daughter) helped convince her it was okay, as she had nearly died multiple times of eclampsia. Yay for my female role models :)

"Women aren't encouraged to examine our place in society - being a feminist IMO involves being rebellious and resistant."

This. Absolutely. It's amazing how incredibly angry many women still get at any suggestion of consciousness raising. There are many, many threads in Mumsnet that bear testament to this.

This will sound corny but I also think feminism is about love. About self love and love for other women.

When we tell another woman to LTB it is an act of woman love. Same goes for seemingly superficial things like not complying with beauty practices and deeper issues like being anti prostitution. They are acts of rebellious woman loving. Feminism is the opposite of misogyny and misogyny is woman hating.

Doesn't sound corny to me, Beachcomber. That's exactly how I feel about it too.

YY ^ to self love and love of other women.

Me too.

Thanks for your anecdote, Beyond. That must have built such a bond between your nan and your mum. Yay for your female role models (and my DF).

Oh yes, yay for you DF too, of course!!

Yes, love and of course the labrys.

As to the bars of the prison - becoming a radical as opposed to mainstream feminist (which I had been since childhood) over the past 2 years has been soul-crushing for me. I have to convince myself to get out of bed because it all just looks so hopeless: as long as human males possess their superior muscle mass and freedom from the reproductive burden - they will exploit it. Only the degree to which they do this varies across the world. It's how most male mammals behave, and ours haven't evolved enough moral conscience to override the programming. The rare one that do are a pleasant surprise, but they're just exceptions that prove the rule.

For example, I used to be passionate about political science which I have 2 degrees in. But all I see now are boys and their big, scary toys
destroying the world in a giant sand-pit. And they won't stop until it all burns.