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With thanks to Toto. Please click on the title to link to the website where the question and answers appear.
Open Question
Why do certain people here pick on Andrea Dworkin?
She was an amazing pioneer, and a personal hero of mine. Why do so many people here, women especially, seem to have such a problem with her? How is that not like hating Susan B. Anthony, or Valerie Solanas?
Answers (9)
- To be honest with you, I didn't mind her in her earlier years, but then she turned into a psychotic sounding radical feminist. She honestly thought men were beneath her and she is PART of the reason why so many people have disrespect for the movement. Not all feminists agreed with her.
Source(s):
Male feminist and equalist.- 2 people rated this as good
- The biggest mistake Andrea Dworkin made was her assertion that every time a woman has sex, she is actually being raped. This is such an erroneous statement, that it's hard to believe that Dworkin wasn't laughed out of academia. If all sex is rape, then why do so many women demand that a man thrust harder during sex? Only a maniac would yell "Harder! Harder!" if she was being raped. Dworkin really screwed up with that assertion, and it's a miracle that anyone took her seriously after that incredibly invalid observation.
- 4 people rated this as good
- @ Thomas - feminists cut her WAY more slack than you are led to believe.
She's easy to pick on because i'm almost positive (but not exactly sure) she was the person who actually invented the "all men are rapist" theme.
People who agree with her and nod their heads in approval are in realty, frightening.- 3 people rated this as good
- Andrea Dworkin Quotes
1 - 2
A commitment to sexual equality with males is a commitment to becoming the rich instead of the poor, the rapist instead of the raped, the murderer instead of the murdered.
Andrea Dworkin
As long as there is rape... there is not going to be any peace or justice or equality or freedom. You are not going to become what you want to become or who you want to become. You are not going to live in the world you want to live in.
Andrea Dworkin
Being a Jew, one learns to believe in the reality of cruelty and one learns to recognize indifference to human suffering as a fact.
Andrea Dworkin
Childbearing is glorified in part because women die from it.
Andrea Dworkin
Erotica is simply high-class pornography; better produced, better conceived, better executed, better packaged, designed for a better class of consumer.
Andrea Dworkin
Feminism is hated because women are hated. Anti-feminism is a direct expression of misogyny; it is the political defense of women hating.
Andrea Dworkin
Genocide begins, however improbably, in the conviction that classes of biological distinction indisputably sanction social and political discrimination.
Andrea Dworkin
Male supremacy is fused into the language, so that every sentence both heralds and affirms it.
Andrea Dworkin
Marriage as an institution developed from rape as a practice. Rape, originally defined as abduction, became marriage by capture. Marriage meant the taking was to extend in time, to be not only use of but possession of, or ownership.
Andrea Dworkin
Men are distinguished from women by their commitment to do violence rather than to be victimized by it.
Andrea Dworkin
Men have defined the parameters of every subject. All feminist arguments, however radical in intent or consequence, are with or against assertions or premises implicit in the male system, which is made credible or authentic by the power of men to name.
Andrea Dworkin
Men know everything - all of them - all the time - no matter how stupid or inexperienced or arrogant or ignorant they are.
Andrea Dworkin
Read more: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/author…Source(s):
- Just read what she says. She's a man hater.
- 4 people rated this as good
- I think she was great. I mean, look at her and what she had to say. She helped prove that the stereotypes about feminists are actually true.
- 3 people rated this as good
- Because she is a crazy, sexist and twisted person?
- 2 people rated this as good
- Tom Leykis says stuff about women that is far worse, yet nobody has anything to say about him.
- 1 person rated this as good
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by M-Just M
- Member since:
- January 01, 2008
- Total points:
- 19,713 (Level 6)
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- Contributing In:
- Gender Studies
Because of her attitudes toward men.
Because of her prudishness toward sexual expression.
Because she does not write logically or coherently.
Toto's Answer:
I appreciate you asking the question, Geri - Feminist Pride!!
Criticizing men for being woman-haters isn't any more "hateful" than people of color pointing out how racist white people have been historically. Critique doesn't equal hate. It's the critique men want to avoid dealing with, so they charge her, and many other feminists, with being a hater or crazy instead.
To Thomas:
She wasn't psychotic. She was sane. She wrote without apology about things men do to women that men like to deny doing. She lived with a man for thirty years. She loved her father, brother, nephew, and life partner. Your remarks are not accurate or responsible.
To ksnake10:
She wasn't laughed out for one reason--she never said what you're claiming she said. She didn't screw up: you did. She was taken seriously. You should not be. Your response contains probably the most famous classic lie about Dworkin and her work that has been conclusively shown, beyond contradiction, to be a lie--an intentional lie spread around the web by trolls to discredit her, with no evidence she ever said or wrote it.
See Snopes.com, a trusted, responsible website which exists to refute lies or prove questionable statements truthful. (Link below.) Summary: the "all sex is rape" lie was started in Playboy magazine to discredit feminists like Andrea Dworkin and Catharine MacKinnon
See also the Lie Detector on an official Andrea Dworkin website. (Link below.) For example, her work discusses sex affirmatively and passionately many times.
To Paradox:
You put forth the same lie, but at least you write you are not sure it is the truth. It isn't the truth. Believing a writer who spoke out against rape and other violence against women is more scary than a rapist and the men who deny rape is a serious social problem is truly frightening. What's so scary about being anti-rape and anti-misogyny? She wasn't anti-man, and this is evidenced in the facts of her life--her whole life--and the facts in her books, her essays, and her speeches. You want proof? She these two speeches:
"Biological Superiority: The World's Most Dangerous and Deadly Idea" (Link below.)
"I Want A Twenty-Four Hour Truce During Which There is No Rape" (Link below.)
To Jade196 4.0: listing quotes is one of the least meaningful and laziest ways to try and represent someone's viewpoints that are discussed in full-length books that it appears you haven't bothered to read at all. That's intellectually sloppy, isn't it?
We continue to see no sophisticated, detailed, intelligent understanding of her work at all.
To Seven and Tom:
These comments are mean-spirited and anti-feminist. You offer nothing substantive or intelligent on the subject at all.
To Gaye Penguin:
Thank you. You note something far too common on Yahoo Answers and beyond: Tom and many other men on this website write all kinds of hateful, insulting, degrading things about feminists, but these very same commenters won't speak out about that. This shows they are here just to trash feminism. Cross them off the list of responsible commenters.
To M-Just M:
This person has clearly never read a single book of hers. A prude? Read either of her novels or just "First Love" (link below): hardly prudish! Funny how some of her critics accuse her both of being a prude and a pornographer! She was a brilliant and talented writer--whether or not you agree with her.
A suggestion to all future commenters: it might be a good idea to read her work--several of her books--and learn to analyze fiction and non-fiction literature before making such irresponsible comments. Finally, see a blogger's response to a related question, for much more on what these trolls are doing here to discredit feminists and feminism. (Link below.)Source(s):
http://www.snopes.com/quotes/mackinnon.asp
http://www.nostatusquo.com/ACLU/dworkin/LieDetect.html
http://www.nostatusquo.com/ACLU/dworkin/WarZoneChaptIIID.html
http://www.nostatusquo.com/ACLU/dworkin/WarZoneChaptIIIE.html
http://www.nostatusquo.com/ACLU/dworkin/FirstLoveI.html
http://radicalprofeminist.blogspot.com/2010/06/those-mratrolls-and-their-list-of.html
I appreciate your bringing this question up in a public forum. To be honest, I don't think a lot of dworkin bashers have actually read her work, only read what people who hate her have to say about her.
ReplyDeleteHonestly, she may never be mainstream, but her writing has saved womyn's lives. I wonder how many people can say that about so-called "sex-radicals"? Oh, pole dancing saved my life! Never would have thought of doing that myself. :)
Having just finished reading Letters From A War Zone, this topic saddens me quite greatly. I believe that Andrea Dworkin was one of the greatest human beings of our time, and the continuous spread of lies about her perpetrated primarily by misogynist MRA's is as tiring and depressing as it is inaccurate. Thank you for posting this as defense of a great thinker, writer and activist and thank you to Toto for such a succinct and well thought out defense of her on Yahoo Answers. It must have been difficult to remain so civil in the face of such ignorance, and I applaud your tact.
ReplyDeleteI agree, womononajourney. What most people who criticise her are so astoundingly ignorant about what she actually wrote.
ReplyDeleteIt boggles the mind that such ignorance is being passed around as thoughtful critique.