Can you be a feminist and pro-life?

[Chris]

I personally work with enough women who were active participants in the wave of the 1960s-80s to question the idea that you speak for all of the women's activists of your generation.

In an historical sense, that movement was divided into two broad camps: liberals and radicals. You sound like you belonged to a particular section of the first group; the type that may have been grouped centrally around, of course, Betty Friedan (author of The Feminine Mystique and primary founder of NOW, as you doubtless are aware); a mostly affluent section that was dominant only in the 1960s and focused pretty much entirely on legal battles against discriminatory workplace policies, conservatively defined. This could be contrasted with the more advanced types of liberal feminism, grouped mainly around Gloria Steinem (perhaps most famous for being the main founder of Ms. Magazine, of course) in the 1970s and '80s. This latter group of liberals was pro-choice, anti-porn, supported lesbians, and promoted other cultural changes in addition to supporting both legal and on-the-ground reformism. And of course it could be even more starkly contrasted with the women's liberation movement (a.k.a. the radical women) that was born out of the campus-based struggles against the Vietnam War and were mainly concerned with uprooting misogyny in the cultural arena, at an ideological level, being that they did not really believe much in trying to change the existing system of things so much as in replacing it altogether.

That last group is one that I associate with a lot online and is significantly responsible for a lot of my "crazy" ideas. They're my favorites. They're awesome. I respect those who have dedicated their entire lives to the advancement of women and have accumulated a lifetime of knowledge and experience in that connection and who know what it is to be the most despised sort of creature on Earth: an elderly female. I like them better than the activists of my generation, taken as a whole, and certainly what's left of radical feminism better than the "third" and contemporary "fourth" wave kinds for sure. In fact, I would go as far as to characterize Sheila Jeffreys as the principal influence on my way of thinking about women's issues. Definitely looking forward to reading Germaine Greer's purportedly upcoming book.

So anyway, I guess my point is that I know that you don't speak for all the feminist women of your generation in the above quote and maybe shouldn't pretend to.



Wasn't revalorism what was called "domestic feminism" in The Handmaid's Tale? Remember that episode from the first season?

I think we've established that no one person can speak for all feminists of any age or wave or radicalism.

[Mister D]

In that old, evil, traditional world the matriarch was esteemed and held a great deal of power however informal it may have been. She ruled the roost. Incidentally, my mother ruled our home when we were kids. If they didn't involve A LOT of money she typically made the decisions. Granted, that's my own experience but I seriously doubt it's uncommon.

[Chris]

Speaking as one of them, I have my doubts about that (bolded). I really don't think that anti-feminists understand the various branches of the movement very well at all.

For example, it's commonplace for people both here and elsewhere online to refer to me as both a radical feminist AND ALSO a "third wave" or "fourth wave" feminist, not realizing that those are contradictory things. They do so out of a persuasion that the movement has become more revolutionary over time when in fact it has simply become more popular over time (at least when defined in the abstract). I would assess that the basic reason why the women's movement is currently more popular in this country than I believe it has ever been before is owed to the fact that it is on the defensive politically and it is easier to rally people to defend existing rights and status than it is to rally people to take to the political offensive and seek out new advances. The reverse scenario was famously had in the late 1970s, when it was visibly obvious that Phyllis Schlafly's anti-feminist movement could mobilize ten times as many people as actions called by NOW or other pro-feminist groups. That was because the women's movement was making advances at the time and the other side was on the political defensive, which is always easier to energize people around.

Some of us see instead an infussion of postmodernism in radical feminism. There's still lurking the old Marxian oppressor/oppressed but transitioned into postmodern abstractions where groups are defined by race, gender, sex, and others.

Wanting to do away with say from the old male/female genders and create a smogasborg of genders is not a defense of old rights and status but is indeed taking the political offensive and seeking out new advances.

[Chris]

In that old, evil, traditional world the matriarch was esteemed and held a great deal of power however informal it may have been. She ruled the roost. Incidentally, my mother ruled our home when we were kids. If they didn't involve A LOT of money she typically made the decisions. Granted, that's my own experience but I seriously doubt it's uncommon.

My mother pretty much ran the home though dad was the punisher and the heavy lifter.

[IMPress Polly]

The most despised creature on earth-an elderly female??? Where in world do you get this stuff from polly.

There are not many men ANYWHERE that dont love their Mothers and the Grandmothers and their Great Grandmothers.
I personally truly believe that statement is just absurd. If you want to narrow that down to an elderly woman who still wants to rant and rave and hate men like a 60s and a 2018 radical then YES thats true.

I tire of these disingenuous arguments. Of course people generally like their own family (except mine). The fact that one likes their grandmother does NOT imply that they like and respect the group that is older women overall. For example, it has been commonplace since the election of Trump for members of this message board to post visual comparisons of Melania Trump to elderly Democratic women, demonstrating what is important to them about women; what it is that people (men) here consider to be the main job qualification. I don't think their grandmothers would be flattered by that.

[Chris]

I tire of these disingenuous arguments. Of course people generally like their own family (except mine). The fact that one likes their grandmother does NOT imply that they like and respect the group that is older women overall. For example, it has been commonplace since the election of Trump for members of this message board to post visual comparisons of Melania Trump to elderly Democratic women, demonstrating what is important to them about women; what it is that people (men) here consider to be the main job qualification. I don't think their grandmothers would be flattered by that.

The "group that is older women" is an abstraction. Almost a statistic. Why would someone like and respect an abstraction?