#it does not address or even acknowledge intersectionality

[brick-van-dyke]

I feel like we, as white queers, need to have a little talk about solidarity and apathy.

This past year, we have been hearing stories of children as young 9 years old, coming home to find their entire families wiped out under bombardments and rubble. That's tragic, but it's also something we've grown accustomed to hearing; probably far too accustomed to. Despite this, have we been posting "how to escape Gaza and Israel aligned countries" or "helplines for Palestinian Americans who are struggling mentally"? Have we sat down and thought "how much room can I make for Palestinian refugees to live in any spare space I can afford to give until they're back on their feet?" In the same way we think about housing homeless queers in America? Have we felt that same dread of helplessness as we watched the Biden administrations support Israel without question, as we have when looking at Trump's support of anti queer groups?

This isn't to shame anyone or guilt anyone, but to genuinely push us to think; why are they any different? Why do these two issues feel different to American queers specially? The simple answer is that targeting queers affects us personally, while the other does not. That's not a comfortable thing to admit, but it is true and it's often why we would feel dread over Trump and Republicans, while not feeling that same level of dread at Benjamin Netanyahu Joe Biden or any of the democrats who are in favour of stricter sentences in the prison industrial complex. We know already, deep down, that the "they are the lesser evil" wasn't true in the sense we would mean it, at least not for Palestinians, black people and those already killed, oftentimes including the black people in our own communities. It will be worse, yeah, but they have been dying in the same ways we fear for ourselves this entire time. We need to think about that and take that in. Queer black trans women have died in record numbers under the Biden administration, but that affects white queers far less when we're not the targets, we can afford apathy and we oftentimes wouldn't know it's even happening when it's not us and people like us. When we're in our circles with mostly white queers and a few black queers, usually very few black trans women who would have felt the fear of being black and trans. That apathy and ignorance is something we have to face; our lack of solidarity until now and our individualistic upbringing to prioritise our own safety. I'm not saying wanting safety and peace is wrong, but we can't forget that others have been paying the price we have been fearing for far longer than just now when we've just been added to that list. For example, disabled queers don't have the right to marry like non disabled queers have achieved, yet we say there is marriage equality and forget this. There isn't marriage equality when so many other issues that don't effect white, cis, abled, etc. queers or any lack of intersectionality that lead to not being targeted by these specific legislations.

It's okay to want to be safe, but we must remember that not everyone in our community has had that luxury before Trump. He's targeting white queers as well now, yeah, and he'll be worse for everyone, but there has already been suffering that we, ourselves, have not acknowledged as equal suffering due to the lack of targetting of white queers. And we have to talk about that apathy and lack of solidarity if we're to move forward. That must become something we are aware of and address, as people and a community. I want to ask us to show the same heartbreak for these people and the same horror we reserve for ourselves when we are targeted, open our hearts to empathy and to make room for those who have been suffering all this time with the same amount of dread you're currently feeling but for far longer; long before Trump first became president in 2016 and now again in 2024, long before Biden and long before even Bill Clinton or George Bush. This has been going on for so long, and we have taken in the "progress" of some protections at the expense of a status quo that sacrifices others. So many have been suffering regardless of Trump in ways we've been fearing for ourselves. It has already been happening to them and we ought to show room for them in our hearts. They are our community, and solidarity must prevail before our own dread. Yes, Trump is bad, for them and us, but we have to stay strong and resist because until now it's been the black community on their own who have bore the brunt of far right prejudice and discrimination while we enjoyed the coddling of the democrat's protections and pink washing. It's long past overdue for white queers to join in solidarity with the black community, Arabs, Palestinians, the disabled community and every other marginalised group targeted by the democrats and who will also continue to be targeted by Trump.

We need to initialise our own will to have solidarity with others and listen to those beyond our own circles and communities, and we need to become aware of the threat of apathy that we are all capable of.

[rebellum]

Ppbthhh im too emotionally tired and busy to engage in a discussion about it but I just saw a thing saying sex-based oppression isn't real and that it's a terf concept, bc sex isn't real

Which like.. isn't how that works

Race isn't real, racism is real

Sex isnt real, sexism is real

Sex based oppression exists BECAUSE there is this flawed idea that there are 2 definable sexes, each with their own totally separate characteristics, and that one of these sexes a) exists b) is more powerful or better than the others c) the "other" sex is weaker and flawed

Like, that doesn't mean "everyone with a penis has a special penis privilege" nor does it mean "everyone who was assigned male at birth has a special AMAB privilege". Cause that's not true. Many people are oppressed specifically BECAUSE they were amab, or because they have a penis, (those are not the same thing!), and they don't fit into societal expectations of what that should mean (that everyone amab was born with a penis and will always have a penis, that they're the only people to have penises, that they must be men, that there must be no sex ambiguity, that the "dominant" hormone in their body is testosterone, that they not only are men but ACT like appropriately men by being heterosexual and strong and wearing men's clothes and doing a man's profession and not seeming feminine and having manly interests etc.)

Like.. sexism is real. It's not a terf concept to say sexism exists. It's not transphobic or intersexist to say sexism exists. Because it does and it's a major force of oppression.

And like one of the things the post mentioned was that the idea of sex based oppression is wrong is because it assumes people have shared experiences solely because of sex.

Which like, a) no it doesnt, that's literally the reason intersectionality exists, to describe how people who share one trait (eg sex) have different experiences that relate to that trait bc of having other traits b) yeah, that's like, one of the issues the modern and intersectional theories of sexism, the patriarchy, queer theory, and feminism as a whole are meant to address. That there exists a thing called sex and people are put into categories of it and that gender is a binary system solely based on sex. There is the belief that there are shared experiences based solely on sex, and pointing out that belief is wrong doesn't mean that everyone in the world goes "oh okay my bad", it means we need to engage with that idea. Like how race doesn't exist except for as a social construct, but racism sure does, and we can't address racism without acknowledging that people think there is a similarity between like a black man born in Toronto and a black man born into a foraging society in sub saharan Africa, a similarity based solely on appearance, that means they are more similar than the toronto guy is to his indigenous best friend he grew up with, but that regardless if the African man goes to Toronto he will experience racism because he's black. We have to engage with cultural constructions in order to challenge and dismantle them, and recognise that they do exist AS CULTURAL CONSTRUCTIONS (on mobile so I can't just put that in italics or it'll make the whole thing italic) even if they don't exist in some sort of "biological reality" and those constructions don't recognise the truth of the situation.

But like I'm just. So tired. I can type that out but I can't type out good replies or read more of what ppl say with a clear mind. Like I managed to say all that but I gotta go zone out to youtube videos for several hours now and stress about how i should be using that time for grad school stuff

[monarda-citriodora]

i get very frustrated with how transmascs and trans men are completely left out of conversations about the oppression women face bc like....we also get a significant portion of that our way too & we as a class are not seen as men by society or patriarchy. we're literally seen as mutilated, ill girls who need to be regulated & legally forced back into our socially determined place. like, we are denied education, reproductive autonomy, autonomy in the same ways women are and sometimes even more so because we are breaking social rules. we are harassed in public, catcalled, followed, subjected to all sorts of misogynistic violence & discrimination and yet ppl often completely ignore us in conversations about feminism & sexism. worse, there is this sentiment that by simply saying we're men & going through life as masculine people, patriarchy will ig just be completely find with a class of ppl it has labeled as women encroaching on it's territory, threatening it's systems of masculinity and hierarchy by asserting that they are the same with cis men? i am unaware of any framework right now that adequately addresses how trans men fit into these discussions that doesn't ignore what we experience. Even intersectionality seems to fail when it comes to this i think bc trans men are not able to utilize patriarchy as men (bc patriarchy does not acknowledge them as men) nor are they able to systemically oppress any group of women. i think transandrophobia is a good concept but at the same time, it really does seem to just come back to being misogyny and esp the sort of misogyny that gets weaponized against masculine women

like, i almost feel like if trans men as a class are ever to stop being treated as women by society it would be bc patriarchy no longer has a chokehold on society and there is no difference between how men and women are treated socially. people transgressing the lines of gender wouldn't be a threat to power bc there would be no lines between genders. it wouldnt matter how a person dresses, what name they go by, what voice they speak with, what intonation styles they use, what jobs they pursue, how strong they are, what medical treatments they need, what education they have access to, etc. bc there wouldn't be a power structure stratifying these aspects of human existence or physical attributes

[asuvmigliac]

What is intersectionality? And what it means to me.

Kimberlé Crenshaw describes intersectionality as "The intersectional experience [being] greater than the sum of racism and sexism, any analysis that does not take intersectionality into account cannot sufficiently address the particular manner in which Black women are subordinated." Now, only 36 years later has the term taken on a life of its own.

Many people use the term intersectionality as a way to define their views or as an interconnected word for feminism. But I think over the years, the word Crenshaw, coined back in 1989, has slowly started to lose its strength and meaning with the use of social media and the rise of performative activism. As The Chronicle of Higher Education wrote in 2017, “The word has migrated from women’s-studies journals and conference keynotes into everyday conversation, turning what was once highbrow discourse into hashtag chatter.”

But what does intersectionality mean to me? I don't disagree with Crenshaw's initial definition, and she's adjusted the definition over the years to adjust to changes going on in the world. Columbia Journalism Review even wrote, '"Crenshaw herself acknowledges that the term ranges far beyond black and female." But to me, intersectionality is a more concise way for me to say that my views (politically or otherwise) mean that I believe in human rights and equality for all. Intersectionality is so great because it doesn't just touch on any one thing. It truly encapsulates what equal rights for all are. It's not just for women. For BIPOC. For the LGBTQIA+ community or the disabled, but for everyone. As someone who is a cis-biromantic-asexual-neurodivergent-Hispanic woman, intersectionality has helped me navigate my place in the world and what it means to me.

[alenvs3000w25]

Blog Prompt #3

What role does “privilege” play in nature interpretation? Please include your working definition of privilege. 

My working definition of privilege is any overt or covert advantages or disadvantages that affects ones positionality in society. While many seek to address overt privileges, especially as of late, there has been this era of 'wokeness' where society seeks to address these issues. While this is great and incredibly important, there continue to be however, so many structural inequalities that continue to impact marginalized communities. Furthermore, there is the concept of intersectionality which discusses an entanglement of identities that result in unique experiences of privileges or discrimination. Intersectional issues are much more difficult to address due to its disproportionate effect on so many differing communities. As well as structured inequality being harder to address as well because these barriers are so deeply entrenched in society. For example, a great portion of our scientific understandings in the medical community are tailored to white males as these are the study pools selected. Despite the genetic differences that create differing outcomes for other sexes or races. Society does not cater to these individuals, not to mention many women must simply accept the care they are given. Like the ridiculous and dangerous list of side effects or risks women face when taking any form of hormonal birth control, that for much of history was not even explained to women. The fact that women have different symptoms of heart attacks that was only recently understood. I think privilege plays a large role in nature interpretation, especially in Canada. Canada is known for its beautiful landscapes, nature, and culture. Yet, Canada has had the privilege to develop this culture and regions as a result of its horrendous treatment of the Indigenous people who inhabited this land prior to and anteceding colonization. While they have attempted to perhaps right their wrongs, in political efforts like the Truth and Reconciliation Act or with the University's land acknowledgements, or with many other arguably trivial actions. This does not change the fact that these groups are still subject to structural inequalities in Canada, including but not limited to; immensely high food cost in Indigenous communities, continued disrespect and ignorance of government reparations, including allowing the construction of oil pipelines on Indigenous soil, and a lack of livable conditions. I think many Canadian nature interpreters can be very privileged in just our access to our amazing land but also in land dynamics that impact our relationships with nature.  

Furthermore, I think in nature interpretation and privilege I think there is the question of access. If we have the ability to access outdoor spaces, there may be geographical barriers including living in an urban area with very few green spaces, and not having the means to travel to the then closest green spaces. Or even socio-economic barriers as not having the affordability of time to spend out in nature. Moreover, physical barriers including disabilities and a lack of accommodation for these individuals. All of these factors significantly impact ones relationship with nature and their interpretation of nature as well. I think being mindful and ensuring equity as well as access is integral to nature interpretation.  

[bisluthq]

girl you cannot be serious…sure, we can acknowledge that white women do benefit from certain aspects of the patriarchy and do take advantage of it sometimes but you cannot tell me that we’re not regressing when it comes to feminism.

misogyny is still a huge issue, no matter the skin color of the woman. black women are historically more discriminated against, that’s a fact but women are hated because they are women. this is why intersectionality is important! in certain aspects a black man will be more privileged than a white woman and vice versa!

what blake lively is going through is the perfect example rn. she has done some weird things in the past but that doesn’t excuse her getting sexually assaulted! people were ready to forgive liam payne for all the fucked up things he’s done because he passed away. johnny depp was excused because he was a beloved actor. justin baldoni is being excused because in the past he advocated for women!

women never get the benefit of the doubt. women can never be imperfect victims. women cannot be unlikable to the general public because it is a death sentence - as soon as something happens to them, everyone is getting their pitchforks out!

how many male abusers work in hollywood to this day? after a trillion allegations that were proven to be true?

brad pitt, johnny depp, harvey weinstein, david o. russel i could go on and on and on and on. women do not receive the same treatment.

if you’re a woman who even dares to speak out against a powerful or really any man - you have to hope that you’re pretty and likable enough with mountains of evidence because otherwise you’ll be blacklisted and made fun of for life :/.

this is the unfortunate reality of it and we’ll be seeing more and more of this after the depp vs heard trial..

eh I think you’re twisting what I’m saying or maybe I misunderstood that other anon because my point was white womanhood serves both patriarchy and white supremacy. Doesn’t mean white women don’t face misogyny (obviously) but we also cannot deny that white womanhood as a structure is useful to both patriarchy and white supremacy and white women often take advantage of this. See the whole “he won’t know who you’re voting for” business in the US election (spoiler: she was voting for Trump anyway) and actually this whole “bring your husband to fix your workplace problems” thing we’re discussing now etc. Obviously that does not mean white women don’t face misogyny or don’t need feminism but like that’s something to address? That’s - as you pointed out - where intersectionality comes in.

I also think absolutely true, women have a far higher burden of proof and are not allowed to be imperfect victims (Amber Heard is an ideal example of this). Women have to be perfect victims to be taken seriously (so… ideally dead. That does it, mostly 💀💀 and even then not always).

But also back to the white women thing - all those guys you mention are continuously propped up and represented by women. (Almost always white and pretty too). Depp’s lawyer was a pretty white lady. Baldoni’s crisis team going after Blake was almost all women. Weinstein is in prison (or like around prison) but his lawyer was a pretty, young, white lady. You also can’t divorce that stuff from the conversation. Weinstein’s lawyer btw prides herself on using her gender to defend men from sexual assault allegations lmao. Like that’s literally what she does all day every day. She protects men from sexual assault accusations.

I also don’t know that it’s a “death sentence” - plenty of women work again after controversy and plenty of men do not. It’s more a case of if you have a thick enough skin and if you’re able to convince people that you’ll make money. But men and women alike get cancelled all the time and the line between who stays cancelled and who doesn’t is less about gender imo and more about who has thick enough skin - and who has resources to fight back - to attempt to withstand the cancellation. I mean the reason Depp got awarded damages is he WAS able to prove the allegations cost him opportunities. He just responded to it by taking her to court and eventually he won. Blake realistically will win in a not dissimilar legal position.

I am definitely not saying there’s no misogyny in society or we don’t need feminism but I AM saying it’s… a complicated discussion that requires nuance yk?

[nothorses]

i don't remember if i've sent a similar ask before but i just wanna talk about how i feel that my political stances (while ideologically consistent and aligned with my personal values) are out of place where i live.

i live in a country where violence of all kinds against women is insanely common, which results in two things i'm conflicted about: the very eager internalization of radfem rhetoric in the few social circles where feminism is even accepted, and pretty extreme social media callout culture (similar to the metoo kind) which spirals into cancel culture.

i know for a fact that saying shit like "kill all men" and "all men are evil" is unproductive at best and harmful at worst. but this is just one example of the sort of rhetoric that is very very common in the most progressive of feminist circles here - it's literally the tip of the iceberg. i feel like i can't speak out against it (as a trans man myself) because i would be offending every woman who's had a horrible experience with a man. it would undoubtedly be seen as "incel behaviour" or misogyny (i actually got called an incel the one time i did it lmao). and anyway that just makes me wonder how we can ever manage to embrace a better form of feminism without first seeing progress already, so that refuting the aforementioned statements (and the feminism they represent) isn't seen as a personal or misogynistic attack. and if things do get better on their own, who's to say that people won't just take it as a sign of radical feminism working? idk it's really confusing

in a similar vein, i despise cancel/callout culture, but i don't know how to reconcile that with my support for victims who speak out. every time someone does that, it triggers a movement of others following suit, but this eventually spirals into attempts to cancel people for very minor incidents that can easily be learned from and moved past. i don't see any point in encouraging people to speak out as long as they're doing it for "good reason" because obviously that's kinda hypocritical, so that leaves me with two options: either nobody speaks out about anything or everybody does about everything. both of these lead to harmful outcomes, whether it's a toxic culture of silence and suppression (which is already a problem here) or a toxic culture of demonization and not allowing growth at all.

i know this doesn't sound great lmao, but i formed most of my feminist opinions based on the things i saw on tumblr and other online spaces (plus some readings by historical feminists) that i felt were logical and effective. the problem with that is that all these spaces are predominantly white - which i am not - so the things i read are mostly by white people. and it leads me to wonder whether, even by critically thinking about the content i consume and forming independent opinions, i'm trying to apply a mostly white solution to a non-white situation. that implies that the brand of feminism i practice and advocate for is only useful in white spaces. it acknowledges the intersectionality of race, class, and gender but it doesn't feel like something that is readily acceptable to my own community - and i don't really blame my community for that either. so i wonder: is it my feminism that's the problem or the situation we're all in?

anyway. idk this is just some stuff i've been thinking about, especially since all the current tumblr drama started again. thank you for reading. stay safe <3

Hey you sent this to me ages ago- I'm sorry it's taken so long to get around to answering!

I can't address everything here, but I can offer some thoughts to maybe chew on:

It seems like you're muddled up in a lot of very black-and-white questions: "either nobody speaks out about anything, or everybody does about everything" is a pretty all-or-nothing way of looking at callout culture.

I've been talking to a large audience for a while now, and I've noticed a few things:

Pretty much everything I say and do will be interpreted and responded to in ways I could never have predicted, especially if it reaches enough people.

However far my reach seems, and however serious my impact, it is always, always going to be a drop in the bucket in the grand scheme of things.

The circles I run in & the shift of culture within them are lightyears away from even the circles some of my friends run in. Whatever the culture here, the culture in a neighboring circle could be vastly different.

I very often don't have the knowledge, influence, or power to try to speak to every person, every culture, every issue, or every circle- or to predict what my words and actions might do. That's not a bad thing. It also neither absolves me of responsibility for my actions, nor means I'm insignificant.

I say that because I think it's important to have some perspective, and because at least personally, it's taught me that it's pretty pointless trying to act based on what kind of impact I think I'll have.

My advice is to evaluate this stuff based on what you actually believe. Incorporate some nuance. Choose what you say and what you do based on what seems right for that situation, and allow that decision & the ideas behind it to evolve over time. Be guided by your values, not other people's potential reactions.

So to take your callout culture question, for example: ask yourself, what makes a callout bad? When might they be useful? Why do people make callouts? Who is hurt when a callout is made? Is it worth it? Is there an alternative? What is that alternative? What does the ideal situation look like? What is reasonable to advocate for?

Those kinds of questions are what critical thinking is, and you'll probably start to uncover a lot of nuance once you start asking and answering them. Embrace it. It means you're giving the issue the care, complexity, and space it deserves.

[goldheartedsky]

I told myself I wasn’t going to make a post like this—that I wasn’t going to stoop to the level of making call-out posts—but I really can’t stay silent after what has happened in the last day or so.

The TOG fandom has a serious issue with excusing antisemitism and allowing people who have painfully hurt marginalized groups to continue to ignore, dismiss, and refuse to acknowledge their limits of intersectionality in regards to social justice. I have seen it myself, been on the receiving end of it, and have talked to other Jews in this fandom about what’s been going on and it needs to start being addressed.

Now, I’m not going to name names or tag people (mainly because I have been blocked by almost all of them for this very issue) but if you message me I will gladly tell you the users involved in this. Also, if you have doubts of any of this’s validity and would like screenshots, feel free to reach out to me here or via Discord and I will share them.

A lot of this started when a member of the All&More server had brought up the scientific and medical “discoveries” during the torture and medical experimentation that took place during the Third Reich and how a lot of the origin of it isn’t taught. LR made a comment saying that “we are three-dimensional creatures who are stuck moving forward in time and can’t go back” and added that not using the research won’t make past horrors not happen. When the original user added that there has been a movement in medicine for removing Nazi scientists names off discoveries and that progress was slow moving, she deflected the conversation onto herself, saying “Not using research won’t make my family not harmed by the Japanese” and then immediately pivoted into admitting that, from what she understood, there weren’t any particularly valid scientific discoveries made by them. She then said, in regards to said Nazi atrocities, “Take it, learn about it, put it in context, and then own it and transform it.”

A Jewish member of A&M voiced their discomfort about possibly taking medicine that was a direct result of the murder of their grandparents and other relatives, to which LR said, “Still stuck in the 3rd dimension, still moving forward in time.” I brought up the fact that medicine was built on antisemitism and racism and that starting over would be better than a lot of the procedures we have now. There is a longstanding issue in medicine of disregarding black pain and so much of what we have now is created by eugenicists—including Nazi scientists. There is still a lot of Jewish trauma due to medical experimentation and that is oftentimes dismissed.

LR then made a flippant comment about “Does this count as Godwin’s Law?”—which is about how all internet discussions lead to someone being compared to Nazis/Hitler. When called out on the inappropriateness of the comment, she did not respond and was backed up by one of the mods of the server. There was no apology made nor an acknowledgment about the casual antisemitism of the comments she made and the dismissal of Jewish trauma/pain.

Now, fast forward a couple months when I was contacted by a third party who had not been in the server at the time but had joined and heard about what LR had said there. H said they were friends with LR and had concerns about antisemitism and would like my perspective. I explained what had happened and offered screenshots if they would like them, which they did. They thanked me and apologized that it got to a point that I felt unsafe in the server and had to leave, which I appreciated.

A couple weeks later they reached out to me again and offered to broker a conversation between LR and myself because the situation wasn’t sitting well with them. I was skeptical (because I had been blocked at that point) and didn’t have a lot of hope that this conversation would actually take place but I felt a responsibility to try and be the bigger person and deal with what had been said head on, so I agreed to sit down and have a discussion with her as long as there was a third party in the chat as well—given our history.

After a couple weeks of back and forth with H and hearing that LR had said that she would “think about it”, she finally agreed. I was asked for a time and date and I gave my availability and was told she would be asked for the same. A couple days later, I was suddenly told LR would only be comfortable with this conversation if H acted as a “literal go-between” with us copy-pasting our responses in their DMs so we can “sit with the message and everyone can get to them when they can” rather than it being a session with an actual back and forth and was asked if I was okay with that. I honestly said no, because this was supposed to be a situation where she and I sat down and discussed what she said in the server, not a back and forth message relay where the conversation got dragged out for days or weeks or however long it was going to take. I said if she was serious about meeting me halfway on this, she needed to be able to sit down and actually talk.

H copy-pasted my response to LR and came back that she had backed out of the conversation, which part of me had expected from the beginning—even though all I wanted from this sit down was for her to understand how hurtful the antisemitic comments were and an apology.

These comments that were made in the server are not a secret. It’s pretty well known what was said and again, these were all on record, not privately made in some DM. She has still not owned up to the comments she said, nor has she ever apologized for them. She has ignored message after message about them and blocked more people than I can count. Many of the people defending her when the discourse begins have also been messaged about the comments she’s said and also either block people or ignore the messages completely and refuse to acknowledge them.

Now, this being said, in the most recent conversation about fandom racism, someone brought up the post that was made reducing users on ao3 to faceless, nameless numbers without saying who they were, what they had done, and how they were specifically contributing to the problem of racism in this fandom. They made the comparison of other situations like HR looking at pay stats to see how to fire and included “Nazis, capitalists, and colonizers.”

This is not an invalid argument. There have been other Jews in the fandom who specifically voiced feeling uncomfortable for the exact same reason. However, another person, LT, decided to specifically make a post calling the OP out and drag them for having the audacity to liken it to the Shoah (which, mind you, this person is not Jewish nor did they decide to capitalize Shoah or the Holocaust as they should have). She received a reply saying, “you’re offended by antisemitism? Here’s LR’s (someone LT has agreed with multiple times over racism in fandom) track record of antisemitic comments” which outlined everything I delved into previously.

LT said that they were “unaware of this incident until a couple days ago” but agreed that it was an upsetting display of casual dismissal of Jewish pain and hoped that LR had apologized. She was then called out for being aware of it and still continuing to reblog LR’s posts even after knowing about the comments and was linked to my post clarifying that LR had not apologized and refused a discussion about it, to which LT said that she had gotten “quite a different version outlined in the post linked and corroborated by a third party” and “felt uncomfortable” making a value judgement, insinuating that I was not being truthful about my side of the story.

I messaged LT off-anon and said that I was not lying nor over-exaggerating about what had happened in the server or about the following discussion about trying to broker a conversation with LR, and was immediately blocked by her. I am also not the only Jew who has sent her messages about this topic, only to have their messages ignored.

Now, am I surprised that I was immediately blocked after voicing my issues with what LT had said in that post? No.

She has a history of making antisemitic comments, most of which happened during the brunt of the Israel/Palestine discussion happening, which included statements such as “You cannot be considered indigenous if you hold a position of power”, that, despite having been displaced for 2,000 years, the Jewish diaspora was “integrated” into their respective communities (a wholly untrue statement), as well as linked to and promoted a website with extremely antisemitic articles including one about “Spartan Jews” and how Israeli Jews are violent to “send messages to their deprived self-esteem” that they won’t be victims again. Half of the comments on the site’s front page included such hits as “Death to all Jews” and “Wow, I had no idea this was happening—I guess it is true that Jews control the world and the mass media.” This website was repeated in multiple posts as “unbiased” and “a good resource” for other people to truly know what was going on.

Jewish dissent on the content of some posts and that website went unacknowledged and dismissed.

Being that LT is a relatively big user in the TOG fandom, her posts got circulated frequently. Seeing things like that touted as unbiased was extremely triggering for me and multiple Jews in this fandom that I’ve spoken to.

Now, the reason I made this post in particular was because I have seen a lot of echoing of the sentiment: “no matter how much you disagree with their sentiment, aligning yourself with racists is...well aligning yourself with racists.”

This statement NEEDS to become intersectional. If we are criticizing the work of people because of who they hold company with, why does that end at racism? If we are going to have a discussion about racism in this fandom, why are we letting it come from people who have openly said antisemitic things, people who have stood by them and supported them in silence, and people who have silenced Jewish voices speaking up about this issue.

These are not separate issues. This is a really good post regarding the white washing of Jews in social justice discussion and it comes full circle into the medical experimentation discussion. Jews were not seen as white during the Holocaust. The Nazis were trying to cleanse the Aryan race because they did not view Jews as white. They experimented on them because they did not view them as white and, thus, disposable.

Every Jewish diasporic community is still vulnerable. Even though the US has half the world’s Jews, over 50% of the religiously based hate crimes are consistently anti-Jewish even though Jews make up 2% of the population. Chinese Jews are still holding their holiday celebrations in secret due to government crackdowns. The attempted genocide of Beta Israel was less than 50 years ago. Across the Middle East and North Africa, Jewish communities are barely hanging on after centuries of attempted destruction. These are not just Jewish issues but racial issues as well because when people make the sweeping generalization of “Jew” and they only mean white-passing Ashkenazi Jews, it erases so much of our community.

I absolutely agree that this fandom needs to have a discussion about race and portrayal in fic and what we can do better moving forward—and I want to see that done—but we also need to acknowledge what so many people starting this discussion have said and the marginalized groups they have hurt along the way. I see these posts come across my dashboard and know exactly who they're coming from and what they think of people like me. If we are going to say, “No matter how much you disagree with their sentiment, aligning yourself with racists is aligning yourself with racists,” then we NEED to be saying, “If you are aligning yourself with antisemites, you’re aligning yourself with antisemites.”

We all need to move forward. But that means moving forward together. Jews included.

[lala-blahblah]

ok reblogging to add my Media Analysis Feminism thoughts just for @paroxysmaljune because this was too long for a comment. MY THOUGHTS ARE SCATTERED I'm sorry.

Anyway hiiiii, so I'm not going to track down any sources for this so you just gotta take my word for it and understand that I am widely condensing this and thus missing out on a lot of important history stuff. But basically I've done a few papers throughout college focusing on pieces of media and the year they came out and how their representation of women mirrors the wave of feminism at the time. American feminism has had 4 waves as of now, you have the suffragettes with the right to vote, you have the 60s and seventies with women aiming for job equality in the work place and free sex/birth control, you have the 90s early otts which has never been explained well to me but it's the riot grrrl girl power movement with female punk which had some good stuff but also some weird stuff with gender roles being pervasive still. It was kinda the "not like other girls" era, where women tried to empower themselves by pushing down certain forms of femininity, but still frowning upon women who strayed too far from the feminine ideal. Also there was an effort to include more women of color (I think of bell hooks but I'm sure there are so many more). And then you have fourth wave which people say was started by the me too movement. Academia is like a decade behind current events so fourth wave was never taught to me in school, but my understanding is that it is about how the internet has impacted the reach of feminism AND a large focus on intersectionality, especially with queer folks and I would say we are still very much in the midst of this with fighting for bodily autonomy alongside trans folks with right to abortion and everything. So for example, the first comics with Peggy Carter came out in the 70s and she is in a comic book where she is on the front lines in the war effort, which is when there was the big push for women to have the right to getting the same jobs as men. And Percy Jackson came out during the early 2000s where Annabeth was really cool and powerful and smart and she didn't like makeup or wear dresses. These were both feminist at the time even though today we can see some of the flaws (Peggy Carter's life focuses on a hetero romance plot and men do all the big fighting, Percy Jackson makes fun of women who care too much (aphrodite campers) and not enough about their appearance (clarisse)). But we have to still acknowledge what it was doing at the time, because these are important stepping stones to where we are today.

Ace attorney is something that is both not feminist now AND not feminist at the time. Ace attorney came out between 2001-2008 (AND to be fair this is a game in adaptation so Japan's culture would have had a big impact on the characterization and plot of these characters. AND I never studied feminist movements in Japan so this is not actually gonna be the most in depth analysis but I'm not in school anymore so it's whateverrr). But it is sooo palpable to me that we are in the space between second and fourth wave. Because yes Mia is a woman studying law! She is up there amongst the men having the same job and she is just as capable as Nick is (maybe more so because she doesn't get nervous and seem to bluff as much as Nick does). So ok, second wave, check. But there is zero self awareness about the treatment of Mia (which is so dumb because Legally Blonde addressed the issue with overlooking women in law in 2001. So why are we still here... maybe they didn't watch legally blonde in japan). The me too movement was important in that it brought up the concept of calling out behavior from men that had been swept under the rug and ignored (also bigger themes of acknowledging the prevalence of SA of course that's just not relevant here) and NOBODY IS CALLING OUT THESE MEN!!! All the men in positions of power are engaging in this behavior! And nobody is saying anything so they're just getting away with it as a joke. So Mia may have the same job that men do but she is not being treated as an equal. Gumshoe the detective comments on how hot she is while on the stand in front of everyone. Miles and Armando both insult her by calling her young and stupid and inexperienced but they do so in a way that calls out her femininity. Miles uses bimbo, a term specifically associated with women that are stupid, and Armando asserts his masculinity over her in a weird paternalistic way by calling her kitten and emphasizing how young she is (even though there's only a 3 year gap) while also kind of flirting with her??? And it's like! Ok yeah the court rooms are ALWAYS insane in this game. Everyone ALWAYS makes fun of the defense attorney and the prosecution gets away with crazy stuff for comedy reasons. BUT NOBODY CALLS NICK KITTEN!!! Nobody flirts with him on purpose to make him uncomfortable while exercising power over him. Nobody is like "wow you've got a great ass Nick"! Ok I don't know if anyone actually calls Mia out on her boobs explicitly I think that would be too much even for this game but you get it! I think the closest comparison to make my point would be, what if every time they demeaned Nick they made a comment about his race. Like instead of being like "wow you sure are dumb nick" if they went "Wow you sure are dumb Nick which is weird because you're asian aren't you supposed to be smart hahaha". Likeee that's a microagression baby. In that same way, all the jokes suddenly get very pointedly about her femininity when Mia comes on stand! Yes it's not meant to be taken seriously but if we don't have anyone shutting down that behavior or being admonished for it in the narrative, then like... you don't see the gravity o f the situation. This is a real thing that happens in male dominated fields and it's awful! And it shouldn't happen! And it's not actually funny because it's too real. You can tell that this game happened during third wave because although it doesn't do anything noteworthy as far as empowering women, it DOES explicitly make markers of "good" and "bad" femininity. Specifically when women go on the stand with a lot of cleavage they are BAD because they're being SEXY and PROVOCATIVE which is a sign of BAD MORALS and they deserve to be MOCKED! But not before we objectify them!

Ok, I was kind of exaggerating at the end. I still really enjoy a lot of it and I've talked before about how I think Ace Attorney is kind of iconic for the range in acceptable forms of masculinity that they include, specifically for having Nick being a caretaker who saves the day by being in tune with the emotions of others as the male protagonist. And we DO see Mia held up as a super capable and smart lawyer who Nick relies heavily on. Nick always shows respect for her, which holds weight because he is the protagonist and the one whose eyes we are meant to see the world through, he is supposed to have the morally correct opinions. And Maya is really cool with her powers! But then again Maya is constantly getting kidnapped or something and needs a guy to save her, and Nick never stands up for Maya when people like Larry who is 7 years older than her try to flirt with her, he just silently stands there and thinks "wow Larry sure is weird". So it does some cool stuff! But not enough cool stuff! And most importantly, we as the audience aren't told that the bad stuff is bad in a strong enough way for it to feel like commentary. So in my ideal world, when people make comments about Mia, Mia would have one guy character on her side who supports her and they both say wow you guys are weird freaks and that's not ok! And ideally they would make fun of Mia for dumb things like her asymmetrical bangs instead of her womanhood. And also ideally Nick would slap Larry for being weird to Maya. And also Miles Edgeworth would reference Judith Butler to show how much he supports women. And also -

"ace attorney trials and tribulations turnabout beginnings" more like "ace attorney and the numerous instances of workplace harassment", why is literally everyone oogling Mia or demeaning her for being a woman GET ME OUT OF HEREEEEEEEE!!

[thechangeling]

I had a question for you, and if you would be willing to answer I would greatly appreciate it. Since your last post referenced this, I was wondering if you had any tips on writing Ty specifically, or autistic characters in general? I think that you might have posted on this before, but I couldn’t find it, so I figured I would ask you. Anyway, like I said, if you don’t mind answering that would be wonderful, but if you don’t want to, no hard feelings!

For me I guess it's more intuition like if something just feels right, but that's kind of hard to explain to people so I'm gonna try and put this into words.

I like it when people make an effort to understand Ty's emotions and where he's coming from. I appreciate people taking care of Ty's emotions through the narrative even when it's angsty and treating them as valid. Also putting in autistic traits in a way that doesn't seem forced. Especially more nuanced things like rubbing your neck or running your fingers through your hair. Acknowledge the fact that Ty is pretty smart. I can't stand fics that dumb him down. But don't write him like a super genius who knows everything either.

I wanna see autistic joy. I wanna see Ty getting so happy and excited after finally figuring out the answer to a tough mystery and not being able to hold back his happy stimming. Ty rambling about his special interests to Kit because he trusts him and stimming with Kit's hair and fingers.

I would also like to see autistic anger. Ty getting rightfully pissed and the narrative actually explaining why. Ty losing his shit in ways that aren't pretty and instantly regretting it. Ty getting weighed down by burnout and avoiding Kit because he doesnt have the energy to be social or be around people at all without snapping. Give me Ty trying so hard to tell Kit how he feels despite not being able to find the right words. So he writes letters where he uses other peoples words and quotes to explain.

Address the trauma he has been through! Address the fact that it is just as valid as Kit's trauma!! Acknowledge the shit that his father put him through!!! Explore how complicated that makes his memories of his father especially compared to Ty's siblings. Acknowledge the fact that growing up autistic isolates you from everyone else and forces you to constantly compromise.

Show me Ty loving Kit but also being jealous of him for not having to deal with the ableism that Ty does. Show me Ty being strong but still vulnerable and not invincible. Show me Ty being afraid of messing up with Kit and violating social boundaries and being afraid Kit might not say anything because of his past trauma even when his feelings are hurt.

I don't think allistic writers should be writing internalized ableism, but you can write about how the opinions of others affect him. Don't infantalize him compared to the other characters. If the others are drinking, let him drink. If the others are swearing let him swear. If the others are talking about it having sex then let him do the same. Autistics don't really flirt in my experience, at least not traditionally. But we usually end up smiling more and touching the other person or trying to be around them a lot.

Explore the intersectionality of Ty being queer and autistic. Or maybe don't if you're straight idk. This will probably require further research.

Autistic people acquire new special interests over time. I don't think he'll drop Sherlock yet because he's pretty invested but he might add a new one. You can have tons of special interests at once actually. I currently have five.

Look up theory of mind and how autistic people lack it. Think about how Ty will perceive everyone's actions if he assumes everyone knows what he knows. Maybe show Ty going non verbal after going through a lot of stress and using pictures or a text to voice app to communicate.

Ty listening to other music besides classical! He uses it to calm down and that's valid but I don't like the implication that autistic people only like soft or slow music. That's not true! I personally love heavy metal and alt rock. I lowkey headcanon Ty as a Queen fan idk.

I can't think of anything else but if other autistics wanna add on then go for it. But my final thought is just let him be autistic. Let him stim, let him be blunt, let him be overwhelmed, let him feel music with his entire being, let him have stim toys and comfort objects but don't have him be just his autism. Let him talk about and show interest in other things besides his special interests, let him show his personality, let him make jokes, show him being a shadowhunter. Also let him have a connection to his sexuality! I swear I've seen so many fanfics where Ty talks about being not straight only in relation to his love for Kit or not at all and acts like it doesnt matter. This bothers me a lot. It does matter! Even when you're autistic.

If you have any questions you can always ask me as long as you're respectful.

[96thdayofrage]

Instead of sharing in the outrage of Nia’s brutal murder, they came with fury for being tagged in a post that they felt challenged their own perceived feminist accomplishments. There were grand displays of defensiveness, demands that they be acknowledged for all the things they had done for black people in the past, and a terrifying lashing out that included racial slurs and doxing.

The fragility of these women was not a surprise to me. In a crucial moment of showing up for our marginalized community, there was more concern about their feelings and ego as opposed to the fight forward for women as a whole. What could have been a much-needed and integral display of solidarity and true intersectionality quickly became a live play-by-play of the toxicity that white-centered feminism can bring to the table of activism.

It is the type of behavior that rests under the guise of feminism only as long as it is comfortable, only as long it is personally rewarding, only as long as it keeps "on brand." But if the history of this movement taught us anything, it is that intersectionality in feminism is vital. We cannot forget the ways that suffragettes dismissed the voices of black women, sending them to the backs of their marches, only for black activists like Ida B. Wells and Anna Julia Cooper to make major moves while fighting for the vote in tandem with their fight for rights as black people—ultimately shifting the shape of this country. If there is not the intentional and action-based inclusion of women of color, then feminism is simply white supremacy in heels.

Going up against liberal progressive white feminists who refuse to let down their guard of “ultimate liberation” to actually learn from women of color—who have been fighting this fight with grit and grace for generations—is the most straining part being a black feminist activist. Still, as disheartening as the actions of many of these women who were "called in" became, my highest hope is that this bizarre episode serves as a lesson, a dissection if you will, of what toxic white feminism actually looks like. Let's take a dive into a few of the items in The Toxic White Feminism Playbook:

TONE POLICING

When women of color begin to cry out about their pain, frustration, and utter outrage with the system that is continuing to allow our men to be murdered, our babies to be disregarded, and our livelihood to be dismissed, we are often met with white women who tell us perhaps we should “say things a little nicer” if we want to be respected and heard.

SPIRITUAL BYPASSING

The easiest way for white women to skirt around the realities of racism is to just “love and light it away”. When confronted with ways they have offended a marginalized group with their words or actions, they immediately start to demand unity and peace; painting those they harmed as aggressive, mean, or divisive.

WHITE SAVIOR COMPLEX

Many white women insist that there is no way they could be part of the problem because of their extensive resume of what they’ve “done for you people.” Instead of listening to what the women of color are trying to express, they instead whip out the Nice Things I’ve Done For Black People In The Past, which often includes everything from “says hi to the black man next door every single morning” to “saved a black child through adoption and treats them just as nicely as my white children.”

This is the most common of all. White women get so caught up in how they feel in a moment of black women expressing themselves that they completely vacuum the energy, direction, and point of the conversation to themselves and their feelings. They start to explain why race is hard for them to talk about, what they think would be a better solution to the topic at hand, and perhaps what women of color can do to make it more palatable.

As these things play out over and over again, it is made painfully obvious that many white women believe that the worst thing that can happen to them is to be called a racist. Let me be clear, it is not. Seeing your child gunned down in the street by the police unjustly is much worse, being turned away for medical care due to race and underlying biases by medical staff, resulting in death, is much worse, being harassed by authorities only to be charged yourself instead is much worse.

But even moments of explicit dehumanization to the black community haven’t been able to rally the majority of liberal white women to join us in our fight for racial justice. I've learned through my work that white women seem to only digest race issues when it is reframed in the light of (white) feminism. So I often have to lay it out this way:

When you try to exclude yourself from the conversation of race by saying things like “I don’t see color,” or “I married a black man and have brown kids,” that's just as irrational as a man saying there is no way he could be sexist or misogynistic because he has a daughter.

When you seek to not be lumped into the conversation about oppressive systems against marginalized people, because you view yourself as woke, you are essentially screaming “not all men.”

When you try to rationalize police brutality by saying “but black people also kill black people,” you’re coming in with the same argument that men have when they say “she shouldn’t have worn that skirt, she deserves to be raped”.

When you walk into black or brown spaces and “suggest” how they can more aptly reach white people on the topic of race you are basically mansplaining, only now it's whitesplaining how people of color should approach their own activism.

When you begin to feel defensive about the conversation of race, demanding explanations, it is like a man walking into a women’s space saying: “Make me feel more comfortable in this moment, even though the point of this space is sorting out how I make you feel uncomfortable everyday in multiple ways.”

So what does allyship actually look like? Accepting the reality of this country's dynamics. White skin yields white privilege and an ally is willing to use their privilege to fight with and for those who are marginalized. Allyship means voting for elected officials who have a track record of ensuring the most marginalized among us are heard and advocated for. Allyship means using your sphere of influence whether it be your dining room table or the boardroom of your company to call out racist actions and ideals. Allyship means uplifting the voices and experiences of people of color so that we are not continuously drowned out and ignored.

"Many liberal white woman have an immediate reaction of defense when someone challenges their intentions."

What makes allyship so hard for most? Many liberal white woman have an immediate reaction of defense when someone challenges their intentions. And it is in that precise moment they need to stop and realize they are actually part of the problem. It is never the offender who gets to decide when they've offended someone. If you feel yourself dismissing the words or experiences of people of color—because you think they're "overreacting" or because you "didn't know" or because "it has nothing to do with race"—it's often due to your ego, not rationale. Listen and learn, instead.

Dr. Robin DiAngelo, a white woman sociologist who studies critical discourse, reminds us in her new book White Fragility that “the key to moving forward is what we do with our discomfort. We can use it as a door out—blame the messenger and disregard the message. Or we can use it as a door in by asking, Why does this unsettle me? What would it mean for me if this were true?”

Racism is as American as pie. In order for the feminist movement to truly be progressive and intersectional, white women must face this fact and begin to take on their load of work. We are long overdue to dismantle this system, which, if it is not intentionally and aggressively addressed, will defeat us all in the end.

[whitehotharlots]

Privilege Theory is popular because it is conservative

Privilege theory, as a formal academic thing, has been around at least since 1989, when Peggy McIntosh published the now-seminal essay “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.” Even within academic cultural studies, however, privilege theory was pretty niche until about a decade ago--it’s not what you’d call intellectually sound (McIntosh’s essay contains zero citations), and its limitations as an analytical frame are pretty obvious. I went through a cultural studies-heavy PhD program in the early twenty teens and I only heard it mentioned a handful of times. If you didn’t get a humanities degree, odds are it didn’t enter your purview until 2015 or thereabouts.

This poses an obvious question: how could an obscure and not particularly groundbreaking academic concept become so ubiquitous so quickly? How did such a niche (and, frankly, weird and alienating) understanding of racial relations become so de rigeur that companies that still utilize slave labor and still produce skin whitening cream are now all but mandated to release statements denouncing it? 

Simply put, the rapid ascent of privilege theory is due to the fact that privilege theory is fundamentally conservative. Not in cultural sense, no. But if we understand conservatism as an approach to politics that seeks first and foremost to maintain existing power structures, then privilege theory is the cultural studies equivalent of phrenology or Austrian economics. 

This realization poses a second, much darker question: how did a concept as regressive and unhelpful as privilege become the foundational worldview among people who style themselves as progressives, people whose basic self-understanding is grounded in a belief that they are working to address injustice? Let’s dig into this:

First, let’s go down a well-worn path and establish the worthlessness of privilege as an analytical lens. We’ll start with two basic observations: 1) on the whole, white people have an easier time existing within these United States than non-white people, and 2) systemic racism exists, at least to the extent that non-white people face hurdles that make it harder for them to achieve safety and material success.

I think a large majority of Americans would agree with both of these statements--somewhere in the ballpark of 80%, including many people you and I would agree are straight-up racists. They are obvious and undeniable, the equivalent to saying “politicians are corrupt” or “good things are good and bad things are bad.” Nothing about them is difficult or groundbreaking.

As simplistic as these statements may be, privilege theory attempts to make them the primary foreground of all understandings of social systems and human interaction. Hence the focus on an acknowledgement of privilege as the ends and means of social justice. We must keep admitting to privilege, keep announcing our awareness, again and again and again, vigilance is everything, there is nothing beyond awareness.

Of course, acknowledging the existence of inequities does nothing to actually address those inequities. Awareness can serve as an important (though not necessarily indispensable) precondition for change, but does not lead to change in and of itself. 

I’ve been saying this for years but the point still stands: those who advocate for privilege theory almost never articulate how awareness by itself will bring about change. Even in the most generous hypothetical situation, where all human interaction is prefaced by a formal enunciation of the raced-based power dynamics presently at play, this acknowledgement doesn’t actually change anything. There is never a Step Two. 

Now, some people have suggested Step Twos. But suggestions are usually ignored, and on the rare occasions they are addressed they are dismissed without fail, often on grounds that are incredibly specious and dishonest. To hit upon another well-worn point, let’s look at the presidential campaign of Bernie Sanders. The majority of Sanders’ liberal critics admit that the senator’s record on racial justice is impeccable, and that his platform would have done substantially more to materially address racial inequities than that being proffered by any of his opponents. That’s all agreed upon, yet we are told that none of that actually matters. 

Sanders dropped out of the race nearly 3 months ago, yet just this past week The New York Times published yet another hit piece explaining that while his policies would have benefitted black people, the fact that he strayed from arbitrarily invoked rhetorical standards meant he was just too problematic to support.  

The piece was written by Sidney Ember, a Wall Street hack who cites anonymous finance and health insurance lobbyists to argue that financial regulation is racist. Ember, like most other neoliberals, has been struggling to reconcile her vague support for recent protests with the fact that she is paid to lie about people who have tried to fix things. Now that people are forcefully demanding change, the Times have re-deployed her to explain why change is actually bad even though it’s good.  

How does one pivot from celebrating the fact that black people will not be receiving universal healthcare to mourning racially disproportionate COVID death rates? They equivocate. They lean even harder on rhetorical purity, dismissing a focus on policy as a priori blind to race. Bernie never said “white privilege.” Well, okay, he did, but he didn’t say it in the right tone or often enough, and that’s what the problem was. Citing Ember:

Yet amid a national movement for racial justice that took hold after high-profile killings of black men and women, there is also an acknowledgment among some progressives that their discussion of racism, including from their standard-bearer, did not seem to meet or anticipate the forcefulness of these protests.

Kimberlé Crenshaw, the legal scholar who pioneered the concept of intersectionality to describe how various forms of discrimination can overlap, said that Mr. Sanders struggled with the reality that talking forcefully about racial injustice has traditionally alienated white voters — especially the working-class white voters he was aiming to win over. But that is where thinking of class as a “colorblind experience” limits white progressives. “Class cannot help you see the specific contours of race disparity,” she said.

Many other institutions, she noted, have now gone further faster than the party that is the political base of most African-American voters. “You basically have a moment where every corporation worth its salt is saying something about structural racism and anti-blackness, and that stuff is even outdistancing what candidates in the Democratic Party were actually saying,” she said.

Crenshaw’s point here is that the empty, utterly immaterial statements of support coming from multinational corporations are more substantial and important than policy proposals that would have actually addressed racial inequities. This is astounding. A full throated embrace of entropy as praxis. 

Crenshaw started out the primary as a Warren supporter but threw her endorsement to Bernie once the race had narrowed to two viable candidates. This fact is not mentioned, nor does Ember feel the need to touch upon any of Biden’s dozens of rhetorical missteps regarding race (you might remember that he kicked off his presidential run with a rambling story about the time he toughed it out with a black ne'er do well named Corn Pop, or his more recent assertion that if you don’t vote for him, “you ain’t black.”). The statement here--not the implication: the direct and undeniable statement--is that tone and posturing are more important than material proposals, and that concerns regarding tone and posturing should only be raised in order to delegitimize those who have dared to proffer proposals that might actually change things for the better. 

The ascendence of privilege theory marks the triumph of selective indignation, the ruling class and their media lackeys having been granted the power to dismiss any and all proposals for material change according to standards that are too nonsensical to be enforced in any fair or consistent manner. The concept has immense utility for those who wish to perpetuate the status quo. And that, more than anything, is why it’s gotten so successful so quickly. But still… why have people fallen for something so obviously craven and regressive? Why are so few decent people able to summon even the smallest critique against it? 

We can answer this by taking a clear look at what privilege actually entails. And this is where things get really, really grim:

What are the material effects of privilege, at least as they are imagined by those who believe the concept to be something that must be sussed out and eradicated? A privileged person gets to live their life with the expectation that they will face no undue hurdles to success and fulfillment because of their identity markers, that they will not be subject to constant surveillance and/or made to suffer grave consequences for minor or arbitrary offenses, and that police will not be able to murder them at will. The effects of “privilege” are what we might have once called “freedom” or “dignity.” Until very recently, progressives regarded these effects not as problematic, but as a humane baseline, a standard that all decent people should fight to provide to all of our fellow citizens. 

Here we find the utility in the use of the specific term “privilege.” Similar to how austerity-minded politicians refer to social security as an “entitlement,” conflating dignity and privilege gives it the sense of something undeserved and unearned--things that no one, let alone members of racially advantaged groups, could expect for themselves unless they were blinded by selfishness and coddled by an insufficiently cruel social structure. The problem isn’t therefore that humans are being selectively brutalized. Brutality is the baseline, the natural order, the unavoidable constant that has not been engineered into our society but simply is what society is and will always be. The problem, instead, is that some people are being exempted from some forms of brutalization. The problem is that pain does not stretch far enough.

We are a nation that worships cruelty and authority. All Americans, regardless of gender or race, are united in being litigious tattletales who take joy in hurting one another, who will never run out of ways to rationalize their own cruelty even as they decry the cruelty of others. We are taught from birth that human life has no value, that material success is morally self-validating, and that those who suffer deserve to suffer. This is our real cultural brokenness: a deep, foundational hatred of one another and of ourselves. It transcends all identity markers. It stains us all. And it’s why we’ve all run headlong into a regressive and idiotic understanding of race at a time when we desperately need to unite and help one another. 

[blkgirlsinthefuture]

Changing the Narrative

From the onset of the novel, Legendborn begins with both grief and trauma. Bree has lost her mother at a crucial part of her life, arguably when she needs her the most. Bree is about to enter college with all this grief, trauma, guilt, and anger and does not quite know how to deal with it. To worsen matters, Bree is about to attend a PWI… I’m sure most of us in this class can agree that this simple fact is the icing on the cake for all the s*it she’s going through. The two questions Deon raises that resonated with me the most are “Who gets to be legendary?”, and “What happens to Black women’s grief and trauma?”

Deonn did an impeccable job at worldbuilding a contemporary Black girl’s experience, especially at a southern PWI. I felt myself relating to multiple experiences Bree went through. There are so many parallels between Bree’s experiences at Carolina and my experiences here at William and Mary that I’m sure most people in this class have picked up on while reading. In fact, on pages 29-30 Bree’s encounter with the white officer felt like a déjà vu. The officer’s endless snooty remarks including calling Bree “girlfriend”, insisting she’s “need based”, and being in utter disbelief that a Black girl was admitted to Carolina based on merit while his white son got rejected, wreaks of the racism and misogyny I face in many white spaces. For example, when I announced that I was admitted to William and Mary with a scholarship covering my tuition many of the white students and adults at my high school were so shocked... as if I wasn’t in the top 3 of my graduating class… Furthermore, on page 75 Bree reflects on entering spaces she feels were not built for her. This feeling is also very familiar. Being surrounded by so many judging white faces and memorials dedicated to the very racist white people who fought for the continued enslavement of my ancestors takes a tremendous toll on my spirit. Aside from multicultural spaces on campus like the Center for Student Diversity, Africana House and other Black clubs on campus, there was never a sense of belonging at this institution.

In regard to Deonn’s questions about legacy, I found it interesting to see the extent to which it relates to what we are seeing on this campus with the re-naming, or lack thereof, of multiple academic buildings. This white institution is trying so desperately to uphold the “legacy” of these old white racist men while many Black and non-Black people of color are constantly fighting for the legacies of the enslaved to be heard, acknowledged and respected. History has shown countless times that individuals who are “allowed” to be legendary do not look like me. In reality, rich white men decide what it means to be legendary in addition to who gets to be legendary.

Finally, Deonn’s question of “What happens to Black women’s grief and trauma?” is one that must be addressed. Going back to my interpretation of Kindred and Black women’s trauma, both within the novel and in reality, I deduced that Black women inevitably face trauma in their lifetime. Deonn even expresses in the Dreaming in the Dark podcast that the Black mother passes many things to their daughters including love, protection, healing and trauma. She does not want to transmit the trauma to her daughter, but she knows the daughter will pick it up one way or another because she’s a Black woman. Black women are often burdened with carrying the trauma of their past and/or present. The ways in which we carry it differ. Certain spaces we enter make carrying this trauma that much harder because even when we try our hardest to just be, we have to deal with this intersectionality of multiple oppressions (racism and sexism). Deonn also stated that there are certain places where we don’t have carry trauma as much, using the Black hair salon as an example. I feel like Black women are superheroes in this way, and I love when we have one another’s backs while the world is against us.

[gemsofthegalaxy]

One of the first things I did upon entering the Les Mis fandom was try to figure out how I would translate les amis/specifically Enjolras' political stances to modern day. Please keep in mind I haven’t actually read the book, I’ve watched a version of the musical and clips of the 2012 one. But it's clearly an important part of his character, like, on a foundational level. 

However, this isn’t the necessarily the easiest thing in the world because the book is (as far as i can tell) specific and very French, so if I’m trying to translate Enjolras’ politics my first inclination is to also put him in a specific place and time.  

So here are some general guidelines I have for writing Enjolras for myself, how I translate his politics the most directly, but first- I think it makes sense that, in whatever AU you are writing, you could assign any Cause and make that his Thing and have him be am activist of that Thing (for example, sometimes I like to make his ‘thing’ Sex Education and Feminism because those are things I like, although that’s not what his politics would directly translate to from 1800s France to Modern) 

Anyway, moving towards my “generic” Enjolras’ politics

Les Mis is French (obviously), therefore the politics of Les Mis are French. I am not French, so I have decided to make things easier on myself- in my modern aus, Enjolras is Canadian. I flip flop on whether he is anglophone or francophone, but because I am anglophone I tend to default to writing him that way

This is because there are big cultural differences between all of the provinces. Does it make more sense for Enj to be French Canadian? Yes, even if only because of his name, it does make more sense. However, I have only spent a total of 10 weeks in two francophone communities, therefore I cant speak to those cultural experiences, but I know they are different than anglophones. 

even if it's not mentioned explicitly, I write Enj as an anglophone Canadian simply because I am familiar with the politics of that community. This is also why I would not write him in the United States, because politics there are another beast.

With all that, if it is not a specific AU where I want him to have a specific cause, I tend to write Enjolras as focusing on anti-capitalism, building communities and grassroots organization, and doing his best to recognize intersectionality and acknowledge the place of race and gender in all social issues.

I also get the sense that, in the modern day and age, he would focus heavily on worker’s rights, housing, and basic income initiatives, again. Basically just trying to address income inequality. Basically, taxing and redistributing the wealth of the TOP earners in Canada (and huge companies) for the good of all the people. I acknowledge this might be projection, tbh, because I personally think income inequality is the root of all evil, lol, even if my personal activism has mostly been in the realm of feminism and LGBTQ rights. 

And again I do think he would identify as a feminist and talk about the patriarchy, race, sexuality, disability- I don’t think it’s possible for 1 person to fully champion all of these things, though, like on a physical “there is not enough time in the day” to do that

as I said at the very beginning, I haven’t actually read the book- but my interpretation of what his activism was like in the 1800s France, I think making income inequality his main Thing, would be the most logical follow through.  something that is underlying our whole society, something that literally makes us sick at a societal and personal level, and is of course further complicated by race and everything else, makes sense to me personally.

[jlinthi1]

Final Reflection

This course helped me to get a unique understanding of the world around me in a way that no other class I have taken before has. Despite being one of the top members in my high school’s Model UN team and the fact that I have taken a number of classes on history and international relations, I feel that my experience in this course has provided me with a much greater understanding of some of the issues in society than I had before. I had been in all-guys schools for pretty much all my academic life before I came to High Point and therefore I had very little experience or knowledge of many of the issues that feminism attempts to confront. While my classes in the past had spent time discussing some of the issues in society, the issues they discussed were mainly about racism or religious morality and the only time sexism was ever really addressed was when discussing violent religious practices towards women.

The concept that stood out the most to me out of everything that we have covered in this course would have to be intersectionality. I found the study of how many of the issues in society build off each other to be an extremely interesting concept and one of the most memorable aspects of the course. Another reason that the concept of intersectionality stood out the most to me is because of Crenshaw’s article “Mapping the Margins” which we read early in the course. I found Crenshaw’s description of how many immigrant women find themselves in situations where they choose to “continue to suffer abuse under threats of deportation by their husbands” to be both the most sickening and the most powerful moment of the course as a whole (Crenshaw, 202). The idea that immigrant women find themselves trapped in an abusive situation due to their fear of being deported, was extremely disturbing to me. This situation reminded me of The Shining as these women found themselves feeling trapped in their lives with their abusive spouse, despite the fact that they had come to America for freedom. The idea that situations like this really occur made the concept of intersectionality extremely interesting in comparison to the other core concepts of this course and it is definitely a huge part of what I will take away from this course.

Because of how impactful this concept was to my experience in this course, I have focused my commonplace book on intersectionality, particularly the many issues in society that overlap and build off of each other to form barriers in many women’s lives as well as how to overcome these intersecting issues in society. One set of issues that I especially wanted to include in my commonplace book was the interconnectedness between immigrant women and domestic abuse that Crenshaw examined in “Mapping the Margins.” The Washington Post article I included in my commonplace book examines these situations and expands on them by interviewing women who have lived through these situations. One thing in particular that I appreciated about the article was that it also touches on the long-lasting effects that horrific domestic abuse has had on the women interviewed. Given that my commonplace book focuses on the many overlapping issues that affect the lives of many women, I found that the lasting effects of the extreme trauma and fear that these women endured was a great addition as it can become yet another obstacle in the lives of these marginalized women.

Another aspect of intersectionality that I wanted to include in my commonplace book was that its presence in cultures across the world contribute to sexual oppression in every nation. One example I used for this was a documentary I had watched last year in my International Relations course, which followed many of the negative effects that globalization was having on the nation of India as well as other third-world nations. While the documentary does not focus on issues facing exclusively women as much as it does issues facing the livelihoods of the people in these societies as a whole, it is still an excellent example and explanation of how many issues in a society such as tradition or industrialization can factor into much greater threats like poverty by intersecting with each other.

I also used my commonplace book to discuss how, in addition to learning about the intersecting of issues in societies throughout the world, I have learned to confront these issues and work towards ridding them from society. I discussed this through explaining the related concept of the difference between equality, where everyone is treated equally, and equity, where everyone is treated fairly. I felt that discussing the difference between equality and equity was a necessary inclusion to my commonplace book as it is a critical component of ridding the world of gender inequality. Why this concept is important to working towards a better and more fair future is that it explains why treating each individual in a society equally does not work as not everyone can benefit from the same opportunities. If a society truly wants to pursue fairness for each individual it should decide to pursue policies centered around equity. The idea of equity was very important to what I took away from this class because of how much I could relate to it.

Speaking as someone with severely delayed processing who needs extra time to be able to put out work that is reflective of my intelligence, the concept of equity is something that I truly believe is extremely important. Before this course, I had never thought of my extended time accommodations as a form of equity before this course and this realization has helped me to get a much better appreciation of the concept of equity. While I believe in working hard to achieve success, I also understand that simply working hard is not enough and that equity is necessary for each individual to be as successful as they possibly can be.

One essential aspect of pursuing equity that I particularly wanted to include was that the first step of pursuing fairness for each individual through equity is to acknowledge the issue in the first place. I think that this is an extremely important aspect of using equity to pursue a goal like ridding the world of gender inequality as sometimes seeing the issues in one’s own culture can be difficult. The concept of ethnocentrism, the idea that one’s own culture is always objectively right, was another idea from this course that really stuck out to me and it often prevents people from acknowledging or sometimes even seeing the issues in their own culture. Given that this course focused on study of the pursuit of gender equality from a global perspective, I felt that trying to avoid ethnocentrism was also a big part of what I learned from this course.

I also I felt that the story of Bibi Haldar was a great example of how the intersection of cultural issues such as sexism and ableism can work together to form extreme obstacles for some women. I included an article that examined how these issues overlapped in the story “The Treatment of Bibi Haldar.” The story itself is a great example of the unique challenges one woman was faced with simply because she was disabled and a woman. Another example of how intersectionality can create obstacles in one woman’s life that I wanted to include in my commonplace book was an article interviewing several Muslim men and women about their experiences with islamophobia in post-9/11 America. Their accounts do a fantastic job of placing the reader in their shoes as they recount how they have been treated as Muslims. The article really helps to illustrate the idea that we have covered in this course’s examination of intersectionality that there is no single experience among every woman as each individual is faced with their own unique intersecting issues in life. Another article I included in commonplace book was one I found just a few weeks ago for the class blog about the likability of fictional characters. I included the article in my commonplace book because it had an interesting section about how feminism interacts with the likability of female characters in fiction. In this section, it discussed how women are judged far more severely than men in real life as well as in fiction. This was yet another systemic issue in society that I felt was worth including in my commonplace book as it intersects with many other oppressive problems in society to make life even more difficult for women.

I believe that this course has helped to get a much greater understanding of the cultural issues around me that I had not thought about before. As someone who wants to run a successful business one day, I feel that understanding many of the cultural issues that affect the people I will work with will be critical to helping each person find success despite the intersecting obstacles they have and will continue to face. While intersectionality stood out the most to me, I honestly found pretty much every concept we studied in this course to be extremely interesting as I have never had a course that studied society in the way that this one did.

[enlightened-aura]

Film Review of Vision Portraits by Ella Blondin

As the producer, lead role, and director of Vision Portraits (2019), Rodney Evans allows audiences to explore the lives of various artists throughout his award-winning film. Evans himself practices the art of filmmaking. In the documentary, viewers are  introduced to the creative endeavors and daily lifestyles of a writer named Ryan Knighton, a dancer named Kayla Hamilton, and a photographer named John Dugdale. Despite their different artistic interests, something shared by each of the four featured individuals featured is their personal struggle with vision impairment. Evans shares his powerful story of trying to make his art form of filmmaking work with his newfound peripheral blindness. Throughout his journey, he seeks solace in, and shares the stories, of artists in similar situations. Using the personal experiences of other artists and himself, Evans provides an intersectional approach to how blindness and disability impacts individuals in society, while addressing themes of ableism and social constructs about able-bodiedness.

     Overall, I assert that this film was very successful in presenting its content with intersectional objectivity. Intersectional theory refers to the understanding that different forms of oppression and social constructs can “intersect”, emphasizing the importance of acknowledging these overlapping systems of discrimination when dealing with social issues. (Bauer) Even though the main topic of the film is blindness, Evans still acknowledges other forms of oppression and how they might affect an individual when they crossover in different ways. Specifically, the experiences of the dancer Kayla Hamilton demonstrate this film’s intersectional perspective because she discusses not only her blindness, but other ways by which she has been oppressed in life.  From being born with one sightless eye and developing cataracts, vision impairment had always been a part of Hamilton’s life. In the film, she confesses that the impact blindness was having on both her daily life and her passion of dancing pushed her to suicidal tendencies because she felt helpless and incompetent. Regarding disability, race, gender, or multiple forms of oppression at once as an obstacle or “abnormal” can make one feel like they are a “deviation from society”. (Ahmed, 121) However, Hamilton channeled these negative emotions into her art. She created a dance performance called “Blindsided”, during which her audience members must wear an eyepatch to understand how being visually impaired affects perception. By incorporating visual and musical aspects of her culture, Hamilton also addresses themes of racism and discrimination in the show, based on her personal experiences as an African-American woman. Through this multifaceted performance, the in-person viewers of Hamilton’s dancing and my fellow movie-goers were exposed to a visual and musical representation of how various forms of discrimination can cross over to magnify the amount of oppression one faces in society. Rather than allowing feelings of ostracization in society to deter her, Hamilton chooses to continue passionately dancing and choreographing, using her love of the art to embrace her differences as qualities, rather than identifying them as flaws. I think that Evans' choice to interview her was an excellent addition to this documentary to enhance its intersectionality. As made clear in Kayla Hamilton’s case, blindness and disability are highly deserving of awareness, but it is imperative that other forms of discrimination are considered. 

     The concepts of able-bodiedness as normalcy, as well as the ableism that commonly accompanies this social construct, are strong themes in Vision Portraits. Ableism refers to discrimination against people with disabilities, and the belief that being able-bodied is the social norm. (Hehir, 1) Photographer John Dugdale’s interview includes his encounters with ableism because of his blindness. Dugdale was diagnosed with AIDS which eventually induced a stroke, causing mobility issues and blindness. Dugdale notes in the movie that one of the first things his parents said to him in the hospital prior to the incident was that the accident was a shame because his career was going so well. This implies that he could no longer be a photographer because of his newfound disability, making it an act of ableism coming from Dugdale’s own family. I found this moment in the film greatly demonstrative of the social construct that being able-bodied is normal, and that having a disability renders one less capable. Even the family members of those with disabilities can possess this normative mindset. Instead of listening to his parents, Dugdalecontinues to actively take photos, even incorporating themes of blindness into his new series. For example, he photographed himself with a fellow blind and homosexual man, emphasizing sensations like touch and taste in the composition to represent how they now rely on other senses when navigating their daily lives. Instead of viewing his disability as an obstacle or tragedy, Dugdale embraced it. He makes the profound statement that, “until [I] was blind, I could never really see.” As researcher Alison Harnett says, “... it should not be assumed that it is the ultimate goal of a disabled person to be cured. The underlying message … of this logic is that disabled people can never be happy as they are and must change to be accepted …” (Harnett, 22). Dugdale insisted that learning to accept his blindness and continue his life normally brought him happiness and insight into his artwork. By continuing his photography with undying creativity, resilience, and passion, Dugdale’s story in this film contributes to the abolishment of ableist mindsets. As a member of the theatre’s audience, I now understand how people with disabilities should not be viewed as requiring a cure or change that suits them to society’s construct of able-bodied normalcy, but should be perceived as individuals who possess the same competence and potential as anyone else.

     To conclude, Rodney Evans earned my praise not only for his consistent intersectional perspective in his film Vision Portraits, but also for presenting various struggles with disability in such a creative, objective, and impactful manner. Evans uses his talent as a filmmaker to enlighten audiences about the reality of being a visually impaired member of society. Oppression against people with disabilities is a topic that is under-addressed in the worlds of pop culture and academia. By using real life stories and personal experiences in his documentary, Evans makes viewers aware of our tendency to categorize able-bodiedness as normalcy. Although Evans and the other blind artists featured in the film face challenges with their art, it does not mean they are abnormal or less talented; such a mindset would be ableist and discriminatory. I stand by my belief that Vision Portraits contains messages and themes of acceptance and intersectionality that have the ability to push society towards a future in which people with disabilities are not subjected to discrimination. 

(Word Count: 1096)

Works Cited:

Ahmed, Sarah. “Being in Question.” Living a Feminist Life, Duke University Press, 2017, pp. 115–134, doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822373377

Bauer, Greta R., “Incorporating intersectionality theory into population health research methodology: Challenges and the potential to advance health equity.” Social Science & Medicine, Science Direct, 2014, pp. 10-17, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2014.03.022

Harnett, Alison. “Escaping the Evil Avenger and the Supercrip: Images of Disability in Popular Television,” Irish Communication Review, 2007, Volume 8, Issue 1, Article 3. doi:10.21427/D7271M  

Hehir, Thomas. “Confronting Ableism.” Educational Leadership, 2014, Volume 64, pp. 8-14. https://www.learntechlib.org/p/99685/