How the Slumflower-Florence Given Debate Exposes the Issue of Commodifying Instagram Feminism

TW: This article discusses racism.

Writer, activist, and blogger Chidera Eggerue, better known by her alias the Slumflower, has become embroiled in a social media dispute with fellow feminist, Instagram influencer, and illustrator, Florence Given, following  Slumflower’s claims that Given has copied and profited from Slumflower’s feminist writings. The argument exposes the racialised issues which stem from the commodification of Instagram ‘pop-feminism’.

The backstory

The stolen ideas in question relate to the Slumflower’s best-selling debut book What A Time to Be Alone (2018) and How to Get Over A Boy (2020). In these memoirs, the Slumflower details her experience of intersectional feminism and womanhood by using direct and empowering prose alongside colourful and attention-grabbing graphics and fonts. In her Instagram stories, the Slumflower confirms that she was the first to devise the innovative idea of delivering feminist content for a Gen Z-Millenial target audience in this unique format.

“The Slumflower reiterates the long-existing problem of white people stealing ideas from the black community and then re-packaging the content in a more marketable format for a white audience.”

On her Instagram story, the Slumflower presents fellow feminist creator Given’s book, Women Don’t Owe You Pretty, which came out in 2020, side-by-side with her own books, commenting on their unsettling similarities. As the Slumflower notes, both her own and artist Given’s work features a matching vivid colour scheme, bold fonts, and punchy feminist rhetoric – influenced by the canon of feminist theory – that result in their books appearing as carbon copies of one another.

The Slumflower reiterates the long-existing problem of white people stealing ideas from the black community and then re-packaging the content in a more marketable format for a white audience – in this case, through Given’s privileged positioning as a white middle-class cis-gendered woman. The Slumflower reminds us that white people rarely credit black creatives for devising the ideas in the first place. As the Slumflower articulates to her followers: this is not a novel issue.

Commodifying feminism

Although it’s easy to cast sole blame on Given in the argument, we ought to critique the very systems which uphold white supremacist ideology, as the Slumflower vocalises in her numerous Instagram stories on the matter. The debate exposes the capitalist and consumerist culture that contributes to the oppression of people of colour within predominantly white industries of the western world, such as the publishing industry.

“The potential erasure of the Slumflower’s intersectional perspective is extremely damaging in a world, and the literary industry, which already dedicates too much space to white voices.”

In Women Don’t Owe You Pretty, Given may well have imitated the Slumflower’s unique feminist content, but the publishers of Given’s book have enabled the gentrification of Slumflower’s multilayered perspective as a marginalised black woman through the re-packaging of Slumflower’s work in Given’s more palatable, more ‘accessible’, white-washed version.

Given’s publishers have assumedly witnessed the popularity of hardback pop-feminism, demonstrated by the Slumflower, and endeavoured to emulate it through Given’s influencing brand. The problem is that in the process, publishers have ignored the Slumflower’s socio-political perspective as a black feminist creator, overshadowing her representation of an oppressed community, utilising the very same ideas which propelled the Slumflower to success in Given’s work.

Despite the fact that in Women Don’t Owe You Pretty Given continually acknowledges her privilege and references black feminist theorists, the illustrator fails to direct adequate attention towards the voices of black women, with Given centering this memoir around her own experiences as a white woman.

Women Don’t Owe You Pretty ultimately speaks from Given’s own experience as part of a social group with greater privileges and power than those the Slumflower has had access to within the black community. The potential erasure of the Slumflower’s intersectional perspective is extremely damaging in the world which already dedicates too much space to white voices.

Feminist influencers

The debate exposes the dangers inherent in monetising the work of feminist Instagram influencers without a second thought. Publishing houses, like many profit-centered businesses, will tend to support whoever has the most followers or the most popularity at the time; with whoever accruing the most profits usually winning this capitalist-fuelled game.

Undoubtedly, less privileged voices and perspectives will be outshone by whoever has the most aesthetically striking Instagram grid or the best outfits. The issue with commodifying Instagram influencers is that once someone no longer becomes popular and a new, more amenable, influencer, such as Given, arrives onto the scene, then marginalised feminist viewpoints can be easily erased and overlooked in the competitive, ever-changing, social media landscape. But it’s precisely the voices of the black community, and other minorities, who have long deserved access to the platform to speak on such crucial societal concerns.

As the Slumflower states in her Instagram story, “passing the mic” to someone who can offer up diverse experiences and viewpoints is essential for debates within feminism to take place. After all, feminism isn’t feminism if it’s not intersectional.

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“If you have to keep ‘acknowledging your privilege’ before making a point, you should probably just pass the mic instead” – THE SLUMFLOWER (@theslumflower) December 7, 2020

Supporting the black community

The Slumflower takes issue with the fact that, although, in Women Don’t Owe You Pretty, Given provides gratitude to nine black women (the Slumflower, being one of them) for educating Given on the intersections between race and feminism, the Slumflower notes that there is no evidence to suggest that Given donated any of the proceeds from her best-selling book to charities which support the black community.

Slumflower believes that such donations could go a long way to rectifying the fractious situation and betrayal that she feels about the re-marketing of her creative ideas for a white audience.

Questioning the authority of feminist spokespeople

The continuing argument between the Slumflower and Given may offer a silver lining, however. Audiences and consumers may wish to be warier in future by researching the context and questioning the authority of content created by those who social media is quick to categorise as ‘feminist icons’, such as Given, before buying into their aesthetic brands on a whim. And we may wish to redirect our attention to a multiplicity of diverse feminists, rather than allowing privileged creators within the Instagram feminist sphere to dominate and capitalise from these important social issues, at a time when the voices of the most marginalised communities continually go unheard.

Shannon Cook

Featured image courtesy of Markus Spiske on Unsplash. Image licence can be found here. No changes were made to this image.