Who's radical now?

Radical feminism. In the 70s, it meant resisting marriage and, if you were really out there, suggesting women needed to be freed from reproductive labor.

Today, though, I think it means something different. When I say I'm a radical feminist, what I mean is this: no law we can make, no practice we can encourage, no policy we can enforce that will create real gender equality. This is because I believe that oppression is not about what men and women are allowed to do or not do, or how they are allowed to act or not act.

What gendered oppression is about is having to be men or women, and the absence of any gender that is not in relationship to these. Even if that relationship is rebellious, as far as I can see, there's no escaping the basic gender binarism and the tying of those beliefs to body parts. And that is, we all remember, essentialist.

The belief that men and women are essentially different is one of the two major factors that I think limits the change people can envision, and therefore desire. The other, the belief that equality has basically been achieved, will have to be saved for a later rant post.