Hi, I was wondering what convinced you to believe in Radical Feminism?
This answer took way too long for me to write, and for that I’m sorry. I struggled a lot with writing this response, because I simply had too much to say. I started with trying to explain as much theory as I could and then I realized that I was basically writing a book which you didn’t ask for.
You asked not why radical feminism is correct or why it makes sense, but why I believe in it. I believe it can do for women what liberal feminism and queer theory are incapable of. Free us.
I do believe that many individual queer activists are genuine in their desire for human rights and freedoms. So why do I think the movement continues the patriarchy?
Modern liberals and their activists have become infatuated with subversion for its own sake. It’s fun to go against the grain. It’s sexy to be different and unexpected, to “queer the boundaries”. However queerness cannot stand on its own; it must be queer in relation to something. The word “queer” means strange, after all.
Subversion itself depends on the context in which it is performed. And the context is patriarchy. Those who find such delight in the subversion will fight to uphold the backdrop in which their actions and identity remain subversive. In order to continue giving the finger to the establishment, the establishment must remain. In this way queer activism has a vested interest in upholding the patriarchy.
This kind of activism will always be futile, because subversion for its own sake has no end except for its own continuation.
When I say “this kind of activism” I mean activism that is focused on making aesthetic changes and statements instead of fighting for structural changes. This activism comes in the form of an intense focus on changing language, making art, and individual development and identity-making. None of these things are necessarily bad, and can even serve useful, but they are not sufficient for structural change.
While activists are operating solely on this aesthetic level, oppression continues in material ways. A female human being can change her pronouns or the clothes she wears and find a million different micro labels for herself and draw her own pride flag, but she will still be oppressed because of the body she has. Abortion bans will still exist. Rape still happens. Medical misogyny, period poverty, child marriage, and pornography still exist. Queer activists do all of the aesthetic and performative activism and then pat themselves on the back as if they have changed anything outside of their own head.
Radical feminism focuses on the material world, and the real issues that physically affect billions of women everyday. We recognize that changing words does not change reality and we are willing and able to meet oppression where it finds us: in the physical world. We do not think “how can I be subversive within patriarchy”, but “how can we dismantle the patriarchy”. We don’t search to find a gender that makes sense for our personal experience because we recognize that gender itself only makes sense in the context of female subservience. We disavow cultural relativism. We have clear goals that don’t move and that we will know when they are achieved. We know what we want, and our goals still make sense outside of the context of patriarchy, because they are based on material outcomes for real women.
Queerness doesn’t exist if patriarchy doesn’t exist. But radical feminism stands apart from any cultural context. And that is why I believe in it.
