To begin this article it is necessary to go back to basics. What is feminism and who is it for?

Feminism is a centuries old political movement dedicated to liberating women from male supremacy. It is, at its heart, a political analysis: a way of understanding the world and its workings. It studies our traditional power structures and asks how we might organise ourselves differently as humans in such a way as to free females from the systemic exploitation and oppression of males. It is a political movement — the only political movement — forged exclusively by and for women, and necessarily so. For a less powerful group to try to effect change by relying on the support of those whose power and privilege are upheld by their subordination might be unwise, after all.

Yet never have I seen a movements clear aims and principles so muddied by misunderstanding and deliberate obfuscation. Lines are redrawn and boundaries constantly shift because feminism in its raw, unadulterated state is so deeply threatening, not just to our patriarchal system but to every aspect of a profit driven society. Our world runs off the back of women’s exploited and unpaid labour. It is women who produce the new workers, who do the vast majority of work in the home so that existing workers may be as productive as possible, and who care for the ones who are old and can work no longer. And so the movement that advocates for our liberation is attacked, co-opted, and flipped upside down at every opportunity because the prospect of its success is just too terrifying.

It is in this context that we have men such as the recently deceased Hugh Hefner being lauded as a feminist, and many of his supporters stating with straight face that their feminism is all about women dressed as rabbits being locked in mansions, because they believe in choice. Who might once have imagined that an individual who, during his lifetime amassed vast amounts of wealth and power from the depiction of women as little more than sexual toys for men, would come to be seen as advocating for the liberation of women from male supremacy?

In any other movement this kind of co-optation would be unacceptable; laughable even. Let’s take as an example socialism: if I was to claim that my socialism was all about the rabid accumulation of personal wealth at the expense of others, and that as a boss who paid my workers little and subjected them to terrible working conditions I considered myself a good advocate for the working classes, people might feel free to tell me that I was not, in fact, a socialist. By the same token feminism has its own parameters. Crucially, it understands that choices are not made in a vacuum, but within a system in which men as a class wield structural, physical, and social power over women as a class. It is not a label that you can simply attach onto the end of any idea and see it instantly transformed into its ideological opposite.

It is 2017 and in our supposedly progressive society we have women being physically attacked, first in Hyde Park, then more recently at the London Anarchist Book Fair, for their views on gender. Women who hold the traditional (and not particularly radical) feminist belief that gender is a social construct used as a tool to reinforce male supremacy, rather than an innate identity which both trumps and dictates ones biological sex, are being assaulted and verbally abused in both public and online spaces by human beings born with male chromosomes and male reproductive systems, who have been coded and socialised male by society, but who say they are women — and not only women, but the most vulnerable and oppressed women of all.

In this way, biological women attempting to advocate for the rights of women oppressed on the basis of that biology are recast as the ultimate anti-feminists, the true misogynists, the perpetrators of femicide. And the ones who shout, “Ugly TERF cunt” at them, who intimidate and punch them, and who destroy their political literature, get to reframe themselves as the real feminist activists, the true revolutionaries, and claim the women’s movement as their own. This slur, “ugly cunt,” which might once have been understood as the epitome of woman hatred, now becomes brave and authentic feminist speech; the woman defending herself against it, the oppressor.

In George Orwell’s classic dystopian novel, 1984, we are introduced to the concept of Doublethink, which describes the ability to hold two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously and accept them both as true. Hefner believed he could keep women in his mansion like animals in a petting zoo, and yet still be an advocate for women’s liberation. Transactivists believe they can perpetrate violence against women, call us ugly cunts, and shut down our political organising, yet be beacons of feminist progress.

Towards the end of 1984, the hero, Winston, is being interrogated by O’Brien, a secret member of the ruling party. O’Brien holds up four fingers, yet insists he is holding up five. Winston knows he can count, he knows there are four. O’Brien says to him:

“You are a slow learner, Winston.”

“How can I help it? How can I help but see what is in front of my eyes? Two and two are four.”

“Sometimes, Winston. Sometimes they are five. Sometimes they are three. Sometimes they are all of them at once. You must try harder. It is not easy to become sane.”

Women can count. We have the right to discuss our rights, and to hold on to what we know to be true. We know what oppression looks like. We know what it feels like. So by all means stick to your view that Hefner was a stand up guy who loved women, or that it’s perfectly acceptable to punch women who won’t submit to your ideology in the face. Just don’t call it feminism. Because it isn’t.