Hillary Clinton is why I’m not a Feminist

2008 June 5

Hillary Clinton epitomises all that is wrong with feminism: privileged, white, western, middle-class, female chauvinists, who hide behind their gender and dress up female fascism as female liberation. If you look up feminist in a dictionary, it usually say something like a believer in women’s right. Well, I’m a believer in women’s rights but I don’t think that having a vagina somehow makes me a more worthy member of the human race, a victim of “the patriarchy”, or entitles me to any special privileges. Sorry, but I don’t want to live in a clitocracy – I abhor female chauvinism as much as male chauvinism – I believe in human liberation, not just female liberation.

I’m not saying that everyone who calls themselves a feminist is a fascist but the Hillary Clinton brigade are, and the feminist movement that sprung up in the 1960s has more in common with fascism than liberalism. That’s why I won’t call myself a feminist. Read any of the main feminist writers and they’re not preaching equality in politics, the law, the workplace or education: what they’re advocating is discrimination against men and lesbian separatism.

A good example, is the old feminist claim that all sex between a man and a woman being rape. Modern feminists say their attitudes have moved on but not when it comes to rape hearings. Feminists are constantly attacking the presumption of innocence in rape cases. Everyone male or female is entitled to the presumption of innocence and the right to challenge any witnesses against them in a criminal trial. If you’re against that then sorry, but you’re a fascist.

Even though most females living in Western societies have rejected feminism as an ideology, feminists theorists won’t respect our freedom of choice: if women reject feminism, we must be brainwashed – too damn stupid to know our own minds – and in need of rescuing by the matriarchy. And if heaven forefend, we don’t vote for the female candidate in an election – we’re somehow setting back women’s liberation and we’re traitors to our pussies.

Feminism just doesn’t respect our choices as women: it’s hypocritical, anti-woman ands unrealistic. Even mainstream feminists, like Greer, still think that all women should live in a pussy colony!

The mantras of feminism – gender identity and gender roles – are nonsnese! I’m not a woman because I wore a dress and played with dolls when I was girl, I am a woman because I was born that way. Gender identity is a biological and psychological fact. And because men and women are different, there are natural difference in our roles in the family. Ovulation, pregnancy and breast feeding are not social constructs – men can’t do them and woman can. A woman can’t get a man pregnant..or another woman! The survival of the human race depends upon “gender roles”.

Genuine liberation is being free from political and economic oppression, not Hillary Clinton failling to be nominated as the Democrat candidate. Breaking throught the glass celling isn’t an issue for most women and it certinly isn’t leaving them destitute. Feminism does’t help women: it promotes male roles as being of more value than female roles. If feminism was about women’s need, it would resepect traditional female roles in the family and society, and not just women in the workplace. Why did Hillary not argue that a married person’s salary ought to be halfed for tax assessment if his or her spouse stays at home? She doesn’t value real women, that’s why!

Hillary doesn’t care that most married women in America, work because they have to, not because they want to.

24 Responses
  1. 2008 August 8

    It is, I’ve just written another post on feminism.

  2. 2008 August 7
    lifeinthesack permalink

    it’s a sad truth. =(

  3. 2008 August 6

    @ lifeinthesack

    I use the label anarchist, which encompasses all human liberation but lie you I embrace femininity and gender equality, and as a Catholic look to Maria Magdalena (the apostle to the apostles) as an example of that, and a victim in life and death of misogyny.

    I don’t have an objection to you or other women using the label feminism, like you said words can change meanings, but I think the word still has the negative connotations of the clitocratic feminists of the 60s and 70s, like Hillary Clinton.

  4. 2008 August 5
    lifeinthesack permalink

    “labeled a feminist it’s not because I believe in gender equality and social justice, it’s because I believe in gender equality and social justice and have a vagina. ”

    I live in a university town in Oregon, so that may have something to do with the fact that I have several male friends that also vocally identify as feminist. Otherwise this would most definitely irk me as well.

    “Also I see no relevance in female liberation outside of human liberation.”

    I couldn’t agree more. =) =)

    “Feminism for me implies the exclusion of men and I don’t think that is helpful.”

    I think the term implies this for a lot of people and that’s why I want to be one of the forces attempting to change the definition. Hmmm. Seems to me we might need to make up a new word….

  5. 2008 August 5

    @ lifeinthesack

    I agree with nearly all of what you’ve said but why the label feminist irks me is because when I’m labeled a feminist it’s not because I believe in gender equality and social justice, it’s because I believe in gender equality and social justice and have a vagina. I see as the equivalent of being labeled a fighetta (tight little pussy) with ideas. If I didn’t have a vagina, I wouldn’t be labelled feminist, so the label is explicitly sexist. Also I see no relevance in female liberation outside of human liberation. Feminism for me implies the exclusion of men and I don’t think that is helpful.

  6. 2008 August 4
    lifeinthesack permalink

    “feminism” is a very very very broad label. I agree with all of your stances on feminism, save the rejection of the label feminist. It seems to reject the label feminist gives misogynists the idea that we are anti-equal rights (*note “equal” *not* “superior”). Instead, I work to redefine feminism as being seperate from *radical feminism.*

    Christians should not renounce their name in light of those right-wing individuals that are doing all they can to sully the positive ideas inherent in the teachings of their namesake.

    Unfortunately evidence such as the wage gap between genders (here in the united states of America) shows that we are not yet equal & that there is more work to be done.

    I used to be an anti-skirt anti-pink person until I realized I was rejecting these things b/c they were connected with this idea that femininity was proof that i really was a member of an inferior group. I subconciously believed if members of my group were able to reject these things, then obviously we were not as inferior as they said.

    Since keying in on this internalized misogyny (in part created by feminism of the 60’s), I now wear whatever color strikes my fancy, own several pink items, wear skirts, take pride in my nurturing nature, and shamelessly accept the flirtations of good men, as well as embracing my ability to outwit my male classmates, tromp through the mud in same aforementioned skirts, open doors for females, self and males alike, fix gadgets gone wrong, practice self-defense, etc…

    We need to realize that gender roles are not rigid, nor need they be and that each member of society is capable of possessing feminine and masculine qualities and that helpful skills are helpful regardless of who administers them and defeating behavior is defeating even when committed by somebody with a vag.

    The things we ask of men in their gender roles are just as atrocious as the things we ask of women (possibly even more so, since women are more free than ever to make their own choices about their lives). This seems to be shifting, but we still have a long way to go. I don’t think we (as individuals) *should* be a perfect balance of both genders or that one gender is better than the other, I simply think we should be allowed to live in a society where each person is free to express their personal strengths without shame/fear. Regardless of genitalia.

    There are innate differences between the sexes. Males on average have stronger upper bodies than women and women on average have stronger lower bodies than men. Men also tend to be larger than women and women tend to live longer than men.

    Intellectually, emotionally, physically, and spiritually we all have equally valuable things to contribute to society regardless of their label as “feminine” or “masculine” gifts & faults they’re all gifts & faults, no matter who sends them.

  7. 2008 June 7

    @ George

    I think that’s absolutely right, when of course women’s dress is usually an expression of their femininity and individuality.

  8. 2008 June 7
    George Carty permalink

    Women’s dress doesn’t exist in a one-dimensional space. I think a triangle with vertices “slut”, “androgyne” and “nun/muhajabah” would be a better discription. Feminists (misnamed as they equate femininity with inferiority) want women to modify their clothing such that they move closer to the “androgyne” vertex.

  9. 2008 June 6

    @ George

    Very probably, then they probably bitched about the sexualisation of women in western society without noticing the irony. I only cover my hair when I’m in Church (an Italian thing) but my Grandmother always covered her hair. I suppose there is a difference because in Iran it required by law but I couldn’t walk down Bow Street with my tits out.

  10. 2008 June 6
    George Carty permalink

    @ steph (11)

    Didn’t feminists at International Women’s Day 1998 accuse Masoumeh Ebtekar (then Iranian vice-president of environmental affairs, and known to Americans during the 1979 hostage crisis as “Screaming Mary”) of hypocrisy after she made a speech blasting Taliban misogyny, because she wears a chador?

  11. 2008 June 6

    @ heather

    My problem with feminism, isn’t with the women (or men) who call themselves feminists, and it certainly isn’t with women’s rights, as long as they are not oppressive to men (or women) – my problem is with feminism as an ideology: firstly, there is a huge difference between opposing gender inequalities and trying to redefine class struggle, as a gender struggle. As a political ideology, it’s nonsense, as history, it’s even worse. All feminism is to me, is middle class western women bitching about being treated as an inferior gender, whilst demanding special privileges because they’re women. If we want gender equality, we’ve got to give up those special privileges.

  12. 2008 June 6
    heather permalink

    @ Steph

    See, I agree that feminism has been shamed by the war in Afghanistan and Iraq and I don’t think we should be invading and occupying other countries and trying to change their cultures but not all feminists support the war, but I still think I’m feminist becasue I believe in women’s rights. See, I think of you as a feminist too. Gosh Steph, you really make me think. :)

  13. 2008 June 6

    Thanks clyde

  14. 2008 June 6

    @ Dksu

    The label feminist is sometimes used by liberals but contemporary Western feminism as a political movement is no more liberal than old school feminist theorists, like Sheila Jeffreys, who said, “If you fuck men you’re collaborating with the enemy,” when NOW, the Feminist majority foundation, Eleanor Smeal, Donna M. Hughes, Hillray Clinton, are all supporters of military interventionism and want to dictate how women in Afghanistan and Iraqis should live their lives.

    How is feminism perceived by the majority of women in the Southern hemisphere – in Latin America, in South East Asia, in the Middle East, in Africa?

    To quote Rana Kabbani:

    “The fighting feminism on its For Women Only programme puts institutionalised western feminism to shame. All that manufactured outrage over the burka, which rose to a climax precisely as bombs fell on Afghanistan; where are the cries of outrage now, when Iraqi women are being incarcerated and raped in US dungeons, where tens of thousands of their menfolk are also being held; when they are being starved, denied drinking-water, bombed, buried alive in the rubble of their homes, maimed and killed?”

    That’s my problem with feminism: it has always been a coercive ideology. Feminism in the 1960s didn’t respect women’s choices to live in the “patriarchy”, and has never supported marriage and the nuclear family, even though most women on this planet want to be mothers and wives. It has never supported traditional matriarchal societies; the right of women to practice the religion they choose; or live under laws that don’t conform to the tennats of feminism. Feminsim treats women as children – that’s why feminists can support the war – it’s the sex war – never mind that the women supposedly being liberated didn’t ask to be. In feminist ideology, they can’t make an informed choice because they’re oppressed by their social settings. So it’s alright to drop bombs on them and colonise them – it’s for their own good!

    That’s not liberalism!

  15. 2008 June 6

    Hello Steph,

    Another great piece, I love the views, not just tis one the perspective and direction this blog has, suits my fancy.

    Cheers,
    Clyde

  16. 2008 June 6
    dksu permalink

    Hrm… Interesting post. Feminism, I think, is pretty much a blanket term for anyone advocating ‘womens’ rights’, in any way – so, that’s ‘female supremacists’ as well as egalitarians. Reading Zinn’s ‘A People’s History of the United States’ (brief on feminism for sure, but at least some kind of a base – I should read up more on the subject), I got the impression that most feminists leaned towards socialism or liberalism, and that there was only a kind of fringe faction that were radical supremacists.

  17. 2008 June 6

    @ Ric

    Thanks :)

  18. 2008 June 6

    @ Alfie

    Thanks, over the last month I has lost interest in blogging a bit but I feel recharged now. :)

  19. 2008 June 6

    @ Amie

    Absolutely!

  20. 2008 June 6

    @ heather

    It depends what you mean by feminism, the ideology and movement that sprung up in the 60s defintely has more in common with fascism than liberalism, but as I said not everyone who calls themselves a feminist is a fascist. And I agree with Amie’s point about political and economic oppression.

  21. 2008 June 5

    @ Heather

    Real easy, cos oppression ain’t just a gender issue.

  22. 2008 June 5

    Damn, but you’re my kind of woman! Oh, damn, wait, is that a chauvinist remark? Fuck it. Where do I send you flowers?

    :)

  23. 2008 June 5

    I really liked this post Steph. I’ve been looking at your other recent ones and I’ll attest that you haven’t lost anything. Keep it up and take care.Fray

  24. 2008 June 5
    heather permalink

    I don’t want to live in a clitocracy (ROTFLMBO) either if Hillary is running it and I don’t feel like a traitor to my pussy either :)

    I don’t agree that the feminist movement has more in common with fascism than liberalism but I agree with everything you said about Hillary, she only cares about herself. See, I don’t understand how you can say you’re not a feminist?

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