Why do lots of black women still feel that feminism is nit for them?

[SpringHasSprungYay]

Isn't it sad that in this day & age, so many black women still feel that feminism is a white woman's thing.
How can we make things better?

[KylieKoKo]

@MangyInseam

There are a certain number of people who, IMO, don't actually care much about race, but instead use it as a vehicle for whatever bile they have to spew.

They are just nasty bullies and will use a person's race, sex, class, any physical differences they have, anything, as an excuse to treat them like shit.

Some of these people on social media that are critical about the kinds of things you mention are really just trying to create in and out groups. They use these things as an excuse to assert their own power. I think that kind of thing is especially common among pre-teens and teens, but a surprising number of adults also work that way, trying to increase their own social credibility by claiming other people are doing things wrong.

That might well be true @MangyInseam but the impact of experiencing racism is the same whether or not the person cares about race or uses it as an excuse to be nasty.

[MangyInseam]

@EastHer

@LittleWhingingWoman

Yes! There is a whole other layer of shit about being mixed race, too. Bloody hell.
My DD has had all sorts of shite levelled at her on social media about whether she is ‘black enough’ to be wearing certain hairstyles or whether she should be supporting England/Ireland/Jamaica in football or whether she can claim blackness or the whole ‘why do light skin girls think they’re too nice’ trope. Everybody has got something to say these days!

I’m so bloody proud of her, though. . She takes no shit.

There are a certain number of people who, IMO, don't actually care much about race, but instead use it as a vehicle for whatever bile they have to spew.

They are just nasty bullies and will use a person's race, sex, class, any physical differences they have, anything, as an excuse to treat them like shit.

Some of these people on social media that are critical about the kinds of things you mention are really just trying to create in and out groups. They use these things as an excuse to assert their own power. I think that kind of thing is especially common among pre-teens and teens, but a surprising number of adults also work that way, trying to increase their own social credibility by claiming other people are doing things wrong.

[picklemewalnuts]

I'm a bit disappointed it died. I've reread it multiple times, learning different things each time.
It's been helpful reading some perspectives that clarify where the obstacles are for women trying to work together.

My appreciation for Boris and other controversial people is in a ' stopped clock, right twice a day' kind of way. I'm sorry that will have sounded so privileged to those who've experienced hardship at the hands/policies of people like him.

It's been interesting to see how individual everyone's experiences are. There is no monolith being prioritised/centred. Just women who are left or right leaning, or religiously conservative, or atheist, and/or lesbian, and/or straight, and/or WoC...

We only win when feminism centres all women.

[KylieKoKo]

It's quite an effective way of shutting down the discussion ...

[ImaniMumsnet]

Hi everyone,

The thread is back open. :-)

[ImaniMumsnet]

Hi all,

We are going to close this thread temporarily while we take a look behind the scenes.

[MangyInseam]

@DomesticatedZombie

I think partly my reticence is also due to not wanting to be wholly consumed by any sort of identity politics, (of course it's impossible to avoid completely, you're not human to not believe passionately in something) but that is why I also do not really hang around the threads on black rights much either. Anger isn't always a useful lens and I'm not sure how I would be affected by it as I have enough to be upset about.

Yep, I completely agree regards identity politics.

So far posters have suggested FWR is populated largely by rightwing/atheist/straight/white/women. Which seems like a lot of assumptions to make for an anonymous internet board, tbh.

Oh, it's interesting that that is your take, because my impression was that people think it is populated by left wing/atheist/white/middle class women.

But either way, I think there is a pattern with regard to women who don't tend to describe themselves as feminists.

There are black women, as noted in the OP, who tend to think it caters more to the experiences of white women.

There are working class women who think it caters to mc women and excludes them.

There are conservative women of all classes who think it excludes them.

There are religious women who think it excludes them.

There are women who may not see themselves as conservatives but have a different or just more moderate view on daycare, or careers, or abortion, or gender norms, something socially they perceive feminism as not accepting.

My sense is that if you really dug down in all of these cases there would actually be quite a lot of overlap in terms of the things these individuals would find alienating. At the same time you would also find fractions within many of those groups with different opinions of individuals, and also sub-groups (say, Asian atheist women vs Asian religious women might tend to perceive their relation to feminism differently.)

It would be interesting to be able to really dig down into what commonalities they all have. I know there is a tendency to want to say, it's about middle class interests being privileged, but I'm not totally sure that would prove to be the case, I think quite a lot of those women might be middle class.

[DysonSphere]

[quote EastHer]@LittleWhingingWoman

Yes! There is a whole other layer of shit about being mixed race, too. Bloody hell.
My DD has had all sorts of shite levelled at her on social media about whether she is ‘black enough’ to be wearing certain hairstyles or whether she should be supporting England/Ireland/Jamaica in football or whether she can claim blackness or the whole ‘why do light skin girls think they’re too nice’ trope. Everybody has got something to say these days!

I’m so bloody proud of her, though. . She takes no shit.[/quote]
@EastHer

Yeah for your daughter being mixed race must be difficult.
It's a reality I even being black, truthfully didn't think about deeply, for years, just assuming mixed raced people just shared the same prejudices as I did, with some light skinned bias. I got a rude awakening during a friendly chat with a mother who sometimes gave me a lift home from my son's swimming lessons:


She told me felt intimidated joining a small private dental practice as she was the only mixed race person there. She was a dentist herself, in my eyes professional and independent, yet she was thinking of walking away from the opportunity.

'You mean there's no one else of colour there?'
'There's two black nigerian women there'
'So...didn't they welcome you?'
'They did, one gave me her contact number if I wanted to ask for any advice settling in. We're meeting for coffee next week'
'So why do you feel uncomfortable then?'
'Did you hear what I said?'
Me silent in bafflement...
I said I'm the only mixed raced woman there.
....Still not getting it.....Completely dumbfounded.
She sighed. 'I get this all the time, do you even realise what it's like for me?'
Our skin tones were quite similar as I'm fair skinned afro carribbean, in my mind, what could she going through that I don't?'
She actually raised her voice in frustration. 'Why do I have to explain? I'm not white, and I'm not black there's no one like me in the practice. I'm on my own, I hate being in that position, no one gets it. No one gets me. I can't identify fully with the black women or the white, I'm different from all of them. I have to prove myself to everyone

I learned something that day I hadn't realised before and I felt quite ashamed. Possibly my blindness was influenced by me having a diverse carribbean heritage with family with shades of skin tones so fair they could even pass for white, so I just assumed the mixed raced reality was the same as mine. But still.

[MichonnesBBF]

@BigHeartyTruffle Thank you for recognising my post...
Agree, some other well wrote replies have gone unnoticed, ignored or just missed because the whole thread has now been so far removed from the original topic...🙄

[Tothepoint99]

@MissyB1

Might get flamed for this but I’m going to say it because it’s something I’ve found myself starting to think. Although I strongly suspect it’s mumsnet that’s colouring my opinion on this, especially some threads on black mumsnet section.
Some black women seem to see sneering at feminism as a way to express anger or frustration with white women. I also think some black women worry that being feminist might detract from fighting racism. So they see feminists as not being in their corner.
I have to say I haven’t come across this in real life though 🤔

So what are you basing your view on having not come across it ever....

[Tothepoint99]

@SpringHasSprungYay Well don't. Asking what a black woman thinks by asking a non black woman to answer for her. Moronic.

[LittleWhingingWoman]

[quote EastHer]@DysonSphere

I don’t think FWR is right wing, but there is sometimes a willingness from some posters to overlook a politician or other public figures record and views on other important issues and cling to the fact they have said something gender critical.

I may have been guilty of it myself if I think back, to be honest. Finding out someone is GC and willing to stand up against the TRA madness is such a monumental thing (when it really shouldn’t be) I have a tendency to go ‘Yes! Yes! Thank God!’, so I do get it.

It’s a tricky thing to navigate. I’m left wing and not religious, so it can feel like constantly trying to decide what’s most important to me. Much like a lot of black feminists might feel, I’d imagine?[/quote]
I see this a lot with misogynistic men saying anti racist things too.
Actually my FB has a couple of very misogynistic white men who virtue signal about racism whilst using sex workers. Maybe these are single issue men. They are happy to purchase women of any colour.

[EastHer]

@DysonSphere

I don’t think FWR is right wing, but there is sometimes a willingness from some posters to overlook a politician or other public figures record and views on other important issues and cling to the fact they have said something gender critical.

I may have been guilty of it myself if I think back, to be honest. Finding out someone is GC and willing to stand up against the TRA madness is such a monumental thing (when it really shouldn’t be) I have a tendency to go ‘Yes! Yes! Thank God!’, so I do get it.

It’s a tricky thing to navigate. I’m left wing and not religious, so it can feel like constantly trying to decide what’s most important to me. Much like a lot of black feminists might feel, I’d imagine?

[HMBB]

@LittleWhingingWoman

Ok this is just my perspective.

I'm not white. I have two family members who are now dead because of violent racist attacks. I've suffered appalling racism and so does my daughter at school now because she is mixed race.

But I don't see all white women as the problem just like I don't see all white people as the problem. For me, I was accepted amongst a lot of friends with Irish families at a time in UK history when as a young girl in the 80's I would be harassed on the street for walking with a white boyfriend. What I found with Irish people in particular in London is that there was a keen recognition that racism had affected groups of people who weren't just black. "No Blacks, No Irish, No dogs etc"

I was beaten in the street by a Muslim man who said I was a whore for wearing a short skirt. I was dragged into an alleyway by a black man and his mate who put their hands up my skirt. A group of black men constantly cat called me and made me feel unsafe whilst I had my baby with me. I was raped by a white man who called me a black bitch to his friends after.

For me, misogyny is far worse than racism. I'm not interested in pointing my finger at white people for all the issues I have faced. It was men who perpetrated most of the violent or sexual abuse in my life. Sure some white women have been snide and bitchy to me over the years. But walking home from school it was a black girl who used to laugh at me and bully me for example. At the same time my best friend was a different black girl. Bullying crosses cultures and colours. It literally isn't black and white and it's simplistic and tribal to point fingers only at white women for doing it or at black women for receiving it etc. There is also a perception amongst black women I know that only they get the racism from whites. I have to sometimes remind them that I have dead family members - that all shades of brown receive racism.

When I'm walking home late at night I'm not worried about racist white women calling me names. That never happens. The racism I get from those kinds of women is more subtle and snide for sure but it's not a physical threat to my body.

However I do get followed by men of all colours. And I've been assaulted by men of all colours. To me male violence towards women and girls is my priority because by rights if they men who had assaulted me had their way I wouldn't be here.

Just my perspective as I said before. I don't find anyone on this board racist - I've seen that the Black Mumsnetters board has been featuring recently so had a look to see what it was like. It's not for me.

If I was a white Mumsnetter I would leave it well alone.

Accusations of racism to this group here suit the transactivist narrative. It also suits the white people who have hijacked BLM.

I am so sorry that you have suffered so much abuse and violence. It is so disgusting how humans behave.

[DysonSphere]

@DomesticatedZombie

I think partly my reticence is also due to not wanting to be wholly consumed by any sort of identity politics, (of course it's impossible to avoid completely, you're not human to not believe passionately in something) but that is why I also do not really hang around the threads on black rights much either. Anger isn't always a useful lens and I'm not sure how I would be affected by it as I have enough to be upset about.

Yep, I completely agree regards identity politics.

So far posters have suggested FWR is populated largely by rightwing/atheist/straight/white/women. Which seems like a lot of assumptions to make for an anonymous internet board, tbh.

@DomesticatedZombie

It's interesting that some people see FWR as 'rightwing'

Clearly everyone is looking at the same board differently. It most assuredly isn't anywhere near RW in my opinion. I must be missing something.

[LittleWhingingWoman]

[quote EastHer]@LittleWhingingWoman

Yes! There is a whole other layer of shit about being mixed race, too. Bloody hell.
My DD has had all sorts of shite levelled at her on social media about whether she is ‘black enough’ to be wearing certain hairstyles or whether she should be supporting England/Ireland/Jamaica in football or whether she can claim blackness or the whole ‘why do light skin girls think they’re too nice’ trope. Everybody has got something to say these days!

I’m so bloody proud of her, though. . She takes no shit.[/quote]
It's mad isn't it? My mum was so racist about my brothers marrying white women she called their babies "bags of dirty white sugar"

That's a long time ago now but now my mixed race child is being told she's either not brown enough or not white enough and all of it is just ridiculous.

She's also gorgeous, so beautiful as to make angels weep. "Mixing races creates angels" says my very elderly mother who has dementia now. A complete turnaround through her almost blind eyes.

[DomesticatedZombie]

Oh, I missed 'English' off the list.

EastHer that is a lot to deal with for your DD. To my mind, this is where feminism is supposed to come in and help out; providing solidarity, analysis; support.

[EastHer]

@LittleWhingingWoman

Yes! There is a whole other layer of shit about being mixed race, too. Bloody hell.
My DD has had all sorts of shite levelled at her on social media about whether she is ‘black enough’ to be wearing certain hairstyles or whether she should be supporting England/Ireland/Jamaica in football or whether she can claim blackness or the whole ‘why do light skin girls think they’re too nice’ trope. Everybody has got something to say these days!

I’m so bloody proud of her, though. . She takes no shit.

[DomesticatedZombie]

I think partly my reticence is also due to not wanting to be wholly consumed by any sort of identity politics, (of course it's impossible to avoid completely, you're not human to not believe passionately in something) but that is why I also do not really hang around the threads on black rights much either. Anger isn't always a useful lens and I'm not sure how I would be affected by it as I have enough to be upset about.

Yep, I completely agree regards identity politics.

So far posters have suggested FWR is populated largely by rightwing/atheist/straight/white/women. Which seems like a lot of assumptions to make for an anonymous internet board, tbh.

[LittleWhingingWoman]

@fuckoffImcounting

English feminism has been strongly rooted in the white middle class for the last 40+ years and embodies and reflects that world view. It is not open to any minorities, evidenced by the cruel transphobia found on so many of these pages.

There have been many versions of feminism in this time. Which particular ones are you taking about?

[britneyisfree]

@MissyB1

Might get flamed for this but I’m going to say it because it’s something I’ve found myself starting to think. Although I strongly suspect it’s mumsnet that’s colouring my opinion on this, especially some threads on black mumsnet section.
Some black women seem to see sneering at feminism as a way to express anger or frustration with white women. I also think some black women worry that being feminist might detract from fighting racism. So they see feminists as not being in their corner.
I have to say I haven’t come across this in real life though 🤔

Seriously stop putting crack in your coffee and sort your head out

[MangyInseam]

@Siepie

I agree with posters who have mentioned feminists' willingness to align themselves with the Conservative party and with the right-wing / small-c conservatives more generally.

If I may draw a parallel, I'm a lesbian and I tend to avoid the MN feminist boards because I find it hard to see posters praising organisations like Christian Concern who want my marriage to be illegal. I get the impression that a lot of straight feminists on Mumsnet would happily throw my rights as a gay person under the bus in order to protect single-sex spaces. It wouldn't be surprising if black women feel similarly when they see white feminists here willing to ignore racism as long as the person saying it is gender critical.

But lots of black women are conservative. And while they might not be happy with BJ or the Tories, they certainly don't see their views reflected in the LP.

While I know there are people who feel the way you describe, there are also lots that don't.

The tendency to tie race too tightly to a particular political party could be a big mistake, look at the US example - despite, or maybe because of the way the Democrats have tried to claim the non-white vote as theirs by right, there are more and more black and Hispanic voters looking to the Republicans - those groups even voted for Trump in greater numbers the second time.

Would you ay those kinds of voters are throwing the rights of others under the bus? Or maybe they just have their own POV not completely dominated by race politics, like everyone else?

[LittleWhingingWoman]

@EastHer

I don’t post much, but I’m an avid reader of the feminist boards on MN and I also read quite a few posts on BMN, even though I’m white. (I understand it’s a space for black women and respect that, so hope it doesn’t seem weird that I ‘lurk’, but sometimes BMN is the only part of the board where certain issues are being discussed. I do sometimes feel a bit intrusive reading threads on BMN, but I guess it’s a public forum and if the women on BMN wanted a totally private black female only space, they would/do go elsewhere).

Digressing slightly, but I think of my daughter reading this thread. She is mixed race and a teenager. Her friends are all black or mixed teen girls. The biggest issue for her and her friends over the past few years has undoubtedly been Black Lives Matter and race is definitely the big issue for them and they’re very vocal about it. I learn a lot from listening to them, as does my DH perhaps in different ways.

However, I have noticed that feminist issues have started creeping in for them as they navigate their teens. My DD is horrified by a lot of the attitudes of boys at school and she has also quietly told me she doesn’t think JK Rowling said anything wrong (this seems to be an anathema opinion to tiktok teens!). I foresee a feminist awakening on the horizon .

It’s going to be a lot to deal with for these girls, though.

My takeaway from watching my DD grow up is that it’s bloody hard for black women to have to deal with all of these issues at once, both in terms of issues highlighted in the media and globally, and in their day to day lives. They’re dealing with everything I deal with as a white woman and then a whole other world of shit. That might sound like a very basic and obvious observation, but really think about it for a moment. That’s a lot of absolute fucking rage to be carrying around when the scales have fallen from your eyes on both the racism and sexism fronts (and then don’t even start me on class!). I can see why some black women just eye roll at white feminists and think ‘you have NO idea, love!’. I personally don’t want it to be like that, and I think we are stronger together as women, but it’s going to take a lot more listening and learning from white feminists before that can happen on a large scale.

This is so true. It's overload!
My mixed race daughter is hearing it the other way - being told by white girls that her white dad was a racist who used me as a sexual slave to have a baby with. These girls are so divorced from the actual experience of black and brown girls they have it all mixed up!