Feminism: It's All Been Co-opted

Isn’t it great when you read somebody who makes thepoint you have been trying to make for ages?

“If women's leaders seemed to ignore some of the murkier questions raised by the Clinton scandal--for example, what does consensual sex mean between two people so unequal in power?--it is in part because feminism at the very end of the century seems to be an intellectual undertaking in which the complicated, often mundane issues of modern life get little attention and the narcissistic ramblings of a few new media-anointed spokeswomen get far too much. You'll have better luck becoming a darling of feminist circles if you chronicle your adventures in cybersex than if you churn out a tome on the glass ceiling.”

Oh, boy, don’t we feminists know who becomes a darling of the feminist circles and who doesn’t. Incidentally, rambling on about class struggle and exploitation doesn’t seem to make the cut.

“But if feminism of the '60s and '70s was steeped in research and obsessed with social change, feminism today is wed to the culture of celebrity and self-obsession.”

This article got me thinking. So I want to talk about two things:

* The cooptation of the feminist movement by the forces of the status quo

* What the current “feminism” looks like

The Cooptation of Feminism

Ok, yes, the feminism of the 60s and 70s has been co-opted by the ideas of the status quo, but it's far from being the only one. The civil rights’ movement, the hippie movement, the anti-war movement, and, most recently, the environmental movement have all been rewritten, repackaged and resold in a more “harmless” shape.

Naomi Klein writes about this phenomenon in her book “No Logo”, specifically in the chapter “Patriarchy GetsFunky”. She argues that in the early 90s the political agendas of the civil right’s movement and the women’s movement were used to make brand-content and marketing niche strategies. In other words, the brands took a small part of what people were fighting for, the increased visibility in the media of women and minorities, and sold it back to us. 

While I agree with Klein, I would argue that this cooptation has been going on for much longer. I have heard of Coke using hippie-type ideas and images to sell its brand sometime during the 60s. And other people have argued that it was precisely the selling of commodities that undermined the very political movements of the 60s and 70s – people were “sold” what they wanted, and so they didn’t have to fight for it anymore.

Except, of course, that they weren’t. Because what people were sold was not, in fact, political change. What they were sold is something that appeared to embody political change.

We can see this another way: as people began consuming (well) above their basic needs, around the 50s and 60s in the rich West, marketers have had to imbue their products with “meaning”.  And the best way to do that is to leech off things that people already care about.

Most political movements of the 60s and 70s suffered this fate, not just the women’s movement. And this cooptation of political messages by brands and media moguls carries on to this day. You don’t need me to tell you that the environmental movement has been co-opted by industry promising to sell “green products” in exchange for extra cash.

We also have to look at the historical context in which all this happened. The political movements of the 60s and 70s were firmly rooted in the worker’s movement. In fact, that’s where they sprung from, if you believe the myth. So that when feminists talked about “women’s oppression”, they were trying to get a mostly male and pale worker’s movement to recognise that women experience a particular kind of oppression.

Now, the worker’s movement, not being easy to co-opt by “media” or “brands”, was dismantled the old fashioned way. And with it, the ideas that people’s oppression comes from the economic system, was gone as well. Without this base, feminism, like the civil right’s movement, becomes a hollow talk of “media visibility” and “empowerment through products”.

What I’ve tried to do is put “feminism” in context. It’s not just that the women’s movement was co-opted by “girl power”. There’s a whole process taking place here, aimed at hollowing out any political movement that may pose a threat to the status quo. This is powered by an economy desperate to sell more and more each year despite actually running out of things to sell.

So, what does feminism look like today? (I’ll be referring to that feminism described by Ginia Bellafante). 

Deprived of its core, base ideas of class struggle, economic exploitation, reproductive rights, power hierarchies, etc. feminism is reduced to a “feel good” pep talk. Without questioning the pillars of “how the world works” feminism has nothing to work with other than images, culture and stories. And so feminism becomes limited to little more than “changing your frame of mind”. In essence, this is how it works: if you re-frame your oppression as “liberation” or “choice” or “empowerment” it will become much more palatable. (Incidentally, this is exactly how self-help books operate). This is relatively easy to do because the system has always given people “arguments” to justify their oppression, and because, unless you are gang raped, or sold to slavery, your “oppression” looks… palatable, or you can, at the very least, dream of it being more palatable in the future. “If only I could re-think of my oppression as liberation, I will no longer be oppressed but liberated”. This is how the core idea goes. And it works wonders for feminist writers, who get some fame and cash out of the deal, and who can usually tolerate their oppression better than most.

This is what powers so much of the feminist blogosphere. “How I learned to wear high heels” is bound to get lotsa hits. Since the actions of one individual hardly amount to significant social change one way or another, this kind of thing spreads like wildfire. I have seen feminists post on how “empowering” X is and on how “oppressive” X is. Both cannot be true at the same time. Unless we define “True” as “what is true for you”.

A movement with no leadership, with no clear set of goals, and with a flaky understanding of what forces shape the world, can be easily co-opted by market forces and be reduced to what a few individuals think about their individual experience.

The solution, of course, is for feminism to go back to its roots. It's an oppressive system, and that means we can't "choose" to opt out. I do understand the desire to believe that we are not all that oppressed. But while we can be forgiven for "tuning down" oppression in our personal lives, we won't get anywhere if we don't recognize the forces keeping all human beings oppressed.

Marxism 2011 - What is Marxism?

Marxism is a festival, much like any other, except that it is based on political ideas. It is organized by the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) and takes place in the centre of London, in the UCL campus. It lasts five days, and it brings together thousands of socialist-minded people to discuss the ideas of Marx and other political thinkers of the socialist tradition.

Its purpose, I believe, is two fold: on the one hand, the festival acts to inform people on Marxist theory, and therefore keeps the tradition alive. This is important. Marxist ideas have withered out of the public discourse, and the texts are really inaccessible to a modern audience.

On the other hand, the festival helps people reframe current events within Marxist theory, so that they can understand better the “what”, the “how”, and the “why”. I am always surprised by the extent to which today’s events can be explained by something Marx wrote in 1867. I am also equally surprised by how much things change when “his” approach is used even in today’s “modern” world: the answer to changing the world always comes back to industrial action, of one for or another.

Marxism is organized much like a scientific conference. People show up at the University campus at 10 in the morning and get ready for a day of lectures on different topics. There are around 10 different topics to choose from on each given time slot, which means that too often there’s more than one lecture you want to attend and you are forced to prioritize. During the lectures, a speaker talks about the topic for approximately 35 minutes. After that, they open the microphone for contributions by the public, and people go to the front and talk for about 3 minutes. The lectures and the contributions are recorded, and are then sold at the end of the festival and/or posted online. A most fantastic collection of lectures is available on the website Resistance MP3. This is the distilled essence of the Marxism festival, and it's invaluable if you want to familiarise yourself with Marxist ideas.

This was my second year at Marxism. This year’s Marxism had a distinctive flavour. Marxism 2010 was based on the idea that “OMG, the cuts are coming and we must stop them because otherwise DOOM!”. Marxism 2011 had a bit more stuff to go over. There are the cuts, of course, dreadful on every front and they were covered in detail by the speakers and the public. There were plenty of references to the “Arab Spring” which was held as a victory for revolutionary forces everywhere. This Marxism had speakers from Egypt, Spain, Greece and Ireland. And last but not least, there was the Grand Strike of J30. Marxism actually started on June the 30^th, and the trade union movement was whipped into a frenzy about the power of the Unions and the Strikes. I can't say I share that sentiment.

These are the basics of Marxism. I'll try to follow this up with what was actually discussed and what I think about the whole thing. If you have any questions about it, don't hesitate to ask.

Marxism 2011 - Kate Smurthwaite

I am back from Marxism 2011 and, more importantly, I am now more or less restored from the stress of it all.

I have lots to say about it, but whether I’ll be able to say it is another story.

But first, let’s focus on what’s really important.

OMG!!! I SAW KATE SMURTHWAITE!!! And I have proof! She gave me her autograph afterwards!!! Look!

*grins* I have been looking forward to seeing Kate on stage for ages.

As part of the Marxism festival, there was a comedy show titled “Hysterical Materialism” which, for those who aren’t “in the know”, is a play on words of Marx’s theory of “historical materialism”. I believe the whole theme of the show is “lefty” politics, and comedians are explicitly lefty. I can’t tell you how amazing and strange it is to hear people on stage cracking jokes about Tories and how much we hate them. For once you feel like you are part of the majority.

We tend to think that comedy and politics do not mix. We are wrong, of course; comedy dwells into politics all the fricking time. We don’t notice because it’s the “default” kind of politics; meaning, it is mainstream and pro status quo. Now when you’re in a room full of socialists, all listening to a lefty-leaning comedian, you notice that the jokes themselves are not all that different. Instead of laughing at fart jokes, they laugh at Osbourne and Cameron.

I’m going to be brutally honest here: most comedians do not have the balls gonads to bring up politics.

Kate has the biggest balls gonads of them all.  The “field” of comedy is hard enough as it is for women, what with having an approximate ratio of 100:1. Not only is she a female comedian, which is hard enough, but she is not afraid of bringing up politics. Now, that in itself takes more courage than any comedian you see anywhere. But not content with that, Kate takes it up a notch and is not shy of spicing up her act with feminist ideas. That, my friends, is absolutely unheard of.

*

I have never, not once, heard a comedian, male or female, use feminist ideas on their act. Though I have heard supposedly “progressive” comedians make decidedly anti-feminist jokes. I’m sure many feminists will agree with me on that.

Why Feminist Comedy Matters

You know how we oppose rape jokes because they make rapists feel validated and reinforce their belief that all men are like them? Well, it’s a similar thing. When Kate makes a feminist joke, she is axiomatically assuming that her audience is on board with feminist ideals. The audience is somewhat “forced” or “coerced” into sharing her values if they want to laugh at the joke. This happens all the time, by the way, with all comedians. People can only laugh with each other and make jokes around sentiments and ideas they have in common. But when Kate brings up feminism, she is giving the impression that the whole audience is feminist and on board with her. So that when everyone laughs, those who are not yet feminists feel that everyone else is. It’s a sneaky but effective way to bring people on board.

If feminists were truly committed to the feminist cause, they would be worshipping Kate. Just because. We should have a Kate fan club with thousands of members.

It doesn’t matter if I disagree with her on something, or if one of her jokes doesn’t make me laugh. The fact that she’s there, when all the cards are stacked against her, should be enough for us to stand right behind her.

It's hard to say anything about Kate other than she rocks. She's funny, insightful and daring. She's also one of a kind. There is literally no one else doing what she does on stage. 

If I could send anything Kate's way it would be a huge bag of support and encouragement, with "keep up the good work" on the label. I have known of Kate for years and in all this time she's kept at it with a determination that should leave us all in awe. She is the living proof that the seemingly impossible, immortalised in the infamous cliche that "feminists have no sense of humour", can be made possible through the refusal to be silenced or go anywhere. 

Like I said, that takes balls gonads. And Kate has the largest ones of all comedians everywhere.

* I spent 5 days surrounded by socialists and let me tell you, for all the “lefty” sentiment, the atmosphere was far from being a feminist paradise. You get the same male-pushiness as everywhere else, not to mention the diminishing of anything female related. During the Q&A of one of the lectures a young woman had the audacity of bringing up the mooncup as an example of a more environmentally friendly approach to consumption. Cue in the males squirming on their seats. You would think they have never heard of menstruation before. I was so angry I felt like shouting and asking them to grow the F up.