Lunapads

I’ve always had a bit of a problem understanding the meaning of “feminism.” I spent the majority of my childhood coercing my male cousins into playing Barbies with me, having the Ken doll staying at home with the kids while the Mom, always a dark-haired barbie, went to work. I suppose that in some ways, this was a direct result of the fact that my father worked freelance, and so he always stayed home with me and was there to pick me up from school while my mother went to work. This instilled the fact that men and women are nearly equal from an early age, and I was surprised that most of my classmates were picked up by their mothers. While my father would carry me out to the classroom on rainy days, I’d see only mothers dropping their kids off at the curb, and I would wonder why their daddies didn’t carry them out as well. As I got older, I wondered why my father and uncle always did the cleaning and my mom and aunt cooked, and in other families, the mom did everything.

As I got into high school, I tended to shy away from the self-labeled feminists: they tended to open their own doors, but would not hold them open for the men, and felt insulted when a man tried to help them with their chair or coat, snapping at them that she could do it herself, whereas I felt appreciative of the help that I recieved from my male friends. Similarly, I never refused them a favor, and more often than not these favors came in the form of sewing a rip in a pair of jeans. I was perfectly capable of performing heavy manual labor (most times, in a skirt and barefoot), but I would not refuse if a guy offered to help me, or to simply take over.

My idea of feminism is one in which men and women acknowledge, accept, and celebrate their physical differences and are treated equally within the workplace. I feel that a woman who can physically handle a job in construction should be treated equally, but that if a woman is not physically on par with the men, then she should be refused the job, or given jobs that she is fit to handle. Likewise, any office position should be earned on merit, regardless of gender, and pay should be distributed in the same fashion. I feel that a great part of feminism is embracing who we, as women, are and what we can accomplish. We should not strive to be treated as men, equal to men; we should strive to be treated as women, accepted and loved and viewed in the same light as men. We should brag about our periods, discuss what size pads or tampons or menstrual cups we wear as men discuss urination, ejaculation and condoms; we should exchange sex and birth and menopause stories openly, as men discuss sex and erections. We should strive to change the idea that the vagina is a dirty thing while a penis is clean; we should be proud of who we are and what we have, and not be ashamed, and not wish to be treated equally to men when it is obvious that we are so different. All genders are special, unique in some way. Leave equality in the office; give me a good, old-fashioned gentleman with new ideas on how to be gentlemanly towards his lady.

Adriana A.
California

This entry was posted on Monday, March 26th, 2007 at 12:03 pm by Guest and is filed under Feminism, Guest Bloggers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.