Not your mom's feminism

I'm making this a new journal post, following from my original feminism thread, as my commentary on this question is pretty in-depth. Here, I am responding to imbtween's challenge to the following statement by me:

The project of feminism is to challenge the legitimacy of the categories people do not choose, not to unseat the legitimacy of categories freely chosen

The reply from imbtween begins thusly:

Is that really true? Even in its most basic definition, feminism is about *empowerment* of category:female.

ON FEMINISMS

So, let's talk about the distinction made nowadays between feminism and feminisms. Yeah, I know, it's not a distinction made in everyday discussion, but it is a distinction made among feminists, at least those of the so-called "third wave".

We talk of feminisms to indicate that those who identify with the category feminist do not necessarily hold the same views about what feminism is or how feminism would best be enacted. We agree often on outcomes, but how we define and judge those outcomes varies considerably. We say feminisms to move away from the myth of feminism as a monolithic front.

We have the definition of feminism you put forward, imbtween. That's a definition of a feminism. It is arguably the definition of the feminism that most know and have strong feelings about (for or against). It most certainly is the definition of feminism that is the most etymologically sensible, given the root of the word being a reference very specifically to the category female, or perhaps more accurately characteristics associated therewith.

MY FEMINISM

What I might have said, to be more clear and accurate in my statement, is that "the project of the feminism I am most interested in is..." This would have at least hung a lantern on the fact that I was not, in any sense, talking about any of the feminisms commonly categorized as "first wave" or "second wave". It might still have prompted a very similar question from you nonetheless, but it would have at least been truer to my concerns.

In other words, what I'm speaking of, well, is "Not Your Mom's feminism."

For those more interested in some of the ways different feminisms might be thought about,there's a useful test here on OkCupid that explores this.

This, of course, begs the question: Well, if you aren't really talking about what most people understand by the term "feminism", then why don't you call it something else?

Well, because no one has come up with a better name, for starters. :/

More to the point, the tools we use in the various feminisms to enact those various feminisms are largely the same. We're drawing on the same methods of inquiry, and once again, we're seeking much the same outcomes, whatever we define our feminism as, even if we don't articulate those outcomes according to the same yardsticks.

ON SAYING SOMETHING NEW

Which brings me to the next part of your comment.

This is not a leveling of categories to the point where all are "equal", but it is an enhancement of a specific category that members and sympathizers believe has been treated, categorically, unequally.

So, before, you used the word "empowerment", and here you invoke "equal" and also, although not yourself quoting it, "leveling". I would note that I have yet to use any of these terms in my arguments (except to talk about persons choosing to be unequal), and I don't expect that I will do. Those are yardsticks of a different feminism from the one that interests me.

I will draw the reader's attention back to my tirade against protests as broken records, just briefly. These terms are examples of where we aren't saying anything new, on either side of the argument. Those words had power (we'll get to empowerment in a moment) when they were first brought forward in political action. Now they just sound trite to those who have stopped listening, and sound obvious to those who can't understand why people won't listen to them.

ON EMPOWERMENT

My feminism is not spoken in terms of "empowerment", because I am neither seeking to obtain the tools to take political action previously denied me nor to give such tools to others previously so denied. There is a place for empowerment, and many worthy organizations engaged in that work every day, but as a political innovation... well, the patent rights have pretty much expired on that one. (Yet, even aspirin is still useful as a generic, of course.)

I'm much more interested in designing, validating, and distributing tools that will enable those already acting politically to act more effectively, and will encourage those not presently acting politically--not because they have been denied, but because it's a lot of work they're not inclined to do--to being doing so, using tools that require less effort than what came before.

Whatever this is, "empowerment" is a poor term for it. Perhaps I'll start calling it "enleverment", as that continues the physics metaphor at the root of em-power-ment, while capturing the idea of doing more with less.

ON EQUALITY

What about the term "equal"? Well, the equality question has already come up on this thread. As with you're earlier questions about choice and choosing, imbtween, I've, for the most part, not engaged the comments dealing in equal and equality, because, once again, I saw that as an argument with someone other than me.

Equality is a very useful legal fiction. By legal fiction, I do not mean that it is false. Rather, a legal fiction is something used in legislatures and courtrooms to organize the performance of the law. It doesn't have to be demonstrably true, because it is what is used to determine what is demonstrably true, or rather what may be found as fact, to use the language of the courtroom. A legal fiction, in that sense, operates as a postulate or axiom does in logic, or a stipulation in contract.

Politically, however, "equality" has no where near as much force as it did back in the days when it was nestled in a triumvirate with "liberty" and "fraternity". Again, it's one of those terms that is either heard as trite or obvious (or perhaps both at the same time), and does very little meaningful political work anymore, so far as I can see. People aren't shouting it from the rooftops all that much, and when they are, no one much cares.

DECISION-MAKING

If not equality, then, what is the feminism, that interests me, about? Well, it's actually about something very much related to your initial concern in this discussion, imbtween. My feminism is about decision-making. Choice, which is the term you introduced, is interesting, of course, or I wouldn't have devoted so much of my last post to establishing my position with regard to it, let alone bring it up again the the comment renaissgrl so enjoyed. But decision-making isn't choice,per se.

Choice is an existential question, and I'm all about existential questions. I'm the Lord High Phenomenologist, after all. :/ (Groucho, where did you make that comment? I want to link to it!) However, decision-making is about the mechanisms of a body that open on to an experience of choice. It is what makes the existential possible.

Choice, ultimately, can lead us to arguments pitting determinism against free will. That debate has been going on for so long that I think we can safely agree it isn't going to be settled. People will still be arguing about it in a thousand years more. (Well, assuming nothing bad happens.)

Decision-making, on the other hand, doesn't truck that rabbit hole, and focuses instead on how choices happen.  (An example of this sort of research was posted on Seeking_uno's journal yesterday.)  Not whether they are free or not, but what actually happens when we choose (and by "we", here, I mean not just humans, but a much broader category of things that choose, or in the very least, decide).

My conviction (much more than a belief) is that the deeper our understanding of decision-making, the more readily we will be able to make enlevered choices, both in our own lives, and in our dealings with the political other.

ON LEVELING

This brings us to "leveling". Now this is a term fraught with problems. It deals in verticality, in hierarchy, and ultimately in the monological eye. It proscribes a spatial relationship between entities, having one of three values: "above", "below", or "level", where here level is taken as synonymous with equal. It further proscribes that such value judgments are empirically evident, universally discernible. Assuming the position of Laplace's daemon, it understandably riles up the animosity of those who put no stock in the determinism implied by it.

My own feminism is not one of making level, whether by propping one category of persons up or knocking another category of persons down (that does not mean that I dismiss out of hand legislative efforts to do either). Rather, the feminism that interests me is one of being present.

There is still a spatiality to presence, but it is not the spatiality that expects anyone to crane their neck or touch their chin to their chest. Instead, it is a spatiality of being with another person, wherever they happen to be, without reference to hierarchy or what is supposedly empirically given.

SEMANTICS

Let me finish up by addressing the rest of your comment, imbtween.

This is, admittedly, pure semantics, but when any -ism provides advantage for itself at the detriment of others, it is flawed. I mean, even the rats in NIMH realized they could not live ethically as long as they got by on stealing...

Agreed, on both counts.

This is pure semantics. That's why it's so important

What does it mean to be a woman, or a man, or a feminist, or a citizen, or a political actor? What does it mean to identify with or refuse to identify with a category, or a cause, or a story of who you are?

What does it mean to use words that have become so hackneyed that no one really thinks about what they mean anymore? What does it mean to listen to people make the same argument, once again, that we believe we've heard far too many times?

What does it mean when we use the same word in debate with another party, both sides understanding it to mean incommensurable things, all the while each expecting the other to mean it the way we mean it?

WHAT IS FAIR

Let me close on this last question, and a quote from George Lakoff's book, Moral Politics.

Children learn very early what is and isn't fair. Fairness is when the cookies are divided equally; when everybody gets a chance to play; when following the rules of the game allows for an equal chance at winning; when everybody does his job; and when you get what you earn or what you agree to. Unfairness is not getting as many cookies as your brother; not getting a chance to play; cheating, or bending the rules of the game to increase your chances of winning; not doing your job and therefore making others do it for you; or not getting what you earn or what is agreed upon.

In short, fairness is about the equitable distribution of objects of value (either positive or negative value) according to some accepted standard. What is distributed may be material objects--say cookies or money--or metaphorical objects, such as chances to participate, opportunities, tasks to be done, punishments or commendations, or the ability to state one's case.

There are many models of fairness:

• Equality of distribution (one child, one cookie)
• Equality of opportunity (one person, one raffle ticket)
• Procedural distribution (playing by the rules determines what you get)
• Rights-based fairness (you get what you have a right to)
• Needs-based fairness (the more you need, the more you have a right to)
• Scalar distribution (the more you work, the more you get)
• Contractual distribution (you get what you agreed to)
• Equal distribution of responsibility (we share the burden equally)
• Scalar distribution of responsibility (the greater your abilities, the greater your responsibilities)
• Equal distribution of power (one person, one vote)

Here, procedural fairness is the impartial rule-based distribution of opportunities to participate, talk, state one's case, and so on.

One of the most basic conceptions of morality we have conceptualizes moral action as fair distribution and immoral action as unfair distribution. However, different versions of what constitutes fairness result in different versions of Morality As Fairness. Equality of distribution is very different from equality of opportunity. Rule-based fairness invites a dispute over how impartial the rules really are. Rights-based fairness differs according to one's conception of what counts as a right. The communist slogan "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs," is a composite of two schemas: the scalar distribution of responsibility and need-based distribution. It therefore invites twochallenges: Is need-based distribution moral? And is the scalar distribution of responsibility moral? In short, seeking morality as fair distribution raises another set of thorny questions.

Another issue in fairness is what is to count as an instance of distribution in deciding upon an equitable distribution. Is it distribution over individuals or over groups defined by race, ethnicity, or gender? Is it a single act of distribution or multiple acts? Is it a distribution at a single time or over a period of history? Disputes over whether affirmative action is fair (and hence moral) are disputes about such matters. Both sides in affirmative action assume the concept of Moral Action As Fair Distribution, but differ over such issues. In general, conservatives and liberals agree that Moral Action Is Fair Distribution, but they disagree strongly about what counts as fair distribution...

FEMINISM IS FLAWED

If the -ism is about providing "advantage for itself at the detriment of others", it is, indeed, flawed. If it is about making moral decisions about what is fair (there's that decision-making again), in a way that recognizes that others are also making moral decision about what is fair, and not necessarily working to the same accounting...

Well, as I say in one section of my profile: "There are no character flaws. Character is what we do with our flaws."

The feminism that interests me, the feminism that I seek to enact, is a feminism with character.

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