Seriously, do we need to tack a gorram Venn diagram onto every feminist blog, or what?

little light commenting at feministe:

THIS IS THE GODDAMN PROBLEM. To you, WOC and queer people are allies to feminism. They are adjunct groups, special interests, separate causes distract from women’s issues.
Let’s unpack that a little.

Women of color, in bringing up their concerns, are allies to (regular) women, who are just doing plain old feminism. Women of color are allies to feminism. Queer people are allies to feminism. Issues of racism, gender identity, and orientation, plus the accompanying oppressions and concerns, are “interesting” side dishes to feminism, which is for women.

Women of color and queer women are women. We are women. Our issues are women’s issues. They are inextricable from our womanhood. They are part of our feminism, and part of we want feminism to pay attention to, because these things are women’s issues. Your version posits that there’s regular women, who just do feminism, and then there’s those allies who drag those regular women in the trap of paying attention and giving energy to other causes–like the concerns of the women next to them who are brown, trans, and queer.

What does that make these regular women, the core of feminism, so gracious as to allow in the interesting sidebars on race and gender and orientation and ability and class, so vulnerable to falling into the trap of paying too much attention to those issues? White. Straight. Cissexual. Able-bodied. Not working-class. Those are “just plain women” in your frame. Their issues are “WOMEN’S issues.” Other women? Women who are different? Their issues aren’t “WOMEN’S issues,” except for the ones they share in common with white, straight, upper-class, cissexual, able-bodied women. Their issues are an occasionally-interesting distraction from real women’s issues.

Thanks but no thanks for your inclusion, pal.