CHICAGO (GAY AND LESBIAN) FREE PRESS
June 10 2005


HEAR ME ROAR

OPINION
By Jennifer Vanasco

I am a feminist.

For about 13 years I have said that without
hesitation.

But then, last week, I saw a documentary by Therese
Shechter called "I Was a Teenage Feminist." And, for a
little while afterward, I thought I might need to
change my mind.

This is most certainly not what Shechter's documentary
is trying to do. Basically it traces 40-year-old
Shechter's journey to understand herself. Why does she
avoid calling herself a "feminist" when she happily
wore that label as a teenager growing up in Canada in
the 1970s?

In voiceover, she says, that feminism gave her the
power to be smart, to be independent and to be
herself. "But lately I've had this feeling like I
don't measure up. I'm not a wife. I'm not a mother and
I'm not a supermodel. What I am is a woman who feels
incredible pressure to live up to a standard that I
don't even buy into."

I watched with irritation. Right, I thought. That's
why I'm a "feminist" and why you should be one, too.
You see, up until I saw her film, I used to shake my
head at women like Shechter. Every woman should be a
"feminist," I thought. To be a "feminist" is to
believe in the legal and economic equality of
women-and certainly every woman believes in that.
Early in the film women explain why they don't
consider themselves "feminists" and basically, they
are the same old reasons: Feminists hate men. They are
angry. They are lesbians.

I gave a startled laugh when Shechter interviewed
Nancy Scibilia, a woman who clearly does
woman-centered work. She left a major record label to
found 28 Day Records, which signs mostly politically
active women. She was trying to explain why she has
never called herself a feminist.
"I guess I have those thoughts that I'm not aware
of-everyone will think I'm gay or whatever," Scibilia
said. "I mean, I am gay, so that has nothing to do
with it."

Yeah, right, I thought.

But when a young woman said, "I don't think we have
that many gender issues in my generation. I don't feel
discriminated against because of my gender," I started
to think.

Maybe "feminist" is an outdated term, like
"suffragette." Maybe feminism is a label that
describes a historical movement instead of what women
are currently fighting for today. Maybe that's why
young women-women who clearly don't mind if everyone
knows they are lesbians-have migrated instead to terms
like "queer."

After all, if piles of women who are clearly
women-centered, many of whom do women-centered work,
don't consider themselves "feminists," then maybe
their instinct is right. Maybe feminism simply doesn't
describe where the women's movement is now.
Our foremothers won a lot for us and I am grateful.
Employers can no longer advertise jobs as being for
men only. Women serve in combat. Women can get legal
and safe abortions (though yes, that right is always
threatened). More women than men graduate from law
schools and in colleges. We have powerful women in
Congress and in boardrooms across the country. We have
women mayors and governors, women pilots and
firefighters, women rabbis and ministers. We no longer
expect that if a woman has to work, she will probably
work as a secretary.

Legal discrimination seems to be a thing of the past.
And we can thank feminists for that.
No, what we are fighting for now is something that is
more amorphous: Cultural parity. Women and men get
family leave but it is almost impossible to leave the
workforce to raise a child for a few years and then
expect to rise in a traditional company. Women
musicians are under-represented on large radio
stations. Abortions are less accessible and fewer
doctors are trained to provide them. And women may be
CEOs and senators but we don't achieve those positions
in numbers that even approach equal.

We're fighting for social equality now-a change in
mind, more than a change in laws. And perhaps using a
word like "feminist," which seems to sharply divide
men from women, excluding them, isn't the best way to
go about it. 

Or maybe it's simply that the women's movement is now
many, many movements, working to achieve very
different things-and feminism is simply too narrow a
term to describe them all.

And yet, after all that contemplation, I find myself
back where I began: I'm a feminist. 
What the word "feminism" gives us, I think, is the
right to be angry. For this is where people who deride
feminists as "angry" get it wrong.
Anger against social injustice is good. We should be
angry, because it's unfair. And feminism says, Go
ahead and rant, girl. You are right to be furious. You
are not where you should be, and that's wrong. 
Anger fuels social justice movements. Anger is what
steels us for argument and action.

So yes, I am a pissed-off feminist. What's changed is
that I don't expect you to be one, too.

***
Therese Shechter attends a Chicago screening of "I Was
a Teenage Feminist," the Pride kickoff for Chicago
Filmmakers screenings, at 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. June 11 at
Filmmakers, 5243 N. Clark St.
 
Write to Jennifer Vanasco at
vanasco@chicagofreepress.com