What do you get if you add sexism and racism?
Bet you didn't learn this in math class!
Racism. Sexism. Homophobia. Transphobia.
Classism. Ableism. Sizeism.
These are just some of the oppressions
that people experience in our culture.
You might be aware of all of these,
but did you know that sometimes,
these individual forms of oppression
can combine with others
to create something more
that the sum of their parts.
Let me tell you a story.
Once upon a time,
a woman named Emma DeGraffenreid along with four other black women
sued General Motors for hiring discrimination,
arguing that the company was not hiring them because
they were black women.
However, the court concluded that because
GM hired black men as factory workers,
it couldn't be discriminating against them based on race.
And because it hired white women as secretaries,
it couldn't be discriminating against them based on gender.
The court failed to recognize that it was because
these women existed at an intersection of racism and sexism
that they weren't being hired.
Here's critical race theory scholar, Kimberle Crenshaw,
the woman who coined the term "intersectionality"
talking about the case.
Now, because Emma was both black and female,
she was positioned precisely where those roads overlap--
Experiencing the simultaneous impact
of the company's gender and race traffic.
The law...the law is like that ambulance that shows up
and is ready to treat Emma only if it can be shown
that she was harmed on the race road or on the gender road,
but not where those roads intersected.
Whether you notice it or not,
people all around you have their lives impacted in unique ways every day
because of the intersections of various oppressions
under which they exist.
For instance, let's say that a black woman
and a white woman both work in the same office environment.
As women, they may both be targets of sexual harassment,
however, the black woman may have different or deeper concerns
than the white woman.
She may experience sexual harassment more boldly
from male employees who have internalized racist stereotypes
about black women's sexuality.
She may have ample reason to fear that if she does
experience sexual harassment,
her claims will not be taken as seriously because she is black.
Because she must navigate racism and sexism
simultaneously,
her experience of sexual harassment in the workplace
will often be wildly different than her white female coworkers.
It's important to note that intersectionality
is not a synonym for diversity.
A company can't have an intersectional staff, for instance.
Rather, it's a lens through which the
various systems of power and oppression intersect
can be seen, analyzed, and critiqued.
And you should get used to using that lens
to think about the world you live in.
For instance, if you see a panel
that's intended to be a discussion of "women's issues,"
but all the women on the panel are able-bodied, or white, or white collar --
you should probably question whose concerns
and issues will actually be addressed.
When middle class white women stand in for all women,
whiteness is reinforced as a standard setting,
able bodies are once again given priority,
and undocumented women are erased.
When Patricia Arquette won Best Supporting Actress
at the 2015 Oscars,
she made an impassioned speech about closing the wage gap --
which is definitely an important issue,
worthy of being shouted out on such a huge platform.
However, backstage after her speech,
Arquette said,
[ARQUETTE] It's time for all the women in America
and all the men who love women and all the gay people and
the people of color that we've all fought for to fight for us now.
Now, to talk about the wage gap,
which affects queer women, too.
And affects women of color more than it affects white women,
and to say that gay people, and people of color should fight
to close the wage gap for women --
as if these are entirely separate populations,
is a huge intersectionality fail.
It makes it clear that when Arquette talked about women during her speech,
she really meant white women.
And look, it may not have been interntional or malicious
on her part,
but intent doesn't really matter.
Also, side note: don't be the white person who boasts
about how much white people have supposedly fought for
people of color.
I mean, what universe are you living in?
You do realize that white people were kind
of the whole problem in the first place, right?
Yeah...
so the lens of intersectionality reveals that the elements of our identity
don't actually exist wholly independently of each other.
There isn't a separate gender box and a separate race box and so on.
All of these elements are inextricably linked
and can combine to put us an unique intersections of oppression.
Another realm in which this is apparent is the world of online harassment.
As a woman, I have received tremendous amounts
of deeply sexualized and misogynist harassment online.
When comedian Leslie Jones became the target of a massive harassment campaign,
the harassment she received was an entirely different sort:
one that combined anti-blackness and misogyny to create something
even more disgusting and horrifying.
And when trans women are harassed online,
they too receive abuse of a categorically different sort;
one that fuses transphobia and misogyny in its efforts
to persecute and dehumanize the target.
One of the clearest and most horrifying examples
of intersectionality in our culture is the collision of anti-blackness,
misogyny, and transphobia that impacts black trans women.
Sometimes called "transmisogynoir,"
this lethal mix of oppressive forces combine
to often keep black trans women living on the margins
of society; and street harassment, domestic violence,
sexual assault, police harassment and police brutality
are just some of the major problems
that members of this population often face.
On top of that, transmisogynoir is nothing short of deadly.
There is a tragic epidemic of violence against black trans women.
And often, even after they are killed for being black trans women,
they are dehumanized in news reports that carelessly misgender them.
Meanwhile, the issues that plague them are largely ignored by lawmakers and the media,
who apparently deem the epidemic of violence against them
not worthy of attention or concern.
Here at Feminist Frequency, we believe that media
can change the world.
As stories about people of color slowly
become more prevalent at the movies and on tv,
it can work to nudge us, a tiny bit a time,
towards destabilizing whiteness from its position of privilege.
Similarly, making stories that center women more commonplace
is an essential part of the long, hard battle to dismantle
sexism and misogyny.
We also need more stories that center disabled folks,
trans folks, poor folks, and of course,
people who live at the intersection of some of these oppressions.
Big thanks to the brilliant writer,
Ijeoma Oluo, whose comments on intersectionality were
helpful in the writiing of this episode.
Check out her book,
So You Want to Talk About Race.
Join us on the next episode when we take a closer look
at misogyny and sexism:
what they mean, how they function,
and how our society keeps them going.
Hope you found this video helpful!
We'd love it if you'd share this episode with your friends and family.