How Openly RadFem Should I Be?

Question

In recent weeks I have talked about radical feminism with a female friend and a female co-worker. We were talking about smth that radical feminism has a view on, and so I brought up a radfem point of discussion and presented radical feminism to them. Ever since encountering FDS and RadFem, I constantly see it in my everyday life. I just wonder to what degrees should I talk about it (obviously only with other women who fds leaning or not flat out pickmes.). I hope I'm not being a 'heroine' here, but I wish more women knew about these concepts, but I also wanna be smart here and avoid unwanted arguments, or even discarding pickme-leaning friends who are otherwise great and are just brainwashed. I used to be a pickme until relatively recently, so it's a huge change. There's a larger chance I'd bring some FDS concepts up now as I'm into feminist media more than ever now as I often encounter pickme behaviour and depracating male behaviour and can finally see it for what is.

Edit: Thank you for all your advice, Queen! It's hard out there for RadFems, and as always, I am grateful for this space and for your words of wisdom! 😘

Héloïse · Accepted Answer

I find a good way of validating the inner radfem in each of my friends was to begin by validating their discomfort.

Women are taught to ignore instincts, question our observations, downplay our needs, and gaslight ourselves (and if we miraculously evaded female socialisation, men will do these things to us, setting us straight 🙄). So when my friends bring up that they felt disrespected, ignored, or otherwise let down by the men in their lives, I always affirm that it’s totally okay.

”You’re not alone.“

”The way you feel about this is valid.“

”Yes, actually, that *does* sound a bit disrespectful - would you like to talk about it some more?”

“That’s funny - I had another friend go through this, too. Isn’t it strange how many women have the same stories sometimes?”

”If I were in your shoes, I’d be angry, too.”

”I wonder why men never have stories like this - the rules seem so different for them.”

”If you need to vent about this some more, I’m here.” (So much as energy allows, at any rate.)

Amazingly, I found that for some women, these simple acts of validation are enough. One friend broke up with her abusive boyfriend a few weeks after we had a conversation where the only thing I did was acknowledge she had the right to feel hurt and betrayed by his abuse and porn use. I didn’t tell her to leave, or that she deserved better, or anything - she left entirely of her own accord. And she’s made it a point to not date men who use pornography in the future, either.

Because women are not foolish - we know the logical course of action to take, and how best to take it in these important life moments. (And if we don’t, we will find out because we’re resourceful as hell.) All we often need is ‘permission’ to realise that we’re not wrong to feel the way we feel. To make more radfems (or at least radfem aligned women), be the one who amplifies the inner voice of the women in your life, and we often find our own way.

PlainSimpleTailor · Answer

Yeah, these are the things I've started to do in daily life: subtly hold men to higher standards and women to lower ones than is typical in our society. When someone tells me a story about a "bitchy" female coworker, I wonder aloud whether that behavior would be considered assertive instead if it was a man. Or I empathize with the women in any story more than with the man. I hold up women as role models. There's lots of tiny little acts of resistance against the gender hierarchy that one can incorporate into their daily lives.

PlainSimpleTailor · Answer

This! Lundy Bancroft talks about this too in his section on how to "deprogram" a friend or relative who's in an abusive relationship. It doesn't work to tell her what to think and serve her all the conclusions upfront. Most women will feel subtly attacked by that, because we all have experiences of being talked down to and not taken seriously. They don't need that same energy from people they should be able to trust. Change has to come from within. I find that going on "feminist rants" in front of women, even if they're already close to "peaking", tends to push them away. Ideological debate is great for forums like FDS but in reality, people usually don't want to feel like a statistic or an open-and-shut case of this -ism or that. We're all a little vain in the sense that we think we and our circumstances are unique and special. That part of us needs validation first before we can acknowledge that we're part of an oppressed demographic. People who are acutely suffering are often not ready for the big picture yet.

Gina_Sinalefe · Answer

This is amazing advice and I agree. Just validate their discomfort and point out the double standards, relentlessly. It questions their programming but in a non threatening way.

Answer

I advise you to not be open about being FDS or radfem. everyone hate us: the altraight, the left, the libertarians, everyone. it's like they are alergic to truth and facts. so be very cautious with who you talk to and what you post on social media.

How Openly RadFem Should I Be?

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