Skip to main content

International Women's Day

I've always somewhat prided myself on being a feminist (despite the rather unappealing picture that this word brings to mind for many). Of course this made me happy to discover that there is an International Women's Day, but also slightly disturbed that I was not aware of this beforehand. Not knowing this and not knowing much about the history behind the ideology that I've taken as my own made me realize how easy I've had things. I've never really had my belief in the equality of men and women tested.

It's scary being reminded that the rights and freedoms that I take for granted every day would not have been available to me if I was born just 60 years ago, or, for that matter, right now in many other nations. If someone was working to take away these rights would I fight for them? Would I be willing to pay the price that those who've gone before have paid? Some of them likely paid a very high price.

I guess all of us eventually see our beliefs tested and refined by lifes bumps and curves much like the father in the movie "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" who's liberal views were tested by the realization of the effect his view had on his own life and family. Sure it was okay to believe that black people were equal to white people until his daughter fell in love with a black man in a time were that was still not considered acceptable by the majority of society.

I find myself often longing for simplicity and demanding more from myself as a feminist, but what I'm discovering about feminism is that the point is not to create a world where all women do what women could not when freedom to do so was not available, but where we can choose what matters to us...home, family, education, work, etc.

I may complain about the difficulties that having choices causes, but I would not have things any other way.

Comments

  1. ~mMarch 9, 2010 at 2:23 PM

    remember that the black housekeeper also had a problem with the inter-racial marriage and took sidney poitier to task for it! in the same way, women themselves can often slow progress by second-guessing their equality with men.

    ReplyDelete
  2. AmandaMarch 9, 2010 at 2:38 PM

    It's scarily true! I remember sitting in the "Journey's of Women in Christian Tradition" class listening to a discussion on the different views on the roles of gender. I noted that the people who took the more tradional view of men having headship in the family were all women themselves. I think feminism in its extremes and the dirty tricks of those who oppose it have given it a very negative face (feminists are lesbians who hate men, etc). When I was trying to find a picture on the subject to go with the post it took me 20 minutes to find one that didn't seem negative, sexually explicit, or just plain old creepy.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

2010

So once again it is that time of year when people reflect back on what they have accomplished in the last year and make plans and goals for the next. I have spent some time looking over the last year and have been very happy with positive changes I have made in my life and tough challenges I have faced. It wasn't an easy year by any means, but it brought many neccessary changes in my life. This year I want to continue that trend and work on one of my weaknesses. Tne biggest weakness I think I need to work on is my lack of consistency. You see I tend to be very good at starting things, often too many things at a time, but I lack the discipline to carry things through. I tell myself I'm going to write down all of my purchases and track my spending...yeah that plan lasts about two days before I toss it. I say I'm going to do my exercises every day...but really it ends up happening very randomly and not nearly as frequently as it should. So this year instead of making a huge...
3 comments
Read more

Where has the time gone?

Alright so on the subject of random blogging, it has been a little while since I wrote anything on here. It's not because I have nothing to say or because nothing interesting has happened over the last few months, but because I am a self proclaimed random writer. I've never been good with deadlines or journaling or anything that takes follow through. I'm more of a in-the-minute, flying off the seat of my pants, motivated by inspirations and emotions kind of writer. So maybe I will give everyone a brief update on what has happened since July. 1) Enjoyed my trip to Pender Island (didn't see any whales on the whale watching excursion (boourns), but did see the biggest grossest jellyfish ever!) 2) Went camping with Danaya and her family along Kootenay Lake and survived a 16km hike up a mountain and back and hours of huckleberry picking (had a blast) 3) Cooked lots of Huckleberry goodies when I got home to share with family and friends (cobbler, pancakes, muffins, etc) ...
3 comments
Read more

Uh Oh Canada?

I was sitting at home last night watching a show I don't watch very often called "King of the Hill." They were playing one of the very last episodes in their long TV run and I had never seen it before. The episode was entitled "Uh-Oh Canada." I often enjoy watching the almost offensively silly view that Americans have of Canadian's as little ninnies, wearing preppy vests, speaking in a Minnisotan accent, and ending every second sentence with a pronounced "Eh". In this episode Hank Hill and his family and friends find their summer festivities being threatened by their new uppity Canadian neighbours. One of the group has decided to go away for the summer and thought it would be fun to switch homes for three months with a family from Toronto. Hank in his usual bid to be the best neighbour possible is left trying to convince his friends that the Canadians will be just like anyone else. To his surprise this family is rude and arrogant and only interes...
2 comments
Read more