Some insider information from an ex rad fem:
The community has a ridiculously huge recidivism rate, meaning that they gain and lose large waves of members regularly.
I was active in the community for a little over two years, and it seemed like every three months or so, there would be an exodus of people who publicly chose to leave radical feminism.
It would usually start with one account saying that they were leaving, and then several others would inevitably follow, and the whole community would go up in flames. Lots of name calling and shit talking, the usual. But regardless of how many times it happened in the past, it would keep happening over and over again.
The two most common reasons people got fed up and chose to leave the community and ideology? Transphobia and receiving abuse from within the community.
Since our ideological journeys seem to be the exact opposite, I’m interested to know what eventually pushed you away from radical feminism/gender critical beliefs in general. Especially as you agreed with it for quite a long time.
Was it primarily the transphobia and intracommunity bullying and infighting, or did you find that the ideas espoused by radfems no longer answered your questions about misogyny/oppression in general?
I can definitely understand the first - although insidious online toxicity seems to happen in every internet community. But I feel like the actual literature/statistics/theory/goals etc of radical feminism very aptly illustrate the state of our world. And the activism radical feminism supports (establishing women’s shelters, ending world hunger, ending and supporting survivors of FGM, destroying capitalism, deconstructing the social/culturing categories of man & woman, to name just a few) seems essential to dismantling multiple structures of oppression.
What are your current views on gender/sex-based oppression/same-gender & same-sex attraction/pornography/prostitution & sex work? Are there any aspects of radical feminism you still agree with, or does the entire worldview seem inaccurate to you now? Do you think a middleground between gender critical and pro gender identity politics feasible or desirable? Did you always have doubts about radical feminism even when you were active in the community? Or alternatively, before you became gender critical, did you secretly/unknowingly hold any radfem views?
(Sorry if that’s a lot of questions! It’s no worries if you don’t want to answer, I’m just curious because the radfem community strikes me as deeply flawed but ultimately more well-intentioned than many iterations of the trans community, the queer community and popular/3rd wave feminism. But clearly your experiences are very different.)
I’m actually very happy to discuss this! Beware, long post below:
I still hold several feminist beliefs that are central to radical feminism, actually. I’m very critical of the sex/porn industry and I’m personally anti-pornography, as well as heavily critical of kinks. I still think that radical feminism has a lot of good in it, and I think radical feminists challenge several aspects of misogyny in ways that more mainstream feminism fails to (like the activism that you mentioned), which is something I respect and appreciate.
It was the emphasis put on transphobia that ultimately pushed me out of the community, but coming to understand trans men and women better is what moved me away from the gender critical side of my beliefs. For starters, gender dysphoria, especially in trans women, was always presented to me as superficial preferences, or a sexualized interest in presenting as the opposite sex, when that’s not accurate at all to actual trans people’s experiences. Getting a better understanding of the lives and feelings of trans people made it obvious that there are, sometimes intentionally and sometimes not, huge misunderstandings happening between radfems and trans people, and it’s resulting in bigotry. There is a very “us and them” attitude present in the radfem community when it comes to trans people, trans women specifically, and its not a good thing.
As for the rest of my views now I’ll just give you a quick rundown since you’re interested:
Gender stereotypes are bullshit, and the more we dismantle the societal structures that try to define us by gender the better off we all will be. However, an individual can transition physically from male to female, or female to male, to alleviate dysphoria, and I don’t believe there’s any good reason to not accept them as the sex/gender they’d like to be accepted as if they’re doing so.
Sex-based oppression is very real and undeniable. Cis women and trans women face different kinds of oppression, as well as similar oppression as well, but that fact doesn’t diminish either group.
Sexual boundaries are important, and respecting them is important. Some people are only wired to be attracted to people with bodies that mirror theirs (aka no mix and matching genitals), and that’s perfectly good and great. Some people don’t mind about the details as much, and that’s also great. Personally I think trans people should use whatever words (gay, straight, lesbian, etc) to define themselves that they like and that lines up with their identities, and I think cis people should do the same, and I think everyone should stop debating who should be having sex with whom because it’s no one’s business and everyone is entitled to be choosy and picky and draw definitive lines about their bodies and sex lives.
Like I already mentioned, I’m anti-porn and I see the sex industry as an inherently abusive one. Basically I see no way for an industry of that kind to ever exist and operate in a way that doesn’t end up, in one way or another, being exploitative and abusive. The porn industry, for example, is an industry, and the only thing that matters to the people at the head of any industry is keeping that industry alive, aka it’s bottom-line.
All industries have something they either produce or sell, and in the case of the porn industry they’re selling bodies to meet their bottom line and compete with other similar companies in the same industry. Even in a world where misogyny doesn’t exist, there is no way that you could have a sex industry that doesn’t exploit and abuse unless the only people in charge are the sex workers themselves. Which is why I support something like the nordic model, that gives the power to the sex workers directly, rather than any of it going to their pimps/bosses/flimmakers/etc.
Ideally I would wish for a complete abolishment of the industry completely, but I honestly don’t know if that’s possible. There are going to be women who, even under complete freedom of finance and choice would choose to enter sex work, and that’s just the way things are. So what I hope for are conditions that give ultimate power to the sex workers themselves, with all the protections therein, so that there will never be a situation where they are forced to sell their bodies for housing or food, etc.
When I was a radfem I mainly feared that I was doing more harm than good. Before I was a radfem I did hold some radical feminist views both without knowing it and secretly. I was a longtime stalker of radfem blogs before deciding to join the community, lol.
I think you’re right about the majority of radfems being well-intentioned. I certainly was, I just didn’t have all of the information. When I learned more, I changed my views. I definitely think there is a middle ground between radical feminism and trans-inclusive and affirming feminism. There are a lot of interesting discussions to be had about sex and gender and how those come into play biologically and socially, and if there could be more focus on learning and expanding on that I think a lot of good could be done tbh
