I haven’t felt this for a long time. But I remember noting a while ago that Afghan men can starve their wives, and noted it down as a potential blog topic. I was stunned, but didn’t feel able to put my emotions into words. But more recently I’ve learned of the Canadian police officer who said that women should avoid dressing like “sluts” to avoid being raped or victimised, and the world-wide protests that are being planned by women in response. And today I shed tears as I watched the 60 Minutes interview of Lara Logan, who was attacked and raped by a mob in Cairo.
And now I hear that a Hasidic newspaper edits two women – including Hilary Clinton, the US Secretary of State – out of a photograph of the White House Situation Room. I’m listening to a radio interview as I write this, and a male commentator said “what’s the point of getting upset about this?” He sees the absurdity of it. But he can’t understand what it feels like to be one of the erased. To know that there are people in this word who consider I count for nothing, simply because I am a woman. I hear men saying “but there is no glass ceiling” or that “feminism has achieved its goals.” I guess when you’re not exposed to something personally, you don’t feel it.
I am shaking my head in wonder. I feel as if I’m back in the 1970s, when these things were more prevalent – when it was common to hear people say “she asked for it” if a woman was raped, when it was legal for a husband to rape his wife. I remember the debate. Men claiming that it wasn’t rape, that it was their wife’s duty, or simply the sanitised language used, describing it as “forcing themselves on their wives.” It’s rape. I heard someone say Lara Logan wasn’t raped, they “just used their fingers.” That’s rape. She felt raped. I see women still being blamed for being the victims: it is apparently their fault that they are sexually attacked if they are so presumptuous as to want to work in foreign environments, or want to wear particular clothes. Seriously? Poor men, their willpower is so weak that they can’t be blamed if they rip the clothes off a blonde reporter, or rape or victimise a women showing legs and cleavage. Poor men, who are so threatened by women in power that they have to pretend they don’t exist. Misogyny seems alive and well, wherever we are. Is this really 2011? Yes, some of these things happen in, how shall I describe them, less enlightened societies, or amongst fundamentalist religious groups. But some of these things are happening in western societies, and here in New Zealand, men don’t always get it.
I know that I can’t make sweeping judgements about men, or about women’s positions in societies based on these incidents. I know that most of the men I know are staunch supporters of women. But still. I see these things and I battle against being treated in my business environment simply because I’m a woman, and I can’t help wonder if every man sees us this way, deep down. It makes me feel unsafe, insecure, and just plain damn angry.
As a teenager I became aware of feminism and why it was so important. It’s been some time since I felt that I could be seen as nothing but an object for men’s pleasure, or as a servant to a man under the guise of the word “wife,” or as, simply … well … nothing. Lara Logan said she felt like nothing more than dirt, just dirt, after her attack. And I wonder at the young women today who don’t think feminism is important.
A Separate Life 