Exactly Who Is Feminism For, Anyway?

[ETA 18 Apr 2008: I corrected a small, but very confusing, error in my list of constituencies that mainstream feminism serves.]

Not for sex workers, apparently. At least, not according to Sam Berg, anyway.

And not Janice Raymond, either, who I see is still sliming her crap all over the place. Losing the “she-males in cahoots with teh ev1l doctors to invade women’s spaces and bring down the women’s movement” war, are you, Janice? So now it’s time to attack sex workers.

What’s my rambling rant about?

Renegade Evolution, along with Jill Brenneman, had been invited to William and Mary College to participate in a debate with Ms Berg and other anti-sex-work activists concerning porn.

Well, Ms Berg is attempting to silence Ren (although, at this point, it seems that staff at W&M College are trying to counter that).

Plenty of other bloggers have written about this.

But, from Ren:

So, I guess, blog about it. I mean, how often have we seen this lately? Sex workers who aren’t “anti” are scary? WoC are “Scary”? Transwomen are “scary”? Lesbians into BDSM are “Scary”, and it is used to push them out, silence them, and keep them out of “Feminist” spaces and debates?

Enough is enough.

Damned right.

It seems like, for the most part, mainstream feminism is for women who are:

• White
• Middle-to-upper class
• Heterosexual
• Cissexual
• Able-bodied
• Neurotypical
• Anti-sex-work(er)
• Engage Don’t engage in non-”mainstream” sex (BDSM, polyamory, etc) or are asexual and are not asexual

(Ok, I fit the white and middle-class parts, but nothing else).

Just read Full Frontal Feminism to see what I mean; Jessica Valenti disappears most women outside that demographic, especially women of color (starting with the cover), and throws a pathetic bone to others. When I look at a “feminism” that caters to the above demographic, I have to ask: How can this possibly be “mainstream feminism” when it includes such a small number of women? Oh, because that small number of women have the power to define what “mainstream” is, and silence those outside the mainstream.

Yeah, “radical feminists” are all about the lesbian (and the “political lesbian”). But, when I look at a “feminism” that caters strictly to lesbians that otherwise match the above demographic, I have to ask: Exactly how is that radical? And when they engage in the silencing tactics that they have against sex workers, exactly how are these “radical feminists” any different from religious fundamentalists?

Look, folks, I’ve been pretty naive and, frequently, ignorant about the limitations of mainstream feminism until recently. But, after the mess that is the trans “community”, Amanda Marcotte’s massive appropriation of the work of women of color, Amanda (I’m not using “X”; Amanda outed herself on that thread) and Seal Press shitting all over the blogs and posts of WoC, WoC shutting down their blogs, the silencing of sex workers, white bloggers assiduously defending their privilege, reading able-bodied white feminists equate being an Aspie with being a sex-harasser (read above the linked comment for context), etc, my eyes are opening.

Makes it tough for me to be a feminist.