While she criticizes the feminist cause for its historical exclusivity, she believes that seeing feminism as a composition of imperfect individuals - not infallible icons - can help critics be more forgiving and future-oriented. As a black bisexual woman, she sees all too clearly where feminism has catered to straight, white, upper-class women at the expense of people of color, LGBTQ+ women, and the working class. Her hesitation to claim the feminist label came not only as a result of her personal affinity to rap. Women who don't fit the stereotypical feminist 'mold' have historically been abandoned by feminism. 'I would rather be a bad feminist,' she declares in Bad Feminist, 'than no feminist at all.' For years, she hesitated to call herself a feminist, because she recognized that she could be called out for hypocrisy. She'd rather have the men in her life do the 'masculine' work of killing bugs and taking out the trash. I am full of contradictions.' She lists some of her 'sins': she listens to misogynist rap on the way to work. 'Let me be clear,' she says. 'I'm a mess. Gay doesn't want to be held up as an example. Then, when they make a mistake, when they do one thing that offends other feminists, they get knocked down. Roxane Gay points out how quickly we put feminists up on a pedestal.
