Feminazi
Feminazi is a pejorative term used to describe any feminist who is intolerant of points of view that challenge militant feminism. It was introduced to a mainstream audience by conservative talk radio host Rush Limbaugh, who credits his friend Tom Hazlett (a professor of economics at the University of California, Davis) with coining the term. It is a neologism, a portmanteau of the words feminist and Nazi.
According to Limbaugh, "a feminazi is a woman to whom the most important thing in life is seeing to it that as many abortions as possible are performed" (source: The Way Things Ought To Be, Rush Limbaugh, p. 192–93, July 2, 1992). Limbaugh also uses the "feminazi" term during discussions of feminist actions or attitudes not specifically related to abortion. According to Limbaugh, the term denotes a woman who makes radical feminism her lifestyle; it is not a term to be applied to feminists in general, but is rather a title to be earned through extremely excessive activism.
Others use the term more loosely than Limbaugh, referring to one or more feminists, drawing an allusion between them and the Nazis, often with varying definitions and explanations of the feminazi term. The term seems to be often used to refer to "militant" feminists, using the "nazi" portion of the term to draw an analogy with totalitarianism in general rather than the Nazi party per se.
The use of the term is often seen a form of ad hominem attack; especially when the term is used more loosely, it can also be seen as ironic or cruel. It can also be seen as a display of ignorance of what historically a Nazi was; Hitler's National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) strongly opposed feminism and advocated the singular role of the woman as a "breeder" and child-care provider. If used ironically, the word plays on the "excessively" activist feminists' image as intolerant or discriminatory in their alleged hatred toward anyone who doesn't strongly support their views.
Trivia
- A similar term Femnazi was coined earlier as the name of the male hating female inhabitants of the fictional planet, Femnaz, in a Legion of Super-heroes story from a 1964 issue of Adventure Comics written by Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel.