Gay’s central theme seems to say that one can still be a feminist without eschewing media that is degrading to women, that perhaps one can still be a feminist even if one’s crushing on a cute but misogynistic guy. When feminism falls short of our expectations, we decide the problem is with feminism rather than with the flawed people who act in the name of the movement.” – Roxane Gay, Bad Feminist For whatever reason, we hold feminism to an unreasonable standard where the movement must be everything we want and must always make the best choices.

“In truth, feminism is flawed because it is a movement powered by people and people are inherently flawed. And what is the subject of feminism but humanity?

And that’s a damagingly black and white position to take when it comes the infinite shades of grey that’s humanity. Feminism is a tough sell, thanks to the patriarchy, so yes, it ends up being an ‘if you’re not with us, you’re against us’ kind of scenario. You lose your right to identify with the rest of the women. If you’re a bad feminist, you lose your right to advocate for the movement. This is why being a ‘bad feminist’ is problematic. And also, ‘what kind of a name is Baby anyway’. The many different people with different ideologies, all crammed together because they all happen to be women who are thinking ‘nobody puts Baby in the corner’. Take another step into this mess, and you’ll see the problems within feminism. And no, mom, for the hundredth time, I don’t hate men. I want intersectionality to be held up as important. It irritates me every time a female celebrity says “I’m not a feminist, but I do feminist-y things from time to time.” Why? Because I’m a feminist, and I’m a feminist because I want gender equality. So many people hold up placards which tell us why they don’t need feminism, and put those pictures on the internet. When I see their faces, I think “you poor fool”. And everyone is reviled for that opinion, whatever it might be.įeminism is a bad word. But it’s also because Feminism is an important issue that we speak about these days. Part of the reason why I found this book so compelling was that it spoke to me before I even knew what it was about. But I was hooked, and I caught hold of the book for myself, and read it cover to cover. I didn’t even start at the beginning of a chapter. I had no idea what the topic of the book was. I first started reading Bad Feminist on a friend’s kindle, at random. While I personally loved this book, I also looked at a couple of critical reviews about it, and I might link or mention them in passing while I’m reviewing this one. Plot Description: A non fiction book of essays by Roxane Gay about feminism.

Bad feminist author