Personally I’d say you shouldn’t “be a feminist” at all. Have goals (whether relating to women’s rights or anything else) and try to find the best ways to reach them. Don’t put a political label on yourself that will constrain your thinking and/or be socially and emotionally costly to change. Though given that you seem to have invested a lot of your identity in feminism it’s probably already hard to change.
Yes, there are obvious advantages to overtly identifying with some established group, but if you identify too strongly and become a capital-F Feminist (or a capital D-Democrat, or even a capital-R Rationalist) there’s a real danger that conforming to the label will get in the way of actually achieving your original goals.
It’s analogous to the idea that you shouldn’t use dark side methods in the service of rationality—ie that you shouldn’t place too much trust in your own ability to be virtuously hypocritical.
Personally I’d say you shouldn’t “be a feminist” at all. Have goals (whether relating to women’s rights or anything else) and try to find the best ways to reach them. Don’t put a political label on yourself that will constrain your thinking and/or be socially and emotionally costly to change. Though given that you seem to have invested a lot of your identity in feminism it’s probably already hard to change.
Shouldn’t? According to which utility function? There are plenty of advantages to taking a label.
Yes, there are obvious advantages to overtly identifying with some established group, but if you identify too strongly and become a capital-F Feminist (or a capital D-Democrat, or even a capital-R Rationalist) there’s a real danger that conforming to the label will get in the way of actually achieving your original goals.
It’s analogous to the idea that you shouldn’t use dark side methods in the service of rationality—ie that you shouldn’t place too much trust in your own ability to be virtuously hypocritical.
Advantages to outwardly signalling group loyalty, perhaps, but to internal self-identification?
As mentioned above, this particular person does seem unusually good at not being so constrained.