A Bestselling Author Has Been Accused of Stealing the Work of a Black Feminist
By: Stark Raving
Tags: Privilege, Feminism, Equality, Women, Racism

A Bestselling Author Has Been Accused of Stealing the Work of a Black Feminist

The Chidera Eggerue vs Florence Given drama

Image from Canva

Florence Given, author of the bestselling book, Women Don’t Owe You Pretty, somehow became the face of intersectional feminism this year — a fact that was always problematic, because she is white and thin, and conventionally beautiful, and therefore not the ideal spokesperson for intersectionality.

Her success story — based on a book that is shallow in content and far from revolutionary — shows what sort of feminism is acceptable today. A feminism that is basic, not too disruptive, and served by someone none threatening — aka, white, and pretty. A feminism that can be easily packaged up and marketed in the form of merchandise. A feminism that is self-centred and capitalism-friendly.

On her Instagram, Florence bragged about “the Floss effect”: after reading her work, women wrote in saying they, too, had cut their hair, dumped their boyfriend, and started dating women. I was always vaguely uncomfortable at how Given managed to take credit for these women’s brave and surely difficult life decisions. And, in all honestly, I couldn’t help but think that the real “Floss effect” is privileged women buying a tote bag with a pseudo-inclusive statement and feeling good about themselves.

Florence had already faced a lot of criticism for her work being superficial — little more than a pink-and-orange collection of Pinterest quotes and 2012 Tumblr feminism with flowery illustrations — but it turned out she might have committed greater evils than just being shallow. In an Instagram post, Florence’s fellow influencer and former friend, Chidera Eggerue alias the Slumflower, accused her of copying her work, saying that Women Don’t Owe You Pretty was basically an amalgam of Chidera’s own books — What a Time to be Alone and How to Get Over a Boy, published respectively in 2018 and 2020.

The social activist described it as a sign of white supremacy, and a shocking example of black people’s activism being used by white people for their own personal gain. “It speaks for itself. Women Don’t Owe You Pretty is essentially an amalgamation of What A Time to Be Alone and How to Get Over a Boy. The only difference is Florence’s book goes into queerness which is not my experience, I don’t touch on that. Women Don’t Owe You Pretty would not exist without What A Time to Be Alone and How to Get Over a Boy,” Chidera wrote on her Instagram stories. “This book is generating wealth. Black women’s ideas generate wealth for white people. But that wealth doesn’t go to our community.”

Florence and Chidera were previously represented by the same management company, Diving Bell, until Chidera broke ties with them a couple of months ago. After she went public in the media, they brought the date for ending the contract forward, from January to last week.

Chidera’s endorsement had appeared on the front cover of an earlier print run of Florence’s book. Chidera said she hadn’t read the book when she had agreed to the endorsement and had asked it for to be removed on the later prints. Chidera also said in a statement that she had informed Florence’s team before publication that she was uncomfortable with the extent to which Women Don’t Owe You Pretty looked like her own book — but had apparently been ignored. A few months ago, the Slumflower contacted Florence to say some of the phrases printed on her merch were copied, leading Florence to pull the products.

I cannot comment on the extent to which Florence willfully copied Chidera’s work, but the debate does raise some valid points about White privilege in the publishing industry. When you Google “Chidera book”, Given’s work appears top of the results. When you google “black feminism book”, it also appears close to the top. Algorithms are pushing Given’s work — a fact that may be linked to ad money from Florence’s team. And while Chidera’s work was popular, the white-washed version was a much bigger phenomenon, both in traditional media coverage and on social media — even though it contains nothing revolutionary.

So I get Chidera’s anger — whether Florence was “inspired” by her or directly copied her is irrelevant — the fact is, she could benefit from an entire white-dominated system that promoted her work more than it ever did Chidera’s, leading her to make money off the work done before her. And even if Florence does recognise her privilege in her book, she is still benefiting from it. This is a fact that can not be forgotten.