Take Your Boobquake And Shove It

I'm sure anyone reading this has heard about Boobquake, which is just a self-aggrandizing bit of culturally problematic slacktivism in response to an Iranian cleric's remarks that womens' immodesty causes earthquakes.

There are a lot of good posts about why Boobquake is both stupid, racist, and offensive, but the best is probably this at SwitchingToGlide:

"I was initially intrigued by the idea as a sort of campy and playful way to collectively disprove an idea, but after about 5 minutes of perusal, it became glaringly apparent that this North American response to an Iranian cleric was more about Islamophobia and ethnocentrism than the rights of Muslim women. The events are a vector for the co-option of feminist rhetoric to further objectify women, and a demonstration of the smug North American sense of moral and developmental superiority over those “other” brown folks in the Middle East."

The author made a very good point about the huge amount of viral support for Boobquake compared to the lack of attendance at a protest against Quebec's racist, sexist Bill 94 which bans the niqab in a ton of situations and is basic religious oppression at its worst.  I saw a lot of western feminists whine at this comparison - obviously we can't all get our asses to Quebec to protest, whereas clicking on a Facebook link is easy -  but the author's point still stands.  Boobquake isn't just popular because it's easy "activism" - it's popular because it cuts across ideological lines to condemn and mock another culture and religion, one that is widely feared and derided in the west.

It reminded me of a recent episode in the Polyamorous community where an Ugandan columnist derided polyamory and all of our favorite Polyweekly contributors such as Datan0de and Joreth went to comment in the most wrong-headed, culturally-insensitive, and privileged way possible.

The issue isn't whether or not in both cases the remarks that spawned the furor weren't bigoted or sexist, as they obviously were.  I'm not a complete cultural relativist.  But the way largely-white, western activists single out displays of misogyny from other countries instead of critiquing the far more accepted versions in Canada and the US is seriously problematic.  It is of no surprise to me that the instigator of Boobquake identifies as an atheist activist, as does Joreth - if there is ever a group that will engage in racist cultural supremacy in the name of their (lack of) religion, it's that one.  I know that's quite a bombshell to drop at the end of the post, but trust me, the post about how atheist activism needs to get the fuck out of my feminism and anti-oppression work will be coming shortly.