We Should All Be Feminists

Culture does not make people. People make culture. If it is true that the full humanity of women is not our culture, then we can and must make it our culture.

When women say ‘I did it for peace in my marriage,’ it is usually because they have given up a job, a career goal, a dream

Gender as it functions today is a grave injustice. I am angry. We should all be angry

Some people will say a woman is subordinate to men because it’s our culture. But culture is constantly changing.

My own definition of a feminist is a man or a woman who says, ‘Yes, there’s a problem with gender as it is today and we must fix it, we must do better.’

We teach girls shame. Close your legs. Cover yourself. We make them feel as though by being born female, they are already guilty of something. And so girls grow up to be women who cannot say they have desire. Who silence themselves. Who cannot say what they truly think. Who have turned pretence into an art form.

Gender as it functions today is a grave injustice. I am angry. We should all be angry. Anger has a long history of bringing about positive change. But I am also hopeful, because I believe deeply in the ability of human beings to remake themselves for the better.

It is easy to say, ‘But women can just say no to all this.’ But the reality is more difficult, more complex. We are all social beings. We internalize ideas from our socialization.

A Nigerian acquaintance once asked me if I was worried that men would be intimidated by me.

I was not worried at all – it had not even occurred to me to be worried, because a man who would be intimidated by me is exactly the kind of man I would have no interest in.

The employee then complained to top management about her style. She was aggressive and difficult to work with, the employee said. Other employees agreed. One said they had expected that she would bring a ‘woman’s touch’ to her job, but she hadn’t.

It didn’t occur to any of them that she was doing the same thing for which a man had been praised