Race as a Fault Line in Feminist Allyship Carolyn M. Jones Medine (bio) Judith Plaskow asks why, when women of color have been members of the editorial board and coeditors of the journal, the Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion (JFSR) “still feels like a white container” (3), signaling issues women of color raise about feminism and calling on white-centered feminists to examine how they may crowd out women of color, closing the space for expressing anger, signaling oppression, and demanding response.1 I was not at the Feminist Studies in Religion (FSR) conference; my remarks are about what I heard and my thoughts, addressing: how race marks the line at which white-centered feminism may choose leverage over inclusion; white women’s tears as a silencing power move; and Black women, particularly, breaking that silence with anger. Finally, I offer what is see as important for the work that is never done. Race is a “fault line” in the feminist movement,2 as white-centered feminism,3 located in racist and patriarchal systems, may privilege whiteness for leverage. Women of color often are let down by feminism, as Shirley Chisholm and bell hooks illustrate. Chisholm, in 1972, realized that key feminists would not back her presidential nomination. They thought she was “good for the cause,” but endorsed George McGovern, who could be “pro-leverage.”4 hooks unpacks leverage: feminists want Black women in their causes5 while simultaneously wishing to [End Page 55] control them.6 White feminists, for example, appropriate knowledge about racism, reproducing it in their scholarship and gaining career leverage.7 While they may be unaware of the depth of such violations, they cause righteous anger, criticism white women may disrupt with white women’s tears. Mary Beard, in a tweet, discussed Oxfam’s staff abusing sex workers after the 2010 Haiti earthquake, suggesting that it is hard to “sustain ‘civilized’ values in a disaster zone.” The backlash was, Ruby Hamad admits, perhaps “unnecessarily nasty.” Beard, in response, posted a picture of herself in tears.8 Beard deployed, Hamad and others suggest, the “appearance of powerlessness” in a harmful, controlling move9—even if the tears were genuine.10 Beard pivoted “her one down identity—woman—to her one up identity—white,”11 undercutting Haitian women’s exploitation,12 getting her critics labeled bullies, and gaining “‘the most protection in a world that does a shitty job . . . of cherishing women.’”13 A Black woman criticizing Beard’s tweet might be seen to “cause” white women’s tears and be labeled an “angry Black woman.”14 This happened in relation to Plaskow’s “vehement” reaction when a Black scholar made a comment to another Jewish scholar who was presenting on the panel. Plaskow, tired and “triggered,” deployed a master signifier: “anti-Semitic.”15 Why? What “ideological edifice” did [End Page 56] she seek to gather power around?16 Was the resulting anger truly “larger than [Plaskow’s] transgression” (6)? Watch it: white woman’s tears. This act stopped—some might say hijacked—the conference. This move reminded me of one of hooks’s female colleagues, a “friend” who wrote “vicious attacks” against hooks’s work for leverage and in a desire for power.17 Plaskow imagines an/other mode than this for FSR, signaling openness and leading me to some thoughts. First, the presence of women of color does not signal inclusion, and inclusion does not mean influence.18 Therefore, second, dialogue with women of color who left FSR and those who embrace other ethnic-identified women’s movements yet remain allied might reveal what is generative. Third, allies must recognize that they may still be part of the problem, not giving themselves “a pass.”19 Fourth, we must interrogate the white supremacist patriarchal frame in which we work and know how we pass on its values. Finally, let’s embrace the pause. Alice Walker reminds us that we are “required to stop, to sit down, to reflect,” to stay “present in the face of uncertainty.” This may lead to clarity.20 Right now, ethnic feminist critiques, particularly those of young women, signal that we must pause, reimagining feminism, community, and justice. [End Page 57] Carolyn...
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Jul 1, 2022
Rūta Kazlauskaitė + 2
Open Access
