-What is feminist praxis, according to the text? What makes it “feminist?” What is your definition of feminism? How would you explain to someone who had not heard this term before?
According to the text, feminist praxis are social movements for racial, gender and other fights for equity, mainly for women, made by women. It’s for a system of ideas, practice and it refers to a set of actions which are informed by theory, research and evidence. It’s also a safe place for women who know what they go through and to know that they aren’t alone. What makes “feminist praxis” feminist is that even though it’s mainly for women, it generalizes the theory and practice of equality for racial, gender, and other movements of equity. My definition of feminism is fighting for the equality for all people whether you’re a woman, man, black, white, person of color, gay, straight, lesbian, transgender, etc. For someone who haven’t heard of the term feminism, I would explain that even though it may be simple, it’s more complicated than it sounds. I would explain that even though it may mean female hence the word feminism, it’s not. It’s more than just being women. It’s equality for all people whether they’re concerned with gender equity and the liberation of being a woman.
-What do the authors say about backlash? What are some examples of backlash against feminism that you have seen or experienced? What do you think drives the backlash in these examples and what are some ways to respond to it?
The authors said about backlash is that backlash comes in many forms. It’s either from outright rejection of feminism to “enlightened sexism” to “postfeminism”. An example that I have seen backlash against feminism would be in the beauty community or industry as others would may called it. In the beauty community, there would always be backlash whether be a person would launched their first or newest makeup line or a scandal that happened recently or a few years ago that would surfaced again. Another example of backlash would also be in social media. In social media, whether a person would be launching something different or new to the beauty or clothing community, there would always be one or two people that would comment something bad or say that that the person stole their idea, and it would end up being a feud about who’s right or wrong. And also in social media, whether a celebrity would be living their life while making their material, social media would always bring scandals about that person to the surface and it causes backlash to that celebrity. I think what causes backlash in these examples is that there will be some people that will always remembered who you were before than the person you are now, will always reminds you of who you were back then in the past instead of letting it go. The ways to respond to backlash are different depending on the situation at hand. But for these examples, I believe that the best way to respond is to respond back to the backlash accordingly, which would mean that you can apologize for the backlash and give some light to it so you can fix it. Or you don’t respond at all, and let all the backlash get to you or not let it get to you at all. No response is a response.
hi Lori,
Great discussion of feminism and feminist praxis– and yes, you’re making an important point here by naming that feminism is not just about “women.” Feminism is about changing power relationships, centering gender, but not limited to only equal rights for women.
I’m interested in your discussion of these examples of backlash and how they can connect to feminism. In the text, the authors discuss “backlash” as resistance to feminism– including outright rejection of feminism (e.g. feminism is bad, dangerous, tears families apart, etc.) as well as the idea that feminism is no longer needed because we have achieved all of our goals. There are so many everyday examples of this– any time one of my uncles learns of my work and asks me, “well, what about men?,” for example, they are saying that something about feminism is threatening and they want to challenge it (and, also, as you point out, feminism is more complicated than women vs. men). I wonder what kinds of backlash to feminism you are seeing in the examples you name — what are the gender expectations in the beauty industry, what do the scandals show us about gender norms, etc.?