The death of feminism and the future of activism.

i want to start this video by showing you two graphs from a study that was conducted recently the assertion was that feminism has done more harm than good and participants had to say if they agreed or disagreed or didn't know now look at the results the majority of democrats men women young or old said they disagree but younger generations are more likely to agree than the older ones when we look at republicans except older men the majority agree especially younger generations especially younger men 62 percent of them you know it's a strong statement saying that feminism has done more harm than good we're not talking about modern day feminism uh wheezing the past tensei has done modern day feminism which is extremely hard to define isn't really light across the political spectrums for different reasons so i asked people on instagram and youtube to answer a poll where i more or less ask the same questions as in the study replacing feminism by modern day feminism basically is modern day feminism doing more harm than good do you think we're reaching the end of the movement i'm quite happy about this experiment because i got 350 answers from largely men um 80 left-leaning 20 right-wing i did mention in the description that i was looking for men who were skeptical of feminism so that makes sense and the critiques that came back the most were the following the men hating miss laundry of radical feminists not tolerant don't engage in a dialogue with men anymore and surprisingly that's the one thing that came back the most girl boss feminism trickle down feminism focusing too much on things like inclusive language instead of really helping women elitist performative too focused on identity politics and not class and last one disorganized and lack of education on what feminism is within feminist circles activists have noticed a sort of doomism um in the face of what has been happening recently especially in the us co-editor of nasty women feminism resistance and revolution in trump's america samitan kupajara declared recently that quote it's surprising there were marches but it wasn't the level of activism that we saw a couple of years ago with black lives matter or even the women's march so my question is very simple is feminism dead before we continue with the video i'd like to introduce you to today's sponsor intimina intimina offers products and education about menstruation that can help you live your best life even on your period they kindly sent me those two ziggy cups too a few weeks ago so that i could try them out they have a leak-proof double rim and can last up to two years so that's a super sustainable option i know these bad boys can look quite scary and that's one of the reason why it took me ages before starting using cups but once you get the hang of it it makes life so much easier you can keep them for up to eight hours and each cup is adapted to your flow many people who have period kind of shy away from doing any sort of activity when they're on their period because of cramps worries about leaking i'm not religious but i'm telling you i would pray to god so that they did not start during a tennis tournament and guess what they always did that's why i'm not religious intimidate cups ensure that you don't have to worry about leaking you don't have to go to the toilets every two hours so that you can enjoy the activity you like to do walking dancing yoga pilates they say you can even wear it during sexy time i can honestly say these are my besties now and if you also want an intimate cup well please go and check the link that i put in the description box and now let's go back to the video [Music] the 2010s were an interesting time for feminism while the meteor movement was getting ready to burst celebrities glamorized or even redefined what being a feminist really meant writer shimamanda ngozi adichie's talk titled we should all be feminists promoted and accepting you can wear hills and still be a feminist approach of feminism that sought to appeal to individuals who felt alienated by the movement's occasional radicalism her tedx talk became a phenomenon especially after beyonce sampled some of it in her music flawless and performed it in 2014 at the video music awards in front of a giant screen emblazoned feminist as journalist michelle goldberg said feminism that valorized the quest for power and prestige suddenly had cultural currency taylor swift who had distanced herself from the feminist movement started to embrace it again in 2014 miley cyrus declared that quote i feel like i'm one of the biggest feminists in the world because i tell women not to be scared of anything katy perry repudiating her previous reputation of the movement said that i used to not really understand what that word meant and now that i do it just means that i love myself as a female and i also love men from then on feminism became fashionable marketable every single woman targeted products became empowering deodorants shavers makeup clothes if i take care of myself that means i love myself and therefore i am a feminist the marriage of capitalism with feminism spread into the workplace and gave birth to the girl boss in 2014 again what a girl boss type of year nasty girl founder and sophia amoroso became popular after the release of her book girl boss following the release western women felt empowered to also create their own businesses using the same pastel aesthetic the same quote with the same mission empowering women you may be familiar with the drift magazine they published a series of essays earlier this year under the title what to do about feminism as michelle goldberg noticed four out of the eight essays used the word cringe to define modern day feminism no matter how you call it corporate feminism white feminism it has become embarrassing irrelevant and out of touch girl bosses and celebrities respectfully shout out women that they are so strong that they can do anything and all of us are sitting there watching this and wondering if that thing is the legacy of the feminist movement susan feludi author of the 1990s masterpiece that is backlash find this discourse frustrating she says there's something cringe-worthy about feminism even needing to be hip these feminisms are ignoring the central question of feminism which is are women materially and politically disadvantaged and how to correct that if that question is just to be unhip we're in trouble towards the end of the 2010s the metoo movement rekindled the hopes of feminist activists who saw in the movement the pronunciation of the personalized political agenda of the previous waves interestingly enough both metoo and girl boss feminism were criticized for embracing a trickle-down approach you would regularly hear that while celebrity victims or female ceos managers were put in the spotlight the majority of women women of color working-class women trans women were still marginalized or silenced while i don't really agree with such criticism being extended to me too i mean me too started in the 2000s with tarana burke to denounce violence to its minority women i think we have to recognize that the women who spoke up were already well established contrary to the belief that they did it to get attention well actually they could afford to lose attention nevertheless on the one hand we had a legitimately negative political and relatively anti-man movement and on the other hand we had a cringy toxically positive all-welcoming type of feminism looking back at the poor people under 50 so people for whom the metoo and girlboss feminism constitute their direct experience with feminism are skeptical if not completely in disagreement with it i would argue that the backlash against the girl boss was quite consensual people on the left on the right came to an agreement on this one everybody found the whole thing quite cringy now things were very different with me too the backlash did not happen on social media it happened in courts in the form of defamation trials the most famous one being the herd v depth trial i mean given how little protection the justice system gives to female victims defamation claims became an effective strategy to silence women in an emotional interview twenty women who had accused piblia a famous french news podcast host shared their experience during the same interview the journalist highlighted that 16 of them were facing defamation claims by pippidyl all over europe women's protection organizations are warning that we might be going back to the pre-metoo culture of silence so women are increasingly feeling powerless in the face of a never-ending backlash that started way before me too but benefited from the distracting power of pop feminism that backlash hidden beneath years of leaning moments and social media slapdowns over whether taylor swift is or isn't a feminist never lost its force or focus faludi rights its retribution has been and always been matched out on the uncelebrated and unaffluent we have to understand that feminists all over the world are completely exhausted and burned out because they've been doing the work when miley cyrus was twerking in front of the unfamous robin thicke okay so this is the part where i'm asking you to be as open-minded as possible because i'm going to present opinions that can be challenging that you might not agree with that i don't fully agree with myself but we are here to challenge our beliefs to learn and part of it in my opinion is confronting ourselves with things that may be uncomfortable to hear sorority this term has different meanings with the rise of intersectionality sorority became kind of synonymous for inclusivity no matter your ethnicity your skin color your disabilities your sexual orientation your religion we are all in this together now beyond identity sorority has also become an argument for the acceptance of let's say every lifestyle or beliefs it's the idea that women are constantly judged by society they are constantly subjected to the male gaze and so we need to find peace in sorority let's not judge each other as women these ideas were part of the third wave of feminism during which eminent figures like naomi wolf and to a lesser degree gloria stenham wanted to include more people into the movement and therefore expanded the definition of what feminism could be femininity as an example re-entered feminists vocabulary the movement ultimately gave rise to what is now known as choice feminism it's a deeply liberal form of feminism that encourages individual agency you are a feminist because you can make your own life decisions if you want to focus on your career go for it you want to be a stay-at-home mom totally fine you want to have only fans why not as long and that's very important as long as you are politically conscious i think we all agree that a large majority of feminist discussions that are happening now online or offline are through the lens of choice feminism and so that's why i want to spend a little bit more time on it because some argue that choice feminism might be the reason why feminism as movement is dying researcher ferguson as an example gives to three characteristics first freedom or liberation is understood as the capacity to choose second a woman cannot choose her oppression she's politically conscious so we should support any choice she makes third it is based on the idea that the feminist movement fought for our ability to make choices so it implies that we are in a post-feminist era i guess sorry those three features you might already guess what are the limits of choice feminism but at least let's take an example last month intimacy expert and sexologist shan budram invited actor and comedian jasmine brown on her podcast lovers and friends the episode was titled i baby my man and it works for us jasmine brown identifies as a submissive partner to an alpha boyfriend she cooks for a man she does the laundry for him she packs his bags she makes sure he sleeps well she treats him like a mother would treat her child and more importantly she finds joy in doing that obviously this episode sparked a lot of conversations online some defended jasmine arguing that she was not submissive she was just choosing to serve her boyfriend like that but she remained independent in that choice and also asked her to completely stop um that this was going too far however jasmine's case poses the question of is the ability to choose always liberating and that's a very controversial question that i'm not sure i can answer researcher ferguson on the other hand is convinced that no she argues that we shouldn't support women who choose to comply with gender roles with gender stereotypes we should judge them and she has a few arguments to back that up first of all she says that choice feminism is non-threatening and to go back to feature number three it implies that we have reached the end of feminism as we knew it since every woman is free to choose what she wants to do second reason why she doesn't like chose feminism and something that made me think for a little while is that it goes against what's feminist since betty friedman in 1963 have done namely to bridge the personal and the political that was almost the murder of the second wave of feminism the personal is political that means the discrimination you face at home in the private sphere but also at work is political well choice feminism tends to de-politicize the personal because no one should judge what you do in the private sphere following ferguson's argument we come to the conclusion that choice feminism is actually anti-feminist since it promotes a fear of politics and prevent women from having difficult yet necessary discussions it's my choice end of the conversation we'll nuance all of that a little bit later don't worry but first let's take another example of someone who tried to judge in the frame of choice feminism and see what it looks like so we're dealing with former facebook ceo cheryl sandberg and her book lenin sheryl sandberg is a corporate feminist she's also a product of neoliberalism ideology in her book she explains to women that internalized misogyny is the cause of their lack of representation at higher positions and that they pull back on their career ambitions too early before they get a child so technically she openly judges women but in the process of teaching women how to gain confidence ask for that pay rise she also do not want to offend stay at home moms who do a quote important and demanding and joyful work and repeatedly expressed gratitude for men who facilitated her career as sandberg's book shows there is discomfort in criticizing women because we might be indirectly criticizing a friend a mother someone we know and understand and care about ferguson states that if we suspend judgment in the context of our personal relationships we seem to be failing in courage as feminists for feminism is precisely about reimagining and reworking the personal choice feminism will continue to have broad appeal to feminists because it gives us an easy way out of the dilemmas of politicizing the personal she concludes that what is ultimately being expressed in a choice feminist position is a fantasy of a world without politics a world in which we are never called upon to defend our views to those who disagree in which we never offend anyone because we tolerate everyone and in which we do not attempt as a collectivity to bring about structural changes this is a vision of a world in which we all get along not because we agree but because we studiously avoid conflict what good is a political consciousness if we are afraid to use it i know that today a slightly feminist stance is immediately perceived as radical but in the case of ferguson she's a true radical in the same vein as lesbian feminists she mentioned a few times the word heterosexuality in the essay as part of those things that we avoid confronting because of choice feminism in fact when ferguson talks about structural changes she talks about dismantling patriarchy and for her that cannot be done without rejecting heterosexuality i find it very uncomfortable but still like to read lesbian feminist books every now and then because it's interesting to see what women who couldn't care less about men do and think even if i don't agree with political lesbianism i have to recognize that lesbians have really pushed for radical ideas in the feminist movement as a whole we wouldn't be there without them and for me looking at my mother's life my grandmother's life i am actually very grateful and i don't think feminism has done more harm than good now i'm going to do what ferguson wants us to do i'm going to make a judgment based on my personal experience and things i've read her and there my judgement is the following i think that as a rule stay-at-home moms cannot leave fulfilling lives maybe you're already thinking about counter examples but let me explain before you comment i was listening to an interview with susan faluti by the way what are those unintentional asmr videos it's very weird because they added some extra sounds to make it more asmr and there are a bunch of other videos like that but whatever and in it she talked about her encounter with beverly a christian conservative activist who founded the organization women concerned for america in 1979 she believed that women owed to stay at home and that it wasn't in their nature to be ambitious however when faloodi was invited to come into her office she discovered that nobody was allowed to talk to her without lay's permission that lay just named herself president for life later during the interview an assistant came into the office to go through the president's travel plans she had been to latin america many times in the past few years valedi was both surprised and amused by the woman you know a conservative woman who loves power who loves to get out of the house to travel she embodied a contradiction that allowed her to remain in conservative circles so among her people while fulfilling what feludi describes as a basic human need to get out of the house be part of the world speak up and have people listen to you and recognize you and appreciate you similarly there have been this trend of trad wives going on for quite some time abby shapiro the sister of ben shapiro is one of them british elena kate pettit is another one both promote a classic lifestyle that favors homemaking but both spell the need to have a platform where they can share not only tips and tutorials but also ideas and values abi shapiro defines herself as a conservative feminist and talks as if she was on a mission to get more people on board and pettit talks about how great britain is truly great and has british flags and pictures of the queen on display everywhere they felt that need to have a public voice now if we go back to the 18th century something i discussed in my previous video the the us invented this concept of republican motherhood and so they gave a civic role to women who stayed at home a century later the temperance movement against the conception of alcoholic beverages and also this french movement included conservative women who used gender roles gender stereotypes to to their advantage to advance a political cause in the groundbreaking book feminine mystic written by betty frieden in 1963 the author interviewed all friends housewives who said that they were not fulfilled by their lives and that's why some of them were actually cheated on their husband in terms of personal experience i'll always remember that time where it was the end of tennis season in june and we gathered the most active families in the club to organize a barbecue there were a few tables and the women sat at one table in particular while the men were dealing with the barbecue and so i sat there as well and i started talking with them i didn't know them much so it was a great opportunity for me to learn more about them none of them were housewives but most of them devoted a lot of time to their family to their kids um to homemaking and i'm not even kidding it only took them like what five minutes to go from small talk to start complaining about their husbands with a that's the way it is type of smile they talked about their lost dreams lost opportunities for the demands of family life it was both extremely interesting but also very disheartening to be there and hear that it has become so natural for women to sacrifice what they have built their dreams for a family for relationship i almost made that mistake myself and i still hear this little voice inside my head every now and then questioning my life decisions because you know maybe that will prevent me from finding someone or building a long-term relationship or whatever so that was my judgment on housewives and i guess what ferguson would like me to do maybe would be to i don't know make a video about it um but i'll never do that not because i'm scared of having people disagree with me that literally happens all the time um but because who am i a white western woman to decide what feminism should look like i come from a country france where islamophobia is pretty bad you may have heard of the egypt ban in the past few years france has tried its best to ban the headscarf in as many public spaces as possible universities courts sport competitions and sometimes even at work those decisions are part of a longer history of republican secularism in france basically we don't really like religion unless it's christianity it's our culture by the way look what i found at the charity shop a few months ago i'm keeping it for like a birthday present or something muslim women are constantly presented as victims they are never invited on tv shows to express their opinion shared ideas or experience honestly i found this obsession with muslim women very disturbing like yes i can recognize a muslim woman in the streets because she's wearing a head scarf but i can also recognize a catholic woman because of the length and thickness of the skirt in both cases they are trying to cover some parts of their bodies or their body entirely but why do we only get mad when it's muslim woman other example you remember the jasmine controversy we talked about earlier well i think it's a good example to understand how we can navigate discussions feminist discussions while respecting women's choices faced with jasmine testimony sexologist shan budram remained absolutely non-judgmental but still she asked questions jasmine said that if her man was a college course she would have an a in his studies to which shan asked and would he get an a in your studies it took a few seconds for jasmine to answer i think so as i said previously a wave of responses followed the release of the podcast among those responses two really stood out for me brinily and tinois highly recommend you watch the full videos i'll put them in the description similarly to shan brennelly and quinoa weren't judgmental but they asked questions and i'm pretty sure most women watching their videos would come out either rethinking submission or giving it up completely in the end i think choice feminism is just a consequence of living in a society that values different experiences different voices it is necessary that we include as many experiences as possible in feminist discussions even if those experiences aren't the purest form of feminism advances don't come from pointing at each other and decide who's more feminist that's extremely elitist very isolating for women who cannot opt out of oppression like that and the reason why people hate white feminism we empower each other by asking questions by relating to one another in our communities or across communities a message like smash the patriarchy will sound more or less relatable depending on your life circumstances a middle class with women might see the dismantlement of patriarchy as the only limit between her and her liberation but a woman of color working at a warehouse cannot relate to that many working-class women understand that patriarchy may be responsible for their present condition but they don't have the material means to fight against it so it's our job to maintain a clear vision of where we're heading no matter how utopian it may be but also to set more achievable goals that might not be as radical but will help in democratizing the movement i'll give you one example that works pretty well all over the world public transportations investing in public transportation is feminist because statistically men use more car and women more public transports and that's also something that is good for the environment so that's a good theme public transport period poverty is another thing providing support so that people like hashal kiki a former housekeeper and unionist takes some space in powerful institutions the french assembly okay so these are reforms they are quite limited actually get it but these little victories will help galvanize people and drive support to the cause that's why a movement like the black panther party managed to get so much attention and media coverage they simultaneously had a bunch of community programs with free food free clothes legal support free health clinics they had the goal to win auckland's election but they also had this very strong message we will dismantle white supremacy i'm not blaming feminists for having to spend hours on mainstream media talking about inclusive pronouns not that they are not important you know language shape the way we think the way we structure society you know those media platforms know very well that by forcing feminists to only talk about those things they make it easier to discredit the movement and avoid talking about real issues where feminists can easily gain support things like we said earlier public transport period poverty etc to conclude feminism in western and also in a significant amount of non-western countries is facing a huge backlash even susan faludi notices that the misogyny is raw now right-wing people don't care about being politically correct when talking about women women bodies healthcare etc um on social media we've seen the rise of the manosphere the podcast the videos now i think something we can do as feminist is reframe debates whenever we have the opportunity to do so to defy anti-feminist logic like asan did with andrew tate um a few days ago that was very funny like validated in the 80s with beverly lahead conservative women who liked power and travelling we also need to listen to the most radical voices in the movement to question our beliefs and to make sure that we don't lower our standards as we've been doing in the past decade we also need to make sure our course is strong that it's challenging but it doesn't eliminate a woman who may have a different experience of feminism depending on their life circumstances i'm not a feminist activist per se my activism is limited to my videos and a few local things nevertheless i'm very politicized and i'm very interested in social movements i worked on um black social movements in the us for two years that's why i wanted to make this video where i compiled different opinions and my opinion i don't pretend to know the truth um as always there's a comment section down below you can share your opinion you can say if you disagree or if you agree um nevertheless if you enjoyed this video i hope you'll leave a little like i hope you'll subscribe if it's not done already again a big thank you to intamina for sponsoring the video sorry i ran out of battery but i would also like to thank my patreons and a special thanks to sam manuel paul cooper jay benjamin oswald jochelle perry and carla i'll see you all very soon and yeah [Music] jeffy [ __ ]

Channel: Alice Cappelle

Views: 452,899

Keywords:

Id: 8mFvAsu5cjQ

Length: 26min 54sec (1614 seconds)

Published: Mon Aug 01 2022