Feminism – the great oppressor

I have reaped the benefits of those radicalised women who paved my way, I have the right to work full time, to acquire an education, to own property, to make decisions. Without doubt, I would argue that I am a ‘true’ and ardent Feminist. Such a sweeping statement requires quantifications and I will therefore define MY personal version of Feminism:

Feminism – my definition:

A belief in, and a passion for, equal rights for all human beings within each and every context and sphere;

A celebratory view of womanhood, and a pride in all that this means

I am a person, with agency, with power, with…well, well an axe to grind, because in the realms of the great and mighty sisterhood sits a dark, unholy secret.

The collective consciousness of the right-on Feminist, equates to the collective conscience of oppression of the ‘right’.

By right, I do not mean politically, because the collective conscience champions victims of oppression, those marginalised peoples exploited by the political right. The parody being, that in forging this collective identity, the marginalised female, she who does not subscribe to the collective conscious view of womanhood, becomes the victim. She becomes that which Feminism purports to support and defend, she becomes the marginalised, bullied into a fear of wearing lipstick, or God forbid, a short skirt.

A colleague, recently informed me that I was Mothering badly by engendering my daughter, that I was subjecting her to societal values of ‘princessness’ and therefore forcing an oppressive identity upon her. At this point may I interject? My subjective position is that I am a Mother of six, four categorised as boys, two categorised as girls, I have been a primary and early years educator, I have studied, among other things, child development and pedagogical theories of education and socialisation. I have also, unsurprisingly met my own children. The colleague who knows better has no children; she has however embraced the Feminist stereotype to empower her own agency. She also has nieces, she therefore feels suitable qualified to sit on cloud, and without ever meeting my children, cast judgement on their environment, upbringing, and my parenting methods.

What she does not have the ability however to do, is to understand that while socialisation, and environmental practices influence a personality, my child is in fact, an individual. Her sister chose to wear multi-coloured dungarees, 2 of her brothers chose to wear long hair, she however, chooses to wear a dress. And surely a fundamental principle of Feminism is choice?

No.

At a recent departmental occasion, another female colleague’s choice of a dress that sat above the kneeline was criticised by a different Feminist, the simple look and comment ensured she spent the rest of the evening sitting self-consciously and wishing she had never attended.

I have heard Feminist friends declare that women wearing miniskirts cause other women to be raped…erm, Judge Pickles, you have nothing on the oppressive practices of the archetypal and stereotypical Feminist. I know women who will not wear lipstick to work, although they want to, for fear of derisory comments. A simply said, ‘ahhh, so you’re wearing lipstick today?’ causes them to declare wildly, ‘lipchap, I have chapped lips!’

This, my esteemed stereotype embracing colleagues, is not Feminism, it is bullying, it is oppression, it is enforcing your views of sisterhood onto the shoulders, and down the ears of others. It is actually, no different from the Barbie adverts that cause me to switch the television off, because while the original motive may be admirable, the pressuring and judgementality is consistent with the oppressive practices of social conformity you claim to despise. Unwittingly, an entire clan of sisters have become so deeply entrenched within the system of oppression that they can see no other means of being, other than judging and criticising and conforming to a stereotype of sandals, baggy clothes and a cleanly scrubbed face. That, sister, is your choice, I do not criticise this, I do not sit in staff meetings and sneer at the gossamer thinness of your cotton shirts, I do not criticise your appearance and make reference to the stereotypical, and overt sexualisation of your make-up-less face, dishevelled hair and beads, and comment on how you looking like a woman at Woodstock, rolling naked in the mud causes women to be raped, because I am more than aware that such an overt simplification of complex phenomenon would be both hypercritical and unfounded.

So when I sit with my Feminist colleagues, with their superior knowledge that their value system is correct; their quickness to comment over other women’s appearances; their speed to lay-blame at every Mothers’ feet; their unwillingness to respect a woman with a different view; I feel a shudder of unease, because somewhere, somehow, that ideology which has the potential to change the world for good, has been hegenomised, and I look at my stereotypical Feminists and realise, that you have all become 'men'. In emulating the power practices of the dominant discourses in society, they have disregarded the fundamental principles of compassion, and they have also forgotten that a woman has a right to celebrate her own identity, however she may choose. Without discursive analysis of this position, and an acknowledgement that for some, Feminism is a crenellation behind which they can hide and excuse themselves while they cast poisoned arrows at the women below, then Feminism becomes yet another oppressive institution. A territory where many women fear expressing individual opinions, and where a new generation of Feminists will not identify with archaic principles analogous to the more subtle, and desirable oppression marketed via Barbie adverts during their childhood television viewing.