This week, I have, for various reasons, been extremely consumed with what one might refer to as feminist issues. I'll try to recap them all here, but I may end up breaking this up into a few blog posts.
1) One of the greatest feminists I know is a speech coach from college. She currently has twins, a boy and a girl, age seven. I am 100% sure that she is doing her absolute best to teach them the same values and that they are equals in every way. Her twins were chosen for the local paper to take through the toy aisles of Target to pick the best toys for Christmas. The results were not depressing; as I said above, I am certain that she treats them exactly the same. However, the young girl chose the girl-oriented Legos and the girl-oriented Nerf shooter. There is no real need for these companies to even create girl-oriented Legos and a girl-oriented Nerf. Whereas they may have improved, the last I read, girl-oriented Legos are even *easier* to create than boy-oriented (or as I like to call them anybody-oriented) Legos. It is clear that society makes an impact even at a young age.
2) I dogsat for a friend's dog named Mia. I took an adorable photo of Mia and posted it on Instagram, hashtagging it with #Mia. I clicked on the hashtag to see other dogs and people named Mia out of boredom. Immediately, a warning came up that the hashtag may be a gateway to disturbing content. #Mia, it turns out is short for bulimia and is a hashtag for those who are supportive of bulimia; often, those who support bulimia are the same folks who are supportive of anorexia and, sometimes, self-harm. It was the most heartbreaking thing I've ever seen, and sometimes, I revisit that hashtag. I revisit it to try to understand the mental state those folks are in. Many name themselves as preteens and teens in their Instagram bio - 13, 14, 15 seems to be the most common age range. The photos are 'thinspiration' - women (they're almost always women) with a thigh gap (where your feet are together but your thighs remain apart because they are very tiny, women with a stomach that doesn't even stick out as far as her hip bones, or a photo of a 'thinspirational' saying like "Bed without dinner; wake up thinner." Guys, these GIRLS are trying to DISAPPEAR. Even though obesity is a much larger crisis in terms of numbers, this is a major problem. These girls are killing themselves or nearly killing themselves while they're young teenagers over the pressure on how to look a certain way. (I know men also can have an eating disorder, but these folks on Instagram are overwhelmingly female.) They aren't trying to get fitter or get smarter or get more friends; THEY ARE TRYING TO DISAPPEAR. It is the most tragic thing that I have ever seen. Not only is it a tragedy, but it is a tragedy that young people are putting upon themselves EVERY day because of the messages they are receiving from the media, from their families, from their peers, and mostly, from their own minds. If anyone with an eating disorder is reading this, STOP TRYING TO DISAPPEAR; YOU ARE LOVED.
3) In my early 20s particularly, I wanted to lose weight and read weight-loss blogs from individuals who are overweight by all medical measures. My favorite became Pasta Queen, a now discontinued blog by a lady in her early 20s who was somewhere in the 300-400 pound range at the start. She was funny and whip-smart. It was by reading those blogs that I learned about the range of weight-loss blogs out there and how focused people are on losing weight. (I personally am in the overweight area of the ever-popular BMI scale and I still struggle with this but do not - and have not chosen to ever - count every morsel that is put into my body.) Through reading these blogs, I learned about terms like 'onederland' - a term that refers to dropping below the 200 pound mark. At the time, I found these blogs harmless since people were just trying to get healthy, but they were among the - probably almost ALL - women, particularly in this country - who think about their weight on a daily or near-daily basis. Ladies, we've got to STOP. I recently read Lessons from the Fat-o-Sphere. I am not sure if I agree with everything they mention, but I do believe their lesson that we need to accept our bodies as they are, even if we do wish to change them. And I suggest we stop trying to focus SO incredibly much on our weight. Men outperform us in the workplace; if even there is a TINY amount of possibility that they keep the advantage because they have so much more time to focus on jobs because they are not focusing on their weight as much, we MUST stop. In Lean In, Sheryl Sandberg notes that women are already at a disadvantage to men in terms of looks already because we cannot do things like wear the same outfit everyday (Steve Jobs) or similar outfits (Barack Obama) because we are massively criticized; let's not put ourselves behind. (Please note, I am in NO WAY claiming that these are the only - or even the worst - offenders in sexism and keeping women down in the workplace, but I'm saying this is just a fringe example of what we could be holding ourselves back from by performing on our bodies. Another note: the reason that Jobs and Obama give is that you do lose willpower and decision-making ability throughout the day from making so many decisions and that way, they do not have to make that decision.)
4) WMATA (Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority - or the metro in DC) got in on the sexist fun this week too. Here is the DCist link to what is going on. Basically, the metro decided to brag about their (really shitty) statistics. (Side note: What else goes less than 9,000 miles before breaking down? NOTHING.) They created two ads. The first was one with a lady talking about metro stats and her friend asking to talk about shoes - SHOES! The second was one with a man talking about metro and his friend saying he hadn't heard the stat. WHY IS THERE A DIFFERENCE?!? Why is there a difference between the ad you make with black people v. white people (Burlington Coat Factory has almost identical commercials this holiday season where the black family got theirs from layaway but the white family could buy their 'haul' straight out.)? Why is there a difference between the ad you make between men and women? Just make the other lady say "I don't know." DO NOT GO WITH A STEREOTYPICAL THING THAT WOMEN TALK ABOUT. Plus, as a woman, I don't talk about shoes that much. I talk about metro more. (probably because metro messes up more than my shoes) FOR GOODNESS SAKE.
5) Microsoft, of all companies, is also making a bra. The bra is meant to determine when women's emotions are changing; when they might start to emotional eat; and to prevent that from happening. When you have a chip that can tell a change in emotion, why would you make a bra focused on preventing women from eating when you could: alert someone when they might hit someone, alert someone when a terrible emotion is happening to someone with a mental disorder, or really anything else. Why is "women can't eat" the focus? (other than money - I know it's all about money) Stop. (and see #2 and #3)
I still have more sexist examples from this week. It's been a bad week for women. I am going to write them later, but I feel better having written all of this. I'm going to be focusing, I'm sure, for months to come on how to fix these problems. I hope you will too and think about outside messages you receive. You are loved. Love yourself.
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