Radicalesbians – Women-Identified Women In “Women-Identified Women”, Radicalesbians argue for a sociopolitical profile of Women that is both perceptive in its immanent imaginings yet, as gender identity would become more complex in its development, not far-sighted enough. Originally published in 1970, this essay argues that heterosexual Women in the United States at the time (ostensible the model for All-Women-Everywhere) were constructed by the ruling class of Men as sociopolitical subjects/Selves through a hetero-patriarchal filter. In a binary-gendered society, that meant as wives, daughters, girlfriends, Women were (and remain) by default, second-class citizens without inherent rights and, importantly, agency. This left them to be considered viable only when they occupied the narrow sociopolitical parameters espoused by the ruling gender/sex-marked class (men/heterosexual). They were not individuals possessing inherent autonomy (and therefore a political voice) but rather identified (and subsequently rewarded or punished) by the most sovereign class: Men. …show more content…
They were not considered viable women by this rubric. Radicalesbians argue that this status not only reveals the hierarchy of gender and all-women’s subordination within it but call for it to be a for a potentially liberating resistance to heteronormative categorization and patriarchy in general. Freedom (albeit limited) can be won through declaring one’s Self as beyond the grasp of heteronormativity as a Lesbian, an act of naming that becomes a resistance and disruptive act of independence within a hetero/male regime. (This is not a complete liberation though, since although no longer beholden to its reward system, Lesbians as existing as citizens of a patriarchy can still be negatively affected by its reach of