Thank you for posting this Daniel.
It seems that no matter what prefix added, "feminist" continues to carry with it truckloads of "stuff" -- remainders of what didn't work with feminism and reminders of what did. Whether or not the word and its load have been tarnished, it was once young and with it came a lot of impulses of youth as well as mistakes before its maturation. There have been individualists feminists (not to be confused with "ifeminists") whose lives and work is significantly referenced without any gender association -- and this I favor very much. There are also works by adamant feminists who have added insight, although I do not want to repeat a lunch date I had with Betty Friedan some years ago when her obtuse and crusty manner alienated me as well as many other women to her particular plight.
Wendy McElroy is an outrageously wonderful and provoking author and I think she has added intelligently to the works of women in this arena. From her early writings on pornography to her recent writings on attitudes, she brings to the turf quality and an out-of-the-box thinking. I look forward to reading her "controversial speech."
This past week, I have read and reread lines from Jane Austin's writings. Jane Austin's keenness of senses represent issues of individuality and intrigue. Even over a hundred or so years (I believe her writing dates 1796 - 1817) cannot change the *quality* of presence most men and women aspire toward. And even in her writings one has to giggle just a little because of the pomposity of manners when taken to an extreme. I think here is a lot to learn from Ms. Austin's early writings (which caught me off-guard when I thought I gleaned a bit of Rand in some of the Austin character's lines (but Jane Austin did come *before* Rand.)) And, her work did conflict with Romanticism -:)
I'd like a 21st Century Aristoi/Austin sensual sensibility.
Cheers!
Natasha
At 07:16 PM 11/5/99 -0800, you wrote:
>Thought this might be of interest, even though the feminism debate has died
>down.
>
>Cheers!
>
>Daniel Ust
>http://mars.superlink.net/neptune/
>
>FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
>
>CONTACT:
>Wendy McElroy
>mac@ifeminists.com
>(519) 986-4266.
>FAX (519) 986-4413
>
>ifeminists.com: 21st Century Feminism
>CHICAGO - With the opening of ifeminists.com today
> (http://www.ifeminists.com/) , the women's
> movement takes a giant step forward into 21st Century Feminism.
> In recent years, American feminism has come to be associated with anger
> toward men who, as a class, are viewed as the political enemy. Many
> feminists have attacked the sexual choices of adult women who enjoy
> consuming and posing for pornography. Others have called for the government
> to impose affirmative action policies and speech codes. Some feminists even
> want to ban new reproductive technologies that offer hope to infertile
> women.
>
> "ifeminists.com smashes the feminist stereotypes," says Wendy McElroy, the
> site's editor and an internationally recognized leader in the individualist
> feminist (ifeminist) movement. "A new generation of women are facing the
> millennium. They deserve a new feminist paradigm that celebrates the
> diversity of their choices and the wonders that technology can offer to
> them. ifeminists.com is an on-ramp to this new way of thinking about
> feminist issues."
>
> "Freedom and choice do not threaten women. Government and orthodoxy do,"
> says McElroy. "Pornography and prostitution? Let women do what they want to
> with their own bodies. Verbal sexual harassment? If women want an equal
> right to explore their own sexuality, they risk encountering the offensive
> sexual attitudes of others."
>
> ifeminists.com invites women and men to come online to socialize, to learn,
> and to explore a wealth of information. The site offers an Introduction
> section that includes a "Frequently Asked Questions" page and an "Are you
>an
> ifeminist?" quiz. For the activist, the Interaction section offers a
> directory of the site's members, an interactive message board, and a live
> chat room. For scholars and students, the Information section features a
> comprehensive and constantly expanding database of hundreds of
>individualist
> feminist resources.
>
> Visitors are invited to become members of ifeminists.com for free. Of the
> first 1,000 people to register during November, 200 will be randomly
> selected to receive a complimentary audiotape recorded by Wendy McElroy.
>Her
> controversial speech critiques policies such as affirmative action and laws
> against sexual harassment.
>
> ifeminists.com is a project of The Henry Hazlitt Foundation, a
>Chicago-based
> non-profit organization that produces Free-Market.Net: The Freedom Network.
> McElroy is the author of books including "XXX: A Woman's Right to
> Pornography" (St. Martin's, 1995), and, most recently, "Queen Silver: The
> Godless Girl" (Prometheus, Dec. 1999). She has been published in magazines
> as diverse as National Review, Penthouse, and Marie Claire.
>
Natasha Vita-More
New Book: Create/Recreate: The 3rd Millennial Culture
natasha@natasha.cc
http://www.natasha.cc http://www.extropic-art.com http://www.transhuman.org