If you were to ask me five months ago if I considered myself to be a feminist, I would’ve screamed from the top of my lungs “YES”! However, fast-forward to now, and the response would be very different. In fact, I now denounce using the term “feminism” solely and I now firmly consider myself to be a strong proponent of intersectionality. Therefore, I am an intersectional feminist.
Born being both a woman and a person of color means that you have many different factors fighting against you succeeding in this world. Naturally, being a woman, I am a strong advocate for women’s rights. Thanks to my grandmother, it was instilled in me at an early age the importance of being vocal regarding the inequality faced by women and minorities in the United States.
Initially, once I officially considered myself to be a feminist, I felt like I was apart of a sisterhood. I felt connected to women of all ages simply because we all had a common goal: striving to achieve equality in a patriarchal society. However, shortly after watching the Oscar’s, I decided that it was time to pull my membership from the “sisterhood” I once boasted about being apart of.
“It’s time for all the gay people and all of the people of color to fight for us now,” were the treacherous words uttered by actress Patricia Arquette while accepting her award at the Oscars.
These jarring and confusing words had a profound affect on me. They made me turn off my television and actually sit there and reflect about who I was and what I stand for as a person. I came to this conclusion: I am an African American woman who stands for equality all across the spectrum of what it is considered to be a woman. Whether that is trans, homosexual, heterosexual, black, white, Latino, or Asian women, I stand for ALL women to be treated just as equally as men. So I thought to myself, as both a woman and a person of color, where do I fall in the world of feminism?
I thought long and hard about an answer to that question, and when I went to school the next day I found what I was looking for. While talking with my friends Emma and Rita about Arquette’s comment, I found my answer. During our discussion, Emma mentioned the word “intersectionality,” and immediately something clicked. The answer to my question was that I do not fit anywhere in the world of “white woman feminism”. After reflecting, I found that this “sisterhood” was extremely exclusive. I also realized that it essentially only caters to benefit white women and white women alone, whether those that consider themselves to be one want to admit it or not.
If you look back at when the feminist movement was first started, that’s when you’ll be able to notice how both racism and exclusion were ingrained in the movement from the get-go. For one, there were no women of color involved, let alone allowed, to be in the movement when Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Caddy Stanton started it. In fact, Anthony publicly made it known regarding how she felt women and people of color deserved to stand on the invisible equality scale. Stating that she will “will cut off [her] right arm before [she] will ever work or demand the ballot for the Negro and not the woman” were her words exactly regarding fighting for African Americans to vote.
The definition of the word intersectionality is: “the view that women experience oppression in varying configurations and in varying degrees of intensity,” according to Kimberlé Crenshaw, who initially coined the term. Since becoming an intersectional feminist, I’ve come to the realization of how important is to acknowledge the different injustices faced by all women. That might prove to be a challenge due to the growing amount of injustices faced by women, which range from police brutality (#WhatHappenedToSandraBland) to a startling pay gap, specifically for minorities. However, we cannot continue to sweep these issues under the rug and expect a change. If we continue to let “white girl feminism” only advocate for things like “freeing the nipple”, we honestly cannot expect to see any changes for the status of gender equality in the US, besides for those who are white.
You can’t just expect for change to come, you have to diligently fight for it. “Nobody can give you freedom. Nobody can give you equality or justice or anything. If you’re a [person] you have to take it,” said Malcolm X. So, whose side will you fight for?
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