Feminism

Chapter 6 Ask a Feminist!

Question:

I have heard a lot of people ask/ challenge that if feminism is for the equality of all the genders and sexes, why is it called "Feminism"?

Answer:

I'll start by quoting Shakespeare, "What's in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other word would smell as sweet."

So, instead of just focusing on the word, let's focus on what the word conveys which we have been discussing since the beginning of the book. Secondly, the movement was started by women to bring them the rights and privileges that men already enjoyed, so it's a word that they could relate to.

As Denise Horn writes in her blog: "... So, can feminism be exclusionary or represent a relationship of domination/subordination? Discussions about binaries aside, I don't think so. For my brother, the crux of his argument rested on the intrinsic belief that the sexes are equal, and to make distinctions of inequality with words like "feminism" creates an inequality through the term's (perceived) suggestion of exclusion (that is, an exclusion of men). But once one takes the domination/subordination tack, we can see that feminism, as a word, seeks to lift the "feminine" out of the subordinate position, and perhaps to unhinge the binary altogether. As Bell Hooks reminds us in her book "Feminism is for Everybody", men are harmed by patriarchy as much as women; feminism celebrates the liberation of men as well as women..."