feminist discourse and the fear of moral contamination

[svnsettia]

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"take that reblog down. don't you know that op supports---?"

we're all people living in the same world, so no matter what you believe, there will be some overlap with other people. nobody can ever be the exact opposite of anybody else. but something i see a lot, and even hear from professors, in academia, and in irl activism, is the automatic assignment of certain ideas with certain ideologies, which are then used to dismiss or dispute certain arguments. there's one example of it that has been plaguing feminist discourse since the dawn of the sex wars:

"radfems are against porn, and conservatives are against porn. therefore radfems are conservative."

let's break this down.

conservatives are against porn because they think that women are evil temptresses that are trying to corrupt good men. they think that female sexuality is dirty, and that sexuality is accurately represented in porn, therefore porn is dirty. conservatives want to protect society from female sexuality. they look at sex workers with hostility.

radfems are against porn because of the exploitation of women and the separation of sex from intimacy... [i already went into detail about this in another post]. radfems want to protect women from exploitation. they look at sex workers with compassion, and understand that swers are among the women who are most hurt by patriarchy.

even if, reading this, you don't understand what the difference is, or you disagree that there's any difference at all... hell, even if conservatives and radfems are against porn for the exact same reason: you can't reasonably deny that they are opposite in nearly every other way. radfeminism wants to destroy patriarchy and is very critical of marriage, intercourse, the nuclear family, capitalism, religion, and every form of oppression. conservatives cling dearly to all these things, and hope to preserve them at all costs.

so spend a moment thinking about it. if radfems and conservatives seem to agree on something, is it because radfems are actually conservatives? or is it because both radical feminism and conservatism are fully developed ideologies that aren't very concerned with appearing to disagree with each other on all fronts?

i'm angry about this because i've had male professors dismiss me, censor me, and label me as conservative [read about it here] for expressing criticism against the sex industry. these profs never even asked me, "why do you think that?" before deciding that i must be a conservative. the same happened to dworkin and mackinnon.

 

 

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