I am a feminist. Maisie Cr ompt on
“ It is basically equal now.” “You got the vote ages ago.” “Men have a tough time too.” “We have equal rights already.” “<strong>The</strong>y just hate men.” “Stop overreacting.” This is what people have said to me when I tell them I am a feminist. For the record, feminism, by definition, is the belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities. It’s the theory of political, economic and social equality of the sexes. I am a feminist because at 7, I was confused that I was called bossy for wanting to lead the games, but the boys were not; at 12, one of my friends who was a boy told me that he couldn’t cry because that was a ‘girl thing’; at 14, when my friends and I were on a Duke of Edinburgh excursion, a man turned around, laughed and said ‘You should’ve made the boys carry your bags’; and now, at 15, being wolf-whistled at in the street like we are objects, or beeped at from a car is meant to be taken as a compliment. It is because of these experiences that I decided I was a feminist, but this seemed uncomplicated to me. I believed that I should be equal to the boy sitting next to me in my class - or my younger brothers - but to others I soon realised it was not. Sadly, no country in the world can yet say they have achieved gender equality. I recognise that I am privileged because my school has not limited me for my gender. My parents did not love me any less because I was born a daughter. But many women are less privileged than me. <strong>The</strong>refore, it is our role, as privileged people who we have the freedom to vocalise our opinions to create change for them. Women in Saudi Arabia have only just been given the right to drive, and every year around 15 million girls under the age of 18 are married worldwide with no say. I believe that it is right for women to be involved in the policies and decisions that affect our lives as much as men. I believe that it is right that I am paid the same as my male counterparts. But as much as I am proud to say I am a feminist, it still comes with a negative stigma. Feminism has become an unpopular word. <strong>The</strong> word ‘feminism’ does not help with this negativity. Feminism has become a hard word for many people to come to terms with because it seems to inherently suggest a favoured treatment of the feminine over the masculine. I think the word ‘feminist’ has so many negative stereotypes because our media, which is dominated by a workforce that is 95% male, is impacting the way the movement is portrayed. <strong>The</strong>y portray many feminists as manly, dominative and uncaring towards their childrenwanting to emasculate men. But this couldn’t be further from the truth. Having been thinking about how the media reflects what we think, I went and spoke to my younger brother - who is yet to consume any of the online media us teenagers see. I said to Oscar: ‘Do you think girls should be equal to boys?’; his reply was ‘Yes, why are you asking me?!’ I then went on to say ‘Oscar, if the word feminist means that you believe girls and boys should be equal, are you a feminist?’ and his reply was ‘Isn’t everyone a feminist then?’ It became obvious to me that it is not the idea of feminism that most people don’t like: it was the stereotype that came with the label ‘feminist’. <strong>The</strong> people I talked to didn’t want to call themselves feminists, but they later decided to say to me ‘I’m not a feminist, but I believe that men and women should be equal.’ This seems to be the standard across the country. In the UK, 92% of women believed in the equality of the sexes; however, only 7% described themselves as feminists. If you are one of those people, cool - we believe in the same idea, but by not labelling yourself as a feminist you are not actively recognising the effort to tackle the inequality, thus resulting in no change or movement. I personally identify as a feminist to recognise the systematic oppression that women have experienced over the years. For equality to be achieved, we need to work together to take down the patriarchy. If you are unaware of what the patriarchy is, it is the invisible, systematic and cultural ideas that we have in society, that usually value masculine characteristics. Although both genders suffer differently from the patriarchy, most of the time men benefit. For example, the patriarchy teaches boys, from a young age, to be competitive, dominant, strong and aggressive - to be leaders and risk takers. On the other hand, it teaches girls to be graceful and emotional, cautious and sympathetic, domestic, patient and sensitive. If we break down the gender roles everyone benefits - regardless of gender. I was lucky enough to meet Laura Bates at the House of Commons a couple months ago. Laura set up the ‘Everyday Sexism’ project after a horrible week of events. <strong>The</strong> first event she shared was when she was walking home one evening and some guys started shouting out of their windows the things they wanted to do to her – she ignored them and carried on home as normal. <strong>The</strong>n a few nights later, while she was travelling home on the bus, a man started groping her leg. When she stood up and said ‘I’m on the bus and this guy’s groping me,’ everybody on the bus looked out the window or stared at their feetcertainly, no one stepped in. Worse than that, there was a sense of ‘Why are you making a fuss?’ which made her feel ashamed. Again she carried on, didn’t mention it, and went home. <strong>The</strong>n, a couple of days later, she was walking in broad daylight and a couple of builders turned to each other and said ‘Look at the legs on that’. Not even ‘her’, ‘that’. After suffering through these three events in one week, she started thinking about why was she was so used to them...and why this was so normal. <strong>The</strong>n she started thinking about the hundreds of incidents that had taken place over the weeks and months and years. Bates spoke to the women in her life and soon realised that every single woman had a similar story. But, just like her, they hadn’t spoken about them because it has been so normalised. Galvanised, Bates set up a website where people could share their stories called ‘Everyday Sexism’ to raise awareness of the problem. At first, she expected nothing of it - that a few people may comment - but in 18 months, 50,000 women around the world had shared their stories. Sexism is so normalised that people seemed accept that it wasn’t an issue, but when they started thinking about it they realised that it is not right. I realise that when people speak about feminism it can seem like it is only a movement for women. But men and boys matter. We need men to be able to join the movement because gender equality is your issue too. Even today my father’s presence in our family is valued less than my mother’s despite them both being important. We cannot ignore the fact that in the UK, suicide is the biggest killer of men between 20 and 49. Men are unable to express their emotions or seek help for fear of being thought less of a man. <strong>The</strong>re is no denying the patriarchy is set up to benefit men on the surface, but the disadvantages far outweigh the advantages for everyone. Both women and men can benefit from feminism; all people should work together to achieve equality. After all, our voices are loudest when we raise them together.
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