A feminist professor of women’s studies, of all people, has suggested dropping the word “feminist” (at least when it’s convenient) in an article she wrote for The Atlantic:
When I was a senior in college and a recent convert to feminism, I bought one of those “This is What a FEMINIST Looks Like!” t-shirts, and it quickly became my favorite item of clothing. The lettering was pink—ironically pink, of course—and I liked to push that irony further by pairing the shirt with a skirt, and maybe even some knee-high boots with flowers embroidered around the top.
When I got married a year after graduation, I wore the shirt proudly on the first day of my honeymoon, while holding the hand of my new husband, our flea-market wedding bands gleaming. I enjoyed the confused looks from people who would stare at my shirt and then at me; I could almost see their brains whirring, trying to process the mismatch between the person in front of them and the shrill, angry, neo-Amazon that a feminist is supposed to be. I loved challenging that misconception, with almost evangelistic zeal.
Seven years later, I still have the t-shirt, but it now lives in a box of old clothes in the attic. I can’t bring myself to give it away, but I also can’t remember the last time I wore it. We are at an impasse, the shirt and I, and this stalemate mirrors another growing ambivalence of mine, one I have only recently admitted harboring: an ambivalence about the word “feminism” itself.
This is a surprising admission for someone like me. Feminism wasn’t just a passing college fad. I have two advanced degrees in feminist studies, not to mention a book on feminist literary criticism coming out later this year. I am now a college professor and regularly teach courses in our women’s studies program. And I still feel that new-convert fervor when it comes to naming and opposing forces of sexism in our society.
And yet, in my professional and personal life, I increasingly find myself talking about feminist ideas without actually using the word “feminism.” Why? It is exhausting to preface every conversation about combating misogyny with winsome, disarming anecdotes about how I actually do like men—enough to even marry one!—and how I actually haven’t burned any bras (and probably never will, because they are so expensive). I’m tired of doing this myth-debunking dance, and, weirdly enough, the conversation often goes more smoothly if I just avoid the “F-Word” entirely.
However, later in the article she suggests that the term still has its uses as an in-group marker:
Every semester, young women come into my office in tears. Much as I did, they are first becoming conscious of how terribly the world views and treats women. In this vital, fragile stage of life when they are just beginning to craft a self and envision a future, these students are simultaneously bombarded with damaging cultural myths about gender. They feel silenced, unheard, diminished.
In moments like these, feminism feels like a gift than I can offer, a word that represents the antidote to what wounds them. A word that can open new ways of thinking and living, not to mention a vault of incredible writers, philosophers, activists, and ideas. I can still remember those initial flashes of discovery, and the way the label used to feel before I became exhausted trying to defend it, how it was strong and new and whispered a promise of change. Yet, as life-giving as it has been for me, the word “feminism” comes with a lot of baggage, and I know that if these young women and men choose to embrace the label, they will also inherit its stigma and the burden of trying to maneuver around it to improve our world.
I wish I had more to give them, more than a galvanizing but hopelessly divisive word for them to cling to, but, for the moment, it’s the only word I have. So until I have something better for them—and I want something better—I will hold onto my t-shirt and keep using the label.
Sometimes.
I’ve long thought that when feminism finally falls out of fashion, women will simply deny ever having been feminists, or even knowing what it means. Instead, they’ll just pretend feminism never happened, and go on about their lives as if nothing ever changed. And, as I get older and see the world more for what it is, I doubt that things will change all that much with or without feminism.
However, if anything, discrediting feminism will take a weapon out of the hands of the people and institutions that use it to disenfranchise and dispossess others, so it is ultimately a worthwhile endeavor.
We ought to keep in mind that what the author here is describing – the double-edged nature of labeling oneself – is something that can apply to men as well. This is one reason I have consistently avoided the MRA label. It can be helpful for rallying the troops and creating a sense of belonging, and it can inflate one’s profile, but it can also pigeonhole people and create negative stereotypes.
For example, when a woman calls herself a “feminist,” she can immediately be linked to Andrea Dworkin, the psychos who support infanticide, and nutjobs like Valerie Solanas. However, women tend to have a labile sense of group allegiance, and are excused for the same (I’d guess it’s innate), so it isn’t as much of a liability for them to associate with a particular group. For men, on the other hand, once you self-identify with some particular group, it’s a lot harder to disassociate yourself from it. This suggests that perhaps the most effective tactic for discrediting feminism lies in going after the men who proclaim themselves to be feminists.
Something to keep in mind.
