Why Radical Feminists Need to Approach Women with Compassion and Understanding
In feminist spaces, especially radical feminist ones, the focus often centers on resisting patriarchal systems, reclaiming women's autonomy, and advocating for justice. And within our communities, there are many women whose lives have been profoundly shaped by trauma, mental health challenges, and struggles with personality disorders. They are survivors, fighters, and complex individuals whose experiences deserve compassion and understanding.
Itâs crucial to remember that trauma whether from abuse, neglect, or systemic oppression can deeply affect a personâs emotional world and how they relate to themselves and others. Many women carry scars that are invisible but real. Their coping mechanisms, even if difficult or misunderstood, often arose as ways to survive environments that were unsafe or invalidating. For instance, traits linked to Cluster B personality disorders may reflect intense efforts to protect themselves from further harm, navigate chaotic relationships, or assert control when life felt uncontrollable.
Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD) â Often linked to histories of abuse or neglect, ASPD in women can reflect survival strategies formed in response to emotional disruption, leading to impulsivity and difficulty with empathy.
Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) â Strongly associated with childhood trauma and abandonment, BPD involves intense emotional dysregulation, fears of rejection, and unstable relationships. Itâs a manifestation of traumaâs impact on emotional processing.
Histrionic Personality Disorder (HPD) â This can emerge from disrupted attachment and low self-esteem, where attention-seeking and emotional exaggeration become ways to gain validation and safety.
Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) â Sometimes rooted in trauma-induced shame and worthlessness, NPD may appear as grandiosity and a need for admiration, masking deep insecurity and vulnerability.
Radical feminism, at its core, is about dismantling oppressive systems and building spaces where women can heal, grow, and thrive. This mission is incomplete if it excludes empathy for women struggling with these challenges. Understanding that these women are not adversaries but part of the broader sisterhood helps us foster solidarity rather than division. Itâs not about excusing harmful behaviors but about recognizing the root causes and offering support that uplifts rather than isolates.
When radical feminists engage with women who have experienced trauma or have complex emotional needs, itâs important to:
Listen without judgment: Hear their stories with an open heart, acknowledging the pain behind their actions or struggles.
Challenge stigma: Work actively to reduce the shame around mental health and personality struggles within feminist spaces.
Create inclusive communities: Make space for diverse experiences, knowing that healing looks different for everyone.
In doing so, radical feminism lives up to its promise not just as a movement against patriarchy but as a force for genuine liberation and healing for all women. Itâs a call to meet each other with compassion, understanding that the road to freedom is often messy and difficult, especially for those carrying heavy burdens.
Women used to be lobotomized, institutionalized, or otherwise silenced for simply acting âout of line.â Today, public shaming and stigma around Cluster B personality disorders(any mental illness let's be honest here) do a great disservice to modern women. These disorders often stem from trauma and are expressions of deep emotional pain and survival mechanisms.
Honestly, this is exactly why Iâm so against using terms like psychosis, moron, or retard as insults in radical feminist spaces. These words arenât just casual slurs, they describe real, often painful experiences that many women endure, especially those who have been abused or marginalized because of mental disabilities. Using these terms as insults only perpetuates stigma and harms the very people feminism should be protecting and uplifting. We need to be mindful and respectful with our language if we want our spaces to be truly inclusive and supportive.
Honestly? Iâm so over it. Thereâs a real issue in this space with certain cliques mocking and belittling neurodivergent and disabled women, women who are just trying to survive, often in conditions most people couldnât handle for a day.
Radical feminism means nothing if it forgets the disabled, the mentally ill, the traumatized, the misdiagnosed, the misunderstood. These women arenât "too much" or "hard to deal with" theyâre survivors of systems that broke them and still blame them for being broken.
If your feminism makes fun of women with developmental disorders, who dissociate, who struggle with regulation, who are in pain youâre not radical. Youâre just another bully in a different costume calling yourself an ally!
Radfems, if this sounds like you and you're thinking, âOh shit, I think Iâve done thatâ⊠good. That means youâre paying attention.
You messed up. Thatâs okay. We all do. None of us are immune to propaganda or the culture we were raised in. Consider this your wake-up call to step up and be a better ally to neurodivergent and disabled women.
Iâm not perfect either. Sometimes it all gets to be too much, and I snap. Iâve handled situations poorly. Iâve said the wrong thing. We are human. I donât expect you to be the perfect ally, but I do expect you to learn, reflect, and own your mistakes.
Thatâs all I can ask for. Thatâs how we grow. Thatâs how we build something better together.
Why Words Like âRetard,â âMoron,â and âPsychosisâ Are Not Just Insults, Theyâre Weapons Against Vulnerable Women
When you use words like retard, moron, or psychosis as insults, youâre not just being edgy or venting frustration. Youâre reinforcing centuries of abuse, dehumanization, and systemic violence especially toward women.
These terms werenât born in playgrounds. They come from institutions where women were locked away, sterilized, experimented on, and erased for being âtoo emotional,â âtoo slow,â âtoo difficult,â or simply âtoo much.â Women who were neurodivergent, developmentally disabled, traumatized, or mentally ill were institutionalized for life. Labeled. Humiliated. Forgotten.
âRetardâ was a medical term weaponized to justify the abuse of people with developmental disabilities many of whom were women and girls locked up without consent, often subjected to forced sterilization.
âMoronâ was a term used by eugenicists to classify âfeeblemindedâ people, a category disproportionately applied to poor, disabled, and neurodivergent women.
âPsychosisâ is a real and terrifying condition that many women experience in silence due to trauma, postpartum disorders, schizophrenia, or bipolar episodes. Using it as a slur erases their reality and paints them as monsters instead of human beings in pain.
Other Harmful Terms That Hurt Mentally Ill and Neurodivergent Women:
âŠarenât just casual insults. These words were (and still are) used to dismiss, shame, and institutionalize women. They were used against women for expressing anger, having trauma responses, resisting abuse, or simply for being inconvenient to men.
When a woman dissociates, cries, self-harms, spirals, or reacts out of fear we call her psycho. When sheâs loud, upset, erratic from PTSD or bipolar, we call her unhinged. When she breaks down after years of trauma and lashes out we call her crazy.
Even today, women with postpartum depression are being labeled dangerous instead of treated. Transmen,nonbianry afabs, autistic women, and women with BPD are being harassed and laughed at for symptoms they cannot control. Itâs disgusting.
You donât know what someone has survived. You donât know what diagnosis sheâs hiding in fear. You donât know who got called âcrazyâ by an abuser so no one would believe her.
So be careful. Be kind. Be radical enough to resist the lazy slur, and think instead about who itâs really hurting.
And I want to say this clearly: If youâve used words like psycho, crazy, retard, unhinged, or insane to insult or belittle a woman especially a woman who was difficult, emotional, or struggling you messed up.
That doesnât make you evil. It makes you human. Weâre all shaped by a world that teaches us to mock what we donât understand. But now that you do understand, you have a choice: be better.
Own it. Admit you slipped. Apologize, not just out loud, but in action in how you speak, in how you think, and in how you show up for the women who are too often abandoned because theyâre âtoo much.â
Difficult women are usually women in pain. And if feminism isnât here to protect them, then who is?
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