This weekend mrules published a diary that made me think. It made me look at my behavior and figure out if I was doing what I should do. I consider myself a feminist, a bleeding heart liberal, and a strong voice for women. But I realized I wasn't behaving like that. No, not at all.
A few months ago, a friend gave me this window cling, because she knew I was voting for Hillary. She voted for Sanders in our primary, but came across this at a local Democrat party meeting and snatched it up, knowing I would appreciate it. [On a side note, I looked online for a better picture than this one I took myself, and I warn you against that. There is an incredible amount of misogynistic filth that comes up when you google “Hillary 2016 sticker”] This window cling has been in my glove box all this time. I've seen it a few times while moving stuff in or out of the glove box, and kept thinking “Not yet.” I didn't feel right putting it on my car. Why not? Mrules’s diary made me think about that and I realized I felt I would be stepping on Bernie’s toes, in a way, to put it on my car before the nomination was Hillary’s. Seriously. I felt like I, a Hillary supporter, would somehow be doing something inappropriate by putting a pro-Hillary sticker on my car, even though I see Trump and Bernie stickers on cars every day, even Carson, Bush, Cruz holdovers, too. But a Hillary sticker would be presumptuous, or something. That is some serious self-effacing bullshit I've been inflicting upon myself. No more. That ends today.
When I was in college some years back, I was the leader of the women’s student organization. We had a little building on campus that held the Women’s Center since 1971. The history in that building was incredible. My favorite was the little shelf of books we lent out to students, including an early copy of Our Bodies Ourselves, Rubyfruit Jungle, Maya Angelou poetry, etc. Great stuff for newbie feminists! Anyway, being part of that group was an eye-opener. That's when I first recognized how we women were being marginalized. Our building was proudly marked as the “Women’s Center.” Every single day, I heard from a man "Why do you get a Women’s Center? Where's the Men's Center??” I ended up getting a campus map, highlighting our building in pink and marking it the Women’s Center, then highlighting the rest of the campus in yellow and marking it the Men's Center. That's right, guys. We get this one building and you men get the whole rest of the campus! You just don't realize it until we point it out.
We welcomed men who were friendly to us to many of our meetings. Certain subjects were just for us women. Meetings were closed when we discussed violence against women, women's health, or other sensitive subjects, but otherwise men were welcomed if they wanted to be our allies. Men were encouraged to participate but we had one very simple rule. They must not interrupt when a woman was speaking. That's it. It was amazing how hard that was for a lot of men, even though they had the best of intentions. Upon the first interruption, I would remind them of the rule but if it happened again, they would be asked to leave. It seemed like even men who came in as allies had difficulty not talking over us. Just like with the “Men’s Center” thing above, they didn't realize it. They called it “correcting” or “clarifying” or even “agreeing” and didn't see that it had the affect of silencing us.
I thought I still carried the lessons of those days, that I still stood loud and proud. But I realize I've slowly lost it. I think day by day, little by little, I've forgotten my power. Time to get back to my roots. Time to remember that I have a voice. It's a loud voice and it's time I use it again. I'm proud to be with Hillary.
I am woman. Hear me roar! Hillary 2016!