The title is oxymoronic, I know. But would you believe the number of ‘social activists’ that claim that they are the epitome of progressive attitudes, and then go onto flat-out discriminate against others? Would you believe the number of people who are picky about who does and doesn’t deserve equality? This can be attributed to intersectionality theory, first coined by Kimberlè Crenshaw, a civil rights activist and lawyer who has contributed massively to critical race theory.
Essentially intersectionality is the idea that one’s struggles and every aspect of their identity being looked at as a whole, rather than in solarity. Typically the six main social distinctions that most people tend to focus on include, racial identity, sexuality, gender, disability, social class and nationality. However there are, of course, more subsets of these groups that may be taken into consideration. Crenshaw has said that, “Intersectionality is a lens through which you can see where power comes and collides, where it interlocks and intersects.” When looking at intersectionality, it is important to see how a certain individual’s struggles may differ from the struggles of someone else, because of the specifics that make up their identity. For example, the way that a heterosexual, cis, white man may have completely different struggles to a queer, transgender woman of colour. It is where every aspect of your identity intersects and how you deal with the discrimination that stems from that.
Crenshaw brought this up in multiple cases, the most notable being DeGraffenreid v. General Motors, Moore v. Hughes Helicopter, Inc. and Payne v. Travenol. For the sake of clarity and simplicity, I’ll focus on DeGraffenreid v. General Motors. The case was in 1976 in which five black women sued General Motors seniority policy that they argued solely targeted black women. The company had previously refused to hire black women before 1964, however afterwards they began to hire them as general social attitudes had changed. But during the recession in the early 1970s, every black woman that worked for General Motors would be laid off because they lacked seniority and hadn’t been there for more than a certain period of time. Crenshaw decided to approach this lawsuit by encompassing both the gender and racial discrimination by General Motors. Though the court ultimately ruled against the plaintiffs, Crenshaw did bring up several important distinctions. She argued against the court’s narrow view of the very definition of discrimination, by saying that they were the prime example of, “conceptual limitations of ... single-issue analyses”. She argued that the struggles that black women faced were unique, and not necessarily comparable to other black individuals and other women. It was the point at which they both intersected, that allowed these black women to face discrimination.
Another example of this is in first and second wave feminism. It was first popularised in the early 1900s and still has a lot of support today. You could see these women who wanted nothing more than to be treated with the same respect men were treated with. Who burned their bras and marched through Atlantic City demanding equality. They wanted a seat at the table, and wanted to make decisions so they could be included in the conversation. So they could improve their quality of life. These women were hailed as the epitome of social justice. But some of these women were the same women who spit on homeless people on the street. These were the same women who believed that women of colour weren’t human. These were the same women who didn’t want to be associated with queer women as they felt as if queer women weren’t real women. In their so-called fight for equality, they managed to exclude everyone who wasn’t cisgender, white, straight, able bodied and rich. So much for justice and freedom.
The issue with this is that these women who weren’t included in this warped view of feminism now had to deal with two distinct issues.They were alienated from the very movement that was supposed to help them get a better quality of life. What’s so bad about this, is that you can’t separate these aspects of your identity. For example, the experience of being a black woman would vary wildly from being a queer woman. Sometimes you’re both. Moreover, you shouldn’t be forced to choose one aspect of your identity over the other. Some just don’t have that luxury.
What’s funny is the fact that so many people thought they were being progressive by being part of the feminist movement, when in actuality they were only interested in their own self-preservation and wellbeing.Whilst you may think of things such as the women’s suffragette movement, it’s easy to see how they were pioneers for women's right, but failed to include women of colour in the conversation. For example, Susan B. Anthony, one of the leaders of the suffragette movement, was a white supremacist and practiced her white supremacist views whilst protesting. By modern standards, this completely detracts from the true meaning of the feminist movement, cheapening its meaning. It took an incredibly long time for women of colour to even be considered actual human beings in western society. Furthermore, a huge problem is that this sentiment is still very much present in today’s society. If you look at the graph entitled figure 1, you can clearly see that black, native American, Latino and Hispanic women make significantly less than white women. However, many people when discussing the wage gap tend to solely focus on the statistics that involve white women. Now, there is absolutely no problem with focusing on a specific set of data, but the issue arises when you claim that there’s no further problem. When you stop at the surface, you are invalidating the struggles and discrimination that others face.
So why don’t people do more to combat the struggles that many face due to intersectionality? Some claim that it is the, “new caste system” encouraging people to deviate from the ‘norm’ which is being white, heterosexual and cisgender. But the very issue with this is that being white and cisgender and heterosexual isn’t necessarily the norm. There is no norm and there shouldn’t be a norm when looking at individuals, because to generalise and stereotype would most definitely lead to further violence and discrimination. People diminish others down to the social groups they belong to, and therefore make assumptions that may or may not be true. The reason this is bad, is just because you’re from a certain social group, doesn’t make you an inherently good or bad person. It’s when people make unjust assumptions that things such as racism and sexism occur, as people are generalising every single person belonging to a given group to behave a certain. Furthermore, the simple word of intersectionality has been stigmatised to being something that is only used by left leaning teenagers with blue hair, and therefore is often disregarded. Many don’t want to actually confront the idea that they may be contributing to the struggles that stem from intersectionality, and only look at people solely based on the social groups they may belong to.
The point of this of all is to get you to take a moment. Pause. You could have good intentions. Great intentions even. You could plan on changing the world and making it a better place. The thing is we all have inherent biases. Yes, all of us - even me. So it’s time we address those biases and recognise that not everyone has the same privileges as us, even though they may belong to the same social group. People shouldn’t have to downplay parts of their identity to be accepted by others. Check out the further reading I’ve linked below if you want to address such biases. So when you’re done, just keep this in the back of your head. Think about it from time to time. And try to be a better person.
Further Reading:
https://vm.tiktok.com/ZM8DY9q7J/ - Scene from the show ‘Blackish’
https://www.nytimes.com/video/who-me-biased - Article by the New York TImes
bias-and-identity-with-students.html - films for exploring race, bias and identity
Works Cited:
https://vm.tiktok.com/ZM8DY9q7J/ (video)
https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/women/reports/2020/03/24/482141/quick-facts-gender-wage-gap/ (image)
https://www.law.columbia.edu/news/archive/kimberle-crenshaw-intersectionality-more-two-decades-later
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