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

Sick in bed, so listened to it all. Gist as I listened below. Spoiler: I didn't find it convincing.

• The suffragettes wanted the vote because they were racist (don't ask for a rationale, there isn't any).
• Metoo is about carceral feminism and about privileged white women taking power from men rather than dismantling power.
• The polical whiteness of feminism makes trying to take back power and white women's anger problematic.
• Right wing feminists and liberal feminists are all the same, because they are politically white.
• Alison Phipps feels that Alison Phipps is very brave.
• The media is anti trans. The anti trans movement is embedded in the establishment and has all the platforms/money.
• How mean it was to suggest Munroe Bergdorf is not appropriate for the NSPCC just because she models porn. This is clearly about white supremacy.
• Blah, blah, blah colonialism.
• Lots and lots of repetition about how everyone in the world is wrong and evil and all think the same thing as Nazis and Piers Morgan because they are white.
• Explains waves of Feminism (sort of), which are all about white Feminism. Apparently the 4th wave is the internet.
• Punishing sexual violence causes violence.
• Everyone is feministing wrong. Everything feminism has achieved is a white supremacist, establishment lie (goes on a lot). No one will listen to Alison because of white fragility.
• White women who experience sexual violence should shut up and acknowledge their privilege.
• How do we deal with significant feminists doing unspeakable things (by opposing trans rights)? Their work is limited and myopic and inherently white.
• She really, really fucking hates the suffragettes.
• Rad feminists define women by their capacity to reproduce which apparently excludes black women.
• Alison is so wise.
• Laughing at the hypocrisy of opposing Geoffrey Boycotts knighthood.
• All men our sleazy so there is no point in naming and shaming. Sacking harassers is NIMBYism.
• Demands for safeguarding protections are inherently white and just feminists wanting their daddy to ride in and save them.
• Not saying that victims can't have their own spaces but... structural view, talking to men, something, something....right that's sexual assault sorted.
• Wow she's so inspiring. Buy her book.

FrackOff. Surely you were taking the piss with this recommendation? Even where it circles valid critique there is just no actual content.

This seems like an excellent way to gaze at our navels and feel incredibly guilty for just existing and get nothing done.

Yes, that's what I got from it. Any kind of action or view is 'problematic'.

In the rest of the world all feminism is focused on the material realities of women's lives because of course it bloody well is.

Quite bloody right too. I was listening to a podcast recently about the Batwa Pygmy people of Uganda and Congo. One of the many issues they face is their women being raped because there is still a belief amongst other more dominant ethnic groups like the Buganda that having sex with them cures HIV.

You would think you if over 90% of your students stop turning up at your lectures you would want to a) find out why and what you can do to improve the way you present your course and b) keep it quiet and hope your colleagues don’t pay too much attention.

I do like a White Russian...

So, to precis: she hates women?

Alison Phipps feels that Alison Phipps is very brave.

In what sense? Her's is a position supported by mainstream feminist organisations and universities and any divergence from it potentially gets you abused, sacked or no- platformed.

In what way is she remotely brave for expressing this incoherent drivel?

Though I am sure all her students identify as being present.

I’m sick of the only acceptable female behaviour and views being those defined by men. It’s the equivalent of white people only listening to other races if an Uncle Tom position is adopted.

She does hate women. She has said so before. She says that she has more in common with her ‘trans sisters’ than stupid biological women.

I can’t see how this is different to the ‘I don’t have female friends because women are such bitches’ type argument.

And yes, wonderful idea there. Don’t punish or even exclude sexual abusers. Many genius.

Just googled Alison. I had foolishly assumed (having only heard her from this) that she was black and that her racism towards white people and claim to speak for black women was based on her experience.

Holy fuck. With hindsight that podcast is insane.

As PPs have said, there are so many issues which do affect non-white women more which could be drawn attention to, but nothing of that here.

Hang on, back up a second. The whole thing is pretty incomprehensible, but... "Rad feminists define women by their capacity to reproduce which apparently excludes black women"

How the fuck does that work?!

Ok, so I listened to a few minutes in the middle to get some idea of her point, she said, "the idea the we (she was referring to western white women) own feminism is ridiculous." She seems to be basing that on the fact that women have written about their own experiences, but not mentioned the history of women in different cultures. (Germaine Greer did tons of that, so that has definitely not been my experience across the board)

I agree white people don't own feminism, I don't think they are claiming they are or that by writing about their experiences they believe they do. In a mostly white country the representation of women will be mostly white. Representation gets slightly misused I think, we want representation of women at 50% but despite the fact the 90% of those women are white they are considered over represented by this white feminism trope.

So much misogyny

Thanks for the summary! Though surely if someone is already ill then listening to that drivel too constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.

I'm fairly sure that the reason no one will listen to Alison is that Alison is talking shite. Being smug about it really doesn't help as much as she seems to hope it will.

In a mostly white country the representation of women will be mostly white. Representation gets slightly misused I think, we want representation of women at 50% but despite the fact the 90% of those women are white they are considered over represented by this white feminism trope.

This. Women are half the population of this country, but most are white so that is going to be reflected in the representation. We need to make sure that the experiences of black and minority women are considered in policy making and that all women have a voice, but yes British feminism is likely to be majority white women, numbers wise.

Frackoff, have you met Alison?

We as in society/feminism, not just white people.

How the fuck does that work?

That was one of several throwaway lines for which I could determine no logical coherence and she did not explain.

Where that happened (as that quote) I have tried to use the exact words she used because I haven't a scooby fucking do what her point was.

The whole thing is quite 'stream of consciousness'.

It's about 80% white in the U.K., isn't it? So say there are 10 people and we get 50% female representation - that would be 4 white women and 1 BAME

How the fuck does that work?!

Perhaps if one day a student finds themselves with no other option but to attend one of her lectures* they can ask how she thinks babby is formed when the parents are not white.

*Snowstorm that they need to take shelter from and the lecture hall is the only place open?

That tweet posted by Reality suggests she's nuts. "Trans women are more my sisters..." Are you OK, hun?

Does Alison have anything to say about the numerous women of colour involved in gender critical feminism? Linda Bellos, Lucy Masoud, Raquel Rosario Sanchez, Allison Bailey? Not to mention the number of Muslim and orthodox Jewish women who will be excluded from public spaces once men are admitted to facilities that were previously women-only?

I listened until the suffragettes (inclusive of the Indian and other minority women of the time) being mixed up with suffragists (the US equivalent.)...

Then it's lost me as there wasn't even basic fact checking.

Can we have a podcast on the problems of white male socialists?

Does Alison have anything to say about the numerous women of colour involved in gender critical feminism? Linda Bellos, Lucy Masoud, Raquel Rosario Sanchez, Allison Bailey?

Yes. She did not name them, but the only cohesive bit is in the middle (because the iterviewer actually asked a coherent question) and addresses this difficulty with Alison's 'argument':

Their arguments are 'myopic and inherently white'. Their type of Feminism was always problematic and is being exposed now as an attempt to grab power from men and to pull up a drawbridge, not liberate others. Feminism needs completely pulling down and remodeling in the image of Alison Phipps.