In today’s West, there’s no debate that feminism is more readily accepted than ever. Since my first waking moment of self awareness, I can distinctly recall the feelings of gender injustice and prejudice I faced. Hopelessness was cultivated through the bitter realisation of standards and limitations imposed on me for both beauty and behaviour.
This discomfort was underlined by a feeling of helplessness, relatable amongst most women with a Western footing. Sexual injustice for privileged women feels more like a social undercurrent than anything more aggressive – but it still needs to be eradicated. I want to make it clear these are not the ravings of an antifeminist or even a post-feminist.
In recent years, feminism has been at the forefront of Western media. It’s been so heavily commercialised that it seems to be slipping on the steps of emancipation. If individual women are able to capitalise on feminism, all the better for it, but it is the insincere corporate appropriation that I can’t stand.
We’re constantly bombarded with brands and celebrities lauding over their recognition of the female struggle, bringing about a social devaluation of Western feminism. In short, the term ‘feminism’ has become as commercially watered down as your common house plant.
“Avacadogood day” and “cut me and I bleed coffee” seem staggeringly out of place with the serious social adversaries and unrelenting cruelty women face due to inequality. Yet many popular high street stops have removed the powerful connotations of the word “feminism” in such a laissez fair way that it seems as important as getting to your nearest Starbucks.
Even Dior has made a £580 T-shirt which says “we should all be feminists”. Buying this T-shirt can not only show that you’re rich, but also that you are a good person who cares about social injustice! (But not fast fashion). Fashion helps to make feminism exclusive to white, middle class consumers who like to be seen at the forefront of the latest trends.
The average consumer is being allocated a spot in the feminist rally through cute patterns and ignorance rather than through information, action or independent thinking. We are taught to believe that wearing a T-shirt that says “Feminism is my favourite F word” is all we need to do to promote ideological beliefs, nevermind the women in slave labour who laboured to produce said T-shirt.
This new-found image of popular feminism has caused ruptures within the feminist movement. The idea of the ‘feminazi’ – another patriarchal attempt to shame women – has been displaced in favour of the new pop feminist whose only fight for the social cause is that of overpriced merchandise and coffee related puns. Feminism is once again transformed by the patriarchal media, this time into a mass of oblivious consumers eating up whatever trend that comes their way.
We also seem caught on the snag of feminist empowerment as the main way in which an artist promotes their work. Feminism sells and has become a trap of triviality.
The commercial slogans and advertisements assembled on the ideas of women’s empowerment are everywhere, so pro-empowerment that they come off trivial and even patronising – such as Nike’s campaign “ladies first, men second”. It only highlights the fact that sexism is still tumbling around in the social undercurrents.
The over-establishment of feminism is definitely a complaint I am privileged to be able to make. If mentions of feminism in a department store get one person interested in delving into these social issues on a deeper level, perhaps the marriage of consumerism and feminism is a net social good. But there is also a danger in forging alliances with capitalism.
We shouldn’t use the fact that feminism is popular as an argument for current female equality, social liberation or emancipation. A better understanding of feminism through education can block the cheapening of the term so that money can be spent on real issues rather than the big corporations capitalising on the suffering of women.
