Men Ain't Shit.

I seem to be on the road to self-identifying as a feminist. Some of you might be looking at me like, well DUH, but let me explain: I've always had feminist tendencies. It's funny, but since birth I've had this nagging conceptualization of myself as a person that deserves recognition as such...but I digress. I've always had feminist tendencies. I just used to be wary of downright against calling myself "a feminist." And before you start thinking I'm some little punk, it wasn't because of all of the shit that gets talked about feminists. Who gon' check me, boo?!

My problems with feminism come from its longstanding history of ignoring the particular struggles affecting women who are anything other that White, middle-class, and heterosexual. And yeah, okay, I know the movement is officially for all women now, but honestly, I believe that like I believe Santorum was talking about "blah" people...like hell.

Get at me when you stop producing foolishness like this, feminism. It's like, damn, and I liked SlutWalk too...

I still see the experiences of women of color, queer women, and poor women being addressed primarily by in-group members. I still see personhood being portrayed as Whites-only when feminists report statistics about "Women," "Men," "Blacks," and "Hispanics." (Should I clap that you're trying when you're doing it so very wrong?) And it's just like, while I'm so glad the right to breastfeed at work has become protected by law, I'm just much more concerned with the fact that unemployment is rising for Blacks as it falls for everyone else. 

And yeah, okay, I know that Black feminism is a thing. It's a really fucking awesome thing. And then there's the whole womanist movement, too. And when I discovered these, I got more open to the idea of maybe calling myself a feminist. And when I realized the error of my previously pro-life ways, I got even more open to the idea of maybe calling myself a feminist. And the above photograph says more than I ever can about how the movement as a whole isn't doing nearly enough to address race and racism, but at least part of that needs to be interpreted in a Gandhi "It's not your Christ I have a problem with; it's your Christians" kind of manner. 

And there's another It's-not-your-Feminism-it's-your-feminists problem that I have: man-bashing. I really don't know what it's going to take for people to realize that the celebration of one thing does not necessitate the belittling of its opposite (not that I believe men and women are inherently opposites). It is possible to love one thing without hating its counterpart. I love being Black, but that doesn't mean I hate Whiteness. I'm pro-choice but not anti-children (for other people). I'm pretty sex-positive, but that doesn't mean I'm abstinence-negative. And I can't stand it when so-called "feminists" attack manhood and masculinity, rather than attacking patriarchy. I can't stand it when "feminism" doesn't realize that portraying women as "good" and men as "evil" not only belittles both genders by erases heterogeneity, but is creating the exact same issues that patriarchy creates by portraying men as significant and women as not. By talking about all the things that are "wrong" with "men," these people are just playing into the narrow stereotypes and archetypes patriarchy has carved out for men to exist in. 

Men have emotions. They hurt. They think. They dwell. They worry. They love. They fear. They have stories to tell, too.

And with that, I give you this awesome short documentary I discovered thanks to Tunde (@BrazenlyVirile) today. It's called Men Ain't Shit, and it goes out to everyone who has ever said any version of that statement. (I'm guilty of "Boys are stupid.")


Men Ain't Sh?t from Le Femme Flaneur on Vimeo.
 

I feel like I'm missing out on what might be my only chance to join a mass protest.

When I started really learning about the Civil Rights Movement in the context of African-American Studies classes here at Princeton, learning about all the discontent and political fracturing that my high school history classes and textbooks had glossed over, if bothering to mention them at all, I wanted to be a rebel. I gained enough insight into the atmosphere of the time to finally decisively cast my lot with my father, who marched with Malcolm X, instead of my grandmother, who was one of King's disciples. I would never deny that I most likely owe the very circumstances of my life to Dr. King, but regardless, I want to FIGHT.

When Princeton experienced the one big racialized incident of my time here during the Winter of my Sophomore year, I was all over the t-shirt/sign-making and wanted to draw lots of attention to the small group of us counter-protesting. I remembered hearing about the Black Student Union taking over Nassau Hall to protest the Vietnam War and wanting a tiny piece of history like that to call my own. But alas, my classmates were meek and apathetic, and our under-participated-in protest will be remembered only in the archives of the Daily Princetonian (and even those articles will be remembered more for their racist comments than for the actual content). 

No one wanted to fight. And so I started to buy into the idea that all the good causes are done, even though everything I know about the world begs to differ. Maybe out-and-out activism in the form of anything other than an academic work just wasn't for me.  Maybe "the movement" as a social construct had died out.

And then representatives from the 99% of the country that is currently being shit on by the tops of the corporations on Wall Street finally realized Marx's dreams of class consciousness and began to come together to rise against the system that is keeping us down. It started with a few angry students, and is now in its 3rd week in NYC and has spread to major metropolitan areas all across the country. Support is pouring in from all over the world. More than 700 peaceful protesters have been arrested in NYC alone. There are ingenious signs, catchy slogans, supplies, celebrities, meditation circles and chanters and marchers. 


The Movement is back, and every time I read a blog post or see an article about #OccupyWallStreet, a very large part of me aches to be there. Maybe this is our fight. I know my presence could never make or break things, that one more person doesn't actually change the game at all...but maybe it would change me. Durkheim calls it "collective effervescence," the feeling of exhilaration one gets from being in a crowd. I think I need to be reminded that people care about things. Normal ordinary people, not just those of us in the Ivory Tower. I think I need that jolt of recognition that things MATTER. I want to feel that I'm part of this larger thing that existed before me and will exist after me and has to exist, must exist...I need to feel a part of something I want to perpetuate. And I know I already have things like that, but none of them feel important the way this feels important. 

I don't hope to ever see a crisis bigger than 1% of the country owning more wealth than the other 99%, or more than half of Black and Latino men in prime employment age (18-35) unemployed, or teachers being laid off by the hundreds, or college students dropping out because tuition got too high, or people who graduate being unable to get jobs, or housing falling to absolute shit, or people interpreting abuse by the government as abuse of the government. This is our crisis. This is our movement. And I can't really justify the expense of going, but these images and words move me beyond expression.

Photo by vincemie

 

Original here.

Original here.

 

I'm black. "Ally" isn't even a strong enough term for my support of gay rights. THIS ISN'T THAT RADICAL. Get over it.

“It is something resting with the parties themselves, for them to decide. If they choose to face this possible prejudice and think that their own pursuit of happiness is better subserved by entering into this marriage with all its risks than by spending the rest of their lives without each other’s company and comfort, the state should not and cannot stop them.” –Justice Carter, Perez v. Lippold (California Supreme Court case from 1948)

The powerful language found in this week’s readings for my Race and the American Legal Process class, regarding the nullification of antimiscegenation laws struck me not only for the sheer forcefulness of the Courts’ opinion, but also for the clear and profound connections these decisions seemingly should have to the current gay rights movement. I have always had an understanding that the gay rights movement has ties to the civil rights movement, and as such been thoroughly disgusted with the heteronormativity and blatant homophobia that categorize such a substantial percentage the African-American community at large, but these court cases have elevated that understanding to a new level; I honestly cannot understand how, with such potent precedent to stand on the shoulders of, LGBT rights activists have not yet secured marriage as a “fundamental…basic civil right” for same-sex couples. My first question is what exactly places the freedom to marry within the scope of basic civil rights; when was it first guaranteed that citizens of the United States have a right to marry? And after gaining a better understanding of that history, I would like to know how the heteronormativity and homophobia that led to the Defense of Marriage Act differ from the white supremacy and precept of inferiority that led to the antimiscegenation and criminalization-of-sexual-relations laws Justices Traynor, Carter, and Warren speak so forcefully against?

Call me naïve, but I am imagining a world in which the quotes from the Perez v. Lippold and Loving v. Virginia read like this:

“Since the right to marry is the right to join in marriage with the person of one’s choice, a statute that prohibits an individual from marrying a member [of his or her same sex] restricts the scope of his choice and thereby restricts his right to marry.”

“The right to marry is the right of individuals, not of [groups of people with the same sexual orientation].”

“Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry or not marry, a person of [the same sex] resides within the individual and cannot be infringed by the State.”

Are these conceived statements really so farfetched? What would it take to bring them to fruition?