Furthermore there is no analogy in women's liberation to the expropriation of the expropriators -- or to the extent that there is (and this analogy is defective), it is simply the attainment of strictly equal bourgeois liberal rights. The power men have over women in a patriarchy is not based in anything fairly simple relationship like differential ownership of productive assets -- something that, with the proper amount of political force behind it, can be corrected by appropriate legislation reassigning property rights in different ways. (The kinds of male oppression of women that can be treated this way are precisely liberal democratic rights of equality, like equal pay for equal work.) Rather, male power over women in patriarchy is based in a much more amorphous and nonspecific set of relationships that require transfdormation of consciousness and culture, not a mere alteratiuon of legal rights backed by political force.
That is, I guess, unless you buy the old-style radical feminist idea that men are an oppressing class who must be overthrown by women and subjected to female power --a sort of dictatorship of the femitariat -- to correct the error of their ways. (Some men might not mind that, and some even subject themselves to that sort of thing voluntarily now -- but that takes us back to our old discussion of BDSM or at least D&S, which is probably an irrelevant disgression here.) Or even, in the mode of lesbian seperatist radfem, you might think that men might be physically abolished completely by, perhaps, sperm banking and sex-selective abortions.
Neither of these reflect your view as I understand it, which is rather that "gender" has to be abolished. Translated out of radicalese, I think that means that traditional sex roles have to be transformed and new kinds of relations, with different concepts of maleness and femaleness created. These might be, as some you say, androgynous, they might be just different from the ones we have now. This is an important point, because it goes to the amorphous basis of continuing patriarchy in a society where liberal feminism is in the main already enacted into law.
I doubt, however, whether anyone remotely on the left, even most liberal feminists (male or female), would disagree that we need to change those gender conceptions and practices -- the differences would come with how they should be changed to realize feminist aims -- the liberation of women, whatever that means, and the liberation, secondarily, of men from the straightjacket of "manliness."
I don't think it is productive at this point for women to say, We talk, you listen. There was a time when that was necessary -- the time of Marge Piercy's "Grand Coolie Damn," when second wave feminism was a big surprise. Now it's not, at least in the sectors of society where women would be inclined to say such thing. We need dialogue and common struggle -- and persuasion.
I put things that way in terms of "those sectors of society" because there are large swathes of American (and Latin, etc.) society where liberal feminism is far from common currency even among women. But there the problem is that women aren't at the stage where they demand to be heard, and many women in those circumstances actively reject such calls to speech and action. I don't think your suggested slogans and tone are necessary going to help much with changing those women's minds (though perhaps they are not meant to), but I have no more idea than anyone else what would.
I suspect that the demands of practical life, the need to work, the resentment at being underpaid and abused at work (which Liza documents in her book in Wal*Mart, Selling Women Short, see also Barbar Ehrenreich's Nickled and Dimed), the pressure of balancing home and work life, etc., all will have more effect than anything we will say. Women who stand up to the (male) boss will be more likely, I hope, to stand up their husbands and boyfriends. But here I wonder how much firebrand rhetoric is going to be of use to them -- unless they generate it themselves. I don't say you disagree.
However, maybe all you are saying is that liberal and leftist men ought to know better and not require persuasion. Perhaps. But we all require discussion. We may have different conceptions of women's liberation which might require talking over. It rarely hurts to try to talk things out as long as that isn't a substitute for action.
So, let's talk.
jks
>
> Do we win capitalists to our side by arguing that
> socialism will benefit
> capitalists? No, we argue for the destruction of
> capitalists and
> capitalism. Thus, we call for the destruction of
> Gender -- Men and Women as
> they exist in class society. BOTH Men and Women.
>
> Aside from which, I'm just a little sick and tired
> of trying to appeal to
> you fuckers by explaining to you how it will be to
> your benefit to support
> feminism or anti-racism or GLBT liberation or
> anti-ablism. Or whatever.
>
> If you support us, you get something out of it. I'm
> sick of marketing
> angles as a tactic. Fuck that. I can see appealing
> to the average Dick in
> those terms, but to leftist men? No. If you aren't
> on the klewtrain and
> you've been on this list for more than a year, it's
> not even worth my time.
>
> Feminists need to butch up and tell you to get on
> the klewtrain or get left
> behind. This train is chugging down the tracks
> without you.
>
> See also, http://thagmano.blogspot.com
>
> Specifically,
>
http://thagmano.blogspot.com/2005/11/why-why-why-dont-we-get-it.html
> and
>
http://thagmano.blogspot.com/2005/11/ok-now-youre-pissing-me-off.html
>
> Bitch,
>
> "You know how it is -- come for the animal porn,
> stay for the cultural analysis."
>
> Bitch | Lab
> http://blog.pulpculture.org
>
> ___________________________________
>
http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
>
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