Early second-wave feminism was dominated by white women who excluded black women

Evidence

When the women’s movement began in the late 60s, it was evident that the white women who dominated the movement felt it was “their” movement, that is the medium through which a white woman would voice her grievances to society. Not only did white women act as if feminist ideology existed solely to serve their own interests because they were able to draw public attention to feminist concerns. They were unwilling to acknowledge that non-white women were part of the collective group women in American society. They urged black women to join “their” movement or in some cases the women’s movement, but in dialogues and writings, their attitudes toward black women were both racist and sexist. Their racism did not assume the form of overt expressions of hatred; it was far more subtle. It took the form of simply ignoring the existence of black women or writing about them using common sexist and racist stereotypes. From Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique to Barbara Berg’s The Remembered Gate and on to more recent publications like Capitalist Patriarchy and the Case for Socialist Feminism, edited by Zillah Eisenstein, most white female writers who considered themselves feminist revealed in their writing that they had been socialized to accept and perpetuate racist ideology. — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 405

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the opening chapter’s account of racism within the women’s movement and to critiques like those in The Combahee River Collective statement. — connects to: White women’s clubs excluded black women even from token recognition — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 379; White feminists pursued work rights only for white women workers — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 387; Early black feminists were isolated from both black communities and the white feminist movement — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 17 (+14 more)

Related

• Early black feminists were isolated from both black communities and the white feminist movement (similarity 0.91)
• White dominance in feminism reflects racial imperialism, not black disinterest (similarity 0.89)
• White women’s clubs excluded black women even from token recognition (similarity 0.88)
• White feminists pursued work rights only for white women workers (similarity 0.88)
• Black women named their race in group titles because exclusion forced it (similarity 0.88)
• The mainstream women’s movement was deliberately structured around white middle-class interests. (similarity 0.87)
• White feminists dismissed race talk to preserve a unified sisterhood (similarity 0.87)
• White feminists excluded black women by analogy rather than overt discrimination (similarity 0.87)
• Black women organized separately after white women’s racism barred them (similarity 0.86)
• White feminists dismissed black women’s attention to racial difference (similarity 0.86)
• Historians have excluded black women from accounts of the women’s rights movement (similarity 0.85)
• The women’s rights movement exposed white women’s refusal to surrender white supremacy. (similarity 0.85)
• White feminists appropriated feminism while hooks reclaims it for all people (similarity 0.85)
• Both white and black patriarchies framed feminism as opposition to black liberation. (similarity 0.85)
• Black women faced a double bind between racist white feminists and patriarchal black leaders (similarity 0.85)

Broader Connections

• White feminists dismissed black women’s attention to racial difference #corroborates (0.80)
• Black women organized separately after white women’s racism barred them #expands (0.80)
• White feminists dismissed race talk to preserve a unified sisterhood #expands (0.75) — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 16
• Early black feminists were isolated from both black communities and the white feminist movement #corroborates (0.70) — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 17
• White women’s linguistic erasure of black women served their own political interests #expands (0.65) — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 416
• White feminists excluded black women by analogy rather than overt discrimination #qualifies (0.60) — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 420
• White dominance in feminism reflects racial imperialism, not black disinterest #expands (0.60) — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 464
• Racial imperialism let white women act as oppressors of black people despite sexism #expands (0.60)
• Black women faced a double bind between racist white feminists and patriarchal black leaders #expands (0.55) — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 28
• Black women needed a separate feminist intellectual tradition #expands (0.55)
• Black women experienced sexist oppression distinct from racism #expands (0.50) — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 47
• Suffrage politics trapped black women between racist feminists and sexist black men #expands (0.50)