Feminism Is for Everybody PDF

Part 1A: This Is What a Feminist Looks Like CHAPTER 1 Excerpts from F...

Part 1A: This Is What a Feminist Looks Like CHAPTER 1 Excerpts from Feminism Is for Everybody bell hooks bell hooks is a leading feminist theorist and cultural critic, whose work focuses on the interconnectedness of race, gender, culture, and class. The author of over 30 books, she has been recognized with numerous awards and has been named one of the most influential American thinkers by Publisher’s Weekly and the Atlantic Monthly, and one of the world’s top 100 visionaries by Utne Reader. Ain’t I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism and Feminism Is for Everybody (excerpted here) are among her most well-known books. INTRODUCTION: COME “they” are taking all the jobs and making the world CLOSER TO FEMINISM hard for white men, who do not stand a chance. When I ask these same folks about the feminist Everywhere I go I proudly tell folks who want to know books or magazines they read, when I ask them about who I am and what I do that I am a writer, a feminist the feminist talks they have heard, about the feminist theorist, a cultural critic. I tell them I write about activists they know, they respond by letting me know Copyright © 2018. Canadian Scholars. All rights reserved. movies and popular culture, analyzing the message in that everything they know about feminism has come the medium. Most people find this exciting and want into their lives third hand, that they really have not to know more. Everyone goes to movies, watches tele- come close enough to feminist movement to know vision, glances through magazines, and everyone has what really happens, what it’s really about. Mostly thoughts about the messages they receive, about the they think feminism is a bunch of angry women images they look at. It is easy for the diverse public I who want to be like men. They do not even think encounter to understand what I do as a cultural critic, about feminism as being about rights—about women to understand my passion for writing (lots of folks gaining equal rights. When I talk about the feminism want to write, and do). But feminist theory—that’s the I know—up close and personal—they willingly listen, place where the questions stop. Instead I tend to hear although when our conversations end, they are quick all about the evil of feminism and the bad feminists: to tell me I am different, not like the “real” feminists how “they” hate men; how “they” want to go against who hate men, who are angry. I assure them I am as nature—and god; how “they” are all lesbians; how real and as radical a feminist as one can be, and if they Gender and Women's Studies, Second Edition : Critical Terrain, edited by Margaret Hobbs, and Carla Rice, Canadian Scholars, 2018. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/ubc/detail.action?docID=6318365. Created from ubc on 2025-01-07 19:34:58. GenderWomenStudies2e-interior-final.indd 16 4/24/2018 12:11:37 PM  Chapter 1   Excerpts from Feminism Is for Everybody  17 dare to come closer to feminism they will see it is not have no idea what it is feminists want. I believe them. how they have imagined it. I believe in their capacity to change and grow. And I believe that if they knew more about feminism they ***** would no longer fear it, for they would find in feminist movement the hope of their own release from the I have wanted them to have an answer to the bondage of patriarchy. question “What is feminism?” that is rooted neither It is for these men, young and old, and for all in fear or fantasy. I have wanted them to have this of us, that I have written this short handbook, the simple definition to read again and again so they book I have spent more than 20 years longing for. I know: “Feminism is a movement to end sexism, sexist had to write it because I kept waiting for it to appear, exploitation, and oppression.” I love this definition and it did not. And without it there was no way to […] because it so clearly states that the movement is address the hordes of people in this nation who are not about being anti-male. It makes it clear that the daily bombarded with anti-feminist backlash, who problem is sexism. And that clarity helps us remember are being told to hate and resist a movement that they that all of us, female and male, have been socialized know very little about. There should be so many little from birth on to accept sexist thought and action. As a feminist primers, easy to read pamphlets and books, consequence, females can be just as sexist as men. And telling us all about feminism, that this book would be while that does not excuse or justify male domination, just another passionate voice speaking out on behalf it does mean that it would be naive and wrongminded of feminist politics. There should be billboards; ads in for feminist thinkers to see the movement as simplisti- magazines; ads on buses, subways, trains; television cally being for women against men. To end patriarchy commercials spreading the word, letting the world (another way of naming the institutionalized sexism) know more about feminism. We are not there yet. But we need to be clear that we are all participants in this is what we must do to share feminism, to let the perpetuating sexism until we change our minds and movement into everyone’s mind and heart. Feminist hearts, until we let go of sexist thought and action and change has already touched all our lives in a positive replace it with feminist thought and action. way. And yet we lose sight of the positive when all we Males as a group have and do benefit the most hear about feminism is negative. from patriarchy, from the assumption that they are When I began to resist male domination, to superior to females and should rule over us. But those rebel against patriarchal thinking (and to oppose the Copyright © 2018. Canadian Scholars. All rights reserved. benefits have come with a price. In return for all the strongest patriarchal voice in my life—my mother’s goodies men receive from patriarchy, they are required voice), I was still a teenager, suicidal, depressed, to dominate women, to exploit and oppress us, using uncertain about how I would find meaning in my violence if they must to keep patriarchy intact. Most life and a place for myself. I needed feminism to men find it difficult to be patriarchs. Most men are give me a foundation of equality and justice to stand disturbed by hatred and fear of women, by male vio- on. Mama has come around to feminist thinking. lence against women, even the men who perpetuate She sees me and all her daughters (we are six) living this violence. But they fear letting go of the benefits. better lives because of feminist politics. She sees the They are not certain what will happen to the world promise and hope in feminist movement. It is that they know most intimately if patriarchy changes. So promise and hope that I want to share with you in they find it easier to passively support male domina- this book, with everybody. tion even when they know in their minds and hearts Imagine living in a world where there is no that it is wrong. Again and again men tell me they domination, where females and males are not alike Gender and Women's Studies, Second Edition : Critical Terrain, edited by Margaret Hobbs, and Carla Rice, Canadian Scholars, 2018. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/ubc/detail.action?docID=6318365. Created from ubc on 2025-01-07 19:34:58. GenderWomenStudies2e-interior-final.indd 17 4/24/2018 12:11:37 PM  18   Part 1   Foundations: Why Gender and Women’s Studies? Why Feminism? or even always equal, but where a vision of mutuality subordinate to men in the domestic household. Even is the ethos shaping our interaction. Imagine living though masses of women have entered the workforce, in a world where we can all be who we are, a world of even though many families are headed by women who peace and possibility. Feminist revolution alone will are the sole breadwinners, the vision of domestic life not create such a world; we need to end racism, class which continues to dominate the nation’s imagina- elitism, imperialism. But it will make it possible for tion is one in which the logic of male domination us to be fully self-actualized females and males able to is intact, whether men are present in the home or create beloved community, to live together, realizing not. The wrongminded notion of feminist movement our dreams of freedom and justice, living the truth which implied it was anti-male carried with it the that we are all “created equal.” Come closer. See how wrongminded assumption that all female space would feminism can touch and change your life and all our necessarily be an environment where patriarchy and lives. Come closer and know firsthand what feminist sexist thinking would be absent. Many women, movement is all about. Come closer and you will see: even those involved in feminist politics, chose to feminism is for everybody. believe this as well. There was indeed a great deal of anti-male sentiment among early feminist activists who were FEMINIST POLITICS: responding to male domination with anger. It was WHERE WE STAND that anger at injustice that was the impetus for creating a women’s liberation movement. Early on Simply put, feminism is a movement to end sexism, most feminist activists (a majority of whom were sexist exploitation, and oppression. […] white) had their consciousness raised about the As all advocates of feminist politics know, most nature of male domination when they were working people do not understand sexism, or if they do, they in anti-classist and anti-racist settings with men think it is not a problem. Masses of people think that who were telling the world about the importance feminism is always and only about women seeking of freedom while subordinating the women in to be equal to men. And a huge majority of these their ranks. Whether it was white women working folks think feminism is anti-male. Their misunder- on behalf of socialism, black women working on standing of feminist politics reflects the reality that behalf of civil rights and black liberation, or Native most folks learn about feminism from patriarchal American women working for Indigenous rights, it Copyright © 2018. Canadian Scholars. All rights reserved. mass media. The feminism they hear about the most was clear that men wanted to lead, and they wanted is portrayed by women who are primarily committed women to follow. Participating in these radical to gender equality—equal pay for equal work, and freedom struggles awakened the spirit of rebellion sometimes women and men sharing household chores and resistance in progressive females and led them and parenting. They see that these women are usually towards contemporary women’s liberation. white and materially privileged. They know from mass As contemporary feminism progressed, as women media that women’s liberation focuses on the freedom realized that males were not the only group in our to have abortions, to be lesbians, to challenge rape society who supported sexist thinking and behavior— and domestic violence. Among these issues, masses that females could be sexist as well—anti-male senti- of people agree with the idea of gender equity in the ment no longer shaped the movement’s consciousness. workplace—equal pay for equal work. The focus shifted to an all-out effort to create gender Since our society continues to be primarily justice. But women could not band together to further a “Christian” culture, masses of people continue feminism without confronting our sexist thinking. to believe that god has ordained that women be Sisterhood could not be powerful as long as women Gender and Women's Studies, Second Edition : Critical Terrain, edited by Margaret Hobbs, and Carla Rice, Canadian Scholars, 2018. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/ubc/detail.action?docID=6318365. Created from ubc on 2025-01-07 19:34:58. GenderWomenStudies2e-interior-final.indd 18 4/24/2018 12:11:37 PM  Chapter 1   Excerpts from Feminism Is for Everybody  19 were competitively at war with one another. Utopian realize. Changes in our nation’s economy, economic visions of sisterhood based solely on the awareness depression, the loss of jobs, etc., made the climate ripe of the reality that all women were in some way for our nation’s citizens to accept the notion of gender victimized by male domination were disrupted by equality in the workforce. […] discussions of class and race. Discussions of class dif- Most women, especially privileged white ferences occurred early on in contemporary feminism, women, ceased even to consider revolutionary preceding discussions of race. Diana Press published feminist visions, once they began to gain economic revolutionary insights about class divisions between power within the existing social structure. Ironically, women as early as the mid-’70s in their collection of revolutionary feminist thinking was most accepted essays Class and Feminism. These discussions did not and embraced in academic circles. In those circles trivialize the feminist insistence that “sisterhood is the production of revolutionary feminist theory pro- powerful,” they simply emphasized that we could only gressed, but more often than not that theory was not become sisters in struggle by confronting the ways made available to the public. It became and remains women—through sex, class, and race—dominated a privileged discourse available to those among us and exploited other women, and created a political who are highly literate, well-educated, and usually platform that would address these differences. materially privileged. […] Even though individual black women were active Lifestyle feminism ushered in the notion that in contemporary feminist movement from its incep- there could be as many versions of feminism as there tion, they were not the individuals who became the were women. Suddenly the politics was being slowly “stars” of the movement, who attracted the attention removed from feminism. And the assumption pre- of mass media. Often individual black women active vailed that no matter what a woman’s politics, be she in feminist movement were revolutionary feminists conservative or liberal, she too could fit feminism into (like many white lesbians). They were already at odds her existing lifestyle. Obviously this way of thinking with reformist feminists who resolutely wanted to has made feminism more acceptable because its project a vision of the movement as being solely about underlying assumption is that women can be femin- women gaining equality with men in the existing sys- ists without fundamentally challenging and changing tem. Even before race became a talked about issue in themselves or the culture. […] feminist circles it was clear to black women (and to Feminist politics is losing momentum because their revolutionary allies in struggle) that they were feminist movement has lost clear definitions. We Copyright © 2018. Canadian Scholars. All rights reserved. never going to have equality within the existing white have those definitions. Let’s reclaim them. Let’s supremacist capitalist patriarchy. share them. Let’s start over. Let’s have T-shirts and From its earliest inception feminist movement bumper stickers and postcards and hip-hop music, was polarized. Reformist thinkers chose to emphasize television and radio commercials, ads everywhere gender equality. Revolutionary thinkers did not want and billboards, and all manner of printed material simply to alter the existing system so that women that tells the world about feminism. We can share would have more rights. We wanted to transform that the simple yet powerful message that feminism is a system, to bring an end to patriarchy and sexism. Since movement to end sexist oppression. Let’s start there. patriarchal mass media was not interested in the more Let the movement begin again. revolutionary vision, it never received attention in mainstream press. The vision of “women’s liberation” Source: hooks, bell. (2000). Excerpted from which captured and still holds the public imagination “Introduction” and “Chapter 1: Feminist Politics.” was the one representing women as wanting what In Feminism Is for Everybody: Passionate Politics men had. And this was the vision that was easier to (pp. vii–x, 1–6). London, UK: Pluto Press. Gender and Women's Studies, Second Edition : Critical Terrain, edited by Margaret Hobbs, and Carla Rice, Canadian Scholars, 2018. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/ubc/detail.action?docID=6318365. Created from ubc on 2025-01-07 19:34:58. GenderWomenStudies2e-interior-final.indd 19 4/24/2018 12:11:37 PM