Intersectionality or bust
Intersectional feminism is a result of the
problems in identity politics. I have divided the issues into 3 core questions
to consider when advocating for a cause.
The questions are:
- Who is able to protest?
- Whose voice is heard when they protest?
- Can we represent all voices including the unheard? How?
Starting with the first question: ‘Who is able
to protest?’
In most cases protesting is a risky affair.
Speaking up against the status quo upsets the ruling elite who benefit from the
oppression that comes with it. The risks can be anywhere from getting fired,
getting arrested and incarcerated, to being killed, and unfortunately the
rewards are not as immediate as the risks. Aside from the risks, protesting
itself is an emotionally and physically demanding process. Activists develop
compassion fatigue and exhaustion from being around so much suffering. Only the
more privileged segment of the oppressed (those who are healthy and have
relatively better finances or job security) are even able to become activists
and risk protesting.
Onto the second question: ‘Whose voice is heard
when they protest?’
Unfortunately people only listen to those with
power. Whether that be financial power, power in the form of connections/contacts
or power in numbers. This means that politicians and the media will only hear
the activists who are more powerful and who’s rhetoric is easier to swallow.
The problem with this is that those people tend to not be the worst off. This
might not be an issue if they also spoke for those that were, but we tend to be
most bothered about the issues that directly impact us. A black man will
ignore the plight of the black woman in favor of earning his own rights. When
an upper class white woman is asked about whether racism or classism is the
bigger evil, she will of course only have one reference point and so will
consider the most dominant form of oppression against her to be the bigger
evil. When these are the women who will be heard and who have the luxury of
being able to fight for their rights it makes sense that they will only be able
to speak of their own experience and sorrows, sidelining the unique brand of
sexism suffered by poor women of color. These are the people oppressed due to
their gender, race, and class. And they are also the ones who were not heard
when people protest about gender, race, or class before the awareness of
intersectional feminism. Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw says “when the practices
expound identity as ‘woman’ or ‘person of color’ as an either/or proposition,
they relegate the identity of women of color to a location that resists
telling”. Intersectional feminism is the acknowledgement that you cannot
separate sexism from racism and class oppression when discussing the experience
of oppression for a woman of color. It recognises that these forces intermingle
and so overcoming them will be more difficult and requires a more diversity
conscious approach.
The last question is about the way forward with
this awareness asking: ‘Can we represent all voices including the unheard?
How?”
Crenshaw highlights the necessity of
understanding the impact of multiple forms of oppression. She gives an example
that shelters serving unemployed poor women “cannot afford to address only the
violence inflicted by the batterer; they must also confront the other
multilayered and routinized forms of domination that often converge in these
women's lives, hindering their ability to create alternatives to the abusive
relationships that brought them to shelters in the first place”. We must
consider more than just finances as a disadvantage. We must look at cultural
practises and how they often provide a breeding ground for the parasitic nature
of patriarchy. This consideration will help address the unique challenge faced
by women of color. In the example Crenshaw gave, a woman's underemployment is
not purely a function of a lack of skill or education. It is a product of her
home environment, upbringing, and societal prejudices as well. Intersectional
feminism recognizes the complexity of oppression and how multifaceted it is.
Unfortunately without keeping this in mind, it is easy to only focus on the
messages from black men about race and white women about feminism and think
that is the whole story. This is how intersectionality is productive, because
it allows us to be more conscious and sympathetic to the plight of others.
The truth is I don’t know the perfect answer to
the last question. All I have learned is we must fight for those who cannot
fight for themselves and use our privilege for them because even if we share
some of the same oppressors, that does not mean we share all experiences. So
first we must listen, then do all we can to make sure their experiences are
heard.
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