Recently left a dinner with a younger friend feeling somewhat disheartened. It wasn't the overpriced aioli or the posh clientelle, but the fact that she found it impossible to consider herself a feminist.
'I've just never found myself in a position where I need to identify as one. I've not met enough women in the world, and don't align myself with all other women just because we share the same sex' she said 'Maybe I'll feel more like a feminist when I get older and reach a glass ceiling or something'.
Internally, I exploded 'ARGGGGGGGGGGGG'; I definitely understood the basis of her argument but I felt that it stemmed from a misinterpretation of what feminism ultimately is. I attempted to create a concise, honest depiction of what feminism means to me so that she might reconsider. 'Feminism isn't man hating, bra burning lesbians wanting to take over the world; but a way of thinking about the world we live in and a movement towards gender equality. Just because I think of myself as a feminist, I don't automatically agree with another person who considers themselves one too. It is an ideology which challenges the idea that women are inferior, incapable and really different from men'.
The presence that feminism has taken to our screens and ears should be celebrated and encouraged. I was discussing how we discovered feminism with my close friends, and none of us really came to the realisation that we were all unknowingly feminists by the time we left university. Despite the fact we went to an all girls school, we received no teaching on the subject in our PSHE classes, which is something I find odd, almost ridiculous. You have a school, filled with hundreds of girls, the headteacher is a woman, and yet no one mentions the F word. I haven't quite caught up with which wave of feminism we can call ourselves right now, but I am optimistic for the future (especially when it comes to the conversion of my friend to feminism... I am making it my mission).
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