“Pity, taken as a spring of virtue, has proved to possess a greater capacity for cruelty than cruelty itself.”
Hannah Arendt, On Revolution
Morality-Led Identity Politics and the Abundance
of Choice
A while back, a treasured white female American friend
had dinner with myself and my spouse. We hadn’t seen each other for many years,
mainly due to Covid-19 restrictions on travel. We debated a famous black male
comedian’s controversial remarks on identity politics, which related mainly to
the tension between representing feminist, LGBTQI struggles and black struggles
in an equal light.
At some point she remarked that as a black male
he held a position of privilege over black women, which is true enough.
However, she then went on to state that most perpetrators of violence against
black women were black men as though that somehow delegitimized his voice in
such a debate.
It was an indicative slip of the blindness with
which identity politics is deployed in ill-considered invocations of
intersectionality. Afterwards my partner – who is also a white woman –
expressed her reservations about the comment. After all, black men being cast
as misogynists is an age-old stereotype.
Indeed, I thought, “who is responsible for the
abuse of white women then?” While some groups of women are definitely more
vulnerable than others it is also true that gender-based violence does not
exclusively delineate along class or race. It is a societal phenomenon that
impacts everyone, irrespective of which racial or class category one falls
into.
These half-baked invocations of
intersectionality represent precisely what the danger of an exclusively morality-led
identity politics presents. One side is good, the other side is bad and there
is nothing in between. You are either for or against a cause, which precludes
any critical analysis of it. One need not dig deep. Superficially deploying
one’s own moral virtue is deemed an appropriate way of driving social change.
Yet this morality-based, virtue-led approach
oversimplifies the complexity of bringing about social change. Any programme of
societal change must necessarily be inclusive of all those who live within it.
It must be collectivist and relational, not relativist in orientation.
What has crudely been termed “woke culture” may
have progressive ambitions, but there is scarce analysis of the strategies and
tactics that have been deployed by the proponents of it. This piece is
concerned with what is necessary to bring about transformative systemic change
in society that is sustainable; change that goes beyond the momentary assertion
of values in a manner that is cosmetic and superficial, and not foundational in
nature.
It is concerned with how identity politics –
whether relating to race, gender, sexuality, LGBTQI, ethnicity, creed,
indigeneity or any other assertion of identity as othered within Western and/or
traditional societal paradigms – has been cosmetically deployed under the broad
umbrella of “woke culture”. I argue that more is required to actualize the
outcomes that these struggles seek to achieve. It necessitates a deeper
engagement with society and all who constitute it.
Current day progressive identity politics takes
its cue from the foundational ideas of liberal freedoms. The liberal notion of
freedom emphasizes individual liberties. It is rooted in the idea that the
abundance of choice enables individual liberties. In this casting a broader
spectrum of choice enables greater individual freedoms. We are free to choose
between the many different options available to us in the world.
These choices could range from what religion
one adopts, to what one chooses to consume or produce, to what culture one
belongs to, where to live, whom to associate with, how to express oneself, and
in more recent history, whom one can fall in love with or have sexual relations
with, the right to choose what medical procedures one can submit one’s body to,
or whom one can marry under law, among others.
The ‘right to choose’ – loosely speaking – is a
cornerstone of liberal freedoms. It relies on the existence of a variety of
choices being available to an individual. It therefore seems a natural
extension of the liberal notion of freedom that an individual would also be
free to choose whatever identity they prefer irrespective of societally
normative notions of what constitutes identity. This has been particularly
emphasized where gender and sexual identity are concerned.
Debating Identity Politics & Authenticity:
Is Identity a Choice?
Such is the enormity of the societal impact of
the emergence of recent identity politics – particularly the raging social
debates around non-binary gender identities (e.g., such as gender fluidity) and
transgenderism, and especially education of these phenomena in schools – that it
has provoked a profound ‘talking past each other’ between those who occupy
entrenched positions on the matter, whether for or against. Both ‘sides’ view the
matter of whether non-binary gender identities and transgenderism is legitimate
or not as constituting a fundamental threat to their right to choose their own
‘way of life’.
However, the emphasis on the legitimacy of
these social phenomena may be misplaced. I argue that at the heart of this
debate lies a matter not so related to contestation over the legitimacy of the
phenomena in question (e.g., whether non-binary and transgender identities are legitimate),
as much as what it means to choose an identity.
Indeed, is choosing an identity and embodying
an identity at the individual level the same thing?
An identity that is embodied is, without
question, fundamentally authentic because it is not performed (I am
using the term ‘performed’ here to mean ‘acted out inauthentically’). Clearly,
being LGBTQI, for example, is not a choice but is embodied[i].
An identity that is chosen, however, does not necessarily come with the promise
of that authenticity. For example, religious conversion – which can necessitate
difficult decisions such as changing names and/or surgery such as circumcision
– can occur through a constellation of modes. Religious conversion can be
genuinely authentic inspired by a spiritual awakening. However, it can also be undertaken
for convenience (e.g., marriage or to belong to a favoured group), fear of
persecution, emancipation, or for display of superiority and/or exceptionalism.
That is, the choice of a new identity can certainly be authentic, no doubt, but
it does not guarantee authenticity. This is because the choice of identity here
includes the choice to perform an identity, whereas there is no choice
where an embodied identity is concerned. An identity that is embodied is a
state of being that is consistent with its doing. It is not an inauthentic
acting out of an identity.
Moreover, is the collective performance of
change the same as real, fundamental change?
It no doubt can be, but it can also not be, and
therein lies some cause for concern around what shape and form the struggle for
identity politics has taken. There is power in the performative. Judith
Butler’s writing on gender performativity argues that gender norms and roles
are acquired through repetition and imitation of acts and utterances that
reinforce existing gender social norms and structures.
By performativity, Butler is referring to acts,
behaviours and speech utterances that create the very thing they describe
through performance. For example, when a judge in a court of law pronounces a
prison sentence upon someone the utterance of the sentence simultaneously
creates the sentence. She illustrates how gender is similarly produced from
performative utterances, acts and behaviours that are imitated and replicated
in society. That is, she views performativity as the route through which gender
norms are ultimately embodied – i.e., through repetition and imitation – in
society.
Butler’s gender performativity is not to be
misconstrued and simplified as the performance of gender[ii],
however (even though she uses the term in her writing), where performance means
(inauthentically) ‘acting’ out these roles as an actor on a stage would.
Misinterpretation of Butler’s work that gender is merely ‘an act’ of some kind
or another has hence led to criticism of her work that is misplaced. For
example; that Butler’s gender performativity relegates transgenderism to a mere
act is a criticism that she has extensively countered[iii].
A key controversial, philosophical aspect of
Butler’s casting of gender performativity is in her recasting of the
Nietzschean claim that “there is no being behind doing, acting; ‘the doer’ is
merely a fiction imposed on the doing – the doing itself is everything” (Nietzsche, 1887,
p. 29: in Salih, 2002). She recasts this to state that, “there is no gender
identity behind the expressions of gender; that gender identity is
performatively constituted by the ‘expressions’ that are said to be its results”
(Butler, 1990; p. 25: in Salih, 2002)[iv].
In this casting the notion of “being” is eschewed as an essentialist – i.e.,
predominantly biologically essentialist – in relation to gender. Rather, gender
identity is produced through language and does not exist before language.
Gender is essentially ““unnatural”” (Salih, 2002) in this casting; there is no
inner gender ‘nature’ that can be spoken of as inner being or self.
This perspective has raised a series of
philosophical objections and queries from scholars. Benhabib et al. (1995: in
Salih, 2002)[v] claims
that Butler’s performativity effectively rids gender identity of a sense of
agency in which normative gender expressions can be destabilized. Other
scholars argue that Butlers conception of gender performativity is itself
essentialist and that it is a strange move to draw on psychoanalytic theory in
accounting for identity without including the essential “I” that is constituted
through psychoanalysis (Hood & Harrison, 1998: in Salih, 2002)[vi];
that it overly attributes gender to power dynamics, rendering gender identity
unstable (Moi, 1999: in Salih, 2002)[vii];
and that gender identities – particularly in reference to transgendered
identities – are often nonperformative, preferring to be constative and
invested in being in the sense that there is an inner sense of gender that goes
against traditional gender norms (Prosser, 1998: in Salih, 2002)[viii].
The perspective that gender is all doing and
not being is clearly controversial, particularly as it rests largely on a
negation of a biologically rooted gender identity that presents as a sense of
self or being, whereas gender identity needn’t be solely biological or
constructed; it can be both. Indeed, to attribute being as biological in the
case of gender is simply to argue that the essence of gender is actually sex.
Gender, however, is socially constructed through performative acts and speech
utterances that reinforce pre-existing socio-cultural gender norms; hence the
notion of being – in this case – cannot
simply be read as biological essentialism; whether that being is a necessary
fiction or not it may still be essential (Salih, 2002)[ix].
Butler’s mind-body, subject-object dichotomy is
hence problematic on many levels. Yet there is an alternative casting; one that
embraces body and mind (and being and becoming) as a unitary whole in the
Heideggerian and process studies sense and situates being in relation to
becoming instead. In this casting, if we ask the question, “what is constituted
through gender performativity at an individual level” or “what being is
becoming through gender performativity” (i.e., where being and becoming are
unitary, processual and not separate) we can regard individuals as being thrown
into gender as much as they are thrown into the Heideggerian world where
subject and object are inseparable. This view is compatible with a process
studies perspective on being and becoming. This is non-trivial, as when being
and becoming are unitary and inseparable in the Heideggerian sense; how gender
is constituted is not solely produced through its performativity. Rather it is
constituted by simultaneously complex biological, socio-cultural, political and
perhaps other influences that inform gender performativity. So, when it comes
to LGBTQI identity for example, being/self/identity is not necessarily
biological – it can be informed by biology – but it is more accurately
described as what has been constituted in the process of becoming instead. This
view coheres somewhat with critiques of Butler’s performativity that propose
more non-dichotomous conceptions of gender identity such as that proposed by
transsexual gender theorist, biologist and writer Julia Serano (2007)[x].
From a process studies perspective this unitary
subject-object sense of being is relational, able to exert personal and
collective agency (i.e., the power of potentia) in response to the restrictive,
controlling power of authority (i.e., the power of potestas). In this casting,
both the power to restrict and to subvert are mutually in operation, which I
argue is key to actualizing a transformative perspective on gender as it
exists, and as it might be.
Moreover, what is constituted through gender
performativity – at an individual level – is important because the word
‘constituted’ implies a stable identity; without this a person cannot identify
as a socially recognizable identity. Moreover, this stability would, to some
extent, also act as an indicator of authenticity where a consistency between
the inward personal sense of being is congruent with one’s actions in the world
– i.e., where authenticity is cast as in response to Heideggerian thrownness – thereby
reinforcing and stabilizing identity even more in turn.
Accordingly, I argue that authenticity is a
product of consistency between being and doing in the process of becoming. Here,
it is important to note that authenticity is sensed or felt in the experiencing
of it by others. It is something that presents in the complex knot of the senses,
and while it can be inexplicable, it is certainly felt. Authentic leaders, for
example, exhibit strong follower-leader loyalty and bonds.
In general, it is easier to discern
authenticity than it is to discern inauthenticity. This is precisely because
the inauthentic acting out of an identity (which I am calling performance) –
whether by an actor on screen or a person in society – uses the same elements
of Butler’s gender performativity (i.e., imitation and repetition) but
insincerely, whether consciously or not. Thus, the space for inauthenticity of
identity opens up in the performance of it.
It is also important to note that in Butler’s
framing the process of becoming is key to the authentic embodiment of identity.
Even where imitation and repetition (i.e., doing) is not yet aligned with one’s
being – in a process of becoming – an authentic identity can still emerge if
the process of becoming is sincerely engaged with.
When there is insincere engagement with the
process of becoming, however, (i.e., it is an inauthentic performance) it can
be due to a range of motivations. For example, it may be motivated by; a need
to thoughtlessly fit in with a group and/or go along with a trend, and/or a
need to acquire power over others through the performance (e.g., through
attaining moral authority, a sense of one’s own superiority, being desirable
and/or standing out as exceptional). Where the latter motivation – i.e., a need
for the acquisition of power – is concerned, the space for the abuse of
identity politics in society is created.
Hence there is profound vulnerability when
performativity is simply (mis)interpreted as performance, particularly when
this is viewed as a strategy for creating societal change. When we are
uncritical of the performance of change at the individual level then we become
vulnerable to the superficial enactment of collective performance of change at
the societal level. These collective superficial enactments in themselves can
serve to stifle and frustrate real, systemic transformative change.
In a searing article entitled “Decolonization
is not a metaphor” Eve Tuck and K Wayne Yang[xi]
identify what they term “settler moves to innocence” as superficial displays of
reconciliation that colonial settlers employ to evade accountability for their
power and privilege, and the substantive losses that indigenous peoples have
endured through the colonial and postcolonial projects. They define ‘settler
moves to innocence’ as follows:
“Settler moves to innocence are those strategies or positionings that attempt to relieve the settler of feelings of guilt or responsibility without giving up land or power or privilege, without having to change much at all. In fact, settler scholars may gain professional kudos or a boost in their reputations for being so sensitive or self-aware. Yet settler moves to innocence are hollow, they only serve the settler.”
(Tuck & Yang, 2012)
There is a profound parallel in the way in
which identity politics is being mobilized today and the ‘settler moves to
innocence’ that Tuck and Yang (2012) identify as prevalent in decolonial
struggles. In the popular liberal zeitgeist of the moment the right to identify
as ‘othered’ within conventional society has effectively been mobilized as a ‘move
to innocence’ by those who occupy positions of privilege in society.
Take, for example; men who identify as male
feminists and invoke that as proof of solidarity with feminist struggles while
enjoying and leveraging the privileges of patriarchy at the same time, or white
Americans who invoke traces of genetic heritage from native American Indians as
reasonable cause to identify as Native American Indian[xii]
themselves.
These are real social phenomena. The number of
people in the US who identified as American Indian or Alaska Native, for example,
jumped from 5.2 million in 2010 to 9.7 million in 2020, which Circe Sturm,
Professor of Anthropology at the University of Texas puts down to people
claiming a distant native ancestor and/or invoking genetic ancestry test
results as proof of identity[xiii].
These great leaps in fostering new identities are not uncommon and there is nothing new about people seeking to identify with persecuted groups to elevate their status or escape accountability. For example, there are many accounts of Germans who invented Jewish ancestries in the wake of the holocaust thereby conveniently distancing themselves from the horrors of the genocide. The politics of victimhood is complex and multi-faceted.
Generally speaking; there are very many
documented instances of people passing as different religions, ethnicities and
races, for a range of different reasons.
While at an individual level extreme identity
appropriation is often underpinned by deep childhood trauma[xiv],
when the collective performance of change grows significantly it can develop a
popular momentum of its own. It can become fashionable for otherwise privileged
people to identify as an ‘other’ within society while continuing to embody the
privilege they enjoy.
In many cases this boils down to embodying
whiteness while performing otherness. I’m not arguing that people shouldn’t
have the right to identify as othered. I am merely arguing that simply choosing
to identify as an ‘other’ shouldn’t place them above criticism. Identifying as
an other should not provide an easy way of deflecting from the privilege and
power they enjoy in society. This is particularly the case where the collective
performance of the cosmetics of change is concerned.
For cosmetic change – i.e., change that is
collectively performed through changes in language, semiotics and the
production and reproduction of socio-cultural ‘no-go zones’ – is not the same
as fundamental structural, systemic and inter-subjective change that is
sustainable into the long term. Cosmetic change ultimately ends up being
accompanied by a fair amount of virtue-signaling and language policing. This in
turn ultimately serves to stifle and suppress the collective and relational
interactions that are required to produce genuine, fundamental systemic change and
the emergence of a new social compact that is sustainable into the longer term.
Moreover, cosmetic change establishes a power
differential in favour of those who (ostensibly) possess such virtue and hence
engage in language policing of those who (ostensibly) do not. Policing language
as imposition of moral virtue and power, however, is an authoritarian position
(albeit liberal) in that it seeks to shut down expression and debate around how
these phenomena are appraised in society, rather than opening-up dialogue that
can lead to deeper understanding and acceptance of these phenomena.
In any quest or struggle for societal
transformation changes in language are certainly important, but simply changing
language does not bring about deeper systemic, structural and inter-subjective
change that is lasting. At best it serves to establish a ‘cosmetics-of-tolerance’
that provides the illusion of change. At worst it can serve as thin veneer of
change that cloaks the reality that deeper systemic change is not in
fact occurring.
Lessons from South Africa: ‘Rainbowism’ &
The Failures of Cosmetic Change
Indeed, this is precisely the root cause of the
failure of the post-1994 ‘rainbow nation’ narrative that emphasized cosmetic
changes above deeper structural and systemic change that would fundamentally
transform South African society in its transition to democracy. In reality,
cosmetic change served as a bulwark against deeper systemic change. Change was
spoken and not embodied. It stayed at the surface.
The emphasis on cosmetic change resulted in
superficial change that was largely unreflective of both South Africa’s distant
and recent historical past and its reproduction in everyday contemporary South
African life. The past was largely swept under the table as though it isn’t
here with us. Self-proclaimed ‘allies’ to black and brown struggles became
complicit in the continued avoidance of their own roles in reproducing racial
inequalities that still play out in society today. They sought to dictate the
terms of how the past should be resolved instead of doing the hard work of
listening, digesting and reflecting on their own complicity in upholding and
reproducing it. They took on their age-old role of instructing us, even on the
matter of our own liberation.
This morality-led change proved to be divisive
and not inclusive. It was inadequate precisely because it made a claim on moral
authority instead of ceding ground to those whose liberation was the matter at
hand.
Real transformative change goes beyond merely
attributing rights and wrongs. It is systemic in that it necessitates changes
in the structural, cultural and power dynamics that produce and reproduce
inequality. Hence, deeper systemic change can only be produced from engaging
with processes that significantly alter structural, cultural and power dynamics
in the country.
Yet our not-so-recently erstwhile oppressors sought
to now declare themselves our liberators, blissfully unaware that while they
could hold our oppression in their hands, they could never hold our liberation
in them. This was simply a move to reproduce their own primacy in their
interactions with us, as they had produced and reproduced ad nauseum throughout
history.
Central to this was a thinly veiled set of
white moves to innocence to avoid complicity in the deeper, systemic and
structural inequalities that had prevailed throughout history, and continued to
prevail as they disrupted our fragile liberation with meaningless displays of
their own virtue. Changes in language were not accompanied by meaningful
changes in actions. Change was not embodied. It was merely performed.
I recall being lectured by a white female
colleague who provided myself and a black male colleague a ride in the early
2000s (it was a once-off ride from one building to another at our place of
work). She asked me why I had felt entitled to sit in the front seat – as if it
were some kind of prize to be seated next to her – and had not offered it to
the black male colleague that was accompanying us. Ostensibly, I was exhibiting
some form of unconscious bias in doing so. Yet the irony of lecturing a brown
man who had lived twenty years under Apartheid and experienced myriad explicit
and implicit racial humiliations – on matters of unconscious racial bias –
completely escaped her.
I wondered what I was supposed to do in future
should a white female colleague offer me a lift. Was it not enough for me to
simply behave naturally, after many years of having to modify my behaviour
simply due to the colour of my skin? Moreover, if the black male colleague had
taken offence, could he not have simply told me so himself? Perhaps they were
in a relationship and there was an expectation I would ride in the back seat. I
had no idea. The point is, I couldn’t react to a set of hidden rules that were
not adequately expressed until I transgressed them. Problematically, she
appeared oblivious that in her efforts to assert a political correction on a
brown male she had effectively usurped the voice of black male (whom I might
add appeared equally uncomfortable as I did). The situation was too riddled
with contradictions to elaborate further upon. And she was one of the good
people … probably still is.
There are distinct echoes of this ruse of
liberation in the identity politics that prevails today. The underlying premise
is that the amplification of the performance of identity tolerance – most
notably through virtue-signaling – is enough to drive transformative change.
Yet, virtue-signaling is not activism. It is
the anti-thesis of activism. Rather than brokering intersubjective
understanding of an issue of public interest through sincere engagement with
all members of society, it casts judgement upon those who are deemed devoid of
the particular virtue in question.
Towards a Relational and Collectivist Identity
Activism
We live in an era where anyone can proclaim
themselves to be an activist for whatever interest they choose. Yet the hard
work of activism necessitates repeatedly engaging with those whose views differ
from one’s own, opening up dialogues and brokering relationships that drive
deeper systemic and broader societal change. It is fundamentally relational in
nature.
Posthumanist scholarship is of relevance in
this respect because it attempts to decentre the perfectible white Western
Vitruvian male subject as normative within society, opening up avenues for
‘merging’ with the human and non-human other. The eminent posthumanist scholar
and philosopher Rosi Braidotti argues for an ethics of collectivity and
relationality in brokering the posthuman future, one that results in a “renewed
claim to community and belonging” (Braidotti, 2013, p. 191)[xv].
Indeed, the ‘hard work’ of activism proceeds
from an ethics of collectivity and relationality – the active ‘doing’ of both –
and not simply from soapboxing a virtuous moral position that excludes and
delegitimizes those who do not share the same moral position. Morality – which
relies on the deployment of virtues – is, after all, relative (e.g., to evils).
We can all hold very different moral positions depending on our personal
orientation. In contrast, ethics are not relative; ethics are derived from
principles that we can all conditionally agree upon.
Principles underpin the social compact that we
broker as a society precisely because we can all agree upon them. These
principles are explicitly expressed in national Constitutions, but also
implicitly expressed in the broader social compact that we produce and
reproduce in our interactions, our relationality.
A national Constitution essentially represents
the principles that citizens – as a nation – can in large part all agree upon. For
example, on principle – in a democracy – we have agreement on the right to
one’s own views and the right to express them on the condition that they don’t impinge
on the rights of others in society. The boundaries of the right to express
one’s own views are continuously being tested on a case-by-case basis, and the Constitutional
principles that bind us act as the guideposts in this respect.
There are also principles that govern how we
interact relationally. For example, treating each other as we ourselves would
like to be treated, for example; inclusively and with respect. We recoil when a
stranger, or even an acquaintance or friend, treats us disrespectfully or
excludes us when we expect to be included, and consider this to be a reasonable
expectation on principle.
Whether the principles that bind us are
explicit or implicit they are key to brokering a social compact. They need to
be agreed upon by all of society. This agreement is conditional, as principles
have to be weighed up in relation to others, and we may differ on how we may weigh
them up at a personal or group level, which makes it relational at these levels
and subject to debate.
Hence, agreement on what principles govern our
social compact can only be meaningfully brokered through an inclusive,
collective approach that also caters for our relationality. That is how we
broker change that becomes meaningfully embodied within a society, not through
virtue-signaling, canceling those we don’t agree with or excluding individuals
and groups from participating in discussions and debates on matters of personal
and public interest.
This should be relatively easy to understand,
but the hard work of activism does not compare well with the ease with which
one can exert moral authority over others and feel good about oneself by making
others look bad, especially in the climate of the 21st Century.
Correcting the language of colleagues at the
newly sensitized workplace or drinking at the font of a social media induced
dopamine rush by seeking to cancel someone is far easier than sincerely
engaging real people with the care and compassion it takes to genuinely win
them over to a cause. It is far easier to simply put them in a box and
broadcast how superior you are to them; to flex virtue over them as though you
have exclusivity over it.
And for those who already occupy positions of
privilege in society it is far easier to self-righteously pronounce one’s moral
superiority over others (i.e., to merely use the cause to establish one’s own
‘move to innocence’) without having to deal with what it takes to bring about
substantive transformative change and live with the consequences of it.
The political theorist Hannah Arendt warned of
the danger that presents when the passions of virtue enters the realm of
politics. She observed that during the course of the French revolution many of
the leaders belonged to the middle class, but after the revolution they had a
crisis of legitimacy. They didn’t have much in common with the poor so to
compensate they professed having virtues that bound them to the cause of the
poor. She observed that they invested in developing a persona (or mask) of
virtue that presented themselves as being wholly motivated by the cause of the
poor. However, this performance of virtue was in fact a self-serving
fabrication designed to maintain their legitimacy. Soon, they began to sense
hypocrisy amongst each other and then began to purge one another. This
culminated in the reign of terror. As she put it,
“If ‘patriotism was a thing of the heart’, then the reign of virtue was bound to be at worst the rule of hypocrisy, and at best the never ending fight to ferret out the hyprocrites.”
Hannah Arendt, On Revolution
We need more than superficial displays of
activism and privileged posturing to bring about real substantive change in
society. We need people who care enough about all of society to engage with
everyone in it, patiently hear them on their terms, and compassionately engage
with them over the differences we have. Only through engaging with the reality
of what activism really is in a diverse society can we forge a new social
compact that is relationally brokered and collectively embodied by our society.
If there is an object lesson that we can draw
from the cosmetics of ‘rainbowism’ in the early days of South Africa’s new
democracy it is that those who are othered within society need be extremely
careful about the allies they embrace in their struggles. For the embrace of
superficial allies can ultimately prove more insidious, stifling and
constrictive to these struggles than those who simply know no better, can be
forgiven for it, and can be won over with time and effort.
End
Disclaimer:
Views presented in
this article are solely that of Camaren Peter and do not reflect the
views of the University of Cape Town, the Graduate School of Business, or the
Centre for Analytics and Behavioural Change NPC.
This piece has been lightly edited after first posting it on the morning of 6 March 2023. Moreover, a reference was omitted and is included here for completeness.
Nietzsche, Friedrich [1887] On the Genealogy of Morals (Zur Genealogie der Moral), trans. Douglas Smith, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.
[i]
See: https://theconversation.com/stop-calling-it-a-choice-biological-factors-drive-homosexuality-122764
[ii]
See: https://d-shultz.medium.com/mis-understanding-gender-performativity-40193562135a#:~:text=Gender%20performativity%20is%20commonly%20misunderstood,as%20a%20performance%20on%20stage
[iii]
See: https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/2009-judith-butler-on-gender-and-the-trans-experience-one-should-be-free-to-determine-the-course-of-one-s-gendered-life
[iv] Butler,
Judith (1990; Anniversary edition 1999) Gender Trouble: Feminism and the
Subversion of Identity, New York: Routledge – In: Salih, S. (2002) On Judith
Butler and Performativity. Originally part of chapters 2 and 3 in Judith
Butler.
[v] Benhabib,
Seyla, Judith Butler, Drucilla Cornell and Nancy Fraser (1995) Feminist
Contentions: A Philosophical Exchange, London: Routledge – In: Salih, S. (2002)
On Judith Butler and Performativity. Originally part of chapters 2 and 3 in
Judith Butler.
[vi] Hood
Williams, John and Wendy Cealy Harrison (1998) “Trouble With Gender,” The
Sociological Review 46 (1): 73–94 – In: Salih, S. (2002) On Judith Butler and
Performativity. Originally part of chapters 2 and 3 in Judith Butler.
[vii] Moi,
Toril (1999) What Is a Woman? and Other Essays, Oxford: Oxford University Press
– In: Salih, S. (2002) On Judith Butler and Performativity. Originally part of
chapters 2 and 3 in Judith Butler.
[viii]
Prosser, Jay (1998) Second Skins: The Body Narratives of Transsexuality, New
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Performativity. Originally part of chapters 2 and 3 in Judith Butler.
[ix] Salih,
S. (2002) On Judith Butler and Performativity. Originally part of chapters 2
and 3 in Judith Butler. URL: http://www2.kobe-u.ac.jp/~alexroni/IPD2020/IPD2020%20No.2/Salih-Butler-Performativity-Chapter_3.pdf.
[xi]
Tuck, E. & Yang, K.W. (2012). Decolonization is not a metaphor.
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[xii] See: https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2021/03/krug-carrillo-dolezal-social-munchausen-syndrome/618289/
[xiii]
See: https://edition.cnn.com/2022/11/05/us/sacheen-littlefeather-native-identity-cec/index.html
[xiv] See: https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2021/03/krug-carrillo-dolezal-social-munchausen-syndrome/618289/
[xv]
Braidotti, R. (2013). The Posthuman. Polity Press, Cambridge: USA.
