Hood Feminism: Notes From The Women That A Movement Forgot Review and notes

The book in 3 sentences

Hood Feminism is not a simple feminist book, it takes us on a journey to hood life, giving a perspective from inside and the relationship with the “outside”.

Because feminism is not just about the suffrage or the freedom to work.

Feminism should address all problems women face, starting with survival and not just privilege. Feminism should address openly the most basic of rights that become problems such as safety, hunger (and eating disorders), housing crisis, sexual harassment, reproductive mutilation, fetishization, parenting harassment, not being “traditionally” beautiful, etc.

Impressions

Outstanding book to get some new perspective about the issues feminism is ignoring because of its white-ism. Felt like a necessary ass-whopping.
100% recommend as a starting point to learn more about what feminism is missing.

Who should read it?

Everybody, all of us that always think of ourselves as feminists, but often forget about how feminism is not only to benefit ourselves and those near us.

How the book changed me

As I said above, it felt like a slap over the head, in a good way. I’ve always defended feminism, always believed women and men are equal. But, sadly because of society, I’ve been influenced by micro-sexism, same with racism. I’m deeply ashamed of it and aspire to leave all that behind.

This book has helped me see some of my blindness to the everyday racism and machismo around me. I didn’t know that feminism because it’s handled by white women in the most influential ways can hurt other women just because they aren’t white. Same with men.

My top 3 quotes

“Feminism is the work that you do, and the people you do it for who matter more than anything else.”

Hood Feminism: Notes From The Women That A Movement Forgot

“Too often white feminism lies to itself. It lies about intent and impact; it invests more in protecting whiteness than in protecting women. It’s not a harmless lie either; it does direct harm to marginalized communities. Being harmful is a source of power that some white feminists have embraced in lieu of actually doing any real work. They get drunk on power and they can’t resist the urge to exert it as much as possible. This isn’t just about the vicious bigotry that lets Kirstjen Nielsen get on Fox News and blame the death of a seven-year-old girl on her family for the “crime” of seeking asylum. Nor is it just the petty power jolt some white women seem to get from calling the cops. Feminism can’t afford to prioritize supporting whiteness over actively combating racist and misogynistic policies that will end up hurting everyone.“

Hood Feminism: Notes From The Women That A Movement Forgot

“Marginalized communities have already developed strategies and solutions as they do their own internal work. Now mainstream feminism has to step up, has to get itself to a place where it spends more time offering resources and less time demanding validation. Being an accomplice means that white feminism will devote its platforms and resources to supporting those in marginalized communities doing feminist work.”

Hood Feminism: Notes From The Women That A Movement Forgot

Summary and Notes

Discovering Multifaceted Realities

Kendall opens our eyes to the multitude of problems people of colour, particularly women, affront every day. Most of these problems are survival-level on Maslow’s Pyramid. While white feminist fight for privilege, other women are struggling to make ends meet. The problems brought up by Kendall in Hood Feminism are:

Safety

You can’t concentrate on improving yourself if you aren’t safe at home, school, work or simply walking around in your neighborhood. The safety problem centers mainly on guns and gangs.

Children can’t play safely in the neighborhood, afterwards we talk about excessive gaming. Children can’t go safely to school, so they skip sometimes to survive, neither can adults go safely to work, putting their position in danger.

Schools aren’t safe either. Where can these children go to be safe? How can they focus on an education for their future if, at any moment, one of their classmates can shoot them?

Why allow guns then?
We have the right to protect ourselves. Right, then what is the police for?
The police protect us. That’s what my family always taught me. “If you have any problem, go to the police”. Disclaimer: I’m white and live in Spain. Unfortunately, some people don’t have this luxury.

Police brutality is common, and if you are black or any other colour that isn’t white, it’s even worse. Some people avoid calling the police to avoid escalating the situation.

There are tons of black women that go missing but nobody does anything, police doesn’t move a finger. They do something when it’s a white woman that goes missing, the rest of the women disappear under the sadness of that sole white woman disappearance. I’m not saying we shouldn’t be worried, I’m saying everyone should be provided the same resources to be found.

Gun violence is a feminist issue as it affects women every day, especially those in low-income areas.

Hunger

Food Deserts exist, maybe you have to walk a long time to get to a grocery store or you have one near you but you can’t afford it. You have to go farther way to a cheaper one, losing valuable time.

“Some forty-two million Americans are struggling with hunger. Statistically at least half of that number are women, but given gender bias in wages, the real percentage is something like 66 percent of American households struggling with hunger are headed by single mothers.

Women and children account for over 70 percent of the nation’s poor.“

Hood Feminism: Notes From The Women That A Movement Forgot

Hunger affects not only nutrition, it also leads us to making poor decisions just to have something to eat, something for the children if it’s the case.

Why create programs to combat obesity? Why increase the taxes in soda?
It’s true, soda is awful for our bodies, with sugar and bubbles. But, it’s what some people can afford It doesn’t go bad, and it’s cheaper than juice. On top, it tastes good.

Instead of increasing the price of sodas, we should be making possible those people didn’t have to drink them to fill their tummies.

Sexuality

One in three Indigenous women will be raped, most probably by a white man. The same for white women, only that white women aren’t under one more fetishization because of their colour. Objectification is worse for women of colour.

Well, they should report it!
Of course, they should (if they want), but what if the police officers are another danger? We know that some police officers are abusing people they should protect. We just don’t know the exact statistics.

Not a single victim of sexual violence deserves it. It doesn’t matter what they were wearing, doing or the place or their skin colour.

This education starts at home. Boys should play with dolls and learn to respect women and not objectificate them, same with girls. Girls can also be taught either way.

Reproductive Rights

Black mothers in the USA die three or four times more than white mothers, bringing to light the huge discrimination happening inside medical centers. We have cases of forced sterilization of women, specifically Black, Latina and Indigenous women. Between 25 to 50% Indigenous women were sterilized in between 1970 and 1976, without their consent.

Not only do these women risk forced sterilization, they also have a higher risk of losing a baby because of racism, limited access to pre-natal care, subpar nutrition and housing. Moreover, if the child has any kind of disability, the discrimination and problems become exponentially higher.

Beauty Standards

Feminism should fight against the white cookie cutter beauty standard. No woman should be “evaluated” by their beauty. There are some trends out there that are atrocious.”She’s a 3″, I saw recently in a post made by a gorgeous girl, said by some guy that didn’t take care of himself at all. That boy, because that’s what he is, lacks the education feminism should have given him.

As women seen from a sexist society, we will never be enough pretty, “good girl”, refined, thin, strong; pretty sure you can continue a very long list by yourself.

Girls are subjected from very young to all these critics, driving them to poor decisions. This desire to be “perfect” drives women to develop eating disorders, bleaching their skin, straightening their hair within an inch of its life, taking dangerous pills, etc.

Women of colour also develop eating disorders, society believes Black women in peculiar are “stronger”, mentally and physically. Making them, to their eyes, immune to eating disorders, if you add food instability, you get an awful relationship with food.

Skin-bleaching products campaigns point that having lighter skin gives access to higher incomes and a better love life. That makes women purchase it in the USA, Asia and other places despite knowing it can cause mercury poisoning, damage to skin and other organs. They want to fit in the cookie-cutter, white-centered beauty standard. Same with hair care, relaxing again and again just to fit in, to get that job or promotion, because for some stupid reason natural curly hair is seem as unkempt.

All feminists should fight against that cookie-cutter beauty standard.

We love fierce women lies

The fetishization of fierce is a plague right now on the whole world, even more on social media. People love videos of the Spicy Latina with la chancla, or the Black warrior woman. But when it’s in real life, society translates it into impoliteness or animalistic.

We know that well-behaved women (by white and sexist limits) don’t change history.

Education

Most of us have had drilled into us that education is über important. Not all of us have the same luxuries in going to excellent schools and universities. The discrimination starts in preschool. For some children school becomes the safe place that their homes can’t be.

Right now, there are schools with enforcement. It becomes a school-to-prison walkway, especially for those of colour and even more for female students. Black students are suspended and expelled three times more than their white classmates, 70% of the arrests made at school are Black or Latin@. There is also police brutality inside schools, they might change the officer if something happens but the systems stays.

Other students also affected are those with disabilities or LGBTQIA. Children with disabilities have double the possibility to be suspended out-of-school. You know, that way they don’t have to lose a teacher only for that kid, in their eyes.

“States spend $5.7 billion a year on the juvenile justice system instead of on our schools. On average, American states spend $88,000 to incarcerate a young person, but allot an average of $10,000 to educate them.”

Hood Feminism: Notes From The Women That A Movement Forgot p. 199

With that data, we could say that the USA government prefers having more uneducated people inside prison than educated people working. Same with health.

Instead of going to school to learn and be nourished they have to be on guard but not too much or they might be body slammed by an officer.

This is children’s and young people’s education we are talking about. Feminism has always fought for education and what is it doing in this case?

Parenting while marginalized

I wasn’t a single mother, but doctors would act like I was, unless my then-husband was physically in the room. Sometimes even though we were very clear that I was the one staying home with our baby, they would start talking to him like he was the one qualified to make decisions because he was white. The hilarious and depressing thing is that these were often white women who were ostensibly feminist. They had somehow convinced themselves that my socioeconomic status meant that what I needed most was their input on parenting as though their “benevolent” racist assumptions had any value in my life.

Hood Feminism: Notes From The Women That A Movement Forgot

Sadly, Black parents have to prepare their children for the racism they will face on their lives outside their home, some of them might not have the time or the resources to give their children an organic diet. It’s more important to keep their children out of crossfire, gangs and jail; or even deportation, this is not helicopter parenting, it’s survival parenting.

Housing

When making housing accessible, we should focus in everyone, including young entrepreneurs, mothers, disabled, mentally ill and elders looking for a place to age in peace, etc. This means not only the house but also being accessible, with affordable grocery stores and emotional care near.

This is a complex situation, where those feminist candidates for public office have to act, and not only promise to the middle class to win votes.

Intersectionality as a Guiding Light

Women’s experiences are shaped not only by gender but also by race, class, sexual orientation, and other intersecting identities. As women, all of us have problems to fight, but if we affront them together instead of hurting each other, we will be much stronger.

Black feminists shouldn’t have to fight with white feminists too, they have enough fighting to do inside their communities. Can white feminists help with that fight? Yes, but we must allow our sisters to guide us to avoid making it worse. Before diving into helping actively black feminists we should fight white patriarchy as it affects everyone. Yes, you can fight your racist aunty.

Remember that all of us are equal, but are not treated equally.