“Bad Feminist” by Roxane Gay

This was my first time reading a whole book by Roxane Gay. I already suspected that I would like it since I’ve read her articles and essays before, but I really appreciated being able to take a deep dive into her mind this this.

While the essays in this book range from her life to pop culture, the main topic is about the title, Bad Feminist. To Gay, a feminist in this day and age has turned into a certain sort of person and a certain sort of woman. Feminists are supposed to be militant, angry, and strictly independent. You are either someone who falls into this category and is a feminist, or you are not.

Gay is not this kind of feminist, and she acknowledges this. In fact she wholeheartedly embraces it. She knows that the fact that she wants a family and kids seems “un-feminist” and that a number of her ideas outlined in these essays are “not feminist.” But she’s discussing them and explaining her opinions anyways. I think that this acknowledgment makes her work all the more engaging because, honestly, who is a “good feminist” these days? And more importantly, if you are a “good feminist” are you a good person? Not to say that you can’t be both, but in my experience the people I meet who are stereotypical feminists are usually following this image because they think that’s what they’re supposed to do, not because that’s who they really are. Which is fine, and sometimes is necessary in order to discover who you are, but a lot of these people seem to lose touch with their own opinions along the way.

Most valuable, to me, were her thoughts on race. She discusses numerous times how media portrays Black people primarily as slaves or servants, when really all she wants is a movie about happy Black people. And this dearth of material then leads to them accepting anything that comes their way, even if it isn’t good. Which can be said of many marginalized communities, but it is most striking for the Black community. Also I know I do not see reviews of movies featuring Black actors that are written by a Black author very often, so I quite appreciated those essays.

In short, I thought this was an excellent book. Gay is welcoming and approachable and explains all of her ideas so well. You can’t help but agree with her nearly every step of the way, and relate to her experiences of trying to make it as a Black, female author in a white male world. White people need to step it up as allies in order to make this world a more welcoming place to people of other races.