By Stephanie Cole
Here at SPARK, actually anywhere in the feminist movement, we get used to fielding questions. Many of them are, for lack of a better word, stupid. I have often had my self-identification as feminist immediately followed by, “So, do you, like, hate men?” I hope I don’t actually have to answer that one.
Another frequent one is, “But what about sexism against men?” While this one is equally infuriating, I think it can be used as opportunity to discuss the way gender inequality negatively affects both men and women.
I am not going to dwell on the nature of the question, except to say that asking about sexism against men is akin to asking about racism against white people. But that fact doesn’t mean that men can’t suffer under our current gender construction. In fact, the same media and cultural constructions that limit the roles offered to women and girls also limit boys. One need only hark back to the J. Crew pink toenail hoopla of last spring to know that.
Just as a girl is dictated a narrow definition of femininity from birth, so is a boy dictated a narrow definition of masculinity. In some ways, girls may have more culturally accepted opportunities for deviation from the norm than boys, at least superficially. (I can’t imagine an image of a girl wearing ice hockey gear would have resulted in as much criticism and homophobia as the image of a boy wearing pink nail polish did.) The prevalent pro-violence, anti-emotion masculine ideal is undeniably harmful and oppressive for individual men and boys, even as it also contributes to the persecution of women.
But SPARK as an organization is specifically concerned with the negative sexualization of girls and women in the media. The media has applied multiple inappropriate restrictions on young boys, but I’m pretty sure sexualization isn’t one of them. SPARK is also a girl powered movement, empowering the young women and girls targeted by the media to talk back to it. But just because our movement is girl powered doesn’t mean that male allies can’t add an extra jolt.
There is no doubt that sexualization harms boys and men as well. When boys see women and girls objectified in the media, they come to subconsciously perceive them as other and less and therefore are more likely to participate in sexist behaviors as adults. I am not suggesting that all boys grow up to be sexists, or that misogyny is entirely due to the influence of the media, but I am asserting that popular sexism creates an unhealthy psychological environment for everyone involved. So, don’t ask the usual questions. Instead, try asking, “What about the boys?” Because SPARK may be girl powered, but in the end, we are all in this together.
Go look up the videos or even blog, of a youtuber called “girlwriteswhat” and then tell me with a straight face that, “asking about sexism against men is akin to asking about racism against white people.”
I mean did you see the View? Where the entire audience LAUGHED at the story of a man getting his penis chopped off and diced in a blender because he tried to divorce his wife?
We live in a society where the genital mutilation of boys is common (circumcision). If girls were genitally mutilated, I bet the feminists would have something to say about that. I wonder…
Or how about how women get less jailtime for the same crimes than men.
How about how father’s reproductive rights pale in comparison to those of mothers.
Look, I identify with many of your causes. I even signed your Lego petition, as I am a big believer in not sexualizing children.
However statements like the one I quoted from your article, is why I would never consider myself a feminist.
Both females and males are hardwired to see males as more disposable than females. Women instinctually value the labour and protection men can provide for their budding “nest” or aka family. That is how a man is measured. In what he can do for women. A feminine man has less physical capacity for hard labour as a provider, and as such, is not as attractive to straight women and is often ridiculed by women. Hence women shamed men who wouldn’t fight in world war one by giving them white feathers of cowardice. They effectively blackisted those men from reproducing, because he/they, would not defend the women. They EXPECTED him to fight and die for them. They EXPECTED the lifeboat first, and men were expected by other men to hand it over. A girly man had less value to society as unlike cis women, he could not reproduce, and unlike cis men, he could not work as hard. So he was doubly useless in building the great societies of humans historically. Such attitudes have simply stuck through the ages. Women got the vote, but unlike men, got it without yielding to the government, the right to draft them to the front lines at said government’s discretion. A non refusable draft on men.
Ultimately, regarding objectification, women are objectified by their looks, while men are objectified – by women – by their jobs and fianancial status.
Women are objectified as ornaments. For beauty.
Men are objectified as lawnmowers. For functionality.