On women, class and feminism, by @annadjinn

Cross-posted from: The Feminists Hood
Originally published: 06.01.18

This post is based on some notes I contributed to a social media discussion about whether class is relevant to a feminist analysis of the sex trade. Someone suggested I make them more widely available, so I’m posting them here. They are a bit rough – but hopefully they might be of some interest.

Traditionally women’s class was determined by her father’s class, unless she was married and then it was determined by her husband’s. Of course it has changed somewhat now but not entirely. There are still those household surveys that more or less assume that if there’s a man in the household, his position determines the entire household’s economic and social class. This has been institutionalised by Universal Credit, which is paid to the highest wage earner – almost always the man in a straight household with children. This represents a profound defeat for women.

Another thing that is often overlooked is the enormous, huge, mountainous, decades-long workstream performed by the vast majority of women that is unrecognised and unpaid: bearing and raising kids.  …

 

The Feministahood : Feminist musings of Anna Djinn, @annadjinn

Why I campaign against the sex trade, at Feminista Hood

Cross-posted from: The Feminista Hood
Originally published: 21.04.17

Not even that hot night when I was 19 and slept with the door to my stuffy windowless room open to catch the breeze caused the blinkers to fall from my eyes. The blinkers that blamed my recklessness in leaving the door open and not the man who walked by and saw my smooth body lying there in all its youthful sweetness. He knew he was the only one in the building still awake and so there was a high chance he could get away with it. As indeed he did.

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The Feministahood : Feminist musings of Anna Djinn, @annadjinn

‘Housewifization International: Women and the New International Division of Labour’ Maria Mies

Cross-posted from: Mairi Voice
Originally published: 11.01.18

“The whole strategy is based on a patriarchal, sexist, racist ideology of women which defines women basically as housewives and sex objects.”

Maria Mies: Patriarchy and Accumulation on a World Scale Women in the International Division of Labour

I have written previously about Maria Mies’ thesis on how the success of the accumulation of capitalism has been dependent on patriarchy and the oppression and exploitation of women.

In Chapter 3 (‘Colonization and Housewifization’) she outlined how wealth and growth in Western countries was based on exploitation of the colonies, where countries, dominated by colonial powers became the producers of consumer goods for rich countries. Rather than meeting their own needs, production in developing countries was promoted to meet the demands of markets in developed countries.

“Production and consumption are now divided by the world market to an unprecedented degree”. (p.114)

 


Read more ‘Housewifization International: Women and the New International Division of Labour’ Maria Mies

“Jezebels” The Handmaid’s Tale, at Mairi Voice

Cross-posted from: Mairi Voice
Originally published: 11.10.17

When The Handmaid’s Tale first became available on SBS On Demand,  I binged-watched it. I am now watching it on live TV, an episode a week and taking notes with the idea of writing a series of blogs, identifying the underlying themes that occur throughout the series.

I have recently seen Episode 8, “The Jezebels” and it is about a brothel.

This is no dystopian scene. This happens here and now, in every part of the globe, where women’s bodies are bought and sold – for men’s use and abuse – through pornography and prostitution.  I felt compelled to write about this episode in particular because it is so relevant and current –it is what is happening in our world, today.
Read more “Jezebels” The Handmaid’s Tale, at Mairi Voice

Situating agency, by Dr Fiona Vera-Gray for @strifejournal

Cross-posted from: Trouble & Strife
Originally published: 20.05.16

Feminist debates on violence against women have often become polarized by conflicting ideas about women’s agency. But in her research on street harassment, Fiona Vera-Gray found that Simone de Beauvoir’s concept of ‘situation’ offered a way to move our thinking forward.

There is a growing need to revisit our conceptual frameworks for understanding men’s violence against women and girls. Recent high-profile cases have raised public awareness of the extent of sexual violence; by using digital media, feminist activists have highlighted the everyday nature of men’s intrusive behaviour. The diverse voices that give feminism as a political movement its complexity and reflexivity have undoubtedly been amplified. But the internet has also changed the way we create, take in and distribute information; often we end up speaking over rather than to one another.
Read more Situating agency, by Dr Fiona Vera-Gray for @strifejournal

When a Man Kills a Woman by @K_IngalaSmith

Cross-posted from: Karen Ingala Smith
Originally published: 27.11.16

Across everything that divides societies, we share in common that men’s violence against women is normalised, tolerated, justified – and hidden in plain sight.

Credit: Counting Dead Women project

… Responses to men’s violence against women which focus almost exclusively on  ‘healthy relationships’, supporting victim-survivors  and reforming the criminal justice system simply do not go far enough. Men’s violence against women is a cause and consequence of sex inequality between women and men.  The objectification of women, the sex trade, socially constructed gender, unequal pay, unequal distribution of caring responsibility are all  simultaneously symptomatic of structural inequality whilst maintaining a conducive context for men’s violence against women. Feminists know this and have been telling us for decades.

One of feminism’s important achievements is getting men’s violence against women into the mainstream and onto policy agendas.  One of the threats to these achievements is that those with power take the concepts, and under the auspices of dealing with the problem shake some of the most basic elements of feminist understanding right out of them.  State initiatives which are not nested within policies on equality between women and men will fail to reduce men’s violence against women.  Failing to even name the agent – men’s use of violence – is failure at the first hurdle. …


Read more When a Man Kills a Woman by @K_IngalaSmith

Andrea Dworkin – Behind the Myth by @Finn_Mackay

Cross-posted from: Finn Mackay
Originally published: 01.09.15

Andrea Dworkin was, and remains, a Feminist legend. It is too bad that what most people know about her is nothing more than anti-feminist myth.

I first met Andrea in Brighton in 1996, at the International Conference on Violence, Abuse and Women’s Citizenship. I was then lucky enough to meet her on two other occasions, including several conversations that I will treasure. I will never forget listening to her keynote speech in that hall in Brighton, amongst rows and rows of over one thousand women, all mesmerised by the honesty and strength of Andrea’s testimony. I will never forget the passion with which she spoke and the clear, steely determination behind her low, slow, measured and husky tones. She did not mince those words; a lot of her speeches are visceral, they reference the physical suffering of abused women and children, they reference the legacy that scars the bodies of those in prostitution and pornography. 
Read more Andrea Dworkin – Behind the Myth by @Finn_Mackay

Justin Trudeau is not a feminist superhero by @LK_Pennington

Cross-posted from: Elegant Gathering of White Snows
Originally published: 12.04.16

Justinjustin-trudeau-yoga_650x400_71459338988 Trudeau is a feminist. We all know this since he says it every single time he’s interviewed. The media is obsessed with this narrative and Trudeau is regularly accused of ‘trolling the internet’ for posting pictures which revel in hyper-masculinity.

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Much of Trudeau’s appeal is that he is a conventionally attractive white male who does yoga, charity boxing and loves kids. Almost as much as Barack Obama does. This is not ‘trolling the internet’. It is part of a deliberate campaign of image management – just like every other politician on the planet. David Cameron taking up yoga would not make him a better prime minister – nothing can compensate for the destructive and deeply misogynistic and racist policies that the Tory party has developed. Likewise, an attractive prime minister who enjoys a photo opportunities with babies – of the human and panda varieties – does not automatically guarantee good policies or even a commitment to feminism.
Read more Justin Trudeau is not a feminist superhero by @LK_Pennington

An Argument for Excluding Men from the Prostitution Debate, by @helensaxby11

Cross-posted from: Not the news in brief
Originally published: 19.09.16

I’m beginning to think that men shouldn’t be allowed to have an opinion on the sex trade, let alone be in charge of deciding the legislation around it. In the last few weeks we have found out that Keith Vaz is a punter, that the Lib Dems are happy with the idea of prostitution being on the careers curriculum at school, and that Jeremy Corbyn just doesn’t care that much:

corbyn-on-prostitution


Read more An Argument for Excluding Men from the Prostitution Debate, by @helensaxby11

Gaslighting Culture by @smashesthep

Cross-posted from: Smashes the P
Originally published: 05.11.15

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Lately I am really coming to terms with the fact that patriarchy is a gaslighting culture, and for the most part, messages do not need to be true in order to be consistently believed by a large number of people, or to be actively disseminated by the media. In fact, I’d go far enough to say that truth is often considered irrelevant in the media. I used to get angry when these messages veered so far off course from the truth, but I’m starting to see that as a feature and not a bug. That is, they never were meant to convey truths or reality- they were meant as wide spread propaganda.

For example, neo-liberal culture frames personal individual negative impacts in terms of “choice” and “consent” rather than systems of power that constrain groups of people, even though choice has very little to do with whether, say, impoverished inner city kids succeed in school. The same is true with the hidden-in-plain-sight fact about the toxic nature of masculinity and male pattern violence. The fear of taking sides or being too radical by *naming the problem* shapes the thinking patterns of almost the entire world.
Read more Gaslighting Culture by @smashesthep

In the Frame – a critical look at the linguistic framing of current debates on prostitution

Cross-posted from: Trouble & Strife
Originally published: 01.05.16

Debbie Cameron takes a critical look at the linguistic framing of current debates on prostitution.

Let’s start with a question. Are you pro-sex or anti-sex?

Maybe you’re thinking: ‘of course I’m not anti-sex, who the hell would be against sex?’

Or maybe you’re thinking: ‘Hang on a minute, aren’t those terms a bit loaded?’

And of course, they are. But that comes with the territory. It’s in the nature of political arguments to be conducted in loaded language. The proverbial ‘battle for hearts and minds’ is always, among other things, a war of words.

‘Pro-sex’ (or ‘sex positive’) and ‘anti-sex’ are shorthand labels for political positions on a set of issues (including pornography and prostitution) which have divided feminists since the 19th century. ‘Anti-sex’ is what the ‘pro-sex’ camp call the people on the other side of the argument: it’s not what the other side call themselves. (Because who the hell would be against sex?)

But the competing terms in a political argument aren’t always straightforward opposites like ‘pro-/anti-sex’. In debates on abortion, the opposing camps are most commonly labelled ‘pro-choice’ (supporting women’s right to choose whether to continue or terminate a pregnancy) and ‘pro-life’ (defending the sanctity of human life and the rights of unborn children). Each side has chosen a label that suits its own argument, and both have been relatively successful in getting others, including the media, to respect their terminological preferences.
Read more In the Frame – a critical look at the linguistic framing of current debates on prostitution

Selling Sex at Rhodes University by @sianfergs

Cross-posted from: Sian Fergs
Originally published: 24.10.15

Originally published as part of a university assignment.

With the price of tertiary education in South Africa being notoriously high, more and more Rhodes University students are turning to the sex industry in order to survive financially.

Like many other students at Rhodes University, Angela* and Lindi*need to work part-time in order to support themselves financially.  But while most of their peers work in local restaurants or shops, Angela and Lindi are sex workers who provide services to Grahamstown’s elite businessmen.

They began doing sex work together in their first year at Rhodes University. “We advertised ourselves as escorts online. It started as a joke, but when we got offers, we thought it could be something worth trying,” Angela says.

From there on, they found sex work to be relatively lucrative and easy work. “We give sex away for free anyway. What’s the harm in being paid?” Lindi reasons. Both of them are currently doing Honours courses. “Our families are not rich and we would struggle to pay for our studies otherwise,” she says.
Read more Selling Sex at Rhodes University by @sianfergs

Enforcing Northern Ireland’s New Swedish-Style Sex Purchase Law – A Sex Worker’s Story

Cross-posted from: Ruth Jacobs
Originally published: 19.11.14

A rainy night in Belfast. Cold and wet with a wind whipping round the corners of the barren streets where women used to stand. How things have changed. A decade ago, even on such a horrible early winter’s night, there would have been activity, but the law changed and drove the women away. Many moved inside, others stood in darker corners by derelict houses or under battered trees in city parks, waiting for the cars.

Now, the law’s about to change again. Protesting that they don’t want to criminalise the women – just the men who seek out the women – the gentle Sinn Fein folk demanded that the old rule against loitering for the purposes of prostitution be struck down.

We talked about this, a few of us, at the quaintly but tautologically-named Commercial Sex-workers’ Clinic recently. The wonderful woman and man who run the service rolled their eyes. They didn’t want Clause 6 of Morrow’s Bill and they certainly didn’t think this ‘concession’ was going to fool anyone.


Read more Enforcing Northern Ireland’s New Swedish-Style Sex Purchase Law – A Sex Worker’s Story

Submission to the consultation on the Prostitution Law Reform (Scotland) Bill from the Nordic Model Information Network

Cross-posted from: Charlotte Proudman
Originally published: 30.11.15

The Nordic Model Information Network is a global alliance of researchers with deep and systematic expertise in researching the dynamics of prostitution and the sex industry, trafficking and violence against women. We write in response to the consultation on the Prostitution Law Reform (Scotland) Bill, and we argue for the adoption of the Nordic Model. We do this in accord with the 2014 Resolution 1983 of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly “Prostitution, trafficking and modern slavery in Europe”, and the (Honeyball) Resolution of the European Parliament, “Sexual exploitation and prostitution and its impact of gender equality”, both of which recommended by overwhelming majorities the approach of addressing demand as best legislative practice throughout the European Union.

Our research is grounded in contemporary evidence including, importantly, the testimony of survivors of the prostitution system, as well as drawing on historical and philosophical inquiry. Many of us have worked directly with prostituted women. We have individual and collective links with a wide variety of organisations working for the abolition of prostitution as an institution of gender inequality and exploitation. We believe it is important to signal very clearly that our position on prostitution is not grounded in a moralistic approach, or in any kind of hostility to women in the prostitution system. Nor is our position linked to considerations about maintaining ‘public order’. Our concern is centrally with the human rights of women in protecting the dignity of all women equally, and with an end to all forms of the subordination and degradation of women.

We unequivocally support the removal of criminal sanctions for women who solicit sex and the strengthening of laws against coercion in the sex industry. On this basis we are in support of law reform that decriminalises solicitation and that focuses on women’s safety. We do not, however, support the general aim of the Bill to reform the law on prostitution in Scotland along the New Zealand model. We set out our reasons for this below. We think it is important from the outset to clarify and correct some of the misinformation, in particular about the Nordic Model, noted in the Consultation Paper.


Read more Submission to the consultation on the Prostitution Law Reform (Scotland) Bill from the Nordic Model Information Network

Is Amnesty Throwing us all Under the Bus? by Not the news in brief

Cross-posted from: Not the news in brief
Originally published: 07.08.15

Amnesty’s draft proposal to decriminalise all aspects of the sex trade is being debated this week and there have been numerous articles, blogs, research reports, comments and tweets about it all over the media. There is an enormous amount of research and counter-research which seems to prove one thing and then proves another, depending on whose interpretation you read, and which side you’re on. Funnily enough, despite the strong feelings on both sides of the argument, and the seemingly unbridgeable gulf between us, we do actually agree on the main premise, which is that the (mainly) women who provide sexual services to (mainly) men should be decriminalised. You wouldn’t know that from the decrim lobby, but it’s true! Feminists opposing the Amnesty International proposal are doing so, not because we want the women in prostitution to be punished in any way, but because we want the men who exploit the women to be held accountable. Full decriminalisation, however, would mean that all ‘sex-workers’ would be free to work legally with no restraints, and that includes pimps, brothel owners, strip club managers and other people who make money out of women’s sexual services. It’s that aspect which causes the conflict.
Read more Is Amnesty Throwing us all Under the Bus? by Not the news in brief

Christine Stark’s ‘Nickels’ – a tale of association

Cross-posted from: John Stompers
Originally published: 13.02.12

Christine Stark has been a role model of mine since 2004. That was the year she co-edited Not For Sale: Feminists Resisting Prostitution and Pornography, which immediately soared up my book chart and remains a Berg top five today.

Not For Sale contains my favorite essay on prostitution, but Stark’s direct confrontation with so-called ‘sex radicals’ in the essay “Girls to Boyz: Sex radical women promoting prostitution and pornography” has the most forthright chutzpah of the collection. My admiration for her anti-pornstitution work led me to take special note of her various creative works released through radical feminist and artistic media.

Nickels: A Tale of Dissociation is Stark’s debut novel and it’s a doozy. The freestyle narrative announces itself on the first page through two fairy tales as understood by a small child. Stark plays with linguistic forms to translate the thoughts in a child’s mind, and it’s a testament to her skill that the unconventional style comes off much more genuine than parlor tricky. The punctuation and odd sentence breaks lend a breathless air and the cadence is tricky to catch at first, but much like watching a Scottish film, the initial confusion of familiar words in an unfamiliar dialect soon resolves and you’re hooked into the storyteller’s groove.


Read more Christine Stark’s ‘Nickels’ – a tale of association

Poldark, Prostitution and Protein World

Cross-posted from: Not the news in brief
Originally published: 16.05.15

In recent weeks several public conversations and debates have taken place on subjects that primarily affect women and girls: objectification, body-shaming, the sex trade…the usual suspects. A new way of minimising the harm of these practices for women seems to have emerged, in the form of claiming they are all gender-neutral, or at least ignoring the aspect of gender, and therefore erasing the equality issue. It’s been done before of course, notably in regard to domestic violence (brilliantly dismissed as an argument by Karen Ingala Smith here), but as a way of silencing feminist debate it seems to be growing in popularity: #NotallMen is being joined by #Don’tForgetTheMen! Men who want us to recognise that they are not *all* bad also want us to believe that they share *equally* in the oppression.

First there was the Student Sex Work Project by Swansea University. This study, based on a self-selecting online questionnaire, found that there was parity between male and female students doing ‘sex work’ and that this should have implications for the services provided to offer support to these students. There was a lot wrong with this survey, primarily to do with the methods used and the stated aims – unsurprisingly it concluded that ‘stigma’ was one of the most significant downsides of the work (as opposed to, say, threat of violence), and, more surprisingly, that ‘sexual enjoyment’ was one of the motivations to go into the trade. This is much less surprising when you note that significantly more male than female students had responded to the survey with a positive response to the question of whether or not they were involved in ‘sex work’ and that the definition of ‘sex work’ included porn acting. A lack of scepticism over this blatantly unrealistic result further discredited the project findings and, bar a couple of newspaper reports, it sank without trace.
Read more Poldark, Prostitution and Protein World

Women and the Drug Traffickers by @andrews_Cath

Cross-posted from: Hiding under the bed is not the answer
Originally published: 26.05.12

Women’s participation in drug trafficking has recently made the headlines thanks to Miss Bala (Gerardo Naranjo, 2011) a Mexican film about a beauty pageant wannabe who is kidnapped and forced to become a drug runner for a gang of traffickers in Tijuana, received critical acclaim at Cannes last year. The screen play is loosely based on a real life incident in 2008 in which beauty queen Laura Zuñiga was arrested aboard a lorry full of explosives along with drug traffickers in Guadalajara, Jalisco. Similarly, La Reina del Sur(The Queen of the South), was one of this year’s most popular soap operas produced by television network Telemundo (USA) in conjunction with the Antena 3 network (Spain) and RTI Producciones (Colombia). The script was based on a novel by Spanish author Arturo Pérez Reverte and depicts the rise of Teresa Mendoza, a young woman from Culiacán, Sinaloa, Mexico, who becomes the most powerful drug trafficker in southern Spain. It seems likely that Mendoza is based on the example of Sandra Ávila Beltrón, alias the Queen of the Pacific, ex member of the Sinaloa cartel, who is currently in a Mexican prison waiting extradition to the US.

While undoubtedly showing how some women have become involved in drug gangs, neither screenplay could be said to accurately portray the complex realities of women’s experience in drug trafficking. Unsurprisingly, women’s participation in trafficking imitates their roles in other, more licit activities and clearly reflects Mexico’s dominant cultural attitudes towards them.


Read more Women and the Drug Traffickers by @andrews_Cath

If you were a feminist. by The Real Thunder Child

(Cross-posted from The Real Thunder Child)

If you were a feminist, you would not feel the need to tell us. Your actions and what you say to other males would mark you out.

If you were a feminist, you would see misogyny for what it is, everywhere it is, neither feeling personally hurt or blamed for the often unconscious actions and words of yourself, and other males. You’d be watchful,mindful. And try.

If you were a feminist you wouldn’t expect thanks for common courtesy, for simply not being a douche.

If you were a feminist you wouldn’t deify choice. Nor would you condemn it. You’d view the choices that women make through the prism of still overarching patriarchy. Whether it be prostitution, sex selective abortion, or the niqab, and question what forces that choice, rather than punishing women for the choices forced upon them by men , and that said overarching patriarchy.

If you were a feminist you’d realise that internalised misogyny is a thing. That females aren’t born hating other females or themselves. That this is a beyond Pavlovian defence mechanism. That this “competition” exists purely as control, with patriarchy handing out the prizes. Prizes such as “good marriages”, which in themselves are gilded cages. Control.
And you’d realise how you, even you, benefit from this, instead of using it as tool for attacking women.

If you were a feminist you’d rest the responsibility for sexual violence where it belongs, with the perpetrator.
You’d be mindful when opining how such violence could be avoided.
You’d realise that it can’t.
You’d know how “advice” on attire , for instance, quickly becomes “what was she wearing”, and why.

If you were a feminist You’d realise that females know it isn’t all men, but that the men who it is, don’t wear badges, so for us , it may as well be “all men”… And you wouldn’t take that personally. Furthermore, if you really are a “good guy”, you’d trust us to work it out for ourselves.

If you were a feminist you’d not question or discuss a female’s medical decisions. You’d know a female’s rights over her own medical decisions are for her and her conscience, and not within your gift to either discuss or endow.

If you were a feminist you’d not opine on her “empowerment”. You’d not require a willingness to comply with men’s fantasies as proof. You’d not regard refusing to as signs that a female is frigid, a prude, or lesbian.
You’d recognise true empowerment not as the obligation to say yes, but as the power to say no.

If you were a feminist you’d recognise that how you choose to live , what you wear, how you define yourself or shape your subjective reality, does not become an obligation for females to accept you.
You’d respect their fears as based on millennia of reality, not “hate speech”designed to deprive you of your “rights”.
You’d realise that being female isn’t a political or lifestyle choice, that being female isn’t an identity, or construct. But rather a material fact upon which the rest are attached, and upon which the oppression of females is excused.

If you were a feminist You’d recognise her sex veto, and not insist that the labels you give yourself, either define your feelings as reality or her sexuality as bigotry.
You’d not require her to affirm your feelings or identity, least of all by opening her legs.
Or accepting your catcalls, or enduring your gaze. Lower YOUR eyes, if needs must.

If you were a feminist you would not feel the need to explain to females how they’re thinking, what they feel , and why. You’d listen to them explaining that for themselves.
Neither would you expect females to educate you. If you truly wish to know, listen. Read. It’s out there, it’s neither obscure or arcane, or akin to “dabbling with the occult”.

This and so much more besides, you would, at least, try.
If you were a feminist.

Don’t blame Emma Watson’s speech for liberal feminist failures.

(Cross-posted from Laura McNally)

Emma Watson’s speech isn’t the problem. The problem is liberal feminism.

Emma Watson’s speech at the UN has made headlines worldwide. It wasn’t a bad speech. Like all women, Watson is doing the best she can with the information she has available to her.

Several feminists have already addressed some of the problematic aspects of her speech. Like many, I am critical of the strategies employed by transnational organisations like the UN. I am also critical of liberal feminism.

But as a woman who is most concerned with women’s liberation, I acknowledge that Emma Watson has created more awareness in ten minutes than I could in my lifetime.

So you know what is more problematic, male-centric, and piecemeal than Emma Watson’s speech?

Liberal feminist analysis. Let me give just a few examples:

  • The liberal feminist movement argues sexist objectification and violent pornography can be feminist, but that Emma Watson’s speech was barely sufficient.
  • Liberal feminism frames sexual violence in porn as an empowered choice for women.
  • Liberal feminism responds “not all porn” in the same way sexists respond “not all men” when we talk about male violence and misogyny. Feminists ought to be aware that criticism is aimed at cultures, classes, and industries, not individual people.
  • While we are in the midst of a child porn and pedophilia epidemic, liberal feminism argues we should sell sexy lingerie to 7-year-old girls because children need “sexual choices.
  • Liberal feminism applies criticism to every industry except the sex trade despite the fact that the sex industry hinges upon classism, sexism, racism and the global trade of violence against girls and women.
  • Liberal feminism prioritises first-world women’s accounts of feeling empowered, shunning women who don’t have the language, resources, twitter or Tumblr accounts to articulate the extent of their oppression.
  • While liberal feminism claims to be “intersectional” it concomitantly evades structural analysis and conceals multiple oppressions with a rhetoric of agency. This is an issue that Kimberle Crenshaw has spoken on recently (1). As if feeling agentic is going to keep the most vulnerable women alive.
  • Liberal feminism claims to want to end sexist stereotypes, but freely labels women “thin-lipped,” prudish, and anti-sex if they dare say any of the things that I have just written here.
  • Liberal feminism has been so concerned about “including men” and being “pro sex” that they have repeatedly published ‘feminist’ works on behalf of male sex predators and attempted killers.

Liberal feminism is not only male-centric in rhetoric, but is institutionalizing and abetting global male entitlement as feminist.

Yet now, I hear, the liberal feminist movement is upset because Emma called upon men in her speech. Pot calling the kettle?

I say, at least Emma isn’t advocating for sex predators, at least Emma isn’t advocating for pedophiles. At least Emma isn’t advocating for men who produce violent pornography. At least Emma isn’t advocating for human traffickers. At least Emma is advocating for women.

Yes, Emma is another white woman adding her voice to a movement that continues to prioritize the perspectives of white people. But does that mean professional white feminists are going to renounce their careers? I wouldn’t expect so. But I would expect that they might consider whether their political analysis serves to amplify or obscure the reality of women already marginalized by the current white-male-centric world order.

Perhaps Emma’s critics can also ponder if liberal feminism is really working to change male hegemony while we continue to be served up diatribes about “finding agency” in oppressive circumstances, by both the feminist academy and its media counterparts. Perhaps they can question whether this liberal, postmodern, anti-structural, a-contextual approach to feminism even means anything for women outside of first-world capital cities… Marketing something as “intersectional” doesn’t just make it so.

It would seem that we can either fight to end patriarchy and the institutions that prop up its existence, or alternately we can work to make patriarchy more acceptable and equitable by selling it as “choice.” One of these options sounds like feminism and the other sounds like corporate strategy. Choice is great… when you are a wealthy consumer.

If the sex trade were a choice that supposedly liberates women, wouldn’t we all be liberated by now? What with pornography making up over a third of the whole Internet, and with the global sex industry estimated at being worth over $7000 billion (nearly ten years ago by the EU). So why is male sexual violencesexual coercionsexual assaultglobal trafficking in children, self harm, objectification and eating disorders as well as suicide rates all on the rise for girls and women in a whole variety of countries?

As it turns out nobody is liberated by these industries and they are rarely a choice. In fact research shows quite the opposite with very few South East Asian women ever personally seeking out the industry. To defend an industry that hinges upon impoverished girls and women’s lack of choice, and instead frame it as being primarily about “women’s choices” shows that liberal feminism is only for women with the social mobility to choose, commonly first-world women. Framing oppressive systems as “choice” is a classist marketing strategy, not an intersectional feminist analysis.

Yes, some women can choose. Some women have the social mobility required to move in and out of different fields of work and that is great. Of course, no woman should be stigmatised for her choices, whatever they may be. But feminist analysis is not just about women with choices. Feminism that only reflects women with choice serves to further silence women who have few or none.

As bell hooks has said:

[Feminism] has never emerged from the women who are most victimised by sexist oppression; women who are daily beaten down, mentally, physically, and spiritually – women who are powerless to change their condition in life. They are a silent majority.

Girls are increasingly surrounded by sex trade influences, with much of the visual culture saturated by pornography, often of young and underage girls. Male entitlement is both global and dangerous. Thai reports show 40 per cent of the sex industry is made up of underage girls. Male sexual entitlement is colonizing the third world faster than trans-national corporations ever could. This local-global industrializing of sexual exploitation is constraining the rights and choices of girls globally. Working to legitimise this exploitation only solidifies the lack of choice for these girls and women.

How then, can liberal feminists bolster these industries and simultaneously claim to fight for choice? Whose choice? Male sex tourists perhaps? And don’t even get me started on just how ethnocentric, individualistic and consumerist the entire notion of “choice” is. From my experience living throughout South East Asia, a deep sense of collectivist culture, filial piety where children are strongly obligated to support their aging parents, combined with poverty; all make the idea of individual choice and empowerment laughable. Poor women living in South East Asia don’t simply log on to seek.com and peruse potential career ‘choices’. Life is just not that simple, despite the supposed binary it is certainly not as simple as victims vs. agents.

An all too common story across Asia is parents who cannot afford to feed their children. They may find themselves forced to send their daughters or sons to the city with the promise of “school and work”, this is increasingly impacting strained rural populations. Are these girls going to be helped by “feeling agency” while they are exploited? Or, perhaps they could benefit from state sanctioned and local development programs, rather than sex predator tourists?

Through conversation, Australian writers have told me that girls in Asia have to “choose” between the garment industry and the sex industry, or otherwise beg. This is an entirely reductionist, ethnocentric and distorted idea of women’s reality overseas. Why is this first-world ‘choice’ narrative homogenizing feminist discourse? What ever happened to intersectionality?

Liberal feminist rhetoric is dominated by first-world accounts of “I think this is empowering so it is.” This apolitical approach evades the statistics and realities of millions of girls and women whose stories we will likely never hear in a feminist bestseller. Feminism has come to mean whatever wealthy consumers want it to mean: “feeling good,” rather than actual change or justice. We seem to forget that the world is not full of women wealthy enough to try out oppressive systems for fun like pole-dance for “sport.” We’ve ended up in a situation where Robin Thicke and Miley Cyrus call their actions feminist. While that’s ludicrous, I can see exactly how they came to that conclusion.

I understand that liberal feminism does seek to change sexist norms and attitudes, but it does so by supporting the industries that ensure sexist behaviour is normative, institutional and profitable. Not only does this garner political legitimacy for sexist industry, but it bolsters the male consumers who can argue their sex tourism and excessive porn use is acceptable or even “feminist.” Empirical evidence shows that first-world male consumers of pornography have higher sexist and rape-accepting attitudes — attitudes that they can more easily enact in locations with fewer law enforcement resources.

I have been told this is all just “good for business,” which sounds more like the perspective of a capitalist, not a feminist. I am struck by recent liberal feminist texts criticizing “neoliberal feminism” (which isn’t actually a thing) while the crux of liberal feminism could not be more closely aligned with neoliberal exploitation of women.

So, is #heforshe going to actually achieve anything with men? At an individual level, I hope so — we certainly need it. What I do know is that, for my friends living in poverty, having men hear about this will likely do more for them than talking about feminist agency or feminist porn.

I understand entirely why Watson’s speech was somewhat piecemeal, problematic and feminist-lite… But that is because she is working with liberal feminist theory, and it’s the best she (or anyone) could do with that body of work.

Watson is simply advocating for girls and women the only way she knows. So all I have to say to her is “Thank you. You did what you could, we have a lot of work to do and we welcome you.”

 

(1) Kimberlé Crenshaw, ‘A Conversation with Founding Scholars of Intersectionality: Kimberlé Crenshaw, Nira Yuval-Davis and Michelle Fine’ in M Berger and K Guidroz (eds), The Intersectional Approach: Transforming the Academy Through Race, Class, and Gender (University of North Carolina Press, 2010).