I interpret this statement differently - and I happen to have a pretty good
hunch Monique does too.
On one auspicious evening she sat in my living room reading french poetry to
one of my cats, and we talked - lots. I am really not claiming some
authoritative voice here, but the implications are pretty serious. What
Monique meant, as far as I could gather, is that to the extent that a woman
does not identify as one who is the "opposite sex" of males, to that extent
her culture refuses her an identity as a "woman".
It is more about the attributional character of identity than some kind of
agency on a woman's part to resist the category and its attributes. And
actually, once, this homicidal maniac who accosted my partner and I in a
restaurant said to the waiter, who had asked him to, "Please sir, leave
those women alone!": "Those aren't women. Just look at them! Call them
women?!"
So I don't actually think the intent of mw's claim was a liberatory one. Far
from it.
mb