Of course, when you have some Americans lining up behind a presidential candidate who a judge declared a rapist and who bragged about grabbing women “by the pussy,” then it’s easy to see why some young men have less regard for women’s autonomy. Young men growing up now can’t see the beauty through the sloppily painted slogans. The law can demand equal treatment, but men may still talk over women, dismiss their ideas because they’re women, and promote guys they hang out with after work.įeminism is like a beautiful white home that’s been covered with obscene graffiti by those afraid of equal rights. Second, even when a law proclaims rights, there’s a vast difference between legality and social practices. Those fighting to keep women subjugated often proclaim that women already have equal rights.
Dostoevsky said, “The best way to keep a prisoner from escaping is to make sure he never knows he's in prison.” That some women have been brainwashed into low self-esteem that they don’t even realize that they are the jailers of their own imprisonment. That some men are so clueless that they are willing to oppress women, even though these women are their wives, mothers, daughters, and sisters. That laws regarding a woman’s right to make decisions about her own body have whiplashed back to the 1950s. It’s shocking and disappointing to me that we’re still having conversations about gender equality 50 years after the Women’s Liberation Movement began (in its modern form).