To Blame a Feminist

Thirty seconds into “apologizing” for what he wrote, he said his comments weren’t about feminists at all.

I am not the pinnacle of political savviness. I am politically incorrect, consciously and accidentally. I say “bitch”, talk a plethora of shit about women and men alike. I curse. I listen to demoralizing, violent and sexist rap lyrics and I sing along, pretending that I’m bad when in reality I was raised on the East End of Long Island in a nice neighborhood with little crime and a stable family.

I am not perfect. However, I am a feminist. I try — I am trying — to stop accepting sexism as truth in political rhetoric, music, pop culture, literature and life. I often fail. My actions don’t always match my thoughts, and that inconsistency is detrimental to the success of the feminist movement.

I am cognitively aware of my aforementioned flaws as part of a cultural norm perpetuating the oppression of women, but ultimately I believe that women and men should be equal. I believe we are equal; society does not reflect my sentiment. Gender equality is pretty simple concept that should have been established years ago, but here we are — the lesser gender, fighting to make our issues relevant in a world scolding us like children: “Daddy is busy with work right now honey, go play with your dolls and we will talk later.”

Everyone’s favorite social media platform, Facebook, has transformed from a fun place to post pictures with your friends to a public soapbox for the under educated and over-opinionated (I am not excluding myself here). People are really confident hiding behind the keyboard of their iPhone6, typing things they would never say in confrontation with a real life person. I read people’s inane thoughts — Donald Trump supporters have been getting a lot of my attention these days — but I can’t shame these people because an opinion is just that. I generally scoff and move on.

I don’t often engage in Facebook fights; when I do, I like to challenge the close-minded, the folks crying “my religion!” as a justification for bigotry, and the ones who have the gall to use the term “feminist” like a curse word.

It was a quiet Tuesday. Work ended early, I was waiting for some of my friends so we could meet up for dinner. I was laying in my bed like a slug, perusing Facebook when I saw a former classmate of mine had posted a status.

I was instantly enraged, for several reasons. First, it didn’t make any sense. Does he know what feminism means? Second, complaining is not exclusive to feminists. The irony in his complaining about feminists complaining is not lost on me. Third, the somewhat broken message seems to insinuate that in a world bursting at the seams with hatred, crisis, war and inequality, women have no room to fight for equal rights. Lesser, once again.

I had to say something. I needed to understand the context in which this fragmented, ridiculous statement was composed. I went for an approach that showed I was annoyed, but curious and willing to hear him out.

I waited. And waited. My comment accumulated a tiny total of 10 likes and one reply agreeing with me. One other person commented, rallying on the side of nonsensical sexism. After one hour, I had received no response from the author.

By that time, my ride was waiting for me outside. I threw on a leather jacket and went to dinner with my friends, paying no mind to my phone for the next several hours. When I returned, I checked to see what, if any, updates had developed in my attempt to prove a point on a public forum.

It was gone. Then entire post had vanished into cyberspace. I closed my Facebook app and reopened it, just to make sure I had not fallen victim to a glitch in the social media matrix.

He deleted it. “Coward!”, I group texted my friends, defeated only by my own over-eagerness to rally against him. I was so curious to know what he meant, and mildly irritated by his defense tactic. Don’t take a stand for the patriarchy if you’re just going to back down when challenged, bro.

I gave the incident little thought the rest of the night, and had completely moved on the following day. That night, my friend suggested we grab “a drink” at a local bar, which quickly turned into me as the designated driver at an unwanted holiday high school reunion. He was there. I chuckled to myself when I made eye contact with him, smiled, and received the back of his head in return. Unphased, I went on about my night.

Three hours later, standing on the crowded bar porch, I felt a tap on my shoulder. He towers over me at about 6'2'’. I think he played basketball in high school. I smelled the alcohol on his breath, pursed my lips into a smug grin and greeted him warmly. “Ahh, yes. Hello…”

“Monicaaaaaa, what’s up buddy?” We exchanged a few snippets of small talk as I waited patiently for dialogue to escalate.

Finally, he caved. “Listen…no hard feelings, right?” I simply cocked my head to the side, still smirking. I wanted him to undo things himself, without any prompt from me, the feminist (and sober) party in question.

He went on to explain to me that he did not mean what he had wrote on Facebook. Because he was intoxicated when he posted it and had left out an entire sentence, making his point unclear.

I responded every so often when appropriate, only with, “Okay.” He went on.

He had drunkenly left a sentence out. He wasn’t making sense in the post and was embarrassed when I commented because he sobered up and realized the error of his syntactical ways. He didn’t mean what he said. Did I understand? He loved women. The post wasn’t even about feminists at all. I get it, right?

I didn’t. He went on.

His status was meant as a commentary on the jumbled priorities of society. He loves women. Feminism wasn’t the right word to use.

“So what was the right word to use?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” he snapped, taking a step back. “Honestly, I just know how you are, and you came at me with this attitude and I didn’t feel like dealing with it. I wasn’t going to go there, you wouldn’t get it. So, I’m just making sure we’re good now.”

And just like that, a sexist man blamed a woman for a sexist comment against feminists.

What a time to be alive.

I stared at him for a good long while, mouth agape, realizing I was too sober and he was too drunk for me to get into it with him in that moment. He kept asking me if we were “good”, with his arm around my shoulder. I recoiled over and over again, trying to maintain my cool in a crowded public place. I politely dismissed him from my presence with a glare and the same smirk I had been holding since we started speaking. I wanted to have a heated debate, to sit him down and detail the flaws in his logic but I knew any point I made would drown in his booze saturated brain. I felt obligated to remain collected. I shouldn’t feel obligated to hold back anything in the defense of feminism.

He is never going to change his thinking. If that broken, poorly constructed thought is really his opinion, then bless this country for allowing him that freedom. In the end, this isn’t about him.

Feminism cannot be half-assed. One day, with enough education, strong gender positive rhetoric, persistence and the right defense tactics, women will be treated as equal to men. When you see something that resonates with you like this guy’s post — biased, uneducated, insulting and sexist — say something. Speak up. If in the process, someone tells you you’re being a bitch, let them.