The problem with being a feminist is that everyone seems to have an opinion about what being a feminist entails. When a contemporary feminist icon like Nikki Minaj tries to distances herself from feminism, while maintaining that she is a “woman who wants other women to be bosses and to be strong and to be go-getters,” feminism becomes murky water indeed. Groups like Women Against Men claiming that feminism is a hate group, an idea that unfortunately permeates much of society, doesn’t help either.
An article in the Huff last year, by Hannah McAtenmey, claims “There is no sitting on the fence. You are either a feminist or sexist.” This is a such an unfortunate perspective because it potentially alienates a large proportion of people, who will likely never call themselves feminists, yet are strong advocates for the rights of women. I’m no coward, but I do believe that you can be a feminist in some circles and an advocate of equality in others. And I also believe that being a non-feminist does not make you a sexist. There are very legitimate reasons to take issue with feminism - particularly the white middle class feminism for which people like McAtenmey advocate.
When I first met my husband we had some very complicated discussions about the concept of feminism. He asked me “if it really is about equality of the sexes, why is is called feminism?” His question would have been a very good one, were we not living in a society that is still struggling to overcome the historical baggage of female subjugation, and were we not living in a society where men and women are still so far from being equal. Recently he mentioned to me that he learned that the wage gap between men and women is a startling 27%. This is not so startling to a woman in academia, who is constantly struggling for legitimacy among her largely male colleagues, but being a man who has worked in the trades for most of his life, where most people start off with the same wage, and female applicants are uncommon, women and men making different rates for the same work never crossed his mind. Now he is heading into a degree in computer game development, and he is for the first time being faced with questions of inequity and inequality in the workplace and in academics. This is how feminists are made. But it is very unlikely that my husband will ever call himself a feminist. Like Minaj says, some words just “box you in”, and try as I might, I will probably never convince my husband to embrace the term. But the concepts, those are easy to grasp once you do some research, and once you give the facts some genuine thought.
I do not wish to distance myself from feminism, and in fact will continue to proudly associate myself with a movement that seeks equality for all people, regardless of gender, ethnicity, and class. But as an intersectional feminist I have begun to recognize that the term feminism may also carry with it a lot of cultural baggage from the Western World, and there are many strong female writers from across the globe who decline to associate themselves with feminism largely because they feel the term erases their particular struggles.
For example, Nigerian writer Buchi Emecheta says: “I will not be called a feminist...because it is European. It is as simple as that… I do believe in the African type of feminism. They call is womanism…” What Emecheta is trying to explain is that Western Europeans and North Americans do not share the same experiences of women from Africa. Our experiences are not universal, so the words that we use to describe our struggles may not be universal either.
As Western feminists we can have a tendency to think our values are universal. We can get bogged down in our own experience of the world. Whether we do this by claiming that any person who is not a feminist is a sexist, or by insisting that women in Africa care about the same struggles as us, we are creating a situation that alienates our potential allies.
Does it weaken the movement that a large proportion of the ‘feministic’ population will likely never call themselves feminists? I don’t think so. Whether you call yourself a feminist or not, if you believe that women should be raised up in our society, and that there are certain accommodations that women deserve based on their sex in order to level the playing field of business, academics, politics etc. then your position is a feminist one. I don’t mind that my husband isn’t a feminist, because I recognize that my understanding of feminism is not universal.
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