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To the OP and @2 - yes it is true, you are 100% correct and it is nothing new. Though there is one thing (to the OP): white, straight women are not a minority, not in this country. They may not have true equality with men, but they are not a minority.

There's really no way to write a short response to this. It is impossible to write an all inclusive one.

The majority of white, straight women in this country have always aligned themselves with the white supremacist patriarchy because they benefit from it and seem to believe the vicious misogyny (including all of the violence against women, psychological, physical, sexual, and even murder) are worth the privilege whiteness affords them. White, straight women are not going to be true allies to other women unless and until they give up their white privilege.

White Women, Come Get Your People
They will defend their privilege to the death.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/06/opinion/lisa-murkowski-susan-collins-kavanaugh.html

Book: White Fragility: Why it's so hard for white people to talk about racism

As a white, straight woman I have been a feminist my entire life, worked to educate myself about my white privilege and chosen to do the work of confronting it and forcing other white women to confront it and demanding they acknowledge how it harms all women, and to do the work required to dismantle it in order to move forward to create and work toward true feminism. It is not easy. White people in general are wholly resistant to the idea of white privilege existing. White people in general are wholly resistant to sitting down and shutting up and listening to the experiences of other women and supporting their needs in an intersectional feminist agenda.

Listening to Black Voices While White
For white women, one of the hardest things is to shut up and listen.
https://medium.com/age-of-awareness/listening-to-black-voices-while-white-1417990909dd

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH
Why I’m giving up on intersectional feminism
https://qz.com/quartzy/1265902/why-im-giving-up-on-intersectional-feminism/

White, straight women need to be called out at every opportunity. White women need to force white women to change. And yet, while white, straight women get their shit together (or not), what do all other women do? That's the question isn't it? Because relying on white, straight women to get their shit together, to give up their white privilege, to become true allies, and to fight for the rights of all women is pretty much a losing proposition at this point (look: white, straight women are the reason Trump is in the White House, which is fucking sick and disturbing beyond belief).

I don't presume to have the answer to that. I believe there are a legion of feminist leaders that are focused on forging forward with creating a feminist world that sidesteps white women entirely, as white women have sidestepped them. These are the women bringing about real change for women in this country - not white women. Some of the current leaders (not even remotely a comprehensive or complete list) include Patrisse Cullors, Amanda Nguyen, Paola Mendoza, Anurima Bhargava, Amanda Stenberg, Laverne Cox, Opal Tometi, Alicia Garza, and Ai-Jen Poo.

7

@4 yes the feminist movement of the '70s was very much focused on white women. there was a huge chasm between the white women and non-white women and priorities and agendas. there are literally tomes written about it.

i hate lena dunham and do not relate to her at all. she is a wealthy, self-obsessed, ignoramus in my opinion.

@5 we know how you feel and what you believe and all of the assumptions you make about everyone else, while demanding your experience negates the experience of all others. everyone has a story. everyone.

so, yes, in a society built on white supremacism from its conception (and white male supremacism at that), simply being born white provides a privilege. no matter how horrific ones life may be. it is the refusal of that privilege by all white people that keeps the system in place and pits the white and non-whites with the SAME EXACT EXPERIENCES against one another - because white people have to have someone to look down on and blame no matter what their situation is.

i have female relatives in my immediate family that were raped by male relatives from birth (as in as infants and for years and years).
they nearly died of starvation growing up because there was no food.
they were beaten with inches of their lives for years, sometimes decades.
somehow, they managed to survive and create lives for themselves.

everything they got in life from a job to a place to live from the time they were born until the day they died (those that are dead, some are still alive and prescribe by the motto that living well is the best revenge) was never hampered by the color of their skin.

they never had to worry about not getting something they wanted or needed because of the color of their skin.

my life from birth was not as horrific as theirs and for that i am deeply grateful and know how fortunate i am, even though i lived in world full of domestic violence and poverty.

as i grew up and had to work or find an apartment or any decision i had to make in my life or anything i chose to go after in my life (including mental health treatment), i never once had to think about the color of my skin. it never occurred to me that i wouldn't get what i wanted (in one fashion or another). why? white privilege. i didn't even know it or realize it or think about for a long time. but there are things i did and got away with because i am white that i never could have done or gotten away with if i had not been white.

i went to college despite having exactly $0 to do so (scholarships, loans, grants, work study, money given to me by my mother's boss who was a wealthy white man, etc.)
one job i worked at paid me so little i had to borrow against their petty cash near the end of every month until i got paid.
i was never shot by a cop when pulled over for a routine traffic stop.
i never had the cops called on me for anything i ever did simply because i was existing and living my life.
obviously, i have never been murdered by the cops simply because i was existing and living my life.
i have never been told to prove i am who i say i am (show my papers, so to speak).
i was never denied an apartment rental, even when i moved somewhere where i had no job and no job prospects and no idea when i would.
i was not denied health care when i needed it when i became seriously ill.
i was never told my illness was all in my head and did not have doctors minimize it or deny its existence (though i was misdiagnosed initially).
i was not denied social security disability when i applied for it.
i was not denied discharge of my student loans due to total and permanent disability.

now all of the above did not happen SOLELY because i am white, but if i had not been white, i know for a fact much of it would not have happened.

you keep on living in your privilege. your denial of it does not change the fact that it exists.


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