Fallibility

I am a little over-stimulated right now. It is a combination of worries, news items, and recent media consumption that has given me too many thoughts. They are related, so they could go together, but there is so much there that it would be too much. If I separate them into different posts I fear they will either be overly repetitive or miss something crucial.

That led to a thought this morning that whatever I write today will suck. Well, that's always a risk.

I decided to let it be a reminder that we are all imperfect, and can't get it right all the time, often for very understandable reasons. That led to a topic.

I have written about intersectionality before, as well as centering Black women. Those are two connected points.

As we work toward equality and liberation, we remember that oppression comes through different vectors, and some people will be caught at intersections of different forms of marginalization and abuse. Therefore, while you may understand one kind of oppression that affects you, you may nonetheless be clueless about one that doesn't. A white woman may have a good grasp on the issues of sexism, but not racism. A Latina woman may understand those, but not be clear on the harmful nature of anti-Blackness. A white man with a physical handicap may not get any of those, but still have some ideas about ableism.

It doesn't have to be that way, but these are easy roles to fall into, especially when the various forms of marginalization are so thoroughly supported by society's infrastructure. Honestly, it hasn't really been that long since I did not know that ableism was a thing. I know about it now, and I can see examples, but I probably still miss a lot because I can.

When we center Black women, we take on three of the strongest prejudices; that would be reason enough to do it. In addition, we often find that they have a greater understanding of the issues and have been working to remedy things all along. Their experience is a great reason to seek guidance from them.

The connection I want to make there is that of course they understand more - they have to. They don't have easy ways to escape it.

It could be possible for them to not be working actively for equality and liberation - they could try and lay low instead - but you will find many Black women on the frontlines working. Then their work co-opted by white women or Black men or someone who is in a place that society more easily recognizes. This is once more a reason to focus on Black women, because when we let that work be co-opted we are missing the point.

Those points are important to me, as is the point that when you are in a bad situation you can choose to try and raise yourself and others, and that is a good thing to do. The point I am going for, though, is that even when you understand some important things, you can easily miss other important things.

Therefore, you may get things like George Takei passing along an ableist piece of humor, or Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie getting it wrong on transgender issues, or Emma Watson criticizing Beyoncé, because they understand one side but do not realize the parts they are missing.

We do not have to automatically discard anyone who messes up. I still want to read We Should All Be Feminists. Not knowing what you don't experience is easy and common.

We do not even have to automatically discard someone who messes up and gets angry when they are corrected (which happens a lot). We can hope that they will stop and think. A good thing to do when corrected is to ask yourself if there is a point to the correction. That is something everyone can do.

We can also all be critical. If someone you admire says something that seems wrong, the choice is not between ignoring the error or ending your admiration. We can look deeper.

Sometimes we will find people that we should discard. Maybe we will notice that the apology isn't really sincere ("I was tired."  "I'm sorry if anyone was offended."). Maybe we will notice that it wasn't just one slip-up on an area outside of their experience, but that they say racist things or appropriate other cultures all the time*. Then maybe that is someone that we stop watching, or buying, or supporting.

Sometimes when we make that criticism, the response will be something along the lines of it being unfair to always expect perfection, or not good to never be able to take a joke (I have some thoughts on humor), but that is not what is being said.

No one is perfect, but we can be better. Looking around at the world today we clearly need to be better. For that to happen, at times correction is required. It doesn't feel great when it's aimed at you, but did you really think you were perfect?

(*Yes, I personally am thinking Bill Maher, Katy Perry, and Amy Schumer, but that is in no way comprehensive and maybe it is easier for me to dismiss them because they don't really appeal to me anyway.)