Four questions to end 2023
Some of my favourite writers and thinkers reflect on this moment in the struggle for gender equality.
Dear reader,
For me, this year ends on a strange, sad note as the war in Gaza continues and the future for Palestinians and Israelis remains fraught and fragile. The two main gender-related stories I have covered in this newsletter in relation to the war are Hamas’ use of rape in its 7th October massacre and the horrors of pregnancy and childbirth in a Gaza under military bombardment. Both are examples of how the brutality of conflict can affect women in very particular ways. Noteworthy, too, has been how the war has highlighted the sidelining of women — the female soldiers warning against a Hamas attack who were ignored, the fact that there are no women in Israel’s war cabinet, and so on.
When I started this newsletter just over a year ago, I wanted to make a space in my life for looking at gender inequality and feminism (and the backlash against it) in detail. I wanted to have an excuse to really see this moment in the shift towards a (hopefully) more gender-equal future, to examine it and think about it out loud, to understand what the result of looking at the world through such a lens might be. I hoped that this exercise would be useful for others, and I am grateful to you for reading it.
To wrap up the first year of this newsletter, and the year 2023, I invited some of the writers, thinkers, and activists I most admire to answer four key questions about the struggle for gender equality and feminism — where are we? And where are we headed?
Enjoy! The Backlash will be back in the new year.
Alona
Helen Lewis, journalist and author
Which story in women's rights and/or feminism has affected you the most this year?
My day job is at The Atlantic, an American magazine, so the Supreme Court's Dobbs decision — which overturned Roe vs Wade, and removed the constitutional right to access abortion — is the first thing that springs to mind. Abortion restrictions affect everyone who can get pregnant, not just those seeking abortions. In Difficult Women: A History of Feminism in 11 Fights, I wrote about women in El Salvador who were jailed for having natural miscarriages, and sure enough, the same thing appears to be happening in the US. A woman in Ohio is on trial for "abuse of a corpse" for having a miscarriage on the toilet.
Which feminist writer, thinker, activist, or other figure should we be paying attention to?
Arlie Russell Hochschild is an incredible thinker. I went back to her classic work The Second Shift recently — on how women juggle paid and unpaid work. On a similar note, I was really pleased that Claudia Goldin won this year's Nobel Prize for Economics. Both write about women as, effectively, a labour class.
What is the most urgent issue in gender equality?
This is impossible to answer, because so many important issues are interlinked, and also worsened by our tendency not to listen to women, and not to believe their accounts of their experiences if they're politically inconvenient. So perhaps that authority gap, or empathy gap, is the big issue underlying so many other conversations — about sexual violence, medical negligence, or sexual harassment at work.
How bad is the backlash against feminism?
It's bad — a reactionary form of gender politics is obviously in the ascendant in the US, and parts of Eastern Europe, and perhaps in British schools too, thanks to the popularity of Andrew Tate and other manosphere influencers. Meanwhile, the online feminist movement has moved away from talking about the material conditions of women — their bodies, their money, their relationships — into a self-indulgent mix of academic theory and Tumblr-speak. I read a lot of online discourse and I think, in the words of the great philosopher Kourtney Kardashian: "Kim, there's people that are dying."
(P.s. I recommend ’s newsletter on here)
Leah Hazard, midwife, author, and activist
Which story in women's rights and/or feminism has affected you the most this year?
I’m devastated by the steady stream of stories from American women and girls who have suffered inhumane distress because of the newly restrictive abortion laws in various states: the 13-year-old rape survivor in Mississippi whose parents couldn’t afford to take her to the nearest legal abortion clinic nine hours away; the Texan women forced to birth babies whose medical problems were known to be incompatible with life; the countless other pregnant people whose states imposed harsh “trigger laws” immediately after Roe v Wade was overturned. Women in the UK aren’t safe from draconian reproductive legislation, either. Although abortion law was upgraded in 1967, we still face penalties related to the 1861 “Offences Against the Person” Act. Note the recent conviction of Carla Foster, who took the abortion pill mifepristone out of desperation during a Covid lockdown, when her pregnancy was beyond the legal limit for termination; or the case of Bethany Cox, who is due to stand trial in 2024 for using misoprostol to end her pregnancy when she was 19. These stories form one overarching narrative: that of a blatant disregard for the safety, autonomy, and dignity of pregnant women.
Which feminist writer, thinker, activist, or other figure should we be paying attention to?
I really enjoy the ideas of Tricia Hersey, the author of Rest is Resistance and founder of the Nap Ministry movement. Rest is Resistance is described on Hersey’s website as “a call to action and manifesto for those who are sleep deprived, searching for justice, and longing to be liberated from the oppressive grip of Grind Culture”. Hersey exhorts us — especially women, and especially those who are Black, Brown or otherwise marginalised by dominant cultures — to question the dominant capitalist, colonialist framework, and to interrogate our place within it. By granting ourselves permission to rest and reflect, we can be more energised for the “work” that really matters. Hersey’s philosophy is about so much more than saying yes to rest; it’s about being selective with our energy, and saying no to underpaid, undervalued, under-recognised labour.
What is the most urgent issue in gender equality?
Ignorance. I really believe that this is at the root of every misogynist crisis in our modern age. Politicians around the world pass laws about women’s bodies without understanding the fundamental biology of conception, pregnancy, and foetal development. Boys and men flock towards misogynist icons like Andrew Tate and Jordan Peterson (two sides of the same coin, as far as I’m concerned) because they have no concept of the visceral reality of living as a woman in this world, and because they are blind (sometimes wilfully) to the very real consequences of “harmless” banter and bravado. The reluctance or refusal to learn about the lived reality of women and trans and non-binary people is dangerous. In fact, it’s lethal.
How bad is the backlash against feminism?
It’s pretty bad, and I fear that it’s particularly grim among younger men and boys. Teachers are told by their male pupils to “make me a sandwich” (one of Tate’s favourite put-downs). Young women report the normalisation of sexually degrading practices such as non-consensual choking and spitting. From contraception to childcare, the continuum of planning and building a family is still predominantly seen as a female domain, with all of the physical and emotional labour that this entails. As the mother of daughters — a 17-year-old and a 20-year-old — I’m encouraged by the boldness, optimism, and candour of the younger generation of women and girls. Bur I do wonder whether these attitudes will be respected and reciprocated by the opposite sex as they grow into adulthood.
Angela Saini, Science journalist and author
Which story in women's rights and/or feminism has affected you the most this year?
The ongoing protests in Iran following the death of Mahsa Amini just over a year ago have occupied so much of my thoughts. I wrote about the 1979 revolution in Iran in the last chapter of The Patriarchs: How Men Came to Rule, and what has happened now has been a reminder that no regime is beyond challenge. It's as though the emperor has finally been revealed to have been naked. The Islamic Republic is deeply patriarchal and it has ruled through fear, but it is having to confront the possibility that its own citizens have become fearless. I don't know whether another revolution will happen, but I am certain that things will have to change — and if they do, that could have repercussions across the region.
Which feminist writer, thinker, activist, or other figure should we be paying attention to?
I would recommend everyone read the late Nawal El Saadawi's beautiful, moving work, especially Woman at Point Zero. Her life was a model of resistance, of standing up even when that meant attracting widespread criticism, and of appreciating the complex pressures that real women experience in their everyday lives when negotiating patriarchal societies and families.
What is the most urgent issue in gender equality?
It's hard to pick one because everything is interlinked, but if I had a magic wand, and could end one thing right now, it would be forced marriage, including child marriage. The International Labor Organisation classifies forced marriage as a form of modern-day slavery, and estimates that around 22 million people are living in forced marriages today. Forced marriage consigns women and girls to lifetimes of abuse and exploitation inside their own homes. It is the most severe and extreme form of patriarchal control, yet because it happens quietly behind closed doors it goes tragically ignored.
How bad is the backlash against feminism?
It's important to acknowledge the progress that has been made, because it's a reminder that change is possible. The central struggles of feminism — votes for women, universal rights, equality in marriage — have become mainstream in a remarkably short space of time when you look at the long sweep of history. But of course, there's so much more to be done and there are so many who are resistant. For instance, powerful religious institutions are doubling down on their insistence that a woman's place is at home, that heterosexual marriage is the only natural way to live, that gender is a fixed thing, and this is having a profound impact on how right-wing leaders across the world are framing their visions for society. You can see it in Russia and Hungary most clearly, but also on the religious right in the US and the conservative far-right in the UK. What's particularly disturbing is how many right-wing women are leaning into these ideologies as well. I worry that we don't always make the best case for why gender quality is better for everyone. Only a small male elite benefits from patriarchy.
Dr. Revital Madar, Marie Skłodowska-Curie Research Fellow, European University Institute
Which story in women's rights and/or feminism has affected you the most this year?
I don’t see the world through frameworks like those of women’s rights that often end up limiting feminism to matters that involve only biological women and a small set of issues. Feminism, to me, is a political agenda whose objectives contradict the capitalist and militarised societies we live in. Consequently, I am suspicious of stories that are framed solely around biological women’s rights and consider every political event as a feminist issue. That includes, in the French context where I live, pension reform, for example. In the European context, it would be the erosion of our democracies and Europe’s treatment of refugees.
In the context of the last two months, the events that have affected me the most are Hamas’ massacre and the genocide Israel has committed in Gaza since. Beyond the human lives that were lost and the human lives that have been maimed, physically or mentally through this vicious cycle of violence, there are the long-term and global repercussions I am wary of, such as what this indifference to human lives and the criminalisation of calls for a cease-fire, mean for the rest of the 21st century. I hope that, despite the horrors we are watching unfold daily, perhaps the intensity of the last escalation of violence will bring an end to Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories and allow Palestinians to enjoy freedom and security. If we care about the lives of Israeli Jews, we should support, unconditionally, the rights of Palestinians. No one will be safe and free if the other is not as safe and as free.
Which feminist writer, thinker, activist or other figure should we be paying attention to, and why?
Because feminism is about plurality, I’ll mention four voices whose words allowed me to breathe in the last two months. I am thinking of the Palestinian poet and journalist Rajaa Natour, especially the text she wrote immediately after Hamas attacked Israel, “We, the Palestinians, Have Shed this Blood,” but I would generally recommend following her. In a sea of voices from both sides who try to justify the killings, Natour’s words allow thinking of decolonialism in feminist terms. There is nothing we, Palestinians and Israeli Jews, need more in this moment. Another voice I am thankful for is that of Orly Noy, an Israeli translator of Persian poetry, a journalist, and the chair of the Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem. She has a unique capacity to find the right words while offering a precise political analysis. A magnificent voice I encountered recently is that of the Palestinian therapist, writer, and translator, Tala Abu Rahmeh. In “’To See Themselves as They Are’ — The Limits of Empathising with Your Occupier,” Abu Rahmeh reminds us of the danger of dehumanisation not of the other but of ourselves. As much as the two are interconnected, we rarely pay attention to how the employment of violence strips us of our humanity. Lastly, there is the voice of a 19-year-old survivor from Kibbutz Be'eri [one of the Gaza border communities Hamas attacked on 7th October] whose testimony is a clear call to stop relying on military solutions and immediately move for political ones. Her words are a clear cry against Israel’s bombardment of Gaza and the endangering of Israeli citizens living in the south of the country.
What is the most urgent issue in gender equality?
Climate. Because this is an existential issue that impacts, first and foremost, the most vulnerable groups in our societies, but mainly because a true solution to the climate crisis entails dismantling our current capitalist economic system. There is no solution to the climate that doesn’t include real degrowth, a move away from the idea that we should always strive to make more economic profit, meaning that we must produce more, consume more, and fill our planet with evermore trash and wars, so our stock markets will rise while ordinary people starve. We saw how disconnected these indexes are during the Covid-19 pandemic. But even now, almost two years into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and nearly three months after the last violent escalation in Israel-Palestine began, some people make money out of these wars and crave wars because if the only bottom line is profit, it doesn’t matter what you sell and how you make money. For the military-industrial complex, it’s the sale of weapons that kill; for others, it’s medicines that enjoy intellectual property protections which end up killing those who cannot afford these medicines while robbing the states that offer their citizens healthcare.
How bad is the backlash against feminism?
There’s a backlash, no doubt about it. It’s nothing new, as well. Yet, we should understand this backlash as part of an assemblage. It is not only feminism that is under attack, after all. That is why I am more concerned with the co-optation of feminism and the instrumentalisation of sexual violence. Both rely on a very thin, if not biological, understanding of feminism that, instead of offering us the political change that is so needed, assists and reinforces the status quo and current world order that is de facto killing us. We can see it happening on the right, with the election of Georgia Melony in Italy, but we see it also in the so-called centre parties, with the election of Kamala Harris, for instance. Co-optation occurs every time women are asked to be satisfied with a strong female figure that offers nothing new economically, politically, or climate-wise. As for the instrumentalisation of women’s rights, it often occurs around sexual violence. When sexual violence is used as a pretext to justify military solutions, when it is used as part of the stigmatisation and persecution of immigrants and refugees or other groups, very often from the global south, we, women, lose. We lose because these voices are fighting, in fact, to keep some imagined female, national, and racial purity. In other words, they fight to preserve their power while limiting our freedom.
Mandu Reid, leader of the Women’s Equality Party
Which story in women's rights and/or feminism has affected you the most this year?
So much has happened this year, it’s difficult to single out one story for special recognition. In fact, the idea of “recognition” (or, more accurately, the lack of it) leads me to what I want to highlight. The horrible events in Israel and Palestine have meant that the year has ended with a spotlight on the loss of life and suffering of civilians caught up in the terror and the heavy-handed, violent response to it. Reflecting on this, I’ve been profoundly affected by the fact that in so many conflict zones around the world violence against women is systematically used by armies and terror groups. Yet, except for a few notable examples, we in the richest and most powerful countries on the planet generally remain oblivious or indifferent. We hardly (if at all) hear about the brutality and atrocities women and girls experience in places like Congo, Sudan, Ethiopia/Eritrea, or Yemen, or that experienced by Uyghur women in China. This disparity of recognition signals that, as far as the affluent global north is concerned, some women’s lives have more value than others, which couldn’t be further from what a truly feminist approach to world affairs demands of us all.
Which feminist writer, thinker, activist or other figure should we be paying attention to?
Minna Salami is the author of a brilliant book called Sensuous Knowledge - A Black Feminist Approach for Everyone. She attributes the poly-crisis we are living through (environmental degradation, climate change, polarisation, vulnerability to pandemics, violence, political destabilisation, and increasing inequality across the world, etc) to the global dominance of euro-patriarchal paradigms over the last few centuries. She argues that the salvation and liberation needed to change the trajectory of humanity and our beautiful planet requires us to embrace ways of being, thinking, and knowing that go beyond the narrow frames of reference that euro-patriarchy forces us into. She passionately draws on, and contributes to, the work of Black and African feminist thinkers who have freed themselves from the intellectual, emotional, and spiritual shackles of euro-patriarchy. Sensuous Knowledge offers all of us an invitation and incentive to bring strength and tenderness, intellect and intuition, compassion and rigour to understanding and solving the most pertinent problems of the day. Pick up any newspaper, or watch any daily news bulletin, and you’ll be instantly confronted by 100 reasons why we desperately need new ways of engaging with each other and contending with the chaos and carnage erupting all around us.
What is the most urgent issue in gender equality?
The answer to this question depends on context and where you are located in the world. In the UK, with the backdrop of a persistent cost-of-living crisis, public services on their knees after 14 years of Conservative Party misrule, the economic and social aftershocks of Covid, and a depressing political debate where the main players are offering competing versions of austerity 2.0 — one of the biggest long-term threats to gender equality is the extortionate cost of childcare and the fact that our early years system is on the verge of collapse, with a demoralised, underpaid, under-appreciated, largely female workforce leaving the sector in droves. Having a properly funded universal system would support and enable green economic growth, boost tax revenues, deliver better outcomes for kids and communities, and accelerate progress towards equality for women more than any other economic or social policy intervention. Political parties that gloss over this or try to fob off voters by doing nothing more than putting the bare minimum on the table (both the Conservatives and Labour in the UK are guilty of this) cannot credibly claim to be serious about tackling gender inequality.
How bad is the backlash against feminism?
Over the last couple of years the backlash against feminism has gained momentum and become more ferocious. It manifests in many different ways. One example is the rise of obnoxious but hugely charismatic and increasingly influential anti-feminist “super-villains” like Andrew Tate. His steadily growing sway over millions of teenage boys and young men should not be underestimated. His operation is not haphazard, it is well organised, and well resourced. It is both creating and contributing to a surge in male supremacist ideology — particularly in the global north. The more normalised these ideas become, the greater their power to undermine progress fought for and won by our feminist foremothers. The backlash must be taken seriously, because winning hearts and minds is essential for feminism to fulfil its promise of transforming society, the economy, culture, and politics so that women and girls can live and thrive as truly equal citizens.
Sophie McBain, journalist and writer
Which story in women's rights and/or feminism has affected you the most this year?
From a personal perspective, as someone who at the beginning of the year was still trying to make sense of my experiences of Britain's maternity system, it has been reporting on the ongoing crisis in maternity care. So many friends have shared stories of births that became dangerous or traumatic for medically avoidable reasons because they weren't listened to, or because there weren't enough staff to give them and their babies the care they needed and deserved. It is a national scandal, but one that I think a lot of women have become desensitised to — substandard care and frequent near-misses have become normalised. Incidentally, I was incredibly lucky to have been looked after by such a compassionate and caring team of midwives who were doing their best in an entirely broken system, but luck shouldn't come into it.
Which feminist writer, thinker, activist, or other figure should we be paying attention to?
I'm slightly dodging this by highlighting three writers who have this year published brilliant and important books exploring the history, science, and politics of the female body. There is Leah Hazard's Womb, a gripping biography of a poorly understood organ and a journey to the origin of human life, Lucy Jones's Matrescence, a lyrical and powerful blend of science and memoir that explores the overlooked biological, personal, social, and political process of becoming a mother, and Cat Bohannon's Eve, a fascinating feminist retelling of human evolutionary history. All three are written slightly in the vein of Caroline Criado-Perez's Invisible Women, which exposed the huge consequences of the gender gap in science and data.
What is the most urgent issue in gender equality?
This is such a hard question to answer — I'd say violence against women, and I'd construe it in the broadest sense, from the global endemic of femicide, domestic violence, and sexual violence, to the ambient hum of sexual harassment and discrimination, to the violence that is done to women's bodies when reproductive healthcare is undervalued, under-resourced, and deliberately undermined.
How bad is the backlash against feminism?
A few years ago I was too complacent, I simply would never have believed that Roe v Wade would be overturned, for example. But can we afford to be anything other than optimistic?
Pragya Agarwal, behaviour and data scientist and author
Which story in women's rights and/or feminism has affected you the most this year?
It is impossible to name one. The issues that I have been engaging with most are: rising violence against women, continued setbacks to reproductive rights, medical gaslighting affecting women’s health and well-being, the huge impact of war and genocide on women, and the way climate change is affecting marginalised women. The UN’s gender snapshot report in 2023 stated that we risk leaving more than 340 million women and girls in abject poverty by 2030, and an alarming four per cent could grapple with extreme food insecurity by that year. We also have data that shows that women spend more than nine per cent more time performing unpaid labour compared to men, and this is merely for western nations. We don’t even have adequate data for many of the countries in the global south (I am not a fan of this term but haven’t found a suitable alternative). Violence against women is on the rise, and 245 million women and girls over the age of 15 experience physical or sexual violence, with more than 60 per cent of these from an intimate partner. An Australian dataset also shows that a woman is killed every 14 days at the hands of a former or current partner. Data also showed that, in the US, at least 33 transgender and gender non-conforming people have been killed violently through gun and interpersonal violence in 2023.
Which feminist writer, thinker, activist or other figure should we be paying attention to?
There are so many. But there is also a lot of noise and it is difficult to separate original thought from so much tokenistic and misplaced feminism. For me it is always good to go back to those who wrote about intersectional feminism because I find that, even as we talk about feminism and gender inequality, many seem to ignore intersectionality. I have been going back to reading bell hooks and Audre Lorde. I have also been looking at writings from scholars and activists from the global south because feminism is not just a western phenomenon. Mahasweta Devi’s Breast Stories (translated from Bengali by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, 1997) is brilliant, as is Sujatha Gidla’s Ants Among Elephants (2017). The essay “Can the Subaltern Speak?” by Chakravorty Spivak is one of my favourite writings that addresses lack of agency and tackles the issue of intersecting identities and power really well.
What is the most urgent issue in gender equality?
Where do I start? There is an urgent need to address the way gendered and racialised ideologies are being enabled and enforced with a view to oppress women, but justified by benevolence. This is happening in politics and in the media. This is happening in the rise of social media influencers that are “brainwashing” young men.
Policymaking is still determined by a privileged few who are not considering the long-term gendered impacts of policies. I think the lack of intersectionality in matters pertaining to gender equality is a huge issue. We are seeing a rising toxic discourse on how we define women, and sort of an oppression olympics on whose rights deserve more attention, which has taken much-needed attention away from how women — particularly those from the global south — are being impacted by crisis, war, and climate change.
At the moment we are way off-target to achieve any gender equality goals by 2030. The UN report I mention above also estimated that we need an additional $360bn (£290bn) a year to achieve gender equality by 2030. There is a lot to do.
Urgently, we need to make discussions around gender norms a priority in school curriculums because we have to challenge these norms and expectations from a young age, in the way we raise our girls as well as our boys. I am seeing that discussions around consent that we’ve had with our daughters since they were born are not happening in schools. All parents and carers should have discussions with all children around choices for our bodies, and the way we treat other bodies.
How bad is the backlash against feminism?
Whenever there is a challenge to the status quo, there will always be backlash. The shifting of established norms, however harmful these might be for society, would always cause cognitive discomfort in those who benefit from such norms and hierarchies. Our brains always try and resist any discomfort and so want to get back to a place that feels comfortable, and where there is no additional cognitive load. But there has always been backlash against any voices that have traditionally been marginalised. It is just that social media has amplified such backlash and these platforms enable people to voice their resistance to feminism without realising that men benefit as much from feminism as women do.
Stella Creasy, Labour (Co-op) Member of Parliament for Walthamstow, London
Which story in women's rights and/or feminism has affected you the most this year?
Where do you start?! There’s so much to both annoy and inspire that reflects the one step forward, two steps around and a stumble that is feminism in the 21st century — from the Lionesses almost winning the World Cup and reshaping expectations about women in sport, evidence of the complete breakdown in rape convictions in the UK and the disparities for women from minority communities in maternity care, to the recognition of the need to support menopause, the collapse of the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) [over claims of sexual misconduct, including rape] and the unmasking of Russell Brand [accused of rape, sexual assault, and emotional abuse]; from the lack of support for the women of Afghanistan and Iran, attacks on reproductive rights in America and Poland, and the murder of Brianna Ghey, to the questioning of whether allegations of sexual assault being used by Hamas could be “trusted”, or even the perennial chestnut about what short hair means for women and whether motherhood has penalties atached. Throughout it all some things never change, as women still have to fight to be heard and for space to be in their own right and to be seen as more than one dimensional — and the hot takes of the Joey Bartons, Piers Morgans and Jordan Petersons of this world are still seen as integral reading materials.
Which feminist writer, thinker, activist or other figure should we be paying attention to, and why?
The person we should be paying more attention to as feminists is Andrew Tate. Every school visit I do the children mention him, excited by what he’s saying and the controversy he’s generated. There seemed to be a presumption that his “downfall” to prison will end that fascination, but in truth it has increased it. He’s not a one man band, but part of a movement that is growing at pace. Hope not Hate research shows how younger generations are becoming more antagonistic towards feminists and interested in joining far-right movements. Young men are increasingly sharing material hardening the view they are being “penalised” by equality rather than liberated by it. I think that is in part because we’re not providing alternative narratives about why its not a trade-off but a trade-up for all. I fear many underestimate how these toxic ideas feed violence against women and the alienation of men. We don’t just need lessons on consent in schools, but also confidence for all kids.
What is the most urgent issue in gender equality?
Intersectionality — the understanding of what privilege actually is and how it interacts to hold us all back. Too often we all pay lip service to it, creating a hierarchy of concerns and arguing that if we deal with one — gender — then all will benefit “to some degree”. I am always struck by how so many violence against women and girls strategies have sections on issues identified to affect mainly minority communities, but without asking why women from Black and ethnic minority backgrounds experience higher levels of all forms of violence. This means when it comes to addressing these challenges we end up taking a “that will do” approach. We elect “some” women so they can reflect “all” women, we tackle “some” sexual harassment to “send a message” rather than securing diverse workplaces. We set up enquiries to “learn lessons” about poor outcomes in public services without being proactive in asking how else women are excluded. Progress is always welcome, but without an intersectional approach we miss using these moments to generate momentum because the problem is “solved”.
How bad is the backlash against feminism?
Much worse, and more organised, than I think is recognised because it uses on and offline methods to browbeat. Any woman who has opened her mouth about equality in the last year will have a story to tell on the vitriol this generates, often being accused of seeking “victimhood” and of being “attention seeking” for speaking up. The draining nature of such attacks cannot be underestimated and isn’t accidental — it encourages silence, rather than solidarity.
There’s an arrogance that believes feminism and the quest for equality are somehow moving forward. In reality, however, things are not that simple as the challenges created by patriarchy evolve, rather than dissipate. Feminism has increasingly been disconnected from power by the “culture wars” – the nature of women’s incomes and voices never being an active part of the discourse on the Daily Mail sidebar of shame. This means that feminism becomes about how women behave and if they are “acceptable” rather than the power they have.
The backlash isn’t just about open hostility. Feminism is increasingly being hemmed in by a very narrow set of questions — the most contentious being about trans rights — that are being expanded to fill the space for discussion on equality. I hate to use the term multi-tasking given it’s often used to justify women taking on the whole mental load of life, but equality does require us to have more than one argument at the same time. It should be obvious we don’t have to agree on all matters to be able to support change on others. However, many increasingly accept the “cancel culture” ethos of all or nothing. History teaches us that if we don’t keep speaking up, we keep slipping back — in 2024 I suspect we could all benefit from less cancelling and more collaborating across divides to make progress.
Thank you for these amazing interviews, Alona! I plan to print them out and read them carefully. I can highly recommend Leah Hazard's book "Womb: The Inside Story of Where We All Began." It's excellent.