When Feminism Wears Lip Gloss: How Pink Patriarchy Undermines the Fight for Liberation

There’s a version of feminism out there that wears a pussyhat, clutches her pearls, and still calls the manager when a sex worker speaks at a panel. She’s the board member who proudly posts “women supporting women” selfies, yet signs off on policies that systematically exclude trans women, criminalized mothers, and survivors who sell sex just to stay housed. She believes in women’s empowerment—as long as it arrives wrapped in a college degree, a polished LinkedIn profile, and a sworn rejection of OnlyFans.

Welcome to the era of Pink Patriarchy—a pastel-washed, Instagram-filtered strain of feminism that mouths the language of liberation while keeping the architecture of oppression firmly intact. It’s what happens when the aesthetics of feminism are co-opted by the very systems feminism was meant to dismantle. Pink patriarchy wears a pantsuit and speaks in TED Talk quotes. It thrives in branding campaigns and boardrooms, shaping nonprofit agendas around “palatable” survivor stories. It demands feminism make women more marketable, not necessarily more free. Visibility is valued over voice, reform is prized over revolution, and safety is selectively granted—usually to those who look, talk, and vote the “right” way.

For sex workers, incarcerated women, trans women, disabled women, and survivors of state violence, this sanitized feminism isn’t just irritating—it’s actively harmful. It’s the version of feminism that celebrates glass ceilings being shattered, while ignoring the women left to clean up the shards. It props up carceral feminism, where “justice” translates to more cops, more courts, and more cages. It co-opts the language of rescue to justify control, treats sex work as inherently exploitative unless it’s serving male entertainment or boosting corporate profits, and invites survivors to share their trauma but not their insight on policy or power.

This brand of feminism creates a hierarchy of who gets to be seen, heard, and helped. Spoiler: sex workers rarely make the cut. When feminism prioritizes optics over outcomes, the most marginalized women are the first to be erased. Sex workers are depicted as either victims or vectors, never as leaders. Criminalized survivors are left out of “safe space” conversations. Harm reduction and decriminalization are dismissed as fringe theories instead of frontline tools for survival. What masquerades as inclusivity becomes just another strategy to maintain the status quo, polished up in pink.

But real liberation? It’s never been color-coded. We need a feminism that is messy, unapologetic, and led by those who have always been at the margins—sex workers, trans women, incarcerated women, drug users, undocumented women, and poor women living at every difficult intersection. A feminism that honors survival as resistance and autonomy as sacred. A feminism that refuses to sanitize pain for professional gain or shrink our stories to fit a donor’s comfort zone.

At SWOP Behind Bars, we’re building a different kind of feminism. One that doesn’t call the cops on us, doesn’t question our womanhood, and doesn’t rewrite our narratives to fit grant cycles. We’re fighting for decriminalization—not as a radical dream but as a non-negotiable demand. We center survivors not just on stage but in strategy. We believe in safety without surveillance, in agency without apology, and in tearing down the cages, not designing softer ones.

We don’t need more pink. We need more power. Not the kind that makes patriarchy prettier, but the kind that makes it obsolete.

If you call yourself a feminist, it’s time to stop undermining sex workers with your lip gloss and pearl clutching—and start showing up for the fight we’ve been in all along.