THE FEMINIST MOVEMENT

It is very importanttostudy and understand the feminist movement, because it claims torepresentthe emancipation and welfare of women in these times. A need toappraiseits logic, practical implications and viability is required, all ofwhichwill be addressed in this chapter.

The word “feminism”itselfis very subjective and has been used indiscriminately, which has led toa certain measure of confusion and the existence of severaldefinitions.Among the current definitions of feminism are:

• Anygroups thathave tried tochange the position of women, or the ideas about women, have beengrantedthe title of feminist.
  • • A doctrineadvocating socialand political rights equal to those of men.

• • • Feminism meanswe seek for womenthe same opportunities and privileges the society gives to men, or thatwe assert the distinctive value of womanhood against patriarchaldenigration.While these positions need not be mutually exclusive, there is a strongtendency to make them so. Either we want to be like men or we don’t.

• Feminists must notonly worktowards the elimination of male privileges but the sex distinctionitself;genital differences between human beings would no longer matterculturally.The tyranny of the biological family would be broken and with it thepsychologyof power.

The emergence offeminisminthe West was mainly due to the dual standards of law in favour of men,which were based on the teachings of Christianity. The earliestfeministcampaigners demanded an end to the double standard of sexual morality,lbut this did not mean that they sought an overall lowering of moralstandards:the early feminists saw chastity not as oppressive, but as both naturaland necessary.

Until fairlyrecently,Westernpolitical systems were open to men only (and there were restrictions onprecisely which men were allowed to take part, namely socio-economicclass).Women had no say whatsoever. The suffragettes campaigned for women’srightsto vote and participate in the political process.

As late as thenineteenthcentury, oppressive marriage laws were still restricting women withregardto earnings. In the event of a divorce, women were further humiliatedbybeing denied access to their children and being cut off from any sourceof maintenance. The divorce laws were heavily biased in favour of men.

The development ofthefactorysystem drew women out of the home, and the oppression perpetrated byemployerswho saw women as cheap labour led to the emergence of a women’smovementthat demanded equal pay and fair treatment. The struggle for equal paylasted ostensibly until 1975, when a law was finally passed in Britain.However, as women are still being exploited in the work place, and itisnot unknown for women to be paid less than men for the same work, thestruggleis clearly not yet over.

The existence of alltheseoppressive laws and practices led to omen coming together to demandequalrights and justice. However, as time passed, capitalism and men inpositionsof power diverted Western women onto a different track. The earlyfeminists’attack on injustice evolved into a movement in which women looked atandaccused themselves. So what began with a struggle to change society’s(inmost cases, men’s) attitudes and laws ended up changing women, arguablyto the delight of men.

The feminist movementhasbecome an academic quagmire which has spawned nearly a dozen schools ofthought. These may be grouped under the headings of Marxist (orSocialist),Liberal, Sexual and Radical feminism. These will be examined and theirtheories and practical implications discussed.

MARXISTFEMINISM

The socialist orMarxisttradition has its roots in the works of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.However, the idea of socialism predates both, and had already been incirculationamong philosophers, economists and politicians. The thought of Marx andEngels is exemplified in the following quotation:

“As individualsexpresstheirlife, so they are. What they are, therefore, coincides with theirproduction,both with what they produce and with how they produce. Hence whatindividualsare depends on the material conditions of their production”.’

Marx’s concept oflabourand value may be summarised as follows: The value and power of labourcontainedwithin this product can be realized only if others want the commodity -if it has an exchange value in the marketplace. In return for suchproductivelabour, the worker receives a wage, which has within it two components- one a measure of profit or the surplus value appropriated by thecapitalist,and the other, the product of necessary labour, is used by the workersto sustain themselves, their family and the next generation. Marx’sdepictionof capitalism includes a further class, a group which is only tenuouslylinked to the production process at any given time: the unemployed, theimmigrant workers, and the women (italics mine). This groupcomprisesvarious parts of the reserve army of labour ready to be mobilised whenproduction needs to be expanded rapidly, and then demobilised duringtimesof recession.

Marxist theoryemphasisesthe idea that what makes us human is the fact that we produce our meansof subsistence. We are what we are because of what we do or, morespecifically,what we do to meet our basic needs in productive activities. What isdistinctiveabout Marxist feminism is that it invites every woman, whetherproletarianor bourgeois, to understand women’s oppression not so much as theresultof the intentional actions of individuals, but as the product of thepolitical,social and economic structures associated with capitalism.

Prior to theintroductionof industrial capitalism, the family or household was the site ofproduction.Parents, children and relatives all worked together to produce whateverwas needed for the family’s survival. Women’s work – planting,preserving,canning, cooking, weaving, sewing, childbearing and childrearing – wasas essential to the economic activity and success of the family unit aswas the work of men. But with industrialisation and the transfer ofproductionfrom the home to the factory or other public workplace, women who forthemost part did not enter the public workplace, at least in thebeginning-came to be viewed as “non productive,” in contrast to “productive” wageearning men.

This is basicallyEngels’theory of the cause of women’s inferior status, which he blamed on thecapitalist system, the family and marriage. In order to bring about anend to the oppression of women, Engels proposed extending legalequalityto women and then introducing them en masse to the workplace.Sucha move would be a prelude to the alliance of all women with the workingclass to socialise the means of production, abolish private property,andusher in an age of monogamous sexual love.

It was thought thatwomen’sprimary oppression lay in their role as unpaid domestic workers. Thisanalysisimplies that the benefits to male wage earners directly offset thedisadvantageinherent in their class position. This points to one solution: theabolitionof housework as it is now known.

What angered Marxistwomenmost about women under capitalism was the trivialization of women’swork.Women were increasingly regarded as mere consumers, as if the role ofmenwas to earn wages and that of women was simply to spend them on “therightproducts of capitalist industry”.

A prominent Marxistfeminist,Benston concluded that unless a woman is freed from her heavy burden ofdomestic duty, including child care, her entrance into the workforcewillbe a step away from, rather than towards, liberation. Marxist womenthereforeworked towards moving the women onto the factory work floor and towardsearning a living of their own, as a means of proving independence andequality.Another socialist, Warrior, argued that in general, males benefit fromwomen’s labour and capitalist males benefit twice. Women are the sourceof all labour in that they are the producers of all labourers. Theirlabourcreates the first commodity, male and female labourers, who in turncreateall other commodities and products. Men, as the ruling class, profitfromthis commodity through its labour. The male capitalist class makes aprofitwhen it buys this labour power and then receives the surplus value ofitsvisible economic production.

Marxist feministsbelievethat all women in the capitalist system are subordinate. Middle classwomenare subordinated in general to the men with whom they live and work,butas members of the middle class they enjoy material and socialadvantagesover both male and female members of the working class. Working classwomen,on the other hand, bear the dual burden of their subordinate gender andclass identities. In the family, as wives and mothers, they are theprincipalreproducers of the labour power from which capitalism extracts itssurplus,for which service they receive no payment. In addition, many of them,evenmothers with children, are in paid employment, which permits the directextraction of surplus value, while the wages they earn serve to meetfamilyneeds, created in increasing number by capitalism itself, for which theincome of the male “breadwinner” no longer suffices.

Yet another theorywithinMarxist feminism suggests that it is not childbearing, physicalweaknessor any other presumed biologically determined differences that are thebasis of women’s subordination in capitalist societies; it is thesocialallocation to women of responsibility for children. The obstacles tochangingthis connection lie in the capitalist system of production.

In Capitalism,thefamilyand personal life, Zaretsky3 detailed Marxist feminist theoryregardingpublic/private conceptualisation. She argues that patriarchal ideologyis vital in the reproduction of capitalism and further that theillusionof a private sphere wherein one’s “personal life” is conducted is anintegralpart of this philosophy. This introduces an entirely new factor: theconceptof a personal life, a subjectivity that is self consciously seekingpersonalfulfilment. This had not been a factor in the analyses of noncapitalistmodes of production. Indeed, one of Zaretsky’s arguments is that thissearchis specific to capitalism.

Zaretsky has two mainarguments.The first is that the rise of industrial capitalism promoted a newsearchfor personal identity outside the social division of labour. The secondis that the expansion of this “personal life” beyond the place of workcreated a new basis for women’s oppression, since the responsibilityformaintaining a refuge from an impersonal society was given to women, orat least to wives and mothers.

Zaretsky traces theparticularprocess of the proletarianization of the pett) bourgeoisie, which gaverise to a need for a search for personal identity outside the sphere ofwork. This became increasingly so as capitalism required a rationalisedlabour process undisturbed by community sentiment, familyresponsibilities,personal relations and feelings.

In 1973, Vogelintroducedan idea that represented a shift from the original Marxistunderstandingof domestic work. Vogel wrote: “In short, domestic labour is neitherproductivenor unproductive… Women’s productive activity in the family does notfall under the capitalist mode of production strictly defined. Thecommoncharacteristic of women, that of being domestic labourers issignificant.Thus women who perform domestic labour form a group whose labour isappropriatedin a distinct way in capitalist society, in a mode of production whosesocial relations differ from those of capitalist production. This meansthat an autonomous women’s movement is necessary to represent theoppressionwhich women share as domestic labourers”.

What Marxistfeministshavetried to highlight is how women’s domestic work is trivialised incomparisonwith wage-earning work, and how women are given the most boring andlow-payingjobs.

Dallas Costapublishedanarticle ‘The Power of Woman and the Subversion of the Community’ (1973)which carried an introduction by Selma James and made the unorthodoxMarxistclaim that women’s domestic work is productive not in the colloquialsenseof being “useful” but in the strict Marxist sense of creating surplusvalue.No women have to enter the productive labour force, for all women arealreadyin it, even if no one recognises the fact. Women’s work is thenecessarycondition for all other labour, from which in turn, surplus value isextracted.By providing current (and future) workers not only with food andclothes,but also with emotional and domestic comfort, women keep the cogs ofthecapitalist machine running.

Given the view ofwomen’sdomestic work as productive work, a “wages for housework” campaignpainteda picture of women who enter the public workplace as carrying a doubleload which meant that the day started with paid, recognised work on theassembly line and ended with unpaid, unrecognised work at home. The wayto end this inequity, suggested Costa and James, is for women to demandwages for housework. They proposed that the state – not individual men(fathers, husbands) – should pay wages to housewives.

The practicalapplicationof Marxism has itself dealt the death blow to its theories, for ifMarxismtruly intended to save women from oppression, then the people of theEasternbloc countries would not have risen up as they did in recent years. Thefailure of Marxism in Eastern Europe is sufficient proof against thistheory.However, we should also look at some of the practical issues:

• Wages forhouseworkis an ideathat is neither feasible or desirable as a strategy for the liberationof women. It is not feasible because if the state pays wages tohousewives,it will only do so in a way that preserves its own interests. The statewould most likely impose a special tax on married men, which would beusedto pay wages to their wives. Depending on how large a bite was thustakenout of the husband’s income – and there is reason to believe that itwouldbe a hefty sum – the wife’s pay cheque would most likely representnothingmore than a rise in status, as there would be no real rise in thefamily’sreal income. The housewife’s pay cheque would have the further,undesirable,effect of imprisoning women in the home.
• To regardchildbirthas theproduction of people to be evaluated as a financial asset is a failureto understand and appreciate the value of human beings. In chapter III,we saw numerous ayat of Qur’an and ahadith whichindicatethe higher status of the female due to her gender and unique ability tobring forth and nurture children. Islam has elevated women beyond thenarrow,worldly concerns of the workplace and earning a wage, and has decreedthather production and nurturing of children gives her a status thatequals,if not exceeds, that of men. If Allah and His Prophet have told us thatthe value of a mother is even greater than that of a father, then thestatusof motherhood must be reinstated to its proper, elevated position.
• The underlyingMarxist theoryassumes equality between individuals in terms of financialindependence:people are only equal if they earn independently to support themselves.Far from liberating women, Marxism has in fact served the interests ofthe bosses by supplying them with a surplus of workers which makes iteasyfor them to demand cheap labour. Real-life experience has shown thatfewwho do get financial independence have gained it by sacrificing theirownphysical and mental health. However, the majority have become thevictimsof rather than the winners of the society. From Chapter II we candeducethe ills befalling women in the non Islamic societies of today.
• Zaretsky suggeststhat the familyis seen as not only a haven for men but also the arena for the personalfulfilment of fathers and husbands, this can only happen at the expenseof mothers and wives.’ This view is contrary to Islamic teachings,whichadvocates the family as a place where both man and woman obtainserenityand peace. The family thus is the arena which provides both partnerswithpersonal fulfillment and protection.
• The assumptionthatchild-careduties in the home form the basis of oppression implies a need tocreatecommunal nurseries, canteens and sleeping quarters. Feminists havefalselyassumed that all women would rather be on the shop floor or in theofficethan spend time with their children. In fact it is highly improbablethatwomen would like to be whisked straight from the labour ward to thefactoryfloor, thus losing the opportunity to nurture their infants. As far ascommunal living is concerned, there are not many people who wouldwillinglyexchange their privacy and personal space for an open kibbutz stylelife.Another consideration is that in a communal environment, it would nodoubtbe the women who would be employed to take care of the nurseries andcanteens,no doubt at unsociable hours and with the lowest status in thehierarchyof roles. (This is in fact the case in many Israeli kibbutzim wherewomentend to be stuck with the menial tasks and childcare whilst the moreinterestingand prestigious jobs go to the men).

It may be argued that toexpectthe state or commune to take care of children is absurd. Since parentschoose to have children, they should take the responsibility for theirupbringing. If we think of children as valued possessions, we shouldnotsay that it is unfair that a family of four should live on the sameincomeas a family of two: we should say that one couple chooses to spend itsincome on children, whilst the other chooses to spend its money onholidaysor furniture. There is no justification for expecting the state to carefor children. In a capitalist system, money has become the reward foreverything.The feminists have lowered women’s value by demanding financialcompensationfor an asset which they should be proud of.

Marxist theoryappearstohave little room for questions that deal directly with women’sreproductiveand sexual concerns: contraception, sterilisation, abortion,pornography,prostitution, rape, sexual harassment and domestic violence.

Marxist feminists trytoretain their loyalty to both socialism and feminism. Consequently, theycontinue to give priority to the issue of class, although – unlikeorthodoxsocialists – they no longer see feminism as a necessary consequence ofa socialist victory.4 They agree, however, that feminism withoutsocialismis impossible (Mitchell, 1971) and for this reason, if no other, thestrugglefor socialism is given prominence. At the same time, these women findthatthey can only do so by means of what amounts to a very radical critiqueof orthodox Maviews on the position of women.

If the oppression ofwomenis based on the economic and legal power that men have over them, andifthat power is class-based, then it follows that abolishing privatepropertyand socialising production destroys the economic foundation of women’sposition.’ However, the experience of socialist countries has been usedto question this logic. Women under Marxist regimes throughout theworldhave been the unfortunate victims of oppression in the home, theworkplaceand in the educational and political spheres. As far as the liberationof women goes, Marxism has offered nothing more than the illusion ofjustice.

LEBERALFEMINISM

Liberal feminists seeworkingtowards the elimination of the differences between the sexes as thefirststep towards true equality.

Modern liberalfeministtheoriesof gender equality are based on the assumption that in order to achieveequal status, all stereotyped social roles for men and women have to beabolished. Conventional women’s work roles assign to them the majorresponsibilityfor unpaid domestic work, especially childcare, and thus handicap themwith regard to their occupational roles. Despite the legal rights ofwomento equality in employment, men use women’s actual or presumed domestichandicaps to perpetuate de facto discrimination by forcingwomeninto a small number of occupational roles that are segregated accordingto labour market types and working time schedules, and that have lowerpay and prestige than comparable men’s occupations. Employed women’slowerincome is used as a justification for the perpetuation of their unequalburden of domestic and child care work and their inferior power in thefamily. Their segregated and inferior roles also hinder theiracquisitionof economic and political power. It is in the interests of men of allstratato use the unpaid domestic services of women and prevent women fromcompetingwith them for better jobs.

Liberal feministsseektocreate an androgynous individual, that is an individual which wouldcombinesome of each of the characteristics, traits, skills and interests thatare now stereotypically associated with either men or women. Anothergoalof the liberal feminists is sexual equality or gender justice, whichmeansfreeing women from oppressive roles and enabling them to rise abovetheirlower (or non-existent) position in academia and in the workplace.

These aims raiseimmediatequestions: should women become like men in order to be equal with men?Or should men become like women in order to be equal with women? Orshouldboth men and women lose their identities and become androgynous, eachpersoncombining the “correct” blend of positive masculine and femininecharacteristicsin order to be equal with every other person? The problems thus raisedare phenomenal.

It is impossible tocreatean androgynous individual because of the physical, anatomical,biochemicaland physiological differences between the sexes. Another point, made byAnn Ferguson, is that it may not even be desirable for people to besocialisedto develop the potential for androgyny. Complete elimination of genderdifferences raises major legal and economic issues. For example, if awomanis allowed to take six months off work following childbirth, should notthe equal male be allowed the same time off to spend time with his newbaby? If men and women have the same intellectual capacity andreasoningskills, then surely there is no particular need for femalephilosophers:men can point out inequities and suggest reforms just as effectively aswomen.

Liberal feministsseektoprove that women are as good as men. But we may ask: why is thisnecessary?Why should women have to be like males before they are deemed equal?Thedirection taken by liberal feminists is destroying the very essencethatmakes women special.

The oppressive rolesfromwhich liberal feminists seek to free women are not confined only tofemales.The immigrant population, male and female alike, are the worst victimsof oppression; but even Caucasian males may be discriminated against inthe case of jobs such as child-care and secretarial work, which are”reserved”for females. No doubt women suffer more than men, but they cannot beseenas unique when ethnic minorities and immigrants in the Western worldarealso suffering oppression. The roots of this inequity lie in capitalismand its need to seek cheap labour in order to increase returns oninvestment.

Elshtain, a critic ofliberalfeminism, states that “there is no way to create real communities outofan aggregate of freely choosing adults”. She argues that liberalfeministshave over emphasised the male up to the point of equating masculinitywithhumanity, manly virtues with human virtues. She argues that liberalfeminismhas three major flaws: the assumption that women can become like men ifthey set their minds to it, the notion that all women want to becomelikemen, and the claim that all women should want to become like men and toaspire to masculine values.

Liberal feminism hasatendencyto over estimate the number of women who want to be like men, who wantto abandon the role of wife and mother for that of citizen and worker.Any woman whose identity is that of a wife and mother is likely tobecomeangry or depressed when, after years of investing blood, sweat andtears,she is told that being a wife or a mother is a mere role, and aproblematicone at that. It is one thing to tell a woman to change her hairstyle;itis something else altogether to tell her that she should get a moremeaningfulidentity.

A profound statementbyElshtainstates that liberal feminists are wrong to advocate that women shouldrejecttraditional values. Articles written for women about dressing forsuccess,making it in a man’s world, being careful not to cry in public,avoidingintimate

friendship, beingassertive,and playing hardball serve only to erode what after all may be bestaboutwomen. It is wrong to assume that women must be the same as men inorderto be socially, economically or politically equal. In fact the sexescanbe different, carry out different tasks, and still be equal on alltheselevels.

From the Islamicpointofview, there is no room for entertaining a desire to create androgynousindividuals. If the Creator had intended this for us, He could havecreatedus as asexual beings who would reproduce like the hydra. However, theissueof oppression of others on the basis of their sex or skin colour stillneeds to be addressed. Equal opportunities and equal pay must beimplementedfor all, without bias. Laws should be instituted that would guaranteesuchequality, whilst taking into account any physical differences andrulingin favour of the weaker individuals. As stated earlier, the Qur’antellsus that Allah has assigned to the male his duties and to the femalehers.The Prophet is reported to have said: “Allah’s curse is upon those menwho imitate women and those women who imitate men”.

RADICALFEMINISM

The New YorkFeministManifesto of 1971 declares:4

“Radical feminismrecognisesthe oppression of women as a fundamental political oppression whereinwomenare categorised as an inferior class based upon their sex. It is theaimof radical feminism to organise politically to destroy this sex classsystem.As radical feminists we recognise that we are engaged in a powerstrugglewith men, and that the agent of our oppression is man in so far as heisidentified with and carries out the supremacy privileges of the malerole.For while we realise that the liberation of women will ultimately meanthe liberation of men from their destructive role as oppressor, we haveno illusions that men will welcome this liberation without struggle.Radicalfeminism is political because it recognises that a group of individuals- men · have set up institutions throughout society to maintainthis power”.

Radical, or extreme,feminismregards men as evil, benefiting from their power over women in everyway,from ego-satisfaction, economic and domestic exploitation, sexualdominationand political power.

Many radicalfeministsarguethat in order to make a complete commitment to feminism, a woman has tobe or become a lesbian. A leading radical feminist, Bunch believed thatonly lesbians can be serious feminists, and that lesbianism is bestunderstoodas a revolutionary rejection of all males and male-defined institutions.

Adrienne Richsuggestedthatcompulsory heterosexuality is the central social structure perpetuatingmale domination.3 A refusal of heterosexuality acts as an undergroundfeministresistance to patriarchy. She defines a lesbian as a woman bondedprimarilyto women who is sexually and emotionally independent of men.

Rich’s “lesbiancontinuum”proposes that all women are lesbians, insofar as they want to identifywith other women. She makes two basic assumptions in her defence of thelesbian continuum as a construct for understanding female resistance topatriarchy. First, she assumes that compulsory heterosexuality is thekeymechanism underlying and perpetuating male dominance; second, sheimpliesthat all heterosexual relations are coercive in nature. Radicalfeministsallege that marriage is at the root of women’s subjection to menbecausethrough it, men control both a woman’s reproduction and her person.Marriageis thus seen as slavery for women, without the abolition of whichfreedomfor women cannot be won. A prominent feminist philosopher, De Beauvoirstated, “Women pay for their happiness with their freedom”. Sheinsistedthat this price is too high for anyone because the kind of contentment,tranquillity and security that marriage offers a woman drain her soulofits capacity for greatness.l

The effect ofremovingmenfrom the scene altogether is not only weakening traditional male/femaletie, if not destroying it altogether, but the bond between father andchildis eliminated. Meanwhile, the tendency for men to become merelytemporarysexual partners and to lose their parental role increases. Instead ofmakingmen responsible and share in the duties of nurturing children, womenareinadvertently freeing men of all responsibilities, no doubt to thegreatdelight of capricious men.

Radical feminism’smainaimis the destruction of patriarchy, which Ruth Blair defines as: “thehistoricsystem of male dominance, a system committed to the maintenance andreinforcementof male hegemony in all aspects of life – personal and privateprivilegeand power as well as public privilege and power”.

Gerder Lerner definesitmore clearly:

“Patriarchy means themanifestationand institutionalisation of male dominance over women and children inthefamily and the extension of male dominance over women in society ingeneral..”.

Patriarchy is asystemofstructures and institutions created by men in order to sustain andrecreatemale power and female subordination. Such structures includeinstitutionssuch as law, religion and the family; ideologies which perpetuate thenaturallyinferior position of women; socialisation processes which ensure thatwomenand men develop behaviour and belief systems appropriate to thepowerfulor power group to which they belong.

Patriarchy also has amaterialisticbase the economic systems are structured so that women have difficultygetting paid labour in a society which values only paid labour and inwhichmoney is the currency of power. Women without economic independencecannotsustain themselves without a breadwinner: they cannot leave a brutalhusband,they cannot withdraw sexual, emotional and physical servicing from men,they cannot have an equal say in decisions affecting their own lives,suchas where they might live. Radical feminism has therefore stressed thenecessityof women exercising economic power in their own lives.

Charlotte Buch hasemphasisedthe importance of class analysis in radical feminism. In her words:

“Women’s oppressionisrootedboth in the structure of our society, which is patriarchal, and in thesons of patriarchy: capitalism and white supremacy. Patriarchy includesnot only male rule but also heterosexual imperialism and sexism;patriarchyled to the development of white supremacy and capitalism. For me, thetermpatriarchy refers to all these forms of oppression and domination, allof which must be ended before all women will be free”.

Arguments from withinthefeminist group state that absolute separatism from men is neitherfeasiblenor desirable. It is not desirable because “women will destroypatriarchyby confronting it, not by isolating themselves from it”.

One of the firstradicalfeminists to gain prominence was Shulamith Firestone, who wrote:

“The end goal offeministrevolution must be not just the elimination of male privilege but ofthesex distinction itself. Genital differences between human beings wouldno longer matter culturally. The tyranny of the biological family wouldbe broken and with it the psychology of power”.

For Firestone it isfromsexual differences that women’s subordination sprang, in part, asreproductivebiology condemned women to a fearful existence of bearing children, tobe oppressed, in squalor and in pain. Firestone states: “Natureproducedthe fundamental inequality which was later consolidated andinstitutionalisedin the interests of men”. In this account, the reproductive bond is noteven remotely pleasing; it is wretched. Firestone then draws thelogicalconclusion to such an opinion she proposes freeing women from theirlongordeal by means of changes in reproductive technology that would allowwomen to avoid pregnancy and childbirth just as is happening now:

“Until the taboo islifted,until the decision not to have children or not to have them naturallyisat least as legitimate as natural childbearing, women are being forcedinto their female roles”.

Therefore, accordingtothisway of thinking, women must rebel. Women must control fertility. Womenmust own their bodies and new technology. Above all, women must controlchildbirth and childrearing. In Firestone’s view, this “natural”inequalitycan only be overcome when there is a complete separation ofreproductionfrom women’s lives, so that women and men are made equal throughtechnologicalinnovations. Technology that will allow artificial reproduction outsidewomen’s bodies must be developed.

Whilst some radicalfeministslike Firestone want to free women from biological maternity, there isanotherversion of feminism that wants to free maternity from male domination.This thesis describes and deplores the transfer of maternity care fromwomen (midwives) to men (male obstetricians) that has occurred in theWestover the past century or so. This liberation of maternity from maledominationentails the return of childbirth to the care of women themselves, butformany feminists it also includes the progressive removal of the rightsandduties of fatherhood.

If men in themselveswerethe enemy, as many radical feminists believe, then the solution couldwellcome to be the abolition not only of marriage or even of the family,butof men themselves, whether by their exclusion from women’s society orbymore extreme means. It is not likely that many women in the movementenvisagedthe physical destruction of men, and certainly it is difficult to seethisas a practical possibility.

Many feministtheoriessuggestthat men have conditioned women and have taken control over them.Feministsthus ignore the views of the majority of women by assuming that womenhavelet their minds be manipulated by men and are not capable of decidingwhatis best for themselves. But if feminists believe that women are weakandstupid enough to be conditioned by men, then it follows that if womenfollowtheir ideologies, then they have merely exchanged one type of coercionfor another.

Feminists object totheallocationof gender roles, and complain if men and women are expected to dodifferentsorts of work solely on the basis of their sex. But if, like thefeminists,we go to the extreme of assuming that we have not rid ourselves oftyrannyuntil men and women are doing the same sort of work, we risk adifferentproblem, that of forcing them to do the same things although themajoritymay have the inclination to do different things.

Feminists object tosexismalthough the majority of people see gender as relevant. When there arefewer women in certain positions on the career ladder, it is thefeministswho are quick to point out sex differences.

Firestone’ssuggestionthatreproduction must take place outside of women’s bodies before women areliberated is senseless. If any advances in “test tube” reproduction aremade, the technology will no doubt be under the control of males. It istrue to say that radical feminism is not practical and would notsurvivefor long if it were implemented: If heterosexuality were halted, thiswouldprevent the production of a new generation and the human race wouldcometo an end. Some might suggest that children could be produced by meansof artificial insemination or cloning. For women to totally succeed inthis they will no doubt be confronted by men, who will rightly fightfortheir survival. It cannot be envisaged even by the most ardentfeminist,that the battle of sexes should led to the battle herds of war. It isinfact absurd to regard men as the core of evil, because there is no realbenefit for men as a whole in suppressing women. Men have to co-habitwithwomen, and most sane human beings of either gender would prefer to livein peace and harmony with their spouses, the “battle of the sexes”makesno sense at all.

Research has shownthatthemajority of lesbians go under the banner of feminism and that theyrepresentaround 10% of active feminists.” In this case it appears that somewomenhave used feminism as a guise to fulfil their deviant sexual desires.Homosexualityis completely forbidden in Islam, and there is no room for “gay”religiousmovements such as those that have emerged in Christianity.Homosexualityrepresents something which is at odds with the natural order andendangersthe stability of human society.

Would you reallyapproachmen in your lusts rather than women? Nay, you are a people (grossly)ignorant!

[al-Naml27.55]

The Qur’anic view(which,by the way, coincides with that of the Bible, e.g. Leviticus 20:13) isthat homosexuality is an abomination and that those who indulge in itare”committing excesses”. This includes both male and female homosexuals,or “gays” and “lesbians” as they are known.

Radical feministsassumethat all marital relations are coercive. This undermines women andimpliesthat they are not capable of taking care of themselves, but need a “bigsister” in an ivory tower to think for them. Radical feminism giveswomenless credit than they deserve.

To propagate acompletebanon marriage would throw the world into disarray. Even if allindividualsdid not become homosexuals, we would find ourselves with a completelypromiscuoussociety. An individual is not always attracted to a person who likeshimor her, so with no moral restraints, those who are physically,economicallyand socially strong would fulfil their carnal desires at the expense ofthe weak. Incest and paedophilia would become rife. It would be anightmarishsociety in which exploitation of women would be the order to the day.

Most of those whohaveexaminedthe development of radical feminism are agreed that it has beenseriouslyweakened by internal disputes, by its lack of formal structure, and bythe inherent weaknesses of its theories. Its heyday was in the late1960s,but since the 1970s it has fallen into a decline with its mostcommittedfollowers retreating into communes where they could practice no morethana kind of personal redemption.

SEXUALLIBERATION

Mitchell suggestedthatwomen’sstatus and function are jointly determined by her role in production,reproductionand the socialisation of children and sexuality.

To determine which ofthesefactors most oppress women, Mitchell came to the conclusion that womenare making progress only in the area of sexuality. Taken to extremes,sexualliberation becomes merely another form of sexual oppression. In thepast,women were condemned for being whores; now they are condemned for beingvirgins. Curiously, a British newspaper report on female converts toIslamasked “Why are British women funding true sexual freedom in Islam”?Thissensationalist piece of rhetoric turned out to refer to the refreshingfreedom from the sexual pressure which is so prevalent in Westernsociety.

Not everyoneconcernedwithhuman liberation welcomed the liberation of sexuality. Marxistphilosophersargued that it was a device to distract people from more seriouspoliticaland economical oppression. Other feminists said that the liberation offemale sexuality brought a reinforcement of the image of creatures of aseparate and powerless sphere. The Victorian stereotype of femininepurityat least had the merit of rendering women special in the eyes of men.Inthe pursuit of equality and freedom even this dubious moral advantagewaslost, and the way was opened for a new and less advantageousstereotype.It was no accident that the most ardent supporters of the “playboy”styleof sexual liberation were men!

A woman may say thatshediets, exercises and dresses for herself, but in reality she is mostlikelyto be shaping and adorning her body for the benefit of men. A woman haslittle or no say about where, when, how or by whom her body will beused,because it can be appropriated through acts that range from standing onthe corner “watching all the girls go by” to the extreme of rape. Incontrast,women’s progress in the area of reproduction, production andsocialisingof children has, according to Mitchell, ground to a halt.

Islam finds the wholeideaof promoting sex for pleasure to be totally distasteful – as do manyrationalindividuals who live in the West. Casual approaches to sex, such as”cruising”or using pornography are identified as being male oriented, since theyfocus on sex for physical pleasure rather than as a means of deepeningemotional intimacy and affection.4 Seeking sex only for physicalpleasureis dehumanising, because it treats people only as sexual objects andfailsto tap the potential of the act for a deeper meaning, which is anintimateknowledge of and commitment to another human being.

The feminist drivetowardssexual liberation has had catastrophic consequences for women’s socialstatus. As we have already seen in Chapter II, the push for women’sequalityin the West has been accompanied by an increase among females of allthevices formerly associated with men. Alcoholism, smoking, gambling andcriminalactivity have all increased and are as likely to be found among femalesas among males. In early 1996, it was announced that the female prisonpopulation in the UK had increased by 30% in the previous year alone.

For many women, theirnew”freedom” has brought the dismal experiences of exploitation,abandonmentby men, abortions, financial hardships, single parenthood andisolation.The sexual liberation movement has resulted in increased social,financial,health and economical hardship. Overall the greater sexual freedom isbeingacknowledged as working in favour of men rather than women.

APPRAISAL

All branches offeminismhave their shortcomings, and the movement has essentially failed toaddressissues facing all the women throughout the world. Marxist theory hasignoredthe issues of oppression of women via pornography, prostitution andsexualharassment. Radical feminism has only served the interests of a fewwomenliving in Western suburbia, and its theories are inherently weak, ashasbeen shown. Sexual feminism has only served to wet male appetites andhasplunged the women of the West into the worst form of oppression sincetheJahiliyyah. The failure of feminist ideologies to truly liberate womenshould come as no surprise, since these are based on theories whichhavebeen devised by humans for humans: as such they will undoubtedlycontainfactors that will please some, displease others, and ignore themajority.The solutions to human problems can only come from the Creator ofhumans.It is to Him that we must turn, and it is in His teachings alone thatwewill find true liberty for all human beings.

The feminists havegivenwomen laws against sexual discrimination and equal opportunities in thefields of education and work, which are undoubtedly deserved and whichIslam would certainly condone. However, as feminism succeeded infreeingwomen from the oppression of law and domesticity, a more sinister formof oppression, in the form of the tyranny of “beauty”, took over. Thisphenomenon is described by Naomi Wolf as the “beauty myth”.

THETYRANNY OF “BEAUTY”

The “Rites” of beautyareable to isolate women so well because it is not yet publicly recognisedthat the devotees of beauty are trapped in anything more serious thanfashionand a private distortion of self-image.” The Rites took over women’sminds,in the wake of the women’s movement, because oppression, like nature,abhorsa vacuum; they gave back to women what they had lost when faith in Goddied in the West. The swift spread of this new “religion” was ablyassistedby the capitalist industries. Now, rather than being assessed on theirpersonal, intellectual and professional merits, women are judged bytheirphysical attributes. This abhorrent attitude is diametrically opposedtoIslam, which directs people’s attention towards an individual’scharacterby asking them to base their respect on the level of a person’s piety.

Until recently,pornographywas only for male consumption. However, the feminists have fallen intothe trap that was carefully laid by those who had a vested interest inmaking women believe it is normal for a liberated women to enjoypornography.Pornography, which never depicts legal, intimate love between marriedcouples,has the pernicious effect of planting notions of the acceptability ofadultery,fornication and rape in idle minds. Film, TV and printed media findthemselvesin direct competition with pornography, which is now the biggest mediacategory worldwide, so the images of women and beauty in those mediabecomemore extreme. Incredibly, pornography generates an estimated $7 billiona year, more than the legitimate film and music industries puttogether.Pornographic films outnumber other genres by three to one. Researchersreport that pornography worldwide is becoming increasingly violent 4and”snuff” movies which record the ordeal of real victims are not uncommon.

Beauty became thecurrencyof exchange and, like money, was highly sought after by women. However,it was more elusive than pound notes or dollar bills, as men keptdevaluingthe “currency”. There are no universal standards: “beauty” is animaginaryidol created by the Western male, who raises and changes its standardsat whim, thereby making it impossible for his mother, sister ordaughterto attain it. Women’s beauty has nothing to do with women: it is allaboutmen’s institutions and power. In the West, the man’s right to passjudgementon any woman’s appearance without himself being subjected to scrutinyisregarded as God-given.

As the whitemiddle-classwomen threw away their aprons and marched out of their front doors inpursuitof liberation, they fell straight into the trap of the capitalistbeautyparlour. The capitalist market has manipulated women to spend over $33billion a year on diet products, $20 billion on cosmetics, $300 millionon cosmetic surgery, and over $7 billion on pornography.

The consequent burdenofoppression borne by women is immense, of which the following representonly the tip of the iceberg:

• The most obviouseffect is thevast amount of time, effort and money which women are expected todevoteto their appearance whilst no such demands are made of men.
• The standards thatwomen areexpected to attain are impossible, because the goal posts areconstantlybeing shifted. The media must take the lion’s share of the blame forthisproblem.
• At any given time,the standardsof beauty are limited and rigid, and exclude the majority of ordinarywomen.Whatever body shape is dictated to be “fashionable,” those whosenaturalappearance differs from it will never be able to attain it and risksubsequentlow self-esteem and depression, etc.
• The fashionindustrypressuriseswomen to fight their own natural bodies by undergoing cosmetic surgery,squeezing themselves into tight dresses and skirts, crippling theirfeetwith stiletto heeled shoes and starving themselves into ill health inthename of dieting.

This is what feminismhasachieved,instead of protesting against male demands that women shouldessentiallybe sensual and pleasing to men. The feminist movement has found itsgreatestsupport among capitalist corporate companies and “playboy” type men.

The demands of thebeautymyth are destroying women, morally, psychologically and spiritually.Womenneed to emancipate themselves from this unjust demand made by maledrivensociety. In order to achieve this it is not lobbying or governmentbillsthat are needed but a need to revert to a philosophy that frees themfromthe tyranny of fashion and role models, a philosophy that appreciates awoman for herself and judges her on her character, and not for herbeautyor bank balance, a philosophy that will reinstate her personal identityand self-respect. This is to be found only in Islam.

The sociologistDeborahL.Sheppard states:

“Women perceivethemselvesand other women to be confronting constantly the dualistic experienceofbeing feminine and businesslike at the same time while they do notperceivemen experiencing the same contradiction”.

Women are encouragedbyadvertisersto wear clothes that express their femininity yet maintainbusiness-likelooks. By this they mean women wear clothes that reveal their breasts,thighs and lace-lined lingerie. Women are caught between theconflictingideals of “businesslike” and “feminine”, and suffer as a result. Over75%of women experience harassment that they blame on themselves and theirpoor control over their appearance. Five studies on sexual organisationhave found that “a woman’s behaviour is noticed and labelled sexualevenif it is not intended as such”. Women’s friendly actions aremisinterpretedas sexual.’ This is substantiated by the fact that 38% of men have beenfound to abuse their power in the work place to rape women. Islamclearlyteaches Muslims to avoid creating or entering such freely-mixedenvironmentsin the first place, which prevents such misery and suffering fromoccurring.

The fashionindustriesdependencyon survival by exploiting women can be assessed by the reaction of theindustry to John Molloy’s best seller book, Women’s dress forsuccess, advocatingwomen to wear a uniform at work. This minor observation made by Molloyled the New York Times magazine, whose financial survival depends ontheadvertising revenue of the beauty industry, to publish an articledeclaringMolloy’s views as passe. Other media, who received a sizeable portionoftheir advertising funds from the fashion industry quickly followedsuit.From all of this, one can understand why Islam, which preachesmoderationand simplicity in dress and lifestyle is facing such hostility from thecapitalist world.

If working women didnotdress up like models, the secret pleasures enjoyed by their malecolleaguesmay decrease. No doubt if women followed Islamic standards of dress andconduct, the incidence of sexual harassment would be negligible andwomenwould be spared a major source of oppression. Above and beyond thatwomen’scharacter would not be passed on sexual appeal but her intellect andability.

From the 60’s onwardsthefashion industry, with capital growth interest at heart, have used themedia to manipulated women in thinking nudity and low weight are anexpressionof liberation. -Between 1968 and 1972, the number of diet relatedarticlesrose by 70%. Articles on dieting in the popular press soared from 60 inthe whole year of 1979 to 66 in the month of January 1980 alone. By1984,300diet books were on the shelves of bookstores. The lucrative “transferofguilt” was achieved just in time.

The paranoia withweightin women has began to appear at a very early age and consequentlyclaimsmany victims. Anorexia and Bulimia are overwhelmingly female maladies:between 90 and 95%

of sufferers arewomen.America,which has the greatest number of women who have “made it” in the maleworld,also leads the world with regard to rates of female Anorexia. TheAmericanAnorexia and Bulimia Association states that Anorexia and Bulimiastrikeone million US women every year. Every year, 150,000 American women dieof Anorexia. Brumberg reports that between 5 to 15% of hospitalisedanorexicsdie during treatment, giving this disease one of the highest fatalityratesfor mental illness.

The UK now has 3.5millionanorexics or bulimics, with 6,000 new cases yearly. Another study ofadolescentBritish girls shows that 1% are now anorexic. According to the women’spress, at least 50% of British women suffer eating disorders.

As the females begantointegratewith the males, in all the spheres, women’s body shape and size begantoplay a prominent role in an oppressing way to the women. A generationago,the average model weighed 8% less than the average American woman;todayshe weighs 23% less.

A 1985 survey showedthat90% of respondents thought they weighed too much. Although today’sgirlshave inherited the gains of the women’s movement, in terms of personaldistress they are no better off. Fifty three percent of high schoolgirlsare reported to be unhappy with their bodies by age 13, and by age 18,over 78% are dissatisfied. The feminist movement has created the hungercult which is striking a major blow against women’s fight for equality.

In the West, femalebodieshave become public property and female “fat” is the subject of intensepublic debate. Women feel guilty about female fat because they are madeto believe that their bodies belong not to them, but to society.Thinnessis not a private ascetic but a hunger, a social concession exacted bythecommunity. A cultural fixation on female thinness is not an obsessionaboutfemale beauty but an obsession about female subservience.

Women’s images in themediaand magazines are glamorised by “retouching” or “computer imaging” sothata 50 year old woman looks 30 and a 65 year old looks 45. Bob Ciano, anart director at Life magazine, says that, “no picture of awomangoes unretouched… Even a well known older woman who doesn’t want toberetouched… We still persist in trying to make her look like she’s inher fifties”. The effect of this censorship according to Heyn is clear:”by now readers have no idea what a real woman’s 60 year old face lookslike in print because it’s made to look 45. Worse, 60 year old readerslook in the mirror and think they look too old, because they arecomparingthemselves to some retouched face smiling back at them from a magazine.Women’s culture is an adulterated, inhibited medium”. How do the valuesof the West, which hates censorship and believes in a free exchange ofideas, fit in here?

This issue is nottrivial.It is about the most fundamental freedoms: the freedom to imagine one’sown future and to be proud of one’s life. Airbrushing age from women’sfaces has the same political echo as making black people look white: itis condescending, insulting and offensive. To make women look younger,thinner and more curvaceous is to erase women’s true identity, worth,powerand history. This is the most damaging type of oppression and women inthe West are slowly waking up to it.3 This is one reason why youngeducatedwomen in the West have found the sincere teachings of Islam to be soattractive.

Magazines and othermediaare under pressure to project the idea that looking one’s age isundesirablebecause their survival in the capitalist society depends on theiradvertisingrevenue. In the US alone, 65 million dollars’ worth of advertisingrevenuecomes from companies who would go out of business if looking one’s agewas acceptable or desirable.4 It is in the interest of companies thatreapwealth from women to make them feel inferior about their bodies.Throughthe media the message is hammered in daily. As women spend millions ofPounds and hours worldwide, on ‘beauty’ products and go throughdangerousand painful procedures to look like the way they have beenindoctrinatedby the media. If only women wake up to their own worth, which Allah hasfavoured them with, the companies via the media, will continue toexploitthem and the problem is going to escalate.

Young women’soppressionis one story, but as women get older their miseries in the West simplymultiply. Old women are not only poorer, but they are also neglected,bythe state and by their own children. Western culture is such thathelplessolder people are left out of sight in public nursing homes, and youngchildrenare kept out of their parents’ sight in nurseries and day care centres.The West is rapidly moving towards a system where it is only worthlivingif you are able to fend for yourself in all aspects. Thus the value ofindividuals is only measured in terms of supplying society either withsurplus labour or beauty. Hence the young who cannot provide thecapitalisteconomy with surplus value and the old who are no longer aestheticallypleasing are excluded from mainstream society and locked away innurseriesand old peoples’ homes respectively. Old age carries such a stigma intheWest that adult children may be reluctant to be seen withtheirageing and ailing parents in public. The very parents who nursed us andwiped our bottoms when we had no faculty of reasoning have now become aburden. In contrast, Islam urges those who are strong and in goodhealthto take care of the infirm, and specifically makes it a duty upon thechildrento take care of their ageing parents and not even to speak to them in aloud or angry voice.

Thy Lord hathdecreedthat ye worshOOip none but Him, and that ye be kind to parents. Whetherone or both of them attain old age in thy life, say not to them a wordof contempt, nor repel them but address them, in terms of honour.

[BanuIsrail 17: 23]

We have enjoinedonmankindness to his parents: In pain did his mother bear him and in paindidshe give birth.

[Al-Ahqaf17:23]

(seealso Luqman 31.14 quoted earlier and Al Ankabut 29:8,AlAhqaf46:16, 17, 18)

The average Americanoldwoman’s income is half that of an old man. In Britain, old womenoutnumberold men by four to one, and of those twice as many old women as old menrely on income support (government assistance). Signs of ageing areviewedby Western women as a calamity, and women are constantly harangued inthemedia about the awfulness of wrinkles, grey hair and sagging breasts.Thesolution offered is: beauty parlours and plastic surgery, which is soriskyand painful that it may be placed on a par with slavery. Moderncosmeticsurgeons have a vested financial interest in a social role for womenthatrequire them to feel ugly. The cosmetic surgery industry in the USgrosses$300 million annually, and is growing at a yearly rate of 10%. Between200,000 and 1 million American women have had their breasts cut openandsacs of chemical gel implanted.

The effects offeminismhavebeen so devastating that women would do themselves a great favour iftheywere to abandon it and begin enjoying the pleasures that the Creatorhasgiven them. Food is a bounty from Allah from which women may eat whatisgood for them and enjoy it. Women’s bodies are for themselves, not forpublic display: they should stop pandering to society’s pleasure andbowingto the demands of the fashion industry. Women should bear the signs ofageing with pride, as marks of seniority and wisdom.

… These are thelimitsordained by Allah; so do not transgress them. If any do transgress thelimits ordained by Allah, such persons wrong (themselves as well asothers).

[al-Baqarah2:229]