I am a feminist, but I don’t just stand for women who look like me

A cosmetics company SK-II launched a campaign earlier this week called “#changedestiny.”

Like projects such as Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty and Aerie’s Real campaign, #changedestiny seeks to empower Asian women; however, instead of focusing on issues of representation and body image, the brand focuses upon the labeling of women in Chinese society and essentially self worth.

A screencap from the video ‘SK-II: Marriage Market Takeover’

The excerpt focuses on unmarried Chinese women over the age of 25, commonly referred to as “Leftover Women.” In the Chinese culture, according to the docu-film, it is important to marry young and to find a good husband, or else the parents will seek a marriage through a different route: marriage markets. These “markets” work like a IRL Craigslist, in which parents will exchange biographies of their sons and daughters, making exchanges and deals in order for their children to tie the knot.

As a feminist, this concerned me.

As Americans – and generally as Westerners – we are so lucky to live in a society where women have greater rights to self-autonomy and individualism. We can pursue careers in STEM, the social sciences, art, and entertainment; we can get married at an older age, and have it viewed as being wise and responsible; we can speak openly about our experiences, without fear of being hushed.

Sadly, not every woman has the opportunity to live according to their intrinsic wants and needs, and must subscribe to rules dictated by society and culture.

However, upon sharing this post on Facebook – my social media soapbox of choice – I received a comment from one of my close friends, pointing out the fallacy in my argument.

She argued that the “lens through which we view culture can skew our perception of these issues” and that there was a danger to my impassioned post.

Through my eyes, I saw individuals being put down for simply wanting to live freely from the oppressive chains bound to Chinese women by their culture. But was I truly seeing the situation as clearly as I thought?

Although I empathized with these women, I could never experience their plight or their pain. I could never feel the societal and cultural pressures that they face, or the blatant discrimination encounter.

Why?  Because I have privilege.

I live in a society where I have the right to make my own choices, have the ability to speak freely, and access to resources that my global sisters may not.

I am not discriminated by the color of my skin; I am not limited by the place I grew up in.

I will never know what it means to be a Chinese woman, nor will I know what it means to be a Black woman, a Latina woman, a Transgender woman, or a woman of any background other than my own.

The goal of feminism isn’t to just heighten the standard of life for one subset of women, but for all women, taking into account their culture and their experiences. All women’s issues are worthy of discussion and that is why it is important to create a platform where all women’s voices can be heard, not just the elite or the Western.

A much younger and less woke version of me in 2011

However, this has been a prevalent issue in American culture. Minority feminists feel their voices being hushed because of the overwhelming noise caused by celebrity “activists” such as Taylor Swift and her controversial “Girl Squad” and Lena Dunham’s HBO hit show Girls‘s lack of ethnic and economic diversity.

We as a society are constantly bombarded by the Hollywood idea of feminism, rather than what it truly is.

I am a feminist, but I don’t just stand for women who look like me. Feminism is intersectional: it crosses the boundaries of race, culture, and gender that seem to divide us by bringing humanity together under the concepts of equality and justice.

I am white. I am a feminist. But I am not a “White Feminist.”