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From a recent post in Feministas:
I have pondered for a while what to write here in the way of an introduction. Here's my story:
I was the greatest hope (like all the other women born in this age) of my mother's generation. Born in the sixties, I was raised to believe that I could do anything without regard to gender. Like all of us born then, I discovered that others didn't see it that way...men and women alike. I was heartbroken when I was forced off an all boys soccer team (the only kind back then...girls leagues came much later) because "someone might hit my breasts." I learned quickly that smart girls were not popular in school. I did what any self-respecting teenager of the time would do...I sold out. I chased boys; I giggled; I flirted; I wore too much makeup; I dreamed of being the Barbie in Barbie's Dream Wedding. I even met Gloria Steinham briefly when I was fifteen. She impressed me, but couldn't compete with my crush on the guy who sat behind me in algebra. I became everything that my mother had hoped I wouldn't.
In college, I became an art house feminist. I read all the books. I quit wearing make-up. I dressed in black. I kissed and groped girls instead of boys. I sat with my self-anointed nouveau Bohemian friends, railing against male-dominated culture between sips of espresso and drags from our overpriced imported cigarettes. I knew all the right words. I could argue theory with the best and brightest. But it was all show. I didn't start to get it until I had my own kids years later. Until my father quit speaking to me because I wasn't married. Until I had to explain twelve-thousand times that I wasn't divorced--I'd just never been married. Until I started to think about what kind of men I wanted to raise...how I wanted them to see the women they knew...and women in general. I look now at the girls who start painting their faces and their hair when they're in elementary school, who start fucking when they're barely old enough to have periods. I live in an age when women are objectified (and, quite frankly, objectify themselves) more than my mother's generation could have ever endured or imagined. I still read the books. I still listen to my mother. I still think Gloria Steinham is cool beyond cool. And I still hold out hope that one day we can all get our shit together and start this revolution from the inside out.
I have pondered for a while what to write here in the way of an introduction. Here's my story:
I was the greatest hope (like all the other women born in this age) of my mother's generation. Born in the sixties, I was raised to believe that I could do anything without regard to gender. Like all of us born then, I discovered that others didn't see it that way...men and women alike. I was heartbroken when I was forced off an all boys soccer team (the only kind back then...girls leagues came much later) because "someone might hit my breasts." I learned quickly that smart girls were not popular in school. I did what any self-respecting teenager of the time would do...I sold out. I chased boys; I giggled; I flirted; I wore too much makeup; I dreamed of being the Barbie in Barbie's Dream Wedding. I even met Gloria Steinham briefly when I was fifteen. She impressed me, but couldn't compete with my crush on the guy who sat behind me in algebra. I became everything that my mother had hoped I wouldn't.
In college, I became an art house feminist. I read all the books. I quit wearing make-up. I dressed in black. I kissed and groped girls instead of boys. I sat with my self-anointed nouveau Bohemian friends, railing against male-dominated culture between sips of espresso and drags from our overpriced imported cigarettes. I knew all the right words. I could argue theory with the best and brightest. But it was all show. I didn't start to get it until I had my own kids years later. Until my father quit speaking to me because I wasn't married. Until I had to explain twelve-thousand times that I wasn't divorced--I'd just never been married. Until I started to think about what kind of men I wanted to raise...how I wanted them to see the women they knew...and women in general. I look now at the girls who start painting their faces and their hair when they're in elementary school, who start fucking when they're barely old enough to have periods. I live in an age when women are objectified (and, quite frankly, objectify themselves) more than my mother's generation could have ever endured or imagined. I still read the books. I still listen to my mother. I still think Gloria Steinham is cool beyond cool. And I still hold out hope that one day we can all get our shit together and start this revolution from the inside out.
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i feel like the generation before us will always be afraid for the next-- they seem so careless, so unsocialized and so primed for big fuckups, and i know i want to tell them to not do all the stupid stuff i did, but i think it's inevitable for people to stumble in the same places. i just worry about the ones who never seem to get it together.
Maybe we need to get it together at an earlier age? Socializing young women so that they don't automatically look for the approval in the eyes of (sometimes predatory) strangers seems like a start. but what a huge thing it is to buck against the grain like that, esp when we all, men and women alike, crave being accepted and liked.
anyway, thanks for letting me ramble, Catelin!
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