I actually have no problem with the post—in fact, a lot of it is quite important I think, in that there are far too many people who confuse online talk with activism. Personally, I felt the article was spot-on in its indictment of passive participation. The comments though… well, there’s a lot of privilege there. I think there were lots of people who responded with “See? Calling me out on my privilege doesn’t help the cause!” Their reading was different than mine.
I think the calling out the article condemns is the stuff that only criticizes, that only points to the gaps. We need to know those gaps and deal with them, obviously. But should the discourse merely be pointing fingers? Obviously not. And sometimes, it comes off that way. In general, this is an awareness thing. It is simply easier to leave out race when discussing feminism unless you’re someone for whom race is a primary, persistent concern, and feminism in North America is rather White. Therefore, a lot of the people on Feministe are going to glom on to anything that seems to offer a “Get Out of Privilege Free” card.
I actually believe that making ‘Feminism’ more ‘PoC-friendly’ won’t help a damn bit with that—rather, intelligent, thoughtful, progressive racial discourse itself must become a topic for discussion. How can a feminist movement hope to be more racially inclusive when society as a whole is scared shitless of dealing with race and racism? They’re all connected, but in the U.S. at least, I can’t see anything happening until people are willing to deal with race. If anything, including race in broader discussions shuts down activity, because so many people won’t touch anything race-related with a 200-ft. pole.
The whole situation just kind of sucks.
She could have written about call out culture without bringing the power disparity implied in her racial reference. What I mean is, she could have illustrated her post by picking on an incident (and I am sure there are many) where she was called out by a White, American, cis blogger like her. Then we can compare apples to apples. Instead, she uses the example of being called out for her racial insensitivity which, in turn, makes her appear even more so racially insensitive.
While I agree with you that the subject is interesting, it all just came across as a hurt feelings rant against the “mean WoC who call feminists out”.
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