Why Feminists Are Anything But “Victims” Why Feminists Are Anything But “Victims”.

“Victim feminism” – this word is increasingly being used when referring to feminist issues such as old age poverty, career opportunities, wage inequality, care work or even sexual violence. In commentary columns one sometimes reads that contemporary feminism consists only of “whining”. Women always find a reason to “roll around in the role of victim” and can’t be taken seriously anymore.

The German sociologist Martin Schröder takes a similar view. In an interview with the NZZ, Schröder says that the women’s movement once had the goal that every woman should live the way she wants, but now “victim feminism” is dominant.

In the “Welt” he continues this thought by writing: Women’s lives are judged too negatively because “illiberal feminism” portrays women as chronic victims. The women are doing much better with us than he would tell them.

Twisted logic

There is a reason, Schröder writes in the “Welt”, why we as a society consider women’s lives worse than they are. Again and again we are painfully aware that the world does not live up to our moral standards. Finally, there is poverty, violence and inequality. But if we notice that the world is worse than we would like, we forget that not only can the world be bad, our claims can also be (too) high.

That is why, according to Schröder, we would also see more injustice where there is now measurably less. This increasing moral sensitivity is a step forward, but is seen as a step backwards if we confuse our increasing demands with an actual decline of the world.

Of course we are all better off than two hundred, twenty, ten years ago. Nobody denies that.

But does that mean that women (or anyone for that matter) can no longer demand better conditions for themselves, in the sense of: who does well, should not do better? Twisted logic.

All just method

In her book ‘Topgirls. Feminism and the Rise of the Neoliberal Gender Regime” on contemporary society: Elements of feminism have been adopted by social institutions and noticeably integrated into public life. In addition, (young) women were given new skills and freedoms, also to study or work.

McRobbie, on the other hand, wants what could be dismissed as a success to be understood differently: namely, as a method of avoiding new feminist demands in advance. In her view, progress is linked to the condition that women are no longer allowed to criticize the system in the future. In the sense of: What more do you want? You already have everything. So don’t complain!

Such cries become more frequent and louder. But fewer and fewer (young) women are impressed by this. They recognize this resistance as an indication of the change they have initiated and move on.

By working relentlessly and fearlessly for a just and non-violent society, they prove themselves far from being passive ‘victims’, but rather active actors.