Barbara Smith, one of the women who drafted the original Combahee statement, pointed out in 2015 that they hadn’t come up with the term ‘identity politics’ to exclude anybody, only to get themselves included.
Yet the phrase was seized on by conservative commentators and has mutated to acquire a pejorative sense
What began as self-proclamation has become a charge levelled by the designator at the participant.
The participant makes an assertion of oppression, and a claim for fair treatment; the designator makes the accusation that the participant isn’t really oppressed, just making an unreasonable demand for treatment that is not so much fair as special.
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