The problem with white feminism

[FrackOff]

Listen to this amazing podcast on white feminism, the link with the right wing, racism and colonialism pca.st/vzbdlq7j

You need to hear the whole thing to get the whole argument

In the UK is it not women working in nurseries who are most commonly on very low pay and who often face barriers to entry in other child care settings?

I have no doubt a lot of darker skinned women are employed in nurseries as are a lot of white working class women.

has her own voice and opinions, much of which has been ignored or decentred by posters on this thread, which I think rather makes Alison Phipps' point

You can't seriously imagine that all the posters on here could tell the interviewer was black and so everyone ignored her views (which were largely just agreeing with Alison)?

This does rather seem like you are not arguing honestly.

Thanks to everyone who posted about being a cleaner ; ) It isn't my favourite thing to do but I honestly felt less exploited than I did as a shop assistant (which involves a lot of cleaning anyway - but you get paid less than the contracted cleaners some places bring in) The pay is usually a bit better and the hours more flexible. Some clients look down on you coughwealthySaudiscough, but some people look down on bin men, shop workers, window cleaners, plumbers etc. Same for bad employers.
Comparing working class service-type occupations,including essential services, to prostitution is such a poor take.

There's a rather large difference in the U.K. pay wise between a private nanny and a childminder/babysitter or even an au pair. The idea of the darker skinned, poorly paid nanny is another Americanism, isn't it?

Childminding, as an occupation, is something many mothers of young children do, or consider doing, in the U.K. Nothing to do with class or race, necessarily. All mothers require childminders at one point or other; especially if grandparents or other family members are not at hand.

Some clients look down on you coughwealthySaudiscough**

I was thinking of that example myself......it is not just about middle class white women, as we are led to believe, but middle class women of other ethnicities can themselves be guilty of treating their domestic help as subservients. Especially those from cultures in which domestic help and 'servants' are the norm for many.

I think it’s actually quite telling that certain posters seem to be arguing that being a cleaner is “unskilled” whereas being a painter or a changing oil or doing minor home or computer repairs for a living is “specialized labor”.

This is the problem right here. Cleaning DOES require specialized equipment (including chemicals that need to be handled and disposed of carefully) and skills similar in type to those needed for the other occupations listed. You ask my brother to clean a house he is going to get 409 and some paper towels and after he’s done you’ll ask him when he’s planning to get started. He has no more clue how to clean than I do how to change the oil on my Car. However of course Either of us could quickly learn either skill.

We don’t see “women’s work” as specialized only because of misogyny. There’s no other reason.

Cleaning DOES require specialized equipment (including chemicals that need to be handled and disposed of carefully) and skills similar in type to those needed for the other occupations listed

Another similar example there could be hairdressing - a "female" job looked down on for being "low skilled"

Absolutely. I can vouch that there are quite a few middle class South Asians and Arabs that have a terrible attitude towards those they consider 'beneath' them and some of the women think it's quite normal to treat domestic helpers badly and not pay them well or expect them to turn up at all hours or do more than they were hired for.

People should be held responsible for their poor or bad behaviour irrespective of their ethnicity and I think many in the West feel reluctant to do this for fear of being labelled racist or something, usually by other 'white' folk in a similar manner to those who are prone to go on about 'white feminism'.

And we're back to the term POC being a construct that fails when it takes no account of social class!

Black women in the UK are affected by colonialism! Where do you think their families have travelled from? Also institutional racism is a direct descendant of colonialism.

Just listen to it. Any precis will take on the tone of the summariser's thinking (see trans kids thread)

There is a correlation between socioeconomic disadvantage and ethnicity.

Correlation does not equal causation though, does it - that would be very lazy thinking

At no point have I denied black women are affected by racism in the U.K. (?!) What I have said, is that some groups of white women are also considered ethnic minorities, and using "POC" rather than BAME, as well as assuming they are the "colonisers" is offensive to them.

Why do you refuse to acknowledge this?

I think it’s actually quite telling that certain posters seem to be arguing that being a cleaner is “unskilled” whereas being a painter or a changing oil or doing minor home or computer repairs for a living is “specialized labor”

This is true but I think at least some were aware that their reaction was not logical but a result of societal attitudes.

There is no reason why painting and decorating, a domestic chore the majority of people do themselves but a minority outsource should be considered a 'skilled' trade while cleaning, a domestic chore the majority of people do themselves but a minority outsource is considered 'unskilled' beyond ingrained, unthinking, sexist societal norms.

Surely skill level is fairly easily defined by how long on average it would take to train a person to perform the job competently.

@Antibles. Yes and no. You have highly skilled cooks, gardeners, builders, musicians, writers and artists who are self taught and don't need people ratifying their skills. Some superb cleaners and decorators ditto. And some highly qualified people who are outclassed by less qualified people for other attributes than paper qualifications.

Black women in the UK are affected by colonialism! Where do you think their families have travelled from? Also institutional racism is a direct descendant of colonialism.

Yes - and some non-white women also benefited. For example:

www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/yasmin-alibhai-brown/racism-and-the-truth-about-the-ugandan-asians-172084.html

Brown gets a lot of shit - often from the Woke - for daring to talk about this.

But this is why we are telling you that you can't elide social class and why we're telling you that importing US cultural imperialism is unhelpful in a non-US context. It won't help British minorities at all.

In fact, I'd argue the elision of class as unhelpful in a US context also: non-oppressed wealthy immigrants are able to appropriate the oppression faced by descendants of African slaves or indigenous peoples as directly applicable to their own situations, even if they grew up as the oppressing class in their home countries in a house full of servants.

Happy for my metric to include for a person to train themselves to that level. I didn't specify whether a formal qualification needs to be awarded by someone else at the end of the training period.

I think we may agree that the skill level reached will depend a lot on the number of hours required to reach it. With some jobs or activities you absolutely must put in thousands to be competent or safe to be let loose on the public lol while for others you really can peak at maximum skill and efficiency with far fewer.

There will often (but not always, depending on supply) be a correlation with how replaceable you or they are. The "fuck it, I'll do it myself" rule is also fairly useful. So for me: Cleaning? I can do it. Wallpapering? I'll give it a stab from scratch. Plastering? Professionals. Appendectomy? Definitely professionals. Etc.

*There is a correlation between socioeconomic disadvantage and ethnicity&

There is also a correlation between economic disadvantage and geographical location, that has nothing to do with race.

I used to be a teacher, and I taught in a very high achieving grammar school, amongst others. Originally, a long time ago, at its inception, this school was a boys' school; and then about twenty or so years ago it started admitting girls.

It was, back in the day, a predominantly 'white' school - with maybe a few children of other ethnicities. These days it is about a 50/50 split between white pupils and pupils of other ethnicities. What is striking is the different ethnic make-up of the school. Large numbers of Chinese - Asian and Indian - Asian, as well as a growing number of pupils of Middle Eastern/Arabic origin, but relatively few black pupils. Of those, it is conspicuous how many are second generation of, say, Nigerian professional parents.

Different ethnic groups have their own issues, and bring with them their own specific cultural patterns. And ethnic groups each have their own class issues too. There is also social diversity within each ethnic grouping.

It's fairly clear that it's a class issue and not a feminist issue. Is anyone surprised that working class women and minorities are at the bottom of the pile in terms of opportunities and aspiration?

Wow, I feel like this discussion has got a little lost in the weeds.

It's not really a question of whether childcare (or cleaning, but mainly this is about childcare IMO cleaning is attached to that for secondary reasons)is an honourable or skilled job.

It's in terms of seeing the ability to use paid childcare to work elsewhere as some kind of feminist victory.

People are able to use childcare and work if they make more money than they need to pay the caregiver. This sets limits around who can afford it, and also who will go into it and what their economic situation is likely to be. Can some university student do that for a year, are their high priced nannies. Sure, but they really aren't characteristic of workers in the childcare sector. A family with two professional jobs and paying for care is better off than they would be otherwise. Maybe the mother also feels freer and more fulfilled as a result, but that doesn't in itself make it a victory for women. It makes it good for her personally, and maybe good for women of her class, and also families of that class.

But what about working class or poor women? They probably don't make enough to pay for care, so they aren't freer in that way, and they don't have access to the financial benefit of care, which accentuates the income gap. If they do childcare themselves they are now doing the same work, just for other people's kids instead of their own, but again that is similar work and not great pay, so how is that liberating for women as a group? What's more, where two income families are the norm, cost of things like housing tends to go up which affects them more. They may find they have to work to get by and use some sort of lesser childcare.

Even if you bring socialised care into the mix it can be difficult, as it may cut down choices rather than increasing them. It is difficult to justify not working for a wage when there is free or cheap childcare, even if you'd much rather be taking care of your own kids, and again the costs associated with a society of dual income families may force taking the job. And the satisfaction of the work for its own sake may not be quite the same between a professional job and some sort of service industry low wage position.

The fact is that some people will always have to be dedicated to doing childcare, and mostly it will be women, especially if it is paid care. So I tend to be suspicious when I hear that somehow women are going to be freed from the tyranny of childcare. The story is perhaps that somehow it's transferred from women who don't like it to those who do, but generally that doesn't seem to be the typical axis of the exchange.

Another similar example there could be hairdressing - a "female" job looked down on for being "low skilled"

Eh? Are you serious? Low skilled?

Anyone who thinks hairdressing is a low skill occupation is welcome to try anything more complicated than a fringe trim on their own hair and then get back to me about how well that went.

(Even the fringe trim can go horribly wrong)

(Even the fringe trim can go horribly wrong)

I can vouch for that.

Eh? Are you serious? Low skilled?

I believe her point was that it is considered low skilled because it's associated with being a woman's job, not because it's actually a low skill job.