The Stereotypes Of Non-White Feminist

Although the text, Women: Images and Realities a Multicultural Anthology, has done a wonderful job of showcasing the diversity of women’s experiences, I find Beverly Daniel Tatum’s work “Defining Racism: “Can We Talk?”” to be the most striking. In the essay, Tatum describes how she (and many other feminists) define racism and who can and cannot be racist. Tatum argues that there are important distinctions between prejudice and racism, wherein racism is defined as a ‘system of advantage based on race” or more precisely “prejudice plus power” (388). Through multiple examples Tatum illustrates that if one accepts and uses her definition of racism then only White people (the group of people who ‘dominate’ society) are racist because “people of

Peggy McIntosh concludes white privilege is, “an invisible package of unearned assets which I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was meant to remain oblivious.” The writer came to this conclusion when observing male privilege initially in America. McIntosh discusses the lack of acknowledgement of men when it came to addressing their own advantages over women even if they could admit the position of disadvantage of women. This shed light on how white privilege is curtailed; In the United States, foundations of our society are interlaced with institutionalized privilege creates unethical levels of dominance; dominance of males over females, whites over people of color,

Whiteness and racism comes from the oppression, colonization and systems of dominance over black people and their feelings. In this case, an intersectional feminist analysis matters because women who are able bodied, cis-gendered, privileged and white are only being considered whereas bell hooks argue that men, women and trans people who oppressed should be fought for. And Peggy McIntosh adds onto this but a white woman who addresses and recognizes her privilege to help other white individuals understand what they have and blacks do not.

This week, the readings touched on issues relating to resistance and social change. Martinez explains how the U.S. has struggled to see issues of race beyond just Black and white. She also stresses the importance of including other races when speaking on these issues. Hernandez argues that the mainstream feminist movement fails to include minority and low-income women and the issues they face. She states that the movement only benefits white middle class women. Collins explains how people’s ideas and behaviors actualize other people’s inequalities. She says comparing levels of oppression is a competition for attention and instead we should use a new mentality that interlocks these inequalities. Harris

Wise’s examination of the inconspicuous character of racism 2.0 dovetails fittingly with our course’s recurring theme of institutionalized racism. In class lectures we have defined institutionalized racism as the discriminatory practices that have become regularized and routinized by state agencies, organizations, industries, or anywhere else in society. Although such practices might not be intentionally racist, they end up being racist nevertheless as consequence of the systematized and unspoken biases that have become increasingly convoluted and entrenched within society over time. It also doesn’t help white people to recognize these discriminatory practices considering they have been unconsciously tailored to be consistent with white perspective and mentality. In her article, White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack, Peggy McIntosh examines not only how white folks often consider themselves to be a normative figure within society, but also how they are carefully taught not to recognize the advantages they gain from the disadvantages that impair people of color. In the article, McIntosh acknowledges the reality of her own white privilege and expresses, “In my class and place, I did not see myself as a racist because I was taught to recognize racism only in individual acts of meanness by members of my group, never in invisible systems conferring unsought racial dominance on my group from birth” (McIntosh 4). In fact, even if white folks do not believe themselves to

Gender and gender issues must be viewed through an intersectionalized approach. I became aware of such issues through social media websites over the years. I encountered terms such a white feminism, feminism, LatinX, and intersectionality, but initially was not sure of their meanings until later. White feminism refers to the 1970’s Women’s Movement in the United States that essentialized men and women as 2 opposite monolithic groups while ignoring the variation within groups due to other variables such as race and class (Garcia, YEAR). Since white women were more educated than females of color, the concerns of the Women’s Movement

In Peggy McIntosh’s, “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack” she introduces the topic of privilege from the point of view of a women in a world designed to favor men. She sees that men acknowledge the fact that women are disadvantaged but are unable to admit that they themselves have higher power. This denial of power is what creates the gap between men and women and is a clear stepping stone to her primary point of white privilege. The problem does not lie in the existence of white privilege but more so in the validation that is given to it. To be oblivious to this privilege is what gives it power to aid the white population, while simultaneously crippling other minority groups. She goes on to state that realizing there is hierarchy is the first step to systematically taking it down. This however has to start by finding where the problem originates.

bell hooks, renowned black feminist and cultural critic criticizes the lack of racial awareness in her essay, Representing Whiteness in the Black Imagination (1992). ‘bell hooks’ is written in lower case to convey that the substance of her work reigns more important than the writer. From a marginalized perspective, hooks argues that sites of dominance, not otherness is problematic and critiques the lack of attention that white scholars pay to the representation of whiteness in the black imagination. Critical feminist scholars Peggy McIntosh and Ruth Frankenberg identify their own whiteness as a dominant discourse, but share a critical departure from hooks with the notion of whiteness as terror. hooks aim is not to reverse racism, but discuss her position to authentically inform readers about how she experiences racism. Furthermore, systems of oppression are manufactured by human thought and thus the site of the Other is always produced as a site of difference. Gender, race, sex, class, disability, and geography are situated differently in social structure, but dominant groups assume they share the same reality though they cannot experience it. In consequence, the Other cannot hold a singularized identity of their own and the binary structure succeeds in containing racialized bodies in place. What happens to those bodies when they cross boundaries of the binary? hooks recounts being routinely disciplined back into place when crossing the border; however, dominant white

As many women struggled to retain their values and traditions, there were existing male dominated conceptions of race and white dominated conceptions of gender. Kimberle Crenshaw describes the concept of intersectionality where race and gender interact in various ways to shape multiple dimensions experiences for different groups

Rich maintains that white feminism begins with the faulty US education system, or for this paper’s purposes, the North American education system. Rich (1984) contends that “Any United States citizen alive today has been saturated with…the warning that any collective restructuring of society spells the end of personal freedom.…But we are not invited to consider the butcheries…of white supremacism” (p. 220). The lack of perspective for North Americans

She describes how white women “ignore their built-in privilege of whiteness” when they ignore the black female’s point of view and focus solely on the white female’s view (117). She points out the hypocrisy of white feminists, in that they will refuse to read black females’ works because they are “too difficult to understand,” but will read the works of Shakespeare, Molière, Dostoyefsky, and Aristophanes (117) There’s an obvious contradiction between white feminists’ “incorporation” of black females into their movement and the exclusion of their literature, which Lorde later analyzes and determines is because white women would feel guilt upon recognizing and validating their experiences. Furthermore, the exclusion of black writings from the feminist movement weakens the strength of the movement, offering the opposite effect as desired. Lorde writes how “ignoring the differences of race between women and the implications of those differences presents the most serious threat to the mobilization of women’s joint power.” (117) Since the feminist movement seeks to apply social pressure to achieve social change, it would make sense to try to gain strength in numbers by including the most people possible; Lorde sees this strength in numbers and calls into question the consistency of the white side of the feminist movement with its

Peggy McIntosh, chapter on “White Privilege, color, and crime,” encourages readers to think about the world in the framework of race, class, and gender on a “White privilege” perspective. McIntosh

As an African American woman teaching predominantly white males, I embrace Collin’s (1990) Black feminist thought, “which can aid African American women’s struggles against oppression” (1990, p. 32), to promote social justice within my classroom. Black feminism empowers Black women to develop a consciousness of their unique experiences within the dominant cultures of race and gender and create a self-definition that diminishes stereotypes held by Black women about themselves and the stereotypes perpetuated in society (1990). In challenging these stereotypes within my sphere of influence, I must know who I am without society’s labels, and this self-definition must stimulate changed actions (1990).

The phrase “solidarity is for white women” emphasizes the limited amount of women in color who participates in academic debates related to female issues. However, this is ironic since solidarity means agreement among individuals with common interest. The phrase species white women even though minorities are the people excluded from the debate agreements. Allan G. Johnson would certainty say that the white women have the privilege in mainstream media. “What it does mean is that I’m also getting something that other people are denied, people who are like me in every respect for the social categories they belong to”. The phrase attempts to bridge the gap between the whites and minorities in mainstream women media.

In an attempt to define Black Feminism, Collins clarifies that it must “avoid the idealist position that ideas can be evaluated in isolation from the groups that create them (Collins 385).” This clarification forms her basis for why Black Feminism is necessary, and who it serves. Thinking about feminism historically, the concerns of black women were pushed aside in favor of fighting sexism; a notable example occurs within the Suffrage movement, where votes for white women were prioritized over women of color in order to push such legislation through. And even when feminism began looking at other social injustices, such as racism and class issues, often only prominent feminists were invited to the discussion. What resulted was, and often continues to be, a problem of white women speaking for oppressed people. It’s impossible, Collins argues, to have Black Feminist thought without examining the experiences and positions of African American women. Therefore, Black Feminism must be a movement that “encompasses theoretical interpretations of Black women’s reality by those who live in it (Collins 386).” However, such a definition brings about many questions: