Needed: A coalition of feminists and conservative Christians

[Silmarien]

It. Gets. Worse.

I've been tracking down the corners of the internet where gender critical radical feminists and trans-women who oppose the transgender movement are in conversation with each other, and ran across a black trans-woman "gender abolitionist" running with black feminist thought who implied that the transgender movement, given its strange focus on the sex industry, was actually pushing trans-people (particularly trans-people of color) towards inappropriate contentography and prostitution. (A friend of mine who works in sex trafficking advocacy and struggling against pushes to legalize prostitution confirmed that there does seem to be a lot of this going on.)

Alongside this, I discovered a new slur in the SJW transgender movement to go along with TERF: SWERF. Sex worker exclusive radical feminist. To believe that inappropriate contentography and prostitution contribute to the oppression of women (and people in general) now makes one a terrible, bigoted anti-feminist. It seems that little concern is being paid towards victims of sex trafficking, since the "choice" to engage in sex work is more important. Never mind that it isn't much of a choice when you are doing it because you feel like you have no other options.

It's an issue that Blaire White discusses here, since apparently when she was in her late teens and trying to pay for her transition, her transgender "support" groups were all pushing her towards prostitution as the answer:

The mainstream transgender movement itself (or whatever dark corner of the internet has been passing for it) seems to be an unmitigated disaster, but to get back on topic completely, I have concerns with the way that some radfems have been teaming up with conservatives to fight it. Apparently it drives them to insane, hyperbolic legal language with no basis in reality.

The way that the transgender movement seems to be all but engaging in sex trafficking, telling the people who depend on it that they may want to consider that they're good for nothing else, and seemingly wedding itself to liberal feminism to champion the normalization of prostitution, all while ignoring the issue of human trafficking, is probably the worst thing I've heard so far on this topic. But the underlying issue here seems to be social marginalization, since people don't go around thinking that their only worth to society is in prostitution (and the most dangerous form of it there is), if they have access to better work.

Given that conservatives seem to be contributing to this by championing their "right" to fire transgender people, I worry about alliances with them just making things that much worse rather than better if the conservatives cannot be liberalized a bit on the issue. But maybe they can be? "Hey, you're driving people into prostitution and indirectly contributing to efforts to legalize prostitution" is a pretty good argument.

 

[bekkilyn]

There is some merit to the "enemy of my enemy is my friend" approach, but in the case of radical feminists and far right-wing conservatives, it could be at best only a temporary and short-term alliance for a very particular issue. Far right-wing conservatives also want to push women back into harmful gender stereotypes and roles, but for different reasons, and it would be wise for any woman, feminist or otherwise, to keep that in mind when considering any sort of alliance.

I remember Andrea Dworkin teamed up with Christian conservatives for a time concerning an issue...I think it had something to do with inappropriate contentography, so there can perhaps be some value in it, but as long as Christian conservatism remains complimentarian rather than egalitarian, there isn't really any middle ground there.

Yes, I've heard the SWERF term before as well and the push towards pushing transgender people into prostitution and that it's supposed to be called "sex work" now rather than "prostitution." It really is an ugly thing, and yes, libfems and progressives in general have been sucked into that philosophy because they want to be "inclusive" and think it's the right thing to do. All part of being "woke."

And of course the TRA groups continue to do their best to silence and "cancel" any sort of discussion that is in any way critical of legalizing prostitution. It makes me really wonder if the real reason they've infiltrated the schools with all the "gender fluidity" stuff and targeting young people who don't quite fit with perceived gender norms and trying to get them to transition and take hormones and all that sort of thing is for the reason of drawing them into "sex work."

There is a whole lot of big money behind the TRA ideology, and considering how fast the movement rose up from being very minuscule with not a lot of funding to practically taking over the globe to the point where even super rich people like J.K. Rowling are very successfully attacked and many of her previously biggest fans turned against her, there is something going on that isn't to the benefit of anyone other than those making a profit out of it.

 

[PloverWing]

bekkilyn, you and Silmarien have made a number of good points in this thread, including a) that women are still in danger of sexism and violence, regardless of what's going on in the LGBTQ community; b) extreme caution should be employed before beginning hormonal or surgical transition, because these are permanent changes to the body; c) there is a real danger of predatory cis-men being able to take advantage of the system and enter women's spaces; and d) there is a horrible phenomenon of people being attacked online, sometimes with threats of violence, for their views, or sometimes just for being a woman online.

I find the intersection of women's rights and transgender rights to be difficult waters to navigate. I have strong sympathies for both groups: I inhabit a female body, so I have the physical and social experiences that go with that; and several people close to me are either transgender or nonbinary, so I can also see the world through their eyes, to some degree. I thank you for your thoughtful engagement with this difficult intersection of issues.

I do, however, want to push back a bit on this:

And of course the TRA groups continue to do their best to silence and "cancel" any sort of discussion that is in any way critical of legalizing prostitution. It makes me really wonder if the real reason they've infiltrated the schools with all the "gender fluidity" stuff and targeting young people who don't quite fit with perceived gender norms and trying to get them to transition and take hormones and all that sort of thing is for the reason of drawing them into "sex work."

What I hear from my trans and nonbinary friends and colleagues is that they want to see acknowledgement of people like them in the schools. They want to hear their teachers and colleagues use their preferred pronouns. They want to be able to have gender expressions that don't fit the standard norms, and to be accepted. Some want to see more gender-non-conforming people in literature, or in biographies, so that they can more easily imagine how to navigate their own lives. And, in many cases, they want things to be easier for the people who come after them. If they faced rejection for their gender identity or expression, they want younger kids to not have to face the same rejection or exclusion.

There's probably room for criticism here, especially if there's too much eagerness to suggest hormonal transition to people who aren't truly transgender. But when I talk to the trans and nonbinary people in my personal life (not on the Internet), I'm not seeing any desire to draw anybody into sex work. I'm seeing the standard things that any out-of-power group wants: desires for acceptance, for non-discrimination, and for making the world better for those who come after them.

 

[bekkilyn]

I do, however, want to push back a bit on this:

What, no death threats or lewd comments?

What I hear from my trans and nonbinary friends and colleagues is that they want to see acknowledgement of people like them in the schools. They want to hear their teachers and colleagues use their preferred pronouns. They want to be able to have gender expressions that don't fit the standard norms, and to be accepted. Some want to see more gender-non-conforming people in literature, or in biographies, so that they can more easily imagine how to navigate their own lives. And, in many cases, they want things to be easier for the people who come after them. If they faced rejection for their gender identity or expression, they want younger kids to not have to face the same rejection or exclusion.

I'd like to see a lot of this too, though I suspect that much of the reason for the rejection of these teens isn't because the majority of them are actually transgender, but because we live in a society that still attempts to force us to behave within stereotypical gender roles. Look at the pink and blue toys at the shops. Why are the little plastic "army men" for boys? I had a whole bag of those that I played with as a little girl. Why are ponies with purple hair for girls? There are boys who like those too. I'd like to see these teens accepted for who they are, regardless of their hobbies, hairstyles, clothing choices, etc. For many, it seems that transgenderism is a way out of these oppressive stereotypes, but it's not a real fix. (The exception being the miniscule number of people with actual dysphoria.)

There's probably room for criticism here, especially if there's too much eagerness to suggest hormonal transition to people who aren't truly transgender. But when I talk to the trans and nonbinary people in my personal life (not on the Internet), I'm not seeing any desire to draw anybody into sex work. I'm seeing the standard things that any out-of-power group wants: desires for acceptance, for non-discrimination, and for making the world better for those who come after them.

Hopefully I'm wrong about the "grooming" young teens for sex work, but it also happens to a lot of teens that do not consider themselves trans, and kids who are or think they are trans are more vulnerable and easier targets for these predators.

I don't agree with giving anyone hormones or surgery for any sort of transition until that person is clearly an adult. I've been seeing too many stories lately of young people who detransition and regret the damage they did to their bodies and their bodies and brains aren't even fully developed yet.

I saw this video yesterday that was in my suggestions after watching the video that Silmarien posted that demonstrates much of my concern here. Pronouns are one thing, but
other things are not so easily reversed.

 

[Silmarien]

What I hear from my trans and nonbinary friends and colleagues is that they want to see acknowledgement of people like them in the schools. They want to hear their teachers and colleagues use their preferred pronouns. They want to be able to have gender expressions that don't fit the standard norms, and to be accepted. Some want to see more gender-non-conforming people in literature, or in biographies, so that they can more easily imagine how to navigate their own lives. And, in many cases, they want things to be easier for the people who come after them. If they faced rejection for their gender identity or expression, they want younger kids to not have to face the same rejection or exclusion.

There's probably room for criticism here, especially if there's too much eagerness to suggest hormonal transition to people who aren't truly transgender. But when I talk to the trans and nonbinary people in my personal life (not on the Internet), I'm not seeing any desire to draw anybody into sex work. I'm seeing the standard things that any out-of-power group wants: desires for acceptance, for non-discrimination, and for making the world better for those who come after them.

I cannot of course speak for Bekkilyn, but I think she is making the same distinction I am between actual transgender people, the transgender movement and its incoherent ideological claims, and transgender activists, most of whom don't care about whether their interests conflict with those of other people, and some of whom are simultaneously involved in promoting inappropriate contentography and prostitution. Twitter wouldn't be conflating trans-exclusionary feminist views with anti-sex work feminist views if this weren't an issue, I don't think.

My concern with this issue is not for transgender college students, but for the ones living on the street (primarily those of color), since there does seem to be a certain degree of exploitation involved. Honestly, I'm actually annoyed that people are fighting over pronouns when there are segments of the transgender community that genuinely are so marginalized that they are being pushed into the type of work that may get them murdered. You can only focus on an issue like personal pronouns if you already have privilege.

I've realized in the past day or so that I don't even know how to deal with the issue of personal pronouns anymore, since I've developed such strong disagreements with the underlying ideology. I am currently gender critical--I agree with the trans movement that what we understand as "gender identity" may well have no genuine connection to biological sex, but that just means it has nothing to do with the words "he" or "she" either. Pronouns are a linguistic function used to simplify communication, so I think both major views here are wrong. If you take the conservative approach and start insisting that transsexuals who are indistinguishable from women should be referred to as "he," you add confusion to a conversation because it's not clear who you're even talking about. On the other hand, if you take this new progressive approach, decide that a man who presents more or less as a man but identifies as a woman (whatever that means) must be referred to with she/her/hers pronouns, you're not just adding potential confusion to a conversation, but you've also found a strange new way of letting biological males determine what precisely it means to be a woman. I'm happy to accommodate transsexuals, since they're making a real effort to pass, and if they're doing a good job of it, I automatically use their preferred pronouns anyway, but some of the other stuff going on looks a lot more like appropriation to me.

I'm kind of irritated by the whole thing because I do have a similar sort of thing going on, though related to culture and language rather than to gender. My lifestyle involves picking up and spending a couple months a year in a foreign country, since I am big on foreign language acquisition. This means that I have to regularly deal with the alienation that comes from being a foreigner at a non-native speaking level. I do what I can to close the gap, but everyone still hears the accent. I don't think I've ever run into outright xenophobia, but there is definitely a fair amount of insensitive behavior, and stuff that I take badly because it's embarrassing to speak at a high level and then make a stupid mistake and give yourself away. But I've learned over time that it really isn't all about me, and that I cannot control the way that people around me perceive me. They don't exist just to validate me.

I feel like people have moved so deeply into the world of subjective, individualistic identity that they have forgotten what social interaction really means. It's interactive, and not about one person imposing their personal reality upon everyone else. This debate over pronouns and non-binary identities seems to be custom made to get on my nerves, since I am (1) gender critical, (2) a linguist, and (3) dealing with not being perceived as I would like to be perceived all of the time. I don't really want to misgender people (except for the man who identifies as a woman while looking like a man, since I think that is a super, super privileged and offensive thing to do), but I think there's something kind of narcissistic about imposing your preferred linguistic structures upon everyone else. If you want to be referred to with they/them pronouns and present in such a way that makes me more likely to subconsciously think "they" instead of "he" or "she," then great! You've succeeded at the gender expression you're going for. If you don't, then... that really isn't my fault. I don't think being inclusive should require a sort of self-indoctrination into unnatural language use. If it happens, it should be organic, not imposed. And I'm not really thrilled that people are apparently wandering around asking anyone who doesn't look stereotypically feminine or masculine what their pronouns are. A lot of what's going on looks like the opposite of combating stereotypes.

 

[Silmarien]

What I hear from my trans and nonbinary friends and colleagues is that they want to see acknowledgement of people like them in the schools. They want to hear their teachers and colleagues use their preferred pronouns. They want to be able to have gender expressions that don't fit the standard norms, and to be accepted. Some want to see more gender-non-conforming people in literature, or in biographies, so that they can more easily imagine how to navigate their own lives. And, in many cases, they want things to be easier for the people who come after them. If they faced rejection for their gender identity or expression, they want younger kids to not have to face the same rejection or exclusion.

Sorry for the double response. I promise this one isn't a rant. (I'm slowly--if a bit angrily--coming to terms with my effective excommunication from the left over this issue, and rethinking everything I had taken for granted. Pronouns have ended up on the chopping block too. )

The issue I bolded is actually a really interesting one, I think, but unlikely to be remedied simply because of how out of control our outrage culture is. I came across this BBC podcast a while back, which describes a couple of pretty wild out of control spirals into "woke" insanity that have happened. At 14:50, he starts talking about the state of young adult fiction, and the sort of impossible standards that are set when a white author includes a character of color (in this case, a Muslim).

I don't know how many people who are not transgender would dare writing a character who is, since if you did, the trans-activists would bury you for it. Destroying people's careers is part of what they do, so why put a target on your back? Even look at what happened to Halle Berry, who backed out of playing a transgender character after receiving criticism. You don't get good media representation if you're chasing away everyone who isn't trans, so this is the sort of stuff that would need to come out of the trans community itself. And maybe it's better that it did, since it's difficult to understand what precisely transgender identity is like if it's not something you have direct experience with (or are close enough to someone who does), but there really isn't going to be that much of it if nobody else is allowed to write it.

 

[PloverWing]

What, no death threats or lewd comments?

Not at all. Live long and prosper.

But this does connect to one of @Silmarien 's links:

I came across this BBC podcast a while back, which describes a couple of pretty wild out of control spirals into "woke" insanity that have happened.

It has taken me a few days to reply, because I listened to the BBC podcast, "The Purity Spiral", as well as the documentary "Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen", which was linked to in the Halle Berry article.

"The Purity Spiral" described the kind of phenomenon that's been discussed in this thread, where lots of people pile onto someone with horrible comments about how they're racist or sexist or transphobic or whatever the issue of the day is, sometimes with threats of violence, sometimes with the effect of shutting down a person's business or getting them fired or something similarly awful. The narrator describes an incident of this in, of all things, an online knitting community. The narrator moves on to describe another similar incident in an online discussion of a new young adult novel. The novelist, Laura Moriarty, said this:

"If you start to follow this, you see the same names writing the takedowns over and over. They're not looking for anything but to destroy books that don't fit their purity test and to show their own purity and moral uprightness. Even some of the people doing it were maybe acting out of fear, because if they don't do it, they get looked at next, you know?"

It was a though-provoking podcast (thanks, Silmarien!), and I think this Purity Spiral phenomenon is something to consider in its own right, apart from issues of women's rights, trans rights, etc.

Listening to The Purity Spiral, I was reminded most of the well-known phenomenon of the legislator who makes loud, grand speeches about how homosexuality should be illegal, then gets discovered with a same-sex lover or prostitute a few weeks later. And, of course, this is at the opposite end of the social-issues spectrum. And there are parallels in some of the political revolutions that have happened in history. I think this Purity Spiral is a phenomenon all its own, driven by -- what? a desire for power, the perverse joy of hurting another person, fear of being discovered as being inadequately pure? Given the right setting, these things seem to rise up in people, independent of whether they're arguing for or against gay rights, racial justice, etc.

I guess my takeaways from this are 1) Wow, what a powerful and subtle sin, starting with the noble motives of speaking for the good, and spiraling into terrible verbal violence. And, 2) reading this discussion, I had been starting down the path of thinking that my support of transgender rights was a bad thing, but no. We shouldn't let go of our demand for racial justice just because there was some rioting in the recent protests; the rioting was bad and wrong, but racial justice is still important. Similarly, even though there have evidently been some awful things said and done in the trans rights movement (or by cis men infiltrating that movement), there are still important principles here that many trans rights activists are working for.

 

[Silmarien]

It has taken me a few days to reply, because I listened to the BBC podcast, "The Purity Spiral", as well as the documentary "Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen", which was linked to in the Halle Berry article.

Haha, I thought we'd scared you away with the ranting. (This whole thing has been very strange for me. I do still support trans rights, but rejecting the underlying transgender ideology and having a more nuanced idea of what "trans rights" even means has been weirdly like a religious deconversion. Am I evil for questioning whether "transwomen are women" is even coherent? Am I a TERF!?!? Yes, I think I technically am.)

In any case, on the issue of moral purity, there's another fascinating story I've come across: the cancellation of ContraPoints, a popular far left transgender Youtuber who committed the heinous crime of casting a trans-man that the community despised for a 15 second voice-over and then refusing to apologize for not hating him afterwards. So the Twitter lynch-mob went after her and then after all of her friends as well for not disowning her. It's this weird witch-hunt where a bunch of non-trans progressives target the population they're supposed to be defending. ContraPoints' rant on it is almost 2 hours long, but definitely worth listening to if you have the time:

At one point, she describes what's going on as similar to the Reign of Terror after the French Revolution, which I think is a very interesting and on point comparison to make. I think much of what is going on with these purity spirals is outrage used as virtue signaling--people care more about looking like they care about causes than they care about the causes themselves. It's 90% performance art and then the insane tribalism kicks in.

On the issue of trans rights, I agree with you that we should still support trans rights. I do think, however, that we need to better define both what transgender identity itself is and what transgender rights really entail.

1) Transgender identity. We've slipped from defining transsexuality as a medical condition involving gender dysphoria whose only known cure is transition, to people being able to self-identify at will and have it take legal effect. This is why Britain has blown up into controversy. If a man can say that he "feels" like a woman, with no questions asked and no requirement to change his lifestyle at all, and suddenly have access to women's sports and spaces, can I say that I identify as a man who "feels" like a woman and suddenly qualify for whatever unique protections that transgender people have?

2) Should transgender rights include the right to qualify for the protections and special provisions afforded to the sex they identify with? Should trans-women be able to have access to scholarships for girls, or women's sports, or be hired at a rape crisis center that up to now has only employed biological women, or head some sort of committee on women's issues as if they were able to fully represent women? I would quite vehemently say no. I think we can protect gender identity as a separate legal status, make sure they are not discriminated as people and that they have access to all sex-neutral services (as well as access to services specifically for themselves, as a protected minority), without eliminating sex as a separate protected status.

We also need to define transphobia better, because right now people seem to think that rejecting the claim that trans-women are women is the height of transphobia, and that is... not good. That's actually really, really bad, since if you apply that to legal status, the whole notion of sex discrimination is at risk of collapsing. Is firing a woman for being pregnant sex based discrimination if we understand that trans-men are legally male, and therefore men can get pregnant too? Conceptual confusion at this level applied to legal questions could actually be really problematic. And will lead to a backlash against transgender rights altogether.

Not related to the practical and legal questions involved, but an interesting blog piece I've stumbled across which comes closest to describing why this whole thing triggered me so badly is this one--it frames the question specifically in relation to society's expectation that women will always consent, will always be inclusive because femininity is already coded as inclusiveness, will never seek to set any boundaries, and when they break this mold... society pounces.

 

[bekkilyn]

I've been noticing that this "purity" culture, particularly on the left, is definitely broader than the TRA movement, and is probably part of what has enabled the TRA's to have gained so much strength in so short of time (along with a few notable big money backers). The "purity" environment was already there and so there was good timing involved.

I'm curious as to where it's all heading.

 

[Paidiske]

Not related to the practical and legal questions involved, but an interesting blog piece I've stumbled across which comes closest to describing why this whole thing triggered me so badly is this one--it frames the question specifically in relation to society's expectation that women will always consent, will always be inclusive because femininity is already coded as inclusiveness, will never seek to set any boundaries, and when they break this mold... society pounces.

That was a very interesting, thought-provoking piece, thank you. It leaves me wondering about the very aggressive responses people sometimes have to me, as a woman in ministry, and whether for them I sit in that "uncanny valley;" or whether being someone with robust boundaries is enough to cause the same sort of reaction she describes.

 

[bekkilyn]

Interesting article I saw today that continues to elaborate on the existing dangers of allowing males to define what a woman is while excluding females from having any voice at all on the topic.

Women in the United States are being Fired for Talking About Feminism

 

[Gregorikos]

TRAs are men who have hijacked feminism.

 

[archer75]

TRAs are men who have hijacked feminism.

In order to force others to sign on to an incoherent sexual fantasy, it seems.

 

[Silmarien]

Interesting article I saw today that continues to elaborate on the existing dangers of allowing males to define what a woman is while excluding females from having any voice at all on the topic.

Women in the United States are being Fired for Talking About Feminism

Bekkilyn, are you on Twitter, by any chance? I joined a month ago and have been following the gender critical (radical feminist / apostate transsexual / angry LGB) community there.

The TRAs I have encountered are... worse than I expected, to be honest. The pure hatred they direct at you simply because they know you don't think trans women are women is a bit frightening (I worry about their mental health). The one conversation I had that was actually quite pleasant, if only because she was trying to reeducate me, ended with her stabbing me in the back as soon as I said something she didn't like, and then deleting her account instead of dealing with conflict resolution when I called her out on it.

The gender critical transsexuals are lovely, though. And the TRAs keep on telling them they're not really trans, since it seems that being trans, like being a woman, is now a state of mind, and fully transitioned people who challenge their ideology can be declared non-trans.

Incidentally, does anyone know any Christian feminists within the radical feminist tradition? I would imagine that would be a thing within liberation theology, but I don't know any names. Now that I've fully radicalized, I need to catch up with my feminist readings.

 

[WolfGate]

Twitter is a dark place. I have been on there the past 4 years or so, mainly so we could keep track of high school baseball. Now that my son has gone to play in college, I'm seriously thinking I will delete my account.

 

[Silmarien]

Twitter is a dark place. I have been on there the past 4 years or so, mainly so we could keep track of high school baseball. Now that my son has gone to play in college, I'm seriously thinking I will delete my account.

I'm having fun on it, haha. I can see how it's completely destroyed all discourse in the modern world, since the sort of us vs. them group dynamics that build up are wild, and I think the character limit really hinders genuine conversation, but my political identity was so shattered by this whole mess, it's nice to be able to flock with other excommunicated leftists.

 

[bekkilyn]

Bekkilyn, are you on Twitter, by any chance? I joined a month ago and have been following the gender critical (radical feminist / apostate transsexual / angry LGB) community there.

The TRAs I have encountered are... worse than I expected, to be honest. The pure hatred they direct at you simply because they know you don't think trans women are women is a bit frightening (I worry about their mental health). The one conversation I had that was actually quite pleasant, if only because she was trying to reeducate me, ended with her stabbing me in the back as soon as I said something she didn't like, and then deleting her account instead of dealing with conflict resolution when I called her out on it.

The gender critical transsexuals are lovely, though. And the TRAs keep on telling them they're not really trans, since it seems that being trans, like being a woman, is now a state of mind, and fully transitioned people who challenge their ideology can be declared non-trans.

Incidentally, does anyone know any Christian feminists within the radical feminist tradition? I would imagine that would be a thing within liberation theology, but I don't know any names. Now that I've fully radicalized, I need to catch up with my feminist readings.

I have a throwaway Twitter account that I only use to get Animal Crossing screenshots off of my Switch and onto my computer or tablet, but otherwise I stay away from Twitter and most other social media as there are plenty of other more edifying things I'd rather do with my time than swim in that cesspool of ugliness.

I'm sure there are Christian feminists within radical feminist tradition, but definitely not the majority. Christianity as a religion has been so unfriendly to women in general that many people have just given up on it altogether.

 

[Silmarien]

I have a throwaway Twitter account that I only use to get Animal Crossing screenshots off of my Switch and onto my computer or tablet, but otherwise I stay away from Twitter and most other social media as there are plenty of other more edifying things I'd rather do with my time than swim in that cesspool of ugliness.

Haha, fair enough. You were caught up on the gender critical terminology will before I was, so I was wondering if you'd already been following the Terven Coven somewhere.

I'm sure there are Christian feminists within radical feminist tradition, but definitely not the majority. Christianity as a religion has been so unfriendly to women in general that many people have just given up on it altogether.

I mean more along the lines of scholarship and feminist theology. Most of what I manage to stumble across is more within the purview of queer theory, which... sometimes I like the result (I'm fond of Sarah Coakley), but by and large I expect it to be a post-structuralist mess.

I think difference feminism and radical feminism have the best synergy with Christianity--the more conservative approach and the edginess of liberation theology, respectively. I'm only familiar with the former, though, since I mostly know Catholic figures like Edith Stein and Dorothy Day.

 

[Paidiske]

I had a bit of a poke around in some academic databases, and found some positive reviews of a book called Keep Your Courage: A Radical Christian Feminist Speaks, by Carter Heyward. I don't know her or her work, but maybe that might be a useful resource?

 

[Silmarien]

I had a bit of a poke around in some academic databases, and found some positive reviews of a book called Keep Your Courage: A Radical Christian Feminist Speaks, by Carter Heyward. I don't know her or her work, but maybe that might be a useful resource?

Brilliant, thank you! Managed to grab it pretty cheaply off Amazon also, so I'll check it out!