TheWRITEaddiction.com

Hilary Clinton was recently quoted as saying that she was puzzled by women who are in favor of equal rights and gender equality but don’t consider themselves feminists. 

Until recently I was one of those women. Here is why:

Growing up as the only female in a family of four children I had a very particular view of what it meant to be a feminist. My mom claimed to be a feminist and so I saw her experience as the norm for the movement. My mother was a very educated woman married to an equally educated husband whom saw his career as the priority. 

My mother raised four children working full time and still dedicating as much time as she could to us. My mother overworked herself. She kept our ship running. If to be a feminist I had to work harder than my brothers for less and still have to raise and run a family, then feminism wasn’t for me. 

As I grew older and learned more about the feminist movement I saw more flaws. I saw the movement as one aimed solely on the helping of middle class and upper class white women enter the workforce. Women of color and less affluent women had always been in the workforce. I viewed the movement as one that excluded the needs of women of color, working class women, and that of queer community. On top of all of this the ever  present hegemony in society paints feminists as aging, angry, men haters. Because of these and other reasons I had no desire to label myself a feminist. 

I find that my generation of women of color need to reclaim the term and modify it to mean something different. We need to include our male allies and be deliberate about no excluding the needs of our LGBT brothers and sisters. 

If I could speak to Hilary Clinton I would let her know that until she were to live the experiences of her sisters of color that she would never fully understand why they and my generation is wary of calling themselves feminists. I find that even within my generation the women who are the first to call themselves feminists are white whom have only felt discrimination based on their gender. For the gran majority of heterosexual white women it is easy to claim the label and be puzzled why the rest of us do not. Those of us who have felt discrimination based on our gender, the color of our skin, the languages we speak, and for whom we choose to love tend to shy away from lumping ourselves to a movement that excludes us. 
I choose to reclaim the term and make it my own. Because of this I can proudly say that I am a feminist. I have the choice to work partime and be able to spend two days a week with my son. I had the choice to go to school and get my three degrees. I had the choice to marry whom I loved. I had the choice to not take my husband’s last name. I had the choice of controlling my reproduction and when to have my child. Many women do not. I choose to not “have it all”. For me to “have it all” means doing it all and not sharing the responsibility with my husband. 

Feminism isn’t the same for everyone. There isn’t anything to feel puzzled about Mrs. Clinton. There are multiple experiences out there and we need to embrace them all.