In 2017, I attended the Women’s March in D.C. protesting Donald Trump. During the march, I saw a sign that someone had that said “Non-Intersectional Feminism is Racist”. At the time, I think I was still learning what “feminism” was, so the whole “intersectional” part was even further away from me. In the event that you’re where I’m at, I’ll copy and paste what the Wikipedia entry defines intersectionality as here:

Intersectionality is a sociological analytical framework for understanding how groups’ and individuals’ social and political identities result in unique combinations of discrimination and privilege. Examples of these factors include gender, caste, sex, race, ethnicity, class, sexuality, religion, disability, height, physical appearance, age, and weight. These intersecting and overlapping social identities may be both empowering and oppressing.

Even outside the context of feminism, it’s not hard to understand - we all have many different things that make up who we are and how we live in our individual social context. A Chinese man of my age and of similar economic standing is going to have a different life than me, just by merit of existing in a very different culture, as one simple example.

The sign at the march that spurred me to do some reading a learning suggests that the Western feminist movements are, in my opinion, rightfully criticized for forgetting or overlooking that non-White women exist and their privileges and discriminations are different. Some historical notes that I’ve read and do not have on hand to cite suggest that the foundation for this is that White women hold enough privilege to participate in feminist work, while non-White women have had to stay busy with their work, keeping the house, toiling for capitalism, etc etc etc.. That doesn’t justify BIPOC women being overlooked, but may explain some of why that has happened.

The Women’s March has generated The People’s March which will be turning out to protest in D.C. following Donald Trump’s next inauguration. I hope to be attending a local action, but will not be going to D.C. for the large one, unfortunately.

In the March’s FAQ, there is a section titled “What should I not bring”, and this is the content of it:

  • Any weapons, or anything that can be construed as a weapon, including pocket knives, multi-tools, mace, scissors, etc.
  • Any illegal drugs (while marijuana is legal in D.C., the march will be on federal property and national park land, where marijuana is still illegal)
  • Coat-hanger imagery: We do not want to accidentally reinforce the right-wing talking points that self-managed abortions are dangerous, scary and harmful.
  • Handmaid’s Tale themed: The use of Handmaid’s Tale imagery to characterize the controlling of women’s reproduction has proliferated, primarily by white women across the country, since the show has gained popularity. This message continues to create more fragmentation, often around race and class, because it erases the fact that Black women, undocumented women, incarcerated women, poor women and disabled women have always had their reproduction freedom controlled in this country. This is not a dystopian past or future.

The last item on the list surprised me, and despite my previous reading, I think that I had to remember the concept of intersectionality. When Hulu 2017 version of Margret Atwood’s novel came out, I think that I saw Handmaid’s Tale costumes showing up at all sorts of protest events, and I had no idea that there were people who thought maybe that wasn’t a good choice of garb to protest in. I suppose this was a “check your privilege” moment for me.

If you’re struggling with it, as I initially did, the argument here is - The Hulu show presents a fictional dystopian society in which rich men have sexual privileges with the remaining women able to conceive a pregnancy, and, if memory serves me correctly, there are no non-White characters, and if I’m mis-remembering, they’re minor. The argument here is that non-White women are now and have been living in such a dystopia. Noah Berlatsky writing for The Verge has a superior explanations to this than my own - “Both versions of The Handmaid’s Tale have a problem with racial erasure”.

A more detailed look at this, I’d invite you to check out Harriet A. Washington’s Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present, which has substantial content about Black women specifically being treated as objects of medical experimentation, typically without any consent, informed or otherwise. I’d encourage you to give it a read.