Femen and feminism

What are Femen's aims, exactly? I'm rather confused about them. They don't seem very feminist to me, especially in their recent actions outside of mosques (suggesting Muslim women need to be "liberated"). Can anyone provide insight/opinions on them?

slytherin wrote:What are Femen's aims, exactly? I'm rather confused about them. They don't seem very feminist to me, especially in their recent actions outside of mosques (suggesting Muslim women need to be "liberated"). Can anyone provide insight/opinions on them?

I don't know i'm from the us and have never heard about the femens, but as far as Muslim women go i believe they at least deserve the option of separating from their religious dogmatism. they should be offered the education to an alternative lifestyle and decide freely if they want to stay or not.

The issue of Islam and women's rights is an interesting one. Not sure if I should address it here as maybe the veil and other such things could have a separate thread, being as it is a very complicated issue. (I'd be interested to see what people think about those things, being not sure myself).

FEMEN..... well, firstly I'm not sure about topless protesting on an ideological level (I get that publicity is the main reason). Obviously it is blatantly sexist that men can be exposed and not considered "naked", in a way that women can't. That is a societal norm that is not going to move easily.
I don't know much about them to be honest, I've had to do a little research. I can see a lot of "outrage" at their protest methods, but to be honest I don't see much point in a counter-hegemony protest that doesn't cause outrage. If you have the majority of the population onside then you can have a lovely walk down the street as a crowd, sing nice songs etc. But when you are counter-culture you have to approach it differently....

(From The Guardian newspaper)
The group, which is a strong supporter of the Russian female protest band Pussy Riot, now has chapters in France, Belgium, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, the US, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Tunisia. Femen's members describe themselves as "feminism's shock troops", and its raison d'etre is to protest against patriarchal individuals, organisations or institutions using their nakedness in what the group unashamedly describes as a militant fashion or "sextrism".
(Erm...... right....)

Also interesting article regarding other cultures, as you referred to:
(I can't actually post the link but search "femen racist colonial")

Femen positions women of the region as veiled and oppressed by their men as opposed to the enlightened and liberated women of the west who live in a developed and superior society where they have the "freedom" to remove their clothes.

The writer pretty much damns them as racist. I personally honestly don't know! But I am leaning towards siding with this writer...... it doesn't help women in cultures one knows little of to just verbally-bash and slander said culture, and apply one's norms to it. But then how do you address these issues?

Yeah I'm of the opinion that they're pretty terrible. Their topless protests are a good idea because of the ideas behind them, and I like the point you made about them needing to do something attention-grabbing to get attention as a counterhegemonic group, because it's absolutely true!

Their other stuff, like protesting outside of mosques and trying to "free oppressed women" who aren't even really oppressed and don't want Femen speaking for them is awful. Assuming you know someone's wants better than they do can easily give away to authoritarian impositions.

There are already prominent Muslim women scholars who speak about gender issues and many women in Islamic countries actually outperform men in school. I feel like Femen concentrates too much on the material (issues of dress) which leads to oversimplification. It's like they saw a movie where women were veiled and immediately decided to go protest without any further research. It is so much more complicated than that.