I’m experiencing an intellectual orgasm of incredible proportions, my friends. Reader Lindsay (a wonderful, kind person) recommended the books of a French feminist philosopher called Elisabeth Badinter to me. I’m now reading her book Dead End Feminism, and what a joy it is! Finally, I have encountered a renowned feminist whose ideas are very similar to mine.
I have received so much criticism from the choice feminists and the “women are victims of everything” feminists, that I even started to doubt my own ideas. I have been wary of saying exactly what I want to say. Now, however, I have managed to rid myself of this silly fear. I can finally stop mincing words and being uber-polite and can begin to talk about my kind of feminism freely.
Prepare yourselves, people. I am going to be as radical and direct as I always wanted to be but was afraid to. This feels so liberating, I can’t tell you.
Thank you, Lindsay, for recommending this great philosopher to me!
A review of Badinter’s book is upcoming. It has one huge defect: it’s way too short. Now, I will be buying everything she ever wrote. And if I have to resuscitate my French to read her untranslated writings, then I’m ready to do that. I’d learn Chinese to read her, she is that good.
Clarissa's Blog 
There is an article about her in one of the last issues of the New Yorker.
LikeLike
I hope they praised her. 🙂
LikeLike
In France, she is not just a writer but what you would call a “public intellectual” (as I read somewhere, France is the only country in the world where philosophers are treated as celebrities). The article dealt with her texts and with her public persona, and had a lot of people praising her and others calling her a wealthy woman (which she is, fabulously wealthy) out of touch. Her defense of DKS didn’t help her cause.
LikeLike
Fascinating. I need to learn more about her.
LikeLike
I think I heard a student make a presentation of her, but can’t remember her way of thinking.
I presented voltairine de Cleyre.
Sorry about my earlier rant on zionists, but I hate them with a passion. They only see themselves and not the other. They occupy another people land (I’m talking about the West Bank and Gaza Strip, there should be two states, even if no state at all would be better).
LikeLike
Can’t say I like her background : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89lisabeth_Badinter.
She looks like a rich, conservative, «feminist».
I think De Cleyre and Goldman are more my types.
LikeLike
Well, I’m from a poor background, so you can like me instead. 🙂 🙂 (Instead of Badinter, I mean. I don’t hope to take the place of Emma Goldman in your heart.) 🙂
LikeLike
Lol, well Goldman is dead so you may have a shot. 🙂
Not related to this, but have you read any of Negri? Reading Empire as of now. Not sure what to think about it right now.
I am kind of in a reading group (critical thinking) where everybody is a marxist but me. It is strange how I can put myself in those situations…..
LikeLike
Ah, that’s a difficult question. I’d start liking the book and then they would come out with something egregious like the revolutionary potential of rap (I’m a huge fan, but come on!) or comparing the LA riots with the liberation of South Africa, so I’d lose all enthusiasm.
Then, of course, we have the fact that they envisioned nothing like what actually took place almost immediately after the book’s publication. After that, they started qualifying and requalifying their opinion, and that was a huge quagmire.
My sympathies on the Marxist group. 🙂 But if you don’t enlighten them, who will? 🙂
LikeLike
“Lol, well Goldman is dead”
-Goldman, my friend, is immortal.
LikeLike
I lost my respect for Negri when I heard him say at a Conference ( in 2003) that the “piquetero” movement in Argentina had the revolutionary potential to become another 1870 Paris Commune. When I asked him which piqueteros was he talking about (at that time, the group had already split into many small subgroups), he said: “Oh, the one I met at the Foro de Porto Alegre”. I don’t think he had ever been in Argentina at that point.
LikeLike
Interestingly enough, I was fist introduced to feminism by a good French friend of mine, whose primary feminist inspiration was Badinter…
LikeLike
oy, she has been on my “do-read-list” for a while.
sadly, my french is no longer good enough to read her in original language/french, thus i have been reluctant to read her in either english or german translation. thx for your encouragement as well 🙂
and per “she-is-privilege-bla …-comments”
imho “go-figure” : also a woman has/needs to have the Woolfesque-room-of-ones-own AND financial means to come up with “philosophical/thinking-of-her-own”. duh .
//pass-the-popcorn//
LikeLike
I wanted to tell you that “intellectual orgasm” is actually my trademarked term, The definition is “a great idea that causes the body to have many of the same physiological reactions as a sexual orgasm”. Please use it accordingly.
LikeLike
Funny.
LikeLike