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!

it is clear as you all say how important it is to hear many and varied voices of women of colour. it just doesn't happen. we (feminists) don't expect a white woman to speak for every white woman's experiences

The problem is those voices of woc need to sound a particular. They need to be downtrodden and on the margins. They need to fit the parameters of the of acceptable non white stories.

I have had liberal types quite angry that I went to private school and university. They were visibly disappointed I didn't fit the narrative.

It does not surprise me that feminists want to talk more about fgm than woc trapped in junior management or entry level roles.

And in terms of xx about the scale of the fgm problem I don't know the answer. But almonds description of the mn response sounds exactly like mn towards woc.

Aaaahhhh yes who drank it kills people that I am black went to a Russell group and got a first.

"They need to fit the parameters of the of acceptable non white stories"

i can absolutely see that

This is why I think woc need to protect their image more. There is nothing wrong with not going to university, being a lone parent or having life mess you about.

But if all images of woc are in relation to benefits, gang, non performance in school, lone parenting, other ethnic specific issues (eg fgm). Then it is very difficult to talk about anything else, in particular about taking the next step beyond just surviving but into thriving.

Broadly I side step any targeted woc initiatives because it just embarrassingly stereotypical.

what do you mean by "protect their image" in terms of how you do that? sorry if this is a thick question - i totally understand what you're saying, but just would like to understand how you do/would do that yourself

Woc are pushed into fronting certain campaigns like xxxx described with fgm or whatever. But what about getting more women on boards. Discussing the challenges of working in senior positions and childcare. Always a white woman.

Drugs, prison, benefits. .. anything that puts you at the margins journalists and feminists alike rush for a woc. Sometimes I think we need to say no. Very tricky given the absence of the hive mind. But when arguing about the presentation of women in TV and the media especially popular American TV shows apart from shonda rimes woc are on the margins. Nothing about their lifestyle is aspirational.
When I was growing up the only sensible black women on TV were moira Stewart and the wife on the Cosby show.

Buffy sorry I feel like I am dominating the conversation but isn't that a bit of a cop out. The areas we all have common cross over are just the white areas. Sometimes we need to turn up and hold the placard even though it isn't about us. There may be some areas where it is just Muslim women and we need to show up. Rather than sitting back debating whether this is a Muslim only issue or if there is enough feminism potential. I think we need to show up. You would think this about class. So why race.

Sorry would not think this about class

I agree, Buffy. I think tensions over these kinds of issues comes from asking white feminists to recognise their (relative) privilege in a context where they are protesting unfairness and discrimination imposed on them by men. It feels wrong and undermining.

But unless we do the kind of bridge building you're suggesting, feminism will be undermined even faster by the fact that women enjoying racial, class and wealth-based privilege will end up securing advances based on increased oppression of other women, and not greater equality with men.

Yes. My battery is now dead.
Well said buffy

Thanks OP for this great thread. I've been lurking because, as you say Buffy, I feel very conscious of being white and not wanting to talk over WoC, but I also want to have a loud, angry conversation about the horrors committed against WoC all over the world.

What I don't want to do (and hear me out, this might sound a bit weird) is start off everyone discussion with "btw I'm not racist!!!"
I think all too often white people (men and women) comfortably believe this about themselves. Loudly proclaiming oneself to be an "intersectional feminist" has the same effect. You're off the hook. It's not your fault, it's other white people hiss boo.
I think that working against racism is a relentless and deeply uncomfortable process of examining your own prejudices and it's never ever done. No one with privilege can ever rest on their laurels and think that they're free from that privilege. It's impossible to live in a white supremacist society (as we all do) and not be acculturated into it.

I think a lot of white feminists shy away from the writing of WoC because we find that process of self examination uncomfortable. I guess my point is that it should be uncomfortable, all the more reason to do it. And not just because all white people should confront their own prejudices, but also because feminism is dependent on it - this is what sisterhood is supposed to be about.

I think, for me, feminism has to be about race.

Even just the issue of racialised misogyny that Black women experience by eg being catcalled is clearly a feminist issue, although white women will often not directly experience it. Or the racism in pornography which is often unmentioned when porn is discussed.

So that's an occasion when you listen.

It's a bit like the way I am much much more aware of harassment I experience as a lesbian than 'just' as a woman, IME. I notice the way I am targetted when straight-looking women are not. That's a legitimate observation even though all women suffer due to sexism.

And because of that - because feminism has to be about racism, I do feel emotionally engaged (as someone who passes white although I have mixed heritage).

I think it's important to get in the habit of talking about it more - like this thread - and reading - there is so much that is accessible now.

The Arquette speech reminded me of this d1oi7t5trwfj5d.cloudfront.net/ee/10/970464b1489fbd7cac8620eddc8b/but-some-of-us-are-brave.jpg book title which is worth reading. I saw it and instantly thought 'oh great I'm not a woman and Black women aren't women'.

There are so many resources from the past hundred or more years of Black women's activism.

I particularly remecommend Chrystos's poems.
poetry.newgreyhair.com/post/36313826984/white-girl-dont-chrystos

www.reocities.com/SoHo/4469/tears.html

And this article blackfeministsmanchester.wordpress.com/2013/01/07/racism-within-white-feminist-spaces/

Agree with everything you have said, Buffy, and feel th same.

Agreed. Though I suppose the real point of intersectionality (when it isn't being misappropriated on twitter ho hum) is that it's impossible to really separate the experiences of a black woman into those experiences that were due to her blackness, and those that were due to her femaleness. She is both black and female all the time.
e.g. the hyper sexualisation of Afro-Caribbean women - is that a feminist issue, or an anti-racist issue? Surely both.

Although I think that feminism seems to get a particularly hard deal in the mainstream media on this. Patricia Arquette made a really dumb comment and was rightly called out on it, but meanwhile John Legend (black musician) made an Oscars acceptance speech about African American men in prison in the US and completely erased the African American women who have also been unjustly imprisoned, and no one called him out on it in the mainstream media (though WoC on the blogosphere rightly did).

Sorry realising I've been faffing around with the word 'black' - one of my African American friends advocates a return to 'black' in the political sense, i.e. synonymous with People of Colour (for interesting reasons!) and I've picked it up from her. Realise it may be a bit confusing.

I tend to use Black and mean it in a political sense as that's what is used in my circle (with some women saying eg African descent woman when that's what they mean) but I also use women of colour in places with a bigger pool of contributors to discussion.
I have an instinctive dislike of initials as they can be v minimising and I hate loathe and detest lgb and variations.

Patricia Arquette did get a hard time because we expect better of feminism and that is a good thing. One of the reasons I don't like some of the black spaces that discuss racism is a) they are sexist and b) the old school uninhibited homophobia. (Source of many family arguments )

In terms of buffy's question I don't think feminism can tackle everything but like rosie said you cannot split the race from the woman. So if you aim for intersectional feminism you pick up racism and other stuff along the way. But at its core feminism is not about racism but you can and do still end up talking about it.

There are lots of things that I feel buffy style raaaaar about that will probably not have a real impact on me. But I accept that I won't know they exist until someone on the sharp end tells me. And I am perfectly at ease with my ignorance because I know I am listening.

rhrealitycheck.org/ablc/2015/02/23/patricia-arquette/

I just read this and it explains the PA thing within a wider context for anyone who's interested.

I typed this out from A Burst Of Light by Audre Lorde - it's about a specific event but towards the end it sums up my feelings about why feminists absolutely have to engage with racism and dismantle white supremacy.

But it is slightly long - apologies.

June 20, 1984
Berlin
I didn't go to London because I loved bookfairs, but because the idea of the First International Feminist Bookfair excited me, and in particular, I wanted to make contact with the Black feminists of England. Well, the fact remains; the First International Feminist Bookfair was a monstrosity of racism, and this racism coated and distorted much of what was good, creative, and visionary about such a fair. The white women organizers' defensiveness to any questions of where the Black women were is rooted in that tiresome white guilt that serves neither us or them. It reminded me of those old tacky battles of the seventies in the States: a Black woman would suggest that if white women wished to be truly feminist, they would have to examine and alter some of their actions vis-a-vis women of Color. And this discussion would immediately be perceived as an attack upon their very essence. So wasteful and destructive.
I think the organizers of the Bookfair really believed that by inviting enough foreign Black women they were absolving themselves of any fault in ignoring input from local Black women. But be able to learn from our errors. They totally objectified all Black women by not dealing with the Black women of the London community. Now if anything is to be learned from that whole experience, it should be so that the next International Feminist Bookfair does not repeat these errors. And there must be another. But we don't get there from here by ignoring the mud in between those two positions. If the white women's movement does not learn from its errors, like any other movement, it will die by them. When I stood up for my first reading to a packed house with no Black women's faces, after I'd gotten letter after letter from Black British women asking when was I coming to England, that was the kiss-off. I knew immediately what was up, and the rest is history.
Of course, I was accused of 'brutalising' the organizers by simply asking why Black women were absent. And if my yelling and 'jumping up and down' got dirty looks and made white women cry and say all kinds of outrageous nonsense about me, I know it also reinforced other Black women's perceptions about racism here in the women's movement, and contributed to further solidarity among Black women of different communities.
Feminism must be on the cutting edge of real social change. If it is to survive as a movement in any particular country. Whatever the core problems are for the people of that country must also be the core problems addressed by women, for we do not exist in a vacuum. We are anchored in our own place and time, looking out and beyond to the future we are creating, and we are part of communities that interact. To pretend otherwise is ridiculous. While we fortify ourselves with visions of the future, we must arm ourselves with accurate perceptions of the barriers between us and that future.

It's very similar to what happens currently when Black feminists challenge racism in feminist discussions - tears, accusations of divisiveness/too much academic language etc.

Really good article popping.