White Feminism

[Brefugee]

suggested from another thread, is this something we should talk about. At the risk of being accused of being a TAAT it isn't that.

But on another thread a black MNer said that at a conference she had experienced racist comments from a panel, and she was the only one who pointed it out. And had been the only black person in the room.

The reason i brought up White Feminism on that thread was that the poster was instantly dismissed as a potential derailing troll. Which is... well not sure if the person dismissing the poster is white or not, but it was pretty much the very same treatment. Immediately written off as insignificant.

I've seen comments on the FWR board before that White Feminism rears its ugly head a lot, and that black mumsnetters don't feel comfortable on the board.

I find that shocking. But I'm not black or of any other minority. I'm a white 2nd waver - and i hope that i don't make racist comments or dismiss black women's experiences. I do hope that if i did, they would point that out to me. (and I'd be sorry they have to do that work)

So - should we talk about this? I do think it causes rifts where we should have bridges.

I think it's kind of ironic that a thread about white feminism has been started by a white woman.

I was one of those on that thread, it’s a serious problem. We can always learn from other’s experience. It’s a shame that BAME people feel excluded from feminism, when a woman of colour took the first steps for us all. Alison Baileys court case established the ground work for us gender critical feminists

Interesing. Why?
Do you think black feminists have to do the work? Or do you think that the fact that i'm white automatically makes me a White Feminist?

as @Sunnydata said: we should all be open to learn. And as black feminists say to us so often: it is not up them to educate us.

So: White Feminism. How do we avoid it?

But i don't think Alison Baily was the first feminist - Mary Wollstonecraft would be my choice for the first woman to really bring feminist ideas into the mainstream. Or at least give it an audience.

She was a white, middle-class woman. That's not her fault, but her experience is likely not to be the same of a white working class woman of the time. Or a black woman of any class at any time.

Some of the problem is lived experience, by default you can’t have someone else’s lived experience. I’ve changed my behaviour since reading about micro aggressions that black people experience,
I normally make eye contact with most people I meet even strangers, but now I don’t do that as often as some find it threatening.

It just seems incredibly patronising to me. I'm sure JanetP is perfectly capable of starting her own thread.

I agree this is an important discussion. But I think it needs to be led by black women

“It’s not a TAAT”

<proceeds to rehash previous thread>

But white women can examine their behaviour as well ,

Yes of course we should call out lazy racist stereotyping, and all other -ist comments, especially in surroundings where you'd expect better.

I wouldn't underestimate how many people are reluctant to speak up though. I was once in a work training session when the trainer deliberately tested us with some sub-GCSE level Maths; gave a simple calculation and asked us if it was correct. I knew it was wrong and why, but was the only one to query it, with the rest of the room (same pay grade as me) looking at me as though I were deranged. I was surprised at how hard it was to put my hand up and publicly disagree, and I'm generally confident with public speaking.

You decided that you needed to start a thread rather than giving the poster time and the chance to give a first person account of her lived experience so " white saviour " mode is an ironic choice

I found the chapter about feminism in "Why I am no longer talking to white people about race" really interesting and valuable. I haven't memorised it enough to be able to summarise it here but I really recommend that everyone should read it, it was really enlightening.

This thread is because the subject is worthy of its thread and not be part of one about another thread.

Well, dear naysayers on this thread, you don't have to read it, do you?

I'm curious though if you see White Feminism as a problem? if you think you're all perfect and never racist? Or if you're black and have an issue with white women trying not to indulge in the racist behaviours of White Feminism?

I'm not an expert, I'm asking a bloody question. Because time after time after time i see accusations on FWR of White Feminism, and yet, there seems no way to change it. Black feminists don't want to bring up the topic, i don't blame them, so if white feminists don't it just sits there like a bloody big boil that nobody wants to pop.

agree @Beowulfa that it can be very hard to put your hand up. The question is, then, if it is a conference as the poster on that thread (who didn't want to start a thread about it, btw, and that is also fine) was - where her experience was dismissed out of hand. What should we do? Is it our place as a white person to point out the inherent racism? Or should we leave it to black women? or if we don't object, either there and then, or afterwards in a comment to the speaker or organisers, are we just endorsing the racist comments?

ok I'll push off then.

The reason i brought up White Feminism on that thread was that the poster was instantly dismissed as a potential derailing troll.

1. The relevant post was kinda plopped into a thread which if run with would have derailed the very important collating of facts about something MN has NEVER allowed before. Why?
2. FWR regular posters are more twitchy than other sections regarding troll like behaviour. And my goodness we get those several times a week on the main boards.
3. I'm sure the incident has happened. That's not in question for me but in saying that a lot of derailing posts designed to get a thread deleted have flavours of me, me, me in a them, them, them thread. That post was a me not them post.

Sure it needs discussing...but in that thread? No.

People's experiences are all different, and that's based on all kinds of different factors. Race is one, also class, sex, regional origin, plus a plethora of individual elements.

People who share certain things may have experiences in common, although quite often, they don't agree even on those.

It's always good to listen to other people, but that doesn't mean we always have to agree with their analysis, whatever group they come from, or we come from ourselves.

Threads like this always descend into a bunch of people arguing about the degree to which people - in these instances white women - are required to completely accept what someone describes as their lived experience, while the non-white people invariably take several different perspectives on the topic anyway.

It's like an object lesson in why identity politics is a dead end, and mainly a tool for manipulating people.

I haven't read the other thread, so I don't know if the comment in question was something that was in fact racist, or was best addressed by "calling it out" in that moment. Maybe it was, or maybe not. But chances are having different perspectives on the question might not be a case of all white women being inveterate racists, or even indifferent to it.

I appreciate the starting of this thread. Not particularly sure what to say about it now other than I think if there are feminist movements that don’t call out discrimination in all forms then they only end up representing a small section of women not all women. The women that are most affected by issues whereby they need safe single sex spaces (refuges etc) are often women of colour, immigrants and working class women so for these women to not feel valued in the discussion doesn’t really make sense to me.

I think this is also why the new Gen Z tend to side with trans activists because the stereotype of the gender critical woman is white, older and middle class…

Not even sure if any of this is particularly important because maybe feminists who are not white and not middle class just feel that there are more imminent struggles that they have to address as black women before the gender critical thing so they are more focused in those areas…like not being spoken to by the police when their children are killed or being locked up in unsanitary deportation prisons…I just don’t know 🤷🏽‍♀️

I do believe there are genuine complaints made by BAME women. I hate the term 'white feminism' as it implies a deliberate exclusion of black women and I could never believe that was ever true. I do think however there has been a deep unwillingness to look at the problem. Sometimes probably for well meaning reasons such as a preference to focus on women only issues. The racism complaints were/are seen as diversions. At least that's how I have read it. Happy to be corrected.

Feminism in the UK is dominated by white faces. Why is that? We live in a predominantly white society. Outside the big urban centres it might be 95%. Where I live whiteness is higher than this. That doesn't justify any racism in the least but might explain why racist concerns are overlooked as marginal to the movement.

I'm not white. I don't really understand what "White Feminism" is. I've always felt that feminism (OK, not in its Liberal iteration, which foregrounds men's interests) has represented my interests as a woman, and have never felt excluded from the feminist movement. I think that the splintering or demonising of feminism as a political movement is only ever going to weaken it. Perhaps - in some cases - that is the intention.

Having said that, I didn't see the thread that the OP refers to. If the conference mentioned was an academic conference, I do think that there is a lot of racism in academia. I've experienced it most directly from white so-called "anti-racist" activists who think that all people who aren't white must think in identical ways (and in the same way as them).

I understand why any group in the UK would be more white because of numbers and areas. I think I was just surprised at the small amount of people of colour at a conference in London where it is pretty diverse. I also don’t see many prominent gender critical black feminists.

I also don’t think racism and sexism can really be separated because it is alway the most vulnerable of society who are affected worse by any discrimination. For example if only Well off white feminists are heard when fighting for their rights, they don’t see the sexism that black women or poor women live and therefore through no fault of their own they can’t fight for that.

Point being the girls in Rochdale for example they weren’t just treated badly by authorities because they are female. They were treated that way because they were also poor and seen as untrustworthy, more adult, chav etc

This is the really key bit of the book I mentioned above but I strongly recommend getting hold of a copy and reading the whole thing. (3 images are numbered in reading order)

It's also a shame to make sweeping statements about people. I imagine some 'BAME people' feel excluded from feminism, and some may have encountered unpleasant situations.

The rest of us are not a homogenous bunch and find positives and negatives in any kind of ideological framework, including feminism.

Personally I feel the types that handwring about 'white feminism' display a more 'racist' mindset in terms of viewing people with darker shades of skin as a homogenous 'BAME' blob and are unable to appreciate that people with darker shades of skin are just as diverse as 'white' people. We don't all have the same experiences or viewpoints or subscribe to the same ideological worldviews, and not all of us appreciate self-appointed 'people of colour' who act like they speak on all of our behalf.

I have always found GC/Radfems individuals as well as groups very welcoming in any event or social gathering, even though I can be fairly open in my criticisms of feminism. It's the 'progressive' or 'libfem' types that come across as more 'racist' to me, but I don't think it's intentional. It's just ignorance due to the kind of ideological and social circles they surround themselves in.

I really do think it would be worth you getting in touch with A Woman's Place and telling them what happened, how it made you feel and why you didn't confront it at the time.

It sounds like a really lazy racist stereotype and you're right that sort of stuff should not go unchallenged

"Point being the girls in Rochdale for example they weren’t just treated badly by authorities because they are female. They were treated that way because they were also poor and seen as untrustworthy, more adult, chav etc"

The problem in Rochdale was also that people were afraid of being seen as racist for calling out a particular community.

I don't like women being silenced by other women - whether black by white or white by black. All our experiences are valid.