Queer Politics, Gender and Patriarchy Pt. 1: You can’t be a Sadomasochist and a Feminist

Recently I have been reading “Unpacking Queer Politics” by Sheila Jeffreys and it has got me thinking about various things. Now, I realize that Sheila Jeffreys is not incredibly popular but I believe she is incredibly informative and really cares about women. The reasons for her unpopularity are lame and hold no real ground. Most people dislike her because she actually questions things and tries to get to the root, which is why she’s a radical lesbian feminist. I honestly believe that we need more women like Sheila Jeffreys to really deconstruct this male supremacy we live in.

Anyway, her book that I’m reading is fantastic and is teaching me a lot about queer theory since I honestly haven’t gone through it. She explains it as well as deconstructs the principles that blanket over lesbianism. Jeffreys explains how the original queer theory was established by gay men and just really speaks about queer men and basically ignores lesbians. She also states that there is a definite difference between the lesbian feminist community and the lesbian community, which she argues is built up around male dominance, patriarchal influences and heterosexuality. Everything I was curious about in the lesbian community is making much more sense after reading this book. I will get to that in my next post, but before I would like to state the importance of Jeffrey’s critique of sadomasochism in the queer community, particularly in the lesbian community.

Jeffreys has criticized practicers of S&M in various articles, critiques and published books. She states that S&M interest in the lesbian community is heavily influenced by homosexual male culture. Now, many people will jump on the wagon and call Jeffreys a homophobe, or at least hateful of gay men, which is entirely untrue. It feels as though a radical feminist or a radical lesbian feminist cannot attempt to deconstruct or critique the gay male community without assault. There’s a huge difference between feeling homosexual men are all one way and questioning male supremacy, gender roles and power struggles in the community. I believe her critique of S&M is fair and in-depth as well as being completely tied to radical feminism and the dismantling of gender.

As most of us know already, sadomasochism is the practice of inflicting or receiving pain for sexual pleasure purposes. That’s basically the jest of it. The practice is debated amongst some feminists much like the critique of sexuality itself. Radical feminists obviously believe that one cannot desire to hurt, rape, beat and humiliate other women for sexual pleasure and still be fighting for women’s freedom. I have met, however, women who consider themselves radical feminists but support sadomasochism. I think this ridiculous concept stems from the fact that many people don’t understand the concept of radicalism, they believe it means “hardcore” or something equally ridiculous when it actually means root. So if you consider yourself a radical feminist and you attempt to find the root to oppression you most likely wouldn’t be able to find anything empowering about S&M. Unfortunately, many of today’s younger feminists have taken the libertarian/post-modernist route and decided to embrace patriarchal practices, worship their vulva by performing in patriarchal plays like The Vagina Monologues and watch pornography.

When I first started seeing so-called feminists supporting S&M practices, I was horribly confused. I couldn’t and still can’t understand how anyone can say they are a feminist while supporting such violence that obviously is male in nature. Jeffreys believes that this idea of S&M fitting into the lesbian culture has changed the entire community, separating the lesbian feminist community and the lesbian community. I have hung around a few lesbians a few years ago, I was very close friends with one woman who considers herself a radical feminist but had informed me that if her friend wanted to practice BDSM with another woman, she would find nothing wrong with it. Obviously, I couldn’t grasp how this made any sense and I started to notice a pattern in her politics. Her politics were incredibly libertarian in that she believed people should just do whatever they feel like and it can still be considered political or revolutionary. This is a giant misconception about feminism.

As I stated before, beating and humiliating a woman for sexual pleasure is not feminist, progressive or radical. I would hangout with her at lesbian bars and gay clubs – I would notice some women would dress like men and spank other women who were more ‘feminine’. Apparently this was ground-breaking and progressive, acting like a chauvinist dude and spanking other women and objectifying them was feminist. How can this be? Well, because she seemed to believe that if a woman did it with another woman it was okay. Apparently you can’t be a woman and hurt other women? I guess that’s why female brothel owners must be feminist and respect the women they sell to men to be sexually tortured. This of course, is not exclusive to the lesbian community, it is merely an example of my confusion surrounding the community and it’s relationship with radical feminism, or lack there of. I know a lot of heterosexual couples that participate in S&M, and since they enjoy it, it must be liberating and excused from any feminist critique.

Do you think sex should become re-privatized and thus hidden away so that the rad fems can’t question its roots? How will women be free if we only question some things and not others? Especially if the practices are harmful to women?

I hope to share more thoughts after I get through more of this great book.