Online feminist conversations are a circus show, just like every other realm of political thought hosted on the world wide web. Anyone from any background can give their perspective, riddled with their own cultural experiences, biases, and ulterior motives making the basis of every conversation a double edged sword. A consistent theme however is the unquestioning assumption of female sexuality and male dirtiness, which I believe continuing is only going to harm female empowerment in the future.
The assumption that I am mentioning is how separatism is the only solution for female liberation, hyperfocusing on political lesbianism and painting men as an unchangeable, corruptive force that ruins everything it touches. The worst thing a woman can do is be with a man, and it’s even worse when a woman wants a man. In this discourse it paints the woman with desire as seeking her own degradation, almost deserving of the harm a man will eventually enact upon her. The best thing a woman can do is control her sexuality, as a man is characterized as one whose harm is written in their genetic code, meaning that a woman is one who must endure the pain that men enact. The best way to win the game is to never participate, as either the biology or social conditioning of existing as male means violence against women is no longer an if but a when.
The biggest criticism I have against this is how at the end of the day, the fault and blame for female suffering is still pushed onto the woman. By viewing and perpetuating this idea that maleness is a dirty and unchangeable force over-emphasizes female sexuality by emphasizing her “purity” as the one thing in her own control, summarizing this decision as the most important thing to maintain her societal dignity. Interacting with men in these social circles is seen as degrading because it is society that has made men into a degrading force. What’s worse than a dirty man is someone who seeks out to be dirtied, a woman who desires degradation and disregards her sexual purity. In the end, this kind of thinking is not revolutionary or innovative, thinking this way does not make someone more enlightened, it’s just as traditional and is another variant of our already existing purity culture.
As society has raised men in a way that promotes the degradation of women, it has raised women in the way where sexuality is the most precious aspect of their dignity. This transforms heterosexual dynamics where intercourse no longer becomes a human instinct that shares pleasure but instead a performance where power dynamics and psychology are explored. Instead of trying to point out this social convention and its harm, trying to incite a cultural shift where either sex is not seen as either “pure” or “degrading”, there is a refusal to address it at all. Instead women in online spaces are still taught to protect their social purity, where there is no accountability towards men and women are encouraged to practice a complete escape from maleness. While female separatism is justified, and even politically advantageous through movements such as Womyn’s Land, the social reason for doing so isn’t revolutionary but merely another niche developed alongside technology in a socially stagnant society.
I believe social female separatism is justified in the sense that there is no reason to engage in trying to change an oppressor as it is ultimately not the oppressed’s responsibility to convince the perpetrator not to enact harm onto them. It is justified when someone is not interested in sewing seeds of change that are not expected to bloom in her lifetime.
By painting the patriarchy and maleness as unchanging and continuously corruptive, there is a learned helplessness towards men and all accountability of sexuality is pushed onto women. There is no force attempting to dismantle a culture and establishing one that recognizes male accountability. If society genuinely believes that being male also means being born as a corruptive force that inevitably degrades and harms women, what does society believe women are genetically encoded with? An inherent endurance to male harm? It feels like these social systems have created a belief where the heterosexual dynamic is one of the oppressed and the oppressor, the victim and the victimizer, where their dynamic becomes immutable.
Portraying maleness as the ultimate threat and femaleness as the ultimate victim, accountability of female harm is difficult and the social “backstabbing” of a complex woman enacting harm is hyperfocused. The worst thing a woman could be is complex and reactionary in a society that expects a woman to be in a constant state of martyrdom. Within purity culture, women’s sexuality defines her identity rather than another aspect of her personhood, where embracing or suppressing her sexuality are the only two options perpetuating a madonnawhore complex.
If a woman ever faces negative consequences of being sexually promiscuous, betraying her purity for dirtying herself with a man– instead of focusing on what role the man has played, they simply see her as dirty for interacting with a degrading force, judging her. Men are painted as animals, unable to think for themselves and a slave to their sexual interests, where any action they have committed under arousal can give them plausible deniability, this cultural belief being a tool of the patriarchy.
Obviously instead of trying to accept this dynamic as a fact of life, it should be reviewed and explored critically. One should carefully evaluate their sexuality and work towards sexual activism where heterosexual dynamics become equal instead of trying to escape it entirely. If sex becomes so synonymous with the psychological harm of losing societal “purity” benefits, then sex no longer becomes a neutral human instinct but a social or political tool. It is the fault of society that should change this purity culture, where sexual status is not all a woman should be, but is another piece of her identity. When a woman’s identity centers or emphasizes sex where it becomes the only part of her identity or the only part she sees herself surviving in, it impacts her ability to live a life outside of these dynamics, and she is not free.
It is a common reaction of the oppressed to put all blame on their neighbors and accept the oppressors as a force rather than something changeable or falliable. While culture is undeniably shaped by everyone, the oppressed never believe themselves to be the default or the arbiter of said culture. The oppressed must cater themselves, basing their identity off of the trauma they have endured from the oppressor, identifying themselves as a reaction to their suffering. I wonder if women have ever tried to imagine themselves in a world where they would get everything they wanted, where they get men who satisfy them sexually and respect them, where their existence is not dependent on social standards determined by other people but themselves. Where true liberation is found with self preservation in the fight to try to find themselves a world where they get to have their cake and eat it too.
