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Whose feminism is it anyway?
Ask someone what feminism is and they will give you a wide variety of answers based on their education, life experiences, and exposure to feminist ideas. There is no one universal conception of feminism because all women are individuals with intersecting needs and issues. To be feminist can be framed as smashing patriarchy, enforcing women’s rights, or creating equity between all people irrespective of sex and gender. The last one is my personal understanding of feminism, which invariably encompasses the first two as the systems of oppression holding women back from equity require deconstructing first. Others, such as gender critics and conservative women’s movements, place far more weight on enforcing women’s rights. All of which begs the question as to who is feminism for, and why should we care about the answer.
It is easy to be glib about feminist hot takes, especially when those takes are rooted in ephemeral conceptions of the universal woman. Susan Sontag’s masterful deconstruction of Leni Riefenstahl highlighted the complexities of women in the orbit of powerful political forces, showing that solidary for women should not come at the expense of ignoring their personal politics. Britain has had three female prime minsters, all of whom were conservatives who sought to strip back basic social security protections, which in turn harmed millions of women. Just because a woman obtains power…
