‘privileged women’ don’t need feminism, says vivienne westwood

Image: Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images Europe

Here we have Vivienne Westwood causing one of her classic kerfuffles by claiming  that she ‘doesn’t see why women in the privileged world need to be’ feminists.

It’s an interesting point to raise as it brings to mind how often those in positions of privilege seem to either forget or willfully ignore the thronging mass outside the mansion doors still waiting for a piece of the equality pie – ‘I made it and I worked hard, so you can too’ becomes the mantra. It calls up unfortunate comparisons with Gina Rinehardt’s revolting assertions earlier this year that if the rich want to be richer then they should stop drinking, smoking and socialisng.

As one who has never had the opportunity, I can only imagine how once we have rested so long in the arms of privilege, we might begin to lose sight of the difficulties facing the rest of the world. Or then again, possibly just cease to really care?

What’s interesting in the case of Westwood is that she is not shouting ‘let them eat cake’ – she has become something of a mouthpiece for a great many human rights causes – it’s just that, apparently, her understanding of contemporary social injustice does not extend to the rights of women in the Western world.

Westwood attempts to temper her initial statement somewhat by stating ‘women in other cultures, let’s call it, should be supported.’ She is vague about what she infers by support, and also just who might be included in these ‘other’ cultures. Defining different groups  as ‘deserving’ or ‘not deserving’ of the magnifying lens of social reform is a pretty dangerous idea, and perhaps the more I think about it, it might just be a pretty lazy way of dissecting the world.

How seriously should one take Westwood’s printed views when the grammar and structure of the article sets it up to appear as though she is shooting off opinion bombs in rapid fire succession? Perhaps the interviewer needed some nice headline sound bites and edited accordingly?

It’s strange to think that Westwood is of the same era as my grandparents; to stand them side by side you would never dream it. It’s not a difficult stretch to ponder if this view is potentially generational. I know my grandparents hold a similar ‘you make your own opportunities’ ideology, which comes from growing up in a war-time era. They too understand that you can ‘somehow (find yourself) in the position of victim,’ but believe it is a position that happens by chance or bad decision making, not a state of being which can be forced on you simply at the instant of your birth.

Perhaps Westwood may have paraphrased her own views out of context, or simply she fails, as many of us do, to recognise the insidious forms that victimisation can take in a society of handed down cultural traditions. When speaking on the unfairness she sees in the differences in knighthood and damehood, she laments, ‘No, there’s no sword. Not like being a knight. And the worst thing is,’ she says energetically, ‘if you’re a knight, your wife is a lady, and Andreas (her husband) would quite like to be something, wouldn’t you, Andreas? But there’s nothing.’

The fact that her husband, by proxy to her position as dame, does not even rate a mention in royal terms seems very much lost on her. Perhaps once you have reached such an affluent position so far removed from the rest of society that a major disappointment in your personal life is lamenting your husband hadn’t received a title right along with you, you fail to understand the nuance of everyday experience and its implications in the wider web of social power.

With such laconic views on the wealth of challenges facing women in contemporary society, perhaps those in glass fashion houses shouldn’t throw such heavy stones?

By Audrey K. Hulm