Writer Naomi Klein says she doesn’t understand gender critical feminism

[PotteringPondering]

Canadian writer Naomi Klein was interviewed at the Royal Festival Hall this evening by the BBC’s Samira Ahmed, about her new book, Doppelgänger. 

Most of the evening was about the book, in which Klein (a left-wing activist) reflects on being confused with writer Naomi Wolf (who now sides with the right and conspiracy theorists). This was fascinating.

At the end, a questioner in the audience asked her how ‘so-called feminists’ can be anti-trans. Klein speculated that it’s white women being seduced by the far right.

Samira Ahmed pointed out that the UK narrative is different, and one of the main legal cases here involved a black lesbian. Klein said she didn’t understand that kind of feminism. 

I was shocked that such an articulate thinker, who’s spent years at the cutting edge of cultural issues, could say she simply doesn’t understand why any feminist would question gender ideology. Seriously?

[Allthegoodnamesarechosen]

Fingers in ears ,sings La la la very loudly. Oh don’t do it to me…….

[IwantToRetire]

Maybe she only talks to Margaret Atwood about feminism. :(

[RealityFan]

Naomi K is too busy shouting at the wind re Naomi W, to have anything meaningful to say about women's rights. Another women who sees struggles as intersectional jostling for position, the trans elephant in the room is pushing women off the bench, she's happy if women have to perch on the floor.

She must fancy herself rotten if she feels the need to bitch about the confusion of her with Wolf, and write a whole book about it.

[WhichOfThePickwickTripletsDidIt]

She is choosing not to understand. It's a choice.

[PorcelinaV]

I'm guessing her self identity and status and career depend on her finding it just so baffling.

She is on pretty safe ground to blame it on white Karens under Nazi influence, but it's best not to say more than that.

[RealityFan]

Interesting she's uppity about another woman being confused with her, but not uppity about men being confused with women.

I'd call that the very definition of selfishness.

[Choppysue]

Right wing has ceased to have any meaning beyond being a slur to fling at heretics. If what these people are is left wing, I denounce myself from any kind of wings lol.

[TheGreatATuin]

It seems to be a pretty common feature of the issue at hand, and I have to admit that's what I don't understand.
How can you openly admit you don't understand something and then criticise it at the same time?
It's like saying 'Capitalism is terrible, but I don't really know what it is' or being vehemently pro or anti-Brexit while asking what the EU is.
I've seen this more than once on on social media: someone saying 'I had to block a friend for being a terf. I really can't understand why she was saying all that'
And I just want to facepalm because of course you don't get it, you just blocked her instead of just asking so you could understand.
I think people are so invested in being right that their brains fly out the window at the slightest hint they might not know what they're talking about.

[WhereYouLeftIt]

"I was shocked that such an articulate thinker, who’s spent years at the cutting edge of cultural issues, could say she simply doesn’t understand why any feminist would question gender ideology. Seriously?"

Perhaps she only identifies as an articulate thinker?

I'll get my coat.

[RealityFan]

Sad to see someone who was a genuine thorn in the side of big corporations now become an apologist for them. In some ways she's the perfect encapsulation of the Left moving from pure class struggle, where it's poor whites/PoC/gays/men/women versus the elites, to pure intersectional struggle, where these groups are pitted against themselves and then men in the trans category pitted against the rest, especially women, and now increasingly gays...to increase the power of corporations, and weaken all working class people, women arguably the most.

A total sellout.

[Rudderneck]

@WhereYouLeftIt

"I was shocked that such an articulate thinker, who’s spent years at the cutting edge of cultural issues, could say she simply doesn’t understand why any feminist would question gender ideology. Seriously?"

Perhaps she only identifies as an articulate thinker?

I'll get my coat.

I suspect maybe it's this.

Here you have someone whose understanding of politics means calling someone right wing is an adequate explanation for dismissing what they say.

She sounds articulate and uses the language of an educated person.

Increasingly though, I think that can be very deceiving, kind of like mistaking a very posh accent for evidence of intelligence. It only shows that she has a certain kind of background, not that her ideas are necessarily that sound or interesting or insightful. (And conversely, sometimes people who are not very articulate can have thoughtful ideas, it can just require more work on the part of the listener to see what they are getting at.)

[OvaHere]

It's easier to say you don't understand the position other women hold than have to explain why you think men can be women and how this won't cause any problems for women at all.

It's purely an avoidance tactic and what people do when they have signed up to support the range of causes labelled as 'left' or 'progressive' rather than weighing up each issue on its own merits.

Saying 'I don't understand' warns off the interviewer from asking anymore probing questions. A bit like if I were to say I don't understand maths then nobody is going to continue to ask me difficult questions about solving equations.

[Choppysue]

@Rudderneck

I suspect maybe it's this.

Here you have someone whose understanding of politics means calling someone right wing is an adequate explanation for dismissing what they say.

She sounds articulate and uses the language of an educated person.

Increasingly though, I think that can be very deceiving, kind of like mistaking a very posh accent for evidence of intelligence. It only shows that she has a certain kind of background, not that her ideas are necessarily that sound or interesting or insightful. (And conversely, sometimes people who are not very articulate can have thoughtful ideas, it can just require more work on the part of the listener to see what they are getting at.)

The sophistry does get ahead of me, I understand magnitudes more than I can express. I very much appreciate the more articulate.

[AtrociousCircumstance]

Also of course it suggests that GC feminists are beyond understanding by bullshitting that their conceptual position is (by NK’s numbnut inference) somehow garbled, tantamount to speaking in tongues. It’s pure othering - to paint the outcast as indecipherable.

She just wants to distance herself from the othered and reaffirm her spot by the campfire. It’s crass and basic and rooted in fear.

[CCTVcity]

I will be honest there was a time I didn’t get it either. All I saw was people arguing and it seemed much to do about nothing. And then I had a think

[AlexandriasWindmill]

To a certain extent, she's being honest - she doesn't understand it.
Most Americans and Canadians don't understand UK feminism.
They don't see that the US and Canadian approach to intersectionality is actually ludicrous and racist and leaves them trying to position white middle-class men as more oppressed than a black lesbian. They don't understand that the UK has an innate value system that puts people's health before pharmaceutical profits and extreme consumerism. And they don't understand our approach to child safeguarding.

[Ohthatsabitshit]

“Just pretend you don’t understand, dear, they’ll soon talk of other things”

[Rudderneck]

@AlexandriasWindmill

To a certain extent, she's being honest - she doesn't understand it.
Most Americans and Canadians don't understand UK feminism.
They don't see that the US and Canadian approach to intersectionality is actually ludicrous and racist and leaves them trying to position white middle-class men as more oppressed than a black lesbian. They don't understand that the UK has an innate value system that puts people's health before pharmaceutical profits and extreme consumerism. And they don't understand our approach to child safeguarding.

She's old enough though that she should have pre-dated this kind of thinking.

Though I find it completely strange, on a regular basis, how people who are old enough to remember when anti-racism didn't mean reducing people to stereotypes, keep asserting that it's always been that way.

Canada doesn't have a for-profit healthcare system, either.

People on the left, a few short years ago, even in Canada, seemed to be suspicious of things like corporations, free trade deals, Big Pharma, and so on. Now it seems like they have completely flipped and questioning these things is a sign of being a right wing nut.

This isn't a UK vs North America things, not wholly.

[CaramelMac]

She’s obviously not very bright then because even if she doesn’t agree with “that kind of feminism” the reasons and principles of it are not difficult to understand, in fact most of the population understand and agree with it without giving the subject much thought at all.

[JennyForeigner]

Yes, this is true. There is glibness and then there are arguments which have moral coherence, and which are in short supply.

[LoobiJee]

Samira Ahmed pointed out that the UK narrative is different, and one of the main legal cases here involved a black lesbian. Klein said she didn’t understand that kind of feminism. 

Did Klein mean she didn’t understand UK feminism or she didn’t understand feminism that includes black women and lesbians?

I found it amusing that she’s written a book about people confusing her with Naomi Wolf. I’ve read two of Wolf’s books but (possibly an embarrassing thing to admit) had never heard of Klein. Although Klein’s book titles did vaguely ring a bell when I looked her up. Is the latest book any good? The topic makes her sound quite self absorbed.

[RavingStone]

So, after dismissing it as a "right wing white woman" thing, did Naomi Klein engage at all with the British Asian woman on the subject of the gender critical British black woman? Did she try and understand?

[napody]

@RealityFan

Sad to see someone who was a genuine thorn in the side of big corporations now become an apologist for them. In some ways she's the perfect encapsulation of the Left moving from pure class struggle, where it's poor whites/PoC/gays/men/women versus the elites, to pure intersectional struggle, where these groups are pitted against themselves and then men in the trans category pitted against the rest, especially women, and now increasingly gays...to increase the power of corporations, and weaken all working class people, women arguably the most.

A total sellout.

Well put.
Although there were moments in interviews about No Logo when it already sounded like she was cosplaying anti capitalism.

Bloody well done Samira Ahmed for setting her straight on 'it's only white women' shite.

[Igneococcus]

Does that mean both Naomis have problems understanding aspects of British life and legal/social details? That won't help me keeping the two apart at all.

[Ereshkigalangcleg]

I've seen this more than once on on social media: someone saying 'I had to block a friend for being a terf. I really can't understand why she was saying all that'
And I just want to facepalm because of course you don't get it, you just blocked her instead of just asking so you could understand.
I think people are so invested in being right that their brains fly out the window at the slightest hint they might not know what they're talking about.

They're also often terrified of finding that they agree with you, even a little bit. They don't want to be ostracised as a nasty old bigot like you, even if you're right.