Feminism is For Everybody [3]
论文作者:None论文属性:短文 essay登出时间:2008-11-27编辑:点击率:7615
论文字数:1720论文编号:org200811272024415404语种:英语 English地区:加拿大价格:免费论文
关键词:Feminismmomentum
quality in the work force with white men. Reformist feminist thinking focusing primarily on equality with men in the work force overshadowed the original radical foundations of contemporary feminism which called for reform as well as overall restructuring of society so that our nation would be fundamentally anti-sexist.
Most women, especially white women, ceased to even consider revolutionary feminist visions, once they began to gain economic power within the existing social structure. Ironically revolutionary feminist thinking was most accepted and embraced in academic circles. In those circles the production of revolutionary feminist theory progressed but that theory was not made available to the public. It became and remains a privileged discourse available to those among us who are highly literate, well educated, and usually materially privileged. Works like Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center which offer a liberatory vision of feminist transformation never receive mainstream attention. Masses of people have not heard of this book. They have not rejected its message, they do not know what the message is.
While it was in the interest of mainstream white supremacist capitalist patriarchy to suppress visional feminist thinking which was not anti-male or concerned with getting women the right to be like men, reformist feminists were also eager to silence these forces. Reformist feminism became their route to class mobility. They could break free of male domination in the work force and be more self-determining in their lifestyles. While sexism did not end, they could maximize their freedom within the existing system. And they could count on there being a lower class of exploited subordinated women to do the dirty work they were refusing to do. By accepting and indeed colluding with the subordination of working class and poor women, they not only ally themselves with the existing patriarchy and its commitant sexism, they give themselves the right to lead a double life one where they are the equals of men in the workforce and at home when they want to be. If they chose lesbianism they have the privilege of being equals with men in the work force while using class power to create domestic lifestyles where they could choose to have little or no contact with men.
Lifestyle feminism ushered in the notion that there could be as many versions of feminism as there were women. Suddenly the politics was slowly removed from feminism. And the assumption prevailed that no matter a woman’s politics be she conservative or liberal she too fit feminism into her existing lifestyle. Obviously this way of thinking has made feminism more acceptable because its underlying assumption is that women can be feminists without fundamentally challenging and changing themselves or the culture. For example lets take the issue of abortion. If feminism is a movement to end sexist oppressionn and depriving females of reproductive rights is a form of sexist oppression, then one cannot be anti-choice and be feminist. A woman can insist she would never choose to have an abortion while affirming her support of the right of women to choose and still be an advocate of feminist politics. She cannot be anti-abortion and an advocate of feminism. Concurrently there can be no such thing as "power feminism" if the vision of power evoked is power gained through the exploitation and oppression of others.