A brief theory of radical feminism
A lot is said and a little is known about radical feminism. Before going into its definition, a brief context. This strand of feminism emerged at the time of the second feminist wave, around the 60’s, being directly influenced by the struggles that had been happening in the North American scenario — civil rights, women’s liberation and fight against racism. It’s important to notice the “radical” from the name, which is frequently associated with extremism and, therefore, is an easy target of many semantic confusion and criticism. In this case, radical is a reference to roots, origins. The choice for the name is due to the fact that radical feminism exploits the first condition of women, taking away all social and gender regulation which was added to the word by the patriarchy.
Acting as a political and social movement, one of the main goals of this feminist strand is to raise women awareness about the subordinate position they still occupy in society. In order to do that, radical feminists defend the deconstruction of premises, concepts and behaviors that are ingrained, so they can reach the origin of women’s first condition. At the same time, they work for the dismantling of the patriarchal system, responsible for the female oppression and sexual division. It’s important to highlight that, for radical feminism, patriarchy is the root of social inequality in all societies, being the main and oldest oppression system, used as a role model for others.
This system of power and male domination gives its protagonists a position of superiority in relation to the “second sex”, to women, which, for radicals, alludes to the idea of sexual caste. In this authoritarian and hierarchical model, men enjoy privileges, have greater economic power and are responsible for defining what means to be a woman, be it in behavior, in the way of dressing or even in ambitions. Thus, women, seen as a pre-conceived identity, are used as a control and domination mechanism by those who use it as a tool to impose social functions. It is in view of this reality that the radical strand defends the abolition of gender, or non-binarity, since it is from it that women receive social markers and a heavy load of stereotypes.
According to the Brazilian sociologist Heleieth Saffioti, “gender is a division created to discriminate which members are from one caste or another, the privileged and human, and the dehumanized and violated, appropriate. Gender is not identity. There is no immanent and transcendental ‘being woman’, patriarchy is a regime of slavery, and it determines that enslaved and subordinate people come to believe that they were born and will die in ‘being a slave’. If someone identifies with the ‘being woman’ as something inherent, they identify themselves with a ‘being a slave’, femininity. And that was imposed by the oppressor”
Polemics and its basis
Considered the cornerstone of radical feminism, the abolition of gender explains one of the polemics which surrounding the strand, that is against transgendered. Assuming that gender is used as a personality attribute and it is responsible for determining the social roles that a woman should play, those who seek to adapt the sex to the gender with which they identify would be reproducing and perpetuating a sexist and patriarchal logic.
“No radical feminist wants to prevent people from feeling or identifying with whatever they like. What we disapprove is that people born with the male sex impose on us a female model represented by female stereotypes. It would be much more dignified and honest if these men said that they recognize themselves within the standards of female gender, but not that it is these standards that make them ‘women’”, explains the radical feminist Eloisa Samy in the Brazilian book “Explosão feminista.
The strand is also against prostitution and pornography, for seeing both as products of the patriarchal domination. While the prostitution reinforces patriarchal definitions that women are a sexual body at the service of men, reaching them as a whole, pornography contributes to the objectification, humiliation and eroticizing of violence against women, which ends up stimulating sexual behaviors that lead to rape and sexual harassment cases.
In its essence, the radical feminism has as its flag the break of stereotypes of behavior, eliminating the social standards imposed on us and the hierarchy that still separates men and women. To this end, the strand advocates the end of the genders men and women, so that the biological body is no longer determinant in socialization and the oldest oppression system has an end.
*This is a translation of a text written in Portuguese
