Feminism Friday - the personal IS political

When I began studying feminist thought, I knew it would change my life. I had always been something of a feminist, believed in women’s equality. But I had no idea how embedded gender roles really were, how everything around us reinforces gender. Through feminist thought I discovered a huge body of work about race, sexuality, (dis)ability, poverty and class, trans issues. Again, I had always believed in equality for everyone regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, class, level of ability - but I had no idea how deeply these identities are embedded within society. All of this led me to examine every relationship I had with another person, and adjust my methods of interacting and engaging with other people in friendships, in my family, in sexual relationships, in workplace relationships, in my interactions with strangers I don’t even know. It led me to examine the implications of my work, my workplace dynamics, how I earn my living. It completely changed the focus of my degree, and my future plans. It led me to question the music I listen to, the movies and TV shows I watch, and challenged me to give up music and movies and TV shows that I loved but were not coherent with the goal of gender equality. It led me to challenge my own identity politics, my privileges as a white heterosexual middle-class able-bodied woman, and what it means to even identify myself by these names. It led me to question the very body I live, the foundations of my embodiment, my personal biology and how my body functions. It led me to examine my political beliefs, the people I voted for. It led me to have a greater respect for the environment. Feminist thought, and the thought I have been exposed to through feminism, has changed my life. I understand full well the meaning of the personal is political. my question is, how can it not be?

I am not a patient person. Never have been. Oh, I have patience for certain things. I am quite good with details, and I can perform tasks that others find ‘tedious’ or ‘nitpicky’ with a high degree of accuracy. But patience is not exactly one of my strong points.

Lately, especially, I have been feeling very impatient. I am impatient for the completion of my degree, and I am impatient to find out where I will be going to school next year, where I will be living. But this isn’t even really the issue for me, why I am short on patience, what situations cause me to lose patience.

I look around my world, my society, and I see much to be desired. I see oppression everywhere I look. I see misogyny. I see racism. I see heterosexism. I see the poor starving, dying of treatable preventable illnesses. I see gay marriage being called down in parliament by my country’s leader and put to a vote whether to keep allowing gays and lesbians to marry. I see funding cuts to vitally important programs like the Status of Women Council. I see kids being born and then neglected, turning into bullies and killing themselves and their classmates. I see rape. I see torture. I see murder, even state-sanctioned murder. I see disease. I see hatred between religious groups. I see wars built on lies and continued on egos. I see cities and towns and villages being wiped out by natural disasters. I see capitalist exploitation. I see war profiteering. I see victim-blaming, everywhere.

and I don’t know what to do. I just don’t know what to do. All I know is, this has got to stop, and fast.

And so I talk about it. I write about it, and I talk about it. I visit other blogs and join in other discussions. I write academic papers about it. I talk about it with my friends and with my family. And I get encouragement sometimes. And sometimes I get D grades from sexist profs. And sometimes my own parents tell me they don’t understand why I am doing what I do, and that I should really think about doing something vastly different with my life because I will never be able to change a thing. And sometimes I get letters and comments from misogynistic assholes who accuse me of hating men, of being a lesbian (which is just so ridiculous, as if I would consider that to be an insult in any way - but the point is that’s how it is meant), of denying women their autonomy, of trying to take down men, of ignoring harms that men experience, of being a godless whore who is on the straight path to hell, of being a frigid bitch who needs a good deepdicking. I get letters and comments from men who want to prove to me how women ask to be raped, how men aren’t at fault because it’s just a natural biological sexual urge for men to rape women, or how violence against women isn’t really that big an issue. I get spammed with more porn links than I can shake a stick at because I talk about sex and sexuality and how pornography is harmful to women and female genital cutting and vaginas and breasts and clitorises and vulvas - many of whom will try any trick in the book to get you to click on their link so their site will pop up on your screen full of shaved crotches and cum shots and women getting fucked in every orifice they have simultaneously. I get unbelievable amounts of hits on this site from people searching for videos of female genital cutting, pictures of children’s genitals, photos of women undergoing pap smears, pictures of infibulated vaginas, and all manner of pornography demeaning and harming women from incest rape to women being fucked to death by a machine. The spam and the searches I receive on this site proove exactly what kind of sick world we live in where women are worthless and small. And each day when I check my stats and respond to my comments and delete my spam, I am alienated by the pervasiveness of this hatred that I can’t escape even as I sit in my own home and facilitate my own little space on the web.

And if I get upset by any of this, I am accused of being overly emotional. If I stick by my arguments I am accused of being inflexible and irrational and having too much pride to admit when I’m wrong. I’m accused of not being very nice, of not caring enough about men and their delicate feelings on the subject of how deeply patriarchy hurts them, too. Posts devoted to supporting and encouraging survivors of sexual violence get infiltrated by men who insist that women are somehow magically raping themselves - are responsible for their own victimhood. And if I lose my patience, or my temper, with insipid fallacious arguments along the misogynistic lines that ‘men are just better than women and it’s a matter of biology so stop trying to fight a losing battle’, then it only encourages them because they think they have found a chink in my armour, they think I’m too emotional and that emotion negates reason so any showing of emotion means I am weak and wrong and they can disregard what I have said and therefore they have won because they were able to remain calm and ‘rational’ - no matter how illogical or irrational their point. I’m sick and tired of repeating the same old stuff, over and over again, to rotating audiences who are unable or unwilling to get it. My patience is wearing thin.

so I don’t know what to do. can’t win. can’t give up the fight.

rock. hard place. me.

it is frustrating. it is infuriating. it is depressing. it is oppressive. It is exhausting. It is isolating. it is heavy and dark and cold.

I am so grateful to my readers who are supportive, who encourage me, who consider what I have written, who share my mindset and my goals, who inspire me, who engage with  me, who challenge me, who teach me. I may be losing my patience lately, but I am not losing my hope, thanks to you. so, thank you.

the rest of you can kiss my ass.