I agree with Julia Long, naming males as men is not a ‘hard line’, ‘extreme’ or ‘unkind’, it is allowing others to framing it as if it is, that is the problem imo, and why things have gotten as bad as they have.
I don’t buy that Stock is just trying to appeal to the mainstream, one can do that by highlighting how unreasonable it is to be expected to be a participant in someone’s fantasy, and pointing out that AGP is harmful to women in many ways. Most people don’t want to be a (often unwitting) participant in someone’s fetish, It is not difficult to appeal to the mainstream once that is explained. I think it is more that she wants to appeal to her colleagues in academia, and wants to appear reasonable to them, and not like those mean radical feminists.
Stock could have refrained from trying to paint radical feminist’s analysis as ‘extreme’, ‘simplistic’ and without ‘facts’. She could have chosen to actually address the points that radical feminist’s analysis raises. For example, she never actually offers a counter argument to Sheila Jeffreys’ analysis of AGP, just dismisses it as ‘simplistic’ and imo tries to manipulate women into thinking they have common cause with AGP men. I think radical feminist analysis is inconvenient for Stock, as it seems to me she cannot counter the actual arguments, so resorts to dismissing the arguments as simplistic and mean and imploring people to ‘be kind’. I suspect this is the reason texts like Janice Raymond’s Transexual Empire or other important radical feminist texts are not mentioned.
By choosing to try to appeal to her colleagues in academia, Stock chose to throw radical feminists under the bus, as in reality the radical feminist position is not the extreme position she portrays it as at all. Unless of course one thinks it’s unreasonable or extreme for women to enact and maintain strong healthy boundaries with men, by refusing to participate in a male’s fiction. I doubt most people would find that unreasonable if it was explained in that way. I think Stock took advantage of the fact that the word ‘radical’ is associated with extreme in people’s minds, when in reality the word radical in radical feminism means root, getting to the root of the problem. By painting radical feminists who refuse to call males women as simplistic, unkind and extreme, it allowed her to discredit radical feminists, while also enabling her to avoid addressing the substance of the arguments.
It seems to me Stock chose to downplay the harms of AGP, and throw those who advocate for strong boundaries with men under the bus, in order to appeal to her colleagues in academia. I think this article about DARVO can explain why Stock has taken the position she has, if one keeps in mind that narcissistic abuse, such as coercive control and DARVO are rampant in academia currently:
‘betrayal blindness is a survival mechanism that arises “when awareness would threaten necessary relationships.”’
‘In other words, bystanders yield to betrayal blindness in the interest of looking out for themselves and to avoid the loss or pain they might risk if they sympathized with the target.
They assign more value to their relationship with the abuser so it follows that it’s in their best interest to empathize with the narcissist not with the survivor.
In fact, in many cases bystanders may stand to gain more social capital if they lend their support to the narcissist. So it is usually a combination of greed for gain and an instinct for self-preservation that eclipses any ethical or moral considerations in the bystander.
In other words, members of the clique adapt to conflict within the group by “turning a blind eye,” to the harmful behaviors of the narcissist.’
www.narcissisticabuserehab.com/darvo/?amp
I also agree with Angela Wild’s response to Stock’s book.
lesbianandgaynews.com/2021/06/book-review-by-angela-wild-a-radfem-response-to-kathleen-stocks-material-girls/