Latoya on Racialicious has a fascinating post up today about feminism, being a PoC (person of color) and coming home to an idea of herself and what she is fighting for. It’s a really moving piece, so I hope that you’ll all check it out.

I think it’s safe to say that so many women feel marginalized in the feminist movement- as in pretty much every movement (unfortunately.) To such a degree, in fact, that I have wondered lately if there could be a unified movement at all.

Personally I’ve been really sad to see a lot of women writers that I respect and read regularly take a little too much joy in all of the horrible jokes, videos and sneers about outed-escort Ashley Dupre, and the recent news of her move to LA. I’ve even felt conflicted about continuing to link to people who have engaged in this mess, and tolerated the slanderous and downright cruel comments that so many readers have posted regarding this woman.

And that is just one issue close to my heart- and there are many. So how do we get unified across all of these boundaries- I mean, do we? Latoya says,

So, it is important to me to state that it is mentally taxing for me to go into non-PoC spaces on a regular basis. I find it exhausting. White dominated spaces are difficult for me to deal with because of all the issues involved with privilege and reference points. I find it tiring to be lectured at about my lived experience.

This is exactly how I feel about entering into the countless conversations that I’ve had with resistant people (including feminists) about sex work- how this work is a woman’s choice, and one that deserves the same respect as choosing to be an accountant, a doctor or a teacher. It is exhausting, so thank you for pointing that out, Latoya.

For years I have had a repeating dialogue with my friends- is it really our job to teach men about feminism? Or to teach our peers how to critically think about women, our work and our lives?! I can’t count the number of collective sighs of frustration that I’ve heard (and emitted) during these rants.

But when it comes down to it, I do feel moved to trudge on. Maybe it’s selfish, or for fear that nobody else will, or that they won’t be loud enough. But I get up (most days) in the morning and I know that I am willing to work through the exhaustion and continue having that same, tired conversation with just a few more people- if nothing else so that they’ll go have it with someone else, and that will be one less person to convince.

I hope that we can continue to enter each other’s spaces and have these conversations- because I still believe that coming together could bring us somewhere even more rich and delicious than perhaps we can even imagine.