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This entire thread finally finally articulates for me why this entire ‘childcare crisis’ is and has been erasing to me from the beginning. https://twitter.com/annehelen/status/1343250806011645952
Let me start by saying, I just don’t have the heart to read the essay. So. I am one of THOSE people. Talking about something I haven’t read.
And also. When I first came into blogging world all those decades ago, it was because I was a mother of two small kids and couldn’t find any place —not one—where I was welcome. ESP in ‘feminist spaces.’
even in 'friendly' poc spaces, i still had to pack up two kids, travel with them to the space, drag them across (what felt like) half the fucking city after finding parking, to finally finally finally get them into the 'free co-op daycare' that i had to volunteer at-
in order to get my kids into the space. i just stopped going after a while. bcz it was SO much work. and that doesn't even take into consideration that at ALL non-POC centered 'feminist' spaces--there was NO childcare, NO travel subsidies for kids, nothing.
so i tried a few 'feminist' spaces for a while, got into my big blow up fights with white women that could not fathom any answer outside of--if you dont want to be discluded, then dont have kids, jesus.
i talked about ALL of this. ALL. OF. IT. in online blogging world. i talked about being a mami of color, about being a poor mother, about trying to figure out how to go to school with kids, about making sure kids were fed, even if i wasn't-
and i talked about what it meant to have kids in feminist spaces. i was universally called any and all types of names BY FEMINISTS. everything you could *imagine*. cum catcher--yes, CUM CATCHER. as in, not my fault u decided to be some man's cum catcher.
i was called irresponsible, i was told 'having kids is a personal choice, it's not our fault you made that choice' i was told i was oppressing childless by choice women, i was told i know how to get an abortion---
why didn't i get one if i hate being a mother so badly--there were multiple women, and one distinctly big name favorite, that told me after i said a great way to help mothers is offer help-that if i expected her to take care of my kids, be prepared for them to be spanked.
there was one massive huge blow up (called 'blog wars' in the olden days, lolol) where a feminist fav said that she paid X amount for fancy plate of food, kids shouldn't be allowed in restaurant-
one of my fav black feminists at that time said she brought her kid to a bar to make a point (in egypt, where 'bars' are not 'bars' in US), and feminist people about chewed up this woman-threatened her with CPS, called her disgusting horrible names--
white feminists that are acting shocked and disgusted and outraged now over what is happening to them--it's been enraging to me in ways i haven't been able to fully articulate. i've lost followers that i really liked bcz i just sputter outrage and they get mad--
how dare i be mad at mothers that are suffering right now?
and i just have not been in the mood to deal with it. so.
and i just have not been in the mood to deal with it. so.
but having spun thru that thread and seen replies to that article--it is helping me to remember **everything that feminism said and did to mothers**.
it is reminding me of how mamis of color went into feminist spaces--whether online or in real world conference space or organizing space--and were told to *fuck*. *off*.
**feminism made a choice**. and it made a choice that motherhood was a personal individual experience, NOT a political issue that feminism must organize around. it made the choice that LED TO what we are seeing today.
but now that individualistic bootstrap personal choice feminism is failing the most privileged women, the ones that can usually hire baby sitters and sit comfortable in knowledge that kids are at safe quality school that serves as way to get them into great college and great job-
NOW--they're like--'feminism has failed women.' and no it's not lost on me that somebody who is sure that 'feminism has failed women' is writing that article for the NYTs. and getting paid for it.
feminist women of color that have been saying for **decades**, this middle class bullshit is not helpful we need to organize in a more radical way--are STILL segregated out of this conversation-
even tho women of color have never stopped having this conversation. ever.
how many ways has covid exposed the ways that feminism in US *and esp online US feminism* has been a catastrophic failure?
Q: how many paid articles have i seen from one single white feminist, in particular a white feminist that came up during the online feminist era, saying--you know what? i was wrong.
A: zero. all of them are still spouting off like the experts they're still getting paid to be.
paid experts that think they're brilliant for...not knowing about an entire WORLD of scholarly thought written by and organized around women that have had to give up their entire lives, their dreams, bcz they had kids.
or have had to fight with such superhuman strength for so long with so little help they finally collapsed under the strain.
the most important part: it's usually women of color doing the work so many white mothers are now finding themselves stuck with. https://zora.medium.com/the-pandemic-housework-dilemma-is-whitewashed-7b41d5f60789
i worked for years as a farm worker--i was lucky, my family didn't have to migrate as other mexican families did. it's backbreaking horrible work and i did the relatively easy blueberry picking. other family members did strawberries, cucumbers, eggs--
all even worse than blueberries. backbreaking, knee destroying. mind numbing. mind numbing.
but bcz liberals and feminists only see brown faceless mexican hordes as the 'face' of migrant labor, they think they're being kind, *generous*, by saying--they're just doing jobs nobody else wants to, let them.
they can't imagine that there is a little girl out in those fields, one that wants to write stories, who gets in trouble with her dick father for being an 'air head' and dreaming instead of working-
they can't imagine the potential of that child, they can't imagine how necessary the very best of that child is to the world--how much the world NEEDS that child's best, how much that child's stories can change the world for the better.
they likewise can't imagine that when that girl grows up into a woman, doesn't want to take care of some white lady's brat kids or clean their house so that the white lady can write stories.
they can't imagine that grown brown woman has her own kids that she has to take care of in between cleaning and taking care of the white ladies kids--
and they can't imagine that grown brown woman has her own stories that she has to set fucking aside every single day, every single moment, until finally she doesn't even bother with them anymore.
bcz she's busy doing the trash jobs that nobody else wants to do.
many of these white women's last nine months have been black and brown women's fucking lifetimes. it's been generational lifetimes.
and if it's a tragedy that privileged white women are having to set aside their work and dreams right now, if it's a national crisis that demonstrates the failure of feminism--what is it that has been happening to women of color for generations?
can any of the experts being paid to write articles for the new york times tell me?
And what is it that feminism hasn’t just ‘failed’ generations of women of color who were mothers, but deliberately and with full intention and awareness, cast them aside?
