Discuss feminism in this thread.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Substantively and without being douchebags.

If it's all the same, I'd prefer not to start with a whole essay on why I have problems with both liberal and radical feminism as conceived in North America and Western Europe*, but I do. People who have followed my forum contributions may be able to guess how and why in each case.

I'm going to be keeping an eye on this thread, so I hope we can get some good discussion going here.

*First of all, some of us seem to have a somewhat, shall we say, quixotic definition of radical feminism. Radical feminism is any feminism which conducts a radical critique of what it sees as patriarchal elements of society rooted deeper than the liberal feminist perception of such elements. That's it. That's the definition. Whether people who identify themselves as radical feminists can be so easily and inoffensively categorized is a whole other issue.

[dead0man]

All I know is that the myth that women get paid 75% (or whatever) as much as a man does for the exact same job (even though that's NEVER what the studies actualy messure or show) isn't helping anybody.

[The Mikado]

Nathan, what are your thoughts re: Judith Butler?  (Al's groaning and rolling his eyes as we speak)  I've found her writings on transvestites to be interesting but not as provocative and radical as everyone told me they would be.  (People are OK with transvestites as entertainers, with a stage separating them, but less OK with them when the transvestite sits down next to them on a bus...this is not novel)

I've had to tackle a lot of history texts by Joan Wallach Scott and her disciples.  Are you familiar at all with Joan Scott?  Gender and the Politics of History is a pretty fascinating little book.  She's heavily influenced by Lacan and Derrida and argues for the use of gender (gender, not women) as a tool for historical analysis parallel to the use of class etc, rather than simple "herstory" inserting blurbs about prominent women into the historical narrative.  Her critique of E. P. Thompson's Making of the English Working Class is, IMO, a necessary companion to the original book.  I've read quite a few of her books by this point, and I'm a fan.  I know his name causes eyerolls, but I'm going to point to Foucault's History of Sexuality trilogy (yes, I didn't just read the first one) as a pretty amazing set of volumes, though a pain in the ass to get through.

Nathan, feel free to talk about East Asian feminism etc. 

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

All I know is that the myth that women get paid 75% (or whatever) as much as a man does for the exact same job (even though that's NEVER what the studies actualy messure or show) isn't helping anybody.

Obsessive quantitative focus like this is never helpful.

Nathan, what are your thoughts re: Judith Butler?  (Al's groaning and rolling his eyes as we speak)  I've found her writings on transvestites to be interesting but not as provocative and radical as everyone told me they would be.  (People are OK with transvestites as entertainers, with a stage separating them, but less OK with them when the transvestite sits down next to them on a bus...this is not novel)

You're entirely correct. Judith Butler's main function is to synthesize ideas that have been kicking around in the discourse for ages. She's a bit postmodern to my tastes, and I'm somebody who likes postmodernism; she does very good deconstructive work on gender setups but then falls into the same trap of assuming that this validates any choice a woman can make by virtue of a woman making it as many liberal feminists, which I think means that she remains insufficiently committed to the precise sort of critique of the social setting in which women make their choices and live their lives that she's ostensibly such a giant in.

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I've been meaning to try Foucault for ages but just can't seem to work up the necessary tolerance for that type of discourse (except for Discipline and Punish, which I love). I'm not familiar with Scott; thank you very much for the recommendation. That sounds immensely interesting.

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East Asian feminism is another one of those areas where I'm less fond of such theory as there is than I am of the literary and cultural output around it. There's actually very little theory in for instance Japanese feminism; most of what exists is stuff that was published in Bluestocking between ninety and a hundred years ago from a distinctly middle-class, typically fervently religious perspective (I'm comfortable with one of these two qualifiers, and as you probably know it's not the one that one would expect from a frequenter of Atlas Forum). East Asian feminism is mostly done in literature and popular culture and in practical avenues; in Japan it's often tied to certain Buddhist attitudes, especially in the newer (relatively speaking) sects such as the various Zens and Pure Lands*. Hiratsuka was studiously Zen, Yoshiya was a sort of lapsed Christian who drifted towards Pure Land over the course of her life, Ohba wasn't religious but used relentlessly Buddhist imagery in her writing, Kimura might or might not think she's in the Pure Land, Kajiura is obsessed with Degenerate Dharma and the Hidden Buddhadharma, and so on and so forth.

(I should point out that of the women I've mentioned only the first was a feminist theorist or activist in the Western sense by any stretch of the imagination. Japanese feminists prefer to tiptoe around Yoshiya, since even though she exhibits distinct lesbian feminist tendencies in her writing she was a figure of the establishment in a lot of other ways and actually got sucked into writing militarist propaganda at one point.)

One feature of Japanese feminism that I find interesting, in addition to how comfortable it is with religious language and symbolism, is that it isn't really interested in the discourse of sexual freedom or sexual license from a feminist standpoint. There's a definite interest in this sort of thing, but that's only because seemingly everybody everywhere is interested in sexual license for some bizarre reason. Sex isn't necessarily presented as a feminist choice in Japanese writing, mainly because feminism isn't worked around an axis of choice in Japan. It's a bit hard to explain and I can get into more detail later if this isn't making sense, but for instance with something like The Ethical Slut most Japanese women would find it incredibly strange and chimerical to think that that would be a 'feminist' text (they might even blame their husbands for it and engage in what's termed slut-shaming in Western liberal feminism, which term would be not only terminologically but conceptually nonsensical to many if not most Japanese women). One of the seminal figures in the history of Japanese feminist iconography is actually the yamauba. The seminal but sadly neglected late Tokugawa poet Ema Saiko wrote 'as my face declines, my mind grows more free'.

You might also remember that Shoujo Kakumei Utena feels very little need to present remotely healthy sexuality.

Of course for all the practicality and il-y-a of Japanese feminism it does suffer from a lack of theory and explicit activism in the realms of law and politics, even though I don't think that that lack is necessarily a problem with the discourse itself.

*since Japan is practically a far more religious society than the West but not a society given to much religious thought or idea generation, this is perhaps to be expected.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

All I know is that the myth that women get paid 75% (or whatever) as much as a man does for the exact same job (even though that's NEVER what the studies actualy messure or show) isn't helping anybody.

For people under 30, it's 108%.

http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,2015274,00.html

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

I highly recommend Feminine Handwriting (or, in a pinch, The Village Beyond) for anybody interested in Japanese 'feminism of daily life'.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

(Al's groaning and rolling his eyes as we speak)

How did you know?

[Free Palestine]

Feminism rocks.

Though not the wishy-washy liberal kind.  Or the "kill all men" fringe.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

If nobody discusses feminism in this thread I'll gladly just post a Kimura Nobuko poem a day.

[Gustaf]

I've had many feminism discussions - they tend to wear me out.

[John Dibble]

I've had many feminism discussions - they tend to wear me out.

I had one yesterday on another blog - I still feel completely drained. (of course, lousy sleep due to my air conditioning not being able to deal with the heat wave we're having right now doesn't help)

Even if you're largely on the side of women, any degree of disagreement tends to get you labeled as privileged, sexist, or misogynist. I think it's true that a man can't fully understand the perspective of women and how they feel about certain issues, but such charges tend to make any kind of rational discourse shut down. You have to walk a tightrope and if you lose your balance at all there's no recovery. You want to have a place in the conversation, but if you aren't towing the party line your opinions are regarded as completely irrelevant so you're inclined to just stop talking about it altogether or you only discuss it with other men and don't get a female perspective.

Frankly I'd rather deal with the actual misogynists - at least I don't care what they think of me.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

See, now we're discussing feminism! Sort of.

Anyway, here's 'The Riverbed', from Feminine Handwriting.


I was preparing to pick up mother's scattered bones and the moon was pale.
Why are you on a riverbed like this? I asked,
and she laughed and said, The mother you know is not the only me.
I was about to put her bones in my kimono chest,
and she said, I no longer want to go back there,
leave me as I am.


(I had the privilege of meeting the translator, Hiroaki Sato, late last year. He's a great man, and has spent his seventy years on a good-faith effort to truly understand women's poetic tradition in his country.)

[Oldiesfreak1854]

I believe in equal rights and opportunity for women, and if that is how you define a feminist, then I am proud to be one.  However, I believe that women should choose their roles for themselves that having anyone else (such as traditional family models or radical feminists) dictate it for them.  I also oppose abortion but believe that women should have control over their reproductive freedom through birth control and adoption (rather than abortion).

[Beet]

I had one yesterday on another blog - I still feel completely drained. ...if you aren't towing the party line your opinions are regarded as completely irrelevant so you're inclined to just stop talking about it altogether or you only discuss it with other men and don't get a female perspective.

I know what you mean - you aren't the only one who has had this happen to them (wink, wink). Don't take it personally - these women are even  better at ripping each other apart than they are men. A lot of guys who wander onto feminist blogs have a way of derailing the conversation so that it's centered around his needs, so it's no longer a matter of how to improve the lot of women. In my experience a man trying to introduce that kind of dynamic will be met by a hostile response.

On the bright side, you don't have to have a place in the conversation to learn a lot. You can just lurk and read, and you can learn a lot that way. You can get their perspective that way.

Ok-- what do people think of the sexualized focus of Western feminism? I noticed Nathan talked about it a little up above. What I mean is, it seems that Western feminists are focused on sexual rights-- birth control, abortion, opposition to sexual shaming, gay rights, transsexual rights, sex work, and body image issues. Not that there is anything wrong with these issues, but they all have to do with sexual identity or image to some degree. Economic issues affecting women, the cost of child care, work family balance, women in politics, women in nontraditional careers like science, the concerns of older women, women of color, and other non explicitly sexualized issues tend to get less than proportionate emphasis in Western feminism. What do you all think of this?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Beet, that's a very good concern and a very good way of putting it. While I obviously can't declare my opinions normative on Western feminism since I am at least on the surface privileged in several senses, it's also a privilege to be able to spend one's time focusing on issues of sexual rights/identity/image. Some of these foci are entirely appropriate and intersect with other things, like trans issues for example, but this is itself a little belied by the frequency of actual or apparent attempts to export Western identity-based and rights-based models of these subjects to parts of the world where that isn't necessarily the most constructive way to deal with such things (hijra, for example, are not 'trans' or trans-identified. They're hijra). Child care and issues relating to motherhood get a scandalously small amount of attention relative to their actual importance in the lives of many or even most women worldwide. There are countries that are good about this but some of the ones that are also have a tendency to revoke support for women in, as Beet put it, nontraditional careers once they marry or have children (Japan is a perfect example of this dynamic but there's also, I've heard--maybe somebody else can clear this up for me--more of this sort of thing in continental Europe than one might expect).

Here's 'A Negative of Spring', from Temporary, Temporary. In a few more days I'll switch from Kimura to Ema Saiko, because I'll have access to my anthology of her work then (it's the same translator).


Spring finally
into the depths of wounds finally
thin rain is falling on a goat's back
in his spine
the consciousness of the age of water revives
elves playing knees knocking each other
a gardener puffing into flowers to make them balloon
infant calls of a goat surfeited with grass
a friend accompanying a boy
brings the cookies she made herself
the excitement of fingers scooping up fresh cream

Blue mold growing inside
the family in a copper pot becomes even more reticent
a boy goes on polishing some amorphous triangle
big sister stares all day at a just-imported fruit she bought

Aged sisters are eating late-spring oysters.
At the other end of the telephone
someone says:
We're conducting a survey of ladies aged 19 to 39, and I'm wondering. . . .
She isn't here.
When do you expect her back, ma'am?
To hell with them!

I remove my ears and plant them in the garden.
The rain goes on falling on them, too.
I hear a young fox playing the bugle.
He must have sensed that I love festivals.

[The Mikado]

Nathan, in some ways talking to you is like talking to a first wave feminist that was recently thawed out from 1920.  (That's not really a bad thing, either)

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Nathan, in some ways talking to you is like talking to a first wave feminist that was recently thawed out from 1920.  (That's not really a bad thing, either)

Well, as long as it's only in some ways! They could be pretty classist and racist. I like to think I try to be like a version of that but minus the contemplation of eugenics and plus certain insights of the past century regarding for instance gender identity.

[Oakvale]

Thoughts on Her - She, Woman

by Oakvale.


Feminism's bull!
I think women really want
To serve their husbands

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Thoughts on Her - She, Woman

by Oakvale.


Feminism's bull!
I think women really want
To serve their husbands

It's not a true haiku. Stop using closed syllables.

[Oakvale]

Thoughts on Her - She, Woman

by Oakvale.


Feminism's bull!
I think women really want
To serve their husbands

It's not a true haiku. Stop using closed syllables.

Reported for personal attack & trolling.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Thoughts on Her - She, Woman

by Oakvale.


Feminism's bull!
I think women really want
To serve their husbands

It's not a true haiku. Stop using closed syllables.

Reported for personal attack & trolling.

どうしお？

[Oakvale]

Nathan's predictable trolling aside (), I hope to have some more actual substantive contributions up in this thread soon. Stay tuned, people - and keep fighting the good fight against the 'feminazis'! [1] LOL!

[1] It's like "feminist" but instead of the "ist" you put "Nazi" like Hitler.





No but seriously, I'll stop now.

[The Mikado]

In Which the Thread's Progression is Summarized in Nipponese Verse

By T. Mikado

Oakvale comments
Nathan posts Nihongo
Atlas benefits

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

While we're on the subject of women in East Asia, I'd like to draw our attention, as I touched upon in the 'Sexuality in America' thread, to the artistic works of such people as noted polyglot postmodern classical prog-rock Buddhist New Age trance-turbofolk composer and frequent soundtrack artist for anime, video games, musicals, and movies of varying quality Kajiura Yuki and noted, er, daughter of Dazai Osamu with all of what one might expect from that Tsushima Yuuko. These unsung heroines of popular media in Japan over the past half-century, from Tsushima's award-winning 1974 short story Kusa no fushido to Kajiura's compositions for the chamber pop group Kalafina, have exemplified an element of Japanese women's thinking on these sorts of issues, especially as related to sex (something that both women kind of tentatively touch or touched on in a lot of their work despite their distinctly unerotic artistic mindsets and Kajiura's apparent celibacy), that I rather like. From Kusa no fushido to the songs on the After Eden album these women, along with many others, take us through a world of love and, yes, sometimes sexuality where, as I said in the other thread, 'the sex acts are made up and gender doesn't matter'. Kajiura seems only peripherally aware that sex isn't actually done with the eyes, and her female singers' lyrical voices weren't even clearly female until quite recently, much less the people sung about being male (which is still not the case). The Tsushima story is about lesbian unfit mothers and their curiously asexual attitude towards touch. It's all very interesting.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Here's a poem by Ema Saiko (1787-1861), one of the more radical statements of the burgeoning female consciousness of late Tokugawa literature that in the last lines unfortunately veers in a somewhat classist direction that's very hard to explain without going into a huge amount of cultural background:

The Three Obediences I've had none of all my life;
as my face declines, my mind grows more free.
To try out a painting brush, I rip a light-silk sash;
to buy myself a gourd, I take a silver pin out of my hair.
Write verse on plantain, and the sheet tears in the rain;
smear one in the air, and a geese formation appears.
I only fear that lazy, careless women at large
might try to follow the wind and moon after me.

And here's an earlier, rather nicer one from her:

This innermost room, with little to do,
is adequate to commit my plain life to.
Drink a bit, and I forget my clothes are thin,
an idea, and I let my brush run aslant.
Wind at the eaves, and the maple sheds its leaves,
on the wet stones chrysanthemums fade.
All day with no guests visiting me,
I've perused books, delighted to learn.