Credo, ergo Sum: What I Call Radical Feminism

[alixtii]

Liberal feminism provides for us a measure of just how far we have come.

Radical feminism provides for us a measure of just how far we have left to go.

Both measures are equally important, and losing track of either can be dangerous.

I do believe:

• That racism, sexism, heterosexism, classism, etc. are systemic, subtly and ubiquitously embedded in our society in places both obvious and invisible, and about as deeply as one can get, in our language(s) (and in our unconsciouses which are structured like a language), in a superstructure which I alternately may call "patriarchy" or "systemic injustice." Remember the word radical comes from a word meaning "root": systemic injustice infects society at its very foundations.
• Thus, that most if not all economies, governments, cultural forms, languages, etc. do in some way flow from this patriarchal root.
• That racism, sexism, heterosexism, classism, and many but possibly not all other forms of systemic injustice are, if not quite equiprimordial, at least so deeply interconnected that it's never quite clear where one starts and the others end. This is a change in position from my teens when I saw all other forms of injustice as symptoms of sexism in a very second-wave sort of way.
• As a corollary, that it is extremely unlikely that racism could exist in a truly non-sexist society (since there is a sense in which racism is always-already inherently misogynistic), and vice versa. It's even harder to imagine sexism existing in a non-heterosexist society or vice versa. This doesn't mean that once we stop sexism, racism will magically fix itself so much as that we won't be able to stop sexism until we've cleaned up our act on race issues as well. On the same pattern, stopping sexism won't heal the ozone layer, but I have no doubt that the anti-environmentalist urge which impels us to harm the Earth in first place is linked in some way to and motivated by misogyny.
• That the various brands of privilege--white privilege, male privilege, heterosexual privilege, cisgendered privilege, etc.--exist even as they are so often invisible and taken for granted.
• That while men are the beneficiaries of male privilege and have certain responsibilities as a result of that, they cannot be "blamed" for patriarchy in any unproblematic way. Indeed, that the urge to blame is itself a patriarchal logic.
• That talk of reverse sexism or other "reverse discriminations" ignores the systemic character of real sexism, racism, etc.
• That male and female are not essential categories but instead the complex interaction of self-identification, behavior, and social interpellation; that the division into male and female is ultimately the result of patriarchal logics.
• That traditionally female values, behaviors, and spheres have been artificially devalued by systemic injustice and need to be reclaimed.
• That being anti-sex (and this includes the passive-agressive "sacralization" of sexuality sometimes found in some religious traditions) is always-already being anti-female and misogynistic.
• That pornography and sex work, while prone to abuse, are not inherently evil, and to view them as such can be misogynistic.
• That there are radically liberatory possibilities in female writing and female pleasure. (Cf. pretty much any French feminist.)
• That there is value in female safe spaces.
• That in a fallen world "pretty good" sometimes has to be good enough; heterosexual sex (or, for that matter, homosexual sex) as practiced by most couples may not be immune to patriarchy or be radically egalitarian and consensual but that's hardly a reason to abstain so long as one is giving it the college try. That even problematic instances of autonomy must be encouraged and celebrated from within the patriarchy, and that to erase this trace of autonomy is to be cooperative with the patriarchal logic.
• That one must use the master's tools to take down the master's house; i.e. patriarchy can only be dismantled from within, and it is possible to use its structures (e.g., "Christianity" or "the romantic comedy genre") against it. This will always necessarily require temporary compromises and cooptations, but can result in demonstrable improvements in both the short- and long-term (at least using the liberal feminist measuring stick). But there is no other choice: il n'y a pas de hors-texte.
• That government legislation is a sometimes necessary but rarely if ever sufficient remedy to systemic injustice.
• That the works of mercy needed to improve the lives of women under patriarchy are important as well as the social action needed to end it. (Cf."the two feet of justice" in Catholic social teaching.)
• Silencing the voices of women and other members of other oppressed groups is never a good thing.

I have, in the past, referred to this complex of positions as "radical feminism," and may well do so again in the future.

The following positions are not ones that I particularly associate with radical feminism, not even my own unique brand of such, but which I think are compatible with it and good to hold in general:

• That dissent, discussion, and dialectic are healthy. Many objections are not stupid and showing that one can respond to them can be a powerful persuasive tool.
• Not getting things completely wrong is almost always a useful and valuable endeavor.

Also, I like slash.

Comments

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

Can you give me an example of a non-linguistic nonverbal mode of thought? I'm not sure how it'd be any different than a mere behavioral response to a stimulus, on the order of a machine (although computers indicate that even machines use a certain basic type of language!).

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

i can't think of what to think of for such a general question. If you give me a couple topics to choose from, I' give you an example.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

What kind of topics do you mean? Like "what is a non-linguistic nonverbal mode of thought of a tree"?

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

a topic you wonder how a person would think about it without words/language. sorry, my mind just blanks if i'm not given a specific question to answer. i don't know how a tree would think, any more than i know what its like to be a bat.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

No, lol, I meant what a person would think about a tree, not how a tree would think (if one assumes a tree thinks). Or, I don't know . . . baseball?

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

In 1989 an earthquake occurred during the World Series and became the first major earthquake to be broadcast on live national television.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that mostly just seems gnomic to me. I'm not sure what would be non-linguistic about that thought.

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

recalling the event as experienced / flash bulb memory

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

But again, I'm not necessarily denying that experience can be experienced qua experience. Just that experience qua experience isn't communicable.

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

If experience was communicable as experience, my life would have been much easier! I objected only to that assumption that the unconsciouses is structured as language and that spuffyduds said language is what we *think* with. Those are both about internal experiences, not about communicating to another person.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

See, I don't think I would agree that thought is a purely internal experience. Insofar as thought is communication to oneself, it's still communication, and thus necessarily based in language as a system of symbols. Experience qua experience is experiencable, but meaningless. For it to have a meaning (e.g., "get on the bus") there must be language.
.

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

Even if you define thought as communication with oneself- how is that not internal? Unless someone has to talk out loud their thoughts or write them down to communicate those thoughts to themselves (and most people do not do that) it is taking place entirely in the person's mind- internal.

Also i disagree that pure experience without language is meaningless. But how to explain it....

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

Well, insofar as thought is communicative, it's external insofar as it its communicating to oneself as if one is another; if that's not going on, I wouldn't call it communication and thus not thought, just more experience.

Whether recollection can be purely experiential is a related issue; I think I'd argue that it cannot be because one is almost always recalling something for a reason (and if one is not it's not so much a recollection as merely a sudden intrusion of the past into the present) and thus it is bearing meaning with a system of symbols.

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

I suppose if you hallucinate a twin for yourself.... i cannot see it as external any other way.

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

i think the bus example above is more useful. i obviously know very little on baseball. i do think a tree can think. it would be very different from how we do of course. it is easier to support one's belief that an animal thinks by pointing to how they behaves or communicates. unable to do that with a tree, i think it can only be left as a matter of faith (and that a tree should think does fwiw tie into spirituality for me)

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

I actually sort of think a tree can think too, in the same way that I think a computer can or could think--after all, what separates our physical brains from a machine or a plant?--but insofar as that it is the case, it seems to me that a language is present. Which, again, probably seems to you like I'm just playing around with definitions.

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

cool, i never met anyone else that thought a tree might be able to think

[ithiliana.livejournal.com]

*waves hands*

Trees can think. I'm fairly sure rocks can too though in a different way, and in different languages/perceptions.

This is based on an experience I translate/call my goddess vision which took place on a Washington beach in July 1976. I've tried to write/talk about it, but it cannot be put into language.

Interestingly enough, though, the woman who does my hair tells me that whenever I try to talk about it, I glow.

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

i think rocks can too.