Feminism has always been bundled up in the idea of American cultural superiority that justifies pursuing hegemony (although the term used is usually "women's rights").
Sure. I thought briefly about using the phrase "American Feminism".
But, regardless, to be more nuanced: Feminism gets rhetorically roped into the case for Western cultural hegemony, which in turn gets used as a justification for US military adventurism.
I just don't think it's particularly shocking that the US government would try to co-opt some of its rhetoric as a justification for military adventurism. They already do w/r/t the Middle East.
Modern intersectionality isn’t the cultural relativism of 20th century liberalism. Intersectionality has a built in escape hatch for any aspect of foreign culture that conflicts with the foundational premises of post-religious children of mainline american protestants. Any such practice gets lifted to a “human right,” thus taking it out of the realm of cultural differences and allowing it to be imposed on foreign societies without accusations of cultural imperialism.
This avoids failure modes of 20th century cultural relativism, which treated everything as socially constructed and therefore within bounds as long as some society accepted the practice. It has a different flaw, however, in that there is no rational distinction between what’s a socially constructed aspect of culture and what’s a human right.
allowing it to be imposed on foreign societies without accusations of cultural imperialism.
I don't actually know if this is an accurate representation of 21st century feminist thought. If anything, I think they just take an inevitableist view and say every country must be allowed to have its feminist revolution in its own time.
Concrete example: I'm Bangladeshi, and our society has strict gender roles. When you visit a Bangladeshi household, the women will spend all the time in the kitchen cooking elaborate meals, while the men are socializing. This is rooted deeply in tradition, religion, etc., and even extends to Bangladeshis who live in western countries. It's how Bangladeshis show hospitality, caring for family, etc.
How do you approach this from a feminist perspective?
1) If you're a western cultural chauvinist, like my mom and me, you'd say that Bangladeshi culture is backwards and the goal should be to be more like say Scandinavians where society doesn't impose this burden to cook elaborate meals on women.
2) If you're a cultural relativist, like most 20th century liberals, you'd say gender roles are arbitrary social constructs, and it's not our place to impose what we perceive as more advanced views of gender roles on other cultures.
3) If you're an anti-colonial feminist, you've got a tension. Unlike a cultural relativist, you cannot accept the Bangladeshi practice. But unlike a cultural chauvinist, you can't say that your own society's view of gender roles is superior. So you have to reframe gender roles as being a matter of women's rights, and therefore outside of culture. You put it in the same bucket as other social practices that we're willing to condemn as being outside the realm of legitimate cultural practices.
Note that the first and second groups accept the premise that gender role are cultural. The third must construct a second category of social practices outside the boundaries of culture in which to place practices that they condemn. But this distinction between what's "culture" and what's “not culture" is arbitrary. The collective imposing social rules on individuals to allocate work, achieve desirable ends, etc., is what culture is. What the anti-colonial feminist has done is just whittled down the box labeled "culture" to include only the aspects of society--food, clothing, etc.--that they don't have strong feelings about either way. It's the "Disney's It's a Small World" version of culture, where everyone is just a Western European wearing different different clothes and eating different food.[1]
This is particularly relevant in the context of this discussion about Steinem and the CIA. The CIA people of the 1950s were in bucket (1)--they thought that Anglo-American culture was superior in its substantive aspects over other cultures. All of those peoples' kids became post-Christian liberals, but their fundamental view of the world isn't actually all that different. (3) is just (1) with more steps and more hiding the ball about the very significant cultural differences that actually exist in society.
[1] More sophisticated intersectionalists will frame this in terms of "choice," but that steals the base. The notion that society can't prescribe social roles to people without their affirmative consent is itself an outgrowth of western individualism. From India to China to Africa to the Middle East, prior to western influence, everyone agreed that society can impose roles and obligations and burdens on individuals based on who they are.
Comments
Feminism has always been bundled up in the idea of American cultural superiority that justifies pursuing hegemony (although the term used is usually "women's rights").
Feminism exists outside of the US
Sure. I thought briefly about using the phrase "American Feminism".
But, regardless, to be more nuanced: Feminism gets rhetorically roped into the case for Western cultural hegemony, which in turn gets used as a justification for US military adventurism.
Modern feminism is generally anti-colonialist and intersectional, which goes against that specific notion
Again, agreed.
I just don't think it's particularly shocking that the US government would try to co-opt some of its rhetoric as a justification for military adventurism. They already do w/r/t the Middle East.
Ok, I see, I think I misread your initial comments. My bad
Modern intersectionality isn’t the cultural relativism of 20th century liberalism. Intersectionality has a built in escape hatch for any aspect of foreign culture that conflicts with the foundational premises of post-religious children of mainline american protestants. Any such practice gets lifted to a “human right,” thus taking it out of the realm of cultural differences and allowing it to be imposed on foreign societies without accusations of cultural imperialism.
This avoids failure modes of 20th century cultural relativism, which treated everything as socially constructed and therefore within bounds as long as some society accepted the practice. It has a different flaw, however, in that there is no rational distinction between what’s a socially constructed aspect of culture and what’s a human right.
I don't actually know if this is an accurate representation of 21st century feminist thought. If anything, I think they just take an inevitableist view and say every country must be allowed to have its feminist revolution in its own time.
What are you talking about? In concrete terms, what do you mean?
Concrete example: I'm Bangladeshi, and our society has strict gender roles. When you visit a Bangladeshi household, the women will spend all the time in the kitchen cooking elaborate meals, while the men are socializing. This is rooted deeply in tradition, religion, etc., and even extends to Bangladeshis who live in western countries. It's how Bangladeshis show hospitality, caring for family, etc.
How do you approach this from a feminist perspective?
1) If you're a western cultural chauvinist, like my mom and me, you'd say that Bangladeshi culture is backwards and the goal should be to be more like say Scandinavians where society doesn't impose this burden to cook elaborate meals on women.
2) If you're a cultural relativist, like most 20th century liberals, you'd say gender roles are arbitrary social constructs, and it's not our place to impose what we perceive as more advanced views of gender roles on other cultures.
3) If you're an anti-colonial feminist, you've got a tension. Unlike a cultural relativist, you cannot accept the Bangladeshi practice. But unlike a cultural chauvinist, you can't say that your own society's view of gender roles is superior. So you have to reframe gender roles as being a matter of women's rights, and therefore outside of culture. You put it in the same bucket as other social practices that we're willing to condemn as being outside the realm of legitimate cultural practices.
Note that the first and second groups accept the premise that gender role are cultural. The third must construct a second category of social practices outside the boundaries of culture in which to place practices that they condemn. But this distinction between what's "culture" and what's “not culture" is arbitrary. The collective imposing social rules on individuals to allocate work, achieve desirable ends, etc., is what culture is. What the anti-colonial feminist has done is just whittled down the box labeled "culture" to include only the aspects of society--food, clothing, etc.--that they don't have strong feelings about either way. It's the "Disney's It's a Small World" version of culture, where everyone is just a Western European wearing different different clothes and eating different food.[1]
This is particularly relevant in the context of this discussion about Steinem and the CIA. The CIA people of the 1950s were in bucket (1)--they thought that Anglo-American culture was superior in its substantive aspects over other cultures. All of those peoples' kids became post-Christian liberals, but their fundamental view of the world isn't actually all that different. (3) is just (1) with more steps and more hiding the ball about the very significant cultural differences that actually exist in society.
[1] More sophisticated intersectionalists will frame this in terms of "choice," but that steals the base. The notion that society can't prescribe social roles to people without their affirmative consent is itself an outgrowth of western individualism. From India to China to Africa to the Middle East, prior to western influence, everyone agreed that society can impose roles and obligations and burdens on individuals based on who they are.
That’s a pretty based take. Where do I subscribe to your newsletter?
those goalposts have wheels, huh?
Uh, what? Communists and especially Soviets were big on Feminism. American women were supposed to be perfect housewives.
This particular rhetoric is usually applied to the Middle East.