Radical feminist's perspectives and solutions

History:

In the 1960s, the second wave of feminism created radical feminists after there has been an improvement on political, educational, and economic system, especially, for middle-class women. In particular, women gained the right to vote and started working outside. The sexual revolution in the United States also has reduced pressure to be monogamous and gave more freedom of sexual expression. There has been an improvement on the lives of women comparing to before, but women still were oppressed regularly. For example, women did not get equal pay as men nor equal rates of getting jobs. Moreover, women still were lack of reproductive rights. Radical feminists believe that a system that supports oppression is a tool for men to control power. Contrary to other types of feminism that power is beneficial when it is evenly distributed, radical feminists believe that power is related to one party being dominant and the other being subordinate.

Second wave of feminism was for diminishing biological identity from socially constructed conceptions of gender roles, especially women's responsibility as caregivers. Sex is fixed because it is biological, but gender is socially constructed. Radical feminists believe that sex is the main reason for the distribution of power. They also believe that society is a patriarchal system, which leads men to a favorable position to dominate women. The main goal of radical feminism is to make awareness of different gender roles, sexual violence and objection of women. Radical feminists find the problem in the current political and social organizations as inherited from patriarchy. Patriarchy causes gender inequality as men try to control women ’s sexual and reproductive potential. Hence, radical feminists seem to focus on cultural change rather than making legal adjustments.

Organizations:

In 1967, Carol Hanisch, Shulamith Firestone and Robin Morgan created an organization called "New York Radical Women." They symbolized female oppression with bras and playboy magazine and protested at the Miss America Pageant in Atlantic City in September 1968. The organization splited in 1969, and Ellen Willis and Shulamith Firestone created a new radical feminist organization called Redstocking. Feminist sexual wars took place in the 1980s. Radical feminists argued that pornography, sex work and sexual abuse were a part of the patriarchy, and liberal feminists argued that they were feminists. They do not accept prostitution, which is buying and selling sex work.

Solutions:

Radical feminists believe that the solution to the gender problem is to overthrow the patriarchal relationship. This event is different from a system that requires equality under the patriarchy. Biological production technology should be developed to give women the right to sexual autonomy. For example, there should be agencies for women to have control, birth control, control over their bodies and minds such as no need to have men to have a child. They believe that creating a female-only social system and organization is also an option. For many years, liberal feminism has largely dominated the work of female criminals, while the work of radical feminists has been chronologically focused on female victims, especially survivors of abuse. Radical feminists played a vital role in the entire movement to break silence. The development of the ever-changing rule of thumb is crucial, which makes it legal for a husband to beat his wife with a magic weapon larger than the thumb. They brought attention to be able to name the violence that is happening and provide services for people to be able to escape from that cycle. The positive result of radical feminist efforts is the establishment of a rape crisis centre as a refuge for women.

Criticism:

One of the criticisms of radical feminists' theories is that they have simplified the problem as men being victimizers and women being victims. Radical feminists have a strong bond of sisterhood that they call for womanhood and women-centered programs. Another critique, women of color, argued that this point of view is mainly focused on gender and only applies to women who are not biased with their race or class. Furthermore, radical feminists are sometimes considered as “man-haters.” An author named Valerie Solanas made a huge impact on this event when she wrote manifestos, Society for Cutting Up Men, about women disposing of men in 1967. She shot Mario Amaya and made an attempt to kill Andy Warhol. The other reason for criticizing radical feminism is related to anti-sexism and came from sex workers who worried about losing their jobs. Anti-sex work radical feminists, also known as Sex Work Exclusionary Radical Feminists believe that it is called rape when someone pays for having sex.For example, the book "Intercourse" written by Andrea Dworkin shows women oppression of heterosexuality and pornography. Although she did not impose the idea, people misunderstood the intention of this book as all heterosexuals were raped.