Week 10: International Women's Day...and stuff

So March 8th, as I'm sure you know if you spend any time on the internet, was International Women's Day, a day designed to celebrate the "economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future". ( www.internationalwomensday.com ). I frequently hear people say that days like this are pointless, or have no real impact, because whatever messages were put across are quickly forgotten the very next day. While I can understand this viewpoint, I'd have to disagree. Because for every, say, 100 people who brush off the issue of women's rights, or never give it any thought after the day is over, there might be one person who catches on. Who starts to ask questions about the way they see women, who even tries to educate themselves about the gender inequality that still plagues our society.  And although from an economic standpoint, one in a hundred is not a great return on investment, I still think days like this have merit.

That being said, March 8th did bring to light a lot of disappointing realities about the way people still see women and women's rights. While I could probably write about this subject until my fingers cramp up and my laptop overheats and dies, I think I'll just focus on one point today.

Being a girl, with a lot of friends (facebook and otherwise) who are also girls, I get to hear a wide range of viewpoints on everything to do with girls, women and our place in society.  What really bothers me is the internalized misogyny I see every single day in girls my age, and even younger. From complaints like "ugh, feminists are SO annoying" to more subtle things like the "act like a lady, think like a man" mantra I see all over facebook - and don't even get me started on slut-shaming. The hardest part of seeing girls I know think this way is feeling like there is no way to change everyone's thinking. I'm getting better at calling this stuff out when people say or post it, but most of the time it ends with the subject being changed for something less "touchy", or me being accused of not being able to take a joke.

It's also hard to talk about changing people's thinking without sounding like an 19th-century missionary - going to "bring light" to the savage and uncouth people who don't know any better. Obviously you cannot fault a person for internalizing what society is constantly yelling at them. But it's difficult not to feel sorry for girls who believe that the length of their skirt determines their self-worth. Explaining that the problematic thinking is the fault of society, and not the person themselves, is not as easy as it sounds. We like to think that our thoughts are our own, the product of our opinions and values, and that we couldn't possibly be brainwashed into certain thinking by the rest of the world. When you tell someone that society has made them think a certain way, what they hear is that they are weak-minded or stupid - which shuts down any chance of a productive discussion.

As of now, I don't have any really good solutions to this problem. I like to hope that if girls hear enough times how valuable, strong, smart and important they are, they will finally realize how horribly twisted and manipulative society's standards for women actually are. Although we should be working towards this every single day, I think International Women's Day is another step in the right direction, and I'd like to see it more widely celebrated and talked about in the future.

Til next time, bloglings