On (not) wearing pink

The rise of feminism

As Rosalind Gill noted a few years ago, ‘we are currently witnessing a resurgence of feminist discourse and activism as well as a renewed media interest in feminist stories’ (2016: 615). In North America and Europe, feminism is ‘popular’ again (Banet-Weiser, 2018). The rise in the popularity of feminism seems to mark a cultural shift. Indeed, my decision to study young women’s attitudes towards feminism in the mid-2000s was fuelled by a sense that feminism was commonly portrayed in a negative light, cast as irrelevant and repudiated. This has changed; feminism is trending (Guillard, 2016) but, like my colleagues (Banet-Weiser, 2018; Gill, 2016; Rottenberg, 2018), I feel ambivalent about this shift.

According to Catherine Rottenberg (2018: 11), ‘feminist themes have not merely been popularized and “mainstreamed”, but they have also become increasingly compatible with neoliberal and neoconservative political and economic agendas’. Rottenberg calls this form of feminism neoliberal feminism as it clearly acknowledges persisting gender inequalities but disavows structural constraints. In addition, it spawns a responsibilized and entrepreneurial feminist subject that takes it upon herself to navigate and manage ongoing gender inequalities. And as Sarah Banet-Weiser (2018) argues compellingly, popular feminism is deeply entwined with popular misogyny and met with a misogynistic backlash. It is also a feminism that frequently refuses intersectionality, is decidedly not angry, accommodates men through its heteronormativity, and has empowerment (rather than liberation from sexist and unequal social, political and economic structures) as its central logic. Crucially too, this is a feminism that circulates mainly on digital media. Feminist media scholarship has discussed the significance of digital feminism, painting a complex picture of the benefits and pitfalls of such activism (in this journal, see Mendes et al., 2018, and also the recent editorial on #MeToo by Zarkov and Davis, 2018). The themes of inclusions and exclusions of particular groups of women have been central to feminist debates about online activism.

Questions around intersectionality as well as the resonances between current forms of feminism and neoliberalism, popular feminism’s entwinement with misogyny and its affective life (e.g. the rejection of anger) are all crucial when studying contemporary manifestations of feminism, such as Feminists Don’t Wear Pink and Other Lies. In relation to popular feminism’s affective life, it is interesting to note that the book contains a section on ‘anger’, thus seemingly breaking with popular feminism’s attempt to be pleasant. But a more complex picture emerges when exploring the sub-heading of this section which, after providing a definition of anger as ‘a strong feeling that makes you want to hurt someone or be unpleasant because of something unfair or unkind that has happened’, states: ‘Feminists Don’t Wear Pink would like to assert that we in no way advocate any feminists hurting anyone; however, you are (on occasion) allowed to be mildly unpleasant to any true sexists in your life’ (2018: 123). These qualifiers – that feminists are ‘on occasion’ allowed to be ‘mildly unpleasant’ – call for a more systematic analysis of the affective politics underpinning the book. Here, however, I want to return to the ways in which the book’s introduction constructs the relationship between feminism and femininity.

Feminism and femininity

Charlotte Curtis begins with the words: ‘I didn’t know I was a feminist until I was fifteen. I didn’t know I was a feminist because I didn’t know I needed to be, and I also didn’t think I would still be allowed to wear make-up if I became one’ (2018: 1). Displaying a postfeminist sensibility (Gill, 2007), Curtis goes on to state that she considered feminism a thing of the past, ‘something we learned about in history class and didn’t have to worry about any more’. More importantly, however, it was the image of a ‘feminist’ that meant she did not want to call herself one: ‘Feminists didn’t use make-up (my favorite hobby). They didn’t shave their legs (my favorite form of exercise). Feminists didn’t like boys (my favorite type of human) and, most importantly, feminists definitely didn’t wear pink. And pink was my favorite colour’ (Curtis, 2018: 1).

On the first page of the book, Curtis makes it clear that her initial rejection of feminism was mainly due to her image of feminists as women who don’t wear make-up, don’t shave their legs, don’t like boys, and don’t wear pink. This list of feminists’ alleged attributes will be familiar to many readers; it also resonates deeply with the accounts of the young women I spoke to in the mid-2000s. What Curtis does not state explicitly, but what I argue is implicit in her statements, is that the image of ‘a feminist’ is that of an ‘unfeminine’ woman – a woman who is unconventional because she refuses to engage in activities otherwise associated with normative femininity. It is notable that feminists’ alleged shortfalls almost exclusively relate to appearance – make-up, sartorial choices, hair removal. Reminding ourselves that femininity is increasingly understood as a bodily property (Gill, 2007), we can read Curtis’s initial renunciation of feminism as a renunciation of women who don’t display conventional femininity.

Crucially, Curtis also evokes the image of the man-hater by stating that she used to believe feminists didn’t like boys. What is left open is whether ‘not liking boys’ also extends to sexual desire, signifying lesbianism. Either way, Curtis’s reference to man-hatred points to the heterosexual norms that frequently structure disavowals of feminism. In the interviews I conducted with young women over 10 years ago, feminists were overwhelmingly constructed as unfeminine, anti-man, and lesbian (Scharff, 2012). Thus, by negotiating feminism, the young women also negotiated heterosexual norms. Indeed, by adopting a performative approach (Butler, 1993), I demonstrated that repudiations of feminism frequently figure as performative acts of femininity. To state that one is not a feminist because one is not ‘one of those unfeminine or man-hating women’, is a rejection of feminism but also a performance of femininity. Crucially, the view of feminism as connoting man-hating and/or unfemininity does not always give rise to performances of heterosexual femininity and also did not lead to a rejection of feminism in all cases. But statements about feminists’ alleged stance towards their femininity, men and their supposed sexual orientation indicate that discussions about feminism frequently involve negotiations of heterosexual norms. It is my argument that similar processes are at play in Curtis’s initial rejection of feminists as unfeminine and not liking boys.

Curtis also tells us that as a young woman she had an illness, which meant she had time to read, including feminist literature by a range of authors. She began to understand that ‘gender equality was not in fact a thing of the past but a far-off dream for the future’. Central to my arguments here, she also

… began to understand that the assumptions I had held about what it meant to be a feminist were in fact a tool of the very systems of hate that these women were trying to smash. This system of hate (also known as ‘the patriarchy’) had concocted an image of a feminist precisely so young women would be deterred from continuing the fight. The lies we have been told about feminism have been fed to us to hold us back from a movement that is actually for everyone. A movement that is more beautiful and more potentially powerful than we could ever have dreamed. As I first began to read I began to understand that feminists do in fact wear make-up (if they want to). They also shave their legs (if they want to) and love boys (if they want to). Feminists can also definitely wear pink, a lot of pink. (2018: 4-5)

By arguing that feminism is ‘actually for everyone’ and that feminists do in fact wear make-up, shave their legs, love boys and wear pink, Curtis challenges the construction of feminism and femininity as mutually exclusive. In doing so, she departs from the accounts provided by the majority of the young women I spoke to. Linked with femininity and, arguably, destabilizing the spectre of lesbianism that often haunts feminism (Scharff, 2012) by insisting that feminists ‘love boys (if they want to)’, Curtis seeks to render feminism palatable to young women.

To be sure, it is not a new move to link feminism with femininity in an attempt to make the former more popular in a heteronormative context. In the late 2000s, for example, a ‘new feminism’ was proclaimed in Germany whose alleged ‘newness’ consisted in the fact that it was no longer anti-man and anti-femininity (Scharff, 2011). This new feminism had many problematic features, such as an individualist and neoliberal outlook, and a lack of engagement with differences amongst women. I also critiqued this new feminism because it reiterated heterosexual norms by repudiating past forms of feminism as allegedly man-hating, unfeminine and lesbian. Indeed, repudiations of earlier versions of feminism as anti-man or anti-femininity reaffirm, rather than subvert, heterosexual norms. Feminism may become more palatable if it is linked to femininity, but the underlying heterosexual conventions that render women who are unfeminine and/or anti-man (in both attitude and sexual desire) unpopular remain intact. While the spectre of the unfeminine, man-hating woman may become disassociated from feminism, unfemininity and ‘not liking boys’ are still depicted as undesirable. Politically, the discursive fusing of femininity and feminism seems to be one of the mechanisms that has not only rendered feminism more popular but also – simultaneously – has limited its radical potential because it fails to challenge heteronormativity.

In addition, the linking of feminism with femininity may also exclude (white and black) working-class women who, historically, occupy the position of the ‘other’ in regard to culturally dominant constructions of femininity. As Beverley Skeggs (1997: 99) has argued, ‘[w]orking class women – both Black and White – were coded as the sexual deviant other against which femininity was defined’. And as postcolonial perspectives have shown, black and brown women ‘are always ambivalently placed in relation to femininity. They are by turns hyper feminine in terms of presumed passivity in relationship to a patriarchy they need rescuing from, and hyper masculine in not meeting the terms of white, (post) colonial femininity’ (Hemmings, 2018: 968). By ‘rescuing femininity’, and associating it with feminism, Curtis’s version of feminism challenges historically prevalent stereotypes of the feminist as an unfeminine man-hater. However, this rescuing of femininity does not subvert the power relationships – in relation to class, race and sexuality – that structure dominant constructions of femininity. Indeed, the fusing of feminism and femininity does not only leave heterosexual norms intact, but also reifies white and class privilege through its embrace of normative femininity.

Concluding remarks

In this editorial, I have focused on the introduction of Feminists Don’t Wear Pink and Other Lies as it frames the book and is written by its curator. I should note, however, that other contributors grappled with the stereotypes of feminists as unfeminine and/or anti-man: Evanna Lynch asked: ‘Does femininity impede feminism?’ (p. 25); Alison Sudol reminds us that the f-word ‘carries with it tales of rebellion, of “man-hating”, bra-burning and sexual revolution and the destruction of the family unit’ (p. 52); and Chimwemwe Chiweza states: ‘I believe in women’s empowerment. Not because I hate men and want to eradicate them from the face of the earth, but because I believe in the ability to achieve great things that resides deep in the heart of women’ (p. 46). In the latter half of the book, Scarlett Curtis comes back to feminists’ relationship with men in a section on ‘Feminist Comebacks’ (p. 209). In response to the imagined question ‘Don’t you worry that all this “feminism” is going to make you really unattractive to men?’, she states that she would ‘rather not snog a boy who doesn’t believe in women’s rights or understand that the fight for women’s equality benefits every human in the world, not just girls. Also, Margot Robbie’s a feminist, and she seems to be doing just fine.’ An alternative comeback would be to ask why women are (expected to be) concerned about their attractiveness to men in the first place.

While I hope that my reflections have served as a further reminder that the linking of feminism with femininity has problematic political implication (Hemmings, 2018), more work needs to be done in order to understand precisely what the affective and political repercussions of this fusion of femininity and feminism are. What seems clear, however, is that even as the desire to challenge stereotypes of feminists is understandable, simply disassociating feminism from ‘unfeminine women’ – with its classed and racialized implications – leaves unequal power structures intact.