Hello, hello, hello!

I’m writing today about something quite important. Now I know there will be people who look at the title of this post and think ‘oh god’ but wait! Give me a few lines. For the past few years I’ve been on my own personal search, the stage of your life where you want to know what you believe in. I’ve read countless books, looked at the world around me, at myself to decide if I am a feminist, what the word means (I’ll talk more about that later on). I wanted to start a weekly segment where I talk about feminism. I want to talk with you all about important issues, feminists to look up to and about our society today. I want to take away the misinformation, at least on my little corner of the internet. Most of all I’ll share my opinion and not step on another woman because of how she chooses to live, because that’s what feminism is about.

For this first post I thought I’d write a little about my life and feminism. Now, since I was a little girl I’ve always been adamant that I could do whatever the boys did. I would play with the boys at school, more than once I was the leader of the army through the woods. I used to draw dolls, because I felt Barbie was lacking, they were called Jenny Anything and they had so many different careers and I was 7 or 8 when I was drawing them. As I got older I still called out sexism, questioned things that I didn’t feel were right. Did I get in arguments with people? Of course I did!

When I was around 17, however, I started to lose my voice a bit. I started at college in a class of almost all boys (I was one of three females, which went down to two in my final year), which I think did have an impact on my idea of feminism. All of my friends were guys, I didn’t feel oppressed and I didn’t see it around me. The feminists I saw around me shouted a lot and talked about what I thought were stupid things like banning a song, I wasn’t like that. So when a boy slapped my bum, it was seen by a staff member and I was asked if I wanted to report it (which I did) I was pressured by the males in my class not to say anything because it was banter, could I not take a joke? Now I think about it am mad, but I was 18 years old and most of the time the only girl in the class and not always that popular for being a ‘nerd’ and a ‘swot’.

So when I got to uni I wasn’t sure about the whole feminist thing. I hadn’t seen a good example of feminism and looking back now I was naive so naive. I wasn’t looking at the bigger picture and I thought these girls were just huge killjoys. Who cares if women want to topless model, do porn or anything like that? Even today I still believe women can do what they like with their bodies and I’ll go into that in a different post. I didn’t see anyone who I could relate to and it’s something Emma Watson has spoken about (the first person I felt like I did relate to). Even in a university discussion I stated I was an equalist because I was fed up of women who thought they were superior to men. I believed the lies, I was young and impressionable and I believed the negativity. In fact now I’m embarrassed, but I truly feel that you need to find your own feminism, it can’t be forced on someone.

It wasn’t until I signed up for a Women’s Writing class and started reading the books that were assigned I started to realise something, there were people in here I could relate to. I realised that things I’d thought were ‘fine’ or me ‘fussing’ weren’t ok. That I can be a feminist and that this angry, hairy, bra burning feminist was something that was mostly made up. Yes there are some people I don’t agree with, but the world would be so boring if everyone thought the same. I realised that I am a feminist and that I may not have always wanted to use the word I’ve always wanted equality for women, I’ve always been passionate about men and women living together and being able to not have social pressures.

I am a feminist and I can’t wait to talk more with you.

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