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Apr 29 2025, 12:55 AM
#3
(Apr 28 2025, 9:42 PM)Elsacat Quote:This does not mean engaging in petty infighting or witch hunts; rather, it requires a willingness to have difficult conversations and to challenge each other's assumptions, even our own.
I agree but I also wonder what that actually looks like in practice.
Good question. I assume both the "petty infighting" and "witch hunts" refer to the dreaded purity spiral. With witch hunts possibly being like, going through a woman's posts/writings/content and maybe "nitpicking" on bits and pieces for not being "feminist" enough. And along with petty infighting, I assume it can all be grouped into what is defined in
TRASHING: The Dark Side of Sisterhood as "trashing:"
Joreen, TRASHING: The Dark Side of Sisterhood What is "trashing," this colloquial term that expresses so much, yet explains so little? It is not disagreement; it is not conflict; it is not opposition. These are perfectly ordinary phenomena which, when engaged in mutually, honestly, and not excessively, are necessary to keep an organism or organization healthy and active. Trashing is a particularly vicious form of character assassination which amounts to psychological rape. It is manipulative, dishonest, and excessive. It is occasionally disguised by the rhetoric of honest conflict, or covered up by denying that any disapproval exists at all. But it is not done to expose disagreements or resolve differences. It is done to disparage and destroy.
She also talks about how to distinguish between politicial disagreements and trashing:
Joreen, TRASHING: The Dark Side of Sisterhood There is, of course, a fine line between trashing and political struggle, between character assassination and legitimate objections to undesirable behavior. Discerning the difference takes effort. Here are some pointers to follow. Trashing involves heavy use of the verb "to be" and only a light use of the verb "to do." It is what one is and not what one does that is objected to, and these objections cannot be easily phrased in terms of specific undesirable behaviors. Trashers also tend to use nouns and adjectives of a vague and general sort to express their objections to a particular person. These terms carry a negative connotation, but don't really tell you what's wrong. That is left to your imagination. Those being trashed can do nothing right. Because they are bad, their motives are bad, and hence their actions are always bad. There is no making up for past mistakes, because these are perceived as symptoms and not mistakes.
The tragic irony of feminists trashing each other is also a good read on "trashing." (It references this article by Joreen.)
These writings might help at least identify the trashing, witch hunts, petty infighting.
I think having difficult conversations and challenging assumptions only works when both parties are willing to actually see the others perspectives. There needs to be humility and the understanding that there can be deep-rooted reasons for another woman's understanding and viewpoint of a topic and may take time to unearth. And most importantly, there needs to be the common belief that both parties are working towards women's liberation. So even if they may not agree with each other politically, they can at least show understanding that the other woman is trying her best to help other women.
I think another thing is that sometimes a woman can be politically aligned with others in a feminism movement but as a human being, exhibits antisocial characteristics that makes it difficult to work together. I wonder if that is what happens in a lot of the examples given in the Joreen's trashing article. Like, all those women were part of "the Movement," how could this have happened so much? (This can happen in any social movement, not just feminist ones, but it seems very common in feminist movements. I agree with Jill Filipovic's "fighting over crumbs" analogy.)
I might be going off topic/rambling cuz it's late. I think the key, if one is trying to be "big tent" in a GC movement, is to keep the goal extremely clear and prevent scope creep. There needs to be a firm boundary. Fighting for sex based rights: a woman is an adult female human. Dress/act how you want, it doesn't change your sex. A mission statement that is unwavering. But then again, if the movement doesn't encompass all of what it means to be gender critical,
is it a gender critical movement? Maybe it needs to be called something else then. I don't know how much the GC movement got watered down as opposed to it just getting hijacked and misused by a louder "just anti-trans" group. (Like now I'm getting into semantics on if "GC" is referring to "GC" as "gender abolition" GC which was probably always "small" as part of the feminist movement or a new "anti [trans]gender ideology" GC which was branched off of "gender abolition GC" with more focused criticism on how transgenderism was a modern twist on promoting/enforcing gender roles, which was easier for the right-wing to co-opt into
just anti-trans.)
Okay I've rambled enough and it's bedtime.
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