Instead of challenging male power, the high-ranking ladies attach themselves to it like tradwives
By Rachel Marsden, a columnist, political strategist, and host of independently produced talk-shows in French and English.
https://www.rt.com/op-ed/authors/rachel-marsden/rachelmarsden.com
Women marching in St. Louis as part of women's liberation demonstration on 26 August, 1970 © Getty Images/Bettmann
International
Women’s Day used to come with a certain esthetic. A celebration of past
victories and a look ahead to new hopes and challenges. But this year,
the vibe is women on social media, https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/ymca-vs-hijab-how-iranian-women-are-hitting-back-at-moral-policing-on-social-media-after-khamenei-death/amp_articleshow/128964324.cmsclaiming
Iranian heritage, dancing in celebration of US and Israeli airstrikes
on Iran, even as reports circulate that bombs had killed roughly 160
schoolgirls.
Meanwhile, Western female leaders – those who
regularly speak about things like feminist foreign policy and are seen
as the epitome of female governance – seemed suddenly to develop an
acute sensitivity about tone. Statements were measured and delicately
phrased so as not to antagonize the men launching the missiles.
The question practically writes itself: how did a movement once defined by dissent become so cautious in the presence of power?
The
answer begins with a misunderstanding of feminism’s history. Contrary
to the mythology, feminism has rarely been as radical as its reputation
suggests. From the beginning, it contained competing factions. Like most
political movements, feminism ended up rewarding the faction that was
easiest for institutions to accommodate.
During the second wave
feminism of the 1960s and 1970s, ideological debates within the movement
were fierce, on everything from pornography and capitalism to
lesbianism and marriage. Different factions claimed the feminist banner,
but only one ultimately ended up with the microphones and funding.
The
version that eventually dominated was the one that institutions could
live with. One that foundations could fund with their shady backers, and
universities could fall over themselves to host. Corporations and
government learned to speak its language, and vice-versa, and feminism
became a feature of the power structure itself.
That evolution did
produce some real achievements, although there’s debate over the extent
to which they were inevitable anyway, particularly given the relative
freedom of women in the Soviet Union during the Cold War era, especially
in the labor force with a reported 80%
employed outside the home by 1983, and America’s desire to better
compete economically with the USSR by increasing its own female
workforce.
Women gained financial independence, legal rights, and social
freedoms that previous generations couldn’t imagine. A woman could apply
for a credit card without a male co-signer. She could sign a lease
without being asked if she worked as a prostitute to pay for it. She
could open a bank account, and chart a life that didn’t require a
permanent male escort through adulthood. If she needed help fixing a car
or assembling furniture, she could hire someone rather than entering
into a lifetime contractual arrangement with the nearest man who owned a
wrench.
But that success also had a side effect. The movement
grew comfortable inside the institutions that it once challenged. Once
feminism became part of the establishment, it absorbed the
establishment’s unwritten rules, including the careful language, the
strategic silence, and the understanding that certain forms of dissent
were impolite.
The result is an inversion. Today’s feminist spaces
are visually diverse and rhetorically inclusive, but ideologically
narrower than many earlier feminist debates. Attend a modern conference
or browse the programs of prominent organizations and you will find
every conceivable identity represented in the most superficial sense.
What you will struggle to find is genuine ideological diversity. Women
who depart from the prevailing worldview rarely appear, unless they have
been carefully vetted as safe exceptions.
In other words, the contemporary movement celebrates difference everywhere except in thought.
This
narrowing has produced some odd priorities. Feminist institutions have
spent enormous energy adjudicating language, identity categories, and
cultural etiquette. The result comes across as theatrical and
performative. Meanwhile, questions of war, foreign policy, and state
power often receive more cautious treatment, depending on the guy in
charge. For instance, does anyone recall a feminist movement against
former President Barack Obama’s drone striking half the planet? Me
neither.
The reaction to the Iran strikes underscores the same problem. When
President Donald Trump announced that Washington had joined Israel in
bombing Iranian targets, killing senior figures and igniting regional
tensions, the moment presented an obvious test. If feminism truly
champions human rights and the protection of civilians, surely the
deaths of schoolgirls in a bombing campaign would provoke unmitigated
public outrage.
Yet many prominent Western women in positions of authority responded with a remarkable delicacy. Statements focused on “regional stability,” “security concerns,” and the importance of “avoiding escalation.”
Direct condemnation of the strikes was rare. Even leaders who
frequently invoke feminist values in foreign policy appeared reluctant
to criticize the military actions too bluntly.
Consider Ursula von
der Leyen, the European Commission’s unelected president and one of the
most powerful women in European and global politics. Her remarks on the
conflict emphasized diplomacy and stability but avoided direct
denunciation of the attack itself. Similar rhetorical caution appeared
across Western institutions led by women who regularly embody or
champion the role of women in power. Yet where were they when this prime
opportunity presented itself to exercise it? They’re always keen to
correct someone’s vocabulary but seem less interested in criticizing a
bombing campaign when it involves the country they’ve hitched themselves
to like a tradwife. They may not appreciate Trump himself, but they’re
dependent on the position that he represents as US commander-in-chief.
Meanwhile,
the online celebrations by diaspora influencers dancing in response to
the bombing campaign represent another strange mutation of modern
feminist-adjacent activism. War is reframed as liberation. The logic
suggests that bombs dropped under the right pretext somehow advance
women’s rights, even when those bombs fall on girls who will never grow
old enough to enjoy those freedoms. That is, if they ever do come into
existence, given the poor track record so far.
Perhaps the deeper problem is that feminism today lacks ambition.
Specifically, that of challenging power. Movements that begin as
rebellions often become institutions, which ultimately favor stability.
Feminism
was never supposed to be just another bunch of seats at The Man’s
table. Its original promise was disruption and the insistence that women
could question every system of authority that governed their lives.
If
that spirit still exists, then this moment should be an invitation to
rediscover it. Feminism doesn’t need more carefully worded statements
from women in power, but rather courage to say something genuinely
uncomfortable when the establishment goes way offside.
A movement
that can address these challenges with the same confidence that it
brings to social debates would be a feminism worthy of its history.
Anything less risks becoming exactly what earlier generations fought
against: a demure and compliant accessory to the status quo.