How can feminism in the UK be more inclusive? Striving for equality for all women

[isequalityamyth]

I have spent 40 plus years pushing, fighting, scrapping at times for equality, fair pay, calling out sexism, even the every day minor crap...if you call me girl I’ll call you kid all day long (apparently that is really annoying). & no I’m not sitting on your lap or taking a ride in your "fuck mobile".

The reality is though that I’ve been fighting from a very white privileged middle class standpoint. I had the privilege of having a feminist father who encouraged my education, encouraged my promotion.

When I went for entry jobs post graduating I was met with a phew by the male interviewers. My name and hobbies are not necessarily reflective of how I look. I got told once in an interview they were relieved I wasn’t a heffer, I looked and sounded english (seriously yes this was stated). This was the normal.

Yes I’ve fought my way up through the glass ceiling, but I was given a ladder.

I'm not demeaning my own battle nor those of others, I am just conscious that I had help, I had a tool set, I had support, I had the right skin colour, I had privilege.

How does one take a different perspective, not all women are the same, we all have different experiences. We are not starting from the same position, as a white Middle class woman I definitely had a head start in the equality stakes.

So my long winded question - how do we make feminism more inclusive? Not so white MC centric. As surely feminism needs to be more inclusive and it doesn't feel that way right now.

Feminism includes all women. It is concerned with all women. As far as I'm concerned what unites us all is the fact of our femaleness and the the unity of experience that effects us on account of this. We search and find what unites us. That cuts across class, race, religion - and even species.

Of course if there are specific groups or demographics that have specific needs that are unique to their particular culture, then they should be and feel enabled and encouraged to set up or create their own specific services

@30PercentRecycled

When I hear that something must be inclusive that often turns out to means it must be seen to do everything and do each of the things in an identical way. I believe that often creates an ineffective blob that descends into internal navel gazing discussion of whose approach should be the one message, which ends up being a bland non-message.

I do feminism in the context of who I am, how old I am, where I live and where I work. I will tackle the issues that I see around me in environment. I understand them, I can affect them, I understand the nuance. It's not about slogans and campaigns it is about changes for the better that I can influence.

I am not able to do that for, say, Hibo's FGM campaigns. I don't have the understanding, experience and influence. I am interested in her work. I donate money to her. You won't hear me campaigning day to day for her cause because I'd be LARPing.

People with shallow knowledge jumping on bandwagons to look inclusive or woke or whatever is damaging to causes in the long run.

If you were to look at my timeline on various SM, listen to my real life conversations, I might seem to be not very "inclusive".

You'd witness me mainly engaging with talking about the things I know and can influence: UK, Ireland, Canada, life as an expat, religion, STEM, representation at board level, gender non-conformity in straight women in the UK, domestic violence, coercive control, social acceptability of the man child, codependency, women's rights in UK law, the long term impact on mothers of giving up work when they have their second child.

You'd see my social circle being maybe 80% white (but mostly not British), mostly fairly well off.

I am not going to start playing white saviour or upper middle class saviour so I can say look how inclusive my feminism is.

So, I will give money to groups on the outer edge of my little world, those who I know enough about to trust. I will disseminate their messages. I will try to understand the pressures they tell me they face in their lives and try to see how it is the same or different to mine.

I will not pretend like I am useful boots on the ground for them. I will not tell them they have to do feminism in the same way as me in my life. Nor will I alter my feminist actions to look like I am "including" their feminism.

Each of us is doing good things appropriate to our sphere of influence and knowledge. I do not believe it is desirable to become a one size fits all blob or to LARP at the oppression of others.

Absolutely. Spot on.

How does one take a different perspective, not all women are the same, we all have different experiences. We are not starting from the same position, as a white Middle class woman I definitely had a head start in the equality stakes

Sounds like you were fortunate to have been born at a time in which the struggles of previous generations of women had borne some fruit - in terms of equality of access and opportunity etc.

But not that long ago, it didn't matter what your social class background was, you didn't have the same equality of opportunities that many of us now enjoy.

I don't recognise the women's movement as being a middle class one; certainly not in its early days. and I'm not sure how one gauges 'middle class'ness' from posts on here?

Feminism is not a 'niche' activity or a club that one joins. It is a way of viewing the world that centres the experience of females. As such it already inherently inclusive.

But as it happens, I've ended up working with families who are far, far less advantaged than I am. If you wanted to use intersectionality in an honest way (not as a trick to shoehorn in some male bodied people) you can see with some of the mothers they are physically, financially and sexually abused and controlled by their partners, discriminated against by our systems (especially when immigration status is an issue), racially abused on the rough estates they are housed on, racially discriminated against and far more at risk during maternity care, traumatised and often with additional needs that are not being met, AND then potentially losing their children or even criminalised for failing to protect their children from the very same abuse that they are still suffering.

These women are far more likely to end up in a prison or to need a shelter than I am. They are less likely to have a voice. They are less likely to understand the new woke language forced upon us that removes reference to women and breaks us into body parts.

This is relevant to your excellent and important points, Wendy

https://www.feministcurrent.com/2018/03/23/leftist-women-uk-refuse-accept-labours-attempts-silence-critiques-gender-identity/

Not long after this project took off, Deptford was gentrified, and working class people like Mcdonagh were no longer welcome. “Working class people can be quite scary to white middle class people not from the area,” she explained.
“We shout and swear and take the mick out of [tease] each other. We speak a different language. One that is often mistaken for aggression. We’re not [politically correct] because most of us have never really believed that politics is anything more then a rich man’s game to get richer. But we’re not unintelligent — we’re just not academic.”
Gentrification brought a sudden increase in “very posh, white, ‘social justice’ groups and movements.” Now, the local groups who claimed to support the most marginalized seemed, to Mcdonagh, to be little more than “a social gathering for privileged students, using the community as a trendy trademark.”
“They used weird pronouns and called themselves ‘they,'” Mcdonagh said. She didn’t think this “rich kid’s trend” would affect her work so didn’t concern herself too much. “We were too busy trying to keep people fed, off the street, and out of prison.”

When I hear that something must be inclusive that often turns out to means it must be seen to do everything and do each of the things in an identical way. I believe that often creates an ineffective blob that descends into internal navel gazing discussion of whose approach should be the one message, which ends up being a bland non-message.

Bears repeating

@CardinalLolzy

Disabled women are a priority for me - they seem to get left behind by everything.

Also this looks like a good organisation for supporting Black women in pregnancy. Black women have a 4x higher mortality rate than white women in pregnancy/childbirth.

www.blackmothersmatter.org

Thansk OP for starting this thread. I'm so fed up of just banging on about feminist issues and not doing anything. So I've started donating. I don't have much, but I'm donating what I can afford. I set up a contribution to FPFW and now I've donated to this fund. Women need to stand together. I wouldn't have got through the trials in my life without the support of the women in my life. I'm trying to be that woman for others. Thanks to PP for making it easy to donate.

But during a discussion with Goldsmiths students about a community housing project, things blew up. Mcdonagh was verbally attacked by students after rejecting the new language being imposed on her community, called a “white cis woman,” then a “bitch and a “cunt.” A young male student tagged her in a post online arguing that the Women’s March should not allow women to focus on “the vagina” as it was “transphobic.” When Mcdonagh asked how he was defining “woman,” the man responded, “Anyone who says they are.”
This is when, she says, it all fell into place. “That’s what ‘self-identify’ means: anyone can say they are anyone… So, rich, privileged people can claim to be marginalized.” Beyond that, she asks, “How can we keep working class women safe if anyone can be a women legally?”

Do you see it, fluffyhippo and BabyBee?

I’m brown - my feminism includes all women - except men. I get leery of the word intersectional because all I am seeing that mean now is “bow to the penis”

Certainly became more of a debate rather than a discussion. But thank you to those open to discussion and for the useful link to the funding thread, I'll have a proper look at that later, for me personally funding a grass route organisation seems a good place to start in trying to make feminism more accessible to more women.

Some interesting points, and some mmmmmm. It's interesting that some don't remember that it wasn't that long ago that sexism was overt/blatant in its nature and so common place that you brushed it off, particularly as a young woman starting in a work place. If I knew what I do now I like to think I would have handled it differently. If you need evidence of how it was, ask people in real life - particularly those over 50.

Was I the right OP to start this discussion, probably not. I'd been waiting to see if this topic came up, and it didn't. I've always viewed myself as a feminist. I may look at it a bit simply, in that I've have always looked at it as female empowerment, the battle for equality for women.

The posters who mentioned that the problem of perception may in part come from the mainstream representation of what acceptable feminism looks like - make a very good point. The more I think about this, yes.

The aim is not to divide, but to discuss how to make more women feel included in feminism.

This past week I have seen racist, misogynistic men like Piers Morgan being lauded by feminists who were sad a seeing one of the "good guys" go. Yesterday Julie Burchill had to issue an apology and pay damages to Ash Sarkar for misogynist and racist abuse that she meted out in order to defend Rod Liddell.

White, racist, middle class men were defended and WoC were attacked. That's a fucked up version of feminism and a good reason for black feminists to view the movement with suspicion.

I don't think you've done anything wrong, or are the wrong person, OP. You have indeed sparked an interesting discussion.

My experience is that women don’t participate in feminism because they don’t have time or they are too busy giving their time to other projects.

I really don’t see many white middle class women in feminist groups or activities, and don’t necessarily see it as helpful for them to move outside of their comfort zone and join if they are happier doing something in their workplaces or with their friends.

There are some amazing things done by women who contribute to this board. I was really impressed by the woman who is campaigning for girls to be included in park design, because there was a gap there to be filled.

With many people having gone off at a bit of a tangent with beliefs around privilege and power and identity, like in the Deptford example, people who have bought into that ideology maybe need to join a big organisation for formal training.

With formal training you can cover issues like safeguarding, the law, safety, access to basic needs, building trust and so on. It takes people out of that ideology and gets them to focus on real life problems and how to actually help people.

Yes Dione, and also this week leftist "feminist" group Sisters Uncut hijacked the outpouring of anger at a young woman's murder to support male murderers, paedophiles and rapists who committed suicide as having been "murdered by the police" in their anti-police, anti-prison campaign. They also made irresponsible public statements which possibly might endanger the prosecution of her murder.

Top feminism!

With many people having gone off at a bit of a tangent with beliefs around privilege and power and identity, like in the Deptford example, people who have bought into that ideology maybe need to join a big organisation for formal training.

With formal training you can cover issues like safeguarding, the law, safety, access to basic needs, building trust and so on. It takes people out of that ideology and gets them to focus on real life problems and how to actually help people.

That's a really good point. And it needs to not be ideological in nature.

Where I live we have women’s groups in local community centres. But a group of working class women or a group of women including a lot of refugees don’t really have the time or resources to explain a lot of stuff to women with no direct experience.

But something like the Witness Service will give you all the basic training in helping others and common issues, and then you can directly volunteer.

The aim is not to divide, but to discuss how to make more women feel included in feminism.

Why? Genuine question.

You say it as if feminism is Feminism_TM (trade marked), an organisation, a structure, that can choose to include and exclude people.

I don't give a hoot if my friend considers herself a feminist or not. I care that she knows she is not alone in fighting the fact that she was silently put on the mummy track after maternity leave. My friend in an abusive marriage, I don't care if she feels like a feminist, I care that the police and courts will protect her, properly, quickly, when she ends the relationship, right now she does not believe they will and so she and the children are staying put.

To me, feminism is a state of mind where you notice, reject and challenge the expectation that women are lesser than men. That's all.

I don't care if women feel like they are in the Feminism Club. In some ways it is better that they don't. If they feel they are "just being normal, sensible and fair" by doing things I would classify as feminism, great, more power to them, even if they dgaf about the label feminist.

I tend to think that you have to be really very privileged to care about the feminism brand, the feminism club. Debating how the feminism branding distracts from the real issues. Most women are simply trying to live their lives in ways that are fair and reasonable.

Even here on this thread talk of whether transwomen and transmen should be included in feminism annoys me. That's the blob getting into ineffective navel-gazing about the brand it seems to me.

Each person should be free to try to change the world to be more fair and reasonable. They don't have to try to solve everyone's problems. They can still be good people if they only focus on their own problems.

To me it is a valid question to say "Should transwomen be included in policy making around breast feeding support in refuges?" and my answer would be no, of course not. "Should trans people be included in policy making around gendered uniforms in work places?" yes, I believe they should. "Should transwomen be included in feminism?" or "Should transmen be included in feminism?" : that's philosophical navel gazing that's not particularly relevant except to people trying to market feminism like a product or organisation.

Again, I believe it distracts from the real issues.

I believe some people press for this kind of philosophical debate precisely because it distracts from the real issues. Thus, I don't usually get involved, instead I Bunbury it.

I glad you started this thread, OP, it has caused some of these ideas to properly crystallise in my mind. Before this they'd been washing around in my mind causing me low level irritation but not properly formed into a coherent opinion. Thank you. Good debate.

wrt 30PercentRecycled - well expressed:

I am not able to do that for, say, Hibo's FGM campaigns. I don't have the understanding, experience and influence. I am interested in her work. I donate money to her. You won't hear me campaigning day to day for her cause because I'd be LARPing.

People with shallow knowledge…

There's a thoughtful piece by Helen Lewis that discusses a related phenomenon amongst those who appropriate identities and moral authority to speak for a marginalised group:

The superficial similarities among all of these cases are striking: mostly women, all educated and professionally successful, all working in fields engaged with questions of oppression and marginalization. And in all of these cases, somewhere along the line, empathy tipped into appropriation. It was not enough to feel the pain of marginalized groups; they had to be part of them, too.
…
I asked Feldman whether it might be appropriate to think of these women in terms similar to the ones he would use to describe his patients. They were suffering from “social Munchausen syndrome,” if you like: faking social injuries in the same way that a classic Munchausen patient would fake asthma or cancer.

www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2021/03/krug-carrillo-dolezal-social-munchausen-syndrome/618289/?

The wider discussion about those who appropriate identities then going on to police others is thought-provoking.

@30PercentRecycled

I've actually really appreciated the practical suggestions. I was looking at it more from that perspective, and a concern that I'm hearing in real life and reading that some women feel excluded from "feminism" due to race, creed, social and economic position for example. This may be in part due to the way feminism is "branded" in the media.

Do I personally view feminism as a brand? - no.

Would I personally like to do more to practically support equality for more women? - yes. And there have been some great suggestions in the discussion which I will follow up on.

@isequalityamyth
If you have any power in your place of work, there is one thing you can do to help women who are less well off and thats to offer fixed hour and fixed pay entry level jobs, with full training given and no previous experience.

Single parents and disabled people who are on benefits and entitled to working tax credits need work but are unable to take jobs that are 'as and when required'.
The agencies paid to get them into work won't send them for interviews unless they are fixed hours and pay.

I get leery of the word intersectional because all I am seeing that mean now is “bow to the penis”

@Wandawomble yes, me too! And it's a real pity, because when Kimberlé Crenshaw first used the term, she was talking explicitly about the ways in which being both a woman, and of colour, rendered her invisible twice.

None of the TRA stuff originally. The gender ideology extremists have co-opted a woman of colour's ideas and misunderstood them! The ironies are multiple ...

@EmbarrassingAdmissions

wrt 30PercentRecycled - well expressed:

I am not able to do that for, say, Hibo's FGM campaigns. I don't have the understanding, experience and influence. I am interested in her work. I donate money to her. You won't hear me campaigning day to day for her cause because I'd be LARPing.

People with shallow knowledge…

There's a thoughtful piece by Helen Lewis that discusses a related phenomenon amongst those who appropriate identities and moral authority to speak for a marginalised group:

The superficial similarities among all of these cases are striking: mostly women, all educated and professionally successful, all working in fields engaged with questions of oppression and marginalization. And in all of these cases, somewhere along the line, empathy tipped into appropriation. It was not enough to feel the pain of marginalized groups; they had to be part of them, too.
…
I asked Feldman whether it might be appropriate to think of these women in terms similar to the ones he would use to describe his patients. They were suffering from “social Munchausen syndrome,” if you like: faking social injuries in the same way that a classic Munchausen patient would fake asthma or cancer.

www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2021/03/krug-carrillo-dolezal-social-munchausen-syndrome/618289/?

The wider discussion about those who appropriate identities then going on to police others is thought-provoking.

This is such a helpful post for me. I want to support other women from more marginalised groups but I always felt uncomfortable about it and didn't know what to do. So I will continue to give money where I can, amplify where I can, but let the experts be the feet on the ground. I will also continue to listen and read - every day's a schoolday after all!

Here's the link - interesting Twitter thread from 2019.

twitter.com/WTFoucault/status/1144980853019303937

The police acted in a heavy handed manner against women protesting male violence against women. By all means continue your support of racist, patriarchal institutions silencing women with force @Ereshkigalangcleg, just as JB defended Rod Liddell and other have spoken out in defence of Piers Morgan. As you say, top feminism.