… intersectionality’s intellectual flaws translate into moral shortcomings. Importantly, it is blind to forms of harm that occur within identity groups. For a black woman facing discrimination from a white man, intersectionality is great. But a gay woman sexually assaulted by another gay woman, or a black boy teased by another black boy for “acting white”, or a Muslim girl whose mother has forced her to wear the hijab will find that intersectionality has no space for their experiences. It certainly does not recognize instances in which the arrow of harm runs in the “wrong” direction — a black man committing an antisemitic hate crime, for instance. The more popular intersectionality becomes, the less we should expect to hear these sorts of issues discussed in public.
Perhaps the most pernicious consequence of intersectionality, however, is its effect on the culture of elite college campuses. Some claims about “campuses-gone-crazy” are surely overblown. For instance, judging from my experience at Columbia, nobody believes there are 63 genders, and hardly anyone loves Soviet-style communism. (That said, the few communists on campus tend to despise intersectionality with an unusual passion.) But one thing is certainly not exaggerated: intersectionality dominates the day-to-day culture. It operates as a master formula by which social status is doled out. Being black and queer is better than just being black or queer, being Muslim and gender non-binary is better than being either one on its own, and so forth. By “better”, I mean that people are more excited to meet you, you’re spoken of more highly behind your back, and your friends enjoy an elevated social status for being associated with you.
In this way, intersectionality creates a perverse social incentive structure. If you’re cis, straight, and white, you start at the bottom of the social hierarchy — especially if you’re a man, but also if you’re a woman. For such students, there is a strong incentive to create an identity that will help them attain a modicum of status. Some do this by becoming gender non-binary; others do it by experimenting with their sexuality under the catch-all label “queer”. In part, this is healthy college-aged exploration — finding oneself, as it were. But much of it amounts to needless confusion and pain imposed on hapless young people by the bizarre tenets of a new faith.
Coleman Hughes, “Reflections on Intersectionality”, Quillette, 2020-01-13.
December 2, 2024
QotD: Intersectionality on campus
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