I may shed myself of the feminist identity soon. But I’m stubborn, and for now, I continue to fight for its true meaning: women, actual women, being deserving of equal opportunity, safety and privacy.
How do people not understand that thinking men can be women is just saying that men make better women than women do? Women can’t break the glass ceiling in business or sports unless it’s a man who says he’s a woman??? It’s nonsensical.
And I have never thought about your point on the Mulvaney excerpt where he aligns himself with a stereotype of how a woman might feel. Why do liberal women, or any woman, not have a problem with that?
It really is a bunch of gaslighting of women in general. And sadly the barrage is not going to end.
I think it might be dangerous to abandon the term “feminism” for what we (second wave feminists) believe in. If the transgender activists appropriate that too, we lose another meaningful, reality-based concept. But that's just my opinion.
I have initiated “CAN FICTION HELP US THRIVE” to empower writers who create fiction with an overarching sustainable vision.
My book, “The Jacksons Debate,” is published under this banner.
“It explores the ethical complexities of interspecies relations through the lens of an advanced alien civilization called the Jacksons. The novel challenges readers to consider how easily a more advanced civilization might view humans as a resource, mirroring humanity’s own treatment of other species on Earth.
I'm not convinced you should abandon the feminist label. Maybe women like you can reclaim it: As you note, letting men cosplay as women in ANY field of endeavor is cheating and straight-up misogyny, the opposite of what we were once told feminism meant.
On the other hand, though ... I had an interesting discussion recently with a Russian friend who is an ardent old-school communist. (A Leninist; soft on Trotsky too, but definitely not a Stalinist.)
He cast Bolshevik feminist aspirations in strikingly similar terms to your 'basic equality' formulation. He was appalled at what he calls the 'bourgeois' feminism (I call it 'second wave') that swept the West during the '60s through the '80s.
I'm a decade older than you, and my mom was immersed in all that, so I recall it well: Ms. Magazine lying around the house, lots of anti-male screeds by Andrea Dworkin and especially Susan Brownmiller. The latter - if I may usefully oversimplify - argued that all sex amounts to rape. You caught the latter part of that wave, 'hairy-legged, angry women marching to take back the night while hating men.'
My mom bought way too deep into that, and it destroyed our family. So I still have a big chip on my shoulder about those 'bourgeois' western feminists.
Maybe the feminist brand ISN'T salvageable. You're the marketing boss, I'll let you work it out.
Amen! I have always considered myself center right, though these days I find myself nearly 100% aligned with others who are “common sense” oriented. People who want to debate the nuances and complexities of issues so we can find sustainable solutions. People who reject silly “mantras” and exaggerations in favor of compassionate truths. I bet if I sat down with you for lunch, we’d find we share more viewpoints than not, and where we differ we’d have great, innovative discussions.
All of that to say, I couldn’t agree more that this current feminism movement steeped in identity politics is completely undoing the advances we’ve made. As a female engineer by trade and mother to a girl who loves to play hockey, I’m furious that I spend time worrying some nuevo-feminist is going to tell my daughter she’s trans. I thought the whole point was to reject the stereotypes and encourage women to be and do whatever they are interested in! And frankly, if I had a son and he wanted to be a figure skater, I’d feel the same about him. But he’d still be a boy. Mapping someone into a gender based on their preferences is the very definition of stereotyping! What nonsense. It’s so frustrating.
Come on, admit it, men win again!! We have got the AWFL (affluent white female liberals) women to fight for the rights of men to replace women.
I know, crazy right? They are also screeching to keep the illegal migrant drug dealers, rapists, gang member, terrorist, murders here in their neighbothods. AWFL crazies!
"They cheer for men stealing their opportunities in some bizarre form of Stockholm syndrome." This helps explain to me why women otherwise appear to be purposefully duping themselves as the helpless sycophantic accolytes of the "emperor who has no clothes."
"Celebrating decades-old “feminine ideals” soaked in pink and adorned with false eyelashes is not feminism. It’s misogyny." There's that, and from my male perspective, it appears that women's tolerance of this sort of thing is akin to the crazy notion that black Americans ought to have embraced Rachel Dolezal as black. You, rightly, are effectively chastising your fellow women for embracing a form of appropriation that no one would normally expect could be tolerated at all in any other context; e.g., even Native American Cherokees had zero tolerance for Elizabeth Warren's claims of genetic heritage (remember the claims she made about her high cheek bones?). It's not just observably insane because it is counterproductive to any support for actual feminism; it's also plainly nauseating, at least from the average male's perspective.
"When ESPN celebrated Women’s History Month with a special about Thomas, that is saying that a mediocre male swimmer is more accomplished than NCAA All-American women swimmers....It’s saying men make better women than women do." Glad you mentioned this. I have been saying, and not getting much support from women, that when they go along with the Lia Thomases of the world, women are actively aiding and abetting a beta-male's hidden, inner-alpha tendencies/desires. That should make any woman sick to her stomach, but the fact that it doesn't even make the average go-along-to-get-along woman even frown a little bit? Stockholm syndrome, indeed!
What can explain such women's failure to defend, for example Riley Gaines, when all of this is considered (given that it is so obvious)? Dr. Laura, in her long-ago-terminated radio show, might have explained it as: women feel that they would just die of embarrassment if they were to challenge other trans-advocating women on this. Sounds silly at first, but what else, other than a basic survival instinct, can explain such failure to defend any actual woman at a college swim competition?
This "dying of embarrassment" problem comes to the front of the minds of most women, and inhibits them from being persuaded otherwise, due to, in my opinion, the fact that almost every woman now has someone in their lives (whether family, friends, or acquaintences) who is raising a boy as a "trans-girl" and who has bought into the "trans-women are women" madness. The natural instinct is to be sympathetic, even empathetic, rather than speak the truth, because speaking the truth might terminate a relationship, and lord knows, we can't have that!
"I doubt Farberger and Rothblatt had to overcome such dismissals of their competence to rise to CEO status. We live in a world where men now win men’s awards and they win women’s awards." Bingo!!! This is most problematic, even to a man like me: they had all the benefits of bias/privilege during their "male years," and now they are benefiting again as "women-CEO's" such that the companies that employ them will never have to even consider you, or any woman, as competitive for that position; after all, those two companies each "already have" a "woman-CEO." So these companies get an ESG blue check mark for having a "woman-CEO" and another ESG blue check mark for having a "trans-CEO." A man like me can't possibly, truly, fully know how infuriating this must be for you, but I can imagine...
"It feels like we are living in the 1950s, when actual women are, once again, relegated to cheering for men from the sidelines. This is misogyny and there is no other word for it." And this is why it absolutely must be denied as misogyny by the the go-along-to-get-along women of the world; it is why they are compelled to shout "trans-women are women" because they simply would "die" if they were seen, or even thought of, as being "anti-woman." They've talked themselves into the notion that they are not being "anti-woman." They're not being "mysoginistic." They're being "pro-trans" - which is the "same as being pro-women" - and you, unlike them, are being a bigot! See how that works?
"But do not tell me this is an achievement for women." Sorry, but that is precisely what your are going to continue to hear, from women and from cowardly men, ad infinitum.
"And certainly, I will not accept that men, who are stronger and faster than women, winning women’s trophies are courageous. They are cheaters. That’s it." And that is why, if women's professional sports accept such men as competitive athletes (here I'm thinking of women's professional basketball - WNBA - and golf - LPGA) they will kill their already poor TV ratings. Men don't want to watch men pretending to be women playing sports against other women. This has no appeal to men who aren't voyeurs.
I’ve been able to get through to some people by describing myself as a “second wave feminist”. So much of what has entered the discussion since the 70’s and early 80’s is not what I call feminism. Thanks to Judith Butler and others, there’s so much distortion now.
What you've said here is really important. I don't think of myself as a feminist or label myself as that. It's become a meaningless term now, a thought-terminating cliche that ends up meaning whatever its user wants it to mean. I have supported women's rights and fought for them, all my adult life. But the elitist, condescending pseudo-intellectual scolds and self-hating white people who often announce themselves as feminists these days are not people I relate to at all.
Their blind support of idiotic post-modern nonsense like gender ideology, critical race theory, etc., and the endless blathering about who is "privileged", and who is not, is so ridiculous.
As a low-income woman who works hard every day, my concerns are not even on their radar. These are the folks that can drop several thousand on a weekend retreat or workshop. I can barely afford groceries. I'm a small-scale farmer in southern Appalachia who lives in a 95 year old log cabin. But according to these high priestesses, I'm a privileged oppressor. It all seems like egocentric posturing to me, and as far I can tell, these are the women who have sat by and enabled much of this gender madness to spread.
I'm old enough to remember when both the left and feminists cared at least a little about lower-income folks. Now they only care if you're brown or trans. I want no part of what many people mean by "feminist" these days. It also seems like this label is one that keeps many people from listening to what you have to say.
Nah, don't shed your feminist identity. Regardless of what may pass as feminism today, and who may claim the term, I think you are a feminist because you are a woman who lives, and has lived, oppression based on your sex class, and because of your feminist analysis. Consider the rest as likely driven by male entitlement, false consciousness and/or gaslighting.
Been there done all this. We need to keep our eyes on the ball, basic equality for women, and let the extremes knock themselves out. Slow and steady, focused on the goal. Which will never be reached by the way, because life. It’s our living and showing up for ourselves and other women that *is* the feminism. All the distractions are just that. Each one of us that has the audacity to be real and to remain undaunted provides the role model and guide map to the next generation of girls who need us very much and who always have.
Not that you would care what I might think about anything, but I would just dare to observe that the next generation of girls just witnessed a sorority kicking out a woman member because she had a problem with a man in a dress using the women's restroom at her college (and this was the same woman who lost her potential college career in women's volleyball when she got spiked in the head by a trans-woman competitor while in high school). The next generation of girls is watching, and learning, that not going along with the trans madness gets you the short straw from both trans-women, and, from women.
Indeed. And I would observe that the next generation of girls is seeing in Ms. McNabb what a feminist looks like. Label these girls and women what we will, they are the ones in every generation who stand up for themselves and others despite risk of violence and yes, censure from other women. And I think they’re just as surprised as anyone to find they have to. They carry the fire.
The surge of the trans agenda has pushed back our progress against gender stereotypes. Why couldn’t the males who like makeup and dresses just be males who like makeup and dresses? Who cares? The acceptance of that is what should have been urged and applauded. So yes I agree that by saying that any man who likes dresses and makeup is a “girl” just says that real men can’t have those preferences, which perpetuates the gender stereotypes.
In my country we had a few men doing that and applauded by women. I’m not sure it gives any progress in itself for feminism but it would be great if men applauded diversity. I heard from Cory/Corina Cole of how trans identified men that are homosexual aren’t welcomed back by the male homosexual community the way that trans identified homosexual females are. It must be hard to have to relate to such rigid standards of acceptance. But that work is male work. Not feminist work. What I mean by that is women can feel whatever or applause however much at it but those standards will only change if men reflect and discuss.
Keep speaking out Jennifer as you speak for so many of us. The last thing I want to do is have to defend my womanhood to anyone. It is also not in my nature to tell others how they should or shouldn't live their lives but here's the rub for me. The trans part of the trans identity is what distinguishes transwomen from biological women. Instead of applauding the very uniqueness of their trans reality, transwomen aren't happy being relegated to this subset. No, they want to be women. That's like a gay man saying he is a straight man only he just has sex with men. Gay men aren't unhappy being gay men or being called gay. Lesbians aren't unhappy being lesbians or being called lesbians. They fought hard for that recognition just as feminists have. What's wrong with transpeople being trans and leaving it at that?
I completely agree. I now say I am a supporter of women's rights but I am not a "feminist." The sympathy I have for confused men play acting at "being a woman" through use of props such as make up, lingerie, dresses, hosiery, huge high heels and fake fingernails are deluded and deceived. The hormones they take (estradiol usually) put them at risk for grave health problems. I recently found out that the muscles in a man's pelvic floor weaken on exogenous estrogen, such that even without genital surgeries, they have incontinence problems. Because that means they'll monopolize women's lavatories as they deal with this, I see even this as a women's rights issue.
How do people not understand that thinking men can be women is just saying that men make better women than women do? Women can’t break the glass ceiling in business or sports unless it’s a man who says he’s a woman??? It’s nonsensical.
And I have never thought about your point on the Mulvaney excerpt where he aligns himself with a stereotype of how a woman might feel. Why do liberal women, or any woman, not have a problem with that?
It really is a bunch of gaslighting of women in general. And sadly the barrage is not going to end.
I think it might be dangerous to abandon the term “feminism” for what we (second wave feminists) believe in. If the transgender activists appropriate that too, we lose another meaningful, reality-based concept. But that's just my opinion.
I tend to agree which is why I stick with it and try to reclaim it.
Hi Erika
I have initiated “CAN FICTION HELP US THRIVE” to empower writers who create fiction with an overarching sustainable vision.
My book, “The Jacksons Debate,” is published under this banner.
“It explores the ethical complexities of interspecies relations through the lens of an advanced alien civilization called the Jacksons. The novel challenges readers to consider how easily a more advanced civilization might view humans as a resource, mirroring humanity’s own treatment of other species on Earth.
It can be found here — https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/228994545-the-jacksons-debate
Very eloquent.
I'm not convinced you should abandon the feminist label. Maybe women like you can reclaim it: As you note, letting men cosplay as women in ANY field of endeavor is cheating and straight-up misogyny, the opposite of what we were once told feminism meant.
On the other hand, though ... I had an interesting discussion recently with a Russian friend who is an ardent old-school communist. (A Leninist; soft on Trotsky too, but definitely not a Stalinist.)
He cast Bolshevik feminist aspirations in strikingly similar terms to your 'basic equality' formulation. He was appalled at what he calls the 'bourgeois' feminism (I call it 'second wave') that swept the West during the '60s through the '80s.
I'm a decade older than you, and my mom was immersed in all that, so I recall it well: Ms. Magazine lying around the house, lots of anti-male screeds by Andrea Dworkin and especially Susan Brownmiller. The latter - if I may usefully oversimplify - argued that all sex amounts to rape. You caught the latter part of that wave, 'hairy-legged, angry women marching to take back the night while hating men.'
My mom bought way too deep into that, and it destroyed our family. So I still have a big chip on my shoulder about those 'bourgeois' western feminists.
Maybe the feminist brand ISN'T salvageable. You're the marketing boss, I'll let you work it out.
You make too much sense to thrive in a large, corporate environment, where being reasoned and logical goes on the "weaknesses" side of the ledger.
Amen! I have always considered myself center right, though these days I find myself nearly 100% aligned with others who are “common sense” oriented. People who want to debate the nuances and complexities of issues so we can find sustainable solutions. People who reject silly “mantras” and exaggerations in favor of compassionate truths. I bet if I sat down with you for lunch, we’d find we share more viewpoints than not, and where we differ we’d have great, innovative discussions.
All of that to say, I couldn’t agree more that this current feminism movement steeped in identity politics is completely undoing the advances we’ve made. As a female engineer by trade and mother to a girl who loves to play hockey, I’m furious that I spend time worrying some nuevo-feminist is going to tell my daughter she’s trans. I thought the whole point was to reject the stereotypes and encourage women to be and do whatever they are interested in! And frankly, if I had a son and he wanted to be a figure skater, I’d feel the same about him. But he’d still be a boy. Mapping someone into a gender based on their preferences is the very definition of stereotyping! What nonsense. It’s so frustrating.
Come on, admit it, men win again!! We have got the AWFL (affluent white female liberals) women to fight for the rights of men to replace women.
I know, crazy right? They are also screeching to keep the illegal migrant drug dealers, rapists, gang member, terrorist, murders here in their neighbothods. AWFL crazies!
"They cheer for men stealing their opportunities in some bizarre form of Stockholm syndrome." This helps explain to me why women otherwise appear to be purposefully duping themselves as the helpless sycophantic accolytes of the "emperor who has no clothes."
"Celebrating decades-old “feminine ideals” soaked in pink and adorned with false eyelashes is not feminism. It’s misogyny." There's that, and from my male perspective, it appears that women's tolerance of this sort of thing is akin to the crazy notion that black Americans ought to have embraced Rachel Dolezal as black. You, rightly, are effectively chastising your fellow women for embracing a form of appropriation that no one would normally expect could be tolerated at all in any other context; e.g., even Native American Cherokees had zero tolerance for Elizabeth Warren's claims of genetic heritage (remember the claims she made about her high cheek bones?). It's not just observably insane because it is counterproductive to any support for actual feminism; it's also plainly nauseating, at least from the average male's perspective.
"When ESPN celebrated Women’s History Month with a special about Thomas, that is saying that a mediocre male swimmer is more accomplished than NCAA All-American women swimmers....It’s saying men make better women than women do." Glad you mentioned this. I have been saying, and not getting much support from women, that when they go along with the Lia Thomases of the world, women are actively aiding and abetting a beta-male's hidden, inner-alpha tendencies/desires. That should make any woman sick to her stomach, but the fact that it doesn't even make the average go-along-to-get-along woman even frown a little bit? Stockholm syndrome, indeed!
What can explain such women's failure to defend, for example Riley Gaines, when all of this is considered (given that it is so obvious)? Dr. Laura, in her long-ago-terminated radio show, might have explained it as: women feel that they would just die of embarrassment if they were to challenge other trans-advocating women on this. Sounds silly at first, but what else, other than a basic survival instinct, can explain such failure to defend any actual woman at a college swim competition?
This "dying of embarrassment" problem comes to the front of the minds of most women, and inhibits them from being persuaded otherwise, due to, in my opinion, the fact that almost every woman now has someone in their lives (whether family, friends, or acquaintences) who is raising a boy as a "trans-girl" and who has bought into the "trans-women are women" madness. The natural instinct is to be sympathetic, even empathetic, rather than speak the truth, because speaking the truth might terminate a relationship, and lord knows, we can't have that!
"I doubt Farberger and Rothblatt had to overcome such dismissals of their competence to rise to CEO status. We live in a world where men now win men’s awards and they win women’s awards." Bingo!!! This is most problematic, even to a man like me: they had all the benefits of bias/privilege during their "male years," and now they are benefiting again as "women-CEO's" such that the companies that employ them will never have to even consider you, or any woman, as competitive for that position; after all, those two companies each "already have" a "woman-CEO." So these companies get an ESG blue check mark for having a "woman-CEO" and another ESG blue check mark for having a "trans-CEO." A man like me can't possibly, truly, fully know how infuriating this must be for you, but I can imagine...
"It feels like we are living in the 1950s, when actual women are, once again, relegated to cheering for men from the sidelines. This is misogyny and there is no other word for it." And this is why it absolutely must be denied as misogyny by the the go-along-to-get-along women of the world; it is why they are compelled to shout "trans-women are women" because they simply would "die" if they were seen, or even thought of, as being "anti-woman." They've talked themselves into the notion that they are not being "anti-woman." They're not being "mysoginistic." They're being "pro-trans" - which is the "same as being pro-women" - and you, unlike them, are being a bigot! See how that works?
"But do not tell me this is an achievement for women." Sorry, but that is precisely what your are going to continue to hear, from women and from cowardly men, ad infinitum.
"And certainly, I will not accept that men, who are stronger and faster than women, winning women’s trophies are courageous. They are cheaters. That’s it." And that is why, if women's professional sports accept such men as competitive athletes (here I'm thinking of women's professional basketball - WNBA - and golf - LPGA) they will kill their already poor TV ratings. Men don't want to watch men pretending to be women playing sports against other women. This has no appeal to men who aren't voyeurs.
I’ve been able to get through to some people by describing myself as a “second wave feminist”. So much of what has entered the discussion since the 70’s and early 80’s is not what I call feminism. Thanks to Judith Butler and others, there’s so much distortion now.
yeah that seems right. there are those who believe that the 2nd wave is what caused the current situation. i disagree.
Yes. We’ve come a long ways from “Free to Be You and Me”. Mostly in the wrong direction.
What you've said here is really important. I don't think of myself as a feminist or label myself as that. It's become a meaningless term now, a thought-terminating cliche that ends up meaning whatever its user wants it to mean. I have supported women's rights and fought for them, all my adult life. But the elitist, condescending pseudo-intellectual scolds and self-hating white people who often announce themselves as feminists these days are not people I relate to at all.
Their blind support of idiotic post-modern nonsense like gender ideology, critical race theory, etc., and the endless blathering about who is "privileged", and who is not, is so ridiculous.
As a low-income woman who works hard every day, my concerns are not even on their radar. These are the folks that can drop several thousand on a weekend retreat or workshop. I can barely afford groceries. I'm a small-scale farmer in southern Appalachia who lives in a 95 year old log cabin. But according to these high priestesses, I'm a privileged oppressor. It all seems like egocentric posturing to me, and as far I can tell, these are the women who have sat by and enabled much of this gender madness to spread.
I'm old enough to remember when both the left and feminists cared at least a little about lower-income folks. Now they only care if you're brown or trans. I want no part of what many people mean by "feminist" these days. It also seems like this label is one that keeps many people from listening to what you have to say.
Awesome article! So well stated and I couldn’t agree more! Thank you!!!!
Nah, don't shed your feminist identity. Regardless of what may pass as feminism today, and who may claim the term, I think you are a feminist because you are a woman who lives, and has lived, oppression based on your sex class, and because of your feminist analysis. Consider the rest as likely driven by male entitlement, false consciousness and/or gaslighting.
Been there done all this. We need to keep our eyes on the ball, basic equality for women, and let the extremes knock themselves out. Slow and steady, focused on the goal. Which will never be reached by the way, because life. It’s our living and showing up for ourselves and other women that *is* the feminism. All the distractions are just that. Each one of us that has the audacity to be real and to remain undaunted provides the role model and guide map to the next generation of girls who need us very much and who always have.
Not that you would care what I might think about anything, but I would just dare to observe that the next generation of girls just witnessed a sorority kicking out a woman member because she had a problem with a man in a dress using the women's restroom at her college (and this was the same woman who lost her potential college career in women's volleyball when she got spiked in the head by a trans-woman competitor while in high school). The next generation of girls is watching, and learning, that not going along with the trans madness gets you the short straw from both trans-women, and, from women.
You just describe the mechanisms of the oppression feminism always fought until third wave lib fem came along leading ultimately to this situation.
Indeed. And I would observe that the next generation of girls is seeing in Ms. McNabb what a feminist looks like. Label these girls and women what we will, they are the ones in every generation who stand up for themselves and others despite risk of violence and yes, censure from other women. And I think they’re just as surprised as anyone to find they have to. They carry the fire.
You are so clear, so articulate. Thank you.
The surge of the trans agenda has pushed back our progress against gender stereotypes. Why couldn’t the males who like makeup and dresses just be males who like makeup and dresses? Who cares? The acceptance of that is what should have been urged and applauded. So yes I agree that by saying that any man who likes dresses and makeup is a “girl” just says that real men can’t have those preferences, which perpetuates the gender stereotypes.
In my country we had a few men doing that and applauded by women. I’m not sure it gives any progress in itself for feminism but it would be great if men applauded diversity. I heard from Cory/Corina Cole of how trans identified men that are homosexual aren’t welcomed back by the male homosexual community the way that trans identified homosexual females are. It must be hard to have to relate to such rigid standards of acceptance. But that work is male work. Not feminist work. What I mean by that is women can feel whatever or applause however much at it but those standards will only change if men reflect and discuss.
Keep speaking out Jennifer as you speak for so many of us. The last thing I want to do is have to defend my womanhood to anyone. It is also not in my nature to tell others how they should or shouldn't live their lives but here's the rub for me. The trans part of the trans identity is what distinguishes transwomen from biological women. Instead of applauding the very uniqueness of their trans reality, transwomen aren't happy being relegated to this subset. No, they want to be women. That's like a gay man saying he is a straight man only he just has sex with men. Gay men aren't unhappy being gay men or being called gay. Lesbians aren't unhappy being lesbians or being called lesbians. They fought hard for that recognition just as feminists have. What's wrong with transpeople being trans and leaving it at that?
I completely agree. I now say I am a supporter of women's rights but I am not a "feminist." The sympathy I have for confused men play acting at "being a woman" through use of props such as make up, lingerie, dresses, hosiery, huge high heels and fake fingernails are deluded and deceived. The hormones they take (estradiol usually) put them at risk for grave health problems. I recently found out that the muscles in a man's pelvic floor weaken on exogenous estrogen, such that even without genital surgeries, they have incontinence problems. Because that means they'll monopolize women's lavatories as they deal with this, I see even this as a women's rights issue.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGuQpt-i6O4&t=616s
I edited out part: I have sympathy for these men, but they are deluded and deceived by their movement.