Repercussions of the Lack of All-Inclusive Feminism
What type of feminist are you?
Feminism today has a very negative connotation to the word. Part of this can be due to the portion of the community that is not all-inclusive. In their actions they exclude minorities, problems internationally, minimizing or completely ignoring problems men face, and only focus on very small sections of what women actually face. Excluding people based off body image/size, race, language barriers, sexuality, or income is some of the most common ways people are not all-inclusive. Theses forms of feminism are also the most publicized by media for multiple reasons. While the media may not seem important they directly dictate what is talked about and trending.
Whats trending directly effects what receives attention on any level. It affects the attendance rates of protests, amount of donations a cause may receive, amount of volunteers and any other way that feminism could be helping causes.
The photo above was taken at a women’s march in 2017. This photo was used in different articles as a top photo. In the front of the photo all you see is women wearing “pink pussy hats”, but in the background you see different signs representing the contrast of women reproductive rights and gun rights. Along with that you see a sign showing the Muslim community supports equality for all. Both of these messages however were lost in the media and never represented because the trend that received and took attention from this were pink pussy hats and a sign that says women say no war. This very simple and typically noncontroversial subject of no one wanting war was given the spotlight purely based on their hats were the trend.
This was not the only protest were these hats made an appearance. Since the hats got so much publicity they remained a trend for a few more weeks and continued to overshadow marginalized topics.
People who already view feminism in a negative light go out of their way to emphasis these types of protests because they recognize that not being all-inclusive is a flaw. If the people who oppose feminism can see that not being all inclusive is one of the biggest flaws, then the people within feminism also have to acknowledge and change this. Changing their behavior to represent all problems would not only improve the public’s view on feminism, but also the people they are disregarding.
Acknowledging that this is a problem is the first step in fixing it. The next step is becoming more aware of these problems by educating yourself on more topics that do not directly affect you but affect others. It is looking outside of your own background and what happens in your neighbor and looking at others. It means continually trying to become aware of what other groups of people face on a daily base.
One challenge that people face that can lead to not being all-inclusive is living in a bubble which makes it difficult to even know that there are other problems in the world. A way to combat this is educate yourself as much as as possible and looking at as many different sources as possible. Finding ways to see and understand the different perspectives as much as you can. Going into different communities and having respectful conversations about the difficulties they face and how THEY want them to change. Since no one is able to fully understand the challenges of different groups it is very important that you ask what and how they want things to change.
It is not always going to be a protest but it may be raising awareness about the difficulties. Through the raising of awareness it could have a variety of positive outcomes. These outcomes could be seen through monetary donations, a rise in volunteers(if that is something that is need), policy change, or a situation specific positive change.
Just like the people who use the media and turned to focus on these seemly superficial topics the media can be used to focus on marginalized topics. While it takes more effort to make these topics known it can be done. It starts with the people, typically well know influential individuals, to start bring awareness to these topics. For example in March of 2018 Howard University, a mainly minority populated school, had a scandal that involved over a million dollars of finical aide being misdirected by employees. This sparked a nine day student sit-in that took place in an administration building.
You would think that a nine day student sit-in would receive national news, but they didn’t even receive local news attention until a few days in. This problem involved minorities and affected their ability to have access to education, so you would think that feminist would want to be all over this.
But they weren’t.
People didn’t know and still don’t know that this was a problem. It is problems like these that we as all-inclusive feminist want to be aware of and help. It doesn’t mean going and joining them on their protest, but it means giving them press, donations, and asking HOW they want our help. With these types of protests it is important to communicate with the people it is directly affecting and asking them the best way you can help so you don’t overstep your bounds and make the situation worse.
It is not just about getting press to show what we want feminism to be, but doing these things in our everyday lives to try and represent all communities. Not just showing up at protests but actually doing things that can improve these problems. Accurately informing others in a respectful manner about these minimized problems is another way to bring awareness in a positive way. Having these not all-inclusive feminists start to change their behavior would not be discrediting any of their past rallies or make their original protests unimportant, but could help improve other people’s lives in hope for a positive change. Bringing awareness to theses marginalized groups would only have positive outcomes for both the marginalized groups and the newly all-inclusive feminists.
So next time you go to you the #freethenips rally think about the people who couldn’t make it because they are more likely to be wrongly accused. Think about the people who don’t live in your bubble of privilege and how you could be helping them. Think about the people in other neighborhood and countries that fall asleep to the sounds of gun fire. Think about how you can become educate enough to influence others to help those people.
As you transition into becoming more all-inclusive it is all about taking small steps and not trying to drastically change everything you do. These first easiest step is becoming educated and sharing accurate information. An important piece of information to remember is just because you had none all-inclusive actions in the past does not mean your efforts were not valid or appreciated. It does not take away from the positive change you tried to take away from. It just means acknowledging that you can and will do better in the future. All of the steps you take from here on out to become more all-inclusive are important and are making a positive difference. Knowing you will stumble because it is unknown territory and that it’s okay is important.
From here on out your actions that you take to be all inclusive will not only change your feminism for the better, but it will also change the marginalized group lives in a positive way.
