Anarcho-Feminism & Anarchist Liberalism-Analysis

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Anarcho-feminism & Anarchist Liberalism-Analysis

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source - Research on Anarchism List

Fri, 28 May 1999 16:54:31

Anarcho-feminism and anarchist liberalism:Some elements of analysis

by Leo Vidal ([email protected])

This article was written in a precise context. As a member of the anarchistbookshop La Gryffe in Lyon (France), I co-organised three days of discussionin May 1998 called "Three days for the great evening". During thisconference, many debates took place some of which were on the question of

sexism. At the time of the last debate about thirty feminists protestedagainst the course of the previous debates denouncing the sexism of theanarchist movement and the impossibility of really discussing maledomination - in general and in the anarchist movement. Following thepublication by these feminists of a text exposing the motivations of thisanarcho-feminist action , four men of La Gryffe wrote a reply called"Anarchy and the women's movement" . The article below is based on thisarticle and analyses a phenomenon of a general nature: men, believing thatthey are the center of the world, act, think and write without taking intoaccount their status of dominance, therefore without taking account of thefact that they are part of a socially constructed group which is the sexclass of men. Thus, they consider themselves universal while they aredominant and they deny de facto the feminist criticism of the social

relations of the sexes. This seems to me incompatible with any claim of aradical left and anarchist nature, i.e. the opposition to any form ofdomination and exploitation be it racism, or lesbophobia and homophobia, orsexism, or capitalism....

Regarding feminist claims, the anarchist movement uses various strategies ofdefence of the male status quo. If the prevalent reaction towards feministsis still formed by denial, ridicule and violence, another strategy passes bya liberal discourse celebrating the diversity from the points of view. Therecognition of the founded good of feminism is then limited to a right ofquite specific existence. It seems significant to me to analyse which placeanarchist men leave, grant, give to feminism and to show the reactionary

functions of the liberal discourse - discourse which is not limited to theanarchist movement but which is even more unacceptable there considering theanarchist will to fight against any form of domination.

A first formal element expresses very well the negation of the male positionof dominance. Indeed, the four male signatories develop throughout theirtext a position of neutrality, of exteriority, even of objectivity via "itwas up to us", "the difficulty of getting us together", "we". The text doesnot practically anywhere express the located position of the authors: noreference is made to their statute of dominance. This quite particularposition of dominance is thus made invisible even as it is the prerequisitefor men to develop a discourse celebrating diversity. Indeed what thedominant ones can perceive as diversity of perspectives is lived by

dominated like the absence of freedom and real diversity. It is thus not amistake that the neutral and plural French "we" (on and nous respectively)criss-cross this text: they express the blindness of these men towards their


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particularity, the specificity of domination and, logically, towards thedomination to which women are subjected.

If these men do not recognise themselves in their position of dominance,they are nonetheless - in the same way as myself. We benefit from the maledomination which structures the entire society and often actively perpetuateit through our way of speaking, glance, behaviour.... Our life is more

pleasant due to the exploitation of women (e.g. their domestic, relational,communicative services) and we have more choices due to the restriction ofthe choices of women (e.g. the fact that women do the domestic and breedingof children work is the condition of our success on the educational,professional and activist level). However these men take a different pathfrom the profeminists by choosing to make invisible their status ofdominance and to deny the deeply socio-political nature of male dominationby developing this discourse:

"The anarchist days were open, without exclusive, like the project of Gryffewants it, with all the components and points of view of the anarchistmovement. However, some of them regard the women's struggle as secondary or

do not perceive the importance of their stakes. Others, more marked still,denounce feminism, consider, from their point of view, than feminism islocked up in a sectarian and particularist dead end that opposes aquestioning of the social order and, finally, that is detrimental to Women'sLiberation. It is like that. All these points of view equally contribute tothe composition of the anarchist movement..."

This discourse is a liberal discourse and non-anarchist in my eyes becauseit attributes an equivalent value to thoughts which are opposed to thedomination and the exploitation of women as to thoughts which deny or makeinvisible this domination. It does not seem necessary to me to show that theanarchist movement has known and possesses tendencies that are anti-Semitic,misogynist, revisionist and that it is necessary to fight against these

tendencies in the same way which it is necessary to fight against theanti-Semitism, the misogyny or the revisionism of our Western society.However it is the opposite which these men defend with regard to feminism.Feminism is, according to them, the expression of a point of view, of acurrent of thought like are for example anti-organisational anarchism,anarchist individualism, anarcho-syndicalism and it would deserve the sameconsideration as the anti-feminism of certain anarchists.

I have some difficulties with understanding what founds this categorisation:what makes it possible to put feminism among the various anarchisttendencies and not among these political minimal requirements which areanti-racism or anti-capitalism? In my opinion, no reasoning can justify thisand only the not-recognition of one's dominant position allowsdepoliticizing to this point the anarchist feminist analyses, delegitimizinganarchist feminist actions and to thus rationalise the defence of one's maleinterests. Because, in my opinion, it is all about this: the celebration ofa certain diversity as long as it does not call into question the authors asmen benefiting of an exploitative system.

Moreover, this celebration of diversity is quite relative because it islimited to discourse and does not relate at all to the implementation ofthis discourse. Because the concrete application would touch the concreteinterests of the dominant ones - as the feminist intervention during theanarchist days of May testifies. In the same way, the powers in place in ourWestern society allow a relative diversity of discourses - even the

expression of major criticisms of this system - as long as these discoursesremain discourses and are not applied in order to transform the concreteorganisation of the society, as long as the rules of the game are not


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changed. "Think what you want, express it, comply with the rules that we fixand all is for best in Brave New World". How can one articulate on the onehand the development by the dominant ones of a precise and strict regulationof social relations and on the other hand the fact that they develop aliberal discourse celebrating diversity? Would this discourse be adecoration behind which a precise machinery functions crushing some for thebenefit of the others? It thus seems to me that the fundamental stake behind

all these words is the defence of a male status quo. The refusal of apersonal and collective questioning. The refusal of a criticism of oneselfas dominant. The refusal of a concrete change of relations within theanarchist movement - for the benefit of women and not of men. It is for thatreason that the authors write:

"Because they are due to the totality of social relations, to the totalityof the social order wherein we live and to the roots of this order,dominance included in male/female relations, like all other relations ofdominance, cannot be solved locally, inside a collective whatever it is(even non-mixed paradoxically). To set this as the top priority inside thiscollective is an absurd and impossible task which, instead of freeing, and

exactly because of its impossibility, multiplies on the contrary, as doreligious groupings, the instruments and the relations of oppression."[emphasis added]

This reminds me of the liberal discourse concerning the criticisms ofheterosexism and lesbo/homophobia: "Me, I am not homophobic. Queers have theright to live their life... but they shouldn't touch me or my children!Because me, I am not a faggot!" A social domination is recognised and at thesame time one does not want to know oneself implied, touched, directlyconcerned even co-responsible. A more anarchist answer - in my opinion -would be to recognise ourselves as sexist, heterosexist and to try tounderstand in what way we are it and how we can act on it - by listening tothe principal ones concerned, the feminists, the lesbians. As writes

Fabienne in her text in number 12 of the revue La Griffe, there is a job tobe done, and it starts with the public recognition of the problem.

It is necessary for us to work at an autonomous temporary zone of lessdomination, instead of defending in an egoistic way a permanent zone of notfighting against the domination. Isn't this paradoxical for anarchists todeny at this point any possibility of liberating experiences within acollective or movement? These experiments do take place concerning informalpower via the rotation of tasks, the turns of speaking, the refusal ofpermanent mandates. Why couldn't one try today to transform the socialrelations between the sexes within our movement? It is not a question, asthe authors affirm in a quite reducing way, to make it "the primaryobjective" but to make it a significant objective among others. And it isexactly that which fear these men in my opinion: of having to put concretequestions about their behaviour and attitude to change them according to thefreedom of the others; to have to pass over a male selfishness to go towardswomen and their multiple claims of justice.

Rather than to denounce with arrogance the so-called "fetishism,communautarism, separatism" of the anarcho-feminists, we should startperceiving the male fetishism centred around the penis and the bollocks -fetishism which can be observed easily through the multiple phantasms ofcastration which are not long in being expressed when the woman-menrelations are questioned. Of deconstructing male communautarism and its malesolidarity beyond ideological differences. It's this male solidarity that

makes men nearly always form a front against women and feminism. And aconcrete example confirms in my opinion that this solidarity is asignificant stake. I often heard anarchist men express their rejection of


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the "politically correct" and to assert the right to a sexist joke, amisogynist or lesbophobic insult - in the name of the freedom of expression.However, the stake is not as much freedom of expression but male solidarity:"humour (sexist, racist, homo/lesbophobic...), in the adhesion which itrequests, translates the power relations between social groups, and by thesame one between individuals."

The liberal response to feminism succeeds this inversion which consists inparticularising a claim of justice and in making invisible a relation ofdomination by posing like neutral an unjust state of things. The goal ofthis article is thus twofold. On the one hand, to show at which point theliberal discourse serves anarchist men in their refusal of feminism in it'sglobal and transversal dimension. It is used to lock up the feministanalysis in the field of tastes and colours. It amounts, concretely, toputting on an equal footing on the one hand analyses who allot theresponsibility for domestic male violence against women to these same women(provocation, masochism...) and on the other hand analyses who perceive thisviolence as an element of political repression against women on behalf ofthe class of men. In an ultimate way, it is an apology for the law of the

strongest for which reason does not have any reason to exist. On the otherhand, the aim of this article is to actively contribute to a state whereinfeminism is not regarded any more as a perspective but as a politicalminimal requirement. Our education of dominance is omnipresent andstructures us but it does not oblige men at all to perpetuate our individualpredominance at the relational or collective level. We have the possibilityof acting differently, of opening up towards the analyses and feelings offeminists and of taking part in their fight against sexism - when they wishit. We can fight alongside women - even in a non-mixed way - againstinteriorized or institutional sexism. It is enough to be ready to break withthe egoistic defence of our interests of dominants and to break with thesemen around us who refuse to call themselves into question.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++Moderator/Moderador/Moderateur : Ronald Creaghe-mail : [email protected] : John P. Clark

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Anarcho-Feminism & Anarchist Liberalism-Analysis