‘White’ Feminism

[Sociallydistancedcocktails]

I was recently on a thread which got me thinking about this.

Do you think ‘white’ feminism exists?

And your thoughts on the article below. I am quoting an excerpt

“White feminism is a term that has been on the tip of everyone's tongue since actor Emma Watson addressed past criticisms of her feminism in statement to her book club about the topic in early January. Though it's difficult to find an exact definition for "white feminism," it has come to describe a not-quite-feminist mindset that doesn't take into account the ways the women of color experience sexism, and how it differs from the way white women experience it. Simply put, white feminism is for white women who don't want to examine their white privilege. The term "intersectional feminism," which stands in opposition to white feminism, was coined by civil rights advocate and law professor Kimberlé Crenshaw in 1989 to help describe the experiences of Black women who not only face sexism, but systemic racism.

Understanding the ways race, gender, and other factors (such as disability, class, or sexuality) intersect is crucial to making our feminism more effective and impactful”

www.bustle.com/p/what-is-white-feminism-here-are-7-sneaky-ways-it-shows-up-into-your-life-7921450

*I am very unclear why specific culturally based issues in the USA are regarded as universal, or certainly suitable for wholesale importation to the UK.

Or least I understand why the USA believes this but I don't understand why people in the UK*

Because we're in cultural thrall to the US and the US can't see beyond the end of its own nose.

@Sociallydistancedcocktails

“For example , you think that race as well as sex has restricted your opportunity”

I’m not sure saying that all.

In my case, I’ve faced racism by white women. But support from white men.

And I have’t been held back. Far from it.
Thank fuck I haven’t relied on the ‘sisterhood’ for help 😊

I've worked in a male dominated industry. I found almost all of them very helpful and supportive, even the most manly and traditional.

There were some assholes, and they might have treated men and women differently, but they treated everyone as people to be used for what they could do for them. Women were useful to them, often, in different ways than men were. But they were basically shits at the deepest level.

One of the things I have noticed about people who end up very high in professional organisations is that they can be a little hard, they are ambitious and willing to sacrifice things, be it morals or friends or family, to get there. They aren't always the most understanding of people who are less ambitious.

And this may be more the case with the women, because often, they have to make an even more radical decision to give up family life. Whether this is because of sxism, or just the nature of motherhood, I am not sure, but in any case fewer of them have kids or spouses compared to men at a similar level. So maybe that impacts the type of person you find in those kinds of jobs.

The USA really can't envisage another country not being just like them, a consequence of being a world superpower, culturally dominant and its citizens physically traveling much less.

I would have expected the UK to be a little more resilient in pushing back, highlighting structural differences and their impact on countries, different histories etc.

The UK doesn't assume every article written in the Netherlands or France will be transferable despite having a considerable number of similarities between the countries.

But I constantly see US books and articles suggested for UK audiences as though they were identically relevant to them.

I would have expected the UK to be a little more resilient in pushing back, highlighting structural differences and their impact on countries, different histories etc.

I think there's definitely push back

I think part of that might be the language barrier, too. A lot gets shared between the US, UK, Australia, NZ, and Canada, but seems to meet something of a barrier going into Europe, because people often don't read much outside their primary language, even if they can. There is a similar kind of transfer between many French speaking countries and I'd assume also German speaking areas.

I absolutely think language is a huge part of it.
The unfounded assumption that because we speak the same primary language we will be able to transport uncritically articles from one country to another as if they had validity because they happened to be written in the same language.

White women treated you badly and you ascribe this to white feminism - were they feminists?
White men treated you well - so do you then extrapolate that sexism doesn't exist and there's no such thing as white misogyny? That would seem foolish and reductive and contrary to patriarchal oppression.
But if white men being nice to you at work doesn't cancel out sexism and the patriarchy then how does 'white women being unsupportive at work' cancel out any good work by feminists?
It's almost as though people will bend over backwards to excuse men and accept crumbs from their table whilst using any excuse to tell women to sit down, shut up and stay in their lane. If you think men (white or BAME) are the heroes who are combating racism and sexism then your experiences are fairly unique.

If the OP is indeed American then that's fair enough, plenty of posters on here are. If not, I agree it would be more relevant to share a text about the UK. Still don't know what kind of racism she's encountered, thus don't know how to offer any specific kind of support. It would make it harder for me to offer specific support and advice as a white British working class woman about white middle class American female racism in the workplace as I don't know what that involves. There may be some universals, but in many ways I would feel as culturally different to a white American woman as an American WOC, especially if they were from somewhere radically different such as the Bible belt, of which there is no UK equivalent . In my work life, being from a minority was seen as an advantage, as it was minority groups we were working with. I'm sure that's not the case in every sector, and there may also be racism I've missed in my own workplace, but the OP is not telling us much so it's not possible to delve any deeper.

Thinking about this, the OP mentioned up-thread that she thought that what was meant by white feminism was really middle class feminism.

There is probably some truth in that, in both the sense that it is what some people really mean when you dig down, and also there are a lot of middle class white people in a country like the UK so it may just seem the two fit together if that is what you see a lot of.

However - there are two places I'd want to go with that. The first is why not just call it middle class feminism then? More accurate as it will include all kinds of people who are not white and plenty who are white won't really fit in.

And it creates a situation which allows middle and upper class non-whites, who may be incredibly immersed in the middle or even upper classes, to claim that they represent people whose experiences and views are quite different. (And some have suggested BTW that this is the purpose of this kind of designation.)

This approach to politics has increasingly be causing certain groups to simply opt out, or sometimes turn to extreme option. I don't know what that might look like in feminism but I think you could certainly see whole groups disengage.

But also, why should this be a disparaging idea. Of course middle class women will tend to reflect their experiences in their feminism, and so will working class women, and so on. That is ok. The goal should be to try and realise that about ourselves, rather than to decide one group has a "bad" kind of thinking or experience.

But also, why should this be a disparaging idea. Of course middle class women will tend to reflect their experiences in their feminism, and so will working class women, and so on. That is ok. The goal should be to try and realise that about ourselves, rather than to decide one group has a "bad" kind of thinking or experience.

Yes, exactly.

White working class Scottish women outside Glasgow and Edinburgh, who come from virtually 100% white schemes, never seem to get much of a look in.
These women have suffered from generations of oppression, which has left them and their families with the worst social indicators and life expectancies in Western Europe.
But they're as invisible now as they always have been
Sometimes situation rather than race is the most important area to focus on

(which by no means lessens the horrendous difficulties woc encounter in the particular situations and struggles they face due to their colour)

"why not just call it middle class feminism then?"
Because the majority of women calling other women 'white feminists' are themselves white and middle class! It's a way of deflecting this fact away from themselves and absolving themselves of their 'guilt'. It's all about middle class self-loathing, in the same way some middle class claim to be working class because they think it makes them more authentic and less guilty of privilege. I think some middle class people don't like the idea that they've got where they are in life at least in part through the happenstance of their birth. Some become conservatives and latch on to the idea that anyone can pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Others, the middle class white women chastising 'white feminists' pretend to shift the blame. None of this helps the disadvantaged.

Yes, Novelusername, I think there is some truth - for some t's a mechanism for expunging guilt. Which shows that it is not a useful kind of guilt.

I also think some people just want to "be good" and accept that this is what it involves, this is what is meant by listening to others and being a good antiracist. They aren't skeptical enough.

The concept of 'white feminism' is racist and divisive nonsense and I say that as a non-white woman.

I have materially more in common with women of every nationality, ethnicity and skin tone than I do with any man.

Don't let them divide us or shut us up.

However, I am not a Marxist and do not for one second believe that “capitalism” causes the oppression of women. Capitalism is a type of economic system. That’s it. The oppression of women has been since the dawn of human history, it predates the existence of economies and all the various economic systems. Women have been and continue to be oppressed regardless of economic system. So don’t think that swapping capitalism for whatever will improve things.

Marxism is actually an analysis precisely of this, though - it's not at all that it doesn't apply to pre-capitalist economic systems: it applies to all economic systems. And Marxist feminism takes as a fundamental premise that the oppression of women by men is the first and more fundamental kind of economic system, since it involves the literal ownership of both women's labour (the work of production) and women's bodies (the means of production - in fact the very oldest and most important means of producing human beings).

All economic systems from the dawn of time have started with the taking of women's labour by men (childbearing, breastfeeding, home-making, cooking, and so on). It might have been less overt or differently-arranged in, say, early hunter-gatherer societies: but the control of women's bodies, and the means to make women work for you (whether in marriage or any other way) has always been a form of economic ownership.

Marxist theory - especially Marxist feminism, which is a development from Marxism - has never thought swapping capitalism for something else would make everything okay. The central point is that structural oppression comes in many forms globally, but it all shares some identical characteristics, and one of those is that at root it's about men owning women, their bodies and their labour, like the capitalist makes the labourer also part of his property and dependent on him.

Marxism might originate in nineteenth century white male thought, but it's something that still resonates across the global south as a way of thinking about the ownership of resources and income streams controlled by the developed north. It's a structure of thought: it's there to be taken up and reused how people want it. Not all second-wave feminism was Marxist either, but it tended to develop out of philosophies that were interested in collective action and group solidarity, whether that was economic or religious or philosophical.

What kind of feminism do you think would help, OP?

"why not just call it middle class feminism then?"

Because class is strongly related to poverty and deprivation, which are a material reality, like sex.

Identity politics is only interested in socially constructed identities like race and gender identity.

I have a lot of time for Marx, but I think his view of men "appropriating" women's labour is pretty thin. About as true as the idea that human societies came to exist as the result of a social contract.

You can see this if you try and turn the argument around, that women appropriate men's labour in order to provide for them and their children when they were pregnant or tied to infants.

Men and women are fundamentally interdependent and the marxist model can't rise to that.

@TheGlassBlowersDaughter

White women treated you badly and you ascribe this to white feminism - were they feminists? White men treated you well - so do you then extrapolate that sexism doesn't exist and there's no such thing as white misogyny? That would seem foolish and reductive and contrary to patriarchal oppression. But if white men being nice to you at work doesn't cancel out sexism and the patriarchy then how does 'white women being unsupportive at work' cancel out any good work by feminists? It's almost as though people will bend over backwards to excuse men and accept crumbs from their table whilst using any excuse to tell women to sit down, shut up and stay in their lane. If you think men (white or BAME) are the heroes who are combating racism and sexism then your experiences are fairly unique.

I’m of course well aware of sexism.😃 I’m not under any illusion on why men in power support women. And that the women who are supported are not seen as a threat to the patriarchy. They are obviously smart and talented, but also conformist enough not to threaten the structure and the male ego.

That’s why I think women who succeed in these environments are really not breaking the glass ceiling in a meaningful way, they are simply advancing their own career. And like I’ve said before, there is nothing wrong with that. I’ve been there, but haven’t couched my own successes in terms of “wins” for women. That would be a bit deluded and cynical

And so back to intersectionality and power structures and how women are not one homogeneous group and that women can and do contribute to patriarchy within their normal day to day lives, depending on their level of access and privilege

Or to put that another way, you can't externalise reproduction in that way.

@cakedays, I don’t have answers. I guess I’m just a cynical old trout

I’m pretty fond of Marx myself and think some of his political (rather than his economic) writing was brilliantly thoughtful.

@SmokedDuck

I have a lot of time for Marx, but I think his view of men "appropriating" women's labour is pretty thin. About as true as the idea that human societies came to exist as the result of a social contract.

You can see this if you try and turn the argument around, that women appropriate men's labour in order to provide for them and their children when they were pregnant or tied to infants.

Men and women are fundamentally interdependent and the marxist model can't rise to that.

Doesn't it make a difference though that the Marxist-feminist modern points out that men's work is paid and women's historically unpaid, in fact not even recognised as work? Men take part in the economic system one way, and are subject to it; women are doubly subject to it because they have to obtain support through a man and their labour is unrecognised for what it is (and historically mystified as not even labour at all but love, service, duty, religious obligation, and so on). This might be something that might appear differently in different societies, but the key reason you can't reverse the model and say that women obtain men's labour (as the MRA movement often seeks to do), is because women's labour has always been secured by threats of bodily or sexual violence in the way it never, ever has been for men.

*model not modern!

@SmokedDuck

Or to put that another way, you can't externalise reproduction in that way.

I don't think that model externalises reproduction at all: it's a relational model, and obviously it is a theoretical model in the first place. But one of the reasons feminists found it so useful was because it both allows us to talk about the paid work women do as labour, and also their unpaid work as another kind of labour that also underpins the economic system.

You could say that the labourers have power over the capitalist because they are the engine of his profits. But he has the power to chuck them out of a job and remove their livelihood. Women might have depended on male labour to raise infants, but we know all too well that men have always been able to remove that support at any time they like and have throughout history used violence, coercion, the law and religion to enforce this. Women have never, ever had that kind of economic power.

Just to extend that model further because I'm enjoying myself and I'll shut up now -- but if feminism is like the union movement for women, arguing about different forms of feminism is a bit like Len McCluskey arguing with Neil Kinnock about the way forward for the workers, when everyone should instead be focused on getting rid of Margaret Thatcher

You have lost me at times cake, but I get your last point!