by Chris Alexion, Copyright March 11, 2006, all rights reserved. 457 views
Individualist feminism (also called ifeminism or libertarian feminism) is a new movement seeking to counter the strident militism and statism of traditional gender feminism. Ifeminists became disillusioned with the movement that preached its support of women while denouncing men, creating bad public policy, and in many cases even harming the women it set out to protect.
Canadian writer Wendy McElroy is a witty and insightful ifeminist voice whose columns at FoxNews and ifeminists.com do a good job of pointing out the (numerous) chinks in state solutions to gender issues. One particularly interesting column takes up the subject of homeschooling and its effect on feminism. McElroy writes that "a peaceful revolution is transforming North America at its roots, and women are in the forefront." She describes homeschooling's "quiet mutiny" against the "quality and content of government education," which is drawing women away from the workforce and back to their children. And the trend is growing.
Yet traditional feminists are strangely quiet on the subject. Why, asks McElroy, "are they ignoring one of the most significant social phenomena for women in the last decade?" McElroy suggests that the politically-correct orthodoxy supported by gender feminism is the main cause of folks bailing out of state-run schools. This PC credo isn't designed to educate but to re-vamp children's values and sexual perspectives. And parents who "do not share these attitudes are upset, and understandably so. The inculcation of personal values in children is properly an aspect of parenting, not a line item in a government program."
McElroy also points to another reason for traditional feminism's lack of support for homeschooling women. The reason is that homeschool moms
embrace much the same family situation that Betty Friedan described as "a concentration camp" in her book "The Feminine Mystique." Friedan and her insights on the suburban housewife are credited with sparking the Second Wave of feminism in the '60s. But what if she was wrong? What if homeschooling is a choice of which self-respecting women should be proud?
What, indeed? McElroy concludes that if feminists want to survive in the 21st century, they'd better embrace the homeschool mom–and fast.
But something tells me that might not happen.
1 • Janine • March 14, 2006 • 3:53 PM
Interesting. I've never heard of ifeminism before. I thought you had a typo. ./chrisalexion_2008-10_wordpress_export_files/icon_wink.gif alt= class=wp-smiley
2 • Dean • March 15, 2006 • 2:05 AM
What if they don't want to survive in the 21st century? What if they just want to feel good about themselves in the moment?
3 • Melissa • March 15, 2006 • 10:09 AM
Very interesting post. I haven't heard of ifeminism before either. A quiet revolutin…I like it:)
4 • Sara • March 17, 2006 • 2:37 AM
I think you are right…they will not embrace us because they simply can't. Their ideology is opposed to this. I know many women who are both liberals and feminists who home school but it will never truly be embraced by the core of any feminist group. I believe this is due to the fact that to homeschool I must give up something of myself and at it's core feminism is a selfish ideology which cares only for what I can get out of life and nothing for anyone else.
