Because of the turmoil caused by poor Amanda’s book, I’ve been thinking about race. I caught myself saying to a friend: “I haven’t been affected by racism in my life, so perhaps that’s why I get more worked up by sexism than by racism.”
Waitaminute.
I have always been affected by racism, but it hasn’t made that much of an impact. Sexism always felt worse and more dangerous because sexism was present in my own nuclear-family home. Racism was at a remove – you can get away from a racist society by retreating into your community. Where do you go to escape sexism in a sexist world?
Here’s how I divide up my 25 years:
20 years = Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
4 years = California, United States
1 year = Lahore/Islamabad, Pakistan (native)
Yes, I’ve spent all of one year in my native country. The rest of the time, I’ve been an expat — mostly a very reluctant one — in countries with huge immigrant populations, neither of which have granted me citizenship or full rights.
Saudi Arabia is a very overtly racist country. Arabs have a ton of race pride (they share the same language with the Lord of the Universe, after all) and they’re not ashamed of it. My dad was an “economic immigrant” from Pakistan to Saudi Arabia in the late 70’s. He was — we were — looked down upon, third class non-citizens in a country recently enriched by the oil boom and very full of its new-found global relevance.
In Saudi Arabia, it is acceptable, both legally and policy-wise, to discriminate on the basis of gender, race and nationality. I had difficulty finding a job because I wasn’t white and had a Pakistani passport. When I did find a job in a school, I was paid less than my white counterparts in the same institution, and this was open knowledge. I was later fired in favor of a white substitute. Context: This was a Bangladeshi “international” school with English as the medium of instruction. I was fired after Bangladeshi parents visited the school on parents-teachers day and found out that a brown/South Asian teacher’s assistant had somehow made her way into the same classroom with their beloved brown/South Asian brats. Can’t have that! (It’s that familiar colonialism-inspired self-esteem issue with South Asians.)
All foreign expats in Saudi Arabia were ghettoized. We had our own “embassy” schools, in the cheaper versions of which we were taught in our native languages by imported teachers who looked like us. We didn’t get to socialize with Saudis or other expats. If we were affluent, we got to go to the more expensive versions of the ghettoized schools, which may have had white English-speaking teachers.
To be Saudi was to be at the top of the totem pole, socially, economically and professionally.
To be white was to be next.
To be Filipino, Indian, Bangladeshi, Pakistani, Sri Lankan, Indonesian was to be at the bottom.
It was so explicit, the system was so firmly established, you hardly noticed. Yep, everyone’s a racist and you’re near the bottom of the heap. Who cares? You had a life to live and could always feel comfortable in your own community of similarly hued folk.
Except you couldn’t, because they were all sexist Muslims.
What bothered me most about Saudi Arabia was never their racism. Most expats were openly contemptuous of their Saudi overlords. Their racism didn’t touch us, even if it used and impoverished us to build a Theocratic Oil Kingdom.
What bothered me most was the sexism, because there was no escaping it.
There is nothing like that kind of racism in the United States. There are laws against it. People are far more enlightened, especially where I live and frequently assume I must be better educated because I didn’t go to school here.
But I started thinking about all the ways mild racism of essentially good liberals is just water off my back.
There is, of course, first and foremost — the colonial past of Pakistan. It was hammered into us at school that we were the kings of the world until white people took it away from us. That, in fact, that was WHY we were third-class non-citizens in an Arab country instead of living comfortably in our own pure land (that’s what “Pakistan” means: Pure Land). Colonialism brought us to this sad pass. True enough, perhaps, but who cares? I didn’t. I am no more colonized than an American kid my age. I’ve never felt much rancor for the Brits/white people because they took the same opportunity to conquer the world that the Arabs took post-Muhammad. It’s what people do — they seek power and land and wealth. I’m just glad they left the English language behind – it’s come in handy. AND we get to qualify for Rhodes Scholarships.
The more trivial things:
I always feel less presentable than a white girl unless I’m impeccably groomed. White is clean, brown is dirty.
I live on a “white” block. I’m the only brown person in some fifty houses and yes, my neighbors do look at me askance. I hardly notice because they can’t evict me and that’s all that matters.
I’m a young brown woman from a country that is on the visa-shitlist of every other country in the world. Even most third world countries are wary of Pakistanis. I’m married to a middle aged white guy. I can see the wheels turning in people’s minds when they meet me and my husband, learn about my background and figure out that I’m on the young side. “Mail order? Not quite. Maybe she married him to come here?” A few people (not all of them white) have actually suggested my ulterior motivations in marrying my husband to my face.
I constantly surprise people with my nearly accentless English. It doesn’t offend me that they’re surprised.
The questions white people ask when they learn of my background! When I was fresh off the boat, I was offended by the inquisitiveness of some of my husband’s friends. And by their ignorance of how people the world over live. Now? I just answer the questions, which are honest innocent curiosity and desire to learn, and don’t think twice about it.
And by the way? Black people here behave in exactly the same way towards me. Blacks, whites, whatever – they’re Americans. They act like Americans.
Why don’t I notice “mild racism”? Because it’s harmless. It’s not really racism – I’m different. I’m novel. I’m alien. They don’t hate me (mostly) — they just wonder what the fuck I’m doing in their midst, stealing their jobs. As well they might — you’d be astonished at how white people (tourists or expats) are perceived in predominantly brown countries — they’re curiosities to be gawked at and perhaps prodded and certainly overcharged, and yep, we have our own set of myths and prejudices about them.
Because most countries in the world are not such melting-pots as America is (and don’t have America’s slave-owning past), most people don’t have the sensitivity to race issues that we have here. Most of the world is comfortably mildly racist and there are few challenges to that even from liberal intelligentsia because most countries aren’t racially diverse (but they’re all sexist, almost without notable exception). Racist jokes are par for the course. People who look different are funny. They talk funny, they look funny, they have funny customs, they do weird unhygienic things in the bedroom and bathroom. They are Other, thus fair game.
Not saying this is right, just human. But American liberals are some of the least racist people I’ve ever met in my entire life.
Sexism, though. Where do you go to get away from that? I’ve been an expat from my native land, yet felt like my race has always allowed me safe spaces. I had a whole country to return to. Within my adopted homes, I’ve either had a ghetto, or I’ve had a liberal diverse area to romp in. Neither have caused me much racial discomfort. I’ve been able to ignore racial prejudice against me because there have been other options. There are many parts of the world where there is no racism. I don’t have a “race” category on this blog. For the most part, I can be unracialized, which is (I firmly believe) a good thing.
But there is no getting away from sexism. It’s to be found in even the most liberal men. It’s legal. It’s culturally widespread. It’s also universal. Where there are women in this world, there is discrimination and contempt and oppression and fear of rape.
So no wonder I’ve always been supremely bothered by the mildest sexism, but not racism. Of course, I’m not speaking for others, this is just how I feel about it. Americans and Saudis may have mild prejudices about me, but my own race disenfranchized and sought to render me un-human because I have a vagina. So I naturally seek ideological allies rather than racial allies.
This is why a race-centric analysis of women’s issues bothers me. Feminism is about women, period. It’s race-neutral. Hopefully, it will remain about women, instead of turning into an ersatz black civil rights movement pre-occupied with issues of police brutality against black men. If I am interested in race issues, I know where to go to read about them. If I am interested in women’s issues, I should be able to go to feminist websites and read about them. I don’t need my feminism to become a catch-all for all social justice issues, because to be honest, the only thing that really fires me up is women’s oppression, sexism and misogyny.
I’m disappointed in major feminist websites which are no longer about women and who keep making posts about unrelated issues with the header, “Because This Is A Feminist Issue.” I have news for you: It’s not, and you’ve lost (some of) your audience.
Not to mention, all this ridiculous in-fighting is leading the feminist blogosphere where it’s led feminist academicians before: You’re on the Road to Irrelevance. Meanwhile, in the real world, women who care about women are working on women’s issues. Thanks for nothing, guys. Go bemoan your white privilege some more – it’s extremely edifying to watch. Surprisingly, I have zero interest in the circle-jerks of white masochists.
Filed under: Feminism, Islam/Religion, Socio-Political
“And by the way? Black people here behave in exactly the same way towards me. Blacks, whites, whatever – they’re Americans. They act like Americans.”–Apostate
It no longer surprises me to hear this. I am also annoyed to no end to hear of black Americans treating other people of color this way. it is one of the biggest forms of hypocrisy. That is not to say that there is or should be an alliance made up of people of color against white people. It is to say that given the history of racism against blacks in this country, we should be the most sensitive to this. Southern folk (whether white or black) are still the worst at this, IMO.
Back to the main issue:
This reminds me of a post I wrote about whether or not to put blackness ahead of womanhood or vice versa. As I see it, racism is bad but sexism strips a woman of power that racism does not. I suspect that is the reason why most women of color tend to champion racial issues over sexism (among other reasons).
Well, I don’t expect that much of people. Most people mean well, blunder frequently and have massive blind spots. Welcome to the state of being human. African Americans are not more African than I am. They’re just Americans and see the world accordingly.
As far as I’m concerned, you aren’t evil if you aren’t torturing someone in your basement and/or voting for Republicans.
And I live near an awful lot of Chinese-American Republicans.
Color is not the last arbiter of loyalties. Very often, it’s money. But that’s a whole ‘nother conversation.
And oh — race in America is a fraught issue for historical and social reasons. I get that.
I suspect what is meant by “WOC” in these online uproars is “blacks and Latino immigrants.” Most other people of color in this country experience less racism than these two groups.
No wonder I feel left out of the race discussions. I don’t belong.
Which opens up whole new areas of discussion.
And oh — race in America is a fraught issue for historical and social reasons. I get that.
How can you say that you get that, but believe that feminism in the U.S. is “race-neutral?”
Apostate, in talking about why you “prioritize” feminism, you don’t have to dismiss racism as “just human” or “mild” or “harmless.” Do you believe that there is”mild sexism” that falls in the category of “harmless?” I don’t. You might be able to “ignore racial prejudice” but many people cannot.
I’m disappointed in major feminist websites which are no longer about women and who keep making posts about unrelated issues with the header, ‘Because This Is A Feminist Issue.’
Wow, what a gutsy post. I’ve become a little bit alienated from a lot of the leading feminist sites for this reason. The shooting of an unarmed man by police is an issue that feminists and everyone concerned about justice should care about, but is it a “feminist issue”? Not really. Is domestic violence an anti-racist issue? Not only is it not considered such, but cases that attract a lot of media attention (like Laci Peterson) are often seen as evidence of the media’s racist fixation on “pretty white women.”
Excellent point. No matter what race is, there will always be a group within that race to oppress: the women. So why can’t women of all races stand together?
A fascinating perspective that should get more airspace. WOC aren’t all one voice. I don’t think any WOC purports to be, but we hapless white feminists often blunder in and make these assumptions. Being in a pretty diverse area with typically half the people at any family function being POC and more than half of those WOC, while I cannot speak for any of them, a lot of what you say rings true.
I could not agree more about that “this is a feminist issue too” post. Um, how? It’s a critical issue. It’s one that deserves our attention. It’s a human rights issue. But it’s not a FEMINIST issue. As you say, if feminism becomes human rights, gues who suffers.
Thanks Apostate,
I thoroughly enjoyed reading this post.
I don’t know if you’d be interested in this or not, but I thought the PBS show “NOW” had a couple of shows that addressed sexism in practical ways.
How can you say that you get that, but believe that feminism in the U.S. is “race-neutral?”
Apostate, in talking about why you “prioritize” feminism, you don’t have to dismiss racism as “just human” or “mild” or “harmless.” Do you believe that there is”mild sexism” that falls in the category of “harmless?” I don’t. You might be able to “ignore racial prejudice” but many people cannot.
Feminism and race are two separate issues. Feminism is race neutral in the sense that there are many many ways in which women are oppressed that really surpass race — they apply to almost all women. The construction of feminism with which I identify and with which I’m most familiar is entirely western — and yet it applies to me, a woman who had never lived in the west until I landed here four years ago.
I don’t believe you can read what I’m saying and think I’m being dismissive of racism. I’m describing how I approach the issue, not how everyone else should approach it.
And yeah, I do believe there is a mild sexism that falls in the category of harmless. Lance Mannion is a terrific example of that — he’s a mildly sexist bastard in some ways who nevertheless writes some of the most trenchant feminist analysis of pop culture and politics I’ve read in the blogosphere.
And what is being called out in the feminist blogosphere recently is hardly even mild racism — it’s at worst blind spots of people who don’t spend a whole lot of time thinking about these things. One can fault them for that, but they aren’t racists.
Color is not the last arbiter of loyalties. Very often, it’s money. But that’s a whole ‘nother conversation.
So true.
And DANG, what an interesting post! Really, really thought-provoking.
I think you’re so right– there is nowhere to go to get away from sexism. This is most excruciatingly crushing to women in fundamentalist families/communities/countries but it really is everywhere. I sometimes think the ubiquitousness of sexism causes girls and women to simply tune it out, pretend it isn’t there, kind of the way you tune out the noise of traffic or elevator music. There’s nothing they can do about it, they can’t get away with it, so they ignore it. I think that these women are often the women who become angry when they encounter feminists or feminist arguments because these force them think about sexism and it’s painful and enraging, a messenger bringing the bad news kind of phenomenon.
I so agree re insisting that feminism should encompass every social justice issue there is. I do think everything is connected, there are ramifications for women and girls wherever there is injustice, but as someone else in comments said, where every issue becomes a feminist issue, guess whose specific issues become invisible, and guess what inevitably gets omitted: the precise details of which sex is doing what to which sex. You end up, in discussions of rape with people saying, “Men get raped too!” but without additional information that is central to a feminist analysis– that yes, men get raped too, *by men*, just as women are raped far and away *by men*.
Thank you so much for this post, Apostate, again, it is so, so rich with insights and lends such incredible and important perspective.
they can’t get away with it
S/b can’t get away from it.
Feminism is race neutral in the sense that there are many many ways in which women are oppressed that really surpass race — they apply to almost all women.
Yes, it’s just that it applies to some women a hell of a lot more than to other women, and those applications almost always appear on racial lines. What’s more interesting is when women apply oppression to other women, particularly among Feminists. All part and parcel of being human, I guess.
it’s just that it applies to some women a hell of a lot more than to other women, and those applications almost always appear on racial lines.
Orodemniades — I don’t see that at all.
Please list the issues feminism takes up that you think exclude women along racial lines.
To whoever is trying to post here using my login (”apostate”), go away. You will not be published if you use my login on my blog to abuse me.
Orodemniades, I think what you mean is when you experience similtaneous oppressions, sexism is worse. But you have to fight poverty, racism and sexism simultaneously.
Wow. My life is so similar.
Donna, yeah, that is what I meant.
Posting too early in the am = lack of coherency.
I wonder about your claim that racism does not exist for women of color in our intimate spheres. Consider these examples:
* immigration police and other police raiding your home, your work, your school
* sex trafficking resulting in forced marriage
* poisonous contraceptions that are targeted to brown-skinned women
* when we are raped, we are called “black bitch” or “chink whore”
“Home” is a location for white supremacist projects as well as patriarchal projects. More specifically, these projects seem to represent an intersection of racism and sexism – the oppression targeting woc often can’t easily be boiled down to one or the other.
One reason why the murder of Sean Bell is a feminist issue is because feminism is not just about women, but it also provides a critical gendered outlook on human rights for everyone. For example, the murder of Black men by agents of the state rips apart Black communities, which has severe consequences on Black women, as it will for Sean Bell’s family and community. Same dynamic for women in Iraq:
http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/042308WA.shtml
And I guess that for me is why radical women of color politics is so important, b/c:
1) women of color are direct targets for intersectional violence and oppression
2) women of color experience the brunt of consequences when are communities are targeted by state violence and capitalism (a la war on iraq, hurricane katrina, and many conquests)
So the project of my feminism (when I’m feeling like a feminist, which has been dampered lately), is not only to look at oppression of women through an intersectional lens, but also how the oppression of my community has gendered consequences.
In terms of what gets to be put under the category of “feminism,” who can tell if the violence targeted towards brown and black women is b/c of their race or their gender? It seems to generally be both, no? Shit, even the violence *within* my community seems to be connected to both – not just b/c I’m a woman, but b/c I am a Black Woman and the combination triggers violence, even from other Black people. That is the reality of intersectional and internalized oppression. That is the true multi-dimensional legacy of the historical context that you talk about.
Hi, Foxybrown. Welcome and thanks for your comment.
Of course racism, if one is affected by it, comes into one’s intimate sphere. I was taking about communities and sometimes whole countries that are one’s own race and therefore bias-free. That doesn’t mean that external racist influences from outside the community cannot impact you in your home; of course they can.
I disagree that forced marriages are a race issue. They happen to women of certain races/nationalities, but they are not happening because of their race/nationality. They’re happening because of religious/cultural factors in those geographic areas and they impact women because women are not free in these societies. Feminist issue, not a race issue.
Sex trafficking is not a race issue either, since it happens to all races but mostly only one gender. Feminist issue.
Poisonous contraceptives targeting minority women: feminist issue based in racism. Why is this feminist and not Sean Bell? Because this exclusively or disproportionately affects ONLY women. If anything at all affects women exclusively or disproportionately, it’s a feminist issue.
Raped white women are called sluts too — their sexual history is also up for examination. Brown women are sexualized and seen as property more than white women, but I see that as the fault of brown misogynistic cultures which have a longer road to travel than predominantly white cultures. But hey, white culture is not that great either and white women are victimized too — white rape victims do NOT have an easy time of it.
When violence and injustice happens to non-white women, it’s a feminist issue. No question.
But anything that happens that affects women (while also equally affecting men)? Not feminism’s concern since feminism is about what happens to, and affects, women exclusively or disproportionately. Otherwise, everything would be a feminist issue because everything affects women.
Foxy – I think the root of the disagreement here stems from what you say here: “One reason why the murder of Sean Bell is a feminist issue is because feminism is not just about women.”
For me, anyway, that’s where we see things differently.
Of course, taking it absolutely literally, feminism is about men as they relate to women. Or about immigration issues as they relate to women. But not about men because, oh yeah, they sometimes marry women and have daughters. And not about immigration simply because some immigrants are female. But about those issues as they specifially relate to women.
What if I said: “racism is not just about POC” or “gay marriage isn’t about just about gay people” in the same way? Not meaning: racism is about white people as they relate to POC or about straights as they attempt to affect gay marriage. But about white people and straights just because they might bump into POC or gay people. You’d probably think me ridiculous and/or dilutive.
I don’t see male-run anti-racist groups posting about feminism in POC communities because it deals with POC. I don’t see environmental groups posting about feminism because some feminists are eco-feminists. I don’t see pro-gay-marriage groups, to use Apostate’s example, posting about feminism because some feminists are gay.
Yes, it’s true that women are left to pick up the pieces of the violence happening around the world in many ways. Gang violence, drug violence, police brutality, school violence, whatever it is, there’s a woman bringing up the rear piecing things together.
Yet if feminism became an amalgamation of these issues, do we think the related POC, prison reform, anti-police brutality, etc. movements would pick up the slack and bring the gendered analysis? Yeah, let’s please not hold our breath.
As Apostate has mentioned in more than one of her posts about racism and sexism, that does NOT mean that feminist shouldn’t care about these issues. Most feminists, I find, are involved in numerous kinds of activism. Many are involved in anti-poverty work, anti-racist work, environmental work, etc. (My own work, although I admit to doing much less than I should, is a limited example –I do counseling of students in poor neighborhoods, and while I focus on female students, I counsel boys too).
Militating that feminism be about women in the strict sense does not constitute an argument for abandoning human rights causes. Just that women deserve the same focus that all the other causes get.
“Feminist issue based in racism.” Well put. I think this encapsulates all of my examples.
Let me also say that, while it’s true that white rape victims do not have an easy time of it, they are more likely to be seen as rape victims at all. In the U.S., determining the sentencing for rapists is practically a science if you take into account the race of, not the perpetrator, but the victim. I think you can predict the cause and effect of that…
The issue is not that white women aren’t oppressed, of course they are, but that because of white supremacy and white normativity, white womanhood is the prioritized womanhood. That is to say, white woman = woman. Ergo, difference in sentencing and attention when white women are victimized.
That, I think, is one of the roots of the blog drama we saw these past few weeks as well as the long history (VERY, VERY LONG HISTORY) of battles among white women and women of color in feminist movements in the U.S.
Okay, you argue that feminism is about women, meaning all women, including women of color. That makes sense at first. But then, what if Black women are saying that when Black men are murdered by the state, that is destructive to our lives, as Black women. You might say, sorry, doesn’t count unless the murder happens directly to Black women because she is a woman. Then a Black woman might say, oh I see, b/c what impacts my life can’t be universalized b/c the U.S. isn’t Black-normative, it’s white-normative. My issue isn’t considered a woman’s issue, though I am a woman (or at least I am to me, perhaps not to you (not you personally, you hypothetically)). So, even though I have to figure out how to raise my kids as a single mom b/c my partner was killed by the state. Even though my life feels meaningless b/c I have no control over the safety of my family and community b/c we are collectively targeted by the state for violence. This violence is not a feminist issue because I am not physically dead, though my life is just destroyed and irreparably harmed in very gendered ways.
Okay, this person might say, then I must not be a feminist. Because according to feminists,
Black woman does not equal woman
Black woman’s victimization does not equal woman’s victimization
Black woman’s experience of violence does not equal feminist priority
See how that goes?
If some women experience gendered violence in a way that is undeniably intertwined with racism, then that means they experience gendered violence in a way that’s intertwined with violence targeted towards their whole community, including the men. So violence targeted towards the whole community is violence targeted towards me. Very difficult for that violence to not be gendered b/c the consequences I’ll experience will be through my life as a woman. That means that this violence is a feminist issue.
That is, if feminism is meant to include Black women and other women of color and our actual experiences.
Which, I think we’ve seen, is a source of some debate…
Foxy, I’ll admit I’ve read around 2,000 comments on this issue (or related issues) in the last month and I don’t get it. I appreciate that you are trying to explain it here and not getting upset with me, but I have to be honest: I don’t get it.
I do want to disagree that the other examples were “feminist issues based in racism.” The other examples weren’t things that happen as a result of racism (sex trafficking, forced marriages).
One thing I do want to know: Why can’t racism be an important issue in itself? Why make it a part of feminism? Do black women have no place in the black civil rights movement?
Everything is of course interconnected. But we do have focused movements. IF the problem is specifically race-based, and does not impact women qua women disproportionately, the proper angle to approach it from is… race-based.
If the problem is gender-based and impacts women qua women, the proper angle to approach it from is… feminism.
Your example of a raped woman, if she’s black or brown, having even fewer rights and recourses, yep. I was raped in Pakistan; I didn’t even report it. I get that. But that’s feminism’s problem because of this racial angle disproportionately affecting women, because it’s mostly women who are raped.
How women’s sexuality is viewed is a feminist issue. If black and brown women are a little behind white women in getting society to view our sexualities justly, that’s a feminist issue. Race plays a part in it, but it’s still primarily women being affected.
See, I’m not saying if race is at all involved, it ceases to be a feminist issue. Just that all race issues don’t become women’s issues because many women are brown.
Foxy – remain a bit confused because the examples you cite in your last comment are feminist issues and should be prioritized as such.
WOC rape victims being treated fairly due to both race and gender;
Sentencing fairness when WOC are victimized;
Black woman does equal woman;
Black woman’s victimization does equal woman’s victimization
As to the example of a black woman’s partner being killed by the state. Your claim is that the harm is gendered. Not sure how. The issue there is police violence and racism. The victims are of both genders – sons, daughters, wives, perhaps male partners.
There are important issues here, and just because they are not feminist ones doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t be addressed. But they get addressed more effectively – meaning, not just white feminist browbeating that isn’t going to do a damn thing to get at the root cause b/c it ain’t feminism—within the appropriate movements, who will focus 100% of their energy on that cause.
So my goal isn’t to make this a 2nd class issue but to make it a 1st class issue by categorizing it correctly. It’s not going to gather steam as a feminist issue. It will gather steam as a police brutality and a racism issue.
I feel as though I am back in one of my Women’s studies classes in college.
Honestly, I really cannot see how racism and sexism can be connected. From personal experience, I either experience sexism as a woman or I experience racism as a black person. I don’t see the evidence of a connection in society at large. Therefore, it is my humble opinion that feminism is feminism and anti-racism is anti-racism.
First, I am very sorry you were raped, that’s horrible.
***
The reason I believe sex trafficking is racialized is because of the relationship between sex trafficking and western colonization/global capitalism. For example, consider the ways in which the West sees Asian women in partiuclar as objects for exploited labor – both sexual and non-sexual. Asian women as women particularly designed for service. This racialized/gendered narrative goes way back…
So, though European women, particularly Eastern European women are also trafficked, there are other colonial/capitalist projects exercised by the West onto the East on the backs of Asian women in particular.
If we try to de-race the sex trafficking of Asian women and other women of color, we miss a crucial piece of why it’s happening. We won’t be able to effectively organize against it b/c we would be ignoring whole reasons that motivate it.
You ask:
Why can’t racism be an important issue in itself? Why make it a part of feminism?
Racism can’t be an important issue in itself b/c it’s not an issue in itself. The same for sexism. Oppression doesn’t work this way. The projects are not isolated. They are intersectional. (For all of us, not just woc, but we can see it more clearly in the experiences of woc.)
Andrea Smith writes in her book, Conquest: Sexual Violence & American Indian Genocide,
“The history of sexual violence and genocide among Native women illustrates how gender violence functions as a tool for racism and colonialism among women of color in general. For example, African American women were also viewed as inherently rapable. Yet where colonizers used sexual violence to eliminate Native populations, slave owners used rape to reproduce an exploitable labor force.”
She then offers loads of examples. The point is that the project of categorizing these harms as sexist and those harms as racist, and then directing feminism only to the first category, will be an ineffective strategy b/c that’s not how this shit works. It ain’t clean like that.
And I’m not making this broad, useless argument that “it’s all connected so we should be against, you know, everything and stuff.” I am being much more specific. Sexism and racism intertwine for *particular projects* of domination. It is intentional. Rape of Native women was the most effective tool of colonization. It is both a feminist issue and a racial justice issue.
About the difference between white victims and black/brown victims of rape. The issue for me isn’t about “fewer rights and recourses.” It’s about whose pain is real and whose pain is unreal. Yes, mostly women get raped. But, some of us are seen as inherently rapeable, and others aren’t. Ergo different sentencing. Different attention when white women are missing and women of color are missing. Different values placed on our lives. And those differences of value stems from that intersection that’s so hard to parse out.
(Also, while I’m thinking about it, the idea that “mostly women are raped” really norms white women. Consider that rape is such a pervasive issue in our prisons here in the U.S. and men of color are being caged at such an enormous rate. Or consider that in the boarding schools where Native children were and are placed after being kidnapped and then raped, abused, murdered, both boys and girls at the same rate. The gender dynamics of rape are more complicated when you center people of color. )
You ask:
Do black women have no place in the black civil rights movement?
I’m going to assume you mean the racial justice movement b/c the black civil rights movement has been over for a while. It is true, apostate, that there is rampant sexism and misogyny in racial justice movements as there is rampant white supremacy and white normativity in U.S. feminist movements. It is also true that I rail to them with this very same argument, all the time. One day — on the *same day** — a white feminist pulled me aside and said, hey, foxybrown, I really feel like women of color target white feminists way too much about racism and it’s b/c of internalized sexism, and a Black male racial justice organizer pulled me aside that evening and said, hey, foxybrown, I really feel like Black women target Black men way too much on this sexism shit and it’s b/c of internalized racism. I am not shitting you, this happened on the same day. I felt like such a cliche, like my life was such a textbook.
The sad thing is that, of course, they both got it wrong. And until we get this analysis of intersectionality, we will fail in our projects to achieve racial justice and feminist liberation b/c we will be marginalizing the majority of women and the majority of people of color.
Octogalore,
Consider these examples of police brutality:
On September 3, 1993, Juanita Gomez and her female cousin crossed the border between Nogales, Sonora, and Nogales, Arizona to meet two male friends to go shopping. Larry Selders, a Border Patrol Agent, stopped all four people, but only detained Gomez and her cousin. Selders then told Gomez and her cousin that he would not take them to the Border Patrol department for deportation if they would have sex with him; after both women refused, he raped Gomez.
The American Friends Service Committee reports that Native women in small communities in Maine were routinely profiled as prescription drug abusers, and, as a result, when detained in a Maine jail were routinely forced to undergo visual body cavity searches, which require women to bend over and expose their genital areas to officers, often while being subjected by sexualized and racist verbal abuse, as a matter of policy, while similarly situated white women were not. Native women organized and were successful in obtaining changes to the jail search policy and access to Native people detained in the jail.
The day after Hurricane Katrina struck, 73-year old Merlene Maten, an African American grandmother and church elder who had evacuated to a hotel in the New Orleans suburb of Kenner, Louisiana following the flooding of her home in the city, was handcuffed and arrested for “looting” by local police. As a Black woman taking shelter from the storm in a predominantly white suburb, she was profiled by police as having committed or participated in a break-in at a nearby deli when in fact, at the time of her arrest, she was retrieving food she had brought with her from her car. Witnesses confirm that Ms. Maten never entered the store in question. Although witnesses tried to explain the situation to police, the officers refused to listen and characterized the women as “emotional.” Ms. Maten was held for over 16 days, first in the local jail, and then in the state penitentiary, on charges that she took $63.50 in food from the deli.
Now, categorize. Which box?
LorMarie,
A great woman once wrote:
So perhaps I cannot be black first or a woman first. I am simply a black woman all at the same time.
Indeed! So, when you experience sexism or racism, what makes you think someone is just singling out one of your identities and not targeting all of you at the same time?
Yes, she is a great woman ;-)
The comment I made was in reference to how I see myself rather than how others see me. My post highlighted the contrast between racism and sexism (racism=power, sexism= vulnerability). How do I know they are not targeting both my identities? My experiences with sexism don’t appear to be all that different from what the average white American woman experiences. But my challenges with racism are drastically different from those of white women. As a result, they are too separate experiences.
“The comment I made was in reference to how I see myself rather than how others see me”
The comment below is what I am referring to:
“So perhaps I cannot be black first or a woman first. I am simply a black woman all at the same time.”
You guys need to think outside of the box. Sexism and Racism are connected, and they probably always will be, regardless if it “makes sense” to you people. Yes there are issues that are about gender specifically, but when you think of how gender is a social construct, and then you think what is race? A social construct as well, used to control people and bodies, thus for many people, it does not make sense to keep feminism all neat and separated , anti-racism all seprate in its own tiny box. To do that, for me, would be like practicing segregation, mental segregation. I am a woman of color. As a human being first, its impossible for me to compartmentalize all the facets that make up me, so for someone to ask me not to think about race when talking about gender, I say fuck that. When I experience sexism targeted towards me by a white sexist male, you better believe that there is a lot more in that dynamic working than just sexism.
….so that being said, I can look to feminist thougths and wisdoms, and literature to study its history and such, but to look to feministe writing to make it applicable to me today, I think in order for it to be a power force in instituting change in soceities today, feminists of all ethinicites and backgrounds should think outside the box, and realize that sexism affects all women. So, publications that pride themselves spreading the good word of feminism, and then not including women of color writers and making excuses for it, it does kind of create a dent in the movement so to speak. where do women of color fit in? must it always be about race for them? Why cant it be about both? Why most we always feel the need to compartmentalize?
Foxy Brown,
The issues you raised definitely occur at the intersection of race, gender, class and nationality. You can separate racism, poverty, sexism and nationality.
But I don’t find Jena 6 and Sean Bell directly related to women’s issues and feminism.
Aw, Donna, thanks. I’m just (rather clumsily, I think) trying to put my perspective out there. I’d like to reiterate though that I don’t expect my experience or view to be shared by anyone else.
Racism, sexism, classism occur in the private spheres.
She just said racism didn’t occur in the private sphere in her life. Same as for me.
donnadarko,
You know, I’ll be the first in line to critique racial justice organizers for mobilizing around Jena 6 and not mobilizing around the New Jersey 7. The lives of men and boys in Black communities are generally valued more than the lives of women and girls. However, I’m not going to tell Nicole Bell and Valerie Bell that because they themselves were not murdered, but their fiancee/son was, they didn’t experience violence.
Feminists have always argued that the family is a politicized institution. Many white feminists have argued that family is an oppressive institution. Many feminists of color have argued that it’s more complicated than that. Yes, the family can be a location of oppression, but it’s also a group that’s under siege. How do we ensure the safety of our families, our children, when we are the main ones responsible for them?
Think back to the Moynihan Report in 1965 when Sen. Moynihan criticized the Black family for having too strong of women and too weak of men. Matriarchal, women-led households were the downfall of the Black community, so went the argument. The analysis was at once a white pathology of Black families and a misogynist attack on Black women. That’s how racism/sexism against woc usually works: at once, intertwined, simultaneously.
Or think way back to chattel slavery and how the destruction of African families had a particular impact on enslaved women.
So, consider how the state-sanctioned murder of a member of these women’s families impacts their lives as women, as leaders of their household, as mothers. It is at once a racist attack with deeply gendered consequences.
LorMarie,
Which category would you place the examples of police brutality above? (My 2:58 comment.)
Racism or sexism?
Foxy, I’m with Donna on your 2:58 examples. Let me spell it out. Those INVOLVED WOMEN and were SPECIFICALLY GENDERED so they are FEMINIST ISSUES dealing with both race and gender. The Bell and Jena issues are not feminist, although both important, issues.
“However, I’m not going to tell Nicole Bell and Valerie Bell that because they themselves were not murdered, but their fiancee/son was, they didn’t experience violence.”
They experienced the results of violence against a black man. A son or male partner would have experienced it too. The violence did not occur because they were female.
Seriously, would the black partner of a white feminist who was killed in a gender/feminism related battle be the victim of racial violence? No, that person would be a black person who experienced violence through a loved one being victimized by it.
Are folks in anti-racist movements who don’t look at feminist issues as anti-racist ones because some feminists are POC accused of not looking “outside the box”? Don’t bother answering that.
foxybrown,
With those three scenarios, there are the issues of immigration, police brutality and racism with deeply gendered consequences. I guess one approach is to look at how to solve each scenario. In Davis’ Should Prisons Be Abolished, strip searches and assaults occur at the intersections of gender, class and race. The main cause of the epidemic of assault in women’s prisons is the sexual stereotyping of women, especially poor women of color. Feminism counters the sexual stereotyping of poor women and women of color. Moynihan blamed black matriarchy for problems in the black community when the problem was poverty, unemployment and racism. His theories about black matriarchy and emasculation were borrowed from black sociologist E Franklin Frazier of Howard Unviversity who said families were a tangle of pathology. Black men clung to black patriarchy and colluded with white patriarchy’s narratives and stereotypes about women of color. They were untrustworthy, lying, disloyal. Feminism was never seen as a solution and is necessary to counter these stereotypes. Even children raised in single parent homes are socialized to embrace patriarchal notions of masculinity. Solutions include feminism and fighting racism and poverty at the same time.
I meant the main cause of the gendered consequences is sexual stereotyping of women and poor women of color. Comprehensive immigration reform, prison reform and anti-racism, in addition to feminism, are solutions.
foxybrown,
With those three scenarios, there are the issues of immigration, police brutality and racism with deeply gendered consequences. I guess one approach is to look at how to solve each scenario. In Davis’ Should Prisons Be Abolished, strip searches and assaults occur at the intersections of gender, class and race. The main cause of the epidemic of assault in women’s prisons is the sexual stereotyping of women, especially poor women of color. Feminism counters the sexual stereotyping of poor women and women of color. Moynihan blamed black matriarchy for problems in the black community when the problem was poverty, unemployment and racism. His theories about black matriarchy and emasculation were borrowed from black sociologist E Franklin Frazier of Howard Unviversity who said families were a tangle of pathology. Black men clung to black patriarchy and colluded with white patriarchy’s narratives and stereotypes about women of color. They were untrustworthy, lying, disloyal. Feminism was never seen as a solution and is necessary to counter these stereotypes. Even children raised in single parent homes are socialized to embrace patriarchal notions of masculinity. Solutions include feminism and fighting racism and poverty at the same time.
Foxybrown,
The experiences of the Latina women were sexist. I see nothing racist about it.
The experience of the Native women and the 73 year-old black woman was pure racism (not related to sexism). Racism and sexism are two separate experiences. I see no evidence either from your comments or in society at large that the two are connected…even for women of color.
To be clear, the first comment comes after the second.
[...] another post, the Apostate writes: This is why a race-centric analysis of women’s issues bothers me. Feminism is about women, [...]
LorMarie,
Your assessment is so interesting, you seem so sure! lol Here’s what I think:
First scenario: The fact is that the border patrol officer stopped the women because they were 1) Mexican and 2) women. Mexican/Latino folks are targeted by racist violence at the border by U.S. guards, militarization of that border is because of conquest and capitalism and racism, women crossing that border practically plan to be raped by the border patrol. How can you say that this is only a case of sexism when the reason for the patrol is about conquest, capitalism, and racism, and the strategy for patrol is about sexual violence?
The second scenario: The Native women were sexually assaulted! How is that not also a problem of sexism?
The third scenario: I could do a complex analysis of this, but I have to run. Let me ask you a related question: What about the stereotype of Mammy? Is that only sexist or only racist?
I just don’t think this neat categorizing works at all. My body doesn’t split that way and it’s not interpreted that way. If you don’t interpret your body as separately black and separately woman, I don’t understand how you can be so sure that others do…
I also think that if we keep making this conceptual error, we will be that much more ineffective at building anti-rape movements (b/c the Native women getting sexually assaulted in prison is apparently only about race) or immigrant rights movements (b/c the Latinas getting sexually assaulted by border patrol is apparently only about gender). We won’t get anywhere b/c woc who experience the brunt of both of those kinds of violences (rape and border violence) will be marginalized in both movements b/c we lack imagination beyond the boxes.
donnadarko,
You write:
“In Davis’ Should Prisons Be Abolished, strip searches and assaults occur at the intersections of gender, class and race. The main cause of the epidemic of assault in women’s prisons is the sexual stereotyping of women, especially poor women of color. Feminism counters the sexual stereotyping of poor women and women of color. ”
These three sentences reveals why feminism is abandoned (or never taken up) by many women of color. You quote Davis’s assertion that strip searches and assaults in prison occur at the intersections of gender, class, and race (yes!), but then you marginalize that truth by asserting that the *main* cause is *sexual* stereotyping. Then you assert that feminism’s project is only to counter the *sexual* stereotyping.
And b/c feminism (as you’ve defined it here) isn’t responsive to intersectional oppression, then why should those who experience oppression intersectionally be feminists?
Many elements of my background are much more trivial than yours, but I am also a female emigre to the West from a conservative / patriarchal (albeit largely secular) country who has been helped a great deal by feminism, and I identify with many of your thoughts. Thank you.
Just to clarify so this is not seen as some kind of strange comment on you, by my background being more “trivial” I mean that I get the feeling I have lived a much more sheltered life than you (on the basis that I find it difficult to imagine anyone who has lived a more sheltered life than I have).
If I wasn’t clear, feminism is the solution to the gendered consequences of each scenario. Comprehensive immigration reform, prison reform and anti-racism are obviously more efficient solutions to some of these problems but feminism is the solution to the gendered consequences of each situation.
This was a powerful essay.
donnadarko,
Right on for clarifying, thank you. I don’t see how a political project like feminism can only address one aspect of an intertwined problem like those listed above.
Are you saying that feminists qua feminists are required to address the rape of Juanita, but not the conditions (border policing) that facilitated that rape? That seems like a recipe for a very ineffective, band-aid kind of movement to me.
Or if I am called a Mammy, feminists qua feminists are only required to criticize the gendered portion of that insult, but it is optional if they want to address the raced portion of that insult? As if the insult could be cut by a knife?
How do you think of a person as someone who can be boiled down to parts? I am not a glass of salt water. I am a whole person that is at once gendered and raced. What is the point of trying to keep feminism clean from race? Who benefits from this?
I clarified three times above because the first post did not go through. Yeah, the first scenario about rapes at the border crossing and the third scenario about stereotyping happen at the intersection of race, gender and nationality. One thing you haven’t mentioned is how the immigration reform movement, the prison reform movement and anti-racism lack a gendered analysis. Shouldn’t it also be the responsibility of immigration activists, prison reform activists and anti-racists to incorporate a gendered and feminist analysis? I see women of color having to do everything themselves.
The Native American women profiled and subjected to strip searches were victims of racism and sexism. Anti-racists are doing most of the work against police brutality as far as I know and they should incorporate a gendered and feminist analysis into their activism. It’s also feminism when women of color demand men of color in immigration, prison reform and anti-racism activism be accountable for their sexism and feminist education. When women of color do not hold them accountable and demand a gendered and feminist analysis in these mostly male-lead movements, women pick up the slack and feminism is diluted.
I see no efforts to make immigration reform, prison reform and anti-racism feminist. That’s half the battle. I see no effort toward that end. Women cannot be all things to all people.
I continue to be surprised at how difficult this is to understand. I don’t hear Apostate, Donna or me arguing against an intersectional analysis. Why do the responses keep going there? The argument is against an analysis of other lefty issues being brought into feminism WITHOUT the gender angle.
donnadarko,
I 100% AGREE WITH YOU with regards to the sexism and misogyny in racial justice movements. As I wrote somewhere above, I am fighting those battles too, every day.
The difficult thing is when feminists assume that when I insist on taking race into account and how gender is raced, that I’m not making the same (though opposite) challenges with men of color and white men. I’m not saying you’re doing that to me, donnadarko, but I am saying that this is something that happens a lot.
If feminism is getting challenged to get its shit together around race, it’s not helpful to only think “Well, we’ll get right on that as soon as the other movements get their shit together around gender.” That’s not accountable. We can make challenges to other movements all we like (and many of us do and are taking shit for it), but we, as feminists, are responsible for cleaning our own house.
Our own commitment (as feminists) to *really see* the experiences of the women of color in the examples above and others like them is our responsibility. We say we’re for women – then let’s be for women, dammit! Let’s organize against border policing so Juanita Gomez and other women like her aren’t raped by the fucking pigs.
Or, another option is just to say:
“No, no, no, we have no comment on border policing b/c it impacts men too and we don’t want to be stretched too thin. If it results in rape, then we’ll have something to say about that rape, but we don’t ant to dilute ourselves by addressing one of the very things that facilitated that rape. Feminism: Stretched Too Thin For Immigrant Women And Their Issues.
Hey, why aren’t more immigrant women feminists?”
That is the recipe for a very narrow, very ineffective, and, yes, very white movement.
I also think it’s important to note that the call for feminists to address institutional forces (like prisons and police) that create gendered violence against women (primarily women of color) are critiqued as “diluting” feminism.
I wonder how the women in the examples above would feel about that…
In the meantime, male-dominated antiprison/police activists also don’t prioritize violence against women of color in our homes and communities b/c it “dilutes” their movement too. So, in the meantime, they can call out cops and prisons for brutalizing our communities, but then not commit to building alternative strategies for dealing with domestic violence and rape b/c it “dilutes” their movement.
As a Black woman who has experienced gendered/racialized violence by the cops and gendered/racialized violence in my home, I guess I’d like to sincerely flip off both movements. I do not dilute. I fucking enrich.
If feminists take seriously state violence against women of color, feminism, as a movement, would be awesome. It would include more women that have less of a voice in feminism. It would have more sophisticated political agenda and analysis to stop misogyny and violence against women. It would be more successful, more powerful, more people, more awesome.
Same for the racial justice movements.
I do not dilute. I fucking enrich.
The difficult thing is when feminists assume that when I insist on taking race into account and how gender is raced, that I’m not making the same (though opposite) challenges with men of color and white men.
foxybrown, can you show me examples of you challenging men of color activists on their sexism and lack of gendered analysis? I never see this happening in real life or online. Do you have a blog or website?
In the meantime, male-dominated antiprison/police activists also don’t prioritize violence against women of color in our homes and communities b/c it “dilutes” their movement too.
I know this too well but they are rarely challenged for not incorporating a feminist or gendered analysis. The only reason we have this sticking point is because feminism is the only movement that’s expected to be all things to all people. Feminists do address institutional forces like prisons and police and they should continue to do so.
[...] just as I was having this exchange with Jill, some conversations about what is or is not a feminist issue and what should or should not be posted on feminist blogs, specifically with regards to posts about [...]
I just read through octo’s last two responses, and I find her tone enormously patronizing, so I’m signing off this discussion now b/c, well, I don’t take well to being patronized to by white people or anyone else.
donnadarko, apostate, and lormarie (if you’re still reading!), thank you for the engagement, it was interesting to read your thoughts. I don’t have a blog or website, just a perpetual lurker, so, no, I can’t prove to you that I’m doing this work. But I can say that I’ve also been asked by men of color to prove that I’m addressing the racism in feminist movements too. So, you know, sad same ole, same ole…
Take care,
fb
Foxy — I don’t hear anyone suggesting that underlying causes of gendered violence shouldn’t be discussed. eg, a discussion of rapes of immigrants should include some analysis of the underlying border police/violence issues. A feminist discussion of a woman being called “mammy” needs to discuss both gender and race aspects of that, because yes, when we’re talking about a black woman, we cannot separate that.
What we are saying, I think, is that generalized discussions of immigration or male-on-male violence, without a feminist connection, aren’t feminist issues.
It’s becoming VERY tempting here to call this something it isn’t — white and some WOC feminists shying away from race. Not at all. I’d like to see many more WOC and their issues to do with both race and gender in the movement. But it’s not a movement for male lefty issues discussed in the absence of any relevance to women except the most abstract. Those are great issues, and they have their own movements.