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So, after a week dominated by men, I'm considering joining the Women's Alliance at my church. There is, or so, I'm becoming predominately aware, a pernicious misogyny underlying our culture. I keep trying to ignore it, but it will not go away. It underlies the ads, the casual conversations in offices and subways, live journal, facebook, twitter and other social media posts and chatter, television shows, movies, novels, news items, comedy routines...and of course the never-ending US Presidential Election. Where on one side we have the poster child for patriarchal male dominance, chauvinism and sexism, and on the other the poster child for feminism and women's rights from the 1960s to now.
This week alone, I heard or overheard the following:
Two guys at work referring to a woman they didn't like or understand, who had long blond hair, spoke rapidly and was strong, as a "girl". I retorted, no, a girl has pigtails and is about so high. She's a woman. I don't like conflict, but occasionally something will irritate me enough for me to make a response.
After facilitating a meeting of male engineers determining the best approach of replacing a major railroad bridge, I was waiting for an elevator. Three men, one a co-worker, were discussing politics. One of the men was about to curse, but refrained, because there was a lady present. I rolled my eyes. And my co-worker stated, she's an adult and can handle it.
The novel I'm currently reading keeps repeating the phrase "don't cry like a little girl" - as an insult.
Meanwhile on the phone, a young female project manager, in her 30s, so not that young, and a licensed engineer is ranting about how the male project managers treat her as if she's their secretary and knows nothing.
In the Rolling Stone article about Hillary Clinton - the reporter states:
The writer isn't, unfortunately, wrong. I've seen it all year long on Facebook, livejournal, twitter, the television, at work, in a book club...from men and women.
I'm tired of it, folks. It's exhausting.
I like men. I get along with men. My father is supporting Hillary Clinton and for the most part is a feminist. My first love was one and supports Clinton. My brother is definitely a feminist, who goes out of his way to support his wife and daughter's dreams. He actually seems to prefer the company of women to men. At work, I actually get along better with the men than the women. And the glowing reviews for my novel were written by men. Online - most of my devoted readers have been men. Throughout my life, I've been lucky to be surrounded by kind men, online and off. Heterosexual, gay, black, white, whatever.
So, I've no issues with men. And misogyny, weird as it may sound, doesn't just reside with men, it's inside women too. I know quite a few women who don't like or respect women, who think women are weaker and should be subordinate to men. That truly believe the bible story that Eve came second to Adam and cursed us all to misery. Not only do they think that -- they are furious at anyone who thinks otherwise. It is almost as if the mere idea that women could possibly be equal to men is offensive to them. It goes against everything they believe and were taught. It is from their perspective fundamentally and worse, morally wrong. Hillary is offensive to them, she depicts an image that unsettles them and challenges everything they've told themselves. Everything they believe to be true. If Hillary were to become President, it would be the worse thing ever -- better Trump who supports their views and more importantly validates their view of themselves and their gender. Trump who supports the Miss Universe and Miss America pageants, who depicts women as fashion plates, objects of male desire, who sees women as subservient to men.
If you were to challenge this view, many of these women would scream at you. I know, I've been on the receiving end more times than I can count. I remember this happening a lot in fandom. The Buffy fandom was notorious for despising S6 and S7 Buffy, who was no longer being depicted as the sexy girl with the short dresses, and with the hot boyfriends. She should be with Angel, they stated, because he was older and wiser than she was. They were threatened by the idea of women doing anything outside of being wives, mothers, girlfriends, or in various "traditional" roles. I remember getting into a fight with various "women" on a fanboard about the idea of a female fireman. Note, it wasn't the male posters who thought a woman couldn't be a fireman, it was the female ones. This astonished me. Most of the battles that I've seen regarding women in fandom have been fought between women.
So there's a lot more going on here - sexism is not that different than racism in the respect that often the victim of it is racist or sexist themselves, and completely unaware. It's so ingrained in our culture that we can't quite see it when it comes hurling out of our own mouths.
During this election, I find it frightening. But I do think it will be to a degree a determining factor, just as racism was to a degree a determining factor in the previous election. I've already seen it in the preliminary rounds, raising its ugly head. It should not matter whether Hillary is female or not. Her gender should be irrelevant. Yet as a recent spot on Funny or Die depicted, it does matter to far too many people.
I found it interesting that strongest supporters of Hillary on my livejournal were men. While the biggest naysayers were women. It was also unnerving. I tried to ignore it. But upon deeper examination, I see why I tried to ignore it. I too found myself falling into that trap. Hillary is threatening to many women like myself. She's aggressive, strong, takes no prisoners, and successful.
She pushes agendas that I don't always agree with. It's safer to like the balding older guy with the glasses who speaks so nicely and promises the world. He's so fatherly. And not threatening at all.
Bernie Sanders was the easy choice for so many women threatened by Hillary. They denied it, yet their rhetoric and often vitirolic attacks on Hillary, the opposite surfaced. It was in a way a repeat of the Obama vs. Hillary election, where Obama, the less qualified choice, was selected because he was less threatening, he was safe to many women. We deny it. But it's there hidden in the subtext. And it is disconcerting. This ingrained sexism that has permeated our lives so deeply that we can't quite acknowledge it.
And it is exhausting. The older I get the less relevant gender seems. We are more similar than we like to admit. Men and women. And the silly stereotypes -- don't often apply in many cases. I've met emotional men and stoic women. My brother is far more into fashion than I've ever been and yes, he's straight. I've met gay men who could care less about fashion and are extremely macho, and straight men who are the opposite. And in between. I've met women who hate to wear dresses and heels, and hate sports. And women who love sports, but also like heels, makeup, dresses and paint their nails.
Gender stereotypes are as prevalent and silly as racial stereotypes. The information age is slowly exploding many of them.
Today, a friend told me that her hope and prayer for the election, was people would not wake up in anger. That they would not act out in anger. Instead they'd wake up gentle and calm, with kindness in the hearts and hope.
I'm hoping the same.
This week alone, I heard or overheard the following:
Two guys at work referring to a woman they didn't like or understand, who had long blond hair, spoke rapidly and was strong, as a "girl". I retorted, no, a girl has pigtails and is about so high. She's a woman. I don't like conflict, but occasionally something will irritate me enough for me to make a response.
After facilitating a meeting of male engineers determining the best approach of replacing a major railroad bridge, I was waiting for an elevator. Three men, one a co-worker, were discussing politics. One of the men was about to curse, but refrained, because there was a lady present. I rolled my eyes. And my co-worker stated, she's an adult and can handle it.
The novel I'm currently reading keeps repeating the phrase "don't cry like a little girl" - as an insult.
Meanwhile on the phone, a young female project manager, in her 30s, so not that young, and a licensed engineer is ranting about how the male project managers treat her as if she's their secretary and knows nothing.
In the Rolling Stone article about Hillary Clinton - the reporter states:
What women know, consciously or not, is that we do not live in a "post-gender world," as some young women I've met firmly believe, but in a world where a quieter and far more pernicious misogyny continues to thrive, baked right into the political culture where women still occupy only 20 percent of the seats in Congress. There is still, after nearly a century of trying, no Equal Rights Amendment. It was notable that during the primary campaign, "I don't vote with my vagina" became a phrase heard often among female Sanders supporters, while women who supported Clinton were often heckled as, simply, "vaginas." Women who support Clinton often add, "but not because she's a woman." Why? "Because," as one 25-year-old New Yorker told me this summer, "everyone always says, 'You're just voting for her because she's a woman,' as if you're stupid and not thinking for yourself."
There is a persuasive argument to be made, particularly for women, that voting for Clinton because she is a woman is the right thing to do. Despite Trump's recent attempts to promote his social agenda as woman-friendly, there is every reason to believe a conservative administration, such as the one that Trump is proposing, would largely kill such policies as equal pay for women; universal day care and early-childhood education; and paid sick leave. A conservative majority on the Supreme Court would have a devastating impact on reproductive rights, crucially in the states where women's access not only to abortion but also to contraception is now in jeopardy. While the Koch brothers may not be funding Trump, they are actively involved in statewide races across the country, pouring money into fiscally and socially conservative candidates who, if they win, will continue to chip away at all facets of women's rights.
Clinton understands the undertones of the attack. She stands in opposition to the Hyde Amendment, for instance, which, with a few exceptions, prohibits the use of federal funds for abortion, a measure that disproportionately impacts poor women. She sees a "concerted, persistent assault on women's health across our country," as she said in June, not only in the number of Planned Parenthood clinics that have been forced to close in the past few years, but also by legislation such as the Blunt Amendment (which failed to pass in 2012 by just three votes), which would have allowed employers to forego parts of their employee health care plans, including services like birth control, based on "moral" grounds. "This entire race is about gender," says Gilligan, who continues to marvel at how many obstacles exist for women in America. "Those are the issues that are playing out now, through Hillary Clinton."
The writer isn't, unfortunately, wrong. I've seen it all year long on Facebook, livejournal, twitter, the television, at work, in a book club...from men and women.
I'm tired of it, folks. It's exhausting.
I like men. I get along with men. My father is supporting Hillary Clinton and for the most part is a feminist. My first love was one and supports Clinton. My brother is definitely a feminist, who goes out of his way to support his wife and daughter's dreams. He actually seems to prefer the company of women to men. At work, I actually get along better with the men than the women. And the glowing reviews for my novel were written by men. Online - most of my devoted readers have been men. Throughout my life, I've been lucky to be surrounded by kind men, online and off. Heterosexual, gay, black, white, whatever.
So, I've no issues with men. And misogyny, weird as it may sound, doesn't just reside with men, it's inside women too. I know quite a few women who don't like or respect women, who think women are weaker and should be subordinate to men. That truly believe the bible story that Eve came second to Adam and cursed us all to misery. Not only do they think that -- they are furious at anyone who thinks otherwise. It is almost as if the mere idea that women could possibly be equal to men is offensive to them. It goes against everything they believe and were taught. It is from their perspective fundamentally and worse, morally wrong. Hillary is offensive to them, she depicts an image that unsettles them and challenges everything they've told themselves. Everything they believe to be true. If Hillary were to become President, it would be the worse thing ever -- better Trump who supports their views and more importantly validates their view of themselves and their gender. Trump who supports the Miss Universe and Miss America pageants, who depicts women as fashion plates, objects of male desire, who sees women as subservient to men.
If you were to challenge this view, many of these women would scream at you. I know, I've been on the receiving end more times than I can count. I remember this happening a lot in fandom. The Buffy fandom was notorious for despising S6 and S7 Buffy, who was no longer being depicted as the sexy girl with the short dresses, and with the hot boyfriends. She should be with Angel, they stated, because he was older and wiser than she was. They were threatened by the idea of women doing anything outside of being wives, mothers, girlfriends, or in various "traditional" roles. I remember getting into a fight with various "women" on a fanboard about the idea of a female fireman. Note, it wasn't the male posters who thought a woman couldn't be a fireman, it was the female ones. This astonished me. Most of the battles that I've seen regarding women in fandom have been fought between women.
So there's a lot more going on here - sexism is not that different than racism in the respect that often the victim of it is racist or sexist themselves, and completely unaware. It's so ingrained in our culture that we can't quite see it when it comes hurling out of our own mouths.
During this election, I find it frightening. But I do think it will be to a degree a determining factor, just as racism was to a degree a determining factor in the previous election. I've already seen it in the preliminary rounds, raising its ugly head. It should not matter whether Hillary is female or not. Her gender should be irrelevant. Yet as a recent spot on Funny or Die depicted, it does matter to far too many people.
I found it interesting that strongest supporters of Hillary on my livejournal were men. While the biggest naysayers were women. It was also unnerving. I tried to ignore it. But upon deeper examination, I see why I tried to ignore it. I too found myself falling into that trap. Hillary is threatening to many women like myself. She's aggressive, strong, takes no prisoners, and successful.
She pushes agendas that I don't always agree with. It's safer to like the balding older guy with the glasses who speaks so nicely and promises the world. He's so fatherly. And not threatening at all.
Bernie Sanders was the easy choice for so many women threatened by Hillary. They denied it, yet their rhetoric and often vitirolic attacks on Hillary, the opposite surfaced. It was in a way a repeat of the Obama vs. Hillary election, where Obama, the less qualified choice, was selected because he was less threatening, he was safe to many women. We deny it. But it's there hidden in the subtext. And it is disconcerting. This ingrained sexism that has permeated our lives so deeply that we can't quite acknowledge it.
And it is exhausting. The older I get the less relevant gender seems. We are more similar than we like to admit. Men and women. And the silly stereotypes -- don't often apply in many cases. I've met emotional men and stoic women. My brother is far more into fashion than I've ever been and yes, he's straight. I've met gay men who could care less about fashion and are extremely macho, and straight men who are the opposite. And in between. I've met women who hate to wear dresses and heels, and hate sports. And women who love sports, but also like heels, makeup, dresses and paint their nails.
Gender stereotypes are as prevalent and silly as racial stereotypes. The information age is slowly exploding many of them.
Today, a friend told me that her hope and prayer for the election, was people would not wake up in anger. That they would not act out in anger. Instead they'd wake up gentle and calm, with kindness in the hearts and hope.
I'm hoping the same.
no subject
I mean, I got the gist of it, since I'm five years old, but all the badmouthing of feminism had an effect on me as a teen until I realized that what people claim about feminism is mostly lies, and they tell them to keep their own shit misogynist worldview intact.
At the moment, any politician who will not stand up for gender equality can forget my vote.