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Jonella Orozco
PHIL 155
11/12/2014
Ecofeminism: What It Is and How It Is a Model For Understanding and Resolving Modern
Environmental Issues
Peter Singer famously states in his essay All Animals Are Equal that the nonhuman (animal)
liberation movement stems from previous human liberation movements: that of blacks, SpanishAmericans, homosexuals, and other minorities (Singer). The obvious problem with these movements is
that they have had limited success throughout that last few decades. For example, racism in America
continues to be a persistent issue. In very recent years- and in the past few months- we have been
witnesses to the slow but continued acceptance of gay marriage in the United States. More
opportunities have been awarded to minorities, especially to the bright Spanish-American youth of this
country, but they somehow are not seen as equal and/or integrated into our society. How is it, then, that
we can say we must base the solution to our ecological problems on these human liberation
movements? It is my strong belief that we must compare our modern environmental issues of, for
example, the increasing global climate, the oppression of animals, and the destruction of the
atmospheric, terrestrial, and aquatic environments to the more obvious issue present in America that
of the oppression and subordination of women. This nontraditional philosophical concept is commonly
referred to as ecofeminism.
The ultimate belief of ecofeminism is that the goal for the women's movement in America and
the environmental movement are mutually reinforcing (Warren, et al). Many feminist beliefs have risen
in popularity today because of the visibility of the struggles that women are being subjected to, which
are all caused by many factors. In home life, some women are still expected to be told what to do by
the man of the household. They are expected to clean and cook and raise children. Even though there

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has been an unprecedented increase in women joining the workforce, statistics prove that women still
do more housework than their spouses (Cosslett). In the workforce, women are now able to hold higher
and more prestigious positions, but are still subjected to accepting lower pay than that of her male
counterpart. Also in the workforce, women are often manipulated and taken advantage of due to
unsupported beliefs that they are not as qualified as males in some way or another. In the media,
women are often sexualized and degraded just because of the obvious physical differences between
males and females. In politics, women are seen by men as not suitable for political jobs because of the
belief that women are not as intelligent and not as able to hold stressful, emotionally and mentally
taxing jobs. This brings me to my argument that our modern environmental issues are indeed feminist
issues. This is because, as Rosemary Ruether states, ...there can be no liberation for [women] and no
solution to the ecological crisis within a society whose fundamental model of relationships [is one of]
domination. For the remainder of my essay, I will compare these feminist issues to prevalent and
increasing ecological issues; I will introduce two separate and influential articles to support my claims;
and I will conclude by demonstrating how these ecological issues can and must be solved using
feminist ideologies.
An interesting concept that many ecofeminists believe in is the idea that environmental and
feminist issues can be solved through a mutual regard for one another. In other words, feminist should
relate to the femininity of the Earth in order to reverse the ecological crisis we are in, while
environmentalists should relate to feminists in order to break down the oppressive boundaries that all
women face. Modern feminists should be looking at the Earth and questioning why we refer to nature
as Mother Nature - a woman. This is an obvious reference to the dominion that man believes he has
over nature. This belief is defined by the anthropocentric views that Lynn White defines in his article
The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis. Man believes that he has dominion over nature and is
separate from it because of Christian arrogance towards nature (White). According to Christian

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ideology, the Bible states that man was given nature and all other life on nature plants and animals
for his benefit. Popular Christian belief also shows that man and only man was made in God's image.
This leads to the anthropocentric view that humans and only humans have moral standing and matter
simply because we are humans. What I find really interesting about these anthropocentric and humanover-nature beliefs is that it can be seen as a direct stab towards women and women's rights. For
example, Christian belief also places woman, in this case Eve, as being, not a separate and equal
individual, but arising from the rib of Adam as if Adam also has dominion over her (she was created for
him because he was lonely). As opposed to White's belief that the solutions of our current ecological
crisis must also be based on religious beliefs, I believe that we must base our solutions on feminist
ideals. The idea that man has dominion over nature stems from this biblical and historical idea that man
also has dominion over woman. But just like these environmental ethics have many different offshoots
and classifications, so does ecofeminism.
Ecofeminism is not and should not be defined by one single belief. This is exactly the case with
modern feminism. For example, there are liberal feminists, Marxist feminists, and radical feminists, to
name a few. If ecofeminism was defined by a single belief, then it would be the easiest ethic to refute.
What many people don't realize is that ecofeminism actually has many facets that are supported by
many connections, as described by the feminist philosopher Karen J. Warren. Consequentially,
ecofeminism can also be used to refute, as I have done with Singer and White's arguments, many
environmental ethic perspectives. I will first define three different ecofeminism perspectives those
parallel to liberal, Marxist, and radical feminism as well as provide definitions to Warren's
connections and how they relate to and refute other environmental ethics perspectives in my next few
paragraphs.
First of all, liberal feminism is defined as all autonomous individuals of any gender having
freedom to pursue their own interests (Warren, et al). This definition creates an understood equality

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between all men and women. Men can pursue their interests independently of women pursuing their
own interests. In order to create an ecofeminist perspective from liberal feminism, one would have to
define ecofeminism as a belief that nonhuman beings have moral standing simply because they have
interests whether that is an interest to eat, to sleep, or to live. This unfortunately excludes beings that
do not have interests, meaning that plants are not considered as equals. Therefore, I would have to
determine that this ecofeminist perspective is partially helpful in raising environmental awareness and
also inadequate for solving all of our modern environmental issues. This is because I believe that all
nonhuman nature (including plants!) should not be thought of as human property just as man believes
he has some sort of domination over women.
Second, Marxist feminism is represented as a belief that women's oppression stems from class
oppression. This signifies that women are only of value instrumentally as opposed to being of value in
their own right, for their own sake, and per their own personal decisions. In relation to environmental
issues, nature and animals are seen, through a Marxist view, as having instrumental value. In other
words, the environment as a whole exists to create economic goods for human needs (Warren, et al).
Therefore, nature only has value in the sense that it is valuable to humans. In my personal opinion,
Marxist feminism should not be applied to ecofeminist ethics because it accepts the divide between
humans and nonhumans, whereas I believe, as I have said, that this divide should not exist.
A more acceptable but still inadequate environmental ethics perspective for me would be the
one that incorporates radical feminism. It is defined by the belief that gender inequality originates from
reproductive biology and sex-gender systems (Warren, et al). This is to say that, in uncommon feminist
terms, men believe they have domination over women because of the power that the male physique
symbolizes. Men are seen as the stronger gender due to their biology the higher level of testosterone
found in males allows them to naturally have a larger and strong physique. The other view of radical
feminism is brought on by notion that women were biologically engineered to bear children and to

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satisfy male sexual desires. The ecological perspective of this is not adequate because it places women
closer to nature than men. As a side note, this is definitive of the incorrect belief that feminism, in
general, was generated to gain more rights for women. The negative connotation of this is that men will
have less rights than women. This is absolutely untrue. The goal of feminism is to create equality
between both genders to raise the bar of rights for women to the exact same level where the bar of
rights for men lies. Therefore, the ecological view of radical feminism is not adequate, to me, because
equality is not present. Consequentially, the domination of women and the domination of nature will
still be present according to this view.
In continuation, I will argue how the different connections present in ecofeminism, as defined
by Karen J. Warren, outline exactly what is wrong with the traditional consequential and
nonconsequential views of environmental ethics. In order to present these historical, experiential,
symbolic, and theoretical connections, I must first add that subordination over nature is justified by a
conviction that women, in comparison to nature, are below men because they, nature and women, are
no longer associated to the human world, which is believed to be superior (Warren 6). These
connections will be useful in establishing my argument that the values found in feminism are essential
to solving major environmental issues.
Historical feminist issues are present in our modern environment in that ecological issues are
very much tied to women's oppression. For example, Warren cites in her paper that in India, the
introduction of the eucalyptus tree became a feminist issues because the loss of native trees caused an
inability for Indian women to continue their subsistence farming practices. I find this piece of
information incredibly sufficient for a historical feminist debate because it presents a damaging of
nature and women's lives as a result of local environmental destruction.
At an experiential level, I can further refute Singer's argument that the animal liberation
movement can be seen as a completely separate entity. He somewhat compares it to previous liberation

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movements. But, it simply makes more sense to relate feminism to our current ecological crisis because
this view will, in turn, cause a revolution against all forms of oppression (Warren 8). With the amount
of women alive in this world, we should be able to combat this form of oppression as well as
oppressions that lie beneath the surface women who are also lesbians, women who are handicapped,
women who are minorities, etcetera. From my own experience, I also believe that factory farming,
meat eating, and hunting arise from the the experiential connection between women and nature.
Dominion over women indicates, in ecological terms, a domination over all forms of natural life. I have
seen undercover animal rights videos in which male workers cause harm to the animals just for not
cooperating with the process of slaughter.
In terms of feminist symbols, I highly praise literature and art for allowing liberating views for
women and nature into popular American culture. Quite the opposite, I could argue that language, and,
consequentially, literature is to blame for creating terms that degrade both women and nature. For
example, the social construct of calling nature Mother Nature completely baffles me. On one hand,
Mother Nature sounds like nature is a motherly figure and can take us into her embrace and care for
us humans. On the other hand, who ever said that nature is a female? And why has that become a
reason to claim her as belonging to man in order for him to treat her as inferior? Additionally, natural
terms to describe women (foxes, serpents, bitches, and cats) as well as feminine terms to
describe nature (virgin timber, fertile soil, and land that is fallow and barren) as described by
Warren et al are, I believe, at the root of why man has come to believe that he has power over the Earth.
Finally, traditional consequentialist and nonconsequentialist environmental ethics can be refuted
can be discredited using any of the previous women-nature connections. This is because the goal is to
create an ethic that is not either male- or female-biased. This statement in and of itself refutes all
modern ethical views towards the environment because they are anthropocentric (human-centered) or
androcentric (male-centered). In his article, Baxter promotes optimal pollution by saying that humans

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and only humans matter simply because we are humans (Baxter). His view is not only anthropocentric,
it is also androcentric. That is to say that androcentrism is a consequence of anthropocentrism, and vice
versa they end up being a direct charge against feminism. As a contrast to Singer's consequentialist
views, philospher Tom Regan's nonconsequalist rights-based views can be refuted by noticing the
divide that has been place between nonhuman animals and human animals.
I believe we indeed all have rights to life, but unlike Regan, I do not believe that it is because
they have a separate right to life as experiencing subjects of a life. I believe that we must accept all the
positions that feminist ideals present and allow them to guide us towards a better environment in all
aspects of the term. The common values that an ecofeminist ethic represents would return. Those that
have been valued as unimportant in traditional environmental ethics such as friendship, happiness and a
genuine un-gendered community. I firmly believe that we all must reject traditional environmental
ethics and follow the nontraditional principles of feminism in order to stop and reverse the ecological
damage present in our modern world.

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Works Cited
Baxter, William. "The Case for Optimal Pollution." (n.d.): n. pag. Web.
<http://hettingern.people.cofc.edu/Env_Ethics_Sp_2012/Baxter_Case_for_
Optimal_Pollution.pdf>.
Cosslett, Rhiannon L., and Holly Baxter. "The Five Main Issues Facing Modern Feminism." New
Statesman. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Nov. 2014. <http://www.newstatesman.com/v-spot/2013/05/fivemain-issues-facing-modern-feminism>.
Singer, Peter. All Animals Are Equal. N.p.: B. Shiplee, 2001. Web.
Warren, Karen J, Et Al. "Introduction to Ecofeminism." Newsletter on Feminism and Philisophy
(1991): n. pag. Introduction to Ecofeminism. American Philosophical Association. Web.
<http://environmental.lilithezine.com/Introduction-to-Ecofeminism.html>.
Warren, Karen J. "The Power and Promise of Ecological Feminism." College of Charleston Libraries.
Environmental Ethics, Summer 1990. Web.
White, Lynn, Jr. "The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis." N.p., n.d. Web.
<http://www.zbi.ee/~kalevi/lwhite.htm>.