i’m getting disillusioned with ‘radical feminism’. i still use the words ‘radical feminism’ and ‘radfem’ because it’s just simplest but the amount of lesbophobia i encounter in radical feminist spaces is wild.
as well as the fact that so many women in these spaces freak the fuck out at radical ideas when it comes to abortion, motherhood, parenting, and partnering with men.
the vitriol and combative responses radical women get in these spaces is shocking to me because these women call themselves radical feminists and i wonder what their radical beliefs are? do they just hate trans people and that’s that?
because when you talk about being pro abortion, being anti natalism, being pro separatism, it’s tears and pouting everywhere. it’s really wild to me to see.
so though i find just defaulting to ‘radical feminism’ in my language is easy, i think i’m just a radical. i have radicalideas and beliefs and yet when it comes to ‘radical’ feminists it’s often considered ‘too much’.
i’m really over it.
Those women are not radical feminists, and they don’t get to redefine radical feminism just because they outnumber the real feminists. They’re pretty all anti-trans and/or anti-porn/prostitution liberals who think they’re “radfems” because liberalism won’t tolerate them and they probably think they sound cool for call themselves “radical.”
There’s some room for disagreement in feminism, I think, when it comes to stuff like separatism and reproduction (even though I personally think it feeds male power and the male agenda to be anything other than a childfree separatist), but the women you’re talking about are blatantly anti-feminist when it comes to most issues.
You’re not the first woman I’ve seen conclude she’s not really a radical feminist because of the posers, and it’s really annoying to me because radical feminism existed before these liberal posers got here via their political homelessness regarding the trans cult and/or the sex industry. Real feminists are not “extremists,” these lib women are just not even feminist in the first god damn place.
Indeed I agree. There is nothing radical about these women’s politics at all. You’re entirely right that they’re just anti porn bc their men watching it makes them sad (not bc they care about the actual female victims). They’re anti trans because they genuinely do think they’re all just pedophiles.
But mention a single word about rejecting performing femininity, about ceasing to birth more victims and perpetrators of patriarchy, about separatism from oppressors and communing with women, about abortion as mandatory healthcare for pregnant girls and teens, and the uproar and tears you’ll be met with calling you evil and mean are next level.
These are radical ideas. We mean radical when we say radical.
I dont consider myself a radical feminist bc bell hook’s sentement really struck me. That femenist isnt something you are its something you do. Identity polotics run amok but the proofs in the pudding if feminism is an action. Personally no i dont think you can be radical non stop. Because even women on fire need some down time.
This. I tend to call myself a lesbian feminist or lesbian separatist or gender critical because I’ve been convinced that radical feminism, at its core, supports “political lesbians” - which I personally find very offensive and lesbophobic… I’m also a zero at actual political action, too busy trying to save myself first.
I won’t use the words “lesbian feminist” because that’s a political lesbian dogwhistle and I don’t wanna be associated with them.
Female liberationist is what I’ve been using.
I just want to point out that during this seperationist debate it’s not the straight women who are emotional. I think they have a point but it’s the exclusively female-attracted who started it and were upset in the first place.
I use the term radfem as an umbrella term for all radical/gender critical feminism/politics. I consider myself just a gender critical feminist though since I don’t feel well versed enough in radical feminism to feel comfortable using the radfem title. I havent really read any feminist texts or literature and mostly just talk about current politics through a feminist lense.
The separatist debate has been really dividing among the community and I can see the issue on both sides but I feel like the majority of the criticism has come from a place of misunderstanding. I think some women interpret the debate as “You’re not a real feminist if you aren’t a separatist or support it” if they don’t want to give up their friendships/relationships with men and not the way it’s suppose to be intended, “You can still have friendships/relationships with men but you could live or exist in a mostly female space and prioritize women in your life”.
Every lesbian I’ve seen talk about it more or less agree completely cutting all men from your life is a little unrealistic but choosing to live with only women, go to women’s only events, spaces, gyms, etc is a way to participate in it on a smaller scale. Or the idea of living in a female only apartment building/housing. It’s just the idea of women having a place to come back to where they know they will be safe from men. It’s really a shame that the discussion brought out so much homophobia from people I expected way better from.
Personally, my biggest experience with these issues has been on Facebook. One cannot be a radical feminist at NOT be gender critical, as the very idea of gender is intrinsically not compatible with the tenets of radical feminism. It is the antithesis of our beliefs.
That being said, some people see the gender critical part and latch on to the name orforce it on others (ie, people calling Posie Parker a radical feminist even though she is not,and has stated herself she isn’t a feminist at all)
Gender criticism has unfortunately also attracted conservative women that simply hate transpeople themselves rather than transgenderism as an ideology and patriarchal structure. That’s where you get a lot of the more “tradfem” people, ones that still holler NAMALT all the time, ones that are homophobic, and women that are all around just gross people.
As a radical feminist, it’s really frustrating to see this wave of conservative women entering radical feminist spaces and being a drain on our energy when we have to re-explain basics over and over before booting them.
(I’m honestly a little concerned that WoLF’s partnering up with some right-wing groups to help push gender-critical thinking has attracted some uneducated conservative women to radical feminism. I have definitely noticed the uptick in the past year.)
Anyways, I refuse to let a few dunces ruin radical feminism. I find myself having to explain what it is and is not over and over again, but I don’t mind it. Eventually they’ll be pushed from our circles.
you know what’s fucking crazy? That men AREN’T THE ONLY PEOPLE WHO ABUSE, RAPE, ASSUALT OR FLAT OUT HURT OTHER PEOPLE ISN’T THAT CRAZY THAT WOMEN COMMIT CRIMES TOO WOW WHO KNEW???? but seriously all you feminists who think women are perfect fuckin angels can literally fuck off. -this is coming from a feminist that is a female
Those who scream sex work is work are the same folks who are doing this shit and encourage it , this is a strip club directly harassing Amber and asking her to resort to objectifying herself in order to pay money to her abuser , we are in hell
Men can publicly voice out their support to child rapists and have matching tattoos with them , and they can abuse their wives and workmates and they can groom 17 year olds and lock them away from their families, they can joke about rape and talk about women in the most dehumanising way possible, they can be caught lying numerous times without getting a backlash because everyone can laugh it off , because that’s what men do and that’s okay , they can go out in public with dirty greasy and a face that hasn’t touched water in weeks without getting humiliated by newspapers and media outlets, they can say the most outrageous things without getting crucified because they’re humans and humans make mistakes and that’s okay .
But women on the other hand are not humans, they’re a fantasy, an image that must be maintained and monitored by everyone around them , therefore they shouldn’t try and break this image by saying the wrong words , or even the right words at the wrong time, in order for them to prove their humanity they have to go through the most inhumane routines, and act in the most robotic of ways, because their tears are for manipulation and their laughs are for taunting , they must not tell the truth but they also will crucified if they didn’t, they’re liars by nature and should work hard enough to be taken seriously even in situations where their lives are on the line, one woman could break this image and the rest would have to carry the curse of Eve , and suffer for an eternity in order to be forgiven again, but men can always say they’re not like Adam.
I want to make it clear that I do not stand with Lily Cade. Lily Cade’s statement here does not represent my views, or the views of any gender critical person I’ve spoken with. I am disgusted by this.
well, i believe that sex is innate. it’s determined in utero based in part on your chromosomes and observed at birth. then, males and females are divided into strict, hierarchal social categories called gender roles. that system is called gender. in an ideal world, gender would not exist, and your sex would have no relation to your interests, personality, or mental abilities. your sex should say nothing about you as a person. but right now, females are seen as inferior because of their sex, and feminism was created to liberate women as a class. that means it’s necessary to define what a woman is and that misogyny is not the hatred of femininity, which is a construct, but of the female sex. i also believe that homosexuality is innate. i believe that homosexual people have the right to define themselves by their exclusive same-sex attraction, and should be open about it no matter who it offends on any side of the political spectrum.
does that sound transphobic? i wasn’t playing dumb to trick you, but to point out that i held your same beliefs several years ago. if asked what a terf is, i would have said the same thing you did, that they were transphobic assholes whose ideals were hurting trans women. i first looked at a “terf” blog when i saw someone call lesbians genital fetishists, and i was confused why no one was calling them out for being homophobic except for the “terf.” i realized that lesbians were being demonized for being gay by a group that i thought was progressive. this group thinks that being attracted to only the same sex is narrow-minded. i found i agreed with other “terf” beliefs, some that i didn’t even realize were supposed to be “terfy.”
i’d encourage you to do more than ask your friends to sum up terf viewpoints for you and look into them yourself. send some anons. at the very least, you should know your enemy, right?
It’s a little hard to explain because mostly what I’ve seen is just nonsensical rambling about gender and how trans people are predators. If anyone who knows what the terfs are actually saying besides “grrr trans people bad!” could you chime off?
A terf is a “feminist” who has fundamentally transphobic ideals. They’re quite harmful for trans people, especially trans women, but their ideas also affect the entire lgbt community. I’m sure someone else can put it into better words but that’s the general idea.
Apparently I didn’t phrase it clearly enough last time for some people so! If you are a bigot, yes terfs and truscum this includes you, get! The! Fuck! Off! My! Blog! If you’re racist, homophobic, transphobic, whatever fucking bigotry you can think of, fuck off!!! This place isn’t for you!!! MAPs don’t even fucking look at this blog!!
imagine having someone disprove your straw man this perfectly and publicly
How aggressively, willfully ignorant they are is honestly amazing. People really do hate what they don’t understand.
