My Thoughts On Feminism...

I recently read Michelle Phan's post "What It Means to be a Feminist," and it inspired me to write down my thoughts on feminism. While I agreed with Michelle's post completely, there were a few parts I found very interesting. She talks about feminism getting a bad rap a bit: "For whatever reason, feminism often gets a bad rap. The term itself is sometimes greeted with negativity even in a society that supposedly thinks of everyone as equals – have you ever noticed that? Perhaps it’s because the women before us who began the feminist movement and fought for our equality took to the streets to enact change. The reality is that in our world, people have to be bold to create change.Towards the end of the post Michelle talks about people who don't consider themselves feminists: "Hearing people say they aren’t feminist, or seeing them roll their eyes at the term can get frustrating to say the least." As terrible as it sounds, I occasionally am the person who starts rolling their eyes when people bring up feminism. That said, I  consider myself feminist.
 I absolutely support the equality of men and women. Which, as Michelle mentions many times, is the core of feminism. So why am I the person that occasionally does roll their eyes at feminism? It is because of the bad rap but also some of the stuff I see on social media on a daily basis that makes me uncomfortable and not want to call myself a feminist. It makes me really uncomfortable when people push their opinions down other peoples' throats. Yes, I have my opinions but I do my best to always present them in an intelligent, educated and calm way so that I don't piss off other people. (I'm really hoping this blog post comes off that way). This is why feminism gets a bad rap and can make me uncomfortable when brought up in conversation. I don't think there's anything wrong with protesting for your basic rights as a woman like protesting for equal pay. But saying that someone's beliefs (unless they are against the equality of men and women) and religion are not right in the name of feminism is morally wrong. For example, a few months ago a girl I follow on Tumblr posted a text post saying that her biggest goal in life was to be a stay at home mom and how she felt uncomfortable talking about this on Tumblr because she had gotten hate about it before from feminists on Tumblr. She was planning on going to college for a certain career to support herself throughout her young adult life before she got married as well. My heart went out to that girl. In fact I messaged her and told her not be fearful. This was a girl who was fighting for and following her dreams? What in the world is wrong with that? Obviously, the feminist fight in the 1970s was to get more women working and out of the house and not be financially dependent on their husbands, which there is nothing wrong with, but if you do have a career that you can fall back on and both you and your husband have agreed that you will be staying home what's wrong with that? Why were Tumblr users hating on this girl for that? That's what makes me uncomfortable about feminism. Why would I want to associate myself with something that is so confrontational and makes everything relative to their cause? I hate being told what I must and must not do. I'm a huge rule follower but if people aggressively tell me the rules or get in my face I literally cannot take it. Instead of sending anon hate to this girl why couldn't a feminist politely message her and say something along the lines of "I'm very glad that you will be able to financially support yourself and are going to college, that's an awesome thing all women should be able to do. Let's talk about feminism and your thoughts about it...". Not only would that have been a really interesting and productive conversation but also a polite and morally good thing to do that's not going to upset a person you don't even know. Feminism shouldn't scare people or make them fearful. I see feminist propaganda on Tumblr all the time that makes me uncomfortable. Rather than turning every Tumblr post into something to do with feminism let's make feminism a respectable thing in our society. Let's all be feminists as well as decent human beings. Let's respect other peoples' religious beliefs, morals and dreams while promoting this positive idea of equality in a peaceful manner.
So am I feminist? Yes. Do I occasionally get a little angry or uncomfortable at things associated with this topic? Yes. In the end, if we all act respectfully and do our best to achieve and maintain equality then at the end of the day, the world will be a better place.