The clitoris: exclusionary and problematic
Susan Cox at Feminist Current reports an odd exclusion:
Lady*fest, a feminist festival scheduled to take place June 22nd – 25th in Heidelberg, Germany, has declared the clitoris “exclusionary.”
The festival, which features workshops, lectures, and art, had initially planned to include topics like, “clitoris/glitzoris” and “masturbation” as part of their art exhibition, but protocol documents from the last planning meeting now explain that the clitoris is “problematic,” because it refers to female anatomy.
Well excuuuuuuuse the fuck out of me – should we all get them chopped off then? Does that idea sound vaguely familiar?
I can’t wait for our trans racial allies to start saying black skin is “problematic” because it refers to something about black bodies.
Except of course I can wait for that, I can wait forever for that, because it would be grotesque and disgusting. Why do so many people think it’s perfectly all right when it comes to women?
The festival organizers have stated that, due to being a “queer Lady*fest,” it shouldn’t empower “only certain groups,” such as those with clitorises, and that the festival will not be “excluding any groups” by referencing female anatomy. Lady*fest claims these actions embody their policy, which translates to, “be tender to all genders,” and that being mindful of how female anatomy offends people will provide “a safer space to all human beings by applying awareness.”
So then why have a “Lady” fest? Why have feminism? Why not just give up struggling and join the MRAs when they cry, “I’m not a feminist, I’m a humanist”? Why not just spell it out that you think women are the only truly privileged people on the planet, and should be taken down a peg or ten?
Naida Pintul, a radical feminist and former organizer of Lady*fest who lives in Heidelberg, is critical of the decision. She told me via email, “Female anatomy has become a taboo.”
“This is a postmodern version of the same old hatred of female bodies and their biology. Once again, we are not supposed to talk about the reality and the consequences of having our female reproductive organs.”
We’re not supposed to talk about abortion as a women’s rights issue. We’re not supposed to talk about pregnancy as something particularly relevant to women. We’re not supposed to destigmatize the vulva by having vulva cupcakes at festivals.
Initially, the decorating of “vulva cupcakes” was planned as an activity to celebrate and destigmatize female anatomy. This event was also cancelled by festival planners on account of vulva cupcakes not being “inclusive” of everyone’s identity.
Erase all the women.
The other day I commented on a post by a male friend about George Tiller in response to someone who made a sarcastic remark about how great abortion is. The following exchange happened:
Me: If you need one, it fucking well is.
Male friend: I support the availability of abortion only in the most extreme cases. Like when a woman is pregnant and doesn’t want to be.
A woman: Like when a person is pregnant and doesn’t want to be, yep.
A woman found it necessary to jump in and correct the guy who said, wittily, “I support the availability of abortion only in the most extreme cases. Like when a woman is pregnant and doesn’t want to be.” A woman thought that was necessary and worthwhile. A woman thought it was wrong to talk about pregnancy and abortion as something to do with women.
This shit has to stop.
Such a weird coincidence how only half of the population have the potential to get pregnant. It’s almost like we need a classificatory term to refer to that group. Anyone got any ideas?
Hmmmmmm – no, sorry, nothing occurs to me.
They Who Shall Not Be Named?
The Untouchables?
Rape statistics skew heavily agianst women, something like a 6:1 ratio of female victims to male. Some might say that that is a feminist issue due to the statistical association of ‘being raped’ with ‘being female.’ But hark! and also lo! it is less than a 100% association, and therefore not a female issue in the slightest! Therefore, #NotAllRapes #NotAllRapists.
Similarly, victims of police brutality and police harassment in general is statistically linked to being non-white, and especially linked to being black. But hark! and also lo! again there are exceptions! Don’t associate police violence to victime race! Therefore again #NotAllCops #AllLivesMatter.
This reasoning leads to nothing less than the disbandment of not just feminism, but every demographic-based social movement.
P.S.
A summary.
Where *are* female people supposed to go for social support about their bodies?
First off, agree completely with the position that NOT talking about women’s specific anatomy is not remotely anything useful. There’s plenty of room in an exhibit like this one to also feature trans-specific exhibits, so this is just… dumb.
That said, Holms, you are aware of the rape statistics for trans women, right, in comparison to the general population of all women? That’s kind of a poor example. Mind you, I’d use that as a reason why trans women are better fit into the category of ‘women’ in these discussions (and thus, see no real reason for that generic ‘people’ that does so much to confound discussion).
We just ask the men?
@ #7 “Holms, you are aware of the rape statistics for trans women, right, in comparison to the general population of all women?”
There’s nothing in Holms’ comment that precludes transwomen from being included in the extension of “women”. The point still stands that being raped is highly correlated with being a woman, which makes rape a valid feminist issue. Just like having a vagina is highly correlated with being a woman, which makes having a vagina a feminist issue.
Freemage, the OP cites an event dropping all mention of female anatomy as a feminist issue purely because the statistical relationship between ‘woman’ and ‘has a clitoris’ is very very slightly less than 100%. The other social issues I mentioned in #5: rape victims are not 100% likely to be female, and police brutality victims are not 100% likely to be non-white; if we apply the same logic, that means the gendered nature of rape is not a concern for feminist activists, and the racial nature of police brutality is not a concern for BLM.
You go on to give an example of how intersectionalism should proceed (the tools, methods, arguments etc. of an issue can be used to highlight a subset of that issue where it meets another demographic without dropping either) but I was pointing out the logical consequence of the misuse of intersectionalism (the tools etc. etc. of an issue being used to highlight a subset of that issue where it meets another demographic and dropping all mention of the former).
To further illustrate:
Intersectionalism in general
“Intersectional” feminism
Freemage, trans women do not fit into the category of women, ever, in any way. They’re men. That’s unalterable. Any violence against them is male on male violence.
Lady*fest? Shouldn’t that be Person*fest?
Now, see, I don’t agree with jstuart @ 11 at all – I think trans women can and do fit into (or just fit) the category of women in many ways. I have doubts about some particular trans women who spend an inordinate amount of their time and energy bashing women and feminism and feminist women, and I suspect – I don’t know, but I suspect – they wouldn’t do that if they fit the category better – that is, if they had a better sense of what it’s like to be a woman in a sexist world. Then again one could say the same thing about for instance Christina Hoff Sommers.
I balk at being ordered to agree that trans women fit into the category of women in all ways, with no qualifications or stipulations whatever, not least because if that were true why would anyone be bothering to order people to agree with it? But for other reasons too – like the fact that if taken truly seriously it would obscure or erase all the difficulties of being trans, and what the hell would be the point of that?
Like…it’s called Ladyfest
And so one of the defining physical attributes of a women is problematic?
In other news, participants at *Manfest* describe the penis as problematic…
Geez.
I cannot possibly be “…mindful of how female anatomy offends people” without an explanation of precisely how the female anatomy offends people and which people are being offended by the female anatomy and so therefore deserve to be protected from any hint that the female anatomy exists.
How do you make the determination to exclude half the population for the sake of inclusiveness without your head exploding from the cognitive dissonance?
If it’s called ‘Ladyfest’ would there be a corresponding ‘Lordfest?’
So even old school concerns over class are jettisoned over the absurd single-issue of accommodating a tiny group of gender-essentialist trans people.
This is the PC reducto ad absurdam apocalypse. Rather the way the Trump candidacy represents the conservative collapse into incoherence.
John, good point. In fact, Ladyfest doesn’t sound like it is for feminists as much as femmes. For many women, the word “lady” is associated with attempts to shame them into modifying their behavior and conform to gender expectations. “A lady doesn’t raise her voice.” “A lady dresses modestly.” “A lady doesn’t run indoors.” The most empowering thing for me was deciding I was not a lady, nor was I classy. I was a person who sat the way I felt like sitting, wore clothing that didn’t match, and swore like a sailor when it seemed appropriate.
@17
Yes, I picked up on that as well. One imagines everyone sitting around, impeccably dressed, while sipping tea and nibbling on watercress sandwiches…all *ladylike*.
Ophelia@13: I appreciate you pointing out CHS, so I don’t have to. I don’t consider trans women who go to the extremes described in the original post to be any more ‘feminist’ than CHS is (and, less extreme, many trans women are sufficiently in error about this stuff that I regard them as bad feminists), but I do regard them to have as least as much right to the designation ‘women’, even if they don’t understand how much feminism does on their behalf. I just also figure feminism means that women (trans or otherwise) are still eligible to be called on their shit.
Freemage – I find myself wondering what it means to talk about “the designation ‘women’” as a matter of rights. That seems odd to me. I could say I have a “right” to the designation Chinese or reptile or astronomer, but what would that actually mean?
I’ll admit that the term is a loaded one. I’d rather we had about five hundred more nuanced words across this discussion, frankly, including several for the many meanings ascribed to ‘right’. But I’m stuck with the language we got. In this specific case, I’d say that the festival should, in fact, regard trans women as women. This doesn’t mean deleting an exhibit about the clitoris, any more than it should mean not including an exhibit about what it means to be an ethnically Middle Eastern woman in the West. (And, since the pertinent ratio is actually inverted, the notion of excluding the clitoris exhibit is actually far more offensive and absurd.)
Not long ago, you posted an article that listed, I think, a dozen things men should know about women’s lives. Two, IIRC, were pretty much jokes used to give the list a bit of levity; the other ten were more authentic. Of them, 2 applied to women’s anatomy, 8 were about women and society (including, FREX, rape and rape culture). Those 8, by and large, conform to trans women’s experiences as well (especially those who transition fairly early, who thus get more direct socialization as women by patriarchal culture). In the other 20% of the list?
I guess what I’m saying is that they shouldn’t have to put up with crap like jstuart posted (and you, yourself, rejected), any more than a woman should have to deal with being catcalled on the street.
On a vaguely related tangent, a trans activist here in NZ was yesterday quoted as saying that they would campaign to have gender identity added to the Human Rights Act. My first thought was ‘complicated’ rather than ‘good’. It is already illegal to discriminate against someone on the basis of either sex or sexuality. I would have thought that however you sliced and diced a situation that would cover you. Man/woman, gay/straight/asexual/pansexual/poly, transman/transwomen, other.
In any of those situation when you tell a person that they cannot discriminate, you NEVER cut across their own rights, as defined in the Act.
If you add Identity, which I think most of us view as being problematic to define if nothing else, you do add the potential to create conflict between the rights of one group vs the rights of another. When woman are told they cannot speak about womans rights because that marginalises (and therefore erases from existence, commits violence or ‘kills’) trans woman, whose rights take precedence? What happens with some of the weirder ‘identities’ we see people using?
I totally support the right of trans people to be who they are. I support a society that is tolerant of all forms of sexuality and gender expression that are based on mutual respect and equality (note that does not include child sex, bestiality or most forms of prostitution). I struggle to see how adding identity to a protected list adds anything other than confusion and I do think that the existing list of protected categories adequately protects trans people.
Rob: That is how it would work in a perfect universe. I assume that they are speaking of the listing in Section 21 of the Act (Google, you magnificent beast). “Sex” is the first element listed there. Several of the items listed show further discussion/definition; in the case of “Sex”, for instance, it states “including pregnancy and childbirth”. Now, an intelligent court would likely agree with you–“sex” is sufficiently solid grounds for preventing anti-trans discrimination in such cases where there’s a legitimate complaint. So the question becomes–are the courts intelligent in ruling that way? Are there ample legal precedents establishing that, for instance, an employer cannot refuse to hire someone because they identify as transgender? If so, then lovely, and explicitly putting in gender identity is more likely to create confusion (since it will have to define who gets protected under that label, precisely). If the courts have been slow to take up that sort of thing, then there might be a case made that they need some further pushing.
http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1993/0082/latest/DLM304475.html
Freemage, fair point. I’m not familiar with the case law on that point. Since the Act would need amending to add ‘Identity’, it could just as easily be amended to remove any ambiguity as to sex as well which would surely do – unless we think that identity merits special protection of it’s own. In which case, how to define it, what limits to place on it and how to ensure that hither to separate classes of protection do not now cut across each other.
Rob: An equitable position. If case law thus far were to prove lacking, I’d suggest that the best amendment would be to place the trans status protection underneath the umbrella of “sex”, thereby making it clear WHY it’s being protected (rather than as its own item).