I think I'd like to say something about it, but I'm not sure what. Feminism can be difficult to talk about (Gosh, really?). If you agree with me, then I'm (uselessly) preaching to the converted; but if you disagree, then our disagreements are probably fundamental and/or quite subtle (& so, either way, probably v difficult to discuss intelligently via interweb). And anyhow, why should you care what I think about it?
But this is my blog, so I'm going to do it anyway.
What I think "about women" – uh, politically speaking – has spiralled around in different directions as I've grown up, I think. As a kid of leftish-lowermiddleclassy parents, I internalised the status quo of 1980s-90s political correctness: there is sexism in the world, women are treated badly and unfairly, this is bad and unfair. But as a teenager it dawned on me that being male wasn't all steak and glory, either; there were unexpectedly bad aspects to being a man in the modern world, too. For example: pop culture seemed to be telling me that boys were foolish and troublesome and evil, most of the time. And I felt like I was being told that girls could do anything, but simultaneously that boys could not. When you're adolescent, any potential unfairness (towards yourself) is a red rag, so this apparent "stupid boys will be stupid boys" meme bugged me a lot. Were girls now getting the best of everything, and always the benefit of the doubt? Had feminism "gone too far in the other direction"?
No. No, it hadn't, and I feel kind of stupid now for even considering sentiments like that. But it took me a few more years to see the world clearly from a few more sides, other than my own. And I had been privileged to grow up in an environment where sexism against women was sometimes less than obvious, I think; maybe that was why it took me a while to see and understand all the things that other people were thinking, the ways that they were acting, the ways in which they were being affected. Actions and consequences, assumptions and beliefs – these aren't always obvious. (Obviously.)
This is what I assume and believe, now: that the similarities across gender are nowhere near as significant as the differences between individuals. I've never known a woman who was more of a woman than a person. But I know most people don't agree with me, they don't believe this; instead, most people think that there are a bunch of crucial, essential commonalities to men and to women, and that these gender-commonalities are more significant than anything else. And to me that's the essential problem of sexism, because I believe that gender is not actually as significant as we make it – or at least, it doesn't have to be. Sexism, like racism, is bad because it's essentially untrue.
So our status quo is messed up, I think. And everyone in our society is disadvantaged by the false assumptions of sexism – that's what I was confused to learn as a young teen, that men (i.e. me) were sometimes being disadvantaged too. But that's not to say that men have it worse overall, because they don't. You can't see the world honestly without seeing that it still disadvantages women far worse than men, I think. (There are so many examples, I'm not even going to get into them; not today, anyhow.)
So. To me, this is International Women's Day: it's a reminder that things are still bad. (Though thankfully much, much better now than they ever used to be; & people sometimes underestimate just how much better, I think.) There are still a whole bunch of big fat sexist problems, all over the place. It makes me feel like I'm always needing to think hard and pay attention and act bravely and behave well, to do my part to make things better. Be fair. Don't be a dick.
International Women's Day: Don't Forget.
So that's what it means to me and what I think about it, I guess.
But, ah, what a serious and humourless post! (Not to mention, possibly patronising, stupid, facile, self-indulgent, myopic, wrong? I don't even know . . . but please tell me in the comments.)
Sorry, folks. To cheer us up, here's a picture of a pony:
Right on.
