Feminism: Militant or Philosophical?

For some people feminism is a dirty word, connoting man-hating militancy, and the women's movement represents an effort to disable families and marriages.  Some feminists have been unflinching in their efforts to bring about legal and social change, and this singularity of purpose has been interpreted as militant, threatening or even crazy.  Andrea Dworkin is one such feminist who has been accused of going too far, failing to compromise or take a middle position when it comes to rescuing women from social and sexual oppression.  She writes to women: "I have to ask you to resist, not to comply, to destroy the power men have over women, to refuse to accept it, to abhor it, and to do whatever is necessary despite its cost to you to change it" (Life and Death, 175).  She goes on to say, "If we have to fight back with arms, then we have to fight back with arms. One way or another we have to disarm men."  This particular feminist approach is off-putting for some women because Dworkin is castigating all men, all men need to be disarmed.  Dworkin's particular life experiences (horrific) reveal why she is so determined to put an end to female oppression, whatever the cost. The problem for feminists at home is that we cannot be Dworkin's acolytes if we want to instill values of empathy, concern, thoughtfulness and respect in our children (daughters and sons). Dworkin's project is not interested in spreading empathy and respect among the sexes, but solely in putting an END to oppression by provoking and fighting back.  I believe that as feminists at home we should be in the business of putting an end to oppression, but that our methods should be focused on the people we are raising.  We need to understand why certain oppressive behaviors arise in childhood and adolescence and change these behaviors and attitudes by teaching empathy and respect.

Immanuel Kant argued that the only moral attitude one can have toward another human being is to view them as a rational autonomous being who is an end in herself, and not a means to someone else's ends or goals. When a person becomes a means to someone else's ends their subjectivity is ignored or denied, and they become objects; hence objectification. Kant's idea is instrumental in developing a philosophical as opposed to a militant feminism, because it exposes those instances when girls and women are treated unjustly, i.e. they are used as means to another person's ends, and it offers us a guide to solving the problem of oppression by requiring that each person's autonomy be respected.  I firmly believe that if the 13 year old boy who attempted to intimidate my daughter's friend into giving him a hand job had been taught as a young boy to respect all people as ends in themselves, to view girls as people and not objects, then he wouldn't have introduced the game of one-way sex to this party of girls.

Recently I was talking with a good friend who has a sixteen year old daughter about this blog and how important it is to talk with our daughters about sex and the sexual culture they encounter. She agreed with me that in the middle school years oral sex is a game of power initiated by some boys, but that as the girls get older they start to use it as a tool to socially manipulate boys. My friend told of how she had tried to emphasize with her daughter that oral sex is still sex; it is a form of intimacy, and degrading when used in a context of social manipulation. My friend wanted to stress to her daughter that sex is an expression of intimate love and can be unifying, but its purpose is perverted when used to manipulate, coerce or dominate others. Interesting point, that girls can in turn use sex to achieve their own positions of power. However, if the genesis of this social and emotional game starts in middle school with a few provocative boys, then its domain is one of male dominance. Girls only figure out their strategies and how to play when they realize that this is the only game around, or that this game is the one to play if you want status and recognition from the boys.  What I fear is that for some young people their sexuality is effected by these practices; that for them sex loses its intimate nature.  When the other person is used as a means to an end, then both people are incapable of building a relationship of mutual trust and concern.

One of my favorite feminist philosophers, Martha Nussbaum, argues in her book Sex and Social Justice, that we can criticize and ultimately change oppressive sexual/social practices while at the same time preserving  trust, understanding, love and joy in our most intimate and fulfilling relationships. I think this is what my friend was concerned about with teen-age sexual behavior; that trust, understanding and love are discarded or ignored when sex is used as a tool of manipulation and people are objectified.  If we take the militant feminists approach, by demonizing men, then we fail to preserve the joy and happiness that can come from mutually respectful, empathic and intimate relationships.  But if we start at home, by demonstrating respect and an interest in preserving dignity, by openly discussing with our older children the dangers of objectification and how it happens, then we are not capitulating bystanders but contenders in the battle for universal human dignity.


As always, please leave your comments, reactions, experiences - they are invaluable in this discourse!