Feminism, Skepticism, Secularism, and a Venn Diagram

[rug]

Venn Diagram of Bullshit, Patriarchy, and Religion intersecting in the center with “Religious Patriarchal Bullshit” as the result.

June 3, 2013 12:01 pm \ Jadehawk
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Skepticism and secularism need feminism; feminism needs secularism and skepticism. The reason for this is that all three deal with removing or restricting the harmful influence of untrue ideas on people’s lives, even if each does so from a different perspective and with a different focus. And in many cases, the different perspectives can work together to achieve the specific goals of each movement better than they would be able in isolation from each other.

That view is often rejected in all three movements: some skeptics argue they shouldn’t deal with religious or social claims; some secularists claim they shouldn’t deal with anything not directly relating to religious control in a society; and some feminists argue for changing religions from within. Those are all valid approaches in themselves, and individuals certainly have the right to be single-issue advocates. Nonetheless, there is a great overlap between the fights against undue religious influence on society of the secular movement, the anti-patriarchy battles of the feminist movement, and the general debunking of false claims of the skeptical movement. It’s there that cooperation and intersectional thinking will work best.

The overlap and the need for feminist, skeptic, and secularist cooperation is probably most urgent and obvious on the issue of reproductive rights. Laws that attempt to ban or restrict abortion are almost entirely religiously motivated and are pushed for by religious people for religious reasons[1]; that makes abortion an issue of separation of church and state. Similarly, a lot of anti-abortion arguments are based on bogus science and medical lies[2]. Debunking for example the false claim that abortion increases risk of breast cancer[3] lies squarely in the territory of skeptics as much as debunking anti-vaccination claims does. Other issues have similar overlaps: strict gatekeeping regulation enforced on trans women before allowing any medical treatment of dysphoria is not based on any reasonable, medically sound basis[4]; the bans on gay marriage and adoption (which affects among other demographics non-straight women) are similarly to anti-abortion laws based entirely on religious bigotry rather than evidence for harm to anyone[5]; etc. Other issues still have partial overlap, or fall within spheres that relate indirectly to the movements’ causes and issues of interest. Such topics include environmental policy(including climate change), promotion of accurate science and education, and other humanist causes.

Beyond simply being convenient allies on clearly overlapping issues, feminism, secularism, and skepticism can benefit internally from each others’ insights, as well. Overlapping memberships mean growth, and they mean more critical, scientific analysis of the issues that members of these movements deal with. Overlapping memberships also help remove blind spots present in each of those movements.

http://feministhivemind.com/

[niyad]

1. k and r

[Bad Thoughts]

2. Bullshit? That's bullshit.

Power is clearly missing from this Rice Crispies mix.

[rrneck]

3. Hmmm. That sounds familiar.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_synergy
Corporate synergy occurs when corporations interact congruently.

This is a consumer solution to a social problem. Just get the right mix of isms and our problems will be solved. The real key is to move smaller isms under the banner of the larger ism. That way one ism can claim to be cooperating with the other isms while leveraging their greater exposure to their benefit.