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Feminism is in trouble. Underneath a veneer of supporting women, there's too much navel-gazing over which women deserve to be protected and which women deserve to be blamed and hated.
Misogyny is the oldest form of bigotry. It is the original form of oppression. Cultures from around the world, across time, decided that women were inferior so that men could control, rape and abuse, all in isolation.
Intersectionality is important for feminism, because misogyny is so entrenched into all sorts of different societies that it also is entrenched into every other form of bigotry, too. Every woman that happens to be part of a different oppressed group too has specific extra examples of specific misogyny that she faces because of that intersection.
That begs the question: can misogyny even be erased before every other kind of bigotry and hatred is erased? Or can no other form of bigotry be erased until misogyny is defeated?
It's interesting just how intersectionality has both the power to bring all women together of all different female lived experiences - but also the power to ensure that there can never be any form of class consciousness for women at all.
How can there be class consciousness and solidarity for all women when there are both white women that gloss over black women's lived experiences at one end, and then lesbians who victim-blame straight women for the abuse they receive at the hands of male romantic partners on the other?
Actual feminism is incredibly hard. Actual feminism means supporting and advocating for all women, not just women you like. It means offering a hand to women who have previously spat at you, or hated and abused you. Women who have been misogynistic or who promoted misogyny. Women that you otherwise (even rightly) hate. It means women who are oppressed in other ways, too, standing shoulder to shoulder with women who are part of oppressor classes because we're all women.
Especially in online spaces, it seems like the bar to be a feminist is to hate men, maybe prioritise and care for some groups of women (aside from using all women as statistics to justify hating men to focus on men again), and, if lucky, possibly a few scan-reads of some foundational texts, and then that's good enough to become a sudden shield to use so that it becomes safe again to make up some new misogynistic slurs. So that it's acceptable to understand that female socialisation is the cause for some anti-feminist behaviours, but it's all those evil women's faults and their free choices to attack and hate others depending on the narrative.
It's obvious that in online spaces, so many that describe themselves as "feminist" come from TRA spaces, because they have hierarchies of women in mind, fuck you, [identity label] woman, stupid fucking handmaiden, you get what you fucking deserve. It's just a remapping of prioritising men to prioritising certain women, like feminism is a new religion instead of a difficult movement with difficult and uncomfortable inner work, even before that has to translate to offering actual solidarity to all women that isn't just lip service.
If you call yourself a feminst, be honest with yourself: are you actually a feminist, or do you just like how the title sounds?