It aims to silence those who will no longer tolerate the violence, abuse and marginalisation we have suffered for so long. This ignores the struggles of women and others at the sharp end of misogyny, racism, anti-trans and anti-queer violence. According to such narratives, straight white men are the new most oppressed group. The article expressed the view that identity politics is good for nothing except dividing movements, using language and narratives that have been made popular by MRA (Men’s Rights Activist) groups and the alt-right.
When we say we need to be recognised and respected within our movements, we need you to listen. No campaign in this country could survive without women, without us – our work and energy and knowledge and organising have been instrumental in all the progressive movements in this country. Whether in political parties and organisations, education, trade unions, or grassroots and community-based movements, we are tired of being accused of ‘bourgeois feminism’ and of betraying the struggle when we raise our voices.
You will see from the names on this letter that we are women who have been in the thick of things. The response to the article felt like a silencing to us and we are writing this because we are way past putting up with that. We all have to examine ourselves as oppressor as well as oppressed – because we are all both. However, that doesn’t make them immune to critique. They should have a say in the decisions that affect their lives, but they often don’t. They are ignored by a political class that couldn’t care less about them. Working-class ‘straight white men’ in Ireland don’t have it easy these days.
It is only by acknowledging all these differences that we have any chance of imagining and building a better world that includes us all. It is an obligation on all of us to honestly look at our different positions within the structures of oppression and privilege under patriarchal racial capitalism. As well, some of us have had a multitude of opportunities in our lives while some of us have had to fight our way through. We live in a world where our advantages are tangled up with the things that disadvantage us – some of us are working class, some queer, some of us are poor, some of us come from minority ethnic groups or have disabilities or don’t enjoy the security of citizenship. These men – our friends, our fellow trade unionists, activists, writers, organisers, and artists – shared and commented on a reductive and damaging article written by Frankie Gaffney, which was published in the Irish Times. Last week, a good number of the left-wing men we work and organise with seriously disappointed us. “We are a group of activist women from a wide variety of backgrounds, races, ethnicities, and sexual orientations.
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