My patience is waning for women who side with the Patriarchy when it comes to equal pay and rape culture.
“Why do we have a women’s day? When is men’s day?” Well, if you are white and male every frickin’ day, really, but officially it’s November 19th. “If women want equal pay then they should work as hard as men do!” Uh, women work harder than men do for way less money. Have you ever even met a single mom? “Men get raped, too!” Yes, they do and it’s horrifying, and hey, look, you’re outraged and you don’t doubt for a second that they are telling the truth. But when a sister gets raped suddenly you’re all “men get raped, too!” and “what was she thinking/doing there/drinking/wearing?” instead of “how do we stop this?” and it makes me want to hit something.
I try to be happy for them that their lives have been so totally devoid of discrimination and violence against them that they are blissfully unaware of it, but it gets harder to do every time I see those fekkin’ memes on Facebook admonishing women to shut up and work harder and try to be as good as men at our jobs if we want to earn the same money.
And if you really, truly are that privileged, then you need to speak the hell up for the sisters that aren’t. You need to use that privilege for all it’s worth, and it’s worth a hell of a lot, because most of the rest of us have to work way harder and longer than the men who are getting promoted over us and making more money that we are.
Mostly, it just makes me incredibly sad that some of the worst women haters are women.
I have to take a bunch of deep breaths and count to about half a million before I have enough love in my heart to be able to say to those women, “Who hurt you to the point where you hate yourself so much that you hate so many women?” But we have to start asking the question. We have to start addressing the fear or the ignorance or the denial or whatever the hell it is that causes these sisters to hate the rest of us. No woman ever asked to be raped. No woman ever asked her husband to beat her unconscious. No woman should ever have to endure any of those things, but they happen. So . . . yeah, what exactly happened to make haters hate themselves so much that they think rape and abuse victims deserve what they get?
We’re here to take care of each other. That’s our job as Lightworkers. Take care of each other, and help more and more people wake up. Some people, certain blonde and emaciated conservative talk show frequenters come to mind, are so radioactively toxic that even God has held up His hands and said,” Nope, I ain’t touchin’ that batshit.” It’s like a form of narcissism. There’s not a lot that can be done, because in order to be healed, a person has to admit that there is something broken that needs healing, and a narcissist will never admit that. Nor will most conservative talk show guests.
So what can we do? We can start gently with the somewhat less toxic women in our communities and circles, who are capable of reason and compromise. That is usually just a matter of gently pointing out that the sister in question has some blinders on, and helping her remove them.
Just because she has blinders on, that doesn’t mean the rest of us don’t see what she can’t–or won’t–look at.
Give her a chance, and don’t make her feel stupid or guilty. Have data ready to back up your statements. Show her that what you are saying is true, that women in other parts of the world, in other parts of the country, maybe even in other parts of her own neighborhood, are struggling and suffering, and mostly through no fault of their own.
And just like men have been stepping up to confront other men to make violence against women unacceptable, we have to step up to our angry sisters and let them know this toxicity is not going to stand. We have to hold this line. We have to hold space with love for love to win.
I may have said it before, but I’ll say it again: Humans are way too good at being horrible to each other.
Can we please stop doing that?
Here’s a song I wrote for International Women’s Day. May reverence and kindness become the new normal soon.