Nice White Ladies

August 13, 2021

Daniels (White Lies) breaks down the role of white women in maintaining the prevalence of white supremacy in American society, emphasizing that even white women who "mean well" are complicit. She elucidates the history of white women's stake in American racism, as well as the cruelty with which they have wielded their power and privilege. Daniels breaks down the racism inherent in the wellness industry, as well as its alignment with capitalism, and explores issues such as cultural appropriation and white women's historic defense of racial segregation in schools. Any reader who has paid a modicum of attention to current events will be familiar with much of what Daniels surveys, including viral Karen videos, the oft-quoted percentages of white women who voted for Trump, pink pussy hat feminism, and the school admissions scandals. There are no fresh or unique perceptions in her discourse, and her targets (which include Gwyneth Paltrow and Sheryl Sandberg) have grown tiresome, eliciting boredom rather than insight. VERDICT Daniels quotes extensively from Black women, and readers would be better served by seeking out their writing directly. Ijeoma Oluo, Charlene Carruthers, Nikole Hannah-Jones, and Alicia Garza have all written books that offer personal context, emotional stakes, and steps for making meaningful change.--Barrie Olmstead, Lewiston P.L., ID

Copyright 2021 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 6, 2021
In this blunt and well-reasoned account, Hunter College sociology professor Daniels (White Lies) challenges white women to “reach beyond the strictures of niceness and the constraints of ladyhood” and work to dismantle the systemic racism they have upheld. Details about her family background, including her grandfather’s membership in the Ku Klux Klan, enrich Daniels’s history of how white women have “instigated, encouraged, and benefited from white supremacy.” She notes that white women in the antebellum South gained power by inheriting enslaved people; that white suffragists opposed giving Black men the right to vote; and that white women have benefited “disproportionately” from affirmative action. Daniels also connects recent cases of white “Karens” calling the police on innocent Black people to historical episodes such as the 1955 lynching of Emmett Till; argues that negative emotional and health outcomes result from believing the lie that “being white will save us from social isolation and disconnection through materialism, individualism, and the satisfaction of superiority”; and guides white women on how to “divest from white spaces” and “acknowledge and repair harm.” Buttressed by Daniels’s personal reflections and lucid readings of American history and culture, this is a bracing yet actionable call for change.

September 1, 2021
Daniels, a Race and Africana Studies scholar, "calls in'' nice white ladies to dismantle white supremacy and promote a non-gendered feminism focusing on the intersections of race, class, sexuality, and more. Daniels argues that, throughout history, nice white ladies have hijacked feminist issues, weaponizing their whiteness and the protections it has afforded them to advance their rights and freedoms at the expense of all other communities, but especially Black communities. Each chapter discusses current media stories to examine a specific feminist issue: Daniels uses the Kardashians to demonstrate white women appropriating and capitalizing on Black culture, and uses Central Park Karen to demonstrate white women weaponizing their race and protected status to harm Black people. Despite the serious subject matter, Daniels creates a very welcoming and a "we're all in this together" tone by framing the narrative with her personal anti-racism journey, including her racist ancestry (her grandaddy was a Klansman). A welcome addition to the anti-racism canon; read alongside the myriad Black and POC authors, activists, and scholars listed in Daniels' notes.

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Starred review from September 15, 2021
An immensely readable examination of White women's prominent role in the endurance of systematic racism. Daniels, a professor of sociology and Africana studies, considers the many ways that White women--incarnated in the countless "Karen" memes on social media--have been active agents in perpetuating systems of inequality from which they benefit. These ways include being nonquestioning actors in hoarding wealth through inheritance, upholding segregation in schools, and cornering jobs at the expense of people of color--all of which stubbornly maintain the political and economic imbalance between White and Black households. The "built-in advantage" of being a White woman is a legacy of the Colonial era, when "white women in the United States were enthusiastic in their cruelty as owners of enslaved people on plantations." Affirmative Action, notes Daniels, has overwhelmingly helped White women in the workforce. White supremacy in the South and the lynching of Black men were predicated on the "protection" of White women, and that sense of fragility and entitlement was passed down through the generations. The author uses a wide array of examples of "nice white ladies" both on the right and the left, well-meaning feminists, purveyors of the "shallow promise of the wellness industry," and "white savior moms" who adopt children of color, and she shows how this "intergenerational" racism is actually raising the mortality rates of White women. Daniels also discusses the tragic suicide of her mother, who, despite relative privilege, was "taught to be nice above all else"--like many White women. Daniels, who has clearly done the work of examining herself first, concludes by offering constructive ways White women can undo the damage of their privileged status by challenging and questioning as well as by cultivating alternate forms of family and kinship outside of the White nuclear family. "As white women," she writes, "we need to tell the truth about ourselves and we need transformation." This significant study, both academic and personal, provides a well-lit path "to swerve away from white supremacy."

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