Shaming the Shamers, Fearing the Perverts. The Political Emotions of Anti-genderism

This paper looks beyond the ideological claims made in the war on gender and explores its affective dimension. It examines specific examples of emotional work done by anti-gender discourse, i.e. its appeals to (and efforts to produce) shame, fear, disgust, indignation as well as love and hope. One theoretical inspiration for this re-framing is Stephen Duncombe’s insightful book Dream. Re-imagining Progressive Politics in an Age of Fantasy (2007). Its central claim is that in recent decades US conservatives have been able to tap into collective emotions far more effectively than progressives thanks to their capacity to „create reality”, rather than merely present it and argue about it. This pattern is more than evident in the aftermath of Donald Trump’s electoral victory; it also very visible in Europe today, as illiberal forces grow in country after country. It seems that reliance on empiricism and rational argumentation has been a costly miscalulation especially where gender politics are concerned. During the last decade the political, cultural and socials consequences of „public feelings” have been examined by a number of feminist and queer studies scholars (Sedgwick 2003; Ahmed 2004; Ngai 2007, Love 2009; Illouz 2012; Cvetkovich 2012). This paper draws inspiration from these works in a close reading of selected anti-gender texts (among others by Kuby, Peeters and Oko). How are readers of these texts and speeches interpelated as feeling subjects with an urgent political mission to perform? What sort of temporality is projected here? Are anti-gender feelings triggered by this discourse or does it feed on pre-existing political sentiments and merely re-directs them towards „genderism”? Last but not least: what might an an affect-based response to anti-genderism look like?