Yes, in fact, I do blame (F)eminism
So there seems to be outpouring of excitement about the Katie Roiphe piece on Double XX on motherhood as a narcotic.
What frustrates about this "excitement" on Salon and all the other more "mainstream" blogs, is the way editors and many readers ignore the work of women outside of their "milieu" be they poor, black, Asian-American, gay, male, community-college educated or otherwise.
My book Baby Love, for example, is also about the subject of feminism and motherhood and making a surprising and seemingly "anti-feminist" choice, and yet received none of
the nuanced treatment. In fact, Salon used my piece on this exact
subject to excoriate me personally, running an ill-informed post by Phyllis Chesler in which I was labeled misguided,
confused, and in the throes of some kind of misplaced mother-daughter
drama. My
work was dismissed as personal pathology.
Which brings us to Katie
Roiphe. Good gracious, she and I hashed it out on Charlie Rose ten
years ago. Her intellect is no more superior, her writing no more
"eloquent," but her
privilege is, truly, many more generations deep, and certain editors apparently believe she has much more in common with their readers--an unfair assessment.
The entire
episode reminds me of one of the more insightful things my mother
told me (and regardless of the current state of our relationship, my mother has told me MANY insightful things):
"We read them,
but really, they do not read us."
Meaning, of course, that
many white women of privilege and access think what they write is new because they don't really
bother to read the work of women (and men) outside of their race and/or class. And yet we think nothing of
reading theirs and weighing their contributions as part of our process
of informing ourselves as we begin to do our own work.
And,
really, truly, the bottom line? I blame it on (F)eminism. Why is it that women of privilege are able to do this with impunity in the name of (F)eminism?
Because this kind of racial and economic apartheid is built into contemporary, especially Second Wave, (F)eminism. This latest exchange of pseudo-philosophical banter is just one more line item on an exhaustive list of betrayals, insults, and selective dismissals of the work of many self-identified feminists and others who have long ago abandoned their affiliation.
This remains a breathtakingly short-sighted method of engagement.
Comments:
Emphatic co-sign.
I was unaware of any of this until I read your Tweet. Sigh. The beat goes on...
Are you familiar with Washington Post reporter Lonnae O'Neal Parker's book "I'm Every Woman: Remixed Tales or Marriage, Motherhood, and Work"? Her experience has been similar to yours in terms of there this being comparative radio silence and/or dismissal in response from the usual suspects. She chalks it up to the white women who write on the same themes being unwilling to deal with her as an equal (married, mothering, college-educated, middle class). Maybe if she'd written a Star Parker-type book about how she had "moved on up" from welfare, that would have been more acceptable...
The timing is interesting as just today I read Nadra Kareem's excellent interview with you in Bitch. Kudos!
Best,
~Deesha
Your complaints about Salon Magazine in the 21st century sound just like the complaints of bell hooks in the 20th. It seems to me that in the same manner too many Black women design their lives such that they cannot be hurt by some Black men---my sisters should also position themselves such that Salon Magazine (and every other "mainstream" media thing) is simply not that relevant.
In the same manner that most Black people accept that there is a Black music (like Jazz), we should also accept that there is a Black form of intellection that requires its own media. We do not have to set ourselves on fire like Vietnamese monks to "prove" that we are anti-establishment but this samsaric attachment to European validation has to tone down a bit.
I love this. Kisses.
I agree with you about the chattering about Katie Rolphe's essay. The sad reality is that many of the writers engaged in this dialogue don't see motherhood outside the scope of their own lives. Subsequently they are oblivious to the fact that they are excluding the vast majority of mothers in the US from the public discussion.
Frankly it's up to conscious consumers to support material that is more representative of their own interests and realities. Case in point,
Baby Love, as well as the anthology, Who's Your Mama? The Unsung Voices of Women and Mothers are both works that broaden the concept of motherhood beyond affluent, married, White women. Thanks for writing the former and for your contribution to the latter.
"Meaning, of course, that many women of race and class privilege and access think what they write is new because they don't really bother to read the work of other women (and men). And yet we think nothing of reading theirs and weighing their contributions as part of our process of informing ourselves as we begin to do our own work."
So... white female writers don't read books other than their own? Or at the most, work by anyone else but white females? Right... Why do some black people like you think that because you're black it means that it's okay for you to hate all white people. And then you hide behind the excuse that because white = privilege, power and black = oppression, powerless, it's not racism. It's not okay for white people to use blanket terms to cover all black people, but it's okay for black people to do the same to white people. Newsflash, being black doesn't mean you get to hate everyone else, just like being white doesn't mean you can hate everyone else. That's not equality.
Say it Mama! As a Black Feminist, I have grown weary of Feminism as times and a lot recently. I am still on the margins and find that feminism still sees me as "not apart of the gang". Shit, I can't even be apart of the "third world" category and be exotic. We are just not there.
Just wanted to throw my voice in here...as a white woman. I read a LOT of authors who are neither white nor privileged. I read what interests me, regardless of the demographic of the author.
I don't consider myself privileged or a feminist. If only my paler skin gave me this free pass I keep hearing about!!! Most people look right past skin tone and see a fat gay girl, so I'm not getting any special treatment here. All-encompassing stereotypical statements about someone's ethnicity hurt everyone, regardless of their genetic makeup. Just a little food for thought.
Look I don't disagree with you that Ms Roiphe is a little late to the party here, but I'll cut her some slack. I honestly do not think its the kind of racism you feel it is. I really believe it is the New York thing. I have been faced with article after article and book after book on business topics published in the WSJ and Times that are months and even years late on economic trends and personal income and employment news. They have no interest in it until one of "their" group writes about it and by that I mean the crowd who lives below 110th and summers in the Hamptons. Its not color per se it is who you know and where you live and work.
OT, but something that came up while reading your post to my kids...as a white working-class mom, how do I explain white privilege to my kids? I know how it feels to be judged and "accepted" with that quiet, unspoken racism. I know, too, how it feels when people assume that I'm a better mother than non-whites (we live near Dallas, btw) and how aggro and defiant I become when other whites in public assume I'm ok with their racist comments (before I inform them I'm not) about a litany of topics.
Somehow, though, I can't find the words to describe to the kids how this attitude affects both their lives and their friends' lives. They don't know which of their classroom library books are written by blacks, or Hispanics, or islanders. The kids know that as whites in a liberal college town, they are still "the majority", yet at ages eight and ten, they simply don't see how "The Privilege" works, and it's difficult to explain to them in a way they can see and feel from their perspective.
Anyone? Thanks for the food for thought, too.
Kasie, AKA dallasmamatat
wow nice i'll twitte this post
http://www.amptoons.com/blog/files/mcintosh.html
This is a list (by no means exclusive) of white priveleges.
Actually, here's a link to a list of many privelege lists. You may not feel "priveleged", but that doesn't mean that you aren't. It also doesn't mean that your life is perfect.
Ooops. Here's that list of lists: http://www.amptoons.com/blog/archives/2006/09/26/a-list-of-privilege-lis...
I agree so much with you, Rebecca. On your whole post, and also on your response up there to Bryan. People are remarkably blase with how they treat the words of women of color intellectuals. We should all just be "thankful" that somebody is paying attention to us, we should all humping on after white approval, we should we should we should. The fact is, we all exist within the same economic structure those white women do, and we're not leaving it any time soon. This is not just some whiny "but I want their approval' rant, this is a legitimate critique of how a white supremacist structure will obsess over the voice of white women *at the expense of* the economic stability of women of color and other marginalized peoples. This is also not about some individual white person who may read nothing but texts by marginalized peoples--but rather instead, as Rebecca pointed out, it's about an *institution* in the U.S. that systematically excludes voices that aren't a part of the "network"--and does that at the economic expense of those voices. Show me a *feminist institution* (i.e. mainstream feminist blogs, feminist radio, feminist organizations, feminist university classes, etc) that can carry on a detailed analysis of the writings of a non-white woman who is not belle hooks and I will show you a dream world.
anyway. Rebecca--you have my forever love and support. Keep your chin up.
xo
to the women/persons who feel they are not racist and do not perceive of themselves as racist, let's tweek the definition of racism a bit: people often think of it as "individual, intentional, and explicit", read: you, wearing a hood, burning a cross. in fact and in practice, racism is institutional, insidious, cunning and implicit. it shapes our nation's economic and social policy - which effects us all, it's what keeps you from smiling at your brown-skinned neighbor or from befriending someone of a different culture at the local pta meeting, and it's everywhere.
EVERYONE regardless of ethnicity has racist tendencies. these tendencies may be small, they may be large. one cannot live in this interconnected universe and not be touched or exposed to it. the trick is some people are able to examine and investigate and transform these tendencies, some simply say they do not exist. which are you?
Eli, thanks for the list link. I haven't checked out Alas! in a long time; it's always good for insight and challenges. It gives me a better place from which to continue to challenge myself and set a better example for my kids.
Rebecca, thank you for your blog. I can't say it enough.
Hi Rebecca--
Thanks much for the tweet about Who's Your Mama? The Unsung Voices of Women and Mothers.
BTW my Twitter handle is:
http://www.twitter.com/yvonnebynoe
i'm a black woman and i do agree with you. thank you for having the courage to say what needs to be said on topics people don't want to talk about. this needs to be brought into the light.
I honestly do not think its the kind of racism you feel it is. I really believe it is the New York thing. I have been faced with article after article and book after book on business topics published in the WSJ and Times that are months and even years late on economic trends and personal income and employment news. thanks for sharing.
@Kasie/Anonymous
You might be interested in this article and the comments which followed:
http://www.antiracistparent.com/2009/08/05/white-noise-white-adults-rais...
I don't know why there is so much of excitement about Katie Roiphe's piece on Double XX like as if an addictive drug. However what makes this excitement also frustrating is the fact that the editors and many readers intentionally disregard the work of women if they are poor, Asian American, black, male or even community college educated. The baby Love book is much about feminism and motherhood. Its altogether interesting!
There has been very much excitement about Katie Roiphe's piece on Double XX. The Baby Love book described here is all about feminism and motherhood and making choices which are very much anti feminist. They seem surprising as well! Salon used this guy's piece and damaged him by running a post which was ill informed of Phyllis Chesler! He was labeled as confused and misguided. I dont know how this guy took it but If I were him I would have given him the beating of a life time!
We all get excited when we hear Double XX of Katie Roiphe. Its very tempting as well! The Baby Love book which he wrote was concerning about motherhood and feminism and it left an anti feminist choice. It though didnt recieve any nuance statement. Unlike Salon who used the writers piece to excoriate him, Katie did differently. She seemed to be nice. Katie and the writer came to an agreement with Charlie Rose ten years ago. Even though she didnt have any intellect or writing superior to, her privilege was very high and deep and that itself makes her better!
I agree so much with you, Rebecca. On your whole post, and also on your response up there to Bryan
The baby Love book is much about feminism and motherhood. Its altogether interesting!
I somewhat not agree with the book. Everyone is not same. There is no specific rule for life.
I agree that there isn't a specific rule for life, but this article provides some great insight to the way things work in life.
Excellent ! You write so well. I re-tweet it immediatly :)
nice blog.Thanks for your post
i'm a black woman and i do agree with you. thank you for having the courage to say what needs to be said on topics people don't want to talk about. this needs to be brought into the light.
I couldn't agree more with this statement "Because this kind of racial and economic apartheid is built into contemporary, especially Second Wave, (F)eminism. This latest exchange of pseudo-philosophical banter is just one more line item on an exhaustive list of betrayals, insults, and selective dismissals of the work of many self-identified feminists and others who have long ago abandoned their affiliation."
This post is great! And the blog is very nice!
Thanks a lot!
The world is changing and everything is changing too. This article focus a lot on Feminism.
Don't blame feminism. Its great indeed. Women are great
I agree too women are great. They contribute a lot and everyone should respect women for their kind contribution.
nice post. also nice template. Keep posting bro
Yes I think motherhood is totally legitimate. It's unfortunate when Feminism turns into a practice of women trying to "prove" to other people (and themselves) that they are *truly* independent. But just because you take the raising of your child very seriously, enough to devote most of your time to it, that doesn't make you a non-independent person.
Thank you for posting such a useful website. Your weblog happens to be not just informative but also very stimulating too. There are a limited number of people who are capable of write technical articles that creatively.
I also found your posts very interesting. In fact after reading, I had to go show it to my friend and he enjoyed it as well!
Pro 19:14 House and riches are the inheritance of fathers: and a prudent wife is from the LORD. It is a thought provoking and a critical analysis about feminism practiced by the affluent. Thanks.
it seem so easy with your presentation but I find this topic to be really something which I think I would never understand. It seems too complicated and very broad for me. I am looking forward for your next post, I will try to get the hang of it!....
regards,
Holy cow .. Good thing Hall has no screening process, if they knew how clumsy I am IRL this would immediately revoked. Thanks for the awesome article though! I think the role is mostly a testament to his skill with words, and that feature is well deserved. :)
nice post..thanks 4 the great sharing.
@chord I agree this is a great post. Keep up the great work. Thanks for sharing with us.
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The sad reality is that many of the writers engaged in this dialogue don't see motherhood outside the scope of their own lives. thank you for having the courage to say what needs to be said on topics people don't want to talk about.
Again thanks for sharing with us.
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