So of course while I was away gasping in awe at Russian
Orthodox churches, stunning lakes, and ludicrously low beer prices, the world
continued to grind away. I heard there was a devastating storm, and then an
American election? More of that later though, because I’m keen to focus on an
issue both global and domestic today – I’m sure the USA can live without my
commentary for another week or so.
Everyday Sexism (and if you are not already following them
on Twitter then by gum you bally well should be), have an op-ed piece in the
Independent today which touches on the idea that sexism is still a socially-acceptable
prejudice. Now, I don’t think that it's the only socially-acceptable prejudice which we need to tackle, given how many times
a week I hear the word ‘gay’ or ‘retard’ being used as a pejorative (that list
is by no means exhaustive), but I want to expand on the point the piece was
making about sexism towards women, partly because it’s Twitter-topical but chiefly
because it touches on one of the aspects of sexism which absolutely INFURIATES
me – that women* are generally and habitually overreacting to sexism.
Firstly, I would like to know what the definition of
overreacting is? If someone insults you or otherwise does something damaging to
you and you ignore them, I would think of that as non-reactive (NB by
non-reactive I don’t mean neutral, as neutral implies not being bothered at all
whereas non-reactiveness can be read as a decision to ensure one’s personal safety).
Anything beyond that is a reaction. So where is the mythical cut-off point? I
would imagine if someone groped my arse and I murdered them then that would be
a clear overreaction (jokes aside), but below the level of physical
retaliation, what counts as an overreaction? Because it seems to me that the
very act of saying anything negative at all about sexism is deemed an
overreaction. Read the comments (or don’t, EVER, if you value your sanity)
under any piece expressing even the most mild feminist view and I will pay you
ten pounds** if no-one tells the writer (or other commenters) that they are
overreacting. David Cameron’s infamous, “calm down, dear” is a prime (and very
public) example of this fuckery. Why
are we so uptight all the time about sexism? Why can’t we see that sometimes it’s
all a bit of fun, a bit of a laugh
with the lads? What’s wrong with us?
What’s wrong with us? I’ll tell you what’s wrong with me. I
am sick and fucking tired of being made to treat sexism as if it were a joke.
Would you tell a black person to calm down about a shop selling golliwog dolls?
Why not? After all, they’re a bit of harmless fun, aren’t they?! A children’s
toy! STOP OVERREACTING. Do you see
what I’m getting at here? We all (or most of us, hopefully), innately
understand that while golliwog dolls are unlikely in themselves to bring about
a new era of apartheid, they symbolise one race’s casual and brutal disdain for
another’s. Their intentions might be
harmless fun, but their reality is sinister. We can see this, so why can’t we
see it for sexism, and why are we unwilling to even engage with the idea that
sexist behaviour is fucking damaging? For women, a lot of the time, I think it’s
because we are afraid not of actually overreacting, but of being labelled in
that way. No-one wants to ruin the fun, do they?*** Apart from humourless
feminists that is! Ho ho.
Now I want to tell you a lovely little story which illustrates this conundrum. Once upon a time (longer ago than I
care to remember in fact), I was walking along a residential street in an
undodgy area of London towards the tube, to go out in town. It was about 7pm,
but because it was November it was already dark. I had a skirt on, stripey knee
socks, and boots – the skirt was short, and the boots were chunky, because back
then I was a bit of a goth (in fact I was heading to the legendary Intrepid Fox
for a night of drinking cider and listening to the Cult). I had headphones in, so
I didn’t hear the group of men (boys?) come up behind me. Maybe if I had I
would have avoided what happened next, but probably not, because I suspect they
were pretty determined to do what they did anyway, to whichever woman happened
to be walking along the street that night. Anyway, one of them grabbed me from
behind and slid his fingers up between my legs. Right the way up – I don’t mean
he was just checking the close shave of my bikini line. I jumped, and he and his
mates laughed and ran away.
And do you know what I did? Absolutely nothing. I carried on
walking to the tube station, where I didn’t tell the station agent. In fact I
can’t even remember if I told my friends, including my boyfriend at the time,
when I got to the pub. I certainly didn’t tell the police. I hadn’t seen the
faces of any of the group who had assaulted me, so I wouldn’t have been able to
identify them anyway. Besides, by that point (I was nineteen), I had already
started to buy into the bullshit of this kind
of thing happens all the time, and don’t
make a fuss, and at least they didn’t
rape me. As in, you’re overreacting.
And although this was probably the “worst” thing of this kind that has happened
to me (yet) given that had I not had knickers on there would have been genital
contact; I completely sympathise with the Everyday Sexism tweeter who tweeted that
this kind of thing just begins after a while to register as “not really serious”,
because I could tell you of literally dozens
of similar incidents which have happened to me, and I am one individual who is
lucky enough to live in a fairly safe, fairly liberal first world society.
My point is, what would you call my reaction? Because I
wouldn’t call it an overreaction – I did what I explained in the paragraph
above, non-reaction – partly as a self-preservation method and partly because
at nineteen I had already learned the mantra of not overreacting.
Well, you know what? FUCK THAT FUCKING SHIT. Fuck that
dangerous bullshit right back where it belongs, and what is more THREE HEARTY
CHEERS for overreacting, because if
overreacting means publicly objecting to the continual, relentless, publicy
ignored and sometimes actively encouraged damage and debasement of women then I
am all bloody for it. To everyone who’s reacted with a pithy epithet to a
cat-call, to everyone who’s told a guy to fuck off in a nightclub when he’s
ground his semi against your backs, to everyone who’s called out the sexist joke
in the work meeting, I SALUTE YOU ALL, and to all the rest of us who have our
days when we can’t do that, when we are too upset or afraid or already damaged to react, we’ve got your
fucking back too, because no-one on earth deserves this daily fuckery and I
really hope that one day society will finally, finally understand that it is
not ok for it to be like this.
The only way that is going to happen is if we
keep calling it out, if instead of avoiding “overreacting” we make sure that it
is in fact one of our main priorities. Think I should calm down, dear? You ain’t seen
nothing yet.
***For anyone who would like an absolutely kick-ass and vital illustration of this problem, I urge everyone reading this to go and read this blog post.
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