A review by e_flah
White Tears / Brown Scars: How White Feminism Betrays Women of Color by Ruby Hamad

challenging informative reflective

“Whiteness is and has always been fluid: to be white is less a state of biology and more a state of proximity to formal power, of access to an exclusive club.”

White Tears/Brown Scars: How White Feminism Betrays Women of Color was an impactful and compellingly written book. The chapters cover a broader variety of topics than the title suggests -- there's the history of how negative stereotypes about women of color were constructed using whiteness and the patriarchy, a present-day look at the methods white women use to stifle women of color's voices, and an analysis of how colonialism props up the status quo. I found the organization of the content a bit confusing at times and would have loved if each chapter had a slightly narrower focus. That said, I learned a lot about the long history of white women using their power to discredit and harm women of color. There's a lot of great information in White Tears/Brown Scars and I would definitely recommend giving this a read.

“Strategic White Womanhood is a spectacle that permits the actual issue at hand to take a back seat to the emotions of the white woman, with the convenient effect that the status quo continues unabated.”