#ti-grace Atkinson

[haggishlyhagging]

The reproductive function of a woman is the only innate function which distinguishes women from men. It is the critical distinction upon which all inequities toward women are grounded. It is, therefore, crucial for women to understand clearly what the nature of this function is, how it is to be defined, and in what relationship the reproductive function stands to a woman.

The reproductive function is a special ability, capacity, or talent held by women. This function is a property which determines their womanhood. The distinction between this function and the usual sense of property is that the latter is static, or primarily spatial, while the former is operational, or exists over time. The reproductive function has the status of property because of its definitive nature.

. . .

The Constitution of the United States, in the Fourteenth Amendment, clearly protects the life, liberty, and property of every person. Any legislation interfering in any way with any woman's self-determination of her reproductive process is clearly unconstitutional. It would interfere with her life by interfering with her person; it would interfere with her liberty by interfering with her freedom of choice as regards her own person; it would interfere with her property since her reproductive process constitutes, in the most integral and strictest sense, her property.

-Ti-Grace Atkinson, Amazon Odyssey

[thatsonemorbidcorvid]

“Men often threaten feminists that, if we're not careful, men will organize. They already are. It's called the Establishment.”

- Ti-Grace Atkinson, Amazon Odyssey

[autolenaphilia]

I don't have much of a stance on baeddels, because i'm not good enough at tumblr archaeology to have one. I have actually done research, because trans women are interesting to me. It seems to have been a small tumblr clique of trans women in the early 2010s? And they had some particular transmisogyny analysis? They imploded around 2014, after only getting started around 2013, as these culty cliques tend to do due to sexual abuse and personal conflicts.

But i can't get any firm grip on who they were and what they believed. It seems lost to time. There is not much evidence as blogs are deleted and are not archived well. Like this post tries to be a comprehensive explanation of who baeddels were, but if you check the sources it's mainly links to non-baeddels explaining what baeddels believed. There is like one archive link that doesn't fully work. The post is essentially third-hand hearsay. Of course I suspect the primary sources are mostly gone at this point. Because the baeddels mainly existed on social media, so much is erased or lost, they are mostly a memory at this point. It does feel like tumblr archaeology, this feels like trying to understand some early christian sect who we only know from accounts of people who opposed them.

Like the baeddels didn't publish books to my knowledge, or seem to have been in the habit of writing manifestos or explanations of what they believed. Like it's not with radfems where you can easily read Shulamith Firestone's The Dialectic of Sex or Ti-Grace Atkinson or Janice Raymond to find out what kind of bullshit they were on.

I'm not convinced the baeddels were like a distinct movement with a well-defined ideology, as that post linked above seems to argue. That they explicitly believed that gender is a choice and choosing to be a man is bad. There is just not enough evidence to do that. Like the primary sources the post have is screenshots of self-described baeddels making mean-spirited posts about transmascs. A lot of it is pretty bad, but doesn't create a picture of a well-defined ideology. I'm not convinced there was really a "baeddelism".

Like I haven't been convinced the baeddels were anything but a specific clique of tumblr trans lesbians who found out about the word baeddel and reclaimed it, believing it to be root of the english word "bad", had a transmisogyny analysis and had some bad, hateful rhetoric directed towards transmascs. Like none of that makes for a distinct ideology, no matter how incoherent.

Part of it that it seems that the baeddels were a relatively small group, that probably had an outsized impact on tumblr discourse. Like I've heard assessments that are like the core baeddel group was like 8-10 people.

The closest thing I found to a baeddel manifesto is this medium post which was published years after the baeddel clique seems to have imploded, and I don't know the connection the person who wrote it had to the original baeddels. I don't know if they thought this is a good summary of their thinking or not. Most of the text is defensive and presents what is basic transfeminist analysis as baeddel theory, which I don't think they can claim? It's not a reliable guide, especially being from 2017.

If you argue that baeddelism is something like "Transmisogyny exists, it's a real systematic oppression that transfems face, and yes, even TME trans people can perpetrate it", I guess I'm a baeddel? This strikes me as basic transfeminist theory, a basic transmisogyny theory as Julia Serano put it. If this is baeddelism, most transfeminists are baeddels.

And here I think the problem lies with "baeddel" as it's used today. They were probably never a well-defined ideological group, but tied together more by personal relationships (which is why they imploded when those relationships turned abusive) and some shared rhetoric. And a lot of what they actually believed is lost to time, due to them only being online and on tumblr specifically.

So "baeddel" has become such a loose word that it can be removed from the context of the tumblr baeddel clique and applied as an insult to practically anyone. The way I seen it used it often means "transfem who writes mean things about transmascs". But more worrying is that basic transfeminist analysis/transmisogyny theory or criticism of transmisogyny perpetrated by tme trans people are labeled as "baeddel".

It seems similar to how people don't have a good handle on who radfems/terfs actually are and what they are, so they label basic feminist analysis as "terfy" or define terf as "self-proclaimed feminist who hates men". I have written extensively about radfems here.

The post about baeddels I linked above actually does this kind of thing to the baeddels. It calls them "transinclusive radical feminists" and describe their ideology as radfem. Which I strongly doubt is true. That's because radfem ideology defines womanhood through biological essentialism and believes cis women's biology is why misogyny and patriarchy exists. It's hard to have a strong transmisogyny analysis with that kind of theoretical grounding. Trans women are neither women or targets of misogyny when you define womanhood that way.

This is why "trans-inclusive" radfems are so often not really trans-inclusive. You can't really take the biological essentialism and transmisogyny out of radfemism, and have it still be radfemism. So accusing the baeddels of doing that doesn't really hold water. Baeddels seem to have had a lot of man-hating rhetoric and separatist ideology, but that is not what defines radfem ideology.

And I do mean it seems to be applied to trans women doing basic transfeminist analysis or using transmisogyny theory. Turns out I was wrong about baeddels not publishing books, because apparently Julia Serano was basically a proto-baeddel and Whipping Girl is the tap-root of baeddelism.

Like look at these two posts.

Calling Serano a radfem is hilarious. Like she is not even remotely that. But I'm actually worried about how transandrophobia/misandry people have this view that Serano and Whipping Girl are this fountainhead of evil "transandrophobia", based mostly on some bad quotes. Because if you cancel Serano and Whipping Girl, it's a way of canceling transmisogyny theory, because Whipping Girl basically created the concept. I'm not saying that criticism and disagreement of Serano and her ideas are bad, but there is this attempt at canceling her. Due to transmisogyny, any mistakes a trans woman make are magnified and used as part as an attempt to destroy her career and isolate her from community. And Serano being such a major transfeminist that it would be a major loss.

And trying to describe her as baeddel-ascent is especially telling. The word is then entirely disconnected from the tumblr clique who claimed the word and whose crimes (which i do not necessarily deny) gave the word its modern power as an insult.

Two more screenshots:

The term is so vaguely defined that this kind of paranoia worries me. Like if you believe that there is this evil cabal of "transmisandrist" trans women still around, and not calling yourself a baeddel is no defense, I don't see this ending happily due to transmisogyny. The transmisogynistic current of call-out culture will practically get people hurt by this. Especially if it seems that critcizing transmisogyny, especially from transmascs seem to be enough to be labeled a baeddel.

The original baeddel clique might have done some horrible crimes. But I doubt they represented some distinct ideology that we need to root out of trans spaces, especially as no one can define and primary sources on what the baeddels believed is scarce.

And that's because of how online they were. I do not want to minimize any abusive content they might have sent, but it strikes me how insignificant the baeddels were. LIke they seem to have existed largely online and wielded their influence mainly on tumblr. They never seemed to have wielded any kind of institutional power. And that's not surprising, if you are a trans lesbian you don't have much power.

The actions of self-described baeddels might have been a problem, but unlike say radfems they seem to have been a very minor problem Like Janice Raymond was working with the Reagan adminstration to deny trans people healthcare, and in my country radfem groups today provide the Swedish government a feminist alibi for not taking action to improve trans rights. Radfems have had a very demonstrable effect on institutional transphobia.

You can't say that about the baeddels. And they probably were nasty to transmascs, but i suspect their greatest victim was the poor trans woman who was one of them, but who was raped by a leading member.

It's kinda insane how they, a small internet sect, have become this boogeywoman to wield against trans woman talking about transmisogyny, including major figures like Julia Serano.

[trinitycove]

LMAO so let me get this right; women who are het-partnered can't be a radical feminist and women who are pregnant/have children/want children can't be a radical feminist?

This is false. Learn the history. Read an article or a Radical Feminist text.

Incomplete list of heterosexual, bisexual, and currently/previously het-partnered Radical Feminists:

Andrea Dworkin

Alice Walker

Chude Pam Allen

Robin Morgan

Ti-Grace Atkinson

[cendrillonmedousa]

Notable, Present-day, Radical Feminists

As a second wave feminism, we assume that radical feminists are hard, if not impossible, to find in today's world. Here is a list of notable women you can still interact with today.

Chude Pam Allen, co-founder of New York Radical Women

Ti-Grace Atkinson, author of Amazon Odyssey

Kathleen Barry, co-founder of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women

Linda Bellos, first Black lesbian member of Spare Rib feminist collective

Julie Bindel, co-founder of Justice for Women

Jenny Brown, author of Birth Strike: The Hidden Fight Over Women's Work

Professor Judith C. Brown, pioneer in the study of lesbian history

Susan Brownmiller, author of Against Our Will: Men, Women, and Rape

Professor Phyllis Chesler, co-founder of Association for Women in Psychology

D.A. Clarke, known for her development of feminist theory

Nikki Craft, creator of the Andrea Dworkin Online Library, Hustling the Left website, and No Status Quo website

Christine Delphy, co-founder of the French Women's Liberation Movement

Professor Gail Dines, author of Pornland: How Porn Has Hijacked Our Sexuality

Melissa Farley, founder and director of Prostitution Research and Education

Marilyn Fyre, author of The Politics of Reality: Essays in Feminist Theory

Carol Hanisch, best known for "the personal is political"

Merle Hoffman, co-founder of the National Abortion Federation

Professor Shelia Jeffreys, author of The Spinster and Her Enemies

Lierre Keith, founder of Women's Liberation Front

Anne Koedt, author of The Myth of the Vaginal Orgasm

Marjorie Kramer, editor of Woman and Art Quarterly

Professor Holly Lawford-Smith, author of Gender-Critical Feminism

Dr. Catharine Alice MacKinnon, author of Sexual Harassment of Working Women: A Case for Sex Discrimination

Robin Morgan, creator of Sisterhood Is anthologies

Dr. Janice G. Raymond, author of The Transsexual Empire

Kathie Sarachild, coiner of term "Sisterhood is Powerful"

Alix Kates Shulman, author of Memoirs of an Ex-Prom Queen

Gloria Steinman

Michele Faith Wallace, author of Black Macho and the Myth of the Superwoman

Dr. Marilyn Salzman Webb, co-founder of the first feminist consciousness-raising groups in Chicago and Washington D.C.

Harriet Wistrich, founding director of Centre for Women's Justice

Laura X, led the campaign behind making marital and date rape a crime in over twenty countries

[ftmtftm]

I'm reading through Ti-Grace Atkinson's Radical Feminism (1968) throughly for an essay I'm plugging away at and man....... Radical Feminism truly does just suck on a foundational level from all angles.

The "us vs them" rhetoric has always existed in Radical Feminism. The desire to define an "enemy" against "all women" has always existed in Radical Feminism. The class reductionist rhetoric that claims the experiences of "all women" are universal and to argue otherwise "weakens the movement" has always existed in Radical Feminism.

And it just makes me sad in a lot of ways honestly. It's extremely limited in scope and narrow minded, but it makes sense in the ways in which it arrives to its conclusions. It's upsetting. I wish the world wasn't failing us all so much to the point of people falling into flawed, extremist ideologies like Radical Feminism. But here we are.

[madam-melon-meow]

VRISKA SERKET IS A BISEXUAL WOMAN.

This is Homestuck canon. She is a transgender woman. This is Pesterquest canon. If you can respect the one you can respect the other.

I understand some are attached to lesbian headcanons. But if yourr bedrock is to insist she experiences comp-het. A THING THAT DOES NOT EXIST IN ALTERNIA. A THING THAT IS NOT SUPPORTED BY CANON. THEN YOU ARE BEING BIPHOBIC. PLEASE DO NOT SPEND PRIDE MONTH ERASING CANON BISEXUALITY. IT IS UNDER REPRESENTED AND MUCH MALIGNED FROM BOTH OUTSIDE AND INSIDE THE QUEER COMMUNITY. BISEXUALITY IS QUEER ENOUGH. BISEXUALITY IS BEAUTIFUL. CHARACTERS LIKE KARKAT. VRISKA. TEREZI. DAVE. ROXY. ERIDAN. GAMZEE. THESE HAVE ALL EXPRESSED BISEXUALITY. IT IS CRUELTY OF THE HIGHEST ORDER TO BE BADGERED BY COMP HET THEORIES ABOUT CANONICAL BISEXUAL CHARACTERS. IF YOU DISAGREE WITH THIS MESSAGE I AM SORRY BUT I REFUSE TO SIMPER AND KOWTOW REGARDING MY SEXUALITY. BISEXUALITY SHOULD NOT BE ERASED. IF YOUR DAVE HEADCANON RESTS ON OVERCOMING INTERNALIZED HOMOPHOBIA THEN BISEXUALITY DOES NOT PREVENT THAT. SIMPLY RELABEL IT INTERNALIZED BIPHOBIA. BUT COMP HET WAS COINED BY ADRIENNE RICH-

~~~~~~~

A (transphobe, if you cant figure this out from the rad fem rhetoric) proponent of the belief that all women can be lesbians regardless of sexual orientation by identifying as a “woman-identified woman”, aka thst the woman’s focuses are on the needs and emotions of other women. This belief is A core component of the lesbian separatist movement began in the 1970s, which should be pinging alarm bells. This is the organization that believes women’s bisexuality , MY sexuality, is inherently anti-feminist because of the implied desire for penetration, sexual dominance, and submission. This woman stated that women due to their socialization could not ever freely “choose” to enter a hetero relationship, that coercion was ever-present. Her words imply bisexual women (and others socialized as girls while growing up) have inherent lack of agency, erasing the freedom and truth of our love for what can be perceived as straight relationships. Ti Grace Atkinson said “ feminism is a theory, lesbianism is a practice.” Lesbian separatists take this to mean Feminism is the theory and lesbianism is the practice, reflecting an assumption that lesbianism is the purest and most desirable manifestation of feminism, and that bisexuality thus is sullied and impure. Compulsory heterosexuality was coined by a TERF for the inherent purpose of invalidating bisexual and transgender women, as both run up against the terf ideology that all men are bad, that all relations with amabs are bad, that amabs are rapists in disguise and abusers on the prowl and to sleep with a man or anyone that could have been a man taints you. Bisexuality has always been transinclusionary. Those who exclude the one tend to exclude the other. terf theory should not be your bedrock of queer or feminist theory. What hurts one letter hurts us all.

S. Young’s “ Breaking silence about the B word“ has a fantastic paragraph about coming out as a lesbian and learning from other lesbians that my sexuality was considered a copout, that bisexuals were treasonous and would run back to men and leave the lesbians behind, that only lesbians had an anti-patriarchal sexuality, that we were buying into sexism by being bisexual. while gay men do not seem to view bisexuals as sleeping with the enemy as strongly as lesbians view us, there is still the presumption that a bisexual man is just trying to hold onto heterosexual privilege.  these views are not absent from fandom spaces.

Bisexuality is treated as a transitional category, as experimenting, as promiscuity, as being a liar and a cheat. To reduce every bisexual character you come across, to force them to “pick a side”, to comment on ship art of characters like John and Vriska as “generic boring and straight”, to similarly comment on art of characters like Vriska and Terezi as “lesbian favs”, to insist it is homophobic or lesbphobic when people push back against this categorization- this is cruel. This is biphobic. This is bisexual erasure. Andrew Hussie, no matter what you think of him, was very clear. They wrote a story in which an entire species is bisexual “by default”- where Kanaya is the only troll in a set of 12 to have a mono sexuality (albeit, while still displaying biromantic tendencies, at least in the ashen quadrant). Whatever issues you have with Vriska and Eridan viewing relationships with eachother and others (Terezi, Tavros, Kanaya) (Feferi) via the lense of their ancestors, that does not erase their bisexuality. (Vriska) canonically dated killed-by-Terezi!John , and followed it up with an albeit unhealthy relationship with Meenah. Vriska had a celebrity crush on nic cage, implied she was attracted to Karkat, and had a relationship with Terezi. Eridan flirted indiscriminatorily with most of his friends of both genders. Gamzee’s infamous flirtations with Tavros and relationship with Terezi exists. So does Roxy’s pursuit of Dirk and her insistence that Jane is hot. Dave pursued relationships with Terezi and Karkat, Davesprite dated Jade. Karkat caught feelings for Jade, John, Dave, Terezi. I could go on but i will not- there are many bisexual characters in homestuck, after all.

Many people view bisexuality as not committing, as not picking between “us” and “them”, as having “passing privileges” by finding an opposite gender partner. We are experiencing a time of great unrest. Do not return to the days of isolating aspects of the community, of infighting that weakens us. You see what rhetoric is being used against the transgender community, against anyone who dares to do drag, to break the binary boxes. Bisexuality breaks boxes too, by daring to love our own gender and other genders. By being unapologetically attracted regardless of sex. Fandom biphobia is nothing so serious as real world oppression, sure. You could say it is just another pin prick. But each pin prick makes me bleed. And I only have so much blood to give.

I see many musicians irl reduced to straight women or gay men when they have repeatedly expressed bisexuality. This is cruel. This is biphobic. This is not the move from inside the community i want to see. For young queer kids online, those experiences will shape them as much as bisexuals being kicked out of the gay organizations does those who are old enough to join one. Homestuck helped me understand I was allowed to be bisexual- i thought bisexuality didn’t really exist, especially not for women, when i was 13. If my first experience with homestuck had been being told vriska is a lesbian and is only compulsive about perusing boys, i would have never understood what i was feeling, because my crushes on boys as a kid, my relationship with men as an adult, those were not and are not a sign of being coerced by society. These feelings do not deminish or delegitimization my attraction to women. To say such a thing is to take away my agency, to reduce me to either an experimental straight girl or a lesbian who is “just confused”- the latter of which is rhetoric transmen and asexuals have aimed at them. This is a biphobic world you have been raised in. All i ask is that you do not impose the rheotric of a biphobic transphobic “feminist” on characters and people like me. This a shitty rant, but i needed to say it.

[oldnewyork]

“Ti-Grace Atkinson, a leader in the feminist movement, is taken into custody outside President Richard Nixon’s campaign headquarters in New York on Oct. 23, 1972, while protesting the president’s positions on child care and abortion. The landmark Roe v. Wade decision would come down three months later.”

[verpaso]

A season 6 pirates scene idea I don’t want to put on my writing/art blog

[Ezra stands before a door on a ship. His hands are tied behind his back, and on each side of him there is a soldier. The soldier on the left has his hand clamped hard around Ezra’s upper arm. Ezra’s face is hardened and glaring.]

ATKINSON: Let him in.

[The soldier to the right opens the door, and Ezra is forced inside, though he snarls at the soldier as he’s forced to take a seat as well.

He sits across from Atkinson at a desk, unaware of who he is. Atkinson is stiff and silent, just staring, maybe analyzing. The room is a captain’s quarters, very neat, though the walls host several guns and blades. A large map hangs on the back wall, various pins stuck into it. The desk is littered with papers and navigation equipment.

Ezra’s eye catches on a small crystal skull, being used as a paperweight. He inhales in recognition.]

EZRA: You’ve been to Dead Man’s Cove.

ATKINSON: Yes, rather. [He picks up the skull, and ponders it.] A long time ago, now.

EZRA: [Sneers.] Now you’ve grown old. Is that your game? Reliving your glory days?

[Atkinson sets the skull down between them, facing Ezra, with a harsh slam.]

ATKINSON: I believe it was Dead Man’s Cove, where I came across one Captain Ortiz, and gave him a rather nasty gash on the cheek. Tell me, Ezra, did that leave a scar?

[Ezra hisses in shock and anger. But he pauses, and frowns in thought, and as he realizes the significance of what Atkinson has said, his eye widens.]

EZRA: That scar—that day—that scar came from— [And his face drops into a deep, ragged rage.] You’re the Pirate Slayer. You’re Atkinson.

ATKINSON: That’s General, to you.

[Ezra starts to pull wildly against his restraints, standing and knocking the chair back. The soldiers approach, and he screams out as they hold him.]

EZRA: You have no idea what you’re in for, you snake! When—WHEN I get out of here, you’re DEAD! No—No, you’re going to wish you were dead, once I’ve started with you—you—

ATKINSON: [He walks around the desk and approaches.] Are you quite done?

[Ezra gears up to spit in his face, but Atkinson grabs his jaw and jerks his head to the side with his good eye.]

ATKINSON: You do not frighten me. I have killed pirates far more formidable than you. If I am a snake, as you claim, then you are the vermin I am meant to eradicate. Now. You have something I want.

EZRA: You already have the Eye.

ATKINSON: What kind of pirate are you, traveling with a British soldier? It must be against your Code. [Clicks his tongue and shakes his head.] Well, the poor boy will be glad to know that an Act of Grace is waiting for him upon his return home.

EZRA: Simon? [He grins.] Simon isn’t coming back to you, you idiot. That’s your own fault!

ATKINSON: Whoever conceals their sins does not prosper, but the one who confesses and renounces them finds mercy.

EZRA: Don’t quote scripture at me, you fool. Who are you to take on the role of God?

ATKINSON: I am His humble servant.

EZRA: HA! Humble.

[Atkinson lands a rough punch in Ezra’s gut, and Ezra’s knees buckle despite himself. Long hair falls in front of his face. Again, he pulls against the soldiers’ grip and growls in Atkinson’s face.]

EZRA: You’ve disowned Simon, and he’s disowned your family name. Your lineage will die with you, old and alone on your hollow estate, and I will piss on your grave, and—

ATKINSON: I’ve had quite enough of this. Get him out! [Shooing motion.]

EZRA: [Has begun to be dragged back to the door, heels dragging.] —your faithful son will be known not as an Atkinson but as a pirate, and a genius, and the only fond memories he will look back on are those of his mother—

[A pale hand grabs a crystal skull. Ezra stops and gapes as Atkinson hurls the skull towards him, just too high to miss his head. The skull thumps against the wall and cracks, and Atkinson is seething, pale face tinted red, blonde hair falling out of place, blue eyes swirling with rage. The skull breaks when it hits the ground.

Ezra is silent for a moment, and the soldiers look almost frightened. Then, Atkinson composes himself and waves them off. Ezra grins, wildly, and starts to laugh, as he’s dragged back out of the room.]

[haggishlyhagging]

The most common female escape is the psychopathological condition of love. It is a euphoric state of fantasy in which the victim transforms her oppressor into her redeemer. She turns her natural hostility toward the aggressor against the remnants of herself—her Consciousness—and sees her counterpart in contrast to herself as all-powerful (as he is by now at her expense).

The combination of his power, her self-hatred, and the hope for a life that is self-justifying—the goal of all living creatures—results in a yearning for her stolen life—her Self—that is the delusion and poignancy of love. "Love" is the natural response of the victim to the rapist.

What is extremely difficult and "unnatural," but necessary, is for the Oppressed to cure themselves (destroy the female role), to throw off the Oppressor, and to help the Oppressor to cure himself (to destroy the male role). It is superhuman, but the only alternative—the elimination of males as a biological group—is subhuman.

-Ti-Grace Atkinson, Amazon Odyssey

[thatsonemorbidcorvid]

“Almanina Barbour, a black militant woman in Philadelphia, once pointed out to me: "The Women's Movement is the first in history with a war on and no enemy." I winced. It was an obvious criticism. I fumbled about in my mind for an answer. Surely the enemy must have been defined at some time. Otherwise, what had we been shooting at for the last couple of years? into the air?

Only two responses came to me, although in looking for those two I realized that it was a question carefully avoided. The first and by far the most frequent answer was "society." The second, infrequently and always furtively, was "men."

If "society" is the enemy, what could that mean? If women are being oppressed, there's only one group left over to be doing the oppressing: men. Then why call them "society"? Could "society" mean the "institutions" that oppress women? But institutions must be maintained, and the same question arises: by whom? The answer to "who is the enemy?" is so obvious that the interesting issue quickly becomes "why has it been avoided?"

The master might tolerate many reforms in slavery but none that would threaten his essential role of master. Women have known this, and since "men" and "society" are in effect synonymous, they have feared confronting him. Without this confrontation and a detailed understanding of what his battle strategy has been that has kept us so successfully pinned down, the "Women's Movement" is worse than useless. It invites backlash from men, and no progress for women.”

- Ti-Grace Atkinson, Amazon Odyssey

[femmesandhoney]

"Words are important for the revolution. I think you need both theory and practice. You don't know what the words mean until you see the action. If you think about it, throughout history women have been able to write, so they have this sort of mystical relationship with words and are frequently given to a lot of verbosity. It's very treacherous. People can say all kinds of the wildest things, and it doesn't mean a damn thing. There should be a relationship between what you say and how you live your life. I think it's very hard for us to believe that we're important. That said, I reject the tendency in some French feminisms and in women's studies more generally to have words take the place of action" Ti-Grace Atkinson, 2008

[whatisitnowforfuckssake]

What are some writings of well-known self-claimed feminists who seem to genuinely hate men and advocate female supremacy?

A quick reminder before you read these: there are feminists who will claim that these quotes did not happen, that they have been “taken out of context” or that these women had no influence on the feminist movement.

The next time you hear any of those arguments, you will know that they are incorrect. And once you’ve read these, you can’t pretend that you haven’t. You can’t go back to a world where feminists have never promoted female supremacy or hatred of men as if it were a virtue.

Most feminists on the ground don't share these attitudes, but clearly some of them do.

“We are, as a sex, infinitely superior to men.” — Elizabeth Cady Stanton

“The proportion of men must be reduced to and maintained at approximately 10% of the human race.” — Sally Miller Gearhart, in The Future - If There Is One - Is Female.

“All sex, even consensual sex between a married couple, is an act of violence perpetrated against a woman.” — Catherine MacKinnon

“The institution of sexual intercourse is anti-feminist” — Ti-Grace Atkinson

“Intercourse is the pure, sterile, formal expression of men’s contempt for women.” — Andrea Dworkin

“I want to see a man beaten to a bloody pulp with a high-heel shoved in his mouth, like an apple in the mouth of a pig.” — Andrea Dworkin (said by the author surrogate character in her fictionalised biography, Mercy)

“I claim that rape exists any time sexual intercourse occurs when it has not been initiated by the woman…” — Robin Morgan

“Satan-like, men possess women, making their wicked fantasies and desires women’s own. A woman who has sex with a man, therefore, does so against her will, ‘even if she does not feel forced.’ — Judith Levine.

“All men are rapists and that’s all they are” — Marilyn French

“Calling me a misandrist like it’s a bad thing” - Roxane Gay

[lizbethborden]

Ti West should have been a woman. I understand that I feel this way because of Ti-Grace Atkinson, but I'm right.

[ftmtftm]

You know, I wonder if anyone has done research into seeing if there are any historical connections or parallels between Radical Feminism and the conservatism of the late 60's~early 70's in response to things like the Free Love movement.

Something just feels very odd to me that a genuine feminist response to the sexual liberation of the time would include separatism that argues for the violence of heterosexual relationships and encourages women to either seek sexual relationships with women or celibacy. "Feminism is the theory and lesbianism is the practice" (as Ti-Grace Atkinson, foundational feminist of the second wave/early Radfem writier, said) type stuff.

That feels very sexually regressive to me, you know, all things considered.

[cactusradical]

‘Postmodernism is a profoundly reactionary political theory. Postmodernism pretends to focus on words, and on words ABOUT words (which it calls “discourse”). Postmodernism pretends to analyze discourse through something called “deconstruction,” but instead words are used to mystify and confuse and, finally, to prevent any meaningful steps forward—especially as regards thinking about the world.’

‘Words are not being used to inform or to clarify. Nor to build one thought upon another until some explanation emerges. Words are tossed in to impress or to dupe. It is impossible to tell what Postmodernists mean because they use the same words to mean different things at different times. For all the emphasis on the importance of language, Postmodernism throws away language as a tool of either understanding or of communication. At best, language becomes an end in itself.’

Ti-Grace Atkinson, The Descent from Radical Feminism to Postmodernism