Why It's Hard To Be a Woman.
I am a girl.
How does that sentence make you feel? What are your first judgements of me just based on that fact. Do you think oh she must be moody, or she's not strong, or she can't do much because she's a girl. Maybe you didn't think at all, maybe you thought she must be strong and she can do anything. I hope that's what you thought but the reality is that most people don't see women as powerful, that women don't compare to men. It's not just men that think that, it's us women too, believe it or not. Why is that a bad thing? We as women experience many different situations every day that make us feel small, that we aren't as capable as our male counterparts. Everything from the price of items we need in our everyday life to the fact that we have to rely on higher up officials just for the right to our own bodies.
One of the hardest things about being a woman, in my opinion, it that no matter what you can't win. Whether that be with men, other women, the media, or the government. Not all men of course, but I feel a majority still to this day think women are objects they can possess or control. They don't see us as equals. We live in a sit-down, shut-up, and let the big boys talk society. With other women, most feel like they have something to prove, and in doing that they seem to tear down other women in the process. Women aren't our competition if we see a woman doing well for herself and building her life the way she wants, whatever and however that may be, we should encourage her. We should compliment her and use her as motivation in our own journeys.
The media implants the idea of a perfect woman in our heads at a young age, we have to look like this and act like that. We can't have flaws, we have to be confident, but not too confident. We have to be skinny, but not too skinny. We have to be this perfect woman and act as she would. Be a lady, cross your legs, shoulders back, and head up. Well, that perfect woman doesn't exist. Even the woman in the magazine doesn't look like the woman in the magazine. Most magazines use programs like photoshop to create the 'perfect' version of an already beautiful woman. So they deceive us into believing that that body and that skin and that hair is attainable when in fact it's not. The media tells us that no matter what we should think we are beautiful, but then it tells us that we don't fit the criteria. When I was a kid I played with dolls, as young girls typically do. Never once did I come across an overweight or short barbie nor one of color. Never. As young as 4 years old we want to look like barbie. We wanted to look like Disney princesses. That is the first unattainable body standard I encountered in my life and I was 4 years old. You can imagine everything I've seen since.
The media also instills in us that we have to be petite and feminine if we have prominent muscles (hard-earned muscles) that we are manly. However, if we have no curves than we aren't woman enough. We are brainwashed into thinking that there is really only one way to look and that doesn't even exist! Imagine what the does to young impressionable young girls.
When it comes to the government, they hold more power over our bodies then they should ever be able to. They tell you that under no circumstances should you be able to get an abortion, but also say well if you can't afford birth control then I guess you're screwed. "You don't really need that, so we're not going to pay for it." Well, then you better pay for the entire life of my unwanted/unplanned unborn child. You better pay for the hospital stay, the diapers, the child care, the schooling, the whole life of this child because I can't, hell I can't even afford birth control right? Get fucked.
Being a woman you get judged. That' not an observation or a theory, it's a fact. It happens every day. You don't wear make-up and don't dress up, you're a slob. You wear a dress and put on a pretty face, you're a try-hard. Are you shy? You must be sheltered or damaged. Are you confident? No, you're rude and intimidating. You're too young to have a child, you're too old to have a child, why don't you have kids yet? When are you getting married? You've had sex, you must be a slut. You're a virgin, you should have sex. Meanwhile, the double standard is that the more women a man sleeps with, the better. The best one though, you have daddy issues. Why the fuck is the impact of a man's failure an insult to me as a person? Me? The young girl who did nothing to deserve being deserted but did and now that's my problem? I don't think so. Also, get fucked.
Mother nature calls, every month that bitch shows up with a vengeance. Are there any perks of this? I guess not being pregnant? Can't get an abortion anyway. The average cost for tampons ranges between $7 to $15 depending on the brand. According to Dollarsandsense.org, the average woman will spend $144/year on tampons, adding up to a whopping $4,752 in a lifetime (Puberty to menopause). It's not like we just can't buy these things. I use a zero-waste alternative but most women don't, so they will have to spend this money on something as simple as a hygiene product. Another argument I have when it comes to mother nature is that it gets blamed. Let me explain, you'll know what I mean. "You're moody, it must be that time of the month." Like us as women aren't allowed to have moods and be upset without mother nature. Sure it gives us mood swings, but maybe sometimes you're just being a dick.
Women to this day still don't make as much money as men. Payscale.com states that the uncontrolled pay gap is 81 cents to every dollar a man makes in 2020. The controlled pay gap is 98 cents. Which is better, but why isn't it a dollar? What an uncontrolled pay gap means is that there are variables, like education and experience. Controlled means there are no variables. Also, women with children get paid less, this is called the "motherhood penalty". These rates have gone up 7% since 2015, but guys we are in 2020, with all the movements and all the women rights campaigns why they hell are we still getting less?
Girls as young as 5 are being forced to abide by unfair dress codes for no reason other than it helps the boys focus. Therefore girls as young as 5 are being taught that our bodies are not much more than sexual for men. It's hot out, well that's too bad, cover up, Johnny can't focus because of your tank top. Well, maybe Johnny's family should have raised him to respect women a little better. If I can focus on completing my homework in a classroom full of men who sexualize me and make me feel uncomfortable than I think you're fully capable of completing your own.
We learn at a young age not to go places alone, use the buddy system. I think this is put into place more for women than it is for men. Women can't go out alone, we're not supposed to go running at night or in secluded parks or listen to music while we do so. We have to be on our toes at all times. We have to carry things like pepper spray and small weapons to protect ourselves in the event that something would happen. We don't get to go to bars alone to meet new people. We can't leave our drinks unattended. The level of carefulness that we have to be is far higher than what it is for men. If we don't do these things and if we aren't careful than we get blamed for what happens. All of these extra precautions might sound a little ridiculous, but they're necessary. "She shouldn't have been walking alone at night." On her way home from her second job to feed her family. "She shouldn't have worn that." To a woman who's proud she's just lost 50lbs. "She left her drink unattended." To the young girl who is having her first legal night out. It's unfortunate that we have to do all these things, but we have to. These things are our survival tactics.
There have been so many powerful movements for women and our rights, starting as early as the Seneca falls convention in 1848. We have Feminism, which unfortunately some see as more of a competition of genders rather than equalization. Some see feminism and say "Oh, they hate men". No, that's not it at all, and the fact that we have a movement to bring awareness of the unfair treatment we receive and you have turned it into an unfairness to men is disgraceful to me. We fight for our right to work in a safe environment, our right for equal pay, our right to your own bodies. Those are things that men just don't have to fight for. Thanks to feminism we also have apps like Bumble, where women speak first to avoid degrading confrontations that you might experience on other dating apps.
Always, a feminine hygiene company has their "Like a Girl" campaign. I personally don't use these products, but I stand by the company because of this. Their goal is to empower young women and make them aware that being a girl isn't a bad thing. It's not perfect, but it's not bad. To show the young women of today that being a girl doesn't make you any less important or any less powerful than being a man does. It's so important to plant these kinds of ideas in young women heads because for so long we've been told to hold back. What if we built a generation where we pushed women and encouraged women the same way that we do young men. What would the world be like then?
We have movements against rape-culture, like the "Me Too" movement. Rape-culture is a 1970's term for victim-blaming and normalizing sexual violence done by males primarily. We allow these things to creep into our society by saying things to young women like "You shouldn't do that, it distracts the boys." Then watching the boys do or say inappropriate things to the girls and we say "Well, boys will be boys." No. Boys will become the men that we raise them to be, so if you're letting them get away with these things then they're never going to think that it's wrong.
The "Me Too" movement is, in my opinion, one of the best things to happens for women. A woman named Tarana Burke founded it in 2006, but it didn't really take off until over a decade later in 2017. It was after the Harvey Weinstein cases came to light. An actress named Alyssa Milano tweeted "If all the women who have been sexually harassed or insulted wrote 'Me Too' as a status, we might give people a sense of the magnitude of the problem." Then "Me Too" exploded. It took over the media, news, magazines, you name it. According to CBC News, nearly 12million people posted "Me too" on Facebook. The New York Times states that "#MeToo brought down 201 powerful men (and) Nearly half of their replacements were women." That' amazing, it's disgusting that there were 201 (known and accused) powerful men who misused that power, but it's amazing that they were caught.
Upon doing my research for this blog I found facts that even made my jaw drop. Rainn.org states that there are 433,638 rape victims in a year and the ages most in danger range from 12-34. They explain that the chance for women in this age range to get raped is 54%, which means that you have the same chance of getting raped as you do for getting 'heads' when you flip a penny. This isn't saying that people who aren't in that age range aren't in danger of being victims. The same website estimates that only 3 out of 4 of those actually get reported. I looked into a few other websites and while the numbers weren't exactly the same, they didn't differ by much.
More statistics that surprised me I found on the Maryland Coalition Against Sexual Assault (MCASA) website. MCASA recorded percentages for rapes based on who the accuser is. For an assault that happens with a spouse, boyfriend, or partner, 25% of those will be reported. For friends and acquaintances 18-40%, and if it's a stranger who attacks you it's 46-66%. Of those reported, according to the same website, only 9% of those accused will get prosecuted. Why don't we report these, it's that easy right? No, it's not. It took me years to just be able to tell myself, let alone others. When something like this happens it's terrifying, it's embarrassing, it's degrading. It takes a major toll on you. There are many reasons why women would be hesitant to report this, the main one being fear. What if they come back, or what if they hurt me again. Others could be the belief that it wouldn't change anything or they feel that there isn't enough evidence to support it. Some women just don't want their families to know and some women might just not know how to go about reporting it in the first place.
After reading more about the goal of the "Me Too" movement, I became curious to know if it actually changed anything. If the numbers went down. I didn't find any information about whether or not it changed the rape statistics, but I found other things that it did have an impact on. Based on the information I read from vox.com, many states either have or are in the process of banning nondisclosure agreements that involve sexual harassment. Like the one that Harvey Weinstein made his assistant sign after he exposed himself to her. Survivors are also receiving large sums of money, which obviously money won't fix the problem or make it go away, but it's still something. In the Larry Nassar Olympic Gymnastics case a $500, 000 settlement was reached from Michigan University. When the money is divided it leaves the survivors between $250,000 and 2.5 million each. Another great thing that arose was the Times Up Legal Defense Fund, which leans more toward women in the workplace. It has since helped 3,600 survivors seek justice.
We live in a world where something as simple as saying "No" could get us killed. I'm not exaggerating, ask females around you if they've ever felt fear for their safety just by simply refusing someone. That's what life as a woman is like, I'm sure there may other things that I could say but since this post is lengthy already maybe I'll post a sequel later on.
We can always protest the rights to our own bodies as many courageous women have done. We can stand up and take down powerful men as we have already. I think what we really need to do is all women, any age, any race, any shape or size, or sexual preference, we just need to care for each other more. To stand up beside each other and lift each other up. To keep an eye out at the bar for our fellow ladies, to compliment them, to help them grow, to encourage them and support them. If we could become a worldwide force to be reckoned with, then maybe we could change some more things.
Hopefully, you made it to the end, I know this one was long but there's so much importance in these things that a lot of people still aren't aware of. Maybe you learned something in this post, maybe you realized something, maybe you don't feel so alone. Maybe, finger crossed, writing this will have a good impact big or small. Thanks for reading.
-Courtney.
