I actually requested this audiobook by Mikki Kendall from my library last month and forgot about it. Then George Floyd was killed and riots erupted and requests for anti-racist literature skyrocketed and that’s when I got to the top of the list for this audiobook. It seemed extra appropriate, so I quickly downloaded and listened to it (it’s a very quick read).
I did learn a lot from this book, but there were a couple things that confused me, specifically her claim that gun control needs to be on the feminist agenda. Isn’t it already on the feminist agenda? What about Moms Demand Action? Yes, women of color are more likely to be killed by stray bullets not intended for them, but Kendall also points to the role guns can (and often do) play in domestic violence, but isn’t that an issue that affects white women as much as WOC? Domestic violence doesn’t care about race or money. It happens at all levels of society, including white, affluent homes.
I felt like a lot of the issues she brings up in this book are issues that liberals generally tend to support, but maybe I’m confusing feminism with other left-leaning policies and attitudes. Maybe I just live in a bubble where the feminists I talk to tend to support these policies already. Kendall does talk a bit about conservative white feminists, but I don’t consider them to be feminists and I don’t think most of them think of themselves as feminists either.
Nevertheless, even when she does talk about issues I already support, it’s always good to hear about them from someone who has been directly impacted by them.
I also appreciate that she devoted the last section of the book to a couple ways in which she has failed other minority communities, specifically transgender folks. It’s always good to get a model of what it looks like to recognize your mistakes and try to correct them. It also helps portray Kendall as a flawed human who is constantly learning and growing, instead of some all-knowing guru with all the answers to fixing every kind of oppression and inequality.
Kendall also narrates the audiobook herself, and while she wasn’t my favorite narrator, she did OK. Besides, it’s always nice to listen to memoirs and nonfiction books in the author’s own voice. This one is a bit of both. Kendall backs up all of her claims with facts and statistics, but she also talks about how certain issues impacted her personally, which made for a very compelling read.