On Radical Self-Publishing

in my last post, i more or less asked the question “how can radfems be so smart and so stupid at the same time?”  i wrote it pointedly at first, but then deleted and said it more nicely.  i have been told the message got through regardless.  writing, afterall, is a logical and even mathematical process whereby other people can follow your thoughts in both directions (if they are so inclined).  if they want to, readers can surmise where the writer must have been coming from to say what they said, and they can also figure out where they are going, or likely to end up if they continue down that road.  the good news is that “editors” cant really change that — the intent, including the conclusions and premises of the author remain, for anyone interested in doing the work.

radical feminist writing, in particular, has been subject to the limitations of the patriarchal press leaving *us* to do the work of figuring out what the authors really meant.  discussing it with other people helps, as does reading the original material for yourself instead of relying on other peoples potentially biased interpretations of it.  for example, i and others understand that andrea dworkin would not, in fact, have advocated for endless reformist activating or holding out hope for men.  i think anyone who reads dworkins entire body of work, and who deliberately reads between the lines (and the lines) can easily see what she was “really saying” when she said to an audience of men,

We do not want to do the work of helping you to believe in your humanity. We cannot do it anymore. We have always tried. We have been repaid with systematic exploitation and systematic abuse. You are going to have to do this yourselves from now on and you know it.

she said we cannot do it anymore.  its a direct quote and its right fucking there, people.  thats from dworkins infamous “24-hour truce” speech which disingenuous (or lazy, or confused, or something) radical feminists often cite as proof that dworkin said and meant the exact opposite — that we can and should keep doing it forever.  fail.  dworkin also seems to have given up on men in her 1999 article for the new statesman, in which she wrote that she had been drugged and raped by men, and that she was ready to die.  so it seems as if, while radical feminist work is in fact censored and edited and erased by the press and other patriarchal forces (and it is) its also subject to being grossly distorted and misused by other feminists to the point that the very meaning is reversed, obliterated and destroyed.  not only is that a really nasty thing to do, it also puts the women who come after in the unfortunate position of not having all the facts on which to make their own decisions, and specifically lacking the very feminist history and context that would help them to come to rational/radical conclusions faster, without always having to reinvent the damn wheel.  a shortcut, in other words.  women are destroying other womens shortcuts.  men are doing it to us too, but we cant stop them (since they will never, ever stop).  there may, on the other hand, still be hope for us.

and while there is no reason that pro-female, anti-male reasons for abandoning what is known as “feminism” would ever make it to/through the patriarchal press, even feminist publications would never publish a woman who had the gall (plus cooties) to leave, particularly if she had cogent reasons for doing so.  get it?  before self-publishing (including blogging) was a thing, leaving the movement also meant leaving access to the feminist press.  silencing complete.

the reason i am talking about this now is that i am in the position to write if i want to, and to publish on this blog, and my work is unedited by others and not limited by the rules of the patriarchal press (but still subject to the general rules of patriarchy of course).  and the position in which i currently find myself — completely disillusioned by radical feminist activating and radical feminists themselves, insofar as radical feminists consistently fail to go to the ends of their thoughts about patriarchy, including how its likely to end — is not one that is familiar to me.  i have only ever read about one woman (sonia johnson) experiencing something similar to what i am experiencing now (similar but not exact, as i do not recall her mentioning NTE stuff).  she self-published her account of course.

so, since i am in the position to self-publish at the moment, i have done so.  i suspect that women silencing other women is the (secondary, after males silencing us) reason there are not dozens or hundreds of accounts of “nutty” radical feminists leaving or being thrown out of the movement.  similarly, i suspect that other women silencing and quashing these accounts specifically is the reason i have never read about other radical feminists who believe that men have already done us all in, and that this cannot be changed, and that abrupt global climate change and loss of human habitat related to male-caused global overpopulation and over male population is a done deal.  call me crazy (plus cooties) but i dont think i am the only radical feminist ever to intuit/conclude that this thing we call “patriarchy” is really a self-reinforcing feedback loop which over time has picked up speed and strength (as self reinforcing feedback loops do) and that at this point, it cannot be stopped.  it is physically impossible to reverse or stop it now.  it will continue to get worse of course, by definition, as this is what self-reinforcing feedback loops do.

i do not think it is unreasonable to conclude that, because patriarchy is not compatible with life, it will only end in death; and probably in proportion to its own size and strength, which is global, (literally) all-consuming, and with the power/energy of 108 billion humans behind it (54 billion necrophilic males over time, and the females they sucked the life out of) and all the power/energy of every bit of fossil fuel and renewable resources weve used to boot.  all that energy* has been pumped into the patriarchal death machine (feedback loop) and its some powerful shit indeed.  its some deadly shit, from which we can rightly predict powerfully deadly outcomes.  i really dont know why this isnt talked about more, perhaps especially by radical feminists.  oh wait!  yes i do.

*while the “energy” imagery i used here may (or may not!) be theoretical/metaphysical, the concept of “exponential growth” implicated in positive feedback loops, including the positive feedback loops global overpopulation and over male population is very real.  i know women understand the concept of exponential growth in our bones — its exactly what we have desperately, historically avoided growing inside us when we have tried to get men to stop fucking us, and impregnating us.  cell division is exponential, get it?  every time an addition is made, its a DOUBLING/multiplying, not merely an adding/counting.  thats what i meant when i said in exponential growth “there is no 6.”  watch a video or a gif of exponential growth for exactly 3 cycles and see what happens.  anytime you go from 1, to 2, to 4, then directly to 8 without a 6…well youre fucked arent you.  this is the exponential concept we “humans” are allegedly unable to grok (an ignorance which therefore alleviates “us” of responsibility for causing it?  i guess?)