Tatum Savage

By Tatum Savage, written May 2025

The following article was initially written as a paper for an entry level Gender Studies course in 2025, before I knew how to properly annotate in the APA format, or write a formal paper. I have not adjusted the errors in the APA formatting to provide a benchmark of my improvement in the future.

Modern feminist movements require a specific, intentional focus on intersectionality to grow momentum. Intersectionality is the purposeful consideration of the different social positions likely to impact a person’s experience in life, such as race, sex, and gender (Bauer et al, 2021) In current practice, much like historical feminist movements (Hallgren & St. Julien, 2021), we repeatedly see heterosexual, able-bodied white women as the primary voices and beneficiaries of intersectionality. (Zakaria, 2021) Initially born from “the Afro-American women’s continuous life-and-death struggle for survival and liberation” (BlackPast, 2012), intersectionality has been watered down by mainstream culture to be more palatable and attractive to white folks, and has lost much of its original purpose in the process. (Zakaria, 2021) Despite this, intersectionality remains vital to the future success of feminism, as seen by movements like trans-exclusive radical feminism, which views women through the singular, incomplete lens of biological sex. Trans-exclusive, also known as gender critical feminism, additionally harms women who do not adhere to its rigid expectations of female gender expression. (Lu, Christina T., 2020)

Perceived as an awkward fat girl for most of my adolescence, I was near the bottom of the social hierarchy that surrounded me in my predominantly thin, white town, and did not feel seen or represented in school or the community at large. Media of the late 90s and early 2000s pushed the same thin, white narrative, and made it clear that being fat was a personal failing I could never overcome, even as a child. Seeing fat women consciously considered in anything felt empowering; when I discovered fat feminists, it was revolutionary.  It was normal for me to see and hear explicitly from white people; my extended family was entirely white, and all adults in positions of authority, like teaching, Girl Guides, and medicine, were white as well. The only time my skin colour was a topic of conversation was after a bad summer sunburn–I didn’t have to consider my whiteness because my all white surroundings subtly powered it. There was no call to question why the feminist voices I was so fond of were exclusively white women until young adulthood.

Many of the fat feminist women I had grown to admire mirrored traditionally white gender expectations. (Chabot-Hamden, 2022) They were heterosexual, with large breasts, small waists, and big bums, often made up meticulously, along with beautiful, long, blown-out hair. I cut off and suppressed significant parts of myself to mirror this image, which had provided me with a comfortable illusion of power and safety. As long as I remained traditionally feminine and attractive to men, I felt some semblance of control and power. 

When I began to explore my gender expression, there was a notable change in how I was treated in society. Being the fat friend meant I’d never been swarmed by attention, but even so, the attention I was paid from men completely dropped off. At first, this indifference caused much pain; I struggled to understand how a buzz cut and button-down shirts had made me invisible.  As time went on, that pain grew into a different kind of power, as I realized being seen as undesirable or uninteresting to these men meant the behavioural performance of feminism was no longer needed socially. There was freedom in that. 

As I continued to push back against the thin, heterosexual, white environment of my upbringing, my internal sense of power was fueled less and less by structures dependent on the approval of straight, white men (Hussain, 2025). This revelation helped me to further see that all modern struggles for liberation are intersectional and connected, as current social structures in North America are framed by white male approval. (Kendall, 2002) If a woman of substantial privilege could feel significant relief from removing only one obligation to straight white men, I could only imagine the power and sense of autonomy it would return to individuals significantly marginalized by this system.

Intersectionality, as it was initially defined and practiced, needs to be at the forefront of feminism moving forward. If white women like me continue the trend of freedom and liberty for us alone, feminism will fail its mission. (Zakaria, 2021) White people who claim to be intersectional feminists must actively seek out and elevate the perspectives and voices of women who do not hold the same kind of power and influence that being born white provides. The increased support for women marginalized by the white power structure will ensure that modern feminism can withstand growing pressures and increase momentum within these communities.

References

Bauer, G. R., Churchill, S. M., Mahendran, M., Walwyn, C., Lizotte, D., & Villa-Rueda, A. A. (2021). Intersectionality in quantitative research: A systematic review of its emergence and applications of theory and methods. SSM – Population Health, 14, 100798. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmph.2021.100798

Billups, S., Thelamour, B., Thibodeau, P., & Durgin, F. H. (2022). On intersectionality: Visualizing the invisibility of Black women. Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications, 7(1), 1-8. https://doi.org/10.1186/s41235-022-00450-1

BlackPast, B. (2012, November 16). (1977) The Combahee River Collective Statement. BlackPast.org. https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/combahee-river-collective-statement-1977/

Chabot-Hamden, Jessie (2022) “The Body Positivity Movement as the Master’s Tools”. Tulips: The Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies Undergraduate Journal. https://ojs.lib.uwo.ca/index.php/tulips/article/view/15416

Crenshaw, Kimberle () “Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics,” University of Chicago Legal Forum: Vol. 1989: Iss. 1, Article 8. Available at: http://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/uclf/vol1989/iss1/8

Hallgren, E., St. Julien, J. (2021) The Gaps of White Feminism and the Women of Color Who Fall Through. NewAmerica.org. https://www.newamerica.org/the-thread/the-gaps-of-white-feminism-and-the-women-of-color-who-fall-through/

Hussain, Y., & Findlay, K. (2025). Understanding the power dynamics affecting black and minority ethnic females in leadership roles. Women’s Studies International Forum, 109, 103066. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2025.103066

Kendall, Francis E. (2002). Understanding White Privilege: What is White Privilege? American University. https://www.american.edu/student-affairs/counseling/upload/understanding-white-privilege.pdf

Lu, Christina T., “A computational approach to analyzing and detecting trans-exclusionary radical feminists (TERFs) on Twitter” (2020). Dartmouth College Undergraduate Theses. 165. https://digitalcommons.dartmouth.edu/senior_theses/165

Zakaria, Rafia (2021). Against White Feminism: Notes on Disruption. W. W. Norton Company. https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/white-women-need-to-reckon-with-their-privilege-to-save-feminism-argues-author-1.6335505