What has happened to the meaning of “Oppression”? How has it affected women, and how can we now steer the narrative to where the message is “sharp and sure”? Frye explains that the term “Oppression” has now been stretched to meaninglessness. Unfortunately, leading to the thought that most if not all are being “oppressed” in various ways. However, this is not necessarily the case. As Frye points out, being oppressed is much different than varying degrees of societal stress and frustrations. The way I see it, women and men are both held at mainstream standards; however, if a woman breaks those standards, she runs the risk of losing her career, “ruining” her reputation, being labeled as difficult or hysterical, etc.
…
I believe that Lorde’s essay leads with the thought that people who fight with the notion that “Oppression” is a competition ultimately can create a further divide, which holds us further from “liberation and a workable future.” Progress towards change can only be achieved when all who are oppressed work together to fight as one.
When I read Lorde’s following statement-
“Within the lesbian community I am Black, and within the Black community I am a lesbian. Any attack against Black people is a lesbian and gay issue, because I and thousands of other Black women are part of the lesbian community. Any attack against lesbians and gays is a Black issue, because thousands of lesbians and gay men are Black. There is no hierarchy of oppression.”
I immediately thought of MLK’s inspirational words, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” And after reflecting over Lorde’s essay, I found myself thinking of the times in my life I have heard “allies” say they “do not see color” I consider how this statement actually does more harm than good. If you don’t see color when you attempt to think outside of your own life experience, how can you see me and the experiences I have faced from being a brown woman in America? If we cannot see diffrences in others, such as race, gender, sexuality, etc. Then how will we effectively manage to change the narrative so that it promotes understanding and acceptance?
Jasmine, I so appreciate your thought-provoking post. Your first paragraph clarifying the meaning of oppression made me think about the backlash we have witnessed in some cases following the Me Too movement, where some individuals have claimed that men that are facing being “canceled” for inappropriate behaviors face unjust and disproportionate consequences for their actions.
While it is absolutely fair to say we have a lot of work to do in figuring out how to appropriately address different levels of transgressions, I still get annoyed hearing all this whining about how unfair it is for these men to lose their careers and good reputations, it’s like they are willfully ignoring that this has been happening to women and nonconforming folk since the beginning of recorded history.
There are so many cases of women losing everything, even their lives, because they dared to have a sexual inclination at all, and tropes used against women who admit to being sexual beings are still plentiful today. I would start listing examples but I fear once I pop I might never stop, the list of women wronged could go on for ages. Of course, we can’t become the monsters we wish to defeat, and we should always try and do better than what was done to us, but that doesn’t make it any less frustrating.
Your comments on oppression are insightful, I couldn’t agree with you more. It is imperative to take an honest look at different types of oppression without minimizing the impacts they have on others. It’s also important to acknowledge these differences we face without making it an oppression competition that drives us all even further apart, starting these conversations with compassion instead of defensive combativeness is so important, and something that is increasingly difficult to do in the culture of angry tweets and divisive language we currently live in.