Critics still question their idea of female empowerment. They want them to wear more clothes, to not be so strong or so sexy, or to not be so cheerfully, enthusiastically unconcerned with hitting a checklist of “appropriate” feminist milestones. But fiercely fighting your way past the boundaries that white supremacy might set isn’t for the faint of heart. We know, after all, that well-behaved women don’t make history. Still, as the criticism of both Beyoncé and Serena ramped up, as the backlash for them choosing to go their own way spread out to criticism not just of their careers, but of their personal lives, even of their children, it was clear that being so fierce had consequences.
And while those two women have the resources and the networks required to insulate themselves, the average woman fighting against the patriarchy is more likely to be far less privileged. Yet the demands that the risks be taken by those without the insulation of racial privilege never abate. Instead the narrative is one that lauds the courage of those who do take the risks, with very little discussion of the possible aftermath. Whether it is being outspoken about police brutality, harassment, and sexual assault in politics, entertainment, tech, or other industries, too often those who speak out are positioned more as sacrifices than saviors. When the seemingly inevitable backlash complete with harassment and death threats starts, some feminists will speak up; many will simply suggest contacting the police or the FBI, but they won’t offer anything else. And if anyone brings up the lack of meaningful support for victims, the conversation is quickly shifted to center on those who didn’t take the risk.
In my experience, when I have been targeted or other Black women have been the primary targets of harassment, Black women have had to back each other up on social media. This is especially true on platforms like Twitter, where filtering out trolls is made more difficult by the lack of quality tools to handle the deluge of voices. When Jamilah Lemieux, then an editor at Ebony, was targeted by conservative trolls, it was Black feminist Twitter that backed her up. Whether the reason for the harassment is being pro-choice, a critique of the political choices of a GOP spokesperson, or something like what has happened to professors like Anthea Butler, Eve Ewing, and other Black academics, they are at best lauded for their fierceness from a distance by white feminist writers. More often they are ignored, or as has been the case with House representative Ilhan Omar, they are targets of white feminists like Chelsea Clinton, until the rhetoric spills over into actual physical violence.
Suddenly the same women who adore fierceness, who celebrate ideals like speaking truth to power, are all about their own personal fragility. After all, being fierce has its consequences. And besides, it’s not like they’re the police. They aren’t responsible for protecting anyone, for helping anyone access safety, or for connecting anyone with resources. Well, not anyone inconvenient, anyway. Not when there was a carceral solution that they could rely on at their fingertips.
We know that carceral feminism (a reliance on policing, prosecution, and imprisonment to resolve gendered or sexual violence) is most likely to be used against women who fight back. Particularly women of color. The state responds to public concerns around sexual violence by re-traumatizing victims. It rarely offers them anything approaching justice. The carceral impulse also informs how feminism responds to victims before, during, and after they attempt to press charges or otherwise combat the patriarchy. What has arisen repeatedly in feminism is a tendency to assume that once victims have gone to the state, their needs are all met. This is especially obvious in the responses to online harassment.
While many feminists have no problem arguing for criminalizing the behavior, they are light on ways to safeguard those experiencing it. Because of the impact of a carceral approach, we see a framework that restricts feminist horizons to structures that expect the individual to fight rather than the collective. This form of individualist feminism relies on the idea that an empowered woman can do anything. It ignores the economic and racial realities that some face.
What does individualist feminism look like in practice? While we stand on the sidelines cheering women on, largely there has been minimal collective efforts to fight oppression across multiple identities. We ignore the fact that the same structures affect us all (albeit differently), and we rely on the myths of strength rather than on any understanding of what it means to work together.
It doesn’t help that when welfare reform was enacted, politicians ignored the fact that victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, and so on might not be able to go back to work immediately or at all. Without funding for public housing and other social safety nets, low-income survivors in particular found themselves “helped” right out of any measure of stability.
While we laud the strength of those who fight back, this sometimes leads to victims being arrested for defending themselves. This is especially true in the case of sex workers, victims of domestic violence, and others who find themselves squeezed by the system that prioritizes imprisoning them over protecting them. The same carceral solutions that imprison them have taken the place of the infrastructure that allowed survivors some measure of freedom to live independently without having to rely on abusers. After all, if you can access affordable housing and welfare programs, your options are already broader than if you cannot.
It’s not that the actions of survivors to defend themselves are necessarily bad or wrong. The state gives them very few options to prevent violence, and many ways to report the aftermath. For those who are not lucky enough to attract broader media attention, self-defense might open the door for them to lose years of their life to imprisonment. But when we only have carceral solutions to social problems, there is very little room for actual justice, much less healing.
In feminist circles the “fierce” warrior narrative is often held up as an honor given to the women who take the biggest risks in their careers or otherwise. “Oh, she’s so brave to press charges.” “It takes a strong woman to do what she did.” It sounds great in passing, the idea of those who fought the patriarchy being stronger, braver, more ferocious than those who did not take the same risks. But what we don’t talk about is what that costs victims. While they are fighting their way through whatever obstacles and feminism stands on the sidelines cheering them on, what happens when the coolness fades? Do we have a safety net, an idea of how to provide for the potential financial and social consequences?
Too often those who take the risks have very little in the way of a backup plan and are staring down the barrel of a life after activism with the same poverty and lack of social and emotional resources, and even more obstacles because of infamy and in some situations a criminal record. For everyone who might win a high-dollar settlement (money can’t buy happiness, but it can buy some measure of stability), thousands more must figure out how to navigate life after losing. Some of our biggest icons die in relative obscurity, impoverished and alone, dependent on the kindness of strangers or the cold, clinical mercies of the state.
We love the idea of a Strong Black Woman, celebrate those who, like Anita Hill, manage to continue to have a successful career in the aftermath. But what about those who can’t do that? For those without a pass back to middle class or the ivory tower, what resources are available? The same feminism that holds them up to fight the battles turns away when the war is over and doesn’t bother to tend the wounds, emotional or otherwise.