History of Feminism

associated with radical feminism for this misconception.

High profile hate born of ignorance draws the negative attention of the literate progressive community, as evidenced by the controversies surrounding Hobby Lobby, Barilla, Chik-fil-A, RadFem 2012, etc.

Radical Feminism is a constructive agenda for ending patriarchy; TERF is clearly destructive to the goal of ending patriarchy.

Unfortunately, it may now be impossible to separate Radical Feminism from TERF in the general public consciousness; the moniker radfem may now be an indelible scarlet letter on the forehead of feminism.

Maybe changing the name Radical Feminism to something somewhat equivalent, and never, ever inviting conservative authoritarian extremist bigots to the party again, can eventually stop the use of "radfem" (or its future equivalents) as an anti-feminist/misogynist slur at some point. Unfortunately, Radical Feminism and Sheila Jeffreys are now eternally joined at the hip in the minds of a large number of relatively socially conscious but inadequately informed people.

And, of course, excluding all of the above, "boys will be boys".

Asking people nicely to stop using misogynistic slurs doesn't seem to work anymore, as witnessed by the adamant, juvenile refusal of many self-described progressives here at DU to stop using the "b" word.

Thank you for initiating this long overdue discussion, redqueen.