Yes, You Are
feminism n (1895) 1 : the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes 2 : organized activity on behalf of women’s rights and interests — feminist n or adj — feministic adj
Above, the dictionary definition of feminism — the entire dictionary definition of feminism. It is quite straightforward and concise. If you believe in, support, look fondly on, hope for, and/or work towards equality of the sexes, you are a feminist.
Yes, you are.
The definition of feminism does not ask for two forms of photo ID. It does not care what you look like. It does not care what color skin you have, or whether that skin is clear, or how much you weigh, or what you do with your hair. You can bite your nails, or you can get them done once a week. You can spend two hours on your makeup, or five minutes, or the time it takes to find a Chapstick without any lint sticking to it. You can rock a cord mini, or khakis, or a sari, and you can layer all three. The definition of feminism does not include a mandatory leg-hair check; wax on, wax off, whatever you want. If you believe in, support, look fondly on, hope for, and/or work towards equality of the sexes, you are a feminist.
Yes, you are.
The definition of feminism does not mention a membership fee or a graduated tax or “…unless you got your phone turned off by mistake.” Rockefellers, the homeless, bad credit, no credit, no problem. If you believe in, support, look fondly on, hope for, and/or work towards equality of the sexes, you are a feminist.
Yes, you are.
The definition of feminism does not require a diploma or other proof of graduation. It is not reserved for those who teach women’s studies classes, or to those who majored in women’s studies, or to those who graduated from college, or to those who graduated from high school, or to those who graduated from Brownie to Girl Scout. It doesn’t care if you went to Princeton or the school of hard knocks. You can have a PhD, or a GED, or a degree in mixology, or a library card, or all of the above, or none of the above. You don’t have to write a twenty-page paper on Valerie Solanas’s use of satire in The S.C.U.M. Manifesto, and if you do write it, you don’t have to get better than a C-plus on it. You can really believe math is hard, or you can teach math. You don’t have to take a test to get in. You don’t have to speak English. If you believe in, support, look fondly on, hope for, and/or work towards equality of the sexes, you are a feminist.
Yes, you are.
The definition of feminism is not an insurance policy; it doesn’t exclude anyone based on age. It doesn’t have a “you must be this tall to ride the ride” sign on it anywhere. It doesn’t specify how you get from place to place, so whether you use or a walker or a stroller or a skateboard or a carpool, if you believe in, support, look fondly on, hope for, and/or work towards equality of the sexes, you are a feminist.
Yes, you are.
The definition of feminism does not tell you how to vote or what to think. You can vote Republican or Libertarian or Socialist or “I like that guy’s hair.” You can bag voting entirely. You can believe whatever you like about child-care subsidies, drafting women, fiscal accountability, Anita Hill, environmental law, property taxes, Ann Coulter, interventionist politics, soft money, gay marriage, tort reform, decriminalization of marijuana, gun control, affirmative action, and why that pothole at the end of the street still isn’t fixed. You can exist wherever on the choice continuum you feel comfortable. You can feel ambivalent about Hillary Clinton. You can like the ERA in theory, but dread getting drafted in practice. The definition does not stipulate any of that. The definition does not stipulate anything at all, except itself. If you believe in, support, look fondly on, hope for, and/or work towards equality of the sexes, you are a feminist.
Yes, you are.
The definition of feminism does not judge your lifestyle. You like girls, you like boys, doesn’t matter. You eat meat, you don’t eat meat, you don’t eat meat or dairy, you don’t eat fast food, doesn’t matter. You can get married, and you can change your name or keep the one your parents gave you, doesn’t matter. You can have kids, you can stay home with them or not, you can hate kids, doesn’t matter. You can stay a virgin or you can boink everyone in sight, doesn’t matter. It’s not in the definition. If you believe in, support, look fondly on, hope for, and/or work towards equality of the sexes, you are a feminist.
Yes, you are.
Yes. You are. You are a feminist. If you believe in, support, look fondly on, hope for, and/or work towards equality of the sexes, you are a feminist. Period. It’s more complicated than that — of course it is. And yet…it’s exactly that simple. It has nothing to do with your sexual preference or your sense of humor or your fashion sense or your charitable donations, or what pronouns you use in official correspondence, or whether you think Andrea Dworkin is full of crap, or how often you read Bust or Ms. — or, actually, whether you’ve got a vagina. In the end, it’s not about that. It is about political, economic, and social equality of the sexes, and it is about claiming that definition on its own terms, instead of qualifying it because you don’t want anyone to think that you don’t shave your pits. It is about saying that you are a feminist and just letting the statement sit there, instead of feeling a compulsion to modify it immediately with “but not, you know, that kind of feminist” because you don’t want to come off all Angry Girl. It is about understanding that liking Oprah and Chanel doesn’t make you a “bad” feminist — that only “liking” the wage gap makes you a “bad” feminist, because “bad” does not enter into the definition of feminism. It is about knowing that, if folks can’t grab a dictionary and see for themselves that the entry for “feminism” doesn’t say anything about hating men or chick flicks or any of that crap, it’s their problem.
It is about knowing that a woman is the equal of a man in art, at work, and under the law, whether you say it out loud or not — but for God’s sake start saying it out loud already. You are a feminist.
I am a feminist too. Look it up.
September 30, 2003
Tags: feminism
oops mixed metaphor!
“How can you be so obtuse? Is it deliberate?” — The Shawshank Redemption
I’ll go into more detail here just in case you aren’t being a twonk on purpose: calling The SCUM Manifesto satire doesn’t narrow the hoop at all — or at least not THAT hoop. The received wisdom is that Solanas wrote TSM as satire, as a play on whatever Swift essay advocates the eating of poor babies. My own feeling, which is why I didn’t do well on the paper, is that Solanas wasn’t really joking, and even if she was, the satire wasn’t successful because she’s not very good. She may have been a feminist, or just crazy, but your opinion on THAT ISSUE has nothing to do with whether you’re a feminist. As to whether SHE’S a feminist, that’s a different discussion, one we’d package with her shooting Warhol, because the real conversation about Solanas is about mental illness, and whether we CAN take a violent manifesto like TSM in the spirit of satire when she shot a guy who refused to produce her plays.
Then again, being a nutcake doesn’t exclude a woman from feminism either.
I’m not sure how, then, the Solanas example proves your point…or what your point is, in the end, except to point out loopholes through which people who resent feminists (or the idea that they might be feminists accidentally) might fit. You could argue that lede-ing a piece with a dictionary definition is hacky, and I’d agree with you — but this piece is entirely addressing how people define themselves and all the extra garbage the word “feminism” has accrued over the years. The definition was integral.
If you don’t want to use the word, don’t, but don’t make it about phantom nits in the argument.
i love u 4 this. u r amazing. thank u thank u thank u! im gonna put it in a feminist booklet, ok? but we’ll give u credit. :-D
i support feminists struggles but here is why i am not a feminist
http://hammerhearts.wordpress.com/2010/08/01/dude-you-are-not-a-feminist/
[…] the political connotations of the word. We should sort this out and de-politicise it as a word. I’m firmly with Sars when it comes to the whole ‘feminist’ issue. If you really want to learn more about my views on this kind of thing, visit the old version of […]
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i’d like a similar article about why it is so important to identify as a “feminist”. Is someone who fights for equality in society, but does not call him/herself a “feminist”, doing less?
Ironically enough, people’s desire to identify with the word “feminist” is itself NOT a feminist issue. It is a person’s personal issue with wanting an identity in conveniently simple label/image.
I read this piece when it first came out. It has been a great comfort to me over the years. I’ve read my fair share of feminist theory, and I know it’s all a lot more complex than this piece, but whenever I just really need to boil it down to the essentials, I revisit this post.
I’m pregnant, and I just found out today I’m having a girl. I’ll be keeping this in a safe place, and showing it to her as soon as she’s old enough to grasp the concept. I wrote a letter to my future daughter on my blog today, and linked back to this post too.
[…] For anyone interested, this article I read almost a decade ago still holds up to me as a beautiful and moving piece about what feminism really is, to me: https://tomatonation.com/culture-and-criticism/yes-you-are/ […]
Thank you for writing this! I just had a discussion with my roommates about how they don’t consider themselves feminists.
Just to remind us of the basis of the conversation:
feminism n (1895) 1 : the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes 2 : organized activity on behalf of women’s rights and interests — feminist n or adj — feministic adj
Maybe those who think there are separate provider and supporter roles could stop for a minute and consider partner roles instead.
Why does your family need to work the same way mine does? All the definition says is that people should be able to work out their own lives without someone saying “you can’t, because you’re a girl”.
Can I ask: have you ever performed this piece? It reads great, but it reads like declamation. I can just hear it in – well, actually, Gil Scott Heron’s voice…
“If you believe in, support, look fondly on, hope for, and/or work towards equality of the sexes, you are a feminist.”
“Yes you are.”
“The revolution will not be televised.”
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Coming back to this essay after many more years to say – STILL relevant, still the best piece I have ever read on what feminism is and isn’t; and sadly I had to link it AGAIN this morning after a very frustrating, disappointing and just plain infuriating conversation with my boyfriend last night. He actually had the balls to say “oh I hope you aren’t going to go all feminist on me” after I commented on some reading I was doing (the blog “Fit and Feminist” among others). I could not answer for a moment; I think I stopped breathing. Then I let him know as gently as I could that I’ve been a feminist all along, and if he has somehow managed not to notice that in a year and a half, then something’s gone badly awry; either feminism does not mean what he thinks it means, I’m not expressing it enough, or he’s just plain not paying bloody attention. Some backpedaling on his part ensued, and some “but you’re not THAT kind of feminist, right?”, and I stood firm. No. I am a feminist. If he has a problem with that then it’s his loss, not mine. I’m honestly not sure what’s going to happen now but I’m too old, too smart, and too tired of BS to cave into a guy’s insecurities at this point!
Richard, the whole POINT is not averages, but individuals. SOME men are more empathetic than SOME women; SOME women are stronger than SOME men.
My sister made all-stars every year she played Little League as she was better than ALL the guys on ALL the teams. Since she grew up post-feminism, she was “allowed” to play Little League instead of being shunted off to softball.
That most of her peers were more interested in makeup than baseball has nada to do with it. She had the CHOICE because of feminism.
When my grandmother was born, women couldn’t vote, let alone play baseball.
Feminism is not saying all people of all genders are absolutely equal in ability, strength, characteristics. It’s saying gender is not the distinguishing factor, but those abilities, strengths and characteristics.
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I have never-not once- met a single person who actually wants equality. Some come closer than others, but everyone will back off if you investigate closely enough. I know this because my experience in trying to treat people equally usually ends up madder than treating them “differently” for lack of better word. And often times, the worst offenders are the ones who claim the loudest (or most often) they are fighting for equality. Go and say programs aimed solely at women with nothing remotely resembling the sort for men should be eliminated and see how fast the supposedly equality-fighting feminists turn on you. Ask why there are more women’s colleges than men’s and why women’s groups are seen as okay while men’s are seen as sexist. Say girls shouldn’t be allowed to play on boys’ sports teams because they have their own, and boys aren’t allowed to go the reverse route even if there is no similar sport for them. And for God’s sake, never, ever say domestic violence should not be treated as anything but a bunch of men abusing women, or that ANYTHING in society is a disadvantage to men.
To be fair, none of this is limited to feminists. It’s also true of pretty much anyone else, including civil rights activists, sexuality rights activists, etc. It’s true of men as well as women. But this article focuses on feminists, so I am too.
Note that I’m not saying feminists are all evil sexists out to conquer men. A significant percentage, more than most of the feminists here would ever care to admit, do fit that definition and cannot be ignored, particularly since they are often the ones with the loudest voices. Much more good could be done for the image of feminism by speaking out against those types of feminists than anything else. But I know not nearly every feminist is like that. Some do accomplish good things, and some good things have come from the feminist movement. But let’s not try to pretend they’re something they’re not.
I was raised in a household with a Marine officer for a father and a liberal feminist as a mother.
In this dynamic, I have been able to embrace the difference between the sexes, yet having a true understanding that greatness is not defined by gender and really by character.
As a man, I celebrate the mysteries of a woman.
As a person, I celebrate the accomplishments of a person, man or woman.
As a father, I still do not want any man around my daughter.
I suppose even in an enlightened state of being, a father is still a father.
Excellent article.
Toby
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Erik, a partnership between two people doesn’t need to be divided into a ‘provider’ and ‘support’ role. Both partners contributing equally might be an ideal to strive for.
Many people see feminism in a ‘zero-sum’ mentality; if women win rights/power or change their roles in society, men must lose out somehow. That seems to be what you think would happen in a relationship where a women contributes more, but it’s a very negative way of looking at the situation.
A lot of people have mentioned redefining “equality”. Maybe “equity” would be a better word to use? Equal opportunities in every aspect.
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would really hope I get to make that decision for myself.
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I’m not sure what prompted me to come back and reread this today, but I’m glad I did. Thanks, Sars.
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