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We Need to Talk about Women: The Problem with Western Liberal 'Feminists'
Chehade, Ghada
http://www.globalresearch.ca/we-need-to-talk-about-women-the-problem-with-western-liberal-feminists/5578811Date Written: 2017-03-08 Publisher: Global Research Year Published: 2017 Resource Type: Article Cx Number: CX20505 Western women have fought hard and bravely for rights and privileges that were denied to generations of women before them and have made vast strides towards greater equality and representation in society. For this, western women and traditional feminism should be applauded. At the same time, the version of feminism that presently functions in the west -- liberal, consumer, mainstream feminism -- has become problematic. Abstract: - Excerpt: Identity politics is a form of political capitulation that gives into the establishment. It is a distraction from, and substitution for, a failed economy and a failed political system. Identity politics replaces political and economic power and choice, or lack there of, with personal choice and personal empowerment. The personal freedoms granted under identity politics -- for instance, the freedom to choose among the ever-growing number of genders, etc -- can mask how politically and economically un-free and powerless we are. Under the present global neocon/neoliberal politico-economic mono-culture, people are increasingly politically and economically disenfranchised and dis-empowered. Rather than focus on the ever-creeping economic collapse, escalating unemployment, political dis-empowerment, the growing police and surveillance state, and the general economic despair that plagues much of the world’s population, identity politics (and contemporary progressives in general) points our attention towards differences, personal identity and personal choice. How convenient for the global power structure/elites. This is especially true among that segment of the western female population -- liberal, consumer 'feminist' -- that I describe above. ... It appears that second and third wave western feminism has degenerated into something that is at once apolitical (or faux political), consumerist, and a service to the global establishment. In the midst of the feel-good, reactionary spectacle of contemporary western feminism, there seems to be very little that is political or left wing in the traditional sense, meaning politics and protest that is critical of hegemonic power, Empire, imperial wars, economic collapse and despair, unemployment, and class issues. Subject Headings |