Can someone explain why intersectional feminism might be problematic?

[CaptainWarbeck]

My sister is big on intersectional feminism, and when she explained it to me it seemed to make a lot of sense. Some women more oppressed than others, recognise your privilege etc. Just like we tell men to recognise theirs.

I also hear Sofie Hagen taking about intersectional feminism, and again she is a big proponent.

But on these boards I see it mentioned critically and I'm not sure why.

Can someone explain? I'm keen to hear all views.

As a mere mortal I find it utterly baffling. But I think this is where its power lies.

There appears to be an ever-shifting hierarchy of oppression, language is constantly policed , dissent is not tolerated and you are cast out for questioning the orthodoxy (which also changes constantly so be careful out there folks!)

Perhaps like many cultural ideas that are a bit barmy there’s a core of useful truth surrounded by a sea of unreasonableness. For lib fems and rad fems alike the task at hand is to get rid of the sea of madness while holding on to the tiny core of reason.

A hundred cliques and doublespeak galore. The opression olympics. 'Trumping' every injustice because someone somewhere has it worse than you feminists.

Leads to no issues being agreed upon as top, questions being punished, and no common ground being found.

w8

Love your post, it’s hit at what I’ve been trying to articulate in my head. Thank you.

Hi W8 what. Did you watch the Crenshaw video I posted? Intersectionality is not about a hierarchy of oppression at all. I agree it’s being interpreted that way by some people but the useful part of the idea is in the (American) name. Intersection. Junctionality does have the same ring!
How does discrimination meet at certain junctions (not a hierarchy but a point at which recognition and choices have to be made) and how can laws be written so they recognise this and don’t allow unfairly discriminating institutions to pass over certain groups while still congratulating themselves about their inclusiveness.

I think the problems of intersectional feminism stem not from feminist theory at all but from the leftist tendency to virtue signaling and sanctimony. This is what has muddied the waters to an essentially good idea.

I also think intersectionality ( and forgive me if I’m wrong, I don’t know a lot about it) seems to conveniently ignore economic factors in favour of identity olympics.

And I think so much oppression is due to economic inequality.

So where I live there are former industrial towns where the grass is literally growing between the paving slabs in the main high streets. There are no jobs, no hope, many social problems faced with dignity by most of the people who live there. Everyone is white apart from the refugees who are being housed there (and on the whole welcomed) These people have no power. None. What does intersectionality offer them? It just seems to want to tell them to STFU.

If you have money you have power and adopting all the pronouns in the world won’t change that.

Haven't rtt.

Intersectional feminism is problematic because MRAs have successfully used it to divide and conquer feminism, by convincing younger feminists that there is no such thing as a common, shared female oppression to unite and fight against.

MRAs have set up many fake social media identities pretending to be BAME women steering the discourse to demonise so-called 'White Feminism' and 'White Feminists' (even though radical feminists are diverse) and also encourage an ageist rejection of historical feminist discourse and 'older feminists'.

Furthermore intersectional feminism has enabled males to successfully wrap these intellectually untethered feminists into believing the absurd idea that a white male (belonging to the racially and sex-based oppressive dominant group) - can legitimately class themselves as the most oppressed subordinate group - beneath that of BAME women- simply by wearing make up and a dress and saying he identifies as female.

Un-manipulated intersectional feminism is extremely valuable, in as much as an examination of how 'race', class, poverty, disability, sexuality, etc can lead to compound forms of oppression, affecting women in nuanced ways....

However - bell hooks is wrong about her 'changing nodes' because the hierarchy of oppressor/oppressed is unchanging even though the situations an individual find themselves in will mean that they are advantaged by the hierarchy in one situation and disadvantaged by another.

GuardianLions

Class never seems to be examined though - unless it’s to throw out ‘middle class’ as an insult.

Exactly. - it is another tactic to reject the words of feminists who sound educated.

I should say intersectional feminism has been successfully hijacked by MRAs & TRAs so it is a rabbit hole not worth going down in the current climate - it usually seems to end up with misogynist divisions eg working class women viewing middle class women as the key oppressor, BAME women seeing white women as the oppressor... you see a pattern starting to form?

It's all bloody divide and conquer of feminism by MRAs

W8 thank you for your post and I agree - cultural relativism (because that's what it is, not intersectionality) applied in this way NEVER has anything to say on behalf of women in hyper-patriarchal communities.

wrappedup - exactly. Intersectionality applied as intended is a structural approach. This is my biggest beef with postmodernism. It steals useful words, concepts, theories and frameworks with specific meanings and inverts them, making everything impossible to discuss with any degree of clarity at all.

Intersectional feminism is problematic because it took a theory proposed by a Black women, changed it and silenced her.

Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw used the case DeGraffenreid v. General Motors. Black women were not employed in the office.
General Motors won the case. They were held to be not racist because they employed Black men on the assembly line; and not sexist because they employed white women in the office.

This clearly is not justice for Black women.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kimberl%C3%A9_Williams_Crenshaw

Liberal femininsm has made a mockery of intersectional theory, and declared it includes men. That means it now excludes many women of colour, who have become bigots.

Yy dj and it plays out for example in prostitution - where men have racist as well as misogynist fantasies where they cruelly violate and humiliate the women in both racist and misogynist ways.

Yes exactly, W8 and GuardianLions

I also see a lot of prejudice against the working classes, as any white woman in a Zara dress making feminist comments outside the intersectional dogma are presumed to be middle class and then told to check their privilege. It's reductionist, belittling and silencing.

Shon Faye had tweeted that 'middle class white TERFs' always focus on FGM and forced marriage when rejecting 'transwomen are women', yet wanted to remind everyone that those things don't happen to those privileged women either. Yes, because white women don't have friends that suffer those things; white women don't work in roles that provide services for those women; white women don't work in government, policy or academia tackling these issues.

Shon Faye invoking class privilege against women is the most laughable thing I've ever heard. He is the absolute embodiment of class privilege himself, which is why his fabulous glitter identity has been so lucrative for him.

As a caveat I don't really know about the theories behind intersectional feminism but I can just talk about what I have seen and experienced about the way it is currently being used in practice.

I think it is a useful idea to a) consider how sexism also links in with other oppressions eg ageism (the way older women are dismissed and belittled while men become more distinguished and respected) b) to try to make feminism inclusive of all women.

However, in practice it just seems to be about trying to silence women's voices. E.g. If a white woman tries to discuss her experiences of sex-based oppression, she is shut down for having 'privilege' or with the term 'white feminism' - and, well in my country at least, most of the women are white so that's most of us silenced already - despite the fact that most of these issues will be relevant to all women.

And it doesn't stop there. E.g. A black woman would be called out for having 'heterosexual privilege; or 'cis privilege'. Then, I as a lesbian would get called out because I've got 'white privilege' and 'cis privilege' and pretty much every women on the planet has got some kind of 'privilege' so essentially we all need to shut up and stop talking about misogyny and sexism and just count ourselves lucky and concentrate our focus on other (male-dominated) groups.

Wrap, i watched it and it was very powerful, she’s powerful. The stats on black women are frankly horrifying. She actually speaks to exactly my point when she is talking about interscetional failure. I think maybe this is the problem as You, Lang and others have pointed out, its become a vehicle for virtue signaling, cultural relativism and bullsh*t.

Crenshaw is absolutely right, specifically about failure of intersectionality. Not seeing people who you should have common cause with. I guess my view is that those intersectionalities do actually exist, they are very real things and I guess my complaint is exactly what she pinpoints. I love her, thank you for posting the video.

I think the experience of black women in the USA is a very specific experience and a lot of the history of the civil rights movement and womens right to vote really does expose where the failures occurred. I’m trying to sort this in my own head so this is probably a bit jumbled up right. But i have always assumed that when i soeak about women i mean all women. I don’t care what colour you are and I have assumed that I am viewed the same way (which is where some of my disappointment about the blind eye turned towards ethnic minority patriarchy stems from).

I guess for me i see it like this. If we say we are concerned specifically about women we mean women who are like us and those who are not. while I faced racism (and the undertones of it which are harder to explain, walk i to the wrong pub, the unfriendly service which only you seem to attract) at times in my life the biggest challenge to my automomy was as an actual woman. So that would be what is expected from in my interactions with other people from my community, what are my obligations as a daughter/sister/ wife/DIL etc. And these were personal relationships, not things that can easily be legislated for. These are issues of how women are seen in society in general to a greater of lesser degree. The biggest barrier for specifically asian women are their own families. Going to say something controversial here but i think muslim women face the biggest barriers in this regard. Indian women have definately had more freedom (to do their law degree and the hoovering at the same time yay!).

I think i have to go away and think about this some more. The pat yourself on the back interectionalists can go do one but there is still something niggling at me about this. The point made that for ethnic minority women, that the femists don’t want to know and the anti-racists don’t want to know rings true to me but how do we mush it together. And therin lies the problem cos in the context of asian culture conflicting with feminism there is a specific problem. Its not just about race, it is often religion, and culture as well. And women will often defend the very systems that opress them on the basis that is an assualt on their culture/religion/race, So sometimes even for women race trumps their womanhood (i fundamentally disagree with this position) Personally for me the rights of women trump all other intersectionalities (at the moment, who knows but I can’t see me changing my mind on that) My right to vote is not in doubt, my right to an education are not being questioned, my rights to medical care are not being questioned as an asian person. My rights as a woman at this point in time (with the gender bill) are.

Sorry i know I’ve been talking about this specifically as an asian woman but that because its the only context that I can speak about it with any autoroty. Anyone got any ideas i’d be interested to hear them.

Very interesting discussion. I may never get this straight in my head. Sorry that was probably lacking clarity. But I’m keen to see what others think of this. Its a difficult subject simply because of the conflicting drivers.

Anyone not watched the crenshaw video i really suggest you do.

Interesting post W8what

An interesctionalist is under pressure to ignore very disturbing aspects of oppression within cultures which specifically affect women because race trumps gender.

I have seen for myself women from Muslim and Asian communities who are campaigning on these issues being ignored when they try to engage with those in power because what they are highlighting is not considered 'politically correct' or 'sensitive to the culture of those communities'. If 'intersectional feminists' aren't supporting those women and are instead looking at the 'wider issues of race/culture' (ie what the male leaders of those communities prioritise), then IMO they are doing feminism wrong.

Shon faye is an asshole. Very intersting points made about class. I always felt a bit uncomfortable to be honest about the check your privilege crap. Who knows what privileges you have or dont have. And i really feel uncomfortable as painting people who are on your side as enemies or ignorant because they aren’t the same colour as you. Yeh i am probbaly never going to full understand the horror of being subjected to FGM or how i would be treated if i were a black woman in america or how people would treat me if i came from a council estate but to assume i cant empathise is just awful.

I think intersectionality as its being used at the moment is very much a bat to hit other people over the head with. Its not going to be taken seriously as a framework if its missued by the very people who need it to explain injustice.

Damn right betty.

Intersectional feminism is basically another word for whataboutery.

An interesctionalist is under pressure to ignore very disturbing aspects of oppression within cultures which specifically affect women because race trumps gender. This is just true, Theresa May’s bloody stupid shariah panel thing where its packed full of men who are basically going to say “its great we see no evidence of women being told they have to go back to abusers” which is blatantly NOT true is a good example of this. Feminism would say every women should be able to expect immediate access to UK law courts in the event of divorce, abuse, custody etc. based on intersectionality you are trying to disprove, you have just given an example of where intersectionality is needed to point out a problem. Which you have with the quoted post.
Those Asian women’s views being ignored and the Asian men having a say plus Theresa May thinking she is doing a feminist thing or one that might protect women. Those two groups will go on happily thinking job done because race and gender has been discussed without involving the very group that needs the help.

Theres a goodness gracious me reunion special (cant find it on youtube) where an asian woman goes to a DV shelter and the response is “i’m sorry but we can’t help you its part of your culture to be beaten by your husband”. Thats what intersectionality is to me. Another example. Pointing out the whole in feminism or how society treat women differently based on different factors. One you have given here is cultural perception. Crenshaw would have picked on that and probably looked at how the law and society deals with this. Why is there a double standard to different groups of women basically.

Hi quencher, as i pointed out in my second post, i agree with crenshaw. These are things and she rightly identifies those as intersectionality failures i.e. not recognising intersectionality and acting upon it.

My point is that intersectionality in the way it is ACTUALLY used rather than how its supposed to be used is the problem. There is a tension at the heart of it and as crenshaw rightly points out that one identity often trumps another and it often leaves very specific groups out in the cold.

I guess what I’m trying to communicate is how intersectionality “speak” looks on the ground. When feminists speak out as anti racists as part of a recognition of racism in society, they oddly end up excluding women. Yet they would probbaly genuinely believe they are speaking AS intersectionalists if you get what i mean. And if everyone is doing it then it distorts crenshaws intention. She points out herself that her own colleagues were using it in the wrong way.

I do agree with you, it is a thing and you are right. What i would argue is that it is being missused and for those of us who aren’t well versed of the theory behind it thats what it looks like.

Black women were not employed in the office.
General Motors won the case. They were held to be not racist because they employed Black men on the assembly line; and not sexist because they employed white women in the office

I am not familiar with the case but if that summary is correct it sounds as if it were badly argued from the wrong starting premise.

Hey lass just out of curiosity how would you have argued this? I still have a niggling thing in my head that I haven’t been able to tease out about this. Am hoping for some more clarity on it.