In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Sex-Kitten Feminists

piny

Or should the term be, “fun feminists”? How about the good, old-fashioned “lightweight?”

So bitch/lab has some problems with Catherine MacKinnon. She elaborates on those problems in a post. Most of them have to do with rhetorical dishonesty–e.g. abuse of the passive voice. There are also places at which B/L believes MacKinnon has shown herself to be clueless about some critiques of radical feminism. Here are some of the things B/L says:

Speaking of “rarely documented,” one of the things I utterly detest about MacKinnon’s work, when I’ve read it, is that it rarely makes any direct reference to a specific writer or speaker. In other words, she’ll attribute a belief of claim to some amorphous being or group or something, but she never identifies who exactly she’s talking about. Funny that. When I first got in a tussle with radfems, that was exactly what I was on about: who exactly are you talking about when you suggest that sex positive feminists say x and so?

*Ahem* Sarcasm aside, who is she trying to kid? MacK is such an attorney with the deceptive rhetoric. In just this one passage, she manages to reveal that she just. doesn’t. get. it. Hello? When women of color criticize the canon of feminist theory, THEY ARE CRITICIZING the way in which their work was co-opted, stolen, appropriated, used, usurped, etc. while they, the women of color themselves, were pushed aside> Or, they were silenced and marginalized, relegated to the status of add-on. Not even a strap on, man! They were just used as add-ons, like tissue stuffed into a bra, as the lone representative voice to be included in the anthology of feminist theory. MacK’s statement ignores the way women’s studies and feminist theory texts focused on the issues that mainly concern white women, using examples of problems faced by white women, taking white women as the implicit standard of what it is to be a woman and what it means to experience oppression as a woman. . . . dot fucking dot fucking dot!

Now, B/L does not mince words. She is splenetic. At no point does she use the passive voice. But she is arguing. She is engaging with the text. Whatever you might think about her logic, or her motives, or her activities and beliefs on other levels, she’s making arguments about what MacKinnon is saying and how MacKinnon has said it.

Which is why it is just a little bit irritating to see this in comments:

wow, it sounds like mackinnon stole your boyfriend and said you have ugly hair. otherwise you wouldn’t have dissected this piece of hers by writing “what a retarded bitch!!” in bubble writing after every sentence (my outsider’s analysis, ala junior high drama, of this blog entry).

anyway, you’re right. she gets to be the “leader of feminist legal thought” even though she doesn’t speak for most feminists, or even most radical feminists.

Is it just me, or is there something just a tiny bit sexist about reducing this post to B/L gunning for a catfight?

17 thoughts on Sex-Kitten Feminists

  1. Pingback: Unwilling Self-Negation » Blog Archive » Sex Kitten Feminists

  3. MacKinnon annoys me, though I am not looking for a “cat fight.” I read about two thirds of her book “Only Words,” and the experience was like eating a sandwich made out of styrofoam. Kelley is clearly smarter than I am; to characterize one of her industrial-strength arguments as a mere “cat fight” is insolent.

    But hey, it’s the ‘nets. Can’t hardly swing your arm without inadvertently slapping a fool or a troll in “here.”

  4. No, it’s not just you. Yes, the drive-by sneer is nasty, unwarranted, and sexist.

    However.

    piny:

    Now, B/L does not mince words. She is splenetic. At no point does she use the passive voice. But she is arguing. She is engaging with the text. Whatever you might think about her logic, or her motives, or her activities and beliefs on other levels, she’s making arguments about what MacKinnon is saying and how MacKinnon has said it.

    That’s not a full description of what B/L is doing, though. Here’s her own self-explanation in a comment on this series of posts:

    it’s part of the “no more ms. nice bitch” series and, as such, i’m purposefully not being fair, or nice, or reasonable, or any such thing. why? because this book, the one that’s inspring these rants, is, itself, not fair, or nice, or reasonable, or any such thing.

    How much is “engaging with the text” supposed to be worth if the rules of engagement are openly and deliberately unfair and unreasonable?

  5. How much is “engaging with the text” supposed to be worth if the rules of engagement are openly and deliberately unfair and unreasonable?

    I think that “fair, nice and reasonable” in this context amounts to “civil,” not to, “ad hominems and intellectual dishonesty.” Like I said, she’s not being polite. She is, however, making arguments about MacKinnon’s arguments, and she goes on to provide textual examples of where she sees those problems. She’s not pretending that MacKinnon hasn’t actually made arguments. She’s saying that she finds them lacking. There’s a difference between, “That’s a stupid thing to say, and you’re a stupid asshole, and here’s why,” and, “You dizzy little girl.”

  6. I don’t want MacK TO BE THE SPOKESPERSON FOR Feminism. I want Twisty Faster to be the spokesperson !!!
    Where do I vote? Can we have a vote?

    No, really I want Amanda Marcotte to be the Spokesperson for Feminism, and Twisty to be the spokesperson for RADICAL feminism.

  7. Radgeek,

    As I noted also in comments: why don’t you run off to the editors of the book in question and pound on them for being rude?

    This started out — the series– because of the incredible rudeness of this book, Radically Speaking. I quoted a passage as to why it’s rude. I’ve quoted another passage in a post a few months ago. Search for Robin Morgn. It’s an excerpt from the article in that book, ‘Radishes, Light Bulbs, and the politics of the 21st century.’ In that article, Morgan derides socialist feminism, marxist feminism, liberal feminism, and cultural feminism as, essentially, male-identified.

    I found it interested, given the ubiquity of rad fem representatives in blogospher to engage in the exact same rhetoric. Repeatedly, rad fems like to call feminists who disagree with them “not really feminists”. A lot of people chalked it up to the unusual personalities of these folks. And yet — here I’m reading a fat read book with 64 contributors in which, yes, I repeatedly read that it’s male-identified thinking, it’s not really feminist, etc.

    From the editors of the book. From Catherine MacKinnon herself!

    The book, furthermore, goes on to make similar claims throughout. It is a diatribe against who they claim are feminist mouthpieces for the patriarchy: those feministsts, that is, who aren’t radical feminists.

    In this passage, MacKinnon basically says that black feminists critiques of radical feminism are, ooops, the product of their male-identified thinking.

    Now, I don’t know how much more rude you can get, do you?

    I’ve mounted a series of arguments against some versions of radical feminism, as well as other types of ‘monotheistic’ political thought. It’s part of a book I’m hashing out at the blog — no publisher of course. I’ve just had this raging book writing itself out, so I’m writing it. These posts have routinely tried to put the best light possible on radical feminism and these other forms of political thought. I call it sympathetic critique or internal critique (following others, notably Alison Jaggar), as opposed to external critique.

    However, when I read the foreward to this book, I said “fucket”. I’m not going to be nice while these fuckers are engaging in extremely venomous attacks on other feminists.

    Hence, the sneers.

    Quite frankly, any feminist theorist who thinks she can “sense” that the real reason behind black feminists’ critiques of rad feminism is that they are secretly male identified strikes me as a feminist that ought to get lots of sneers — regardless as to what her name is or whether she publishes it in the likes of the Yaw Journal of Law.

    Notice, of course, that I don’t take away her feminist union card, though I’ve sure had mine taken away by the so-called arbiters of what counts as real feminism in this here Blogosphere.

    * there are valuable pieces in the book. it’s not worthless. I am, however, quite annoyed with the book in the same way Elayne Rapping was when she read it. In her review she wrote:

    Radical feminists, she insists, are as much social constructionists as are post-modernists.

    But since these are among the most vociferously and incessantly argued points in the book, why did reading it make me so mad? Because every grain of truth and righteous indignation is confounded and obscured and sullied by the contributors’ nasty, disingenuous misrepresentation of their real differences with their “enemies.”

    Like I said, if you don’t like rudeness, why don’t you go talk to MacKinnon or the editors of this book. IOW, go tell it to a cushion.

  8. Now, I don’t know enough specifically about the range of opinion taken by people who tend to call themselves radical feminists, so I can’t comment specifically on the intellectual currents within radical feminism.

    That said, I’ve noticed a strong current in “radical” other political orientations that suggests that they fancy themselves the real deal, and anyone who disagree is an apoligist or a faker.

    Which I find very difficult to engage. It’s rude, it verges on intellectual bullying, and it doesn’t exactly make me feel like what I say will be taken seriously and engaged honestly. Which really really frustrates me, cause generally they have a point, and on that should be taken seriously.

  9. piny:

    I agree that there’s a difference. My concern is over just what “engaging with the text” is supposed to mean in this context.

    B/L:

    I’m not concerned with whether you’re “nice” or “rude” towards MacKinnon, Morgan, et al. What I’m wondering is whether or not you are trying to represent their work fairly and accurately in the course of criticizing it, given that you apparently deny this in the comment above. Maybe you meant something else by it, in which case my worries are misplaced.

    So, just to be clear, in this series of posts (I know that in other posts you’ve taken a very different argumentative stance), are you just saying that you intend to return rudeness because you think you’re getting rudeness from the contributors? Or are you also saying that you intend to return uncharitable reading, cheap-shot argument, etc., because you think you’re getting uncharitable reading, cheap-shot argument, etc. from the contributors? If it’s the former, then that’s my bad for reading too much into your statement. But if it’s the latter, then why would this kind of “you-too” argument excuse perpetrating more of the same stuff that you’re condemning?

  10. Knifeghost — HA! that’s my book in a nutshell — only it’s oriented toward the mechanisms of the theory — where, e.g., the theory engages in what I’ve jokingly called a “monotheism of thought”. Namely, where the theory tries to find the One, True oppression. I just wrote a series on Ward Churchill’s thought that would be part of it since Churchill wants to show that, not only was the US genocide of American Indians like the Holocaust, but Hitler found his inspiration in the genocide of native americans in the US. (Churchill’s speaking to the literature on the rise of fascist social movements. Part of this literature is to argue that fascistic social movements aren’t accidents attributed to wacked out leaders but are, rather, the result of a certain confluence of events: the crisis of finance capitalism, the mechanism of nationalist development, the rise of claims of a national identity, etc.

    Rad Geek — if you think my arguments are cheap shots, that’s something you’ll have to argue. Clearly, *I* hardly think they are cheap shots. My language isn’t kind. I’m sarcastic. I use lots of colloquialisms which people of think is rude.

    Do I intend to engage in the same kind of BS they engage in — the willful misreadings of, for example, poststructuralist thought?

    Hardly. I’m not really interested in making weak arguments.

    E.g, throughout this first section they keep saying, “We’re just as much social constructionists as the Pomos!”

    Um, yeah. The “pomos” (whatever they mean by that) are typically *criticizing* social constructionist thought. I just did a preview review of the article by Tania Lienart in which she defends rad fems against the charge of biological essentialism, which she apparently thinks is the thrust of critiques of rad fem essentialism (it’s not) by laying out how rad fems are *cultural* essentialists.

    No. I’m not really interested in making those kinds of arguments. It’s pretty weak tea, especially if, like Lienart, you just fill up a barrel with water and a bunch of fish and hand your critics a shotgun.

  11. “why would this kind of “you-too” argument excuse perpetrating more of the same stuff that you’re condemning?”

    That’s exactly it.

    “given the ubiquity of rad fem representatives in blogospher to engage in the exact same rhetoric. Repeatedly, rad fems like to call feminists who disagree with them “not really feminists”. A lot of people chalked it up to the unusual personalities of these folks.”

    This snide little passage is a smear. There is no argument about content here. Next thing you know she’ll be going Malkin on radfems by describing them is “unhinged.” Or perhaps that “unusual personalities” jab already did just that?

  12. Oh, and Bitch Lab,

    I’m sure you’ll have no trouble getting your book published. Any book that attacks feminists, rad or no, gets published no matter what, no need for research or facts or anything. Just ask Kate Rophie!

    Books that support feminism however, not so much.

  13. I’m sure you’ll have no trouble getting your book published. Any book that attacks feminists, rad or no, gets published no matter what, no need for research or facts or anything. Just ask Kate Rophie!

    Oh give me a break. It’s offensive and rather silly to compare B/L to Katie Roiphe.

    Rad fems do not own feminism, any more than any other kind of feminist does, and criticizing radical feminism isn’t the same as “attacking feminism,” any more than rad fems’ constant critiques of other feminists constitute attacks on feminism. And you know, I really believe that any healthy movement has to have room for internal debate. We can argue about how to handle that debate so that it’s productive, but the debate is absolutely vital. Consensus is a sign of intellectual stagnation.

  14. This snide little passage is a smear. There is no argument about content here. Next thing you know she’ll be going Malkin on radfems by describing them is “unhinged.” Or perhaps that “unusual personalities” jab already did just that?

    Um, yes, there is. If I argued that, “Sean Hannity and other conservative pundits consistently use eliminationist rhetoric, and imply that to be liberal is to be unamerican,” I’d be arguing about their content. She’s saying that radical feminists say that unless you’re a radical feminist, you’re not a real feminist. The title and opening lines of my post refer to “fun feminists,” which is a term radical feminists at the Margins use to refer to feminists like Amanda Marcotte.

    I’m sure you’ll have no trouble getting your book published. Any book that attacks feminists, rad or no, gets published no matter what, no need for research or facts or anything. Just ask Kate Rophie!

    …What Sally said, for fuck’s sake. And I’ve got a reprinted copy of The Transsexual Empire here that says that radical feminists don’t always need to do their research, either.

  15. After denouncing this line as a contentless smear by bitchlab:

    Repeatedly, rad fems like to call feminists who disagree with them “not really feminists”

    gayle concludes:

    I’m sure you’ll have no trouble getting your book published. Any book that attacks feminists, rad or no, gets published … Books that support feminism however, not so much.

    Way to prove BL’s point!

  16. B|L: I haven’t read enough Churchill to be familiar with that argument, but I agree that (on the face of it) it’s consistent with “Monotheism of thought”. Which, again, is a damn shame. He makes a great deal of sense is a lot of other ways. I always thought of him as falling victim to another Deadly Sin of activism/radicalism/anti-opression, which is that he’s given to inflammatory rhetoric. I don’t care how justified that inflammatory rhetoric is, it doesn’t do anyone any good.

    When you get the book written, I’ll read it.

  17. B/L:

    O.K. I misunderstood you, then. I wasn’t trying to argue that some particular argument of yours in particular was in fact a “cheap shot;” I was asking about your intentions and the standards to which you’re holding yourself, given your own description of what you were doing. People often make cheap shot arguments knowing that they are cheap shots, or not caring whether the arguments are cheap shots or not, if they’ve decided that the situation doesn’t demand being “fair” or “reasonable.” (If you asked Robin Morgan, for example, whether she meant to give a serious presentation of cultural feminist thought in her one-paragraph mockery of it in “Radishes…,” I’d bet dollars to donuts that she’d say that she didn’t.) But since you didn’t intend by that description of yourself what I thought you might have intended by it, my bad.

    That said, do you realize that criticizing the conduct or views of a vaguely-specified, undifferentiated mass of opponents — e.g. “rad fems” at large or “rad fem representatives in the blogosphere,” etc. — without making clear who and what you’re referring to, is exactly what you criticized Catharine MacKinnon for doing in your own post? I think I have some idea of who and what you have in mind, but I hope you realize that you are on much stronger ground when you’re referring to specific arguments that (say) Robin Morgan or Renate Klein or Heart or ginmar or whoever made than when you make these kind of statements.

    gayle,

    I agree about the smear on “rad fems,” etc. in the comments above. But it is unfair to compare the sort of intra-feminist criticism that B/L is doing, even when it’s mean and even if it’s unfair, to the hack anti-feminist polemics that are pumped out by Katie Roiphie, Warren Farrell, and the rest of the professional blowhard brigade.

    In some sense it’s true that any criticism between feminists involves “attacking feminists,” but then, that includes plenty of radical feminist books and articles that criticize other feminists, or other radical feminists. Some of those criticisms are well-founded, and worth making, others much less so. (The Redstockings’ Feminist Revolution, to take one example, has plenty of both kinds, and at times gets a lot nastier than anything B/L has done so far.) The criticism can and should be assessed on its own merits, not on who the targets are.

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