Discussion post: Class and Feminism

[farting_nora]

Use this post to discuss class issues and how they relate to feminism. I'm going to post a little bit as a starting point, but feel free to add your own thoughts

Comments

[farting_nora]

I agree with you completely. I do not believe that my children's existence is a tragedy, and I think anyone who believes that there are groups of women that shouldn't ever have children even if they want them (usually young, poor, or disabled women are the ones discouraged from reproducing) need to find a word for themselves other than pro-choice since their stance basically boils down to "some women should have a choice, but some should just do what I tell them to"

[apricotflower]

this has been an issue in my campus's pro-choice group (before my time) so rather than mostly fighting for access to abortion, the focus is being shifted towards reproductive justice in general encompassing the rights not to have children, the right to have children, and the right to parent (to try to keep in mind all the women and parents whose children are taken away from them, especially from indigenous women in and around our community). I hope that this group will continue working at keeping more classism, racism, ablism, and colonialism in mind.

[implodes]

yes. i basically die inside whenever someone brings up "but what if the mother's POOR?!" as an argument for keeping abortion legal. yes, i know that sometimes women will decide that they cannot financially afford a child. but i feel so defensive when i hear this because, yes, we were on welfare for awhile when i was born, but it was perfectly fine that my mother decided to have me.

[gloraelin]

I think it's hard for me to have a discussion solely on class standing and feminism ... since every experience I've had relating to the two has been in additional intersection with other oppressions [orientation, disability, etc].

Right now the issue I'm most having difficulty with is... because I am poor, I apparently don't "deserve" to have appopriate, adequate medical treatment. I'm on Medicaid [because yay broke and disabled!] and the amount of times that people have been disgusted with me for getting seen at a specialist's office is astonishing. It seems like we become less-than as soon as we fall below the poverty line

[farting_nora]

Last time someone gave me hell for paying with food stamps I threw a couple candy bars in my cart just to spite them.

[dancesontrains]

<3

[katiemariie]

I feel like a lot of times I end up being erased in discussions about classism and feminism. There seems to be this idea that there are two types of feminists: middle-class/rich woman studying theory in a lofty university and the working-class woman living theory and doing activist work. Somewhere in between as a working-class woman majoring in gender studies at a large, public university, I fall through the cracks

[gloraelin]

I love the assumption that sexual violence is the only reason we fear going out after dark.

[bestdaywelived]

I grew up in a lower income more rural neighborhood; we were poor (as were a lot of people, truthfully) and I lived in a trailer growing up. I went to college as one of the handful of girls in my neighborhood to make that choice, and I now live in the Philadelphia suburbs and go to law school.

It's a weird feeling. Friends of mine would always talk about family vacations and nice clothing growing up and I was jealous, but it's an entirely different world living among the middle class. They send their kids to Europe to do theater programs. They send them to $15k/year private schools. I've seen 4-year-olds in Ugg boots. It's so bizarre to me.

[meleth]

I still have trouble dealing with that definition of "middle class." I grew up in a lower-middle class neighborhood, where people definitely couldn't afford to do anything like that.

[columbasimplex]

Combine this with an utter lack of affordable childcare in the U.S., and you've got yourself a vicious circle. We put all the burden of childcare on women (and when dad's not in the picture, which is depressingly more likely in a situation of existing poverty, there's not much of a choice), then castigate these same women for needing public assistance to care for the children we expect them to raise, so we expect them to get jobs, but then blame them for not being able to find SOMETHING! to do with those darn kids. I guess if you're poor and have committed the cardinal sin of having children (something society says women are supposed to do!) you're just supposed to, I don't know, leave them at the poorhouse steps so you can go get a job? There are so many contradictory messages for poor and working-poor women with the audacity to want to (gasp!) raise their own children - you can't win.

[supermishelle]

This seriously pisses me off. My friend is on welfare, works two jobs to pay rent for her 1 bedroom house, car note, gas, bills, groceries, clothes and babysitting and she still doesn't make enough to make ends meet. Even with benefits but they still want to cut her benefits because ~she's making too much money~ working 2 jobs. She pays $150 a week just for babysitting while she busts her ass at 2 jobs. That's beyond ridiculous.

It seems as soon as a woman makes any progress they want to cut benefits. Got another job? Less money for you. Oh there's a man in the house? Someone get the butcher knife so we can cut you off.

[elialshadowpine]

"I don't know, leave them at the poorhouse steps so you can go get a job?"

I've literally heard someone say in all seriousness that they think poor women should give their kids up to child services, because if they can't care for them they shouldn't have them. It's fucking sickening.

[bseidler]

I think a problem people will find is they try to make theories that generalize the entire system. The problem is that the system functions very differently at the different levels, so to compare them under the same standards will never work

[farting_nora]

Focusing entirely on one oppression and dismissing all others as you seem to be suggesting will never work.

Oppression isn't just about financial opportunities, it is also the way you are treated by others and expected to behave. A wealthy minority is still oppressed because they are still a minority.

but I think you'd find at the lower end of the spectrum there isn't any favoritism for gender or class.
As someone who has worked in the service industry, this is hilarious to me.

[bseidler]

"but I think you'd find at the lower end of the spectrum there isn't any favoritism for gender or class

[bestdaywelived]

The plural of anecdote is not data. In the customer service jobs that I've had, men were almost always management over women. Additionally, I would argue that mothers were favored over childless women when it came to things like scheduling and holidays; mothers were allowed to get all holidays off if they worked a bullshit morning shift on New Year's Eve, while the rest of us had to work 2 holidays, and prime shifts on those holidays (Christmas Eve night, Christmas Morning, and New Year's Eve Night).

Obviously my experience is similarly not universal. HOWEVER, poor women who have children are likely to have to make their $ stretch farther than poor men are.