a feminist rant in response to feminist rants.
this is not my MO y'all, Leo season is making me SPICY.
“Meaningful transformation will not occur through pronouncements of equality from various government institutions.” - Dean Spade, Normal Life: Administrative Violence, Critical Trans Politics, & the Limits of Law
I just scrapped a version of this that got really specific about some feminist in-fighting that happened on Substack the past few days. I think there is some value in naming names and showing receipts, but I also become riddled with anxiety when I participate in things that are so specific. So. I’m not going to name names. I do quote two people and it’s not hard to find out who they are, but I want to say upfront (and I will repeat below), that I appreciate both of these writers, I just have big disagreements with them. That’s okay!
Instead of naming names, I’ll synthesize the highlights from the various essays and subtweets that fueled some feminist debate this week: What seemed to set things off was a post from a woman who said many moms are frustrated with feminism, partly because of the negative impacts of girlboss feminism and cancel culture. A very popular feminist podcaster subtweeted this in response (and I’ll quote, because I don’t want to mischaracterize it):
