Stop Stepping on Your Own Head

I don't have many unpopular opinions because as long as you're minding your own and not interfering with the party I got going on over here then we’re cool. I just cannot understand why people over inflate the conflict in this subject and why my opinion is even considered an unpopular one. Lemme set the tone for you then you’ll understand where i’m coming from but before you read the title, get a glimpse of the language or if someone told you to read this rant they found of some random girl with no credentials smashing her keyboard,

please, please and please

listen to what i have to say about this topic with a critical lens so that we can discuss and find a solution to my dilemma. I’m not like your Uncle, on his unnamed round of Rum, Sake, A Good Ole fashioned Beer or whatever other culturally significant alcohol you relate to, spewing some drunken monologue at Thanksgiving. Think about this like when you were younger having a sleepover with your cousins in the basement. You know those heated conversations when it's like 2 AM, the ultimate arena for life's philosophical questions in my humble opinion, and you're telling each other conspiracies with a vibrant energy because your point of view seems so simple to understand? But then your mom gets up and starts yelling at y'all cause you can't contain your voice in the heat of the moment. All that to say I’d like to create discourse and hear what you also have to say to change my mind from this seemingly ridiculous opinion, but only after you fully understand what i have to say by listening to what’s coming out of my smashing keyboard.

I hate men. I’m actually not even sorry about it. Sorry.

As a student in university I can understand the importance of references so I’ll only speak about what I have empirical facts on through research, first person accounts and the experiences I've had from identifying as a woman my entire life so as to strengthen my argument. My immigrant parents often ask what it is about seemingly unimportant media, over their preferred choice of the morally and financially rewarding world of medicine *yawns*, that has made me dedicate my life to it as a practitioner. As a 21 year old I grew up on the Internet and as a media scholar I can understand how much influence that media has over those who use it as a learning resource. I’ll save you the thousands of dollars of debt, cringe-y student groups and the late nights of university life and sum it up for you; everybody learns and is influenced by the media, maybe not by directly consuming it but by interacting with those who do, which is innumerable in BIG 2020, fyi.

There’s a really neat point that I learned in one of my early theoretical media classes called The Gaze, it’s what's used to make media more visually appealing while also constructing the narrative that we understand the story through. The Gaze is the lens that is used to help viewers follow and understand the stories being told in the media, which has historically and is very rarely even presently held by women and even less often by racialized women, like myself. One of the most influential and studied filmmakers of our time who is notorious for mastering the creation of narrative through The Gaze is Alfred Hitchcock. As a young 21st century black woman I can confidently say he wasn’t making films for my demographic, which is what made me so critical to how he displayed women in his films as I was literally watching this world I had no relationship towards narrating my experiences. Men were always the ones taking action, the one that the camera followed, the ones given autonomy… the ones in power. He was a master at it and what makes it even more messed up is I loved watching it. I’d be lying through my teeth if I said he wasn’t a master storyteller, but what kind of stories was he telling? He repeatedly tells the story of men as subjects with diverse characteristics, complex traits and multifarious life experiences while women are just accessories with no inherent identity other than to compliment the man like a tacky, made in china, dollar store keychain — disposable. His movies, and most popular media in general, are built on the idea that women are objects to be consumed and stared at without judgement and I can’t even blame women for participating because who is going to give up the notoriety, and most notably for me the $$$, for some BS moral high ground. Is feminism finna pay these bills??

Because media is a part of our everyday lives and is so rarely created using the female Gaze it allows its influence to seep into everyday life and have men staring voyeuristically at women. Men are simply portraying what the media has set the tone for; women are trophies and if you like them and work hard enough you can have them. This isn’t a movie though and very rarely do these men have the magical charm of a Washington or a McConaughey that immediately wafts and enchants women off their feet like the steam from a pie on a cartoon windowsill. What they will always have is audacity, that’s why mens pockets are bigger than women's, to carry their audacity. If you want me to rip off my skirt as soon as you walk near me then stand in the rain with a boombox if you're so gangster then. Don’t get me wrong, I love the beauty of love in pop culture; I wanna fall in love like Romeo and Juliet (the DiCaprio version obvi), I wanna Cater 2 U like Destiny’s Child and I wanna post my significant other all over my social media while proudly proclaiming that I’m theirs. But that’s not all of me and my identity forms greater than what is prescribed for me in the media and society.

You get where i’m going with this don’t you? Cut post- “society is one big patriarchal playground” rant and to the meatier subject matter that I would like to discuss: its effects on women.

I get the biological differences in the sexes and the connotations that come with them; men are providers, women are nurturers blah blah blah but honestly there’s beauty in it if it's done right. Everyone has a role and if they do their part we all grow collectively. I guess you could say I subscribe to the different but equal model to enhance the balance of experiences allotted to me rather than the same dull stories; men and women can and should have different life experiences because they are all equally important in our collective growth as a species. You’re telling me that men who cannot bear the common cold without moaning and groaning could bear the feeling of their uteruses quite literally ripping themselves apart, monthly? Or BIRTH?? Same way that no matter how much I train to get to my physical prime, I could never out fight a man at his physical prime (sorry to my boxing coach please don’t make me do any more burpees I promise that’s not the solution). HERE IS THE PROBLEM THOUGH, because women are deemed as objects, these roles are taken out of their intended context and are used to create the fictional gender roles that obstruct women's rights and autonomy. In following what the media prescribed for them, men feel as though they have to put on a performance and audition for coochie while believing women must do the same; they have objected themselves into this performance introduced by the media and expect us to also follow our same media influenced role without any variations. Sure, women like strength, confidence, self-assuredness etc which are traits that are depicted as masculine in the media but are also traits that develop when you are comfortable with who you are, regardless of sexe. If you feel as though it’s meant to be performative just to beat then not only are you deceiving the world (and being sort of rapey tbh) but you are deceiving yourself. The result of this influence is women feeling as though they also have to be performative in their sexualization, regardless of whether or not they want to, because without that then they cannot navigate the vast majority of the world that is influenced by these fictitious roles. It’s human nature to want to be valued but by being defined by these impossibly rigid standards, you are taking autonomy away from women (men too, but who cares because they themselves set the standard). Men are allowed and even encouraged to come into themselves but as soon as a woman comes into her own she's not playing the part of the inanimate trophy.

Now I know what you're saying “not all men do that”, you’re right. Men are human too I guess *rolls eyes* and when someone critically thinks about their place in the world then they evolve. This is why I witness so many beautiful marriages, why I have male friends, mentors and love all my brothers, they're just humans who have used the readily available resources to better themselves from ghetto thinking. Women aren’t given that same autonomy to discover themselves though and it is directly responsible for the oppression we face. Although I want to live my life autonomously, the medias prescribed role for me as a woman has influenced the word around me to reject my sex when I deviate from that role. It creates barriers in my pursuit of self-identification and actualization when I didn’t even choose to be a woman.

I feel a sort of cognitive dissonance to my womanhood because of gender roles, it hinders the development of individual female identity with the coercive influence of a basically fictitious system.

It's so dehumanizing when I even have to argue this angle, my identity and my sex aren’t one but rather are complimentary. I don't choose to do things because I am a woman, they’re chosen and I just so happen to be a woman. Of course my sexe has influenced how I’ve lived my life but instead of taking that as a simple fact in the greater scheme of my identity, but if I deviate from anything that doesn't fit that rigid sexe model will be used to oppress me, read: lack of research on women's medical treatments, legislation on women's reproductive rights, access to education and employment etc. I’ve been told since birth, then had that narrative reinforced all 21 years of my life, that my worth is adjacent to your perception of my sexe that it makes me feel as though if you don’t perceive me in a light most pleasing to you ie: a child rearing object, I am worthless.

You don’t have a phat ass? WHACK!

You want an education? WHACK!

You want an abortion? WHACK!

You want treatment at a hospital because you, a dark skinned woman, feel pain? LMAO go home loser!!!!!

This leads to so much confusion because I do not identify as a woman, I am identified as a woman; I am not a woman because I exhibit these gender roles but rather just because I have a uterus and all the corresponding parts. I don't understand why I even have to say this but when I don't choose to express “femininity” it's not a radical movement, not everyday social justice movements omg. I just thought these cargo pants went well with this outfit or I really enjoy coding, or I stand up when I'm systematically being treated poorly but this “radical” ideology extends to every intellectual, emotional or social action I choose as a woman whether I intended to or not.

This can vary depending on a woman's personal lived experience; while I can continue to go on about my seemingly unimportant criticisms of feminism as a middle-class western woman, I understand that there are various political and cultural implications to consider in the severity that these roles play. I’ve been met with a slew of poignant responses in the times that I’ve spoken up about this topic. What bothered me was that some women didn’t even recognize the slums they had placed themselves in by allowing these roles to be perpetuated (I can’t say that I am better than them in that I don’t perpetuate them myself but like check yourself sometimes, ya know?). I consulted many people to understand their views as players in this game and there were unfortunately several instances of attacks on me but the one that struck me was when a woman labelled me as angry for no reason (quite common and honestly lazy comeback tbh). When I calmly asked her why she thought of me to be angry when I was simply trying to understand her she told me “you just won't shut up, always going on about nothing”. I hate insulting people but wow, can you say worms for brains? I was intrigued but she blocked me — lolz — so I can only make the connection myself; when you are conscious about injustice, the oppressor and those complicit in the oppression will not not understand your anger. I understand people's need to be valued and accepted by others because it's human nature but she was living in some sort of Stockholm Syndrome reality at the cost of her own identity. It’s interesting to observe those that reject feminism, not because I think they’re *insert unjustified insult on character* but because of the factors that they use to justify these bleak realities. I call myself a radical feminist because I think my ideologies deserve radical change not because I carry out radical actions in a Tasmanian Devil-like rage. It is so baffling to me when people are against feminism because it should not have to be radical, what exactly is so radical with wanting to be treated like an autonomous human? Right before she blocked me she claimed I’m like those men hating women who are mad because men don't want them. Firstly lol, sure Jan. Secondly, why is that the only factor that you believe to be of influence to me? Should I not be alloted critical thinking when I'm constantly being shown various narratives? Who exactly will it serve for me to be complacent in a system that oppresses based on uncontrolled biological differences? It’s so pathetic to me that people can understand that there are social differences in the sexes but believe it to be a coincidence that the people who experience sexism happen to be the ones with uteruses. Women undoubtedly require special social, political and legal protections same with all other racially, economically, and politically oppressed demographics. What is a magical coincidence though is that the conscious ones have to bear the brunt of this unfortunate reality when the evidence of people being systematically oppressed even to the point of DEATH simply because of their biological differences is so widely being reported. Why are we choosing to ignore those stories?

The reason I say I hate men as an all encompassing term is that any man, and other influenced demographic regardless of their personal benefit, who is not conscious on a 24/7 basis will be influenced into perpetuating these ridiculous value systems. If you were looking into flying and found that the rate of crashes were 37 for every 1000 flights you’d be surprised no? Objectively, you could then look at how many flights can possibly take off in a particular day for you to be affected? Air Canada has about 230 per day, Air France 1,500 and Southwest has about 4,000 at peak travel season for reference, so it all depends on who you wanna bet your odds with, when you wanna do it, and if the destination is really worth it. Personally, I'd tell flying that imma just stay my black ass at home and read a book or something.

But that's just my opinion.

But, what if I told you that according to The Canadian Government’s Department of Justice, 37 of every 1000 women are sexually assaulted. This coupled with statistics from three separate studies also done by the Department of Justice with survivors of sexual assault, that states 64% of women do not ever report assault to the police can only make you imagine what the real numbers are. The study also says that 5 of every 1000 men are sexually assaulted and that 68% of male survivors do not report their assaults; my objective is not to undermine the severity of sexual assault and the very real victims that are affected but rather to highlight how high the statistics are for women to strengthen my arguments objective. Then what about the evil things they can get away with that aren't necessarily assault, the jobs/education they can deny you from, the access to healthcare tailored to you or just the general dehumanization; the opportunities and autonomy that are all being ripped away from you because of your genitalia. I don't know about you guys, but PERSONALLY imma just stay my black ass at home and read a book or something.

But that’s just my opinion.

Obviously I'm conscious of these barriers so I have the self respect to not be treated like this but there’s only so much I can do if my opinion remains unpopular regardless of how simple it seems to me. Womanhood is beautiful but the views I've been subjected to take as fact are not wholly and only what I choose for myself. It’s wild to me that this is such a divisive topic when it is a simple story on power structures. Feminism is the fight for basic rights yet because of the narrative being given full control in the media and not the true stories of women being heard, so many people seem to be against this basic mission of human activism and I'm made to sound like a broken record. Sometimes silence is the only thing you can count on — if you stay home and isolate yourself from the problem then you will be fine — but I have to make the decision to not “hush” any longer regardless of the interjections I might receive, so that the story gets heard and changes from an unpopular one. The reason I say it's an unpopular opinion is because the majority of us did not choose this; our representations are made to be totalizing while not having any input from us.

Of course I cannot highlight the years of academic research and experiences of women in this basement at 2 AM but what I can highlight is that without listening to these diverse, complex and multifarious stories then the single story I had been told my whole life would continue to hinder my ability to relate to anything else. Old lame white men in power created this system because it benefited them and y’all are eating it up like a fat kid who just discovered chocolate cake. It's whack and I don't subscribe to it because it's not a story I would even like to relate to. But like a Shakespearean fool imma just be here in the corner, eating my pineapple-d pizza with the rest of my unpopular opinions and sit in peace knowing that my opinion might be unpopular but at least it’s mine.