WHY I AM NOT A ‘RADFEM’
23 March 2008 — Arantxa
Something deeply bothers me about the term ‘radfem’ and althouth I don’t fully understand why it bothers me, I hope that an attempt to articulate it will help clear things up. The use of ‘radfem’ seems to refer to a woman as the embodiment of a politics of women’s liberation and sets her aside from other women who, supposedly, are non-’radfem’. I see both the idea of politics-as-status and the differentiation of women as contrary to feminism.
Feminism†, to me, is the conceptualising of male dominance that most closely approximates the reality of male dominance‡. Feminism, as resistance to male dominance, is, therefore, the liberation of women. As individuals, none of us have accumulated the experiences necessary to allow us an overview of male supremacy but collectively we do own a body of knowledge that describes every aspect of it.
We resist based on what we know. Our knowledge is flawed. We learn. Feminism is a progression towards the collective knowledge of women. But the term ‘radfem’ describes a stasis - one that can be shared by some women, but not others.
It did occur to me, more than once, that perhaps I’m being petty but the word ‘radfem’ keeps popping up as a group-identity signifier and sometimes in decidely anti-feminist contexts.
†I think it was Catharine MacKinnon that said ‘radical feminism is feminism’. As an affirmation of this, I say ‘feminism’ rather than ‘radical feminism’.
‡ Men’s own concept of their dominance is based on a false justification and is therefore false.
23 March 2008 at 7:37 am
Oh dear, and here I was thinking it was just so you didn’t have to say ‘radical feminist’ all the time!
23 March 2008 at 11:19 am
The first time I read ‘radfem’ on a blog I didn’t know what it meant. It’s a term used amongst the initiated (anti-feminists included), so to speak. The meaning ‘feminist of radical politics’ is gone. I see ‘radfem’ as nothing but a label - one that is meaningless but to denote a group membership.
Many women referring to themselves as radical feminists seem to be describing a set of beliefs (e.g. anti-porn) and seem also to be setting themselves apart from other ‘types’ of feminist (radical takes on the meaning of ‘more’ or ‘better’). This, to me at least, is suggestive of club membership entry requirements.
There are women who separate from men; black women who also separate from white women; and lesbian women who separate from heterosexual women. Woman, black and lesbian are all lived realities. Separatism on these grounds is, I think, a valid feminist endeavour. Separatism on the grounds of shared political beliefs is not - even less so when this self-identification occurs alongside blatant sexism (it goes hand in hand with the arrogance of labelling oneself ‘radical feminist’ while being largely ignorant of its meaning).
Perhaps what I’m saying is too much out of context. I hope it still makes sense.
23 March 2008 at 4:25 pm
Thanks for this post, Arantxa- you’ve given me a lot to think about. I never thought of it like this before, but I should have done! xxx
24 March 2008 at 12:58 am
It took me maybe two and a bit years, at least, of reading various radical feminist stuff online and off, and talking regularly with a couple of long time radical feminists, until i felt i understood enough and had made and was making enough change in my life to claim that i was a radical feminist. Radfem to me is just a shorter way of saying it, i wouldnt use radfem for an academic text but it seems like a reasonable way to shorten it when typing nowhere near as fast as my mind is going. Its not about being in a club, its about subscribing to, living, promoting, being of, a certain type of political ideology and behaviours. Its not just about being anti porn, from my pov its more about being anti hierarchy and anti oppression, with a particular focus on the oppression of women under male supremacy. Its not the only political label i carry or identify with but its the one i feel most strongly involved in and directed by.
24 March 2008 at 10:41 am
I think what you say about being anti-hierarchy and anti-oppression is very important and I think that the first place for us to start understanding it is in our relationships with each other; that it’s something we really need to talk about and explore. This dialogue seems to get left out but dominance (competition, persuasion etc) is such a key part of how we have learnt to relate to each other that it doesn’t just go away because we, for example, say ‘OK, so this meeting/organisation is non-hierarchical’. The dominance/submission model of interaction is often the only way we know how to interact and it places a barrier in between women; it keeps us separate from each other.
24 March 2008 at 2:37 pm
Yep totally agree with what has been said about being opposed to heirarchical structures and power imbalances and this opposition must begin with the way we relate to each other- friends, lovers, Sisters and strangers alike. For example, to be opposed to violence against women, but promote violence in consensual relationships is anti-thetical and most certainly not feminist. My growing understanding about the politics of sex has been a process of decolonising my mind from heterosexuality, sexual objectification and the eroticisation of violence and domination/submission. It’s an ongoing struggle to reclaim my desires. I agree we should talk more about this cos so many lesbian spaces are not safe spaces for women- sexual aggression, domination/submission and prejudice are rife.
I was an anarchist before I learned about feminism, which introduced me to the practice of non-hierachical organising which to me is so important in feminist activism.
As for the term radfem, I agree that there is alot of simplifying of radical feminism to mean opposition to single issues such as porn. I think as women the road to understanding the level to which we are oppressed and the extent of male violence, is a long road and an ugly road- women may start the journey of understanding by calling themselves radical feminists because they are opposed to issues that have affected them in their life- ie male violence and porn, but as the journey continues they may become more learned about the nature of women’s oppression to lean that radical feminism means a whole great more.
I do think there are some feminists who call themselves ‘radfems’ as if it is a club and look down on other women who are not against porn, as if they are not feminist enough. Part of me feels this is encouraged by the way many of us communicate and also debate or in many cases argue- via email, discussion boards and blogs.
I suppose the way I see it, I have a commitment to women’s liberation, even though I cannot understand the full nature in which we are oppressed and am still evaluating my own privileges and behaviour.
I’ve never been bothered about calling myself a radical feminist but I feel backed into a corner to say it to distinguish myself from strands of feminism that I feel are unethical or very liberal. By affirming a space as radical feminist, one is saying what the space stands for, which is necessary considering we can go to a feminist space nowadays and hear feminists promoting the sex industry and sado-masochism.
To determine a space radical feminist, is to affirm the space as safe (or at least the commitment to making it safe) for all women away from violence, oppression and discrimination.
Would be great to talk more about this at the radical feminist gathering.
24 March 2008 at 11:07 pm
More and more, I like describing myself as woman-centered. While I share with radical feminists a commitment to ending dominance hierarchies and subordination in all of its forms, and while, of course, I oppose pornography, prostitution, sadomasochism and am centrally concerned about violence in relationships, some things about historic radical feminism don’t resonate with me. Radical feminists haven’t always been nonviolent, for example, and that’s a core value to me. Sometimes radical feminists have rejected women’s spirituality and women’s culture, which are also core to me.
The other thing is, one origin of the term “radfem” on the internet is really pretty negative. During the old Ms boards days (2000, 2001) I started the first ever woman-only thread — “Radical Feminist Womyn’s Space”. It caused a huge brouhaha and made lots of people mad, men especially, but also some feminist women, and over the course of the conflicts that took place because of these threads (ultimately there were more than 50 of them), those of us who participated in the threads started to be referred to as “radfems,” or “radfems(tm)”. The term has continued and it doesn’t always or even usually have these negative connotations, and I’m sure the word “radfem” has also been used by other, non-Ms boards people, but it still sometimes “feels” wrong to me.
I also have met women who actually were very much radical feminists but didn’t particularly identify that way for various reasons, but they invariably liked to be known as “woman-centered.” So I guess this latter term is my term of choice lately.
Great thoughts, everyone.
Heart
29 March 2008 at 9:45 am
Charlie, that’s probably the way forward, creating a space based on radical feminist knowledge about male violence against women. Definining the purpose of a space altogether avoids ‘entry requirements’. I, too, hope this is something we can talk about at the gathering.
Heart, I’m also starting to think more in terms of woman-centredness. For me, thinking about the difference between saying ‘feminist woman’ as opposed to ‘feminist’, for example, has helped me feel more close to all women and see all women as my people. This is not a rejection of the term feminist (I always tell men that I am a feminist because I want them to know that I reject their authority) but a way of removing divisions between women.
3 April 2008 at 9:45 am
I don’t know. I love radical feminism even though I understand the criticisms here. An older women I know refuses to call herself a feminist. She claims that the word feminist seemed to come from the universities (back in the 1970s when the second wave kicked off). Before that every woman was a women’s liberationist. There was not feminisms and the schisms of socialist, liberal, radical, cultural feminisms didn’t exist so much. A women’s libber was a women’s libber. So this older lesbian identified as a women’s liberationist. Increasingly, I am beginning to see her point. The feminisms from the universities are not grass-roots. They don’t take a real interest in, and have no meaningful commitment to, women’s everyday existence. Mayhaps at some point I will drop the Radical Feminist label and identity, but for now it defines my politics more accurately than anything else I have come across. Oh and Catharine MacKinnon said that radical feminism was actually feminism, unmodified. By this she meant that radical feminism was feminism unmodified by socialism, liberalism, post-modernism etc, etc.
5 April 2008 at 2:55 am
Hmm, I feel pretty torn about this. In one sense I see where you are coming from Arantxa because categorizing oneself as a type of feminist could unintentionally lead to excluding other feminist women from the good fight. But, in another sense, I think we all here know how it feels to hear other feminists focus so much of their energy and attention to causes that go against feminism rather than support it. Thus the unfortunately necessary situation in which I would call myself a RADICAL feminist to make clear what my views are on patriarchy and how it operates in our society.
“We resist based on what we know. Our knowledge is flawed. We learn. Feminism is a progression towards the collective knowledge of women. But the term ‘radfem’ describes a stasis - one that can be shared by some women, but not others.”
While feminism is born out of personal experience and what we know, let us not forget our frustration at arguments such as “well, in my experience BDSM is fun and liberating so that makes it so!” I am not at all implying that proponents of radical feminism have not made mistakes in their own theory and activism. What I am saying is that in a culture in which women are divided by racial and class and “ability” hierarchies that pointing out the flaws in another woman’s arguments and identifying oneself as a radical feminist in order to show WHY you oppose her arguments is actually necessary in many cases. Otherwise we would just be pretending to all agree with each other on something when we simply don’t. There is no way we can have a collective knowledge of women’s experiences if there are so many feminists today that oppose the idea of communal understandings and woman-centerdness (i.e.: individualism, pro-capitalism, pro-pornstitution, etc.). Don’t know if that made any sense.
As far as the term “radfem” I have seen it used both in exclusively radical feminist spaces as well as liberal feminist spaces. So depending on the context, that can change the tone used in the term “radfem.” I usually call myself a “radical feminist,” needless to say.
I don’t think radical feminism as we know it has to be rooted in academia, thus negating it in a sense. In fact, I think radical feminism, with its focus on woman-centeredness and a critical look at male dominance being at the root of things and working with racial and class oppression, is really grass-roots in its approach to women’s rights and herstory.
5 April 2008 at 4:55 am
I don’t think radical feminism as we know it has to be rooted in academia, thus negating it in a sense. In fact, I think radical feminism, with its focus on woman-centeredness and a critical look at male dominance being at the root of things and working with racial and class oppression, is really grass-roots in its approach to women’s rights and herstory.
Absolutely and fully agree with this Lara. I was argueing about the word feminism coming from the universities. I believe that most women’s liberationists identify most strongly with radical feminism. Certainly, from my experience, liberal, post-modernist, and socialist feminisms come out of the universities, radical feminists are grass-roots wimmin. But our cause is women’s liberation. Perhaps that should be the way we define our politics, rather than as an ‘ism’, as an ideology. Just discussing here, not saying what wimmin should and shouldn’t choose to call their political framework.
5 April 2008 at 4:37 pm
Lara, I absolutely agree with the need to separate from causes that go against feminism and make clear an anti-patriarchal stance. When it comes to how we do this, both you and Charlie have suggested that qualifying feminism with ‘radical’ is the result of an unfortunate situation or one that you are backed into - I see it that way too. If I say I’m not a ‘radfem’ it is not to say that I do not subscribe to what radical feminist theory represents. I use the term feminism over radical feminism precisely because I refuse to be backed into recognising woman hating as a form of liberation for women and I, also, refuse the term ‘radfem’ precisely because I think it’s use is not in the spirit of radical feminism.
Something that has come out of thinking about this is, for me, the realisation that as long as we just say ‘radical feminism’ we are not necessarily rejecting the false notion of ‘feminisms’. What I mean is that if radical feminism is feminism unmodified then anything that is ‘modified’ simply isn’t feminism. It occurs to me, as above, that this could be seen as petty nitpicking but I reckon that it’s nothing less than seeing woman hating for what it is. I’ve thought about what allecto said above and what I think follows is that any ‘feminism [modified] by socialism, liberalism, post-modernism etc’ is feminism modified by male politics, i.e. the politics of male dominance. ‘Feminism modified’ is, in other words, the incorporation of anti-feminism into something which, ultimately, isn’t feminism at all. And anything that isn’t feminism is antifeminism. If we do not recognise and cannot name woman hating for what it is, then what are we fighting for or against, and what exactly are we liberating women from?
If I say feminism rather that radical feminism it is because anything not radical feminism isn’t feminism. To this, I’d add that there is more to feminism than knowing where you stand: knowing who you are standing with; recognising that we are all women (all subject to male rule) and expressing this recognition through solidarity. I object to the term ‘radfem’ because it’s use - the use that I have seen of it - has often implied a lack of solidarity with women.
5 April 2008 at 10:55 pm
Them’s fighting words, Arantxa. I totally and absolutely agree with you… BUT, try telling the pomo’s, the liberals, the queers and the socialists that they ain’t feminists. See self get shot down in flames!!! Fun stuff defining what the word feminist means.
An older feminist Lyn Ariel argued that instead of calling post-modernist, socialist, queer, liberal feminists feminists, we should instead call them liberal women, post-modernist women, socialist women. Because the causes they fight for, the priorities they have are not wimmin’s causes. At most they seek to reform male-supremacy, not get rid of it. And that ain’t feminism to her. And while I agree, it doesn’t always work in practice to tell some socialist woman that she isn’t a feminist (however much I have desperately wanted to say this over the years) because perhaps she is on the same journey that I am on, it just will take her a little longer.
I object to the term ‘radfem’ because it’s use - the use that I have seen of it - has often implied a lack of solidarity with women.
I understand what you are saying here and I do agree. Heart wrote a post ages ago criticising the young, hip anti-porn wimmin, who call themselves radicals but don’t make any sacrifices, don’t make any kind of deep, personal, political, spiritual commitment to womenkind and our struggle. That post still resonates with me, despite the fact she wrote it two years ago.
So radical feminism is feminism, unmodified, is woman-centred and women-centering, is political, is personal, is spiritual, is ecofeminist, is anti-racist… I could go on and on.
27 April 2008 at 9:18 am
allecto, I read that post - On What Radical Feminism Is and Isn’t - by Heart and still think about it from time to time. Here it is.
As for telling a socialist/liberal/post-modern ‘feminist’ that she is not a feminist, well, I just wouldn’t do that. This has to do with which organisations I will support, which campaigns I will get involved with. It is, for example, about recognising, pointing out, dissociating from and refusing to shut up about the woman hating politics of organisations advocating harm-reduction strategies and legalised brothels.
27 April 2008 at 5:25 pm
[...] came to blogging relatively recently and so missed this way back in 2006 when it was published, via Arantxa, please read this from Heart, on What Radical Feminism Is and Isn’t. Or, if you’ve [...]
27 April 2008 at 5:28 pm
[...] came to blogging relatively recently and so missed this way back in 2006 when it was published, via Arantxa, please read this from Heart, on What Radical Feminism Is and Isn’t. Or, if you’ve already [...]