One intuitive and widely held conception of feminism is neither ethnocentric nor justice monist. It is the conception, articulated in the early work of bell hooks, of feminism as opposition to sexist oppression. Oppression, according to Marilyn Frye is a social phenomen wherein disadvantage systematically accrues to members of certain social groups relative to members of others. Systematicity and group-based disadvantage are necessary conditions for oppression....Sexist, or gender, oppression is systematic disadvantage that accrues to a person by virtue of a membership, or perceived membership, in a gender--or as a result of a system of gender. Serene J. Khader (2019) Decolonizing Universalism: A Transnational Feminist Ethics, p. 37.
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It may seem to exclude opposing forms of oppression beside sexism, such as racism, capitalist oppression, or imperialism--or to suggest that sexism ought to be prioritized over them. Indeed, because of such concerns, hooks later changed her definition of feminism from the one I have jst endorsed to include opposition to all intersecting oppressions. However, taking the fact of intersectionality seriously, and opposing other oppressions, does not require building opposition to other oppressions into the concept of feminism (and, in fact, many intersectional feminists do not take intersectionanility to be a definition of feminism). Something does not have to be part of the definition of feminism to be morally urgent. Moreover, there is a reason specific to the project of this book for not making opposition to imperialism and racism definitional for feminism. Incorporating opposition to imperialism into feminism defines away the possibility of conflict between feminist and anti-imperialist goals, a conflict that is endemic to transnational feminist praxis. Serene J. Khader Decolonizing Universalism: A Transnational Feminist Ethics, p. 41 (emphasis in original)
Regular readers know I am interested in platonic feminism. By this I mean the family or cluster of positions that often simultaneously (i) deny political equality (and so defend forms of aristocracy or elitism); and (ii) insist that any privileges /rights and obligations you give to men based on some quality/property must also be offered to leading women who have this quality/property. Platonic feminism often presupposes claims about (iii) natural/heritable inequality of talents, but need not require these. Often, platonic feminists rely on controversial claims about the distribution of talents within populations and the symmetry (or not) of these between the sexes. Finally, platonic feminism is compatible with (iv) commitment to moral equality of all. So, often Christian or Muslim platonic feminists embrace (iv), while pagan ones need not.
Platonic feminism so understood has a long history going back to at least Plato's Republic (hence the name; I would be thrilled to find a female anticipation to Plato, so we can change the name). Men and women have defended varieties of platonic feminism, including Ibn Rushd (recall), Christine de Pisan, Thomas More, Marie le Jars de Gournay (recall also), Anne Marie Van Schuurman (recall), Margaret Cavendish, etc. I do not mean to suggest that platonic feminists are beyond criticism: some platonic feminists have been eugenicists and racists.
The term -- platonic feminism -- is anachronistic and does not require the author's familiarity with Plato. There are at least five reasons to be interested platonic feminists: first, it allows for the recovery of the (frequent) aristocratic women whose writings were effaced from memory due to the masculine conception of mass democracy (which understood itself as a progressive enterprise)--recall these posts (here and here on Olympe de Gouges) on Eileen O'Neill's Disappearing Ink. Second, it makes visible key features of pre-history of feminism, which now turns out to have quite significant length. Third, it turns out that platonic feminists often have quite sophisticated analyses of institutions of oppression and the mechanisms of acculturation of gender. Fourth, those of us interested in emancipatory (including feminist) project may well learn from the successes and not infrequent failures of platonic feminism. So, for example, some versions of platonic feminism anticipate what we may call (after Sandberg) 'lean-in feminism.' Fifth, such an interest may be a fruitful remedy against the widespread assumption of moral progress. The claims of this paragraph are, in part, an invitation to read my other posts on platonic feminism and a promissory note.
The charge of anachronism, while maybe true, is not fruitful. (I doubt that it is true because it also presupposes that we already know what the history of feminism is.) Today, I want to respond to the charge/objection that platonic feminism is not really feminism because it shortchanges women who lack the requisite properties/qualities it is willing to advance/defend.* We may say on behalf of the objection that (at least the female partisans of) platonic feminism exhibit(s) an incomplete sisterhood.
So let me respond. As Khader notes in her excellent book (which I will be blogging more about soon): while opposition to all forms of oppression is welcome (even required, perhaps), feminism is about opposition to sexist oppression. Often platonic feminists live in aristocratic and hierarchical societies where there are many forms of subordination and hierarchy. In such contexts, women can be oppressed by many social mechanisms and institutions. The question from the perspective of feminism is to what degree they are oppressed in virtue of being a woman (because, say, patriarchy, religion, inheritance laws, economic prohibitions, medical views, etc.). As it happens some platonic feminists were quite radical about proposing alternative forms of (egalitarian) political organization, while others seem quite at ease with various other forms of hierarchy, including forms of hierarchy that ignore the lived experiences of many women.
Now, to be sure, not all objections to, say, patriarchy, are feminist in character. For example, Locke is a fierce critic of (Filmer's political conception of) patriarchy. But the criticism is (to the best of my knowledge) not offered in virtue of patriarchy's oppressive character toward women.
Yet, one may still think that this response does not get to the heart of the problem. Platonic feminists are, in practice, primarily interested in advancing the political and economic interests of meritorious women.+ Nearly all platonic feminists assume, in practice, that this will be only a (talented) subset of all women.** This may not be a feminism worth having. I think the objection contains a kernel of truth and certainly invites us to reflect critically on a system of privilege/hierarchy. But to me the objection does not seem fully persuasive.
Consider feminist defenses of pay equality in professional women's sports or funding (stateside) for female college sports.*** By definition these activities are elite activities. In the case of professional sports that's self-evident. In the case of college sports there are barriers to entry along athletic and scholastic (and often economic) dimensions. One may object to professional and college sports on many grounds, including, perhaps, that they reinforce a social system of hierarchy (and celebrity, and for the capitalist critics a variety of exploitation, etc.), including many forms of oppression that victimize women. But granted our imperfect conditions (and Khader is very much theorizing for non-ideal circumstances), opposition to gendered/sexed pay-inequality and funding seems feminist even if it does not exhaust feminism.++
*Some version of this objection was put forward to me by my collaborator Sandrine Bergès.
+This is certainly not always so. Ibn Rushd, who can be misogynist, is quite clear about and opposed to the gendered oppression of all women.
**Kathleen Creel reminded me the similarity with W.E.B. Du Bois's The Talented Tenth.
++I should say that I do not consider myself speaking for feminism the way I do often conceive myself as extending liberalism.
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