Let's Talk about White Feminism

[MagnificentDelurker]

This is going to take a bit long but please bear with me. I feel like an intruder as I have actively been avoiding feminism and specially the white kind all my life. Kinda like putting my hand in my ears and saying la la ... So I feel a bit of an imposter to come and talk about white feminism with some supposed sagacity but here it goes:

First a bit of background: I am an immigrant to UK from a deeply religious and Muslim country. I have been as gender non conforming as you could get in country with mandatory hijab laws. I have argued for women's right as much as I could but still I would never call myself feminist. So it was a delight to discover mumsnet and read writing of so many fiercely intelligent women.

So seeing so many of my sisters getting attacked for supposedly white feminism I had to rant somewhere. I have met many feminist who have been overtly/ inadvertantly racist. Probably not more so than general population but again that is not the point.

Feminism is a women's right movement. Feminist cannot be expected to fight everyone's battle for them. Feminists are humans like most, we (humans) are capable of detailed analysis of situations that are close to our own experience but generally would fill the rest with background noise or stereotypes. We might know in detail how subtle but effective sexism works but at the same time completely black out the experience of being working class man. This is just human.

However, this does not invalidate the experience of a white middle class woman. The suppression is real and she has every right to fight for herself. Her fight has also benefitted me as a muslim women growing up in a different era and a different country. Because women fought for vote, it meant that I did not have to. We were given the right to vote because it became a norm in most countries. I did not have to fight for right to education either. I was automatically educated, again it became the norm. I was albeit begrudgingly admitted to university, was even allowed to choose typically male subject (engineering). In fact, the ratio of women to men in my university (predominately a STEM university) was no different to say US (where I travelled for post graduate studies ) . I am happy that I did not have to fight these battles and I thank (white) feminists for it, even if some were racists. We have our own battles, from fighting mandatory hijab to street harassment, to unfair divorce laws. I am mightily glad that we do not have to fight from square one.

Yes there are times that what is called as white feminism can transgress. But those are not the times when white women are fighting for rights that might only affect a subset of women they belong to in short term. They transgress when they advocate to invade my birth country to free the women. They transgress (in my opinion and I understand that many disagree) when they advocate for banning hijab and hence taking agency away from muslim women. They transgress when they they simplify the experiences of my life as a muslim woman to just being a victim.

None of the above applies in this fight for women's spaces. And I feel very included that these women fight not for banning of my hijab but for spaces that I can feel comfortable taking my hijab (not me specifically as I don't wear hijab but you get my point).

Finally, among marginalised people sometimes those with more power are the only ones with a voice and that does not mean they should not use it.

It is a bit incoherent but just wanted to say you go girl to all of you (and rant a bit)

but I don’t think it’s accurate to say anybody, never mind white feminists, advocated an invasion ‘to free the women’.

There is no way anyone said that unless they had an agenda about feminism...

I've been on twitter today for the first time in ages and I see how 'white feminism' is used there, often by white men, but I don't feel particularly inclined to react against the term. Yes, I'm white and feminist and middle class and I have a fuck ton of privilege and a million blind spots. But I'm a woman and I'm queer so that's where I focus my efforts. I can't speak for women of colour because it's not my experience. I can listen and I can try not to get in the way. But I can't authentically be anything other than a white feminist. If my blind spots are annoying to women of colour I'm pleased that they feel able to tell me, because i need to know where I'm missing something important. If I'm annoying white men I'm just doing my job.

I like your job, kittens. I may join you!

I do think western women can have a habit of telling other women how to live. Presumably it's better we empower each other to make our own decisions. I'm also afraid that we can encourage rebellion which brings with it severe punishments in s9me countries. The young people dancing to 'Happy' who ended up imprisoned, for example.

I'm happy to lend support to other women, I can't set their agenda. Only the women affected know if they want to be allowed to drive more than they want to tackle their dress code.

To be fair, it's usually the Daily Mail saying that we are invading to free the poor oppressed hijab wearers. The rest of us know it's all about oil.

@hipsterfun you're being highly disingenuous with this "I just agreed with what she said about her own post!" nonsense. Unless you truly have no experience of how social interaction works, you know fine well that you were massively rude and dismissive and it was uncalled for.

These boards are dominated by the perspective of relatively affluent, often older, women raised in majority white communities in the UK. Their perspectives are valid. I belong to the same group (well, late 30s, so depends how one defines "older"). But on one of the rare occasions we actually get a poster who talks about being from a significantly different background, everyone piles in to tear her apart over totally imagined insults. Do you honestly not see how terrible that looks?

And you need to stop fixating on the invasion thing. Another poster has linked you to information about this and you've ignored it and continue to wilfully miss the point. What are your other criticisms of the OP, exactly? You keep coming back to this one thing - that you clearly have not understood - as a justification for your rudeness.

I think you're implying that I'm a man or possibly trans in your last post, though I'm not sure what I've done to make you think this?

I think some of the responses on this thread are an example of why some women of colour feel ignored and alienated by 'white feminism'. A white man on twitter crying 'white feminism' is a totally different thing to a woman of colour explaining how she feels marginalised.

During the run up to the invasion of Afghanistan there was considerable coverage of how awful the regime was to women and how great things could be once the regime was overthrown. For example many stories about the attitude of the Taliban to the education of girls.

This was just one pretext among several that was used to sell the invasion to a particular constituency, ie the liberal left. But it was definitely put forward in the media and would have been hard to miss at the time.

I could imagine women in Afghanistan being pretty pissed off at hearing this "reason" and then watching the allied forces bomb their country to shit and leave utter chaos and suffering behind.

I didn’t find it coherent. What do you want me to say? I can’t prove I wasn’t being disingenuous.

But on one of the rare occasions we actually get a poster who talks about being from a significantly different background, everyone piles in to tear her apart over totally imagined insults. Do you honestly not see how terrible that looks?

Could you be confusing me with other posters? I wasn’t tearing her to pieces over an imagined insult. I didn’t feel insulted, I was questioning a particular thing she’d said; you interpret that as a fixation, fine.

If you can, for a moment, accept I was in good faith, would you have me disagree differently on account of the OP’s different background? (Difference being difficult to qualify and quantify.)

I wasn’t implying you’re a man or trans I just realised I’d made an assumption based on nothing.

nauticant, I agree it was a pretext. And I don’t think it’s accurate to say ‘white feminism’ was advocating for it. Most feminists I know wouldn’t be into invasions, broadly speaking.

MagnificentDelurker
First of all thank for that post. Unlike some posters, I found it very clear and insightful.

It’s amazing how the fights women fought at home (so here in the U.K. or the us or France etc etc) has created a template for all other countries to follow. And yes that means considering women vote and education as the norm rather than something to fight for.
The fact that feminists (white) have had that sort of power in their country has allowed massive changes in other places in the worl where I wouod have been harder to implement.

But I do hear you on he (very big) risks for (white) feminists to then think that their way of looking at the world is THE right one. And therefore to impose certain ways such as not having to cover yourself because it’s just the expression of the (over)power of men on women.
I’ve actually had a few discussions on that subjects with other women and I’ve always struggled to explain WHY for eg Muslims women are not ‘enslaved’ by the simple fact they are wearing the hijab. Probably because, as a white woman, I don’t know enough to be able to explain it!

So THANK YOU.
Thank you for reminding us that being a feminist doesn’t allow us to dictate to other women how to live their life. That some customs that we, in our culture, we can sometimes see as ‘bad’ and ‘degrading’ (a word I have hear often about the hijab for example), do have the same meaning to you/others.
Thank you for reminding us that we can suffer from the same privilege blindness that men can suffer from too.
And that we need to LISTEN and not judge. Listen and accept that this is someone else experience, even if it grates (to hear some of our ideas/behaviours are actually wrong/racist).

What about when some women's right to self expression creates an environment that allows others to be abused? Some women think sex work is a legitimate career choice, meaning that it's harder to legislate to protect the majority who are exploited. Women who freely choose 'modest' dress, make it easier to pressure those who would like to dress differently.

How does that work? Please don't think I'm being goady. I'm learning!

pickle because we shouldn’t be fighting for the right to dress in less modest way but for the right to dress the way we want, if possible wo any judgment either way (too modest is being uptight/very religious and not modest at all being a s*t)

Ok. So all choices made by women are feminist choices. That works for the hijab, but what about working in the sex trade? If it was never an acceptable choice, it would be easier to ensure no woman is exploited in porn, prostitution, stripping etc.
I'm a novice at feminism, I'm afraid.

nauticant, thanks. We were not living in the uk at the time (military serving overseas) and so didn’t really see any of the uk tabloid coverage. It certainly wasn’t a reason discussed in military circles, but I can see that media coverage might have chosen that angle. (Equally - there is of course always bias in military propaganda machines - not my intention to suggest that they had any more veracity than the red tops)

Thanks All
The discussion is becoming more interesting as many poster originally offended have had their rants as well.

What motivated the post was that each time women did something in Britain or US where I have links my FB would become full of what about women in Saudi Arabia. As if women have to shut up as long as they are better off than women in S.A. The recent trend in accusing women’s rights activivists of white feminism also did not help. I am using the term “white” for lack of better word. And I have not come here to ask anyone to check their privilege. God knows I probably have more advantages in my life than most women in Britain white or otherwise. I am not apologising for them or asking anyone else to do so for theirs.

Just adding another perspective on why feminism is not easy and that’s why I have avoided it.

Now for hijab:
As a young woman, I hated mandatory hijab. I think preventing young girls to enjoy their bodies is abhorrent. How I yearned for the wind in my hair and how I yearned for my youthful beauty to be in full display. In my case this was done through forced hijab but there are myriad of other ways.

Pickle,

What you describe can happen but I have also seen mixture of women with or without hijab living side by side (before mandatory hijab). My mom and her sisters one example.

In fact a version of what you describe is a good picture of my life now. To succeed in my job I have to be always groomed, in high heels and have to look as young as I could. I finally decided to cover my beloved grays. I worry that plastic surgery becomes ubiquitous and as a result I will be “forced” to do it just to fit in. So I get you, I am afraid I don’t have an easy answer but still think banning hijab is not the answer. Happy to listen and change my mind.

Not all choices are feminist choices. But we all make choices from our unique cultural standpoint. Wearing makeup and shaving my legs is not a feminist choice but I do it because I am not prepared to go against societal expectations. We all have to battle against our social conditioning and we don't always win. And the stakes for Muslim women who choose not to cover (in some communities) are much higher than the stakes are for me so how can I judge their choices, even whilst acknowledging they aren't ideal and supporting ways to dismantle the expectation.

We all make compromises but we are happier to judge the compromises women from 'outsider' communities make than look internally at our own choices.

Or to run with the sex work analogy I believe prostitution is VAWG and detrimental to the status of women in society. There are very few women who freely choose prostitution, the vast majority do so because of all of the shitty options available to them It seems the least shitty. Lib fems would say it's their choice and argue that rad fems take away agency from prostituted women by saying that they don't make free choices. What rad fems actually say is a choice between three different types of shit is a false choice so they want to work to increase the number of choices available to them and reduce demand from the men who think they have the right to pay to abuse someone who has limited other options.

Timbuktu

One major deterrent to my swimming regularly is the fact I don’t like to shave my legs and don’t have the courage to go to the pool unshaven.

I'm going tomorrow and so have spent today removing my winter pelt.

I wish I could just say fuck it but I actually find it really hard. I have a colleague who doesn't shave and doesn't care and I was surprised by how uncomfortable it makes me to see her body hair. It's really fucked up conditioning.

Someone posted recently (in another thread I think) about cultural ideas of modesty and I think that's an area which is actually really ripe for analysis. In japan and parts of Scandinavia mixed naked sauna/ hot springs is appropriate. In the U.K. we usually expect the female body to be covered from above the nipple to below the buttocks with the midriff being seen as a little racy and not something an older or larger woman would show but in India it is totally acceptable and more formal/traditional but showing the legs is immodest.

I feel uncomfortable changing in open changing rooms and try to get dressed under a towel etc but many other cultures really don't care. I remember going for a Turkish hamman where I was stripped nude and thoroughly scrubbed all over by the lady.

I find it fascinating. And in the same way we recognise men can never escape their male conditioning i don't think that we ever escape our wider cultural conditioning either.

What the Hell is "white feminism"? I thought feminism was for all women? Surely that's the point? A black British woman will have different experiences from a Black African woman, but they will also share a lot of the same experiences, and some of these will be because of being female. Just like a white middle class woman will have a different sort of life, and different challenges to a white working class woman.
You might not have just said to your son " that junkie from up the road just let his dog shit on our garden again" ( like I just did.), you might have just said " darling it's time for your cello lesson" but it's irrelevant.

Women of colour face racism, working class women often face poverty, but these are ON TOP of sexism and misogyny.
And what feminist, white or otherwise, has been trying to ban the hijab, or invading countries to "free the women"? News to me.
Most of my women friends are feminists. They are a mixed bag- some will experience racism, some disablism etc etc. ALL experience sexism.
And why the assumption that all feminists online ( so, you know, you can't see them) are white??
That's quite an assumption really, isn't it?

Sorry if I'm missing something. .I'm not an academic - I'm just pragmatic. All this dividing women up and guilt ridden hand wringing for not being the right kind of oppressed just seems counter productive.

Who cares if you are white? Anyone who tells you to shut up or tells others to ignore you because you are white and there are "more oppressed people elsewhere" is a bigot. It's the same as when MRAs say "but what about homeless men" in response to something a feminist says.

This is inherent in "intersectionality" and has allowed the trans agenda to thrive. They are the "most oppressed" and you can't question them from your "privileged position". Fuck right off.

I think the reason some feminists tend to react so strongly against hijab is that we’ve had our own “hijab”here for so long and fought like tooth and nail to get rid of it.

We know all too well the insidiousness and complexities of modesty, conformity, the sexual double standard, the idea of women being the gatekeepers of sex and virtue, etc, because that was our culture until very recently. And still is to an extent.

The collection of ideas that the hijab represents isn’t foreign to western feminists. It’s our very recent history.

The collection of ideas that the hijab represents isn’t foreign to western feminists. It’s our very recent history.
But how can you say that what you, as a white woman from the West, saw with your ‘hijab’ is what women see in a Muslim country for example?
Who are you to say that you somehow know they feel the same and therefore you can tell these women how they feel or should aim for (I assume no need for a hijab ever??)

I know some fierce feminists who will always dress modestly. Because they are totally able to mix their religious beliefs and feminism. Whilst not being critical of women who dont want to ‘abide’ by those modesty rules.

IfNot nope a black woman in the U.K. will experience issue linked to fact she is a woman (like any other woman) AND the discrimination linked to the fact she is also black.
The double whammy will make her experience different than the one you experience as a white woman.

Women of colour face racism, working class women often face poverty, but these are ON TOP of sexism and misogyny.

For a lot of WOC is isn’t “on top” though. That way of thinking suggests that there is a hierarchy to the discrimination or oppression or whatever that the WOC often faces and therefore opens the door to having her experience devalued because her argument/struggle/standpoint etc as a WOC is seen as less significant than her experience as simply woman. That isn’t quite right because as many PP have pointed out, unless you have been in the position whereby you are inherently made aware of your race or faith as part of your life experiences, then the two often cannot simply be seperated as seperate entities. For many WOC, those strands of their identity are far too closely intertwined for that distinction to be made.