In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Selfless Signal-Boosting Wednesday

tigtog

These signal-boosting posts are a complement to our long-standing Shameless Self-Promotion Sundays, this thread is for recommending someone else‘s writings/events.

Especially welcome are links to those who are blogging on issues Feministe has not recently addressed (the links can be to older posts, just something you’ve found recently relevant).  Please save the self-promotion links for this Sunday – use this thread to let Feministe readers know about the other blogs you love to read, and activist/celebration events you long to attend, especially from those on the margins of the mainstream social justice communities, who tend to not get as much exposure as they should.

Netiquette Guidelines:

  1. Effective signal boosting names the article author(s) and/or organising bodies.
  2. Include content notes/trigger warnings/NSFW alerts where needed as a courtesy to other readers.
  3. Keep this thread focussed on the linking – the idea is to make your comments on the other blogs being linked!  (seconding/thirding etc is fine, adding extra Content Notes for the benefit of other readers is a community service, linking further/related reading is always welcome, but keep it short and sweet)
  4. If you have Reasons to not leave a response on a recommended article, don’t just dump it on this thread  ~ analytical discussions about various links belong on the Open Thread or Spillover.

19 thoughts on Selfless Signal-Boosting Wednesday

  1. So, there was a post written on XOJane that must be experienced to be believed. Unless someone is trolling, it might be the height of self-centered white woman’s tears. Erika at Black Girl’s Guide to Weight Loss has a nice take down.

    A person nervously walking into a new space doesn’t mean they’ve never set foot in a studio – you’re not there every day, you don’t even know if she’s never set foot in your yoga studio before. You made the assumption erroneously because it fits your biases. Of course she’s never set foot in a yoga studio before – she’s fat. Is this for real?

    Excerpted from An Open Letter to the XOJane Writer Who Cried About a Black Woman in Her Yoga Class | A Black Girl’s Guide To Weight Loss

      1. I had to read that XOJane article to believe it. The author expresses a strange mix of braggadocio and self-flagellation. And it’s interesting how she seems to think that fat and black go hand in hand.

      2. Just a reminder of the guidelines re discussing signal-boosted links – too many comments on any one of these links tends to discourage people from posting more links because of a perception that they’ll get lost in the noise. I understand why people want to comment on this story in particular, but can further commentary please take place on this week’s Open Thread?

    2. At first I was pretty sure that the post was an Onion style parody, but the consensus seems to be that it’s real.

      Wow.

    1. [As per the netiquette guidelines in the OP, discussion arising from signal-boosted links belongs on the Open Thread or Spillover, not here. Your comment belongs on Spillover ~ mods]

    3. Crommunist has a response to Goldberg’s article from a critical-thinking perspective: On “toxic feminism” – The Nation and the people

      Her piece is not the first such article to be written making this absurd argument, nor is it likely to be the last. I have tried here to engage with what she said, because the structure and components of the argument she is making are wrong, and I’m sure that she’d be among the first to articulate a version of the points I make above if an article decrying online feminism as being “hostile to men” were to be published somewhere prominent.

      Crommunist also links to a response to Goldberg from Andrea Smith at PrisonCulture: Interlopers on Social Media: Feminism, Women of Color and Oppression

      We’ve been involved over the years in various transformative justice and community accountability efforts. We know something about the importance of allowing for mistakes. We all make them. We understand something about intentions (good and bad). But we also understand the imperative that when you know better you should try to do better. And here’s the thing. Many white feminist now know better (or they should) but they simply refuse to do better. That’s the truth. The pain, anger, and frustration that emanate from this must find their place. Often, that place is online.

    1. Excellent link, Athenia – I was just going to post it myself!

      This paragraph of Veronica’s really got me thinking about how defensive many of my fellow white women are around critiques of “white feminism”:

      The article spends a good deal of time discussing that many “white feminist” projects such as #femfuture, Jezebel and Feministing are not run by just white feminists. And this is true. And while I do think it is poor shorthand, for me, when I see “white feminism” in twitter critiques it means that the feminism espoused is exemplary of middle-class liberal feminism that is stereotypically seen in white feminists who fight for access to sterilization at 25, but ignore/are ignorant that WOC have been sterilized by force for decades. Perhaps we would be more pointed to say “liberal feminism,” but I am really not sure of that. I would love thoughts in the comments, as this is the one part I really don’t have a solution for.

      There’s currently only 4 comments on Veronica’s post. It deserves much more extensive engagement than that.

  5. , Advocates for Pregnant Women. Includes cases of pregnant women arrested for “abusing their bodies without regard to their fetus” forced C-sections, et al. Childfree women, I recommend you read it too.

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