Feminazis are real and they can hurt you
”French rapists: prison, Foreign rapists: prison + plane”, says a purple protest sign. The identitarian ”feminist” group Nemesis forced its way into the Women's Day march in Paris, shouting ”Free us from immigration”, under police protection and a private security escort.
Using feminism to promote a xenophobic agenda – known as ”weaponised feminism” and defined as ”femonationalism” by sociologist Sara R. Farris – is on the rise in Europe. It focuses on portraying minorities like immigrants, Muslim communities, and transgender people as threats to women, while failing to advocate for women's issues like domestic violence or equal representation.
The 2015 sexual assaults in Cologne, for instance, were used extensively to fuel anti-immigration rhetoric, while groups like For Women Scotland campaign against transgender rights for ”eroding women's rights”.
These actors tend to soften on other feminist battles, like French far-right leader Marine Le Pen voting to constitutionalise abortion rights, when it can lead them to make a bigger impact on anti-immigration policies.
Collectives like Nemesis are way more than ”protest crashers”; they are part of a well-funded lobby that, despite its deep nationalism, has European ambitions.
Founded in 2019 in France, Nemesis has been active in French-speaking Switzerland since 2021 and works closely with politicians across Europe. Italian, Dutch, and Spanish political figures are also seen using women's rights to push conservative views.
The far-right typically garners more support from men, but in the last European elections, the French far-right party National Rally saw equal support from male and female voters for the first time in history.