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Date: Fri, 11 Nov 2005 15:36:42 -0500 (EST)
To: improvetheworld &AElig umich.edu
From: James W Mickens <jmickens &AElig eecs.umich.edu>
Subject: Re: last attempt to move on
Status: O

>      I dislike being misrepresented.  I never said
> that a goal should be to destroy all gender aesthetics
> and differences--quite the opposite.  Either you
> (Lisa) weren't reading anything I wrote too carefully
> or I was unclear.  In fact, the main point of my last
> response was that no one in this particular circle
> expressed such a goal, "ornamented language"
> notwithstanding.

"No one in this particular circle expressed such a goal?" Hmmmm . . . this
claim deserves closer inspection. There are three issues here: first,
whether self-proclaimed radical feminists exist in this email group,
second, whether radical feminism espouses the "destruction of all gender
aesthetics" and the like, and third, whether the views expressed in our
email group conform to radical feminist ideology. Empirically speaking, we
can consult the whiteboard and previous emails to determine that there
are, in fact, self-proclaimed radical feminists in this group. The
question now becomes whether radical feminists (as strictly defined by the
literature) believe in the eradication or complete reengineering of gender
roles. According to the Wikipedia, "radical feminism is a branch of
feminism that views women's oppression as a fundamental element in human
society and seeks to challenge that standard by BROADLY REJECTING STANDARD
GENDER ROLES [emphasis is mine]." Now, let's consider some quotes from
several famous radical feminists:

"All sex, even consensual sex between a married couple, is an act of
violence perpetrated against a woman."
--Catharine MacKinnon

"Only when manhood is dead - and it will perish when ravaged femininity no
longer sustains it - only then will we know what it is to be free."
--Andrea Dworkin

"[Rape] is nothing more or less than a conscious process of intimidation
by which *all* men keep *all* women in a state of fear."
--Susan Brownmiller

It sounds to me like the radical feminist literature *is* calling for a
thorough destruction of current gender roles. I don't think that I'm
selectively quoting above, since all of these authors (Dworkin in
particular) are aficionados of exceptionally vivid images and metaphors.

Now, I move on to issue three: are the "radical feminists" in our email
group truly radical feminists?


> I only thought
> some were wasting time attacking the ideology of a
> particular type of radical feminist when there were
> none in our immediate midst.

The fact that you must use the qualifier "particular type of radical
feminist" is illuminating. It's true that nobody in this group espouses a
*truly* radical notion of feminism, e.g., that our patriarchal society
should be replaced by a matriarchal one in which women dominate and men
are subjugated. So, my main question is . . . why are they calling
themselves radical? To do so is both a semantic mistake (because they
don't seem to adhere to the extreme tenets posited by the radical feminist
literature) and a practical one (because it alienates potential political
allies and stunts the growth of the progressive movement). I'm inclined to
believe that Michelle is radical only to the extent that she believes
gender discrimination is the primary or most pernicious form of
discrimination. This claim is debatable but certainly not extreme, and her
end-goal of improving everyone's quality of life is laudable. In my
opinion, the problems arise in her articulation of these goals, an
articulation which is sometimes couched in the florid deconstructionalist
vernacular of *true* radical feminists, people who are actually very
extreme, very impractical, and ultimately harmful to the progression of
women's rights.


>      It is extremely frustrating that in response to
> my pragmatic suggestions I received another two essays
> on the woes of radicalism.

I didn't complain about your pragmatic suggestions. In fact, I *agreed*
with your suggestions, and went so far as to suggest that they were not
radical in origin. I then made an additional point that associating basic
notions of equality with labels like "radical" or even "feminist" is
counterproductive to the goal of building effective progressive political
movements. My polemics against radicalism are designed to get the "radical
feminists" in this group to think about what radicalism really means.
Having read the radical feminist literature, I see a big difference in the
relative moderation expressed here and the extremism expressed by Dworkin
and associates. Teasing out these distinctions is important if we as
progressives are to effectively sell our message.

In conclusion, we're all friends here ;-). There's no need to become
angry, only pragmatic.

~j