I don’t want to be snarky about the “moms” protest because all of these protests are so important and it’s good that people care and everyone is doing their best, but... consider this my scream into the void, begging that we stop with the “mom” thing in activism.

It’s premised on the idea that motherhood makes you more moral, more nurturing, more sensitive to suffering. And also that mothers are usually apolitical, and soft, and non-threatening (until they’re fierce mama bears). In other words, lots of sexist stereotypes to make this work

You rarely hear men invoking fatherhood in order to legitimize their opinions. You often hear women invoking motherhood, long a source of social identity for us. It reinforces this idea that being a mother is a woman’s primary path to recognition and adulthood.

Which doesn’t mean that talking about motherhood is bad activism. Of course not. I’m talking about the organized use of “mom” as a signifier — “Moms For X,” “Moms Demand Y.” Why “moms” if not to imply a whole set of stereotypes that go along with “mom” to justify women talking?

It also suggests that women who aren’t mothers have less of a role in advocacy. It relies on the presumed respectability of (white) motherhood for legitimacy.

The reality is that women, and particularly the boring middle-aged women the media loves to ignore, have been hugely powerful in Democratic electoral politics over the past three years. They are a force, but written off as Resistance wine moms or whatever.

I worry when I see the embrace of the same stereotypes that generally make it harder for women to participate in public discourse, and that seek to legitimate certain female voices on the basis of very old ideas about a woman’s purpose and place.

None of which makes the people at the Mom protest bad or sexist. I think they’re great! Like I said, folks are doing their best out there. Just a request to consider what we’re leaning into when we rely on “we’re moms” to justify women talking.

This from @JessicaValenti is a good point, and just to be clear, I don't mean this as a "Mom Protests Are Bad" hot take. It's just... complicated. And there's a difference between subversion and using stereotypes in the service of something good. https://twitter.com/JessicaValenti/status/1285930647329157121?s=20

I see the mom protests as relying on the cultural veneration of white motherhood in the service of something good and important. But they still rely on, and reinforce, that veneration. And as we know, that has political limits - just look at how much we actually support mothers.

ANYWAY, really, the folks taking to the streets are incredible and I am in awe of them (the mothers, the people who aren't mothers, the black women who have led this all from the get). My intent isn't to say "stop, this is bad." It's to say, let's think about how we do this.