The @feminist Instagram Scandal: Allyship or Ownership?
Recently, it’s been brought to light that one of Instagram’s most popular feminist pages, @feminist, with a following of 6.5 million, was run by two cis men — which begs the question, is this allyship or ownership?
While yes, men can be feminists too, feminist allyship falls silent when the true identities of those running the account are a secret to the public. We discuss why this is problematic in our podcast episode entitled, “why the @feminist instagram account was problematic.”
When you search social media for feminist content and find an Instagram account with millions of followers and posts that speak on specific experiences, the last thing you expect is for two white cis men to be the curators behind it all. You don’t expect to be deceived while giving your support to a movement. But that is the case if you’re following this controversial Instagram page.
First, let’s focus on the Instagram account’s handle, a very popular username that many would search for in order to find feminist material and information. It’s worth noting that this Instagram handle doesn’t include any special characters in its name. It’s the most basic, all-encompassing name to use for a feminist account, and they own it — meaning, these cis men got there first in the race for the best feminist Instagram username. But why did they do this? Are they allies or did they see an opportunity and jump on it?
We here at she. first uncovered this information in the early months of 2020, based on a very unknown Medium article by Sam Sedlack for Slay The Patriarchy in 2018. However, the original article has since been removed but currently exists on Sedlack’s website. This article should have been a lot more widespread, considering the Instagram account’s popularity so we were compelled to find out more about this revelation.
After further investigation, our findings confirmed that this not-so-known information was indeed true. An account targeted to women and women’s empowerment was completely run by two cis businessmen, Tanner Sweitzer and Jacob Castaldi, who used the Instagram account for profit along with other pages such as @itsfeminism, @march, and @chnge.
Since being exposed, many on social media have argued that this is an example of allyship and that feminists can be men too, and while this is true, this is not what’s problematic.
The issue is that their attempt at allyship was secretive which is not allyship.
Using a Feminist Platform as a Profitable Opportunity
The term “ownership” in this article refers to the profitable market that these men sought after. The feminist page was not born out of allyship, it was born for potential revenue and they knew it would gain momentum from women seeking feminist content.
Allyship would mean giving this platform over to women and underrepresented groups to run and create content for. In addition, this account also doesn’t create original content but instead, curates the work of artists and activists online. This has also garnered some negative attention for the Instagram account in recent years when they re-posted the original work of others on social media without crediting them for it — essentially profiting off other creators’ work for their 6.5 million followers.
Allyship means supporting and giving a voice to those which you’re allying for. The feminist page was not created to empower women.
Issuing a statement to their followers on Instagram, the creators of the page said that “While our intentions were rooted in allyship it has recently become clear that we have come up short.”
The inauthenticity of this page was suspicious from the start but unfortunately, it gained the attention of so many who were mislead. After they realized they needed to credit creators for their work, the two businessmen still continued to come up short.
Their captions were repeatedly impersonal as if they didn’t really have an opinion on the post they were uploading or perhaps didn’t understand what they were posting in the first place so decided to be neutral in their captions. Again, we see a distance in allyship.
The Secrecy of a Feminist Allyship Is Not Allyship
The fact that it was never advertised that this account was run by two cis men is arguable. It was a secret. If you are an ally of feminism and run a feminist Instagram page, you would put that in your bio and let people know that you speak to elevate those who are not listened to. You would say that you cannot speak personally on some of these posts but that you respect the experiences of those who do understand.
As an example, a post was uploaded onto the feminist page in July 2020, depicting discharge that cis women experience when ovulating, and the caption read, “Remember, discharge is completely normal and a sign of a healthy vagina! How many of you thought discharge meant something was wrong with you when you were younger?”
Followers of this account didn’t know that cis men were asking them this question. It would be more empowering if a cis man asked a woman about how it was growing up in a world where her body was shamed and how that ultimately led to an un-education of her body’s natural functions. In this scenario, there would be an opportunity for her to educate him on this experience and ask him to use his privilege to change society.
We need more men supporting posts like this instead of profiting off it and being a secretive ally. If you’re going to be an ally, be public about it — that’s what women need.
Since being exposed, the businessmen recognized the need to re-think their content strategy saying, “It is time the management and curation of this platform is put in the hands of the communities it is existing to represent” and intend to have a women-based, LGBTQ+, BIPOC, team managing the feminist platform no later than January 31st, 2021.
If you look at what the feminist page has posted on its timeline, it can be quite surreal to think that two men were the secretive curators behind posts about discharge.
Cis 13-year-old girls who see posts like this are not represented when two cis men upload this type of content. If you’re an ally posting this to shed light and enhance awareness, tell people who you are. Women need to know they have allies.
In one of their posts, @feminist played a clip of British broadcaster, journalist, and author of “Period. It’s About Bloody Time,” Emma Barnett, speaking on what they called their “friend’s” podcast @the_female_lead. In the podcast clip, Barnett says, “If men had periods, there would be a cure” — insinuating that there would be a cure for endometriosis, menstrual pain, etc. if men were the people who experienced them. We have to wonder, did their “friends” over at the_female_lead know who they really were this whole time?
In this post, they had an opportunity to say that they were cis men who believed women should be treated fairly in medicine and stand up for women — but they didn’t. Again, retreating even more into the dark shadows of what they call “allyship.”
We need men to stand up for women too, we need that allyship, but we’re not getting it — and this page is an example.
Inauthentic Feminist Allyship and the Lack of Support Online
It is very difficult for us here at she. to believe that these men are allies because if they were, they would have been vocal about it. The profitable market they sought after is palpable because of their concealed identity.
Owning an Instagram account with that many followers provides you with ample partnership deals which only fueled the incognito duo even more.
Their attempt at allyship was questionable for different reasons in the last few years with many people assuming that the page was run by bots. This assumption was perpetuated as a result of the discriminating comments that existed on their page, highlighting that the account was not moderated by its owner(s).
The comment sections on this page itself are a breathing ground for toxicity with many people from traditional, patriarchal backgrounds spewing hate speech to those commenting their alliance in response to the posts.
It’s not uncommon for comments on Instagram to have some kind of hate sprinkled throughout, especially if it’s a page with a lot of traffic, but what’s important to consider is that the owners of this account allowed it.
They had zero moderation on these comments showing that they welcomed any kind of traffic to their account. It was never a safe space. Instagram pages have the ability to limit their comments and delete or block people that are literally there just to spew hate but @feminist remained silent any time their followers were being virtually attacked.
Pages that are this big with this amount of followers are often also big enough to probably have this as their full-time job — those comments should have been moderated. No feminist page should put up with misogynistic abuse from people online whose mission is to discriminate against women.
Moreover, this page was also never verified because, in order to be verified, your identity must be verified too — adding to the suspicion as to why an Instagram page with 6.5 million followers was unverified.
Feminist Allyship or Performative Activism?
Since the men’s exposure of their identity, many of the comments in response argued that this is an example of equality, is it not? Of course, men can be feminists — they should be. However, if you choose to be a feminist only when it works in your favor, it’s not feminism. It’s performative activism.
With impersonal captions and phrases that deceitfully disguise themselves as being from the point of view of a woman, manipulated the page’s followers into believing it was run by those who understood their experiences, or at least, those who publicly advocated for them from a position of privilege. It’s insincere and it’s performative.
Not only were their captions vague, but one post, in particular, that was uploaded in July 2020, confirms the inauthenticity of this supposed women’s empowerment account.
In a sorrowful yet witty animation of a woman sitting on a blood-stained couch clutching a heating pad, the caption reads “We have all been there before…” There were no quotation marks included in this caption, so it is not clear whether or not this was a direct quote from the original illustrator’s post. Anyone reading this caption assumes that the page was run by someone who understood the experience of being crippled in pain with a period while also wondering how much a new couch is going to cost! An ally would not use this caption. This was a deceitful attempt at gaining an oppressed group’s trust.
Once again, an example of men overriding a woman’s voice and experience. It is a big deal that this Instagram account did not include a woman’s voice in its narrative.
It would be the same issue if a straight person was running an LGBTQ+ account or if a white person was running a BLM account. We wouldn’t accept it. Let the people who’s voices are so often silenced, have a platform to speak on their own experiences.
Marginalized groups deserve, at the very least, to use their voice. It’s OK if it’s not your experience and you are not able to fully understand it, but don’t steal from those voices that have the right to speak on their own experiences.
By Sophie Dunne
