>to use an example, during the burqa wars that broke out among
>bloggers, where white bloggers used the burqa to represent the most
>horrid conditions of women's oppression imaginable, activist women of
>color bloggers pointed out that, goshes, one of the more horrid forms
>of oppression was having a bombed dropped on your head. at that point,
>who gave a shit about the burqa?
To use another example from the feminist blogosphere.
There was a radical feminist (in the truly radical sense of Dworkin's radical feminism) who was very popular. Not so much because everyone agreed with her ideas, but because she was a truly awesome writer. She had every major feminist blogger blogging about her controversial posts -- among which was some classic environmentalist stuff about how the answer, in part, was population control.
To make any number of her posts, like all good polemicists, she would occasionally rely on racializing imagery. Korean farmers who looked for wives abroad under Korean policy, were "hayseeds" (and other derogatory names usually assigned to rural "white trash" in the u.s.) She referred to people who had children as "breeders," which set off a lot of radical women of color bloggers who were reminded of the times they, themselves, as mothers had been called "breeders" if they'd ever collected a welfare check or who had found that their poverty was blamed on their uncontrolled breeding habits. There was more, but a lot of it boiled down to the fact that Twisty (at I blame the patriarchy) often talked about issues that were perceived to the kinds of concerns that consumed young, single white, professional feminist bloggers: the tyranny of the tiny handbag, the horrors of high heels, the oppressiveness of blow jobs which no sane person, Twisty claimed, ever wanted to give of their own volition.
What was also happening was a kind of insularity among white feminist bloggers. They had their own invite-only email list, composed entirely of white women. They linked to one another and promoted each others blogs. When they did link to blog posts written by women of color, the typical swarming happened. The readers of the big white feminist blogs would descend on the women of color blogs, read and leave. No one would participate and engage their posts. It would also unleash a small swarm of racists. This happened on my own blog. If you wrote about race from a leftist perspective, commenters would show up to call you names. I ignored them and didn't reproduce their comments. Why feed the trolls?
Eventuallly, a blogger at Blackademic, Courtney, wrote a post about the reproduction of racializing sentiments and interactions at Twisty's blog. Twisty showed up and said, "Lookee. I'm just a wee little blog that no one pays attention to. The big bloggers, like Dailykos, Firedoglake? they will never pay attention to little old me and my radical feminist ideas. So, the people who are really responsible for exclusion? They are the men, over there. See?" Imagine Twisty pointing her finger at the Patriarchy.
What she was saying was, "Don't pick on _me_. I'm not the source of the problem. Whatever you think I said that was racist, well the bigger problem is we're fighting this common enemy: patriarchy. Look over there (pointing). It's them, not me."
What was happening was a dynamic that happens over and over again among feminist activist groups. When people engage in the long-standing tradition of internal self- and social-criticism of the practices _within_ the activist community, people get very upset. They feel it's derailing. They say it takes the focus of the _real_ enemy. Why are you doing this, they say? Why are you breaking up _our_ movement?
Well, what's wrong with that?
It's the same damn demand, "Lookee. We've got this problem, it's called Patriarchy. The source of all problems is patriarchy: racialization, racism, hierarchy (a key word in radical feminist analyses: it's hiearchy -- not class), homophobia, postmodernism, queer theory and queer liberation -- all of it can be sourced to patriarhcy. We fight that, and all the other issues will go away.
It's not just Twisty. This was the driving theme behind books like _Radically speaking_ a radical feminist manifesto for the 90s. it was the underlying impulse behind Ariel Levy's horrible _Female Chauvinist Pigs_. Her problem, as it turned out, was having to take courses exploring the intersectionality of race, class, and gender and put up with cultural relativism in the classroom. Quelle Horreur!
Of course, Twisty's response just put kerosene on the fire.
Since then, there have been similar blowouts over the direction of feminism and its representation by bloggers who are increasingly making the media rounds, asked to represent feminism to the rest of the world. Jessica Valenti hosts discussions with black feminist bloggers who are subjected to racializing attacks by her readers and nothing gets done about it. She writes a call for papers for an anthology that is heterosexist in its assumptions. She gets called on it by the transgender community. She corrects the problem and then includes papers speaking to that issue, what had initially been a gaping hole in her analysis. Is there mention of the criticisms from people who had improved her work? NOt a bit. It was if she magically collected those papers and published them, making it a better book in the process, but not a mention of the original error and how, collectively, the book was improved.
Amanda at Pandagon writes a book that deploys racializing imagery of Jane of the Jungle and King Kong. People point out the problem, while white people like Michael Berube defend her cover and illustrations as "ironic". Defenders have this bemused reponse, "wow. These funny little people making funny little complaints about really silly stuff. there are so many bigger things to worry about. it must be that they are jelus." Or, they get defensive and say, "Why are you attacking me. I'm on your side. I have a history of anti-racism or anti-heterosexism or whatever. How can *I* be the problem. Please, look over there (pointing) at those guys, they are the problem. Not me. See (pointing) look! Stop picking on me. I'm not your enemy."
And to their defense rush their readers who then charge the critics with breaking up "our" movement. Why are you doing this? You are ruining the good thing we had going here. You are turning around, focusing on (racism, heterosexism, elitism, etc.) among *us*. But the real problem is out there. Newt Gingrich. Anthony Scalia. Rush Limbaught. Ann Coulter. THEY are the racist, sexist, heterosexist, elitists. Certainly not us! We have our anti-racist, anti-sexism, anti-heterosexist, anti-elitist street cred right her in our tiny little handbags and manbags. See?
why oh why are you ruining *our* movement? if you people hadn't decided to get all uppity and call us out for silly things -- and besides, I think you are getting entirely too much pleasure out of this and that's suspicious. why are you so into calling us racists, anyway, huh? -- none of our problems would be happening. we'd be stronger, more focused. We might have even gotten rid of patriarchy a long time ago. But noooooooo. You are telling us, white people (straight people; men; middle class people) that we are the problem. Insufferable! I'm gonna take my marbles and go home.
The problem, of course, is the use of the expression "our" movement to begin with. it's "our" movement when they want a grand coalition. It's "our" movement when they want women of color to stop talking about, say, forced abortions among poor white women and women of color so it won't distract from the pro-choice message. It's not that they don't ever want to talk about. Just not now, when "we" are trying to get a point across. Can you just put "your" issue on the back burner, for now? Please. We'll get to it later.
shag