Editing Feminism (section)

=== Affirming female sexual autonomy ===
{{See also|My body, my choice}}
For feminists, a woman's right to control her own [[Right to sexuality|sexuality]] is a key issue and one that is heavily contested between different branches of feminism. [[Radical feminism|Radical feminists]] such as [[Catharine MacKinnon]] argue that women have very little control over their own bodies, with female sexuality being largely controlled and defined by men in patriarchal societies. Radical feminists argue that sexual violence committed by men is often rooted in ideologies of male sexual entitlement and that these systems grant women very few legitimate options to refuse sexual advances.<ref>{{cite book |author1=Rohana Ariffin |author2=Women's Crisis Centre (Pinang, Malaysia) |title=Shame, Secrecy, And Silence: Study On Rape in Penang |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HfsDAQAAIAAJ |access-date=1 October 2011 |date=1997 |publisher=Women's Crisis Centre |isbn=978-983-99348-0-9}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last1=Bennet |first1=L |last2=Manderson |first2=L |last3=Astbury |first3=J |date=2000 |title=Mapping a global pandemic: review of current literature on rape, sexual assault and sexual harassment of women |url=http://academic.udayton.edu/health/01status/rape01.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121102214813/http://academic.udayton.edu/health/01status/rape01.htm |archive-date=2 November 2012 |website=[[University of Melbourne]]}}</ref> Some radical feminists have argued that women should not engage in heterosexual sex, and choose [[Political lesbianism|lesbianism]] as a lifestyle and political choice, a view that has fallen out of favor, as [[Human sexuality|sexuality]] is seen as largely biologically influenced rather than a choice one can make for political reasons.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

Some radical feminists argue that all cultures are, in one way or another, dominated by ideologies that deny women's right to sexual expression, because men under a patriarchy define sex on their own terms. This entitlement can take different forms, depending on the culture. In some [[conservative]] and religious cultures marriage is regarded as an institution which requires a wife to be sexually available at all times, virtually without limit; thus, forcing or coercing sex on a wife is not considered a crime or even an abusive behaviour.<ref>{{cite journal |vauthors=Jewkes R, Abrahams N |title=The Epidemiology of Rape and Sexual Coercion in South Africa: An Overview |pmid=12365533 |date=2002 |volume=55 |issue=7 |pages=1231–44 |journal=[[Social Science & Medicine]] |doi=10.1016/s0277-9536(01)00242-8}}</ref><ref>Sen P. Ending the presumption of consent: nonconsensual sex in marriage. London, Centre for Health and Gender Equity, 1999</ref>

In 1968, radical feminist [[Anne Koedt]] argued in her essay ''[[The Myth of the Vaginal Orgasm]]'' that women's biology and the [[Clitoris|clitoral]] orgasm had not been properly analyzed and popularized, because men "have orgasms essentially by friction with the vagina" and not the clitoral area.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Wahlquist |first=Calla |date=31 October 2020 |title=The Sole Function of the Clitoris Is Female Orgasm. Is That Why It's Ignored by Medical Science? |url=http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2020/nov/01/the-sole-function-of-the-clitoris-is-female-orgasm-is-that-why-its-ignored-by-medical-science |access-date=20 December 2020 |website=The Guardian}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=6 January 2013 |title=The Myth of the Vaginal Orgasm by Anne Koedt |url=http://www.uic.edu/orgs/cwluherstory/CWLUArchive/vaginalmyth.html |access-date=20 December 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130106211856/http://www.uic.edu/orgs/cwluherstory/CWLUArchive/vaginalmyth.html |archive-date=6 January 2013}}</ref>

Other branches of feminism such as individualist feminism consider themselves [[Sex-positive movement|sex-positive]], and see women's expression of their own sexuality as a right. In this view, what is or is not "degrading" is subjective, and each person has a right to decide for themselves what sexual acts they find degrading and if they want to participate in them or not. Individualist feminist, [[Wendy McElroy]] wrote in her book, [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/621306.XXX XXX: A Woman's Right to Pornography], "let's examine [...] the idea that pornography is degrading to women. Degrading is a subjective term. Personally, I find detergent commercials in which women become orgasmic over soapsuds to be tremendously degrading to women. I find movies in which prostitutes are treated like ignorant drug addicts to be slander against women. Every woman has the right—the need!—to define degradation for herself."{{cn|date=March 2025}}

According to this view, part of sexual autonomy is the right to define one's boundaries, desires and limits around their sexuality rather than accept a narrative in which all women are victims of men during a sex act.{{cn|date=March 2025}}