(no subject)

[maevele]

totally ready to distance myself from feminism just because i don't want to be associated with the racism in white feminist circles

Comments

[pnkrokhockeymom.livejournal.com]

I hear you. I'm not going to distance myself from feminism, but I'm going to denounce and distance myself from feminists I think are behaving abominably and refusing to check their white privilege and examine themselves.

One reason I'm not comfortable distancing from feminism is that I don't think, and actually have never thought, that Amanda Marcotte speaks for feminism, nor do I feel prepared to cede her the field. Part of that is maybe because until very recently most of my feminism was not an online thing, but a real life thing.

It makes me angry, v. angry, to have worked so hard to reclaim the word feminist as one of my feminist goals and have certain white feminists, not just amanda obviously, but have a portion of white feminists poison my pool with their refusal to be even a might self reflexive.

I left a lengthy comment over at Feministe about this late last night. I plan to post on it this weekend, but I have to get some actual, you know, work done today. (I spent yesterday getting caught up on what happened).

[pnkrokhockeymom.livejournal.com]

Here's a link to my most recent comment over there, if you are interested.

http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2008/04/25/i-guess-its-a-jungle-in-here-too-huh/#comment-167488

[shemale.livejournal.com]

i can't call myself a feminist anymore because of it (and a small number of other reasons).

[tupelo-lights.livejournal.com]

So what's the new word? Patriarchy-resister? Anti-genderist? Womanist...? (That last one was a joke. 'Womanist' really makes me gag.)

[maevele.livejournal.com]

What's wrong with "Womanist?" because I'd use Womanist if I didn't feel like it belongs to black women. I'd like a word that encompasses both anti-sexism and anti-racism. I guess I could just start prefacing "feminist" with "anti-racist" but "anti-racist feminist' is a mouthful.

[tupelo-lights.livejournal.com]

For me, "womanist" always sounded too binaried, essentializing "woman" being another problem of American feminism. But I didn't know that it was coined by black women. Thank you.

Anti-racist feminist sounds fine to me, though yeah: it is a mouthful. But at least it would get people asking you to qualify it, which would start conversations.

[maevele.livejournal.com]

Yeah, Alice Walker started Womanism back when the second wave was marginalizing the fuck out of black women, and expecting them to put being a woman in front of being black.

I'm honestly considering just taking back the term "women's libber" because while it may have all the "hairy legged manhating bra burning" baggage, it at least isn' the label that white feminists who are okay with racist bullshit are using currently.

Or maybe just "Liberationist." It doesn't specify which group needs the most liberating, only that I'm pro the liberty of anyone oppressed.

[lantry.livejournal.com]

There is already a soft pansy little word called "Humanist", but well, I think I already made my views on that word clear in this very biased statement.

[maevele.livejournal.com]

Naw, I've mocked too many "I'm not a feminist, I'm a humanist"s.

[leeoakfire.livejournal.com]

That is a very interesting, and emotionally draining, controversy! I rarely read blogs anymore, as I am too busy. So, I would not have known of this if you had not pointed it out. I will probably always identify as a feminist, but I am in agreement with you on all else mentioned in this post. Thank you for letting me know about this.