Women's Day 2012 rant. Why am not a Humanist.

There have always been questions about why Feminists are not Humanists and why we do not want better lives for everyone, man, woman and child, regardless of gender. The question why we tend to characterize everything according to gender and find a woman centric bias everywhere rather than considering it as a human centric issue.

Humanism can best be defined as ‘a democratic and ethical life stance, which affirms that human beings have the right and responsibility to give meaning and shape to their own lives. It stands for the building of a more humane society through an ethic based on human and other natural values in the spirit of reason and free inquiry through human capabilities. It is not theistic, and it does not accept supernatural views of reality.’

I would like to point out some things at this instance.

1. Democracy, ethics, rationalism and the definitions of right and wrong in modern society have evolved through patriarchal mechanisms. When you think of justice, you think masculine. When you think of logic and rationalism, you don’t see a woman, you think of a man deep in thought. Debates, arguments and discussions are so structured as to make sure dominance plays a major factor, not equality of merit.
2. Humanism is not an umbrella word for ‘Feminist+LGBT supporter+concerned with class disparity’. In that case, whom are you fighting for? Everyone has his or her reasons and their excuses.  It is a blind spot. Where do you stand when it comes to transgender marginalization and prostitution? Or incest? What are your philosophies on that? Being a Humanist, you need to process these thoughts at a cortex level using the UN Human Rights as a benchmark and not along the post-conventional moral paradigm as postulated by the Humanistic philosophy.
3. Consider the universal set with many parameters interacting with each other. Each of these, while producing their own final expressions, makes sure of one thing. Woman comes after man. White, black, brown, rich, poor, upper caste, lower caste, Hindu, Muslim, Christian, whatever be. The woman withstands the worst of every cruelty heaped on her community. By empowering a woman, you empower the whole community.
4.  Humanism in itself is extremely imperialistic. We are asked to follow a Western world view which does not acknowledge the human diversity, to analyse in a cost-benefit manner and to use a just world hypothesis to introduce a paternalistic hierarchy with whom the West sees as less fortunate.
5. Feminism brings people together. In every region, religion and culture, the sectionalities interact and give a nuanced view of what the least privileged woman is going through. When we get that woman out of the trench, it means that we have successfully tackled every single issue in that community.

So, in effect, we are asked to follow essentially the same norms, rules and regulations evolved over millennia, which form this seamless patriarchal fabric with the only exception that we now deliberately use the masculine rigidity of our ‘free inquiry’. Ironic!

And this is why, I am not a Humanist. I am a Feminist. I am a Feminist first, second and last.