Redstockings

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Redstockings, also known as Redstockings of the Women's Liberation Movement, is a radical feminist group that was most active during the 1970s. The word is a neologism, combining the term bluestocking, a pejoritive term for intellectual women, with "red", for its association with the revolutionary left.

1 History
2 Ideology
3 Writings
4 References
5 External links

[edit] History

The group was started by Ellen Willis and Shulamith Firestone in February 1969 after the breakup of New York Radical Women. Other early members included Kathie Sarachild, Patricia Mainardi, Barbara Leon, Irene Peslikis, and Alix Kates Shulman. A group called Redstockings West was started in San Francisco in 1970, but was independent of the East Coast group. Redstockings went through several phases of activity and inactivity; they first split up in 1970 and were formally refounded in 1973 by Kathie Sarachild, Carol Hanisch, Patricia Mainardi, and Barbara Leon. (Ellen Willis' was involved only peripherally with the reformed group.)

In the early 1970s, Redstockings were noted for their "speak outs" and "zap actions" (a combination of disruptive protest and street theater) on the issue of abortion rights. (This style of protest was emulated by an early-1980s pro-choice group, No More Nice Girls, one of the founders of which was Redstocking veteran, Ellen Willis.) Redstockings was one of the influential but short-lived radical feminist groups of the Sixties that produced many of the expressions and actions that have become household words to people in the United States--Sisterhood is Powerful, Consciousness-Raising, The Personal is Political, The Politics of Housework, The Pro-Woman Line, The Miss America Protest.

More recently, the group leads a project to make available radical feminist papers and original source organizing material building on their concept "History for Activist Use" through the Women's Liberation Archives for Action, as well as putting out new theory on women's oppression and what to do about it. In 2001, they put out a book called Confronting the Myth of America: Women's Liberation and National Health Care. As of 2006, the group is active and operates a website, though Kathie Sarachild is the only original member still active with the group.

[edit] Ideology

The group is a strong advocate of consciousness raising and what they refer to as "The Pro-Woman Line" – the idea that women's submission to male supremacy was a conscious adaptation to their lack power under patriarchy, rather than internalized "brainwashing" on the part of women, as was held by some other radical feminist groups. Redstockings holds the view that all men oppress all women as a class and that it is the responsibility of individual men to give up male supremacy, rather than the responsibility of women to change themselves.

Redstockings relationship to other strands of feminism of the 1970s was complex. Like many other radical feminists, they were critical of liberal feminist groups like the National Organization for Women, whom they viewed as advancing women's liberation only as a type of institutional reform while ignoring the interpersonal power of men over women. The Redstockings were more influenced by Marxism than were other radical feminist groups, however, they nevertheless strongly rejected socialist feminism (which they referred to as "politico" feminism) as subordinating the issue of women's liberation to class struggle. On the other hand, Redstockings were also against cultural feminism, which in their view substituted the building of a separatist women's culture for political engagement. (In Redstockings' view, most other tendencies of radical feminism, especially after 1975, were expressions of "cultural feminism".)

Redstockings were strongly opposed to lesbian separatism, seeing interpersonal relationships with men as an important arena of feminist struggle, and hence seeing separatism as escapist. (Like most radical feminists of the time, Redstockings saw lesbianism primarily as a political identity rather than a fundamental part of personal identity, and therefore analyzed it primarily in political terms.) Redstockings were also opposed to male homosexuality, which they saw as a deeply misogynist rejection of women. Redstockings line on gay men and lesbians is often criticized as homophobic (Echols, 1989).

[edit] Writings

Notable essays associated with the group include "The Redstockings Manifesto", "Program for Consciousness-Raising", and "The Politics of Housework". A number of other essays written by the refounded group were published in a 1975 anthology, Feminist Revolution. In the anthology, they also published a controversial report on Gloria Steinem's involvement with a liberal youth group that was later revealed to have been funded by the CIA. This publication created a lasting rift between members of Redstockings and feminists who were close to Steinem. (The latter report was left out of the 1979 Random House edition for fear of a libel lawsuit.)

[edit] References

Echols, Alice. (1989). Daring to Be Bad: Radical Feminism in America, 1967–1975. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. ISBN 0-8166-1787-2
Redstockings. (1979). Feminist Revolution. New York: Random House. ISBN 0-394-73240-5
Willis, Ellen (1992). Radical Feminism and Feminist Radicalism. In: Ellen Willis, No More Nice Girls: Countercultural Essays. Wesleyan University Pr. ISBN 0-8195-6284-X