Feminism for women of colour...

[AnotherEpisode]

As a black woman, I quite often feel sidelined within feminism.

I don't feel feminism addresses the difficulties faced by women of colour in western societies and quite often I feel I am drawn to race issues over feminist issues because of this.

I absolutely have more difficulties in this society because of the colour of my skin than I do because of my sex.

I feel that the lack of understanding towards racism amongst feminist circles gives me a stance of one over the other in which racism usually wins, which is unfortunate really!

This article, although written in a strong, comical and sometimes rude tone, gives a good insight!

thegrio.com/2015/02/23/patricia-arquette-blacks-gays-white-women/

Not sure why I'm posting but I'm interested in a wider perspective especially people's thoughts on the article!

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/fgm-top-gynaecologisthits-out-at-political-prosecution-for-female-genital-mutilation-9213200.html

My response? I asked a lot of (barked) questions. What did they mean, why were they asking, why did they think I might have undergone it etc. It became very obvious I was annoyed and thought the people asking were being stupid. I made clear that it was not a practice where my family come from. My father had never heard of FGM until it started being talked about in this country.

Is anyone collecting data from the pregnant women presenting with fgm. I believe the doctor that it is rare at the homerton but isn't the whole problem is that people are extrapolating from anecdotes because there is no hard data.

Also since you cannot confirm fgm without the woman herself you need to wait until she presents so IF there is cutting of British born girls you only know IF they elected to tell or were giving birth which from looking at daughters of eve website occurs in their 20s. So there is a potential delay of a decade or more. And given immigration movements the girls at risk COULD be in schools now.

I know that is a lot of IFs. But Xxx I think you raise a good question but I think the answer is more information.

Just a comment on the FGM article above. I was (until last year) a Safeguarding trainer for children's services staff in a London borough. Our FGM awareness training was written and delivered by a Somali woman who I believe has done a lot of research (as well as grassroots community work) on FGM, and has herself undergone FGM.

Her understanding is that, at least in our area of London, a lot of FGM is done outside of the UK but not necessarily in 'home countries'. Lots of families travel to the UAE to have it done privately by doctors out there. So not the 'taken to a village in rural Somalia to be cut in a hut' type story the media often portrays...but private doctors in practices in Dubai or Abu Dhabi carrying out these procedures. I find it incredibly disturbing that the UK government seems so helpless (or behaves as if it is) in these cases. I don't know the legal ins and outs, but I do know that it angers me. It feels like the way the Irish government outlaw abortion and turn a blind eye to the waves of women coming to the UK to terminate unwanted pregnancies. Clumsy analogy, maybe (I am pro choice til I die), but this 'if its not on my patch I don't care' attitude really riles me.

There have been cutting communities living in England for a long time, we are already looking at first gen women giving birth here.

HSCIC are collecting data from pregnant women now, in April they will ask when and where they were cut. From what it known from the study so far is that hardly any women were cut in England.

www.hscic.gov.uk/searchcatalogue?productid=17245&q=%22female+genital+mutilation%22&sort=Relevance&size=10&page=1#top

There is little evidence that girls are travelling abroad to be cut either.

This is a subject I know all about, there is one study being used by the govt at minute that has some many methodological flaws it's embrassing if someone handed it in has a undergraduate thesis it would get a 2.2 at best.

But the study suits to govt narrative on subject so they are using it.

*a lot about not all about. Sorry I am sleep deprived.

Xxx that doesn't make sense if the girls are not cut in the UK and don't travel abroad is the implication that these are foreign born women who were cut before they immigrated to the UK.

The data summary doesn't state the proportion of UK born women. What I am getting at is are there British girls at risk?

In April HSCIC will begin officially recording of when and where women have been cut. But unofficially it is already known that very few UK born women have been cut.

Govt agencies are having their budgets slashed to within an inch of their lives, but a lot of money is being spent on FGM prevalence research, there are several agencies and departments looking for evidence of FGM being carried out and so far nada.

I don't know what to say since there are people campaigning on the basis of this being a problem here in the UK. And a lot of these campaigners are the grassroots as it were. So what possible axe do they have to grind.

Let me put it this way so far the dept of health, education, UKBA, social services and police have been tasked with trying to find of evidence of FGM and so far its has resulted in one extremely dodgy criminal prosecution and a shaky arrest from project azure which is likely to fall through.

I don't think they have an axe to grind but there is also no evidence its happening

I am not trying to be difficult as such but the absence of evidence of cutting in the UK isn't an absence of fgm.

Like I said above children who are cut don't seem to report so the time lag means we won't know for ages. Meanwhile there are activists in the community saying it is an issue. It's just odd to campaign on this issue if it does not happen.

But there isn't a time lag, cutting communities have been in the UK for a long time, if we take the Somali and Eritrean community we already have first gen women giving birth here.

We are straying quite a long way away from teh OP. FGM is just one issue affecting different groups of women in varying ways. There are others.

Dramatic ones (that may only affect a small minority of individuals) get attention, like FGM and forced marriage. Bigger ones, like discrimination in employment, healthcare etc, are overlooked. I would like to see that change. Not by shoving the dramatic issues into obscurity, but by being bolder about addressing the wider issues.

Your right ratbag , its just there is so much inaccurate information about FGM that I had to expand on it.

Just got back from work and I see the thread has moved on to FGM but I thoughti would quickly respond to coffee

My experiences were not limited to one employer. The thing is, they are not actually deliberately being like that, they are actually quite oblivious to it. For instance, they believed that changing the goal posts after my application was for the greater good of the department. I can genuinely say that they would be horrified if they could just see how dismissive they are of me due to my ethnicity.

Another example, if I suggest a different working pattern in order to make department more productive, the manager will use the terminology 'if its not broken, don't fix it'. If my white colleague suggests something similar or something that is unworkable, it will still be considered. It's as subtle as that. It's crazy how my colour makes me stand out, yet renders me invisible.

Got to go see to the DCs now. Will post later, more on topic

There are FGM survivors from various parts of the UK saying that carrying out FGM is common in the UK.

If the point of this thread is that we are going to listen to WOC then we have to listen to those women, regardless of whatever evidence the NHS does or does not have.

Otherwise this just gets added to the long line of things that women reported were happening to them and found themselves disbelieved.

Well I am a woman of colour and my professional experience tells me its not happening on the scale first thought not that it is not happening at all. I can think of lots Somali/Eritrean women so say it is uncommon but don't feel they have the space to make that statement because it labels them as co conspirators/part of the problem. If you are a black women particularly a black Muslim woman you must be the most liberal the most patriotic.

My new years resolution to myself is not to simplify things, life is complicated, people are complicated, narratives are complicated.

Also who gets to speak on behalf of all people from cutting communities. Surely they can only speak on behalf of themselves.

I hate that I am taking up so much space on this thread so I am going to bow out after this post.

You only ever see black Muslim women in one dimension, they only ever enter the pubic space when they are reinforcing a certain narrative (they need saving). I can think of a whole host of varying narratives but they are never picked up in the mainstream press.

Also in anyone is interested in the topic I suggest you read 'do Muslim women need saving" by lila Abu lughod. Its an excellent read and explains othering. I included a PIC which shows Muslim women depicted on book covers, there is only one way Muslim women are presented at that's as them lacking agency over themselves