Can the Master's Tools dismantle the Master's house? And should that be the goal?

Question

Audre Lorde wrote, "The Master's tools can never dismantle the Master's house."

I have always had grave misgivings about this. As a black man, it seemed to me sometimes like a more sophisticated version of accusing people of "acting white", of being "Oreos" or "Toms".

Why can't such tools be used to subversive ends?

And is dismantling the house what we should strive for anyway?

I would prefer to add windows and doors, expand the space, build new rooms, add new levels.

Because it is the only house we have.

Thoughts?

Additional Details

SUPER
I think it can be either.

Answer 1

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker

Ms Lorde first published in Seventeen Magazine. She graduated from Hunter College and Columbia University. She received a National Endowment of the Arts Award and a Creative Arts Service Grant. She was a poet in residence and professor at several universities. She was a passioned accomplished poet. But it seems to me that she used the Master's Tools quite adroitly to her own advantage. I have no problem with that.

WHO SAID IT WAS SIMPLE

There are so many roots to the tree of anger
that sometimes the branches shatter
before they bear.

Sitting in Nedicks
the women rally before they march
discussing the problematic girls
they hire to make them free.
An almost white counterman passes
a waiting brother to serve them first
and the ladies neither notice nor reject
the slighter pleasures of their slavery.
But I who am bound by my mirror
as well as my bed
see causes in color
as well as sex

and sit here wondering
which me will survive
all these liberations.

-Audre Lord

Asker's Rating:

Asker's Comment:

Thanks for sharing that! You're right of course: despite her misgivings about academia and about mainstream political process, she did use the tools available to her in her own way.

Answer 2

Nah it's a load of shite. Of course the master's tools can bring the master's house down..

Answer 3

Master's Tools can be used to dismantle the Master's house only if the master allows it and it should that be the goal only if it is the master's goal. These tools cant be used to subversive ends as there is an existing master - slave relation. Dismantling the house is what we should strive for if the master so deem as the goal.

If you prefer to add windows and doors, expand the space, build new rooms, add new levels, you should do that to your own house and not the masters house. Who cares the preferences of others while the master is in the house? If it is the only house we have, then its better not to do things that would cause one to be kicked out of the house. Even otherwise, there is no point in dismantling the only house we have.

Answer 4

Well this has been a fascinating study in perspective for me....as I read your question, I read 'Master' to be the term for the man of the house, rather than a slave/master relationship. As it is in GWS, I jumped to the assumption that we were referring to husband/wife!

Answer 5

is this metaphorical? if so if you take up the tools, you take up the house, if you dismantle the other house, you only end up with a reflection of that house as yours, having used the same tools. perhaps with more levels and windows, but none the less.

master=power, house=where it resides, tools=and the methods associated.

the house survives, in manner of speaking, the master survives in a manner, and the tools survive regardless.