A couple years ago I took a group of college women's basketball players overseas for an exhibition tour of games. While in Amsterdam we spent one afternoon at the Rijksmuseum and before going in, the tour guide explained the cultural significance of the Rijks: It is considered one of the most revered museums in the world and of course houses priceless works of art. An art lover myself, I couldn't WAIT to see the Rijks. As we began walking through, however, I suddenly became very uncomfortable.
(One note before I begin: I titled this diary "A" feminist perspective, not "The" feminist perspective. I don't speak for any group of women and am not trying to lump women together. But I do speak from a position of gender consciousness and do believe women should develop a sense of collective gender identity...)ok, on to my argument:
I (a white woman) was in a group of mostly black young women looking at what we were told to be "priceless" works of art. All the works of art, however, depicted white people in traditionally white landscapes. What must it be like, I wondered, to be in the middle of something revered (the museum) and feel like you didn't belong?
I can't know for sure if those women felt that way: As a white woman, I can never know what it feels like to experience racism or sexism for that matter from their perspective.
Lately, however, I have been reflecting on that museum tour. I am intensely interested in the political process, but keep getting messages about my place in the political process. Here we are again, with the Democratic ticket featuring two men. Like the paintings, which seemed to need "whiteness" to be classified as "priceless," one prerequisite for being President in this country appears to be "male-ness."
Gloria Steinem says it best:
THE woman in question became a lawyer after some years as a community organizer, married a corporate lawyer and is the mother of two little girls, ages 9 and 6. Herself the daughter of a white American mother and a black African father — in this race-conscious country, she is considered black — she served as a state legislator for eight years, and became an inspirational voice for national unity.
Be honest: Do you think this is the biography of someone who could be elected to the United States Senate? After less than one term there, do you believe she could be a viable candidate to head the most powerful nation on earth?
Gender is probably the most restricting force in American life, whether the question is who must be in the kitchen or who could be in the White House. This country is way down the list of countries electing women and, according to one study, it polarizes gender roles more than the average democracy.
I am a Barack Obama supporter. I think he is doing amazing things, I think there is no question that he is superior to John McCain in every way and I think he is going to challenge a lot of things we have taken as "common sense" in this country. But the Obama-Biden ticket does not challenge our conception of gender roles. This may not be important to you. My feeling is that a lot of the people on this site are men. I don't know what it's like to live as a black woman and men don't know what it feels like to live every day in an oppressive gender system. I walk by the fraternity houses on campus and get ogled. I look at the professors (my future profession) and see hardly any women with children--although plenty of the male profs have little ones at home. I go to the bookstore and am slammed with magazine images telling me how to be younger, slimmer, sexier --i.e. better appeal to men.
Our taken-for-granted and often transparent ideas of gender are not something that can be changed with new legislation. Rather, changes happen on the cultural level. A woman in the most authoritative position in our country would "trouble" (thank you Judith Butler) how we think about gender. Suddenly we can see women as something else besides passive and demure. We have made some inroads. Hillary Clinton got far in the primaries. We have Nancy Pelosi. But we are far from accepting a woman in a position of power. Just look at how Hillary is treated on this site. People don't just criticize her positions on various issues, they attack her with sexist undertones (Shrillary, anyone?)
Biden is a good pick. He plugs holes, he'll be a great surrogate, he'll help reel in the blue collar vote. But the Obama-Biden ticket does not challenge gender roles and does not get us any closer to what the UK, Sri Lanka, Ecuador, Argentina, Chile, Finland, India, Ireland, Liberia, The Philippines, Germany, Haiti, New Zealand, Moldova, Mozambique, The Netherlands Antilles, Ukraine, The Åland Islands, Argentina, People's Republic of Tannu Tuva, Mongolia, Bolivia, Iceland, San Marino, Guinea Bissau, Malta, East Germany, Nicaragua, Ireland, Burundi, Ecuador, Guyana, Switzerland, Latvia, Finland, Indonesia, Serbia, Georgia, Austria, Chile, Israel, India, Pakistan, Ukraine, Portugal, Dominica, Norway, Yugoslavia, Lithuania, Bangladesh, France, Poland, Turkey, Canada, Rwanda, Bulgaria, Sénégal, South Korea, Republic of São Tomé e Príncipe, Peru, Macedonia, The Bahamas, Jamaica have already done: elected/named a woman as their top leader.