Is feminism just about women?

[alias_sqbr]

So, this is something that's been bugging me about feminism as a movement for a while, and I was hoping some of you more educated and involved feminist types could educate me. I've been prodded into asking by a few annoyed posts about racism amongst feminist bloggers at debunkingwhite which helped me crystalise the issue in my head.

EDIT: The answer, it appears, is "Yes" :) Kind of. See strangedave's very interesting comment on the subject.

Now I realise that the word "feminism" has many meanings, and even if you ignore the ones only used by non-feminists(*) you still have some fairly different ideologies amongst self-identified feminists. But looking around at various "Feminism 101" type places (see, for example, the links near the bottom of this post), the basic consensus is that, roughly speaking, feminism is about fighting or at least acknowledging gender oppression and believing that women deserve basic human rights.

But a few other definitions are more strict: feminism is about recognizing and being against all oppression and bigotry. So which is it? Or is this a matter of contention?

I've always assumed the first. Everything I've seen which describes it self as being feminist is first and foremost about gender and women. I have seen feminists criticised (and criticising themselves) for ignoring the plight of non-white, GLBT, disabled etc women, but assumed that was general "We expect better of you lefty social justice types", in the same way as one would criticise a disability advocacy group for being sexist.

A POV I have seen which irritates me beyond measure is "Once we get rid of the patriarchy there will no longer be any homophobia or racism", with the implication that anyone who wants justice about racism etc should become a feminist activist, and all their other problems will magically vanish away. I've seen this argument used for why "feminist" is a perfectly good synonym for "against all oppression", much better than say "equalist". (This despite fairly common displays of racism, transphobia, homophobia, etc amongst groups of women and feminists in particular)

But recently I've realised that this may not be what people mean when they argue that "all feminists are against racism" etc. Nor are they just assuming that anyone who is good on one point (ie feminism) must naturally be a "good" person in other ways(**). They may actually be using the second, more restrictive definition.

But by this defintion the feminist movement sucks. Because if feminism is against all oppression and bigotry, why are they focussing so much on women? Why do feminist books and blogs etc not focus as much on the plight of the black or gay or disabled man as much as they do on the white middle class woman? (I mean, by either definition they should also be focussing on disadvantaged women, but by this one there is absolutely no good reason why women should be first priority rather than just one disadvantaged group amongst many) I mean it's still ok for individual feminists to focus on particular issues which may only involve women, in the same way as it's ok for individual environmentalists or environmental groups to focus on say one particular animal or issue, but it would be all shades of wrong if they all focussed on saving cute furry animals, and none on say global warming.. except specifically as it affected cute furry animals. And of course the very word "feminism" becomes incredibly loaded, alienating disadvantaged men from the group that theoretically represents them.

Am I missing something? Because as I see it there are three possibilities:
(a) There are two contradictory definitions of feminism being used, with both groups seeing theirs as obvious and well accepted, and I've just missed seeing any of the inevitable clashes;
(b) People who assume that all feminists are against racism etc are full of crap;
(c) There is something incredibly wrong with the feminist movement beyond the generic intolerance you get in any group of people not specifically gathered together to fight that particular intolerance (e.g. I'm sure disability advocacy groups are sexist)

Personally I'm going for a little of column (a), a little of column (b) :) But it would be useful to get some more knowledgeable feedback, since I get into in arguments with people who have women's studies degrees and end up frustrated and unable to defend my POV.

Ranting on why all feminists suck etc to go here please :P

(*)Like: crazy man hating gender separatist
(**) A common misconception, despite a great deal of evidence to the contrary. I think my favourite was "Anyone who has accepted Jesus Christ as their personal savior is free from sin" with the clarification that yes, there are an awful lot of people who give every impression of thinking they've accepted him, but clearly haven't or they wouldn't be sinning would they? Similary, there are apparently a lot of people who fight for women's rights and call themselves feminists, but they can't really be feminists, because then they'd be nice! And unbigoted!

Comments

[strangedave.livejournal.com]

Only two contradictory definitions of feminism? Feminism is a cause, not a philosophy - in effect, its a cluster of different philosophical positions that all have some attitudes in common.

Now, most feminists understand that feminism opposes patriarchy. And many feminists have come to a philosophical understanding of the patriarchy that sees it as not only the cause of discrimination against women, but also the same basic system that drives intolerance against many other groups. And if you see things that way, then you see feminism as intrinsically against intolerance in all forms - once you attack the foundations of discrimination against women, you at the same time attack discrimination against racism, class, etc.

Other feminists have a different philosophy, and don't see all causes of discrimination as intrinsically linked. They can still be against oppression and bigotry (you can think that discrimination against women and other forms of discrimination are both wrong, without thinking they have the same cause). Some might even think that accepting feminism means being opposed to discrimination in general, but working towards feminist goals doesn't necessary aid other anti-discrimination causes. According to this view, you just have to choose a cause, and they've chosen feminism, but all those other causes are good too.
Other feminismts have different philosophies again - there are certainly feminists who would agree with the idea that feminism sucks, particularly there are definitely black feminists who think white feminism sucks because it is so bad at seeing and fighting racism and classism.

Other feminists think completely different stuff. I'm sure you can find anti-semitic or otherwise racist feminists if you look hard enough. You probably wouldn't need to look that hard. It would be pretty easy to construct a basically racist feminism from the archeological theories of Marija Gimbutas if so inclined, for example.

So, essentially, I'm going with a little from column a, and mostly column b.

And also, option d) actually, people are bad at consistently espousing the one philosophy, and some people just don't think hard about whether their collected prejudices form a philosophically consistent position, They can still call them themselves feminists.

[ataxi.livejournal.com]

"Feminism is a cause, not a philosophy"

Shouldn't that be a cause AND a philosophy, the way you're talking about it?

"in effect, its a cluster of different philosophical positions that all have some attitudes in common"

To me if you have a grab-bag of viewpoints which you're going to call "feminist viewpoints", feminism should consist of their intersection, not their union.

I realise this is a prescriptivist / descriptivist argument, and fine, "feminism" obviously has a multiplicity of meanings most of which depend on context, none of which is absolutely right or wrong ...

"some people just don't think hard about whether their collected prejudices form a philosophically consistent position, They can still call themselves feminists."

But in some cases, everyone else is bound to disagree, or qualify their claims.

[strangedave.livejournal.com]

Shouldn't that be a cause AND a philosophy
A cause and a bunch of related philosophical positions.

To me if you have a grab-bag of viewpoints which you're going to call "feminist viewpoints", feminism should consist of their intersection, not their union.

Sure, a quite sensible approach. That does not, me me, appear to be how the term is consistently used in practice, though, hence the resulting confusion which prompted the question.

in some cases, everyone else is bound to disagree, or qualify their claims.
Absolutely. But this creates arguments, rather than solves them.

[ataxi.livejournal.com]

"Absolutely. But this creates arguments, rather than solves them."

I usually end up agreeing (with a few regrets) that quibbling endlessly about terms isn't a good way to build consensus and make progress.

But once progress has been made on the broad shared goals of a movement the time not previously spent persuading others to share your more specific ideas will suddenly seem more important.

[alias_sqbr]

Ooh! Thankyou for your well considered reply, I think you have it exactly.

The problem is that many (most?) self identified feminists may be part of "the feminist cause" but the actual definitions I have seen of feminism tend to be as a philosophy, as an opinion about gender and society without any direct expectation of action. Which I think is rather disingenuous, since there's a lot of assumed baggage that goes unstated, including being part of the cause. And yes, I do focus perhaps too much on written definitions rather than people's actions, but I'm a literal minded maths nerd, I can't help it :)

I think the sorts of feminists who have been confusing me are the "The patriarchy is under it all" sort, and the way you've expressed their POV makes it sound less bad than the understanding I had (and actually kind of sensible). Still, I think if what we're talking about is the underlying power structures inherent to society and their underpinnings in racism, sexism, etc, not just about gender, then there's no good reason to call it "The Patriarchy". This just inflates the importance of gender and implies that all women (no matter if they're rich white etc) are the innocent victims and all men (no matter if they're poor or black etc) are the powerful aggressors. It's like my (white, straight, male, somewhat working-class) dad expressing all social justice in terms of class, it means he never has to be part of the "bad guys" because he always defines them first and foremost as being the rich(*).

I am all in favour of people being able to self-identify as feminist (or whatever) even if they don't think about it very hard and their position makes no sense, if we start excluding those sorts of people there'll be very few "ist"s left of any flavour :)

(*)Am reminded to refer to the patriarchy as many times as possible tomorrow. Whenever I bring up sexism when he's in the middle of a rant about the Oligarchy Ruling Us All he gets all flustered until he can find a way to blame it all on the industrial revolution or something.

[out-fox.livejournal.com]

Um, I refer to the Patriararcy and that's not what I mean AT ALL. Rather it's the opposite - to acknowledge political inequality while noting structural power relations [aka of course as a a white woman in a wealthy minority world state I'm privileged over many men].

Ok, I mean this in a nice way seriously, but where are you getting your info? Are you hearing strident campus feminists or something? Patriarchy =/= men!!!

[alias_sqbr]

*pauses*

*realises that while I have gone out of my way to make sure I have a fair understanding of what the proper definition of "feminism" is, I'd just assumed I'd picked up the correct definition of "Patriarchy" from context*

Oops. I have very poor reading comprehension when it comes to philosophicalish concepts you see. (This stuff hurts my brain in general, which is why I'v taken so long to work my way down replying to all the long complex comments. Yours is next after this!)

*googles*
Are these roughly ok?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriarchy_in_feminism
http://gray.intrasun.tcnj.edu/Caribbean/Patriarchy.htm

Because that's roughly what I had in mind, though I'll admit I expressed my point very poorly in my comment to strangedave.

My point is this: I have no problem with feminists who think that being a feminist means also fighting against other sorts of inequality(*). I do have a problem with any who try to bring all fights against bigotry under the umbrella of feminism, since it elevates gender above race, sexuality etc.

That is:
- it ignores the many hugely important non-feminists working against other sorts of bigotry
-whatever it should be, the feminist movement in practice has largely focussed on gender, so the equation anti-bigotry=feminism easily becomes anti-bigotry=feminism=fighting against gender inequality, making gender the top priority
-similarly, words like "feminism" and "patriarchy" (and presumably other feminist terms and concepts) are inextricably linked to gender, by usage and entomology and often by definition. If they become the dominant terminology then gender becomes the central focus.

I'm not saying feminists don't care about or notice racism etc.(**) But making feminism the default is as bad as making male the default. Someone who says "Fighting racism is part of feminism's fight against the patriarchy" almost certainly doesn't mean to exclude disadvantaged men, but it does have that subtext, in the same way that someone saying "Our company needs a new chairman" is probably entirely happy to have a woman in the role...but the word still has an exclusionary subtext.

Anyway, I'm probably still missing something, and it's possible that the sort of attitude I'm worried about doesn't actually exist. But that's the vibe I get, and if I don't express it and have people point out why I'm wrong it'll sit there niggling at me whenever I get involved with feminism (which I would very much like to do. The Patriarchy sucks however you define it)

*hopes this is both clear and not horribly offensive, has a nasty feeling it is neither*

(*)Assuming they accept that not everyone sees feminism this way, both inside and outside the movement.
(**) I realise that what I said to strangedave basically said that, but that's not what I meant. I forgive you for not being psychic :)

[out-fox.livejournal.com]

My apologies, I jumped off the handle there. I'm pretty much a feminist history buff and I tend to lunge into debates without checking where others are at in the background.

The wikis on feminism are kinda vauge imho, but from what you're saying here it sounds like you're referring to the radical feminist and/or dominant liberal academic feminist forms of defining it. In which case, there definitely really are feminists like that -very influential ones in Oz- but I don't think they're the majority in practice and I agree with your point about trying to make feminism a central encompassing approach being as problematic as making masculism central.

But I should go find some links or definitions to clarify myself before I blather more *goes surfing*

[alias_sqbr]

Ah, that's cool. It's a very loaded subject.

And don't worry, I'm aware that that sort of feminism is just one sub-branch. This post was prompted by coming a across a few of them who acted as if that was the only logical way to be feminist, and then getting this POV mixed up with the much more reasonable "Being feminist should imply not being a bigot about other things". But now things are much clearer, and I stand better prepared for the next time I engage in a discussion on the topic. Huzzah for my brainy friends list :)