“Hood Feminism” & The Dangers Of Anti-Politics.

First, I must start off by saying that I think Mikki Kendall’s collection of essays “Hood Feminism: Notes From The Women That A Movement Forgot,” is all around a solid collection of essays. Many things are talked about, such as Kendall’s life experiences, to Kendall’s takes on various Twitter drama. Kendall points out that our society takes problems more seriously when they are affecting white people. Usually these are things that have already affected the black community for decades, but the white feminist community was often silent until the issues started to affect white women. Kendall also brings up the struggles of indigenous, Latinx, LGBTQ, Muslim, and the impoverished, and points out that they too are often left behind by the white feminist movement. Kendall does a good job outlining this approach to intersectional feminism.

It is fair to say that this book centered more around anti-politics: the reaction against or rejection of the practices or attitudes associated with traditional politics. This book focused more on lived experiences and struggles within the black community, rather than specific public policies or legal systems that hinder marginalized communities. This certainly can be a good thing, as public policy and legal case studies can bore people. While I personally might be more interested in learning about public policy and politics, I am in favor of an all of the above approach to fighting against racism and our white supremacist system. Different people are looking for different types of media, and if someone is looking for a great overview of the legal systems of white supremacy in the United States, I’d recommend The New Jim Crow: by Michelle Alexander. If someone is looking for education on public policy, I’d recommend reading progressive news sites, or following and listening to interviews with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Rasheeda Talib, and/or Ayanna Presley, some of the most successful women of color politicians who share the anti-racist anti-poverty ideology. However, if you are looking for someone to talk about their lived experiences as a woman of color, Kendall is a writer I’d recommend.

However, anti-politics attitudes can be bad too. Think about the BLM movement and the good and bad anti-politics takeaways people had from the movement. The movement itself is nontraditional political action. Throughout my entire childhood, national civil disobedience movements with millions of people throughout our country was something that did not exist for any political issue. Despite the BLM movement being an untraditional form of anti-politics, the movement was great for the country. However, think about some of the anti-politics surrounding some of the BLM movement. People would highlight the violence and property damage of the almost exclusively peaceful BLM movement. People formed militia groups and counterprotested. This is also a form of anti-politics, and a form of anti-politics which I wholeheartedly think has a negative impact on society.

I was most interested in getting to the essay titled “Race, Poverty, and Politics,” as I am very interested in politics. I figured that anything explicitly about politics would focus a little bit more on public policy specifically around race and poverty. The essay starts off in the 90s, briefly running over Clinton’s right wing austerity politics, saying, “the first Clinton administration was almost as aggressively anti-poor people as Reagan’s administration a decade prior. Between Clinton’s “welfare to work” bill and gutting of other social safety nets, it was clear that ending poverty wasn’t actually a priority for his administration.” The failure of the Clinton politics were clearly and concisely outlined, followed by an outline of Trump era and the historical president for white feminist backlash in the face of black success. Next, Brett Kavanaugh and Bernie Sanders get brought up. I would like to post this entire section in its full context, as this is the section of the book which I will be taking issue with.

Hood Feminism passage

“Take The performances that marked Justice Kavanaugh’s rise to the Supreme Court. Images of white women wearing “I stand with Brett” and “Woman for Kavanaugh” T-shirts filled the airwaves during the hearings. Though there were plenty of white men included in his support system (men who famously outnumbered women in one photo app for the “woman for Kavanaugh” buses), the site of a group of ten to fifteen women confidently cutting a path through the protesters to show support for a candidate likely to undermine access not only to reproductive justice, but to healthcare in general, was jarring. They ranged in age from maiden to crone, and yet none of them seemed wise enough to grasp that they were arranging themselves solidly against the rights of all women in favor of propping up the patriarchy. And it’s not just an issue on the right-many of Bernie Sanders’s most fervent supporters were seemingly convinced that verbally attacking anyone of color who criticized him was good politics.

Bernie Bros was the name given to this mix of real supporters and trolls who seemed to haunt social media platforms specifically to aggressively berate anyone who was not a Bernie Sanders supporter. Although some Sanders supporters insisted that the Bernie Bros weren’t real, and they were all trolls, and that the term erased women who supported Bernie, the reality was that the term wasn’t the problem. The problem was that theoretically leftist supporters of Sanders felt comfortable calling black and brown voters “low information” for not supporting their preferred candidate.”

Clarifications and Bernie Derangement Syndrome

I was genuinely confused when I read this. “What does The Brett Kavanaugh hearing have to do with Bernie Sanders supporters?” was my immediate reaction. The Kavanaugh hearings were in 2018, and Bernie did not start campaigning until mid-2019. I originally read the last sentence of the first paragraph as, “And it’s not just an issue on the right-many of Bernie Sanders’s most fervent supporters were seemingly convinced that verbally attacking anyone of color who criticized (Kavanaugh) was good politics.” In reality, there was no coalition of Bernie Sanders supporters online or in real life who supported Kavanaugh, and Bernie Sanders himself opposed Kavanaugh at every point in Kavanaugh’s nomination process.

I instead chose to interpret that sentence as “And it’s not just an issue on the right-many of Bernie Sanders’s most fervent supporters were seemingly convinced that verbally attacking anyone of color who criticized (Bernie Sanders) was good politics.” When interpreted this way, the sentence conforms with reality, whereas the Sanders supporters supporting Brett Kavanaugh interpretation does not conform with reality. Even though interpreting this paragraph as Sanders supporters defending Sanders makes less sense in the context of the paragraph, I must interpret it this way, because Sanders supporters did not defend Kavanaugh.

There is a slang term used online: “(person’s name) derangement syndrome.” This is a pejorative term used to point out when a person has such a negative fixation on another person, that they completely derail unrelated conversations to the person that they hate. As we’ve established, neither Sanders or his supporters supported Brett Kavanaugh. While I don’t think Kendall has Bernie Derangement Syndrome, bringing up Sanders and his supporters in a paragraph that has nothing to do with Sanders or his supporters reminds me of Bernie Derangement Syndrome. It also reminded me of the Anti-BLM people who choose to focus on a few violent people at BLM rallies who are universally denounced by the movement, rather than focusing on the actual serious issues the BLM movement is bringing to the table. Any form of derangement syndrome can often be a bad form of anti-politics that can hinder our intersectional feminist movement, generally by over obsessing about one personality to the detriment of all other issues.

Kendall’s weird double standards for a member of a marginalized group.

Secondly, I want to point out the double standard Kendall has for Jewish candidates in comparison to not Jewish candidates. While I don’t think Kendall is anti-Semitic, I think her fixating on Sanders supporters and not attacking any other Democratic candidates supporters is both strange, and certainly comes close to the anti-Semitic trope of Jewish people being able to control the masses through media. Of course Kendall is not explicitly saying that trope, but that trope is implied by Kendall when she specifically calls out the only Jewish candidates supporters. I definitely don’t think Kendall intended to use an anti-Semitic trope, and I definitely don’t think Kendall has anti-Semitism in her heart. Also, these borderline anti-Semitic tropes were fairly common among various news media personalities, so I can see how Kendall or anyone could uncritically repeat them without thinking about how they harm the Jewish community. However, I was shocked to see that this trope made it through the editing process to a published intersectional feminist collection of essays.

The truth is that yes, there are some Bernie Sanders supporters who are toxic online, and yes, it is a problem. Sanders was asked to denounce and repeatedly denounced some of his supporters who were toxic online. However, all the other candidates also had toxic supporters online and neglected to denounce them. When you look at the numbers, Sanders supporters were no more or less toxic in 2020 than any of the other Democratic candidates supporters, and Sanders supporters were actually statistically less toxic in 2016 than Clinton supporters (possibly because Sanders condemned his toxic supporters and Clinton did not).

There certainly were way more Sanders supporters than Michael Bennett supporters or Amy Klobuchar supporters, so I understand why people have the perception that obnoxious Sanders supporters were everywhere around political discussion. Additionally, the majority of the mainstream media did not support Sanders, and thus were more likely to be targeted by and write about the harassment of Sanders supporters. Certainly if you encountered any one of these toxic Bernie supporters, you may understandably have a negative perception of Bernie supporters as a whole. I feel sad when I see a Sanders supporter with 23, 37, 185, or 177 followers say or imply that black and brown voters are “low information,” but I also feel sad when I see the top MSNBC political analyst say comments like Sanders supporters are “misfit black girls.” If you know me, you know how much these types of online obnoxious political commentators frustrate me. In fact, one of the main goals of my online presence is to have a place where people can talk about politics without getting attacked by anyone.

I am sad that some of the supporters of my preferred candidate were toxic. I am in full alignment with Senator Sanders and denounce Sanders supporters that can people of color “low information,” and any Sanders supporters that harass people online. I also completely disagree with politicians who do not denounce their toxic supporters, such as Clinton, Trump, Harris, Buttigieg, and Bloomberg to name a few. Additionally, I implore people who are serious about stopping online harassment to be aware of people who only dishonestly hold all different candidates and all different candidates supporters to wildly different standards. It was very easy for people to disguise attacks on political candidates they don’t like by disingenuously appealing to issues that we all care about generally, while not holding their own preferred candidate to the same standard. I am totally fine with anyone criticizing Sanders supporters, but we have to make sure we properly contextualize those criticisms, and acknowledge that Sanders was the only candidate in recent memory trying to reduce online harassment from his supporters.

Kendall also dismisses the “Bernie Bro” term as “not a problem.” Bernie Sanders supporters were majority women. Also, in a field of over 20 candidates, Sanders polled better with and got more Latinx votes than any other candidate, and was second among African American voters. I’ve definitely meant women of color who felt as though the term “Bernie Bro” erased them. The term “Bernie Bro” was created by Hillary Clinton in the 2016 campaign as a catch-all term to deflect from all criticism of her from the left. It was a clever way to disregard a majority woman multiracial voting block through tone policing and civility trolling. “Uppity” or “shrill” would have been words used in the past to describe these movements in the past, which Kendall does a good job at addressing in other parts of the book.

Actual racism by actual Democratic politicians in 2020 primary

Kendall often says that she does not want to punch down, and instead wants to punch up. I don’t think that means she can’t criticize the culture of online harassment and toxicity in political discourse online, but I think it is also beneficial to criticize the rhetoric of the politicians themselves. Amy Klobuchar declined to prosecute the infamous murderer and former police officer Derrick Chauvin, Pete Buttigieg said that he wasn’t getting more black supporters because they are homophobic (statistically, black people are equally homophobic to white people), Kamala Harris implemented a policy to imprison the parents of truant students, and Michael Bloomberg implemented stop and frisk, a policy which disproportionately targeted black men. All the candidates apart from Marianne Williamson did not support material reparations for descendants of slaves. All of these things are bad, however, the 2020 election is now over, so let’s focus on the person who won, Joe Biden.

Joe Biden: Of course any politician from the 70s will have a questionable record on racial issues. From the crime bill 94, to the treatment of Anita Hill in 92, to the eulogy to segregationist senator Strom Thurmond, there was plenty to criticize Biden on. During the 2020 primary, he made up a story about going to South Africa when Nelson Mandela was released from prison. But the big question is, how do Joe Biden’s antiquated thoughts on race contribute to his inability to deliver legislatively for marginalized communities?

One of the most important questions of the 2020 primary was, ‘how will you get things done with obstructionist Republicans.’ People who remember the Obama administration will remember his continued efforts to compromise with Republicans. Republicans were unwilling to pass any legislation on any issue, even when Obama proposed right wing ideas such as the individual mandate health insurance system. Sanders and Warren said that there would have to be a grassroots movement of people pressuring legislators to pass legislation to benefit working class people. Regardless of whether or not you think the Sanders/Warren strategy would work, we know Obama’s strategy would not work. In spite of this, Biden’s strategy for working with the Republicans was identical to Obama’s. Even though the Republicans explicitly did not want to work with any Democrats, Biden was insistent that the Republicans would have an “epiphany.” Only this week did Joe Biden finally admit that his strategy was wrong: “I did not anticipate that there would be such a stalwart effort to make sure that the most important thing was that President Biden didn’t get anything done.”

Why does Joe Biden have these beliefs? Is he insane? After all, a definition of insanity is doing the same things over and over and expecting different results. Perhaps he embodies the white savior trope, thinking that he can get things done that a black man cannot. I can’t claim to know Joe Biden’s head or heart, but what I do know is that Joe Biden’s strategy has failed to deliver for the black community on issues of healthcare, voting rights, healthcare, housing, and more.

There were so many important political things to talk about in 2019 and early 2020. It saddens me greatly that Kendall’s only input on the 2020 primary election was to point out that some Bernie Sanders supporters online were obnoxious. I don’t expect incredibly robust and extensive criticism of all the shortcomings of every political candidate, but Joe Biden wasn’t even mentioned. Kendall generally had solid criticisms and was not afraid to punch up in other parts of the book, and I’m disappointed that she seemed to pull her punches in this essay.

Anti-politics

We are finally getting to the reason I’m warning against anti-politics within this book. I am sad that there is so much toxicity among a large percentage of multiple candidates constituencies in 2020, and I’m happy that Sanders denounced his unhinged supporters, and I’m sad that candidates did not denounce their unhinged supporters, the question must be asked, what on earth are we even talking about right now. The title of this essay was “Race, Poverty, and Politics” so I must ask the question: is this really the only thing we should be talking about in relation to Sanders or his political movement? This is the most meta political conversation imaginable. The only commentary given on Sanders is a small subsection of his supporters. It strikes me as an odd thing to take away from the 2020 Democratic primary. Think about the topics in the 2020 debates: climate change, income and wealth inequality, voting rights, healthcare, supreme court picks, living wage, food and housing insecurity, white supremacy, etc. Think about how those issues affect black women in the United States. In fact, if you’ve read Hood Feminism, you probably have a good idea of how important these issues are. In fact, Kendall was in the middle of talking about one of these important issues (the discourse around 2018 Supreme Court pick Brett Kavanaugh,) when she mid-paragraph started to criticize Bernie Sanders supporters in the 2020 campaign.

This obfuscation of omnipresent political issues with extremely meta conversations about the discourse surrounding the supporters of an unrelated political candidate is what I’m referring to when I say anti-politics. I really enjoy reading thoughts and criticisms of Bernie Sanders. I remember listening to Angela Davis of Democracy Now in 2016, and I found her thoughts on Bernie’s lack of vocabulary to properly describe the conditions of white supremacy that we currently live under. This was a huge part of my political awakening. Also, the truth and reconciliation commission for slavery and other forms of legalized oppression in the United States was a tremendous first step, but I would have preferred his campaign have actual material reparations included. Despite many candidates dishonestly attacking Sanders for not including material reparations, Marianne Williamson was unfortunately the only candidate willing to commit to material reparations. I even made this criticism in a video of Bernie Sanders in January 2020, right before the primaries. Criticisms of all candidates are important, and I think criticism of Bernie’s platform in 2016 improved his platform in 2020 due to good faith criticism.

Sanders won over more nonwhite political leaders in 2020, such as representatives AOC, Ilhan Omar, Pramila Jayapal, and Rashida Talib, and even got an endorsement from Jesse Jackson, the most successful Black presidential candidate not named Barack Obama. Some like Michelle Alexander did not endorse any candidate, citing her disagreement with Sanders on reparations, acknowledged that, “No one would have benefited more from Mr Sanders’s political revolution than black people.” The reason these elected officials and civil rights leaders flocked to Sanders was just that, the political movement. The political movement, similar to Jesse Jackson’s rainbow coalition, aimed to solve problems such as “Education,” “Housing,” “Hunger,” and “Gun Violence.” These are also the names of essays in Kendall’s Hood Feminism.

When Kendall talks about the Clintons, she talks about her political disagreements and their punitive attitudes towards the impoverished. When Kendall talks about Sanders, she talks about anti-politics Twitter toxicity. As someone who reviews fantasy books, I understand the power of bringing messages of racial and economic justice to all corners of the internet. While I consider what I do to be anti-politics, my goal is to bring a message of racial and economic justice to people who wouldn’t otherwise see it. While I can’t speak to the intent behind Kendall’s critique of Sanders, her critiques of the Sanders movement are a disempowering form of anti-politics in the realm of real politics. Kendall also used this style of anti-politics in a way which I thought had good effects on online discourse. Criticizing Lena Dunham’s outlandish version of white feminism, and criticizing how the support for victims of gamergate was only offered to the white victims of gamergate are great forms of anti-politics that Kendall engaged in. But I want to implore people who read and agree with Hood feminism to be careful when criticizing political movements. Every political movement is criticizable in one way or another. I think having people like Michelle Alexander and Angela Davis pressure movements from the left will only make their views stronger and sharper, but criticizing a movements civility, decorum, and tone is the oldest trick in the book, and should absolutely not be applied to the Sanders movement, which was no more or less toxic than any other candidates political movement in 2020.

Conclusion

There are so many atrocious best selling books that advocate for horrible politics, and Hood Feminism is not one of them. I feel like Kendall and I have a very similar political agenda. However, I notice a common trend among some of my political allies, who are rightly disillusioned by the political system. I want to propose an ‘all of the above’ style approach to politics, both through traditional and nontraditional methods. I was happy to see Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar make appearances on popular Twitch streams to play the video game “Among Us” and push their progressive political agenda. These streamers and politicians empowered each other. It is okay if people have a less traditional approach to politics, but please, be careful of the political stories you focus on. People like Kendall have potent cultural commentary, and I am sure her commentary on the Sanders platform would make the movement stronger. Instead, she used her platform to disempower the political movement that she seems to most closely align with.