History of Feminism
Related: About this forumThe Three Tragedies of Shulamith Firestone
But the thing I found saddest about that New Yorker piece is that Firestones brand of truly renegade feminism was once considered mainstream and has since fallen out of fashion. Her 1970 polemic, The Dialectic of Sex, was a best-seller. In it, Firestone advocated for a total overthrow of the family structure and for babies grown in artificial wombs. She also reinterpreted Karl Marx through a feminist lens. It was a deeply intellectualand, sometimes, thoroughly bonkersbook. Millions of women bought it, discussed it, and were changed by it.
Contrast that with the feminist manual thats currently No. 1 on the New York Times nonfiction best-seller list: The ubiquitous Lean In. Yes, I know, I know, youre all sick of reading about it. But Sheryl Sandbergs book is undeniably a phenomenon, and the phrase lean in has become part of the culture in just a few monthsno small feat. Instead of encouraging women to overthrow or revolutionize or even really change any existing structures, Lean In tells young women the path to parity is buying into a conservative, corporate world.
This is not to say that I believe Firestone was always right. Faludi quotes a New York Times reviewer, who calls Dialectic both brilliant and preposterous, which sounds about right. But theres something heartrending about the fact that whats now called radical is a book advising women to play the corporate game the same way that men always have. Its all pretty bland and boring in comparison to a book that compared childbirth to shitting a pumpkin.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/xx_factor/2013/04/10/shulamith_firestone_was_the_last_of_the_renegade_feminists.html
I love the 'Dialectic of Sex', even if it leans on Freud a bit too much for my taste. When I first read it, I thought it an incredible vision, almost Science fiction like. I like this article because we are seeing this, this---acquiescence---for lack of a better word of a number of American women. So many are placid and content in their privilege; Stepford like in choices. This isn't restricted to gender or even sexual orientation. True revolutionaries are far and few between, and it's debatable ala FEMEN, how women can even find a way toward revolution that doesn't, at heart acquiesce to the demands of patriarchy.
Others agonize over not being sexually attractive enough, thin enough, have the right kind of hair or makeup. I haven't read 'Lean in' I will eventually.
On the other hand, young feminist movements like Hollaback are awesome. There's a lot of awareness being raised out here and around the world. The Internet, for all it's faults allows, at least voices to be heard.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)And it is true. That is the path to equality with men in this patriarchy. This capitalist patriarchy.
This is why I do not seek "equality". I seek to overthrow the goddamn patriarchy. And furthermore, fuck capitalism, its stinking shit of a son.
Capitalistic economics carry out colonialism ideology and there's your 'other' right there. Other countries, as long as they are poor and without real political teeth as well as much preferred non- white; other cultures, so we can point our fingers at them and tsk tsk, (meanwhile outsourcing jobs so we don't have to pay a living wage or benefits, assisting in keeping the poor poor in countries we want to lay judgement on) other political systems so we can keep our populace ever so slightly afraid.
Capitalism is part and parcel of patriarchy and vice versa. I think not understanding this is why otherwise reasonable minded people think feminism is wrong because 'we're all in this together'---clearly also not understanding privilege.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)Works a treat for those at the top. Throw a few bones to a few bourgeoisie and they'll help make sure nothing much changes, too. Nothing too major. Just some tweaks.
ismnotwasm
(41,992 posts)With multiple aspects. Religious sexual repression is part of what created the kind of pornography we have today for instance. Which is why I find accusations of 'prude' or whatnot for being anti-porn endlessly amusing, what I'm a 'prude' because I don't let capitalistic corporate versions of dumbass sex dictate what I find erotic?
Um, okey dokey then.
MadrasT
(7,237 posts)redqueen
(115,103 posts)Or at least I try not to. Some of it is etched in deep. Pisses me off
MadrasT
(7,237 posts)I tried nearly every exotic erotic thing conceivable... and kept wondering why much of it it wasn't actually all that enjoyable in real life.
Then I realized I was defining eroticism based on other people's examples (cough, cough, porn, etc.), not my own.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)ismnotwasm
(41,992 posts)Jesus God some of that shit looks painful. (No not the SMBD stuff where pain is at least a part of experience) My husband once dated a Stripper who could, among other things, lift her leg straight up over her head from the side--she was in great shape. (a nice person, ended up married with three kids, sent us Christmas cards for years) I thought something like that could make the sex better but he says not really, it's always a combination of things like sight, scent, touch, sound, emotion.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)fuck that shit. lol
never could jump into the pretend.
has to be grounded and felt, not played out.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)It's almost all centered around the male gaze, the idea of male gratification. Even if its just one woman, she's often posed in that caricatured, outrageously stupid way that no woman would actually get off in. (Unless her idea of 'getting off' was pleasing male viewers or women who internalized the male gaze, which we all do to some extent.)