‘Femcel’ influencers urge their followers to give up on gender equality and use men for financial gain – in the name of feminism

Summary

The “femosphere,” a growing online space for women, mirrors the misogynistic “manosphere” with toxic ideologies, including anti-gender equality views and strategies to “conquer” men.

The term describes communities like Female Dating Strategy and “dark feminine” influencers who reject liberal feminism, advocating traditional gender roles as empowering.

“Femcel” influencers urge their followers to give up on gender equality and use men for financial gain – in the name of feminism.

Critics warn these spaces mix conservative and feminist ideas, creating “anti-feminist feminism” that appeals to those disillusioned with mainstream feminism.

While less linked to violence than the manosphere, researchers caution against its potential for radicalization and harm.

  • pack_of_racoonsEnglish
    6·
    5 days ago

    Liberal feminism convinced women that it would be liberating for them to take on both traditional, household gender roles, but all it did was saddle women with an even greater burden.

    I disagree wholeheartedly with this sentiment with regard to early liberal feminism. Liberal feminism allowed women to vote, go to school, have a bank account without their owner’s husband’s permission, get divorced, and gave women the freedom to choose what they want for their individual lives. If a woman wants to pursue a life full of traditional gender roles liberal feminism does not stop her from doing that.

    Liberal feminism succeeded, though not completely as there are still inequalities that exist, in liberating women within the context of a capitalist society. It roughly brought them up to the oppression level that of a man in a capitalist society. I’m not going to argue that it wasn’t a missed opportunity to bring upon a socialist revolution, it certainly was. And in hind sight was sorely needed as among other things it would have likely eliminated the chance of existence for in/femcels and the blight they bring upon the world.

    Meanwhile, the movement to make women independent left a lot of men lonely, bitter, and resentful…

    Honestly, that’s a problem for those men to deal with. It is also pretty obvious that a certain group of men would be bitter and resentful now that society makes it harder for them to chain down a woman.

    I think people need to abandon the idea that freedom comes from independence.

    This is an easy thing to say when the only people you’ve ever been dependent on were benevolent. What happens when you require support from someone that does not allow you to make you’re own decisions or respect your bodily autonomy? You also need to recognize that feminist women can, and still do, engage in loving mutually supportive relationships. The goal of liberal feminism was/is to allow women to be independent not to mandate that they are.

    TBH I cannot really tell if you’re arguing that Liberal Feminism did not go far enough and should have been Socialist Feminism or that Liberal Feminism went too far by allowing a woman to live a life independent of a man.

    • TheDemonBuer@lemmy.world
      2·
      5 days ago

      You make a lot of really good points.

      I should start out by saying that I wholeheartedly agree that it is a very good thing that women now have the right to vote, go to school, have a bank account, etc. I think those are unequivocally good things, and I am not advocating for a reactionary return to a time before liberal feminism did successfully liberate women in many very important ways. I should have expressed that, that was my oversight and I can certainly see how my comment made my position on that unclear.

      Honestly, that’s a problem for those men to deal with

      Well, that’s the thing, I don’t think it is just their problem, I think it’s our problem.

      This is really my issue with liberalism, it’s inherently antisocial and hyper individualist, and thus fails to account for the ways in which we are interdependent. In fact, the power dynamics that you allude to in this statement…:

      This is an easy thing to say when the only people you’ve ever been dependent on were benevolent.

      …only exist because of liberalism. It was supposedly the right of husbands to have authority over, and, yes, even ownership of their wives and children, which is an antisocial concept. Some of those husbands were more benevolent than others, just as I’m sure some slave owners were more benevolent than others, but ultimately both power dynamics existed because of the supposed individual “rights” granted to those men by god or nature. Using liberalism to liberate women from institutions that liberalism helped create, isn’t ever going to work.

      Like I mentioned before, to be a wholly independent person is going to live a brutally difficult life of isolation. There’s a reason we evolved to live in communities, because it aided our survival, both as individuals and as a species. We benefit from living in healthy, stable, high functioning communities, and so we should each be interested in the well being of everyone in our community, even the lonely, isolated, hapless young men. Not by returning to a time when they would be given ownership and authority over women, but by helping them understand that they are a part of a community, that they benefit from being a part of the community, but that being in the community comes with certain responsibilities and obligations.