Editing Radical feminism (section)

== Movement ==
{{Globalize|section|USA|2name=the United States|date=October 2019|talk=Talk:Radical feminism#Worldwide_view_(globalize)_banner/template}}

=== Roots ===
Radical feminists in the [[United States]] coined the term [[women's liberation movement]] (WLM). The WLM grew largely due to the influence of the [[civil rights movement]], that had gained momentum in the 1960s, and many of the women who took up the cause of radical feminism had previous experience with radical protest in the struggle against [[racism]]. Chronologically, it can be seen within the context of [[second wave feminism]] that started in the early 1960s.<ref>Sarah Gamble, ed. The Routledge companion to feminism and postfeminism (2001) p. 25</ref> The leading figures of this second wave of feminism included [[Shulamith Firestone]], [[Kathie Sarachild]], [[Ti-Grace Atkinson]], [[Carol Hanisch]], [[Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz|Roxanne Dunbar]], [[Naomi Weisstein]] and [[Judith C. Brown|Judith Brown]]. In the late sixties various women's groups describing themselves as "radical feminist", such as the UCLA Women's Liberation Front (WLF), offered differing views of radical feminist ideology. UCLA's WLF co-founder Devra Weber recalls, "the radical feminists were opposed to patriarchy, but not necessarily capitalism. In our group at least, they opposed so-called male dominated national liberation struggles".{{sfn|Linden-Ward|Green|1993|p=418}}

Radical feminists helped to translate the radical protest for racial equality, in which many had experience, over to the struggle for women's rights. They took up the cause and advocated for a variety of women's issues, including [[abortion rights]], the [[Equal Rights Amendment]], access to credit, and equal pay.{{sfn|Evans|2002}} Many women of color were among the founders of the Women's Liberation Movement ([[Frances M. Beal|Fran Beal]], [[Cellestine Ware]], [[Toni Cade Bambara]]); however, many women of color did not participate in the movement due to their conclusion that radical feminists were not addressing "issues of meaning for minority women", [[Black women]] in particular.{{sfn|Linden-Ward|Green|1993|p=434}} After [[consciousness raising]] groups were formed to rally support, second-wave radical feminism began to see an increasing number of women of color participating.

In the 1960s, radical feminism emerged within liberal feminist and working-class feminist discussions, first in the United States, then in the United Kingdom and [[Australia]]. Those involved had gradually come to believe that it was not only the [[middle-class]] [[nuclear family]] that oppressed women, but that it was also social movements and organizations that claimed to stand for human liberation, notably the [[Counterculture of the 1960s|counterculture]], the [[New Left]], and [[Marxism|Marxist]] political parties, all of which were male-dominated and male-oriented. In the United States, radical feminism developed as a response to some of the perceived failings of both [[New Left]] organizations such as the [[Students for a Democratic Society (1960 organization)|Students for a Democratic Society]] (SDS) and feminist organizations such as NOW.{{Citation needed|date=July 2008}} Initially concentrated in big cities like [[New York City|New York]], [[Chicago]], [[Boston]], Washington, DC, and on the West Coast,{{sfn|Willis|1984|p=118}}{{efn|While Willis (1984) does not mention Chicago, as early as 1967 it was a major site for consciousness-raising and home of the ''Voice of Women's Liberation Movement''; see Kate Bedford and Ara Wilson [http://people.cohums.ohio-state.edu/wilson935/chrono1.htm Lesbian Feminist Chronology: 1963–1970] ({{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070717042308/http://people.cohums.ohio-state.edu/wilson935/chrono1.htm |date=17 July 2007}}).}} radical feminist groups spread across the country rapidly from 1968 to 1972.

At the same time parallel trends of thinking developed outside the USA: The Women's Yearbook<ref>The essay on "Feminist Tendencies" in the Women's Yearbook (Frauenjahrbuch '76), published by the new Frauenoffensive press in Munich and edited by a work group of the Munich Women's Center in Myra Marx Ferree: Varieties of Feminism German Gender Politics in Global Perspective (2012) p.60 {{ISBN|978-0-8047-5759-1}}</ref> from Munich gives a good sense of early 1970s feminism in West Germany:

{{Blockquote
|text=Their Yearbook essay on behalf of the autonomous feminist movement argued that patriarchy was the oldest and most fundamental relationship of exploitation. Hence the necessity of feminists' separating from men's organizations on the Left, since they would just use women's efforts to support their own goals, in which women's liberation did not count. The editors of Frauenjahrbuch 76 also explicitly distanced themselves from the language of liberalism, arguing that "equal rights define women's oppression as women's disadvantage." They explicitly labeled the equal rights version of feminism as wanting to be like men, vehemently rejecting claims that "women should enter all the male-dominated areas of society. More women in politics! More women in the sciences, etc. . . . Women should be able to do everything that men do." Their position—and that of the autonomous feminists represented in this 1976 yearbook—instead was that: "This principle that 'we want that too' or 'we can do it too' measures emancipation against men and again defines what we want in relationship to men. Its content is conformity to men. . . . Because in this society male characteristics fundamentally have more prestige, recognition and above all more power, we easily fall into the trap of rejecting and devaluing all that is female and admiring and emulating all that is considered male. . . . The battle against the female role must not become the battle for the male role. . . . The feminist demand, which transcends the claim for equal rights, is the claim for self-determination.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Ferree|first1=Myra Marx|title=Varieties of Feminism: German Gender Politics in Global Perspective|date=2012|page=60|publisher=[[Stanford University Press]]|location=Redwood City, California|chapter=Women Themselves Will Decide: Autonomous Feminist Mobilization, 1968–1978|isbn=978-0804757591}}</ref><ref>Frauenjahrbuch '76 p 76-78</ref>
}}

Radical feminists introduced the use of [[consciousness raising]] (CR) groups. These groups brought together intellectuals, workers, and middle-class women in developed Western countries to discuss their experiences. During these discussions, women noted a shared and repressive system regardless of their political affiliation or [[social class]]. Based on these discussions, the women drew the conclusion that ending of patriarchy was the most necessary step towards a truly free society. These consciousness-raising sessions allowed early radical feminists to develop a political [[ideology]] based on common experiences women faced with male supremacy. Consciousness raising was extensively used in chapter sub-units of the [[National Organization for Women]] (NOW) during the 1970s. The feminism that emerged from these discussions stood first and foremost for the liberation of women, as women, from the oppression of men in their own lives, as well as men in power. Radical feminism claimed that a totalizing ideology and social formation—''patriarchy'' (government or rule by fathers)—dominated women in the interests of men.

===Groups===
[[File:Redstockings.png|thumb|Logo of the [[Redstockings]]]]

Within groups such as [[New York Radical Women]] (1967–1969; not connected to the present-day socialist feminist organization [[Radical Women]]), which Ellen Willis characterized as "the first women's liberation group in New York City",{{sfn|Willis|1984|p=119}} a radical feminist ideology began to emerge. It declared that "[[the personal is political]]" and the "sisterhood is powerful";{{sfn|Willis|1984|p=118}} calls to women's activism coined by [[Kathie Sarachild]] and others in the group.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Feminisms Matter: Debates, Theories, Activism|last1=Bromley|first1=Victoria|publisher=University of Toronto Press|year=2012}}</ref> New York Radical Women fell apart in early 1969 in what came to be known as the "politico-feminist split", with the "politicos" seeing capitalism as the main source of women's oppression, while the "feminists" saw women's oppression in a male supremacy that was "a set of material, institutionalized relations, not just bad attitudes". The feminist side of the split, whose members referred to themselves as "radical feminists",{{sfn|Willis|1984|p=119}} soon constituted the basis of a new organization, [[Redstockings]]. At the same time, Ti-Grace Atkinson led "a radical split-off from NOW", which became known as [[The Feminists]].{{sfn|Willis|1984|p=124}} A third major stance would be articulated by the [[New York Radical Feminists]], founded later in 1969 by [[Shulamith Firestone]] (who broke from the Redstockings) and [[Anne Koedt]].{{sfn|Willis|1984|p=133}}

During this period, the movement produced "a prodigious output of leaflets, pamphlets, journals, magazine articles, newspaper and radio and TV interviews".{{sfn|Willis|1984|p=118}} Many important feminist works, such as Koedt's essay ''[[The Myth of the Vaginal Orgasm]]'' (1970) and [[Kate Millett]]'s book ''[[Sexual Politics]]'' (1970), emerged during this time and in this [[Social environment|milieu]].

=== Ideology emerges and diverges ===
At the beginning of this period, "[[heterosexuality]] was more or less an unchallenged assumption". Among radical feminists, it was widely held that, thus far, the sexual freedoms gained in the [[sexual revolution]] of the 1960s, in particular, the decreasing emphasis on [[monogamy]], had been largely gained by men at women's expense.{{sfn|Willis|1984|p=121}} This assumption of heterosexuality would soon be challenged by the rise of [[political lesbianism]], closely associated with Atkinson and The Feminists.{{sfn|Willis|1984|p=131}}

Redstockings and The Feminists were both radical feminist organizations, but held rather distinct views. Most members of Redstockings held to a [[materialism|materialist]] and anti-[[psychologism|psychologistic]] view. They viewed men's oppression of women as ongoing and deliberate, holding individual men responsible for this oppression, viewing institutions and systems (including the family) as mere vehicles of conscious male intent, and rejecting psychologistic explanations of female submissiveness as blaming women for collaboration in their own oppression. They held to a view—which Willis would later describe as "neo-[[Maoism|Maoist]]"—that it would be possible to unite all or virtually all women, as a class, to confront this oppression by personally confronting men.{{sfn|Willis|1984|pp=124—128}}

[[File:Ellen willis.png|thumb|[[Ellen Willis]]]]

The Feminists held a more [[idealism|idealistic]], psychologistic, and [[utopianism|utopian]] philosophy, with a greater emphasis on "[[sex role]]s", seeing [[sexism]] as rooted in "complementary patterns of male and female behavior". They placed more emphasis on institutions, seeing marriage, family, prostitution, and heterosexuality as all existing to perpetuate the "sex-role system". They saw all of these as institutions to be destroyed. Within the group, there were further disagreements, such as Koedt's viewing the institution of "normal" sexual intercourse as being focused mainly on male sexual or erotic pleasure, while Atkinson viewed it mainly in terms of reproduction. In contrast to the Redstockings, The Feminists generally considered genitally focused sexuality to be inherently male. [[Ellen Willis]], the Redstockings co-founder, would later write that insofar as the Redstockings considered abandoning heterosexual activity, they saw it as a "bitter price" they "might have to pay for [their] militance", whereas The Feminists embraced [[separatist feminism]] as a strategy.{{sfn|Willis|1984|pp=130–132}}

The New York Radical Feminists (NYRF) took a more psychologistic (and even [[biological determinism|biologically determinist]]) line. They argued that men dominated women not so much for material benefits as for the ego satisfaction intrinsic in domination. Similarly, they rejected the Redstockings view that women submitted only out of necessity or The Feminists' implicit view that they submitted out of cowardice, but instead argued that [[social conditioning]] simply led most women to accept a submissive role as "right and natural".{{sfn|Willis|1984|p=105}}

[[Rosemarie Tong]] proposes the terms ''radical-libertarian feminism'' and ''radical-cultural feminism'' to address the fundamental split within radical feminism over how to dismantle patriarchal oppression.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Tong |first=Rosemarie |title=Feminist thought: a more comprehensive introduction |date=2009 |publisher=Westview |isbn=978-0-8133-4375-4 |edition=3rd |location=Boulder, Colo |chapter=Radical Feminism: Libertarian and Cultural Perspectives}}</ref> Radical-libertarian feminists, such as Kate Millett and Shulamith Firestone, advocate for the abolition of rigid gender roles and the embrace of androgyny, arguing that women should be free to adopt both masculine and feminine traits to achieve full human potential.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Tong |first=Rosemarie |title=Feminist thought: a more comprehensive introduction |date=2009 |publisher=Westview |isbn=978-0-8133-4375-4 |edition=3rd |location=Boulder, Colo |chapter=Radical Feminism: Libertarian and Cultural Perspectives}}</ref> They emphasize sexual liberation, including diverse sexual practices, and support artificial reproduction as a means to free women from the biological burdens of childbirth. In contrast, radical-cultural feminists, like Mary Daly and Marilyn French, celebrate femaleness and the unique virtues traditionally associated with femininity, such as nurturing and community.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Tong |first=Rosemarie |title=Feminist thought: a more comprehensive introduction |date=2009 |publisher=Westview |isbn=978-0-8133-4375-4 |edition=3rd |location=Boulder, Colo |chapter=Radical Feminism: Libertarian and Cultural Perspectives}}</ref> They critique androgyny as a rejection of women's inherent strengths and promote lesbianism as a more liberating alternative to heterosexuality. Radical-cultural feminists also see natural reproduction as a source of women's power and oppose artificial reproduction, which they believe could further entrench male dominance.

=== Forms of action ===
The radical feminism of the late 1960s was not only a movement of ideology and theory; it helped to inspire [[direct action]]. In 1968, feminists protested against the [[Miss America]] pageant in order to bring "sexist beauty ideas and social expectations" to the forefront of women's social issues. Even though bras were not burned on that day, the protest led to the phrase "bra-burner". "Feminists threw their bras—along with "woman-garbage" such as girdles, false eyelashes, steno pads, wigs, women's magazines, and dishcloths—into a "Freedom Trash Can", but they did not set it on fire".<ref name=":3">{{Cite journal|title=Kreydatus, Beth. "Confronting The Bra-Burners" Teaching Radical Feminism With A Case Study"|journal=History Teacher Academic Search Complete}}</ref> In March 1970, more than one hundred feminists staged an 11-hour sit-in at the ''[[Ladies' Home Journal]]'' headquarters. These women demanded that the publication replace its male editor with a female editor, and accused the ''Ladies Home Journal'', "with their emphasis on food, family, fashion, and femininity", of being "instruments of women's oppression". One protester explained the goal of the protest by saying that they "were there to destroy a publication which feeds off of women's anger and frustration, a magazine which destroys women."<ref name=":4">{{Cite journal|author=Hunter, Jean|title=A Daring New Concept: The Ladies Home Journal And Modern Feminism|journal=NWSA Journal}}</ref>

Radical feminists used a variety of tactics, including demonstrations, speakouts, and community and work-related organizing, to gain exposure and adherents.{{sfn|Willis|1984|p=117}} In France and West Germany, radical feminists developed further forms of direct action.

==== Self-incrimination ====
On 6 June 1971 the cover of ''[[Stern (magazine)|Stern]]'' showed 28 German actresses and journalists confessing "We Had an Abortion!" ({{ill|wir haben abgetrieben!|de||vertical-align=sup}}) unleashing a campaign against the abortion ban.<ref name=FMT_§218>{{Cite web | url=https://frauenmediaturm.de/neue-frauenbewegung/abtreibung-gegen-218/ |title = Gegen §218 – Der Kampf um das Recht auf Abtreibung |website=FrauenMediaTurm |date = 20 April 2018 |language=de}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web | url=https://www.digitales-deutsches-frauenarchiv.de/akteurinnen/aktion-218 | title=Aktion 218| date=13 February 2019}}</ref> The journalist [[Alice Schwarzer]] had organized this avowal form of protest following a French example.

In 1974, Schwarzer persuaded 329 doctors to publicly admit in ''[[Der Spiegel]]''<ref name=DerSpiegel>{{Cite news | url=https://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/print/d-41739035.html | title=Abtreibung: Aufstand der Schwestern | work=[[Der Spiegel]] |pages=29–31 | date=11 March 1974 |language=de}}</ref> to having performed abortions. She also found a woman willing to terminate her pregnancy on camera with [[vacuum aspiration]], thereby promoting this method of abortion by showing it on the German political television program ''Panorama''. [[Cristina Perincioli]] described this as "... a new tactic: the ostentatious, publicly documented violation of a law that millions of women had broken thus far, only in secret and under undignified circumstances." However, with strong opposition from church groups and most of the broadcasting councils governing West Germany's [[ARD (broadcaster)|ARD]] (association of public broadcasters), the film was not aired. Instead Panorama's producers replaced the time slot with a statement of protest and the display of an empty studio.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://feministberlin1968ff.de/womens-center/abortion-gynecology-1973-75/|title = Abortion ban / Modernizing Gynecology {{pipe}} Berlin Goes Feminist|date = 20 January 2015}}</ref>

==== Circumventing the abortion ban ====
In the 1970s, radical women's centers without a formal hierarchy sprang up in [[West Berlin]].<ref>Cristina Perincioli, "Berlin wird feministisch"(2015) p.89, Interviews with several witnesses translated in English: [https://feministberlin1968ff.de/womens-center/berlin-womens-center-1972/]</ref> These Berlin-based women's centers did abortion counseling, compiled a list of Dutch abortion clinics, organized regular bus trips to them, and were utilized by women from other parts of West Germany.<ref>Frankfurter Frauen (eds.), "1. Frauenjahrbuch" (1975)</ref> Police accused the organizers of an illegal conspiracy. "The center used these arrests to publicize its strategy of civil disobedience and raised such a public outcry that the prosecutions were dropped. The bus trips continued without police interference. This victory was politically significant in two respects... while the state did not change the law, it did back off from enforcing it, deferring to women's collective power. The feminist claim to speak for women was thus affirmed by both women and the state."<ref>Myra Marx Ferree: Varieties of Feminism German Gender Politics in Global Perspective (2012) p.91 {{ISBN|978-0-8047-5759-1}}</ref>

==== Leaving the Church ====
In West Germany, 1973 saw the start of a radical feminist group campaign to withdraw from membership in the [[Catholic Church]] as a protest against its anti-abortion position and activities. "Can we continue to be responsible for funding a male institution that ... condemns us as ever to the house, to cooking and having children, but above all to having children".<ref name=FMT_1973>{{Cite web |url=https://frauenmediaturm.de/neue-frauenbewegung/chronik-1973/ |title=1973 (März) |website=FrauenMediaTurm |date=17 April 2018 |language=de}}</ref> In Germany those baptized in one of the officially recognized churches have to document that they have formally left the church in order not to be responsible for paying a church tax.<ref>[name=FMT_1973>{{Cite web |url=https://frauenmediaturm.de/neue-frauenbewegung/chronik-1973/ |title=1973 (März)] |website=FrauenMediaTurm |date=17 April 2018 |language=de}}</ref>

====Protest of biased coverage of lesbians====
In November 1972, two women in a sexual relationship, Marion Ihns and Judy Andersen, were arrested and charged with hiring a man to kill Ihns's abusive husband. Pretrial publicity, particularly that by ''[[Bild]]'', Germany's largest tabloid, was marked by anti-lesbian [[sensationalism]]. In response, lesbian groups and women's centers in Germany joined in fervent protest. The cultural clash continued through the trial which eventually resulted in the conviction of the women in October 1974 and life sentences for both. However, a petition brought by 146 female journalists and 41 male colleagues to the German Press Council resulted in its censure of the [[Axel Springer SE|Axel Springer Company]], ''Bild''<nowiki/>'s publisher. At one point in the lead up to the trial ''Bild'' had run a seventeen consecutive day series on "The Crimes of Lesbian Women".<ref>Cristina Perincioli, "Berlin wird feministisch"(2015) p. 117 translated in English: [https://feministberlin1968ff.de/womens-center/media-group-1973-75/]</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://feministberlin1968ff.de/lesbian-life/1973-74-witch-hunt/|title=1973-74 Witch Hunt {{pipe}} Berlin Goes Feminist|date=23 January 2015}}</ref>

==== Genital self-exams ====
These helped women to gain knowledge about how their own bodies functioned so they would no longer need to rely solely on the medical profession. An outgrowth of this movement was the founding of the {{ill|Berlin Feminist Women's Health Center|de|Feministische Frauen Gesundheits Zentrum|lt=Feminist Women's Health Center|vertical-align=sup}} (FFGZ) in Berlin in 1974. {{citation needed|date=October 2020}}

=== Social organization and aims ===
Radical feminists have generally formed small activist or community associations around either consciousness raising or concrete aims. Many radical feminists in Australia participated in a series of [[squatting|squats]] to establish various women's centers, and this form of action was common in the late 1970s and early 1980s. By the mid-1980s many of the original consciousness raising groups had dissolved, and radical feminism was more and more associated with loosely organized university collectives. Radical feminism can still be seen, particularly within student activism and among working-class women. In Australia, many feminist social organizations had accepted government funding during the 1980s, and the election of a conservative government in 1996 crippled these organizations. A radical feminist movement also emerged among Jewish women in Israel beginning in the early 1970s.<ref>Misra, Kalpana, & Melanie S. Rich, ''Jewish Feminism in Israel: Some Contemporary Perspectives''. Hanover, N.H.: Univ. Press of New England (Brandeis Univ. Press), 1st ed. 2003. {{ISBN|1-58465-325-6}}</ref>

While radical feminists aim to dismantle patriarchal society, their immediate aims are generally concrete. Common demands include expanding [[reproductive rights]]. According to writer [[Lisa Tuttle]] in ''The Encyclopedia of Feminism'' it was "defined by feminists in the 1970s as a basic human right, it includes the right to abortion and birth control, but implies much more. To be realised, reproductive freedom must include not only a woman's right to choose childbirth, abortion, sterilisation or birth control, but also her right to make those choices freely, without pressure from individual men, doctors, governmental or religious authorities. It is a key issue for women, since without it the other freedoms we appear to have, such as the right to education, jobs and equal pay, may prove illusory. Provisions of childcare, medical treatment, and society's attitude towards children are also involved."<ref>Tuttle, Lisa (1986). ''The Encyclopedia of Feminism''.</ref>{{Full citation needed|date=June 2022}}