On Speaking Out and Receiving Backlash

Someone reached out to me this week to ask about backlash / negative reactions when speaking up and out about gender-based violence. I told the truth: it comes with the territory, but not always in the way you think.

There are different types of activists and different ways we speak up. Some of us share our personal experiences, some take the megaphone and lead from the front, some battle it out through affidavids and court documents, others in legislative and policy advocacy. Each way brings with it a different response and some of that will always be negative.

I recently started reading June Jordan's book: 'Life As Activism' and I am sure, even though she is held up as a feminist icon now, that back in her day, she experienced some of what author Sara Ahmed calls 'Feminist Killjoy'. Ahmed writes in the blog post 'Setting The Table, Some Reflections on Why Tables Matter':

"Killjoy Truth: To Expose a Problem is to Pose a Problem.

- You might be told you are being divisive or difficult. That you have ruined the dinner or the atmosphere. And once you are known as a feminist, the one who exposes a problem, you don’t even have to say anything. You just have to open your mouth and eyes start rolling, as if to say, she would say that, she will say that."

I shared with this person that one of my more painful memories about my late brother was realising after he passed that he had unfriended me on Facebook. His girlfriend said it was because I was always responding seriously to his 'jokes', some of which were misogynist. I was boring, too serious, I was killing his FB joy. As much as that hurts, the jokes were still wrong. Needed to be disrupted, corrected, pointed out.

There is, of course, a whole other thread about the very real danger of speaking out, of death threats and security issues and more. But for now, I am acknowledging that there are also more personal ways we are rejected that hurt. I offered this advice to her: find a tribe, even just one other person. I have a whole bunch of fellow killjoys I trade complaints with regularly when things get to much. We are, always, stronger together.

**Link to blog post by Sara Ahmed: https://feministkilljoys.com/2024/06/28/setting-the-table-some-reflections-on-why-tables-matter/