ESSAY: BAD FEMINIST

Roxane Gay is an American novelist, essayist, and editor. She teaches English at Purdue University Illinois. She is a writer and opinion contributor for The New York Times and The Guardian. Gays work is focused on intersectionality. She studies the interconnections between race, gender, popular culture, fiction and politics.

Bad Feminist is a collection of essays about feminism and its contradictions.  Roxane Gay tells her story through the lens of our society where the culture that we consume perpetuates stereotypes. For Roxane Gay feminism is plural, with its many contradictions because we all have different opinions and approaches to feminism. She thinks that each approach needs to be supported in our fight for equality. Her message makes clear that you  can be black, white, queer, love pink, hate car maintenance and still can voice your opinion  while you occupy the space freely, and be respected.

“PINK IS MY FAVORITE COLOR. I USED TO SAY MY FAVORITE COLOR WAS BLACK TO BE COOL, BUT IT IS PINK—ALL SHADES OF PINK. IF I HAVE AN ACCESSORY, IT IS PROBABLY PINK. I READ VOGUE, AND I’M NOT DOING IT IRONICALLY, THOUGH IT MIGHT SEEM THAT WAY.”

I chose this book because we often have bad representation of feminism where the word itself is related to anger, rebellion it can feel too demanding (which seems fair to me today because there’s much to do about inequality). In this book, Roxane Gay helps us to recontextualize what feminism is and what feminism stands for: equality, freedom, support, where “Bad Feminism” is in reality inclusive feminism.

“NO MATTER WHAT ISSUES I HAVE WITH FEMINISM, I AM A FEMINIST. I CANNOT AND WILL NOT DENY THE IMPORTANCE AND ABSOLUTE NECESSITY OF FEMINISM. LIKE MOST PEOPLE, I’M FULL OF CONTRADICTIONS, BUT ALSO DON’T WANT TO BE TREATED LIKE SHIT FOR BEING A WOMAN.
I AM A BAD FEMINIST. I WOULD RATHER BE A BAD FEMINIST THAN NO FEMINIST AT ALL.”