Feminism without Feminists Summary

This article provided a lot of insight and research to examine the influence that gender, race, and social class has on the opinions of people on particular shows, movies, and other sources of media. The specific show the research focuses on is the popular TV series Sex And The City. From the gathering of data and citing of past research, it was concluded that gender, race, and social class all had major impacts on personal opinions. Throughout the article, Kim references interviews with various fans of the TV show and their personal opinions. The fans interviewed varied in social class, gender, and race with the vast majority finding the show offensive or unjust. Several fans believe that the show's main characters are all upper middle-class, heterosexual women and that their everyday lives and interactions with one another are a privilege of their class and wealth. It is also believed that the show discriminates, because biological women are higher in the hierarchy than transgender women, and the SATC women are not attracted to men who have become homosexuals or that lack wealth. It is also stated that bisexual, lesbian, and gay characters are clearly dominated by heterosexual people. Pregnancy and maternal instincts are also depicted throughout the show in a variety of ways. The show was praised that motherhood is shown as a learning experience rather than a maternal instinct. More opinions are referenced throughout the article, which provide valid arguments to why the show could be realistic, or offensive and belittling. Many believe the show portrays feminism as a lifestyle rather than a political ideology. The article also provides a quick history of Feminist theory and how the first civil rights movement mainly benefited middle-class white women. Black women and women of color benefited from their own movements as white feminists did not address the issue of race or class. This idea was grouped with SATC as it is sometime considered “too white” and middle-class women are the dominant group. Overall, the article was quite interesting. It was very fascinating to see how people of different classes, races, and genders brought up different arguments as to why SATC was either positive or negative. I will not be able to watch a television show the same again, as I will be thinking of ways the depiction of characters or settings could be offending certain groups of people.  To be fair, TV producers look to air shows that will receive the most viewers, not necessarily the shows that are the most politically correct. Even today, I see changes in the shows that are aired on TV. Instead of the older shows in which the main characters are all men or all white people, there are shows such as Blackish or two broke girls in which all the main characters are of color or are women.