Lewd Women and Wicked Witches

A Study of the Dynamics of Male Domination

Marianne Hester

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2003
• ISBN:
  9781134911363
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Medicine
• Subtopic: Health Care Delivery

In the sixteenth century and seventeenth centuries it was women who were almost exclusively persecuted as witches. However, the witch craze has been subjected to surprisingly little feminist analysis. In Lewd Women and Wicked Witches, Marianne Hester reviews and develops revolutionary feminist thinking. Accordingly, she shows how witches can be seen as victims of the oppression of a male dominated society.
Concentrating on English source material, the author shows how witch-hunts may be seen as an historically specific example of male dominance. Relying on an eroticised construct of women's inferiority, they were part of the ongoing attempt by men to maintain their power over women.

Chapter 1

The introduction

The dynamics of male domination

In this book I set out to do two things. Firstly, to explore the specifically sexual, and dynamic, process whereby men have, and maintain, dominance over women. Secondly, in the light of this, to re-examine the early modern witch-hunts in England. I use what may be called a revolutionary feminist approach.

Men have, and maintain, power over women in many different ways and at many different levels: at work, in the home, through legislation, and so on. But the most crucial aspect of an explanation of women’s oppression and male dominance is the analysis of sexuality, because it is within the constructs of male and female sexualities that we may observe the central dynamic of male domination over women. In the context of male supremacy, male and female sexualities are constructed as specifically different and unequal. This has led MacKinnon, for instance, to argue that ‘male and female are created through the eroticization of submission and dominance’ (1987b:136). In other words, men’s power and women’s social inferiority are made ‘sexy’. The process of constructing women as erotic or ‘sexy’ objectifies them, positioning women as subordinate and men as dominant. We can see this process especially clearly within pornography, and it is acted out within heterosexual relations: where male sexuality objectifies the female object of desire, while female sexuality is objectified by the desired male subject. But this process is more generalised than even these examples suggest, it is integral to all male-female relations within male supremacy. Moreover, it is what makes male supremacy unique and especially enduring.

Male domination over women may be appear to be natural, but this is not the case. Men have to actively maintain and perpetuate their power over women. This takes place, as in the maintenance of any social order, by pressure to consent, including force, the threat of force and ideological pressures. But the system of male domination over women is uniquely different from other systems of power because it relies on the eroticisation of inequality between men and women, and enforces control of women by the use, as well as threat, of male sexual violence against women. Feminists have documented how male sexual violence has the effect of controlling women’s lives socially, and serves, furthermore, to construct men as more powerful than women.

The result is a system of male supremacy where sexuality and ‘personal relations’ are extremely crucial areas for acting out and maintaining male dominance, and where these unequal power relations between men and women are institutionalised in many different ways as well as reflected in social relations generally. Revolutionary feminist analysis presents the institution of heterosexuality as a linchpin of male dominance and control over women, because it is in heterosexual relations that men are able to ‘do power over’ women to the greatest effect (Leeds Revolutionary Feminist Group 1981). In particular, and at the present time, male sexuality is constructed so as to control women socially.

There has been a tendency amongst feminists and others to see the terms ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ as separate, sex denoting biologicallybased characteristics, with gender denoting the social characteristics of men and women (Oakley 1972; Archer and Lloyd 1982; Chetwynd and Hartnett 1978; Sharpe 1976). But this is too simplistic. In male-female relations it is the social meaning attached to biology which is important, rather than actual biological features, and sex is therefore gendered. In this sense sex and gender become interchangeable, which is how I shall use them here. In addition, the commonly perceived definition of ‘the sexual’ or ‘sexuality’ is that this is based on some innate drive or instinct, where heterosexuality especially is presented as the only or main form of sexual behaviour (see Oxford English Dictionary 1975; Segal 1987; Sayers 1982). But this is incorrect. Sexual behaviour is socially constructed, and I use these terms to denote particular social constructs and social relationships.

In the context of male supremacy, men and women experience male-female relations differently, but also generally as mediated via the dominant male view. It is therefore not only vital to examine women’s specific experience of male-female relations (that is sexual relations), but also to analyse women’s experience in the light of the dominant male constructs. In other words, to analyse and understand male supremacy we need to study men: their behaviour, sexuality, institutions, and so on, because that is where the power lies. For instance, when we examine male violence against women we have to look at men, that is, the perpetrators, if we are to understand comprehensively why men sexually violate women, and what to do to counter this (see Scully 1990).

Revolutionary feminist theory has been criticised (alongside radical feminism) of ‘ahistoricism’ because of the seeming longevity of male dominance suggested by this theoretical framework. For example, Lynne Segal in a recent book suggests that ‘The revolutionary feminist ascendancy at the close of the seventies… [reasserted] an ahistorical image of sexuality existing outside specific social contexts and relationships (Segal 1987:101). By applying revolutionary feminist theory to material from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries I will show that this criticism is not justified, and that the theoretical framework does by no means impose ‘ahistorical’ constraints. Certain features characteristic of the maledominated social order do seem to persist over time, but the actual expressions of these features are historically specific and subject to change. What is important is that, in terms of the material examined from both twentieth-century and early modern (sixteenthand seventeenth-century) England, the persistent features include masculinity and femininity as sexual constructs and the use of sexual violence as a means of social control by men over women, yet the form these take differs between the two periods. Indeed, it is partly because features such as masculinity and femininity are subject to change that male dominance as a social order is so enduring: the ideological constructs and material relations change as circumstances change so as to re-establish the male status quo.

I have chosen to focus on the early modern witch-hunts because of the apparent importance of this phenomenon to male-female relations during the early modern period. The witch-hunts entailed the prosecution, imprisonment and execution of thousands of people, almost exclusively women, in England alone. Not only were the vast majority of the accused women, but they tended to be a particular group of women: age, marital status, kin relation to other ‘witches’, economic status, liaison with the Devil, and sexual ‘deviance’ all being important factors. Reading accounts of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England I was struck by the enormity and importance of the witch-hunts as an obviously gendered phenomenon. I was also struck by the lack of interpretation of the witch-hunts in relation to gender, and the way writers have tended to treat these persecutions and many other contemporary social features, such as the changing economy, as entirely separate topics without making any attempts to link these (see Larner 1983; Trevor-Roper 1969). By examining some of the particularly important contextual areas which form the background to the witch-hunts, such as the period prior to the hunts, demographic, economic and ideological features of the actual witchhunt period, and also the decline of the persecutions, we can see that sixteenth-and seventeenth-century England was a period of great change, as well as deep-rooted gender inequality.

I show that there are important links between the witch-hunts, the changing circumstances, and male-female relations. By reference to the context of the witch-hunts it may be argued that the persecutions served as a means of social control of women at a time of great social change, and when men were actively pursuing the more lucrative and influential positions within the emerging capitalist economy. Indeed the witch-hunts may be seen as an instance of sexual violence against women, relying on sexual constructs of masculinity and especially femininity, and they constituted an important part of the dynamics of male domination in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England.

The subject matter of this book is closely associated with my own biography and development as a feminist: the problems explored have come about through my involvement with the Women’s Liberation Movement, and intimate knowledge of debates among, and activities carried out by, feminists since the early 1970s. Involvement with the Women’s Liberation Movement and feminist campaigns has, over a period of time, led to changes in my analysis of women’s oppression. During the 1970s I saw myself as a ‘socialist feminist’. In short, I thought that women’s oppression was primarily in the interest of capitalist social relations, or ‘economic’ social relations rather than men. The late 1970s may be seen as a ‘crisis point’ of socialist feminist analysis for many feminists, and I was no exception (see Segal 1987; Rowbotham et al. 1980). ‘New’ feminist concerns were becoming important, in particular, racial divisions between women and male violence. But socialist and Marxist feminist theories, based largely or ultimately on analysis of capitalist production, were unable to come up with adequate answers.

The issue of male violence against women, made increasingly public by feminist campaigns about domestic violence and rape, made the problems seemingly inherent in socialist and Marxist feminist theory more pertinent (see London Rape Crisis Centre 1984; Rhodes and McNeill 1985; National Women’s Aid Federation 1976). It was extremely difficult to provide an analysis of male violence against women within this framework without reliance on radical, and especially revolutionary, feminist theory (London Rape Action Group 1985; Hanmer 1978; Katyachild et al. 1985). Along with other feminists I found that these difficulties of applying socialist and Marxist feminist analysis were also compounded by the behaviour of men on the Far Left who were claiming to be allies of the Women’s Liberation Movement (see Chester 1979; Leonard 1982; Friedman and Sarah 1982: part II). In response to feminist criticism some men were changing their behaviour; but the outcome was often a more devious and hidden means of ensuring their continuing control and power in relation to women (however unconscious), rather than an undermining of male dominance (Leonard 1982; Hester 1984; Mitchell 1971; Rowbotham 1972). Others were directly hostile to the Women’s Liberation Movement, seeing feminist concerns as a ‘diversion’ from the ‘real struggle’ around economic class conflict (a situation exacerbated by the prospect of increasingly right-wing governments undermining workers’ rights, as exemplified by that of Margaret Thatcher) (Segal 1987:49–55).

I found that an analysis taking production as its starting point was inadequate for explaining these complex gender relations. Instead, a theoretical framework with a different set of priorities, that women’s oppression is primarily in the interest of men and expressed by an ideology that sees men as superior to women, seemed more appropriate. Within this framework women are oppressed by men as a group, rather than by the economic system or by society. This type of perspective has, since the beginning of the present Women’s Liberation Movement, been the stance of radical feminists generally (Firestone 1979; Millett 1970; Redstockings 1970; Morgan 1970). But while radical feminists in the United States were coming up with answers about male violence, in the late 1970s radical feminists were not very visible within the British Women’s Liberation Movement. Revolutionary feminism developed in this apparent vacuum.

Revolutionary feminist ideas were made visible at the 1977 Women’s Liberation Movement National Conference. The intention at this stage was not to create any new tendency within the Women’s Liberation Movement, but rather to reassert what Jeffreys (1977) calls ‘political feminism’, that is, the development of a radical theory and strategy to overcome male power. However, a distinct grouping did develop as increasing numbers of women expressed their support for the general call for a ‘revolutionary feminism’.

The influence of early radical (largely American) feminist writings can be seen in the revolutionary feminist papers and articles, including the ideas and discussions of Redstockings (1970), New York Radical Lesbians (1970), Shulamith Firestone (1979) and Kate Millett (1970). Also apparent in the early revolutionary feminist work is the influence of Marx and Engels’s work on conflictual class relations, and their claim that the first social division was that between the sexes due to the sexual division of human reproduction.1 Millett’s work, in particular, can be seen to outline the framework of theorising women’s oppression which the revolutionary feminist approach has adopted and developed further.

Radical and revolutionary feminist approaches overlap, but there are also differences. Both radical and revolutionary feminists take women’s experience as the starting point of their analyses. In distinction to some radical feminists, however, revolutionary feminists in addition problematise ‘men’ (Leeds Revolutionary Feminist Group 1981), while radical feminists tend to emphasise women’s experience and research on women, and are concerned, for example, with creating ‘women’s culture’ and even ‘women’s language’ (Daly 1979; Stanley and Wise 1983; Griffin 1984; Rich 1977; Chester 1979; Redstockings 1970; Henderson 1979). I think it is impossible to divorce women’s experience from the social context of life in a male-dominated society, with all that may entail, such as exploitation in the home and at work and sexual violence, without ending up with an unrealistic notion of female experience. It is crucial to study ‘men’, their writing, behaviour, sexuality, and other constructs. Thus while women’s experience forms an important basis for feminist analysis and theorising, it is not enough: theory also needs to take the (male) context of that experience into account.

An important focus for the development of revolutionary feminist theory during the 1980s has been the Patriarchy Study Group (see Coveney et al. 1984b). The group met over a number of years to develop theory concerning the nature of male supremacy or ‘patriarchy’. We found that there were a number of issues regarding male sexuality and women’s oppression which it was especially important to answer; including why are some men apparently ‘turned on’ sexually by urinating in women’s shoes? Or why do ‘some men visit prostitutes in order to eat their excreta from teaspoons?’ (ibid.: 13). Analysis of these rather horrifying and seemingly perverse activities, amongst many other issues, led us to realise that male sexuality, as it is currently constructed, is about power. We decided that male sexuality often appears to be perverse because it is perverse. In other words, it is about constructing men as powerful in relation to women (and about constructing some men as powerful in relation to other men), that is, about inequality rather than equality. We concluded that male sexuality is constructed so as to control women socially, acted out in heterosexual relationships as well as in rape, pornography and other forms of male sexual violence against women.

This book documents the construction of sexuality for the social control of women and the empowering of men both today and in the early modern period, examining male sexual violence and heterosexual relations in order to do so, and I begin by discussing some of the important issues raised by Marxist and socialist feminist analyses of male domination.

Chapter 2

From men partially to men primarily responsible for women’s oppression

With the re-emergence of the Women’s Liberation Movement in the late 1960s, Marxists were thought by some to be in a unique position to develop an analysis of women’s oppression. Already the Marxist analysis of capitalist production incorporated the notion of exploitation and inequality at its centre and it was presumed that it could also be extended to analyse the specific, and oppressed, position of women. Marx had explained by his ‘labour theory of value’ that the central oppression under capitalism constitutes the exploitation of the working class for profit, and Marxists set out to study the subordinate position of women by linking it to this apparently central economic oppression. The ‘domestic labour debate’¹ was an early outcome of this, and centred on the extent of the contribution by women’s domestic labour to the overall value of (male) labour power in the capitalist sphere (Benston 1969; Seccombe 1974; Coulson et al. 1975; Gardiner 1975; Harrison 1973; Smith 1978). Other approaches, focusing to a slightly greater extent on male-female relations, included the ‘dual labour market thesis’ (Barron and Norris 1976) and ‘women as a reserve army of labour’ (Beechey 1977; Bruegel 1979; Braverman 1974). Both positions argue that women’s subordinate role in the domestic sphere places women in a subordinate position within the capitalist sphere, with less pay and security than men, and that this operates to the advantage of capital. An attempt was also made to overcome the economic reductionism of these approaches by theorising patriarchy at the level of ideology, that is, to see patriarchy as part of the reproduction of ideas separate from the capitalist sphere (Mitchell 1975).

By the late 1970s, however, socialist and Marxist feminist theory appeared increasingly inadequate for dealing with crucial questions of the day, questions such as racial divisions between women and male violence and, underlying these, the nature of ‘patriarchy’ (Kantor 1984). The Marxist work was being criticised by socialist feminists as ‘sex blind’ because Marxism had great difficulty explaining gender divisions specifically (Hartmann 1979; Barrett 1984). As Michele Barrett explains:

Marxism, constituted as it is around relations of appropriation and exploitation, is grounded in concepts that do not and could not address directly the gender of the exploiters and those whose labour is appropriated.

(Barrett 1984:8)

The socialist feminist response to the problems raised by these approaches intended to link feminist analysis, that is analysis ‘emphasizing precisely the relations of gender’ (Barrett 1984:8), with Marxist theory. The result has been a variety of ‘dual systems’ approaches.² ‘Dual systems’ usually connotes the two systems of capitalism and patriarchy, or capitalism and reproduction; and it is the way in which these systems relate, or interrelate, which has been discussed at length.³ Attempts have been made to ‘marry’ the somewhat ‘unhappy partners’ of capitalism and patriarchy so as to develop a theory which takes into account both capitalist and gender relations. This approach is exemplified by the work of Zillah Eisenstein (1979) and Heidi Hartmann (1981); and in different ways also by Christine Delphy (1977, 1980), Cynthia Cockburn (1983) and Sylvia Walby (1986). Another direction has been to extend the work which posits patriarchy as ideology or ‘discourse’. This is exemplified by the work of Chris Weedon (1987). In this chapter I will discuss the dual systems approaches of Eisenstein, Hartmann and Walby, and the post-structuralist approach of Weedon to examine the issues and problems that they raise with regard to the maintenance and perpetuation of male domination.

DUAL SYSTEMS

Both Eisenstein and Hartmann argue that it is the sociallyconstructed relations between men and women, or patriarchal relations, which are specificallly oppressive to women. Yet in their eagerness to ‘marry’ the systems of capitalism and patriarchy Eisenstein, and Hartmann to a lesser extent, obscure this crucial oppressive relationship for women. Instead they see capitalist relations as more important than, and also separate from, malefemale relations—hence ‘capitalist patriarchy’ (Eisenstein) and ‘patriarchal capitalism’ (Hartmann). But, if patriarchy existed before capitalism, and continues in post-capitalist societies, as Eisenstein and Hartmann both suggest, then patriarchy appears to be much more persistent than any economic mode of production, also adaptable and probably dynamic. I want to examine how Eisenstein and Hartmann, in their respective approaches, deal with this problem.

For Eisenstein ‘capitalist patriarchy’ is the contemporary interrelationship between patriarchy and capitalism. Patriarchy takes the form of a male hierarchical ordering of society, which derives from ideological interpretations of biological differences between men and women, in particular women’s capacity to be mothers. It provides the sexual hierarchical ordering of society while capitalism in turn feeds off this hierarchy. She suggests that the relationship between the two systems may not be altogether smooth, although the unequal gender relations remain in both because of the sexual division of labour which cuts across them.

Eisenstein’s analysis incorporates the notion of historical change, and also how male dominance may be maintained over time. She describes how, as patriarchal control in the privatised family diminishes (as has happened historically), the same sexual hierarchy is in turn transferred to capitalist relations such that male dominance is maintained:

As women increasingly enter the labour force, some of the control of patriarchal familial relations seems to be undermined. This is compensated for such that…the ghettoisation of women within the labour force at the same time maintains a system of hierarchical control of women both sexually and economically, which leaves the sexual hierarchy of the society intact

(Eisenstein 1979:28)

None the less, she argues, women’s oppression may be overcome. The stage where this will take place is the productive sphere because the point for transformation of both capitalism and patriarchy is the sexual hierarchy of society (as sexual division of labour). For Eisenstein the increasing entry of women into paid employment will thus play a major role in enabling women’s oppression to be overcome, and in this sense her approach is similar to some of the earlier Marxist feminist work.

Yet Eisenstein’s analysis is also ambiguous. On the one hand she is suggesting that capitalism and patriarchy are intertwined into one system—capitalist patriarchy—while she is also suggesting that battle has to be done against both ca...