The conservativehome.com blog: Dworkin the talk

The Sunday Telegraph’s Jenny McCartney* is latest conservative commentator to eulogise the far-from-conservative Andrea Dworkin. Other unexpected mourners include David Frum, Maggie Gallagher and the Daily Telegraph leader column. The outpouring of rightwing regard for the radical feminist has not gone unnoticed by Sarah Baxter, writing* in the Sunday Times:

“Derided for years by the right as the archetypal “feminazi” man-hater, the outsize, dungaree-clad writer went on to respect and befriend leading conservatives while becoming alienated from many left-wing champions of women’s rights.”

It seems that pornography was the crucial issue that led to Dworkin’s alienation from the conventional left and to her tentative dialogue with some conservatives. Dworkin never deviated from the old feminist line that “pornography is the theory, rape is the practice”. She was therefore appalled when liberals and leftists began to embrace pornography as an aspect of “sexual liberation”. Indeed, these days the anti-porn left is a lonely place – just ask Clare Short.

Why the transformation in attitudes? There are those like Camille Paglia who think that pornography “empowers” women. Then there are those who approach the matter with an attitude of “postmodern irony”. But the real reason, and some of the blighters will admit to this, is that they realised just how much they enjoyed it. And that is the key to mainstream, leftwing, secular morality – its utter lack of self-sacrifice: It is all about making demands of others, not one’s self.

There are some exceptions. For instance, deep environmentalism requires all sorts of sacrifices by its devotees. But like radical feminism, it is not of the mainstream left. Most liberals eat meat, after all.

Consumer boycotts barely count -- switching from Israeli to Spanish oranges is hardly heroic – and the purpose remains to pressure others, not to reform one’s self.

As for higher taxes, these are usually meant for those earning more than, er, well, more than whatever you happen to be earning yourself. Moreover, higher taxes mean more jobs and higher salaries for public sector workers (which covers a lot of leftwingers) -- or for those who work for the newspapers in which those jobs are advertised (which covers a lot of leftwing journalists).

Andrea Dworkin was a leftwinger that walked her talk. I’m not, of course, suggesting that she herself found pornography in anyway enticing – clearly she was viscerally repelled by it. Rather she was willing to promote a difficult and unpopular message, one which came at a cost to her own popularity and precisely on those issues where she was most vulnerable to personal attacks of the most vicious kind.

It must be said that conservatives dissent from much, indeed most, of her separatist feminism. Of course, that should not stop us from recognising her insights into the true nature of pornography and the costs of the sexual revolution. But further to that, and as opponents of the post-modern left, we should applaud the bravery of her commitment to what she believed to be the truth – and which, quite often, was.

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