The Feminifesto Seminar Club: Session 15

With the lockdown keeping all of us at home, this was our second Feminifesto Seminar Club meeting that took place online. A smaller group – Bhavana, Kirthi, Suraksha, and Vaishnavi – attended. The session began with a short check-in to see how everyone is doing under lockdown, and to get a feel of things on ground in each one’s vicinity. Suraksha, as an intern with the International Organization for Migration shared some insights on the way COVID-19 has affected refugees and migrant populations around the world.

We then went on to watch Roxanne Gay’s TED Talk, Confessions of a Bad Feminist. It was an eye-opening and powerful talk, because it helped us not only introspect but to also acknowledge that while the right to exercise one’s choice is feminist, not every choice one may make is necessarily feminist. It was particularly interesting to see how there were some everyday life choices that Roxanne Gay herself talked about, that felt intensely relateable and even reassuring. We then looked at ways in which our lives are centered around notions of guilt and how that operates with cancel culture in place.