> So, you want to use the phrase "the master's tools" to mean a
> different set of problems than what Audre Lorde addressed in her essay
> "Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference." Does that
> mean that Lorde's metaphor is "simply wrong"? That's a very odd
> response. Surely, you can use the phrase to mean whatever you want it
> to mean, but that doesn't make her different use of it "wrong," does it?
I don't see why anyone has to drag in all the stuff about capitalism, sexism, racism, or whatnot. Just look at this from a literary standpoint. Lorde was using a metaphor. And metaphors work best when, in and of themselves, they make sense.
Take the metaphor, "closing the barn door after the cows have gotten out." We use this phrase to characterize the dopiness of establishing protections after the damage has been done. This metaphor gets the point across, and it _works_ when it's interpreted literally.
Or, try the metaphor, "You catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar." Again, the metaphor has a number of roughly analogous meanings: sweetness is more appealing, you make more headway when you're nice to people, etc. But at its most literal meaning, it's true: flies like honey, they don't like vinegar as much. (By the way, in the opening sequence of Serio Leone's _Once Upon a Time in the West_, they smeared marmalade on Jack Elam's magnificently ugly kisser to get the fly to crawl in his beard.)
Lorde's metaphor has have a nice sound to it. But it fails on this point. There's no need to invoke its applicability to capitalism, or racism, or sexism, or theories of power. It's a _bad metaphor_.
In short: If you're going to create a metaphor, it really helps to create one that makes sense when it's interpreted literally. Or, if you're going to make a hammer, don't make it out of feathers and butter.