Mikki Kendall's Crucial, Confronting 'Hood Feminism' is the Most Important Book You'll Read This Year

Mikki Kendall’s crucial, confronting book Hood Feminism makes something clear from the outset: mainstream feminism is broken. And not only is mainstream feminism broken, but in its current millennial pink members club and pink ‘pussy-hatted’ form, mainstream feminism is serving to uphold white supremacy. You may be reading this and nodding along, already aware of the issues inherent in the feminist movement. If you’re not, if you’re a current feminist shaking your head and getting a little bit heated at the mere suggestion that feminism’s current iteration is imperfect, I implore you to keep in mind this section from the book before moving forward:

When allies are challenged, they often insist that there is no way they could be part of the problem. They default to rattling off an extensive resume of “what they’ve done for you people.” They whip out the “I was an ally when no one else was”…laundry list, intended to cover everything without ever engaging with the current problem.

Allies tend to crowd out the space for anger with their demands that things be comfortable for them. They want to be educated, want someone to be kind to them whether they have earned that kindness or not. The process of becoming an ally requires a lot of emotional investment, and far too often the heavy lifting of that emotional labor is done by the marginalized, not by the privileged, but part of the journey from being a would-be ally to becoming ally to actually being an accomplice is anger.

            I read this chapter, on being an accomplice instead of ally, feeling ashamed, complicit (by the way: it’s no one’s job to make me feel better about that, something white women the world over still have trouble grasping). I’m part of the problem; a big part. I’ve worked with charities abroad for 10+ years and dedicated a grand total of zero community service hours helping marginalized communities close to home. Kendall should not have had to write this book to educate white people on the harm they’ve done. The fact that she put in months of emotional labor to write Hood Feminism, about problems that have existed in front of our eyes for years but that we chose to ignore, is part of the problem. It is also part of the problem that I wasn’t compelled, and that others weren’t compelled, to prioritize anti-racist reading until all the things that had been happening, that Black people had been trying to tell us about, for decades, were shared on social media. You may not be actively racist, but isn’t being inactively racist just as bad? Isn’t posting a prettily packaged anti-racist IG tile to your story, acting as if you care, and then taking no action to make a meaningful difference, while excusing yourself from the narrative, tantamount to lying to yourself and those around you in the service of willful ignorance?

Regardless of where you were before, if you’re a white person reading this, let’s all just take a moment to admit three things: 1) we have failed the Black community time and time again, and 2) we should feel guilty, and 3) it is no one’s responsibility to assuage us of this guilt.

Are you still not convinced that you’re not a bad feminist, one whose conception of the movement has focused solely on the advancement of white women? Too uncomfortable to continue reading? Sure that you’ve sufficiently educated yourself on the struggles of the BIPOC communities?

Consider this: a couple years ago, when Lena Dunham mentioned in a conversation with Amy Schumer that she felt Odell Beckham Jr. was ‘ignoring her’ at the Met Gala, positing with no evidence that it was because she wasn’t conventionally attractive, I personally laughed it off as another instance of Dunham being ceaselessly self-absorbed, a ridiculous human. The reality that Kendall brings to light:

“I don’t expect Dunham or Schumer or feminists like them to listen to Black women or other WOC. It’s not an innate skill for white people, and for white feminists who are used to shutting out the voices of men, it can be especially difficult to hear that they have the power to oppress a man. But that doesn’t change the history of Black men being demonized or killed for expressing an interest in white women.”  

The fact that I’ve never had to think about things in that way puts my privilege on bold display. The fact that the white women who founded “feminist utopia” The Wing priced it at $2,000+ per year while Black employees reported harassment by white members speaks to Kendall’s statement that Black women “can’t afford to believe that helping white women achieve parity with white men means that someday white mainstream feminist ideals will reflect our needs.”

What do you think of when you think of feminism? Take a minute to consider what comes to mind. For me, the very it’s the #MeToo movement, a movement that centered the harrowing stories of white women and their sexual assaults while simultaneously silencing Black women for their attempts to share the same (and when apologies were issued, centering themselves in those apologies).

Before I read Hood Feminism, the below were a few things that didn’t come to mind when I thought of feminism (but that should’ve):  

·       On gun violence: “girls in marginalized communities drop out of school at the same rate as boys in an effort to avoid having to pass through places where shootings are common…that is, in an effort to survive”

·       On hunger & the soda tax: parents in marginalized communities may be working too many hours to prepare food, dealing with food storage issues that mean storing fresh juices and produce is outside the range of possibility, and may not be making enough to afford juices and produce in the first place. Soda is shelf-stable and inexpensive, and a program that works to combat obesity instead of mitigating the hunger that causes it is part of the problem

·       On the harmful conservative narratives around welfare programs and their recipients being “lazy”

o   40% of SNAP recipients are already working, using food stamps to supplement their salary and keep them capable of being in the workplace (so they can afford things like childcare) – many of the remaining 60% are children, the elderly, or family caretakers

o   SNAP provides 12 meals to every 1 meal provided by charity; government dollars go much farther than charitable contributions. Beyond that, paying taxes that assist our government in addressing hunger should not be a controversial issue…at all.   

·       On sexual assault:   

o   40-60% of Black women will be assaulted before age eighteen

o   One in three indigenous women will be assaulted

o   White men are the demographic most likely to sexually assault women, across the board

o   Instead of working to combat this sexual violence, we place white people in marginalized communities and set up programs where the sole narrative is: “early pregnancy is bad” and often excuse the behavior of these white men with “what was she wearing?” and “what was she drinking?” narratives

·       On crime and the portrayal of missing persons in the media: name the first Missing Persons case that comes to mind. Elizabeth Smart? Jaycee Duggard? Natalee Holloway? Now consider the fact that “despite making up 13% of the population, Black women account for 34% of the missing each year.” Can you name any missing Black women? Can you name any missing indigenous women? Likely not, because “of the 5,712 indigenous missing women, 116 were registered in the Department of Justice database.”  

Now that we’ve run through just a few of the issues Kendall addresses in her book, let’s consider why white women haven’t addressed this. Much like white men, white women think of power as a “zero-sum game.” If a white woman gives up her seat for a Black woman at the table, she fears she’ll lose her voice, which, in her humble opinion, is the most important voice of all.

So, what can we do? First, let’s stop relying on Black women and people of color to educate us on their plight. We all have the power to do our research, to educate ourselves on these issues. Next, let’s remember to put aside our egos, our needs to be “centered in every struggle.” Let’s be willing to get uncomfortable, let’s be fine with getting yelled at – we deserve it. Now, let’s consider the policies and institutions that continue to uphold white supremacy and actively work to challenge them. Then, do the work. Help create community organizations to address the issues that you’re seeing and hearing about – and make sure you put Black women and women of color in leadership roles. Like Kendall says, we need to be accomplices, not allies – and our work here is only just beginning.