Unfeminist First

It takes a tremendous amount of courage for a marginalised person to say something is X-ist. To talk about the structure that kicks them to the ground and walks on them. & a person who stands up does not derive any grotesque pleasure from the callout: it’s neither enjoyable, nor entertaining. They rightfully fear retribution.

This is even more the case when the person walking on you has a feminist card.

This is nothing new: there is bullying in social justice. I’ve experienced quite a bit of it myself, & so have people I’m close to.

Every time I speak, someone twists my voice.

Every time my voice is strangled, I must bear the brunt of their denial. Though we are all working for the same ideal so I must bear my burden in patience, no? That in itself is victim-blaming.

This is only going to happen again, and again, and again, and again. & again.

Every “bugger off” I have snapped in frustration is not without reason: the amount of time we spend fighting “allies” is ridiculous. It is exhausting. It results in worse cultural paranoia.

The various kyriarchal structures are not something to be debated. They are established fact. They need to be engaged with critically & worked through without privileged guilt because marginalised people don’t need you giving yourself kudos for doing what a decent human being should have been doing in the first place.

There is that constant pressure of “needing to take sides” when there are no real sides. Because you know what? It’s a continuum. Everyone screws up. It’s how you deal with being wrong. & people with feminist cards hate being wrong. It’s somehow worse than the apocalypse itself. Yes, some people are more guilty than others, but all are responsible.

Watching your friends/supporters harass someone who somehow summoned the courage for a callout without saying anything to prevent them from doing so? No excuses.

Continuing to speak over the heads of a marginalised group without acknowledging or apologising for your own fail in the past? No excuses.

Watching people in a FEMINIST SPACE show their pantslessness and say nothing despite engagement from others calling it out? No excuses.

Branding people who have legitimate concerns with the harassment and epic fail as splintering the movement and demanding solidarity from them? No excuses.

Using the marginalised as a convenient Other to point out the ~lack of attention~ “your” issues are receiving? No excuses.

Invoking “policing” as a tactic to discredit the voice speaking against you,when the police have been the foremost instrument of violence against minority groups? No excuses.

If this is not done in a critical manner, it is only a stronger signal for people to squander their privilege yet again. & then we’re back to square one with the kyriarchy. The onus of fighting for ourselves does not fall on us, because it was on our very backs that these structures were built.

Does the responsibility of engaging the same people who are oppressing us fall with us who have been silenced? Must we put up with the fauxrationalisations? Because they aren’t rationalisations, they are nothing but ‘splaining. They demonstrate a fundamental misunderstanding in how kyriarchy functions as various intersecting systems crushing people beneath it.

Because these so-called rationalisations are in essence derails. They only make minorities more afraid of speaking up.

They devalue and dehumanise, and in doing so pave the way for more dehumanisation, more oppression.

They are exactly what makes so-called feminists into convenient tools of the kyriarchy, thus becoming the very monsters they purport to fight against.

They’re the same. Tired. Old. Shit.

I speak here knowing that my voice will once again be twisted.

But I am an optimist.

So quit it.

Quit the harassment, quit the self-centering, quit the dislocation of our voices.

If your cause was so progressive, if your ideal is so noble, you would not step on us to get there.

No regards,
Thursday
Weekday Blues.

[This post was written for Bitch Magazine’s Feminist Carnival. Incidents that involved me personally are all publicly viewable at The Sadness Of Pencils. Others are available upon request.]