'If we stop defining each other by what we are not and start defining ourselves by who we are, we can all be a lot freer' - Emma Watson
It's been a while since I wrote a blog post. There's something about working full time that seems to have the ability to take all your time and creativity. Lately though (and in particularly since November 2016), I have found more and more things I want to speak out on.
Today I wanted to post about something that has been niggling me lately. It is an issue close to me as I approach 34, but I think it is a wider issue in society as a whole. After all, the personal is political. I am referring to the tendency of women to judge other women. I have touched on it in previous blogs and really nothing has changed. It could even be getting worse. Women are more vocal about feminism, more supportive of each others choices and rights, and yet we cannot stop looking at each other and comparing the choices we have made in our lives. We all do it. What about the men I hear you say? Well I think men make our lives hard enough, sure they do, but I think this issue is a strictly female one. While men will support each other, women can be more inclined to tear each other down. You can see it every day on social media.
I'm going to put this out there now. Some people are going to say, 'well yeah duh' and some will be like 'ah sure, rabid feminist alert' but I don't care, I truly believe this. Hillary Clinton lost to Donald Trump because she was a woman. I am simplifying a very complex issue down to the bare bones here, but there you have it. Let me phrase it another way, only a woman could have lost to Donald Trump. On paper, stack them up side by side and the least qualified candidate won. It happens in jobs all over the world when the most qualified candidate is a woman. That's because, although the 'boys club' lives on and thrives, women cannot seem to commit wholeheartedly to the 'sisterhood'. Exit polls suggested that 53% of white women voted for Donald Trump. How on earth any woman could vote for a man they heard on tape bragging about sexual assault is beyond me, but they 'just did not like' Hillary. I would like to add as a disclaimer that women of colour actually came out in force for Hillary, but theirs is a different experience to mine and I will not speak on it.
I'll pull you back from politics now before I lose you. I could write a million blogs on that subject, but I actually want to bring you back to more mundane day to day stuff. Now I am 33, single and with no children, my marital status is one of the first things I am asked. When people realise I don't have children, the next question is usually 'do you want childen?'. I say people, but it's women. It's not men that ask me that question and that is why I say, as women, we have got to stop. We have to stop judging, we have to stop imposing our own desires onto others, we have to stop trying to 'help' people that are simply choosing to go down a different path. Maybe I don't want children. Maybe I cannot have children. If that is the case, would it not be painful for me every time someone asked? Maybe I cry every night because I want to meet the love of my life (I don't by the way, just some nights), so when my friend sends me yet another suggestion on ways to find a man would it not be painful for me? Most of the time the intention is good. But they do say that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. I don't see the same expectation being placed on men. Why is a single man in his thirties a bachelor who just needs to have some fun before he settles down, while a single woman in her thirties must be a desperate spinster trying to decide whether to freeze her eggs or not?! This is just one example of the expectations women put on other women. I highlighted this one because it bugs me in particular at this time in my life. Every day though women judge other women for the way they dress, who they date, how they speak, the careers they chose, the way they behave, etc etc. The list goes on, I could write a blog on each one and how damaging they are. Women even judge each other on the feminist movement they identify with (that's a whole different issue!). I believe women now have a responsibility to think about the impact their unconscious actions (even their thoughts) have on other women. We are holding each other back every time we reduce each other down to a basic societal expectation of what it means to be a woman.
For me, feminism is about women having equality, freedom and choice. That is the choice to be whoever they want to be, go wherever they want to go, fuck whoever they want to fuck (you get the point). So all of us need to consider this when we look to the women in our life who maybe don't have the kind of life we do, or want what we want. Instead of shoehorning each other into this one size fits all idea of what a woman should be, we should be embracing each others differences, encouraging each other to live life and follow the path that truly makes us happy. For some, that's a little house in a small town with a husband and children. For some, it's travelling the world alone and experiencing new things daily. For others it's getting married eight times (go Liz!). There was a time in the not so distant past when having this choice was not an option. Women did what was expected of them and the ones that dared rebel, joined the ranks of fallen women before them. We have come a long way, but as Hillary Clinton learned last year - we still have a long way to go.
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