I’m against liberal feminism because I’m against liberalism. I’m a socialist, I don’t think we can achieve liberation from men in in a capitalist society even one with regulations.
Liberal feminism doesn’t really threaten the status quo and doesn’t commit. It believes that the most effective way for women to stop being oppressed is through the state - legal methods. It doesn’t see the state as an inherently violent patriarchal tool in of itself and reforming an inherently violent patriarchal tool can only take us so far.
Of course its important to focus on the world we live in now and ideological purity at the expense of how I actually live is ridiculous.
Lberal feminism believes that the problem isn’t that men have the power to hurt and abuse, but rather than women don’t also have access to that power (eg: defending Hillary Clinton who supports imperialist policies in the global south, being super thrilled about women who break through the glass ceiling to own car companies that cover up murder).
Liberal feminism wants women to have access to the same power as men. I don’t. I think the power and societal advantages men have are born via violence are not exactly what I think a just world needs.
Liberal feminism views equality as a step-by-painful-step process of an individual woman (particularly white, Western women) stepping on the backs of other women to get more power and has this weird belief that sisterhood will make them turn around and help someone else up instead of safeguarding their own power.
Liberal feminism is individualistic. Liberal feminism is ineffective. Liberal feminism prioritizes certain women’s lives over others. Liberal feminism says things like “i’m not an angry lesbian hair feminist so you should take me seriously because I love men”. Liberal feminism says that it isn’t men they’re angry at but the patriarchy (exactly what is the patriarchy made of, ghosts???). Liberal feminism doesn’t name the problem and doesn’t see things as systemic.
SHOW NOTES
