My Brand of Feminism

....And my last few posts have all been feminist rants. Yeah, I know.

I am indeed a feminist, in the sense that I believe in equality between men and women. Obviously we're not biologically equal (men can't have babies [which practically requires superpowers of pain resistance] and women can't pee standing up [which has numerous practical benefits]), but societally we could be, if there weren't all these social constructs built around keeping us in assigned gender roles. If you stray out of your designated gender role, the only explanation anyone can think of is that you're a big homo. Or just fucking weird.

It was bad enough cooking your meals and doing your laundry everyday

When will I not have to hear old men telling me I should smile? Probably not till I'm old too and they no longer give a crap because my tits will be too saggy. This bus driver the other day acted like I was all depressed, just because I got on the bus and started feeding my money into the machine. I'm not exactly animated on my way to class in the morning. Or any time I ride the bus alone, for that matter. I'm sorry, your bus isn't really that exciting, and your conversational tactic is severely lacking.

I also get this from older male customers at work sometimes. Obviously, as a counter girl, a certain amount of good cheer is expected of me, but if I get a bad vibe off an old guy, I'm definitely not going out of my way. I'll be polite, but that's it.

A significant part of the problem, it would seem, is that my neutral face tends to look like a hostile face to strangers. But that doesn't make it okay for older men to take this condescending attitude toward me, like I somehow owe them a smile. If I have to whore my smile out for a five cent tip, you can take your quarters and shove 'em.

Hell, I can't even tell whether or not I actually smile enough to most customers at all, nevermind creepy old men. I must do something right though, since plenty of people, especially young guys, seem to respond well.

The next feminist revolution should involve us taking back control of our smile.

"Will You Marry Me?" "Fuck No"

Whenever I hear stories or see videos of some guy choosing an extremely public way to propose to his lady, I always cringe. The fantastic confidence (and possibly arrogance) of a man to do that annoys all hell out of me. What if she says no? Then she has to say no in front of a shit ton of people who know nothing about the couple who are expecting her to say yes. And if it's being filmed to go on the internet? Even worse. The whole world can marvel at what a heartless bitch she is, refusing omg! such a romantic gesture. I'm largely opposed to PDAs in general, not because I'm a prude, but because, personally, I view affectionate gestures of love to be very private by nature. By displaying such gestures in public, you take away from that private aspect. At a certain point, it even looks like showing off. A proposal of marriage is a pretty big gesture (and it's only a gesture unless you prove you really do want to spend the rest of your life with someone), and making a huge, ostentatious show of it in public impersonalizes it, almost shames the girl into saying yes. It's no longer between man and woman, it's now just a big show for the public's entertainment.

Pride And Pestilence

Every night at closing time, I have to drag the big, heavy menu board and bench in from outside so nobody comes along and steals them in the nighttime. It's no picnic, and I can't exactly lift either over my head, but I get 'em in alright. The only hiccup is getting the feet of these items over the doorframe. Annoying, but, it's my job, and I'm perfectly capable of doing it. What always pisses me off though, is when some guy tries to insist on helping me out. They always do it with a smile, with a touch of condescension, a bit of smugness, even amusement. They insist, even after I tell them no, it's all right, I got it, I can do it, no really, I'm fine, they insist, they just can't possibly let a young lady like me do any physical labor. It's a huge pet peeve of mine that certain men won't take no for an answer. Offer once, maybe twice, and then let it be. I don't give a shit how strong you think you are, and it just pisses me off how weak you apparently think I must be. I guess, even though I'm clearly no swaying reed, being a woman automatically cancels out any significant physical strength I might possess.

The main thing that drives me nuts is that they just keep insisting. I don't think I would keep refusing help if I was really incapable of doing something, for fuck's sake.

Regrettable Yesteryear

As a person born too late to really remember the '90s, as in the '90s, my main recollections are of boy bands and Sugar Ray. Like, I remember actually sitting there with a cd player or a radio, listening to them. Other music was filtered into my subconcious such that as a result, I can recognize a large variety of music that I can't really recall listening to. This was the kind've stuff my mom would play when I was little, but the music I actually sought out for a short period of time was N'SYNC and Backstreet Boys. I missed the early nineties, the substance of it, the stuff that's still remembered, for better or for worse.

What this means now is that I have a deep, impassioned appreciation for the '90s as they were outside my tiny sphere. This means also that I am deeply wounded whenever someone old enough to really remember that decade, the feel of it, the sound and the smell of it, totally disses it. They recall this last decade of the twentieth century as sucking massively, but as someone who came of age in the beginning of this millenium, the '90s was the last great attempt at a real subculture. It was right before people became easily accessible and capable of spilling their sick, perverted guts all over the Internet. The intentions were already there, but as of yet they had not found their outlet. The music was an outlet of sorts, but now it's faded into the background of yesteryear.

The nineties pulled the curtains shut; it was the last chance to create anything even seemingly original, and now we're stuck in the future, full of cancerous pedophilia, and the most terrible, tasteless music.

Things I've Noticed Watching X-Men: Evolution

1. Professor X relies on Jean Gray, the young, attractive sweet-talking telepath, to recruit new teenaged X-Men before Mystique can. She keeps failing, though.

2. Scott (Cyclops) is a terrible whiner; he's meant to be the "attractive" one, since Wolverine's a little old for the show's demographic. And despite his laser beam-powered eyes, all he can do is knock people around. He can blow up walls, but other people just get the wind knocked out of them.

3. If Jean Gray also has telekinesis, and she happens to get caught by the bad guys and tied up, can't she use her powers to untie herself?

4. Storm drives Professor X around in his car like his personal black chauffeur. I mean, come on, hasn't the Professor heard of hand-powered brakes? I thought he was supposed to be a genius. He also still hasn't mastered stairs in his wheelchair (which is weirdly cumbersome, even being what it is).

5. Don't these kids ever just sit around and eat pizza?

I Satisfy My Own Requirements

I don't see that there's anything wrong with "good enough," as long as it really is good enough for you. It doesn't seem like people necessarily need everything to be perfect, we just all have a complex (at least Americans do) about never settling for less. Sure, people settle for things all the time, but isn't there always this nagging voice in the back of their heads, saying, "Why the fuck did you settle?? Why didn't you do more, try harder?" When we go through primary school, the message is usually to shoot for the moon, at least in the media and through endless subliminal wording. Not that you're actually capable, but that you really have to try, because we're Americans for chrissake, that's what our Constitution is all about.

The problem, really, is that people are fed an ever-evolving but always-unattainable American Dream, and so we're never allowed to be satisfied with anything that's just "good enough."