Does feminism promote victimhood?

Here's my easy guide to debunking that nasty myth

Have you noticed that this word is never applied to anything men do?

Q: Why do feminists exaggerate the reality of male violence and create unnecessary fear in women?

A: Male violence towards women and girls is a huge, global problem affecting the vast majority of females. Every credible piece of research both by governments and NGOs backs this up. Bodies in morgues cannot lie.

Q: Why don’t feminists use the term ‘sex work’ and recognise it as a legitimate form of labour?

A: The inside of a woman's body is not a workplace. Unionisation of so-called sex work has been attempted in a number of countries and always failed. Rebranding prostitution as work means that rape is merely theft.

Q: Feminists who campaign against the sex industry are the enemy of poor migrant women whose work they are putting at risk.

A: Poor migrant women should not be in a position where they have no choice but commercial sexual exploitation in order to earn a living. As sex trade survivor Rachel Moran says: "The thing to do when a woman is hungry is to put food in her mouth and not your cock."

Q: Prostitution is the oldest profession. Instead of fighting to end prostitution, should you not be campaigning for better terms and conditions for ‘sex workers’?

A: This phrase (only commonly used about prostitution since World War Two) is generally used to suggest buying sex is inevitable. However, if you want to mis-label prostitution as a profession, then it’s the second oldest. Pimping comes first because there was no prostitution until men created the idea.

As for improving conditions for prostituted women, in countries such as New Zealand, Germany and the Netherlands, where governments decriminalised pimping and brothel owning to improve conditions, there are higher numbers of murders, and ‘working conditions’ are still horrendous for the women.

Q: Feminists deny women’s agency and, instead of empowering women, label them as victims.

A: Providing access to the inside of women's bodies for one-sided sexual pleasure does not empower any woman. Pimps and punters disempower and violate women. Feminists seek to expand women’s agency by creating meaningful choices.

Q: Some women (including trans women) like to be wolf-whistled and objectified because they find it flattering. Feminists who call this harassment are just spoiling the fun and probably jealous of the attention.

A: If a woman enjoys male sexual attention then it is not harassment. To rebrand sexual harassment as harmless fun is the oldest trick of patriarchy. It only benefits men.

Q: Feminists who argue for the imprisonment of men who have committed violent crimes against women are racist. The criminal justice system is racist, so you should not support it.

A: No feminist supports a racist criminal justice system. Feminists who are engaged with criminal justice issues only support the imprisonment of men as a last resort, and if those men are too dangerous to live within the community.

Q: White women claim victimhood as a way to divert attention away from their racism and privilege.

A: If white, privileged women are raped and beaten by men, they have been victims of male violence. When the likes of JK Rowling is accused of “weaponising her trauma”, this is victim blaming, pure and simple.

Q: But men are also affected by domestic violence. Some research shows that over half of all victims are men who have been abused by female partners.

A: Definitions matter. Many men who ticked ’yes' on the British Crime Survey, when asked if they had been the victim of domestic violence, had classed ’nagging' from their female partner as an excuse for his abuse. Several domestic violence refuges for men have been opened over the years and not one bed has ever been slept in. A minority of men die at the hands of their female partners, and almost all have been perpetrators rather than victims of domestic abuse. One woman dies every three days at the hands of her former or current male partner. Homicide figures tell the true story.

Q: Take FGM and forced marriage of girls. Women are the ones perpetrating these crimes, not men. How can you therefore call these atrocities ‘male violence’?

A: Women are routinely held responsible for upholding cultural norms within the patriarchal family system. We are required to be moral arbiters and to ensure that girls are kept in line. FGM and forced marriage benefits those who seek to control female sexuality and reproductive rights. Women do not benefit from colluding in our own oppression except to escape punishment or in some cases to be rewarded for complying.

Q: If feminism focuses so much on victimhood, does this not paint us as weak and pathetic? This therefore perpetuates the stereotype of women as the weaker sex?

A: Feminism is about resisting male violence and supremacy. It sends a very clear message to girls and women that male violence and abuse is not natural or innate, nor is it the natural order of things. It situates women as resisters not victims.