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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region Forums"White Women Elected Trump"
Vox:What happened when I took a White Women Elected Trump sign to the Womens March
Read what she says at:
Link to tweet
HopeAgain
(4,407 posts)Trump was as much elected by those who didn't vote as those who voted for Trump, those who didn't volunteer as those who volunteered for Trump and those who remained silent while people hissed that Trump was right and just wasn't giving into political correctness.
triron
(21,916 posts)installed him! Election was a farce.
Gothmog
(144,005 posts)The sign has a good but troubling message designed to make people uncomfortable.
snpsmom
(638 posts)Phoenix61
(16,954 posts)And all of it is good
RedWedge
(618 posts)solidarity will grow.
Maru Kitteh
(28,303 posts)I've been paying attention to how many times I see it and the post-counts of the users. I've noticed some similarities in those using it.
This is not an attack, it's an honest question as it seems a very weird trend.
RedWedge
(618 posts)In most uses regarding women, it stems from the title of Flavia Dzodan's seminal essay, "My Feminism Will Be Intersectional or It Will Be Bullshit."
http://tigerbeatdown.com/2011/10/10/my-feminism-will-be-intersectional-or-it-will-be-bullshit/
Feminism in mainstream culture usually means "white middle-class het/cis feminism," when it needs to be much bigger, meeting people where their identities intersect with "feminist." The tent needs to be bigger, or it's bullshit.
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)Many of us are seemingly unaware of some fundamental truths:
"...learning about and reflecting on the critical role that black women had played in the civil rights movement only put into greater perspective what doing the work looks like. White women: Simply showing up to a march isnt doing the work, and holding a sign isnt real courage. Courage is standing up for your fundamental rights when you are marginalized, disenfranchised, and unsupported. Heroism is facing, head on, agents of institutionalized racism when your life or your childs life is on the line."
RedWedge
(618 posts)Humans have great power to imagine and empathize with other people's experiences, but we have to be reminded to do it. "My feminism will be intersectional or it will be bullshit" is a quick-and-handy reminder.
Maru Kitteh
(28,303 posts)an essay from 2011 ain't it. I'm just wondering from where.
If you don't have the answer, it's fine, no problem.
My alarm bells went up when the MSM was working at a hundred different angles to delegitimize the march on Saturday by decrying "missed opportunities" of not including the anti-choice agenda, asking if the largest global march in history could have had more people show up if we reached out more to men, etc., etc.
Those discussions, to delegitimize the march, were also where I first started hearing the word "intersectional" tossed around so much.
Hence, my suspicion. That shit did not sit well.
RedWedge
(618 posts)to make marches better down the road.
I mean, sure, the idea of intersectional solidarity goes back to the late 80s/early 90s. Feminism being intersectional or being bullshit comes from the essay. In some ways and in some locations, the march planning was highly intersectional. In some places, it wasn't. Talking about it and committing to doing better down the road is never a bad thing.
thucythucy
(7,986 posts)Thanks for the link and the pithy explanation.
Eleanors38
(18,318 posts)Oh, why not another one...
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)Now, we start again for 2018.
seaglass
(8,170 posts)yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)What we are talking about now is reconciling our fractured party.
If we don't, it won't matter who the Republicans run at any level. They stay united.
seaglass
(8,170 posts)elected Trump by default were.
I have been thinking about the subject of this OP for a while. I had the same concerns when the march first came about, when the organizers at the time were all white women. My daughter and I contemplated going to DC but I wouldn't have gone if the leaders were all going to be white women. They did hear this and pretty quickly added a diverse leadership.
My daughter and I went to the march in Boston and I can say that while the LGBT community was well represented, and ages of attendees ranged from babies to grandmas there was not a lot of racial diversity, it was mostly white woman. The leaders of the Boston march and the speakers were diverse but again, attendees not so much.
So thoughts about this - it is really uncomfortable to be grouped in with those that repulse you (ww Trump voters), especially when you feel like you did the right thing. This I think is why some white women get defensive about it. But...one of the points that WoC have made repeatedly is that we, as white women, likely know other white women who voted for Trump - so what did we do about that? We probably know white women who are racist, sexist etc. - and what do we do about that? And by not challenging those people in our lives, we are complicit. And I accept that. I haven't come to terms yet with what I am going to do about that.
Still, I feel like the march was the right thing to do and I'm glad I went. There was a lot of love and support. It got under Trump's skin. It was a start.
Eleanors38
(18,318 posts)I got zapped (hidden) for a little sarcasm from some Democratic "Underground" members.
BTW, have you wondered why this site is called "Underground?"
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)I know what "underground" is.
No one marched Saturday in Montgomery, Alabama.
emulatorloo
(43,982 posts)Wounded Bear
(58,440 posts)both from other groups and from Repub electioneering.
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)there's one group who won't make this mistake again.
Then we can start to work on - "White Men."
The Polack MSgt
(13,159 posts)"As the number of retweets, likes, and followers continued to grow, I started to get a sinking feeling I was being rewarded for clearing a very, very low bar. People were celebrating me for basic self-awareness and a modicum of a challenge to my fellow white women. Lets be real. I carried a protest sign with a very basic statement of fact to a march organized and attended by many black and brown women, many of whom had messages similar to mine. Even in my own reflective tweets afterward about my experience, I was borrowing from observations black and brown women made about the march and attempts at intersectional feminism through the decades. I was a living embodiment of white mediocrity versus black excellence.
Self awareness is so hard to find. Thanks for the link.
BainsBane
(53,003 posts)Yet you once again absolve them and blame women.
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)you get to design my sign for me!
m-lekktor
(3,675 posts)sections of articles online and on friends' facebook page. This is purely anecdotal and hardly "scientific" but I encounter just as many vile Trump supporting white women as I do the men.
Fresh_Start
(11,330 posts)than the women.
RedWedge
(618 posts)they need to call out and organize their demographic sisters is never a bad thing. White women listen to other white women. All Democratic votes are important, but it's good for white feminists to be reminded that their privilege is no small matter and can be used more effectively, and much more often.
JI7
(89,182 posts)That vote republican.
Why don't white men do something about their own instead of blaming identity politics and anyone else who is not a white male.
RedWedge
(618 posts)JI7
(89,182 posts)And other bigotry.
Write men voted in way larger numbers yet people make excuses for them .
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)This is about listening and understanding.
JI7
(89,182 posts)I see that white women who voted for him are bigots and other white women don't make excuses for them.
uponit7771
(90,225 posts)loyalsister
(13,390 posts)Last edited Tue Jan 24, 2017, 08:04 PM - Edit history (1)
In an anthropological context, women know that close proximity to white men offers an advantage. Patriarchy is enabled by the fact that women use it to their advantage. It makes perfect sense to want to advance or secure a comfortable or superior place in the hierarchy.
Awareness of the fact that 53% of white women betrayed us all and 94% of women of color tried to save us can be something we accept and think about rather than center the conversation on our own votes. We should not ignore an opportunity to have a conversation about coming together to challenge the patriarchal culture that wants to keep us all "in our place." While white women may be more comfortable on the tier close to the most powerful, we are still not equal.
The pattern of white women choosing white men over women of color underscores some of the more insidious machinations of patriarchy and the racism ingrained in the feminist movement. White womens modus operandi for gaining powereconomic, political, and otherwiseis simple: acquire power from those who have it. And those who have historically have had it are white men. This has resulted in white womens historic abandonment of their black and brown sisters, as well as their more heinous adoption of white supremacist rhetoric to advance their own status.
https://qz.com/835567/election-2016-white-women-voted-for-donald-trump-in-2016-because-they-still-believe-white-men-are-their-saviors/
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)loyalsister
(13,390 posts)Thanks for the visible context.