Siobhan Brooks, ”Black Feminism in Everyday Life”

The failure to grasp intersectionality that I think a lot of white feminists (and really people of every type of movement seem to miss)

She bawled? What the fuck was she bawling for?

(via searchingforknowledge)

Why I still don’t believe white women collectively can be feminists.

Because they ain’t got their shit together and do not want to.

As long as y’all are on Jezebel, suckin Hugo Schwyzer’s dick, and screaming over women of color, y’all ain’t feminists.

(via sourcedumal)

Jessica Valenti is terrible, Caitlin Moran is terrible, Kathleen Hanna is terrible, Naomi Wolf is terrible.  Your white feminist representatives are terrible and can get their transmysogynist, heterosexist, colorblind bullshit out.

(via treelet)

(Source: wretchedoftheearth, via righteouspussypower)

tranqualizer:

trigger warning for sexual assault, rape culture, rape

this post is being made by a light skinned able bodied southeast asian viet masculine of center queer boi who is a survivor of sexual violence and fetishization who is sometimes read as an asian woman of color in some spaces. 

my hesitation to come to the defense of of women and girls who have been a victim of rape, sexual assault, anti-sex and anti-women health education with “stop slut shaming” is for a lot of reasons

but first i want establish a few things

• i fully and whole heartedly believe in the power and rights of women and femmes to have sex with whomever in whichever way and whenever they want
• i don’t have answers to how we need to message our movements or what tactics we should consistently use
• while my experiences re: sexual and intimate violence were in the days when i identified as girl and woman i want to acknowledge that that’s not how i am identify today and i am mostly not “read” that way (contingent upon how dominant cis community “reads” gender non conforming bodies)

and then i wanna say that

• i don’t always believe that a campaign to “stop slut shaming” is the first message we need to go to when talking about rape culture and sexual violence against women and femmes. language like this can be alienating for a lot of reasons and primarily because for WOC and GNC POC like myself, our entire existences have been centered around the definitions of desire, sex and sexuality as defined and imposed on us by white supremacy. i have spent my entire life navigating the contradictions of being both desexualized and hypersexualized. so my entire existence in conversations about control or lack of control around my body has been often narrowly focused around my presumed sex, sexual identity, sexual desires and attraction.
• when we use “slut shaming” as a blanketed response to how complex rape culture is, we don’t speak to the WOC and GNC POC i know who will never identify as sluts, will never reclaim slut maybe because we are more familiar with words like “ho” or maybe because, again, we’ve spent our entire lives trying to figure out how is that our bodies, as people of color, are appealing to everyone at one point in time yet becomes unappealing - yet still centered in their sexual desires - when we resist sexual assault and speak out about our survivorship. 
• “stop slut shaming” narrows the conversation (for me, at least). when i have heard this as a response to the times i have shared in intimate space that fact that i have survived sexual violence and fetishization which i am still healing from, i cringe. i collapse. my healing feels hindered because i don’t need others to focus on whether or not i have radical politics around fucking and having sex or controlling my body through being intimate (or not with others) because the reality is when i was sexually assaulted, when i was/am fetishized that is not a consensual experience - it is not reflective of my belief that i have every right to have sex and do whatever the fuck i want.
• it is not always a radical act of solidarity when we assume the boundaries and conditions of how sexual assault happened; when we assume that the person/woman/femme involved has the same politics as the ones “stop slut shaming” implies; when we assume that the person/woman/femme involved was all about fucking this person and then suddenly not and it followed a narrative of the dude or person saying “but you’ve done it before, etc, etc, etc.” the radical act of solidarity of listening to the person who is experiencing the shit and saying i hear you, i see you, i am listening and i will not center your experience around your sexual desire because in that moment it was not about your sexual desire (or lack thereof) that someone assaulted you. it was because someone assaulted you and shame on that fucking person.

trigger warning for sexual assault, rape culture, rape

Sarah Dean, Who is Beyonce Calling a Bitch? (via stand-tall-ladies)

“Who is Beyonce Calling a Bitch?” ok i’ll start

• you
• the lady who wrote this article

(via blackfemdomdotcom)

White feminists are THE most willfully obtuse motherfuckers on the Internet. And sure this is huffpo whose journalism is akin to tmz at this point but like REALLY?

They were mad when Beyonce said girls run the world which was mostly a jam about taking power away from men by becoming financially independent which for a lot of women, particularly women of color, is a huge deal. White women can keep on babbling about glass ceilings and “equality” if they want, I don’t want to share a damn thing with white men.

Then they were mad at her for dancing in a leotard at the Super Bowl never mind Beyonce’s choreography is essentially calisthenics in stilettos - SHE NEEDS ROOM TO MOVE. Also whatever happened to body autonomy? Is that also a thing Black women aren’t allowed to participate in?

Then they were enraged that she would name her tour Mrs. Carter, selling her independence down the river! Not for a second pausing to think that 1. it’s a radical act of vulnerability (that black women are rarely afforded) to love another person that much and be unafraid to show it and 2. It’s one of the greatest (public) examples of (traditional, I know) modern day Black love other than say the Obamas.

So now Beyonce claps back with a teaser, not even an official single, telling all of them to hush and reaffirming her position as the one who is in control of her life (took some time to live my life, don’t think I’m just his little wife) and actually calls all of the catty bitches “bitches” which I think is GREAT. Being nice to assholes gets you nowhere so why even try? State your position and move on.

But I also think it’s interesting that white women automatically assumed this was for them - that everything woc do is for them. It reminds me of something Diana said, “I keep forgetting how much of the world’s experiences belong to white ladies for their own purposes.” If you stop assuming Bey is talking to you or making music for you (clearly she’s been on her black girl shit since Destiny’s Child) you wouldn’t be so upset when you don’t understand her message. Everything isn’t for you.

TL;DR STAY MAD HAIRFLIP

(via basedandbiased)

flawless commentary.

(via smallrevolutionary)

FLAWLESS COMMENTARY.

(via notesonascandal)

for all the white bitches crying about OMG I DON’T HATE BEYONCE, WHO EVER HATES BEYONCE, here’s your fucking answer you dense motherfuckers

(via slay-z)

(Source: , via decolonizeyourmind)

(via righteouspussypower)

fromonesurvivortoanother:

honestly i’m sick and tired of cis white woman Fun Feminists™ always talking about the same convenient idols:

• Gloria Steinem - Transmisogynist, as written in her own book
• Rosie the Riveter - Rosie costumes every Halloween by baby feminists and at rallies a bajillion times over…meanwhile there’s 1000000s of important Women of Color throughout history whom these people never look into. yup i see you and your convenient lens there.
• Alice Paul & company - spoke out against Black suffrage, considered Black people to be subhuman
• Sojourner Truth - the “hard-working magical negro slave woman who is just as strong as a man so that makes her awesome!!!!!” image of her is racist and inaccurate, as written about by bell hooks in Ain’t I A Woman
• Shakesville - ableism and transmisogyny
• Jezebel - a business, not a feminist publication, which is racist, transmisogynistic, and supports rape culture
• Amy Poehler and Tina Fey - regularly transmisogynistic, casually racist
• Jessica Valenti - racist on a regular basis, rehashes material written about by WoC feminists for decades and makes a massive paycheck off of it

An Open Letter to Caitlin Moran by Nyux (via redefiningbodyimage)

And all of these reasons is why I am uncomfortable calling myself a “feminist” - because mainstream feminism doesn’t give a shit about me or other marginalized women, and it never has. 

(via wocinsolidarity)

(via bartelmydeis)

fortunatelight:

davidlynching:

fun fact: iraq, pakistan, afghanistan and saudi arabia have a higher percentage of women in the government than the us & the uk

another fun fact: white people tend to get very angry when you point this out to them

ah white feminists, can y’all take note?

(via younghuns)

bad-dominicana:

girljanitor:

vividgrim:

jadzbionic:

pocproblems:

girljanitor:

cyberfawn:

I’m all for women’s rights and stuff but like some people take it too far idk like obviously there are things that we need to work on as a society and there’s a whole lot wrong with societies views of women and the way we are expected to act but like a 12 year old girl was shot in the face for trying to go to school in Afghanistan?? idk in America we have it pretty good I guess I feel like a lot of the time ppl are just looking for something to complain about

I would like to show you how ass-ignorant you are right now.

Remember when a 7 year old girl IN AMERICA WAS LIT ON FIRE AND SHOT BY THE POLICE FOR EXISTING???

Or when Tanya McDowell, a Black single mother sent her child to a school outside her district  in hopes of getting the child a better education, received a 5 year prison sentence?????

Remember when Joe Arpaio is too busy forcing women to give birth in CHAINS to even both to investigate OVER 400 RAPES in his jurisdiction?

Or when the number of women in poverty are at an all-time historic high RIGHT NOW?

And that women of color are TWICE as likely to be poor as white women?

Or when the Scott sisters received life sentences for stealing $11 as teens?

Or when Marissa Alexander was sentenced to 20 years for firing a warning shot from a gun she legally owned at her abuser who was threatening to kill her, 9 days after giving birth?

Or when CeCe McDonald was put into prison for DEFENDING HERSELF AGAINST A NEO-NAZI TRYING TO KILL HER?

Or when South Carolina sterilized over 7,000 people, mostly Black women?

Or when Regina McKnight, Laura Pemberton, Rachel Lowe, Martina Greywind, Michelle Marie Greenup, and countless other women have been thrown in jail for being PREGNANT?

BUT YEAH WOMEN IN AMERICA HAVE IT PRETTY GOOD, RIGHT?

SHUT UP WITH YOU WHITE SAVIOR BULLSHIT AND CLEAN UP YOUR OWN FUCKING HOUSE BEFORE YOU START FUCKING AROUND IN OTHER PEOPLE’S HOUSES.

I’d also like to add that [from wikipedia] “In the United States, the median income for women is roughly 77% of the median income for men.”

^ that’s for WHITE women compared to WHITE men.  black men make less than white woman, and black women make even less than black men.  post-racial society, indeed.

B O L D E D

latinas make about .50 cents to a white mans dollar, actually. so yeah.

farahjoon:

I know some of you from the department follow me, but I don’t fucking care if you see this — that is to say, I hope every single one of you see this and get angry with me.

A white liberal feminist from our department just re-posted the “We can all do it! Feminism is worthless without intersectionality and inclusion” poster that’s been circulating the Internet.

They write,

Where is the white woman? What about inclusion? Sorry, this is the 5th time I’ve seen this posted and this poster IS my frustration with the feminist movement at the moment. YES, it is totally time for white feminists to step aside. It’s time for FEMINISM to be inclusive, to embrace intersectionality, to let people speak who haven’t spoken. Time for new identities to be created, and for new spaces to be created, (it is always time for this) but since when did intersectionality and inclusiveness become about ignoring white identity all together. I feel like I can’t even talk about any issue that I would have with my white identity, since it’s so readily seen as an identity of power. And no, white people don’t need to be included in every poster about feminism, but maybe in one that talks about inclusiveness it would be a good idea. Or do we still really see this as white feminists vs feminists of color? It’s bullshit.

Their friend writes,

totally been struggling with this lately…feeling super dismissed and confused about the shame i start to feel about the color of my skin…then i realize that the root of that shame is total bullshit… nonetheless, glad you posted this and glad someone else is feeling me on this

I have no words.

My heart is POUNDING.

I do have a poem from my drafts, though.

Murder White Feminism

I want my feminism to be mean.

I don’t want to water down my meanness.

My meanness is something that I’ve worked hard cultivating.

My meanness is fruitful.

My anger is righteous.

My rage is a resource.

I don’t want my sister to grow up in an environment where feminism is co-opted by our oppressors.

I don’t want my feminism to be whitened, to be deadened, to be sucked dry of its most potent ingredients, to be drained of all its venom and vitality.

When can we bury white feminism?

How much longer do we have to wait?

When can we put this godforsaken entity of static movements and futile ideologies to rest?

Because we deserve better. Because we deserve more than what they give us.

In fact, we don’t even want what they give us — we are fucking done with what they give us.

They give us wars against the ones we love.

They give us drone strikes and sanctions and genocide and famine and imperialism.

And we are fucking angry.

We are so angry.

We.

Are.

So.

Angry.

We cannot go on.

We refuse to align ourselves with such utter bullshit.

And we remain contemptuous.

And we remain skeptical.

And we remain strong.

Because we’ve learned from the best:

Nina Simone, High Priestess of Soul

Leila Khaled, Poster Woman of Palestinian Militancy

Cherríe Moraga and Gloria Anzaldúa, two unapologetically radical queer Chican@ freedom fighters

And the Lorde Audre, too, whose words on the power of personal (r)evolution remain unparalleled in a world that keeps telling us that feminism is a Fun Bourgie Anglo Thing™

I’m here to tell you that it’s not.

Together we will exorcise the lies.

Together we will re-(w)rite our lives.

Together we will passionately, provocatively, pridefully slay this beast of prey.

(Source: aloofshahbanou)

18mr:

Today is International Women’s Day. We wanted to commemorate by sharing what one of our heroes, Grace Lee Boggs, wrote last month about her understanding of feminism.

As we approach March 8 and Women’s International Day, I’ve been thinking about how my understanding of Feminism has evolved over the years.

I was born female to Chinese immigrant parents above my father’s Chinese American restaurant in Providence, R.I. My mother did not know how to read or write because there were no schools for females in her little Chinese village. When I cried, the Chinese waiters used to say, “Leave her on the hillside to die. She’s only a girl baby.”

So I realized at an early that huge changes in women’s rights and lives are necessary in our world.

That is why as a teenager, after reading Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s, Women and Economics, I decided I was a feminist. What I meant mainly was that I would never become dependent on a man for my livelihood.

I didn’t begin to think more deeply about the role of women until ten years later when I became a movement activist in the black community. That was how and when I learned that the 13-month Montgomery Bus Boycott which launched the civil rights movement had been organized by women.

Within a couple of hours after Rosa Parks’ arrest on Friday afternoon, December 1, 1955 for refusing to give up her seat to a white man, the Women’s political Council had blanketed the city with 50,000 “Don’t ride the bus” leaflets and was busy organizing the boycott.
To keep people off buses, they created an alternative means of transportation, contacting and pooling hundreds of volunteer drivers, mapping out routes to get workers to all parts of the city, following regular bus routes so that workers who “walked along” the streets could be picked up.

It was a model of Visionary/Solutionary Organizing. On Monday, December 5, the buses were empty.

In recent years, as Detroit has been devastated by deindustrialization and the struggle for a new non-capitalist society has been developing in Detroit, I have discovered that when one society is coming to an end and a new one is emerging, women play a solutionary/revolutionary role because women’s work, of raising and caring for the home and family is ongoing.

Thus in Detroit today Asenath Andrews has created the Catherine Ferguson Academy, a public high school for pregnant teens. The Boggs Educational Collective is starting a place-based school. Time Banking is being organized by Kim Hodge et al. Ann Heler is pioneering a Free Health Clinic.

Thanks Grace. Thanks to all the women in our lives who do such important work every day.

(via cmao)

bad-dominicana:

And for white women, sexual freedom consists of bein free to fuck whoever, while bein sure they occupy the spot for most powerful, protected, respected women on earth.

A black womans sexual freedom is trying to have a sex life thats consensual, without bein mangled and treated like disposable fare or garbage, and largely failing, coz bein,the worlds ugly mule means thats the majority if not all advances and propositions, no matter how amazing you may be…..

what the hell is safe sex if its never safe spaces to begin with? When our,own homes are where we face the most violation, and other relationships, we are taught to barter like youre only worth pussy, when you dont even have worthy people to fuck at all coz few people understand youre human and of those few who do, even less will be compatible to begin with.
What is sexual freedom and safe sex when basic psychological safety isnt even an option most the time?

Tl,dr; idgaf bout white sexual freedom coz you been done used that freedom to exploit and cage me in as your shebeast fuck toy thru centuries.

farahjoon:

suckingonalemon replied to your post: I’ve had this blog since the beginning of 2010 —…

Wait so so you not like any feminist that is white??

You know what, this is such a ridiculous question but I’ll answer it anyway because I’ve answered it time and time again.

Before I say anything, I want to mention how condescending and straight-up presumptuous some of the white feminists on here have been to my friends and I. For example, I have been immediately unfollowed for trying to correct a popular white feminist blogger who was spreading misinformation about women in Iran. (NEWS FLASH: I’M AN IRANIAN AMERICAN WOMAN.)

When I criticize “whiteness” or say things like “murder white feminism,” I’m talking about what is mainstream, I’m talking about the establishment, I’m talking about systems and institutions and politics that keep a very particular social order in tact.

This isn’t about me “hating” anyone — I know and have worked and learned alongside and am friends with feminists of all backgrounds.

What I’m stressing is that we don’t forget about race/ethnicity/class/religion/immigration status/sexuality/ability when we talk about movement work. That is to say, our problem isn’t just “patriarchy” — it is white supremacy, it is capitalism, it is heterosexism, it is transphobia, it is Judeo-Christian hegemony, it is xenophobia, it is Orientalism, it is ableism, it is imperialism, it is genocide. In other words, we have to go beyond domestic issues such as the so-called “wage gap” — btw, WOC make way less than the 77 cents/dollar that the mass media outlets incessantly problematize — and “battle of the sexes.”

So when I say “murder white feminism,” I’m asking all of us to come together and reconceptualize feminism because we can no longer afford to look at these issues through such an excruciatingly myopic lens. If we don’t revolutionize our thinking, if we don’t even attempt to challenge ourselves and each other, if we settle for the status quo, we can neither seek nor ensure tangible social, political, and economic change.

(Source: aloofshahbanou, via angryasiangirlsunited)

(Source: maarnayeri, via theirriandjhiquishow-deactivate)

katelucia:

Jada Pinkett-Smith is aware of the critics that frown up their noses at the way she raises her daughter, Willow. Willow cuts, dyes and styles her hair as she pleases, a fact that bothers many who feel girls shouldn’t have that much control over their appearance at such a young age.

Jada decided to address the criticism in a Facebook post:

“A letter to a friend…This subject is old but I have never answered it in its entirety. And even with this post it will remain incomplete. The question why I would LET Willow cut her hair. First the LET must be challenged. This is a world where women, girls are constantly reminded that they don’t belong to themselves; that their bodies are not their own, nor their power or self determination. I made a promise to endow my little girl with the power to always know that her body, spirit and her mind are HER domain. Willow cut her hair because her beauty, her value, her worth is not measured by the length of her hair. It’s also a statement that claims that even little girls have the RIGHT to own themselves and should not be a slave to even their mother’s deepest insecurities, hopes and desires. Even little girls should not be a slave to the preconceived ideas of what a culture believes a little girl should be.”

(via le-kif-kif)

Andrea Smith, Indigenous Feminism Without Apology (via vanillaandlavender)

preach

aka why i hate ‘wave’ centric language about feminism

(via spookyprincesskitten)

(via le-kif-kif)