The Meta/Ethics of Radical Feminism, Not by Mary Daly

[alixtii]

In the comments of hannahrorlove's post attacking slash goggles, peasant_ and I somehow found ourselves in a conversation about the metaethics of radical feminism. Specifically, she asked:

If you reject relativism as uncomfortable, and you reject an exploration of belief formation as uninteresting, what has led you to believe in the near-universal radical nature of the problem?

It's true to say that I'm a radical feminist (insofar as I am one), as a result of certain important influences in my youth and childhood, in particular the influence of my mother, one of my high school English teachers, etc. (Mostly my mother.) This is true, but uninteresting. As a philosophically-interested human being, I don't just hold certain beliefs but also justify them to myself. These justifications are, of course, also causally determined and could be, if one were interested in doing so, explained in purely material terms. But I can't think of myself merely as a belief box (anybody have a cite for this concept?) into which random beliefs were merely shoved by nature, and I don't really think anybody could.

Mary Daly, in her book Gyn/Ecology, which is actually subtitled The Metaethics of Radical Feminism (and how disturbing is it that my copy--which is really my mother's old copy, has a huge picture of an axe on the cover?), which has been the deepest and most direct radical feminist influence on me in my adolescence and throughout my life, seems to avoid the question somewhat:

I would say that radical feminist metaethics is of a deeper intuitive type than "ethics." The latter, generally written from one of several (but basically the same) patriarchal perspectives, works out of hidden agendas concealed in the texture of language, buried in mythic reversals which control "logic" most powerfullly because unacknowledged.

[. . .]

There are, of course, male-authored, male-identified works which purport to deal with "metaethics." In relation to these, gynography is meta-metaethical. For while male metaethics claims to be "the study of ethical theories, as distinguished from the study of moral and ethical conduct itself," [she cites Titus and Keaton's Ethics for Today here as the source of the quote] it remains essentially male-authored and male-identified theory about theory. Moreover, it is only theory about "ethical theories"--an enterprise which promises boundless boringness. In contrast to this, Gyn/Ecology is hardly "metaethical" in the sense of masturbatory meditations by ethicists upon their own emissions. Rather, we recognize that the essential omissions if these emissions is of our own life/freedom. In the name of our life/freedom, feminist metaethics O-mits seminal omissions. (12-13)

There is much to love in these passages (remind me to re-read the entire book over the summer). But this still leaves open the question: where do radical feminist ethics come from? (Daly's next paragraph implies the answer might be the goddess Metis.)

A certain amount of philosophical pragmatism, a la Richard Rorty, enters into the discussion for me at this point. I think I've indicated before that I'm not sure what it would mean to assert that "the nature of the problem is radical and near universal" as some type of meaningful, propositional claim. How would one go about falsifying such a claim?

What I would argue is that the claim does not and cannot have a truth value. Instead, it is useful to conceive of the problem as being radical and near universal, while making no ontological claim--because pragmatism in general eschews ontology.

The questions raised by this answer are obvious: useful to whom? and according to what standard of usefulness? I don't see anything obviously wrong in ethicizing epistemology and metaphysics (well, I could see someone arguing it was contradictory to the self-evident nature of truth, but that's rather begging the question) (and theology goes here as well; this was an important point as I working on feminist meta/theology in undergrad), but certainly we need to have some account of feminist ethics in place?

I can see three possible responses (and this part of the discussion is familiar to me, because I explained this part point-to-point to my London roommate in a hostel bar in Austria in 2004). The first is existential commitment, which is basically to refuse to answer the question. Now there are some things that existential commitment is good for, not least of all acting as a stopgap explanation as one works out a more detailed metaethic. "This is where I stand; I can do no other" is a principled position I can respect, but it ideally shouldn't take the place of critical dialectic and self-exploration.

Now obviously someone working from a position of existential commitment can make normative claims; there's nothing stopping them, after all. But they can't quite give an account of why other people should take them seriously, so they're only useful in modifying the behavior of other people who share those commitments. This strikes me as a rather weak and silly sort of radical feminism (but perhaps describes the traditional, "real" radfeminists of the 70s quite well!).

The second option would be some sort of foundationalism. But as you note, foundationalism isn't really compatible with the core premise of radical feminism, that systemic injustice runs all the way down. (Although nowadays I would probably want to hedge on it a little and say something like it might run all the way down, and if it doesn't it still runs down pretty darn deep.) To locate supposedly "feminist" ethics in reason, language, or culture would be to merely reinscribe masculinist domination.

When I was in undergrad, it seemed to me the process was simple: you let feminist ethicists do their thing, and then we feminist metaphysicians and theologians would apply the results to metaphysics, epistemology, and theology. (Aesthetics always seemed to fit very uncomfortably into this system.) The idea of deriving ethics from religion still sort of gives me hives, but it's obvious that the system as I was thinking of it just isn't tenable: it throws way too much burden on the feminist ethicists. Standpoint theory has too many implicit metaphysical and epistemological assumptions to be able to do what it does and be logically prior to those disciplines. Appointing ethics as queen of the science isn't ultimately a meaningful change, any more than demoting metaphysics and putting epistemology in its place, or doing the same with philosophy of language, had been. As long as the sciences have a queen, we have a problem.

Ultimately, then, I think the only workable option is a dialectical one. Reason (and I'll use that as a lump term for metaphysics/epistemology/theology) and ethics always have to be in dialectic to each other, with neither (or, in another sense, both) being logically prior to the other. (So, gritting my teeth, I have to accept that it is sometimes acceptable to turn to Scripture in order to learn about ethics--but this turn to Scripture will always-already be informed by a certain ethicism.) The limits of liberal democratism are built into itself and reveal themselves in history, so that there is a sort of imperative built within reason, language, and culture themselves for it to progress into radical feminism.

Comments

[wisdomeagle]

Fairly disturbing, yeah, but not too surprising given her hate-on for the patriarchy and the castration imagery she employs.

[http://users.livejournal.com/peasant_/]

Thanks for giving this a home, it was becoming increasingly awkward discussing it in a complete stranger's journal.

Okay.
:cracks knuckles:

As a justification that strikes me as an elegantly argued, clearly stated and logically coherent case, and it is one that I find really hard to respect. You may if you wish consider this pure prejudice, but I struggle and ultimately fail to understand (and I do mean understand in a very fundamental way) how anyone can hold a belief that is not founded on empirical observation. I am aware that some people do, many of them rational and logical people, but it is not something that I can in any way equate with or understand. You were brought up by a feminist and I was brought up by a scientist. In my understanding, even if one is claiming that a notion is innate then empirical observation is required to discover it and prove its innateness. And since the latest research has shown that there is a genetic basis to belief, I suppose we can just conclude that I do not posses the so-called god gene and probably leave it at that.

So, bearing in mind this prejudice of mine, a couple of very interesting points are immediately raised by what you have said.

If existential commitment and foundationalism both boil down to 'I believe this because I believe it' - which it seems to me that they do - then how does creating a dialectic between Reason and Ethics break the circle? I would describe that as simply adding an extra instrument to the orchestra whilst the angels dance on their pin. Unless of course you are in fact relying on the ethicists to bring in that vital element of observation which you seem reluctant to engage in yourself. (There is nothing wrong with being reluctant to engage in observation, if it doesn't interest you then it doesn't, but I would be so much more comfortable with understanding what you are saying if you were founding it on someone's observation, and then acknowledging what you have built your foundations on.)


So, gritting my teeth, I have to accept that it is sometimes acceptable to turn to Scripture in order to learn about ethics
You've lost me round that bend. Where does scripture come into it? Why should it be of any more or less relevance to ethics than any other text? (Well, apart from the fact that there is a bias of subject matter in many religious texts towards expounding on ethical issues.)


And then just when I am scratching my head and about to conclude that I can dismiss the whole thing as intellectually enjoyable but trivial, you say this:
The limits of liberal democratism are built into itself and reveal themselves in history, so that there is a sort of imperative built within reason, language, and culture themselves for it to progress into radical feminism.
Which looks very much like an observation.

[http://users.livejournal.com/peasant_/]

A thought occurred to me this morning arising out of some of the posts resulting from the current breast-fondling kerfuffle.

One of my many beefs with feminists (in the 'those bloody feminists' sense of the word) is that all to often I see people making claims for all women in the name of feminism. Since with monotonous regularity I either disagree with those claims or find myself actively excluded from them, this is a continuous minor irritant and a slow trickle of coal onto the fire of my smouldering resentment and 'reasons why I do not call myself a feminist'. What struck me this morning was that out of your entire flist - presumably a flist with a considerable bias towards interest in feminism and philosophy - we are the only ones taking part in this conversation. (The couple of comments up top about the axe not really being part of it.) That interests me because it helps give a possible explanation for why so many of the feminists on LJ make these 'speaking for all women' statements so often. It implies that there is actually very little interest in working out the underlying meta-ethics of feminism. There certainly isn't a reluctance to discuss feminist issues generally on LJ, yet no other takers at all for this conversation? I can't help feeling those two facts are probably related. People who have never really thought about the origins of their beliefs and ethics are far more likely to slip into the error of claiming they speak for 'everyone'.

That probably sounds like a snide criticism, but actually it makes me more tolerant of them. If I thought they had sat down, really analysed why they believe what they believe, and they still thought that all women should or did believe the same thing as them, well then I would feel even more excluded by feminists than I currently do. Realising that they are probably just being thoughtless because they've never considered the issue, because it doesn't interest them, makes it far easier for me to forgive them.

well done

[(Anonymous)]

thats it, guy

Thoughts on Religion on an Ash Wednesday Morn

[pingback-bot.livejournal.com]

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[(Anonymous)]

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