Feminism is not a bad word. Here are some myths around feminism, busted.
Feminism: What is it?
Feminism is about advocating for gender equality for all genders. Previously feminism was focused on women’s rights and equality for women, naturally, since this issue had to be brought to the fore. But back then, the issues related to the LGBTQIA+ community did not make much of a roar, and hence was not a big part of the feminist agenda. The first wave feminism from the eras of Mary Wollstonecraft or Elizabeth Blackwell also did not take into count class, race, and ableism. Since the second wave, and especially from the racial movement of the 50s and the 60s revolutionary peace movements, Feminism has evolved to include everyone and seeks equality in all these aspects. It is a belief that everyone should have the same opportunities as a man would. I say ‘a man’ here because, traditionally, it is men who have had access to education and job opportunities without facing any barriers. Whereas for other genders, education, jobs, and general security in life is still not a guaranteed.
Here are some common misconceptions about feminism, debunked!
Feminists can’t take a joke
There is humour, and there is sexist humour. Jokes at the expense of another person is always bound to hurt them. It’s not that feminists can’t take a joke; but when we are not laughing at one, it means we are the joke. And that goes out for everybody. If a comic singles out a person in a wheelchair and cracks jokes about their disability, would you laugh along? Maybe you would, but you’d feel sorry for laughing. Why can’t you do the same for women? When you find a forwarded crass wife joke, instead of ‘haha’-ing, you can just nip it in the bud and say, ‘I didn’t find it funny.’ But with all this being said, you should also note it down that sense of humour is the number one thing women look for in their partners.
Feminists hate men
There is a popular notion that feminists are only women and if a woman is a feminist, they must hate men and that these women are lonely, ugly, fat, and undesirable women. At the crux of it, feminism has little to do with femininity and beauty as much as it does with equality and intersectionality. Profiling people based on how they look to say they are feminist or not is a faulty measure, and one that has no basis. Just because people don’t fit into the conventional notion of what they should be like does not warrant to them being subject to such misconceptions. For starters, check out Emma Watson’s beautiful and moving United Nations speech at this link:
Emma Watson at the HeForShe Campaign 2014 — Official UN Video
Feminism has come far enough
Due to the amount of attention feminism has been gaining since the sixties there is a rising notion that feminism has now reached its peak, but the truth of the matter is that this is only the beginning. There is still so much inequality everywhere on the basis of gender, class, race, ability, and sexuality which needs to be talked about and remedied. Due to patriarchy having an overarching presence in our lives, even a little attention to something other than the patriarchy ends up making a lot of noise. The fact that there is so much noise about feminism now shows that we have so much we have yet to unlearn and learn again.
These are some of the misconceptions about feminism that have dominated the conversation around feminism and are often used to demean a feminist in conversation, but these misconceptions, as you’ve seen, are mainly baseless and not valid arguments which are used to undermine feminism. While these are a few misconceptions mentioned here, the movement has gained recognisable ground and today it has many people continuously fighting for a better world for everyone to live in.
