12 books to help you fight the system

Feminism is for Everybody cover (Image via South End Press)

5. Feminism is for Everybody

bell hooks is a feminist author and social activist, who focuses especially on intersectional feminism and systems of oppression. If her intent hasn’t already hooked you, then maybe her drive will. hooks has published over 30 books and many scholarly articles, not to mention the fact that she frequently gives public lectures and appears on screens everywhere. She is a tireless, outspoken feminist badass.

So, given the fact that hooks (who writes her pen name all in lowercase) has been publishing left and right for decades, it’s a little difficult to pick one particular work of her to recommend. Perhaps you’re still a little new to the feminist movement, words and phrases like “intersectionality” and “systems of oppression” might make you feel a little disoriented. If that’s the case, then I recommend hooks’ Feminism is for Everybody: Passionate Politics.

The ugly truth is that many people equate the modern feminist movement with an unfair fight for political correctness (a phrase that throws up many people’s hackles) and misandry. Chances are, you’ve heard the word “feminazi” thrown around, which in my opinion is the equivalent of bringing up Hitler in an argument; once you do that, you’ve automatically lost.

But, argues hooks, that is nowhere near the truth of feminism at its core. In Feminism is For Everybody, she writes that “A genuine feminist politics always brings us from bondage to freedom, from lovelessness to loving….There can be no love without justice.” Feminism, as described in this book, liberates everyone from a painful system of oppression. As the title so emphatically states, feminism ultimately benefits all, regardless of gender and other structures.