Connections

According to Susan Faludi, feminism's' agenda "asks that women not be forced to 'choose' between public justice and private happiness. It asks that women be free to define themselves instead of having their identity defined for them, time and again, by their culture and their men." This is the first concrete definition I have seen of feminism and I think it is well said. In Faludi's article "Blame it on Feminism", she argues that women have not yet achieved equality and already there is what she calls a "backlash" that is trying to put feminism down before it reaches it's goal. She writes that many people are misinformed with ideas of "man shortage" and "infertility epidemic" to break the progress of feminist ideals. Faludi writes, "to blame feminism for women's "lesser life" is to miss entirely the point of feminism, which is to win women a wider range of experience." She presents a valid argument and I agree with her. I like that her definition is not that feminism is women wanting to take over the world, but that feminism is women wanting to progress. Wanting to gain more experience and freedom.

Women have been faced with a struggle for any kind of progress for decades. The more the struggle, a greater awareness of the power of men unfolds. In the past, and Faludi is arguing in the present, men have been treated far better than women; with more freedom and opportunity. How? Why? The men "in charge" work to justify the "superiority" of their sex and so far, it has worked.

"If Men Could Menstruate" is an article that plays with ideas of what men would do or how they would act if they could menstruate. In my mind it was a humorous and light, but also quite an accurate article.  As Gloria Steinem says, "clearly menstruation would become an enviable, worthy, masculine event: Men would brag about how long and how much." Carrying on with more examples, what Steinem really gets at is that men can twist things to justify their power in a way that women are not as able to do. Is that then how they sustain their power? Steinem says, "The truth is that, if men could menstruate, the power justifications would go on and on. If we let them." Is it the justifications of power that keep men at the top? Is this a call for women to be more proud of who they are and what they do and learn to justify their power? Is this justification of power a connection that all men share?

It was interesting how differently our class reacted to this article. In general, it seemed the women seemed to think it was humorous and light, whereas the men in the class were uncomfortable with it and felt that it was incorrect and extreme. Could this experience with the class be an example of a deeper connection that men have with each other? Perhaps all men naturally justify their actions and ideas without realizing it.

But just like men, women have a deeper connection that causes women to relate to each other. The connection between women will be explored in my next blog.