oh, fucking hell.

[fierceawakening]

I've never been big on Ani DiFranco really. I do love some of her old songs, especially "Shy" and "Buildings and Bridges," but that's all. Still, I didn't realize she'd said this:
When asked about being a feminist she stated, “All decent people, male and female, are feminists. The only people who are not feminists are those who believe that women

Comments

[rootietoot]

I completely agree. I don't like being told how to think or act.

Matthew 7:1-4
1 “Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2 For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
3 “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 4 How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.

This seems relevant to me here.

[fierceawakening]

Thank you, Rootie. I shouldn't get so upset about it, I know, but even after a long time it still makes me see red. It's such a fucked up thing to say.

"Oh, you left? Too bad for you that you think you have free will, haw haw! As long as women are oppressed, you belong to with me!"

Really, who wants recruits that are only there because they can't quite find the hole in your logic? Are those really the allies you want helping you take down the Pat?

I'd much rather recruit people for my movement who actually want to be there. But maybe that makes too damn much sense.

[rootietoot]

The Feminist Movement is something I decided was irrelevant to my life when a teacher told me I was wasting myself by wanting to get married and be a housewife/mother. What the hell does she know, anyway, about me? NOTHING. Why does my decision to follow a very traditional path mean another woman cannot become a doctor or CEO? Who am I betraying? NO one! I tried to get interested in it again a few years ago, but the virulent stridency of their arguments completely...i don't know...when a movement has no room for variety, and takes on a black-and-white/us-or-them attitude, it loses it's credibility with everyone except themselves and turns into a colossal circle-jerk. (if you can call a feminist back-patting party that.)

[fierceawakening]

Yeah, that's how I felt. I tried to be a little different and thoughtful, but in the end... I stepped out of line in one community and had people who I thought were my friends email me and basically say "Take this back. We'd hate to ban you."

And I was just... no. Maybe I was wrong about the issue discussed, but the idea that my going against the consensus mattered more than being respected as a member of the community who didn't say frivolous shit... well, it soured me on the whole thing forever.

[fierceawakening]

I really don't like the quote, because I think that it's up to every individual person to choose which labels he or she accepts, and why.

I also think it erases a whole lot of problems that groups have had with the larger feminist movement. There's a reason, for example, that womanism arose and has a different name. Would Ani, a white woman, be justified in telling women of color "well, I just lump you under 'feminist' because it mean the same thing?"

I'm not sure that's intended, but I do think it (and other unfortunate failures at intersectionality) are pretty strongly implied by that wording. I think that's troubling, because it centers the idea of fighting sexism on the particular vision of a majority. (In my experience: from the US, white, college educated, involved in academic circles. Most likely also nondisabled and cisgendered.)

[fierceawakening]

http://fierceawakening.livejournal.com/1262145.html?thread=8157249#t8157249 says it better than I can

[erin_c_1978]

Yeah. I don't think that almost anyone means it this way, but in practice it seems to work like:

1) "Feminism is the radical notion that women are people, so if you agree with that, you're a feminist!"

2) "...which means that if you don't identify as a feminist, you don't think women are people."

3) "And if you don't agree with us on X issue, you're no feminist!"

4) "Therefore, you have to believe X thing to be any kind of decent person."

And of course, not everybody in the whole group is saying this at once, so you end up with some people yelling at you that you HAVE to consider yourself a feminist and other people yelling at you that with that opinion you can't possibly consider yourself a feminist, and basically it's just really tiring.

[fierceawakening]

This, exactly. Any time anyone says "There is no room in my belief system for an Other," I run.