Neha Viswanathan, of the spectacular blog Within/Without, wrote some very insightful comments about my post on masculinity - and generated a lot more discussion than I did! Since my browser doesn't let me post a comment there, I'll write one here. I think it's so important to see patriarchy as a system of gender oppression, which oppresses both genders (I know, there's more than two, but bear with me, I'm still learning!) Sexist roles abuse women - and they also make it impossible for men to live full emotional lives. Which, as I argued in the post, allows all sorts of repression and sublimation to take place, very useful for capitalist labour discipline.


Bolshevik women were more than workers or housewives - on a t-shirt too

Neha makes the point that the Bolsheviks used masculinity to denigrate the ruling class, whose French language skills were seen as effeminate. I wasn't aware of this, though I'm sure the Bolsheviks had many backwards attitudes. I'd just add that the Revolution made it possible to challenge the material structures of sexism. In the first years, through heavy privation, the Bolsheviks set up collective kitchens and daycares, freeing many women from unpaid domestic labour. They legalized abortion on demand and homosexuality, decades before many other countries, and a good indication of their thorough understanding of gender oppression. That ended with Stalinism, which brought back in strict, traditional role models, but the early accomplishments are a testament to the strength of feminism's first wave, and its meeting with the height of revolutionary socialism.

For further reading, I'd recommend Leon Trotsky's "Women and the Family", and Alexandra Kollontai's "Love of Worker Bees" - Kollontai was a central committee member, who wrote a fictionalized account of setting up a collective household, and the challenges that presented to gender and work roles.