I wanted to expand on a comment I left last week on Sara’s post, “Too Few Femillennials: Exploring Feminism's Role in Millennials' Lives.” In that comment, I pointed out that many Americans associate gender inequality with extreme cases of female oppression in other countries. This may be contributing to the recent stalling of the feminist movement that Sara explored in her post.
Because gender inequality in the U.S. is often less visible than in other countries, many people are unaware of it or dismiss it. The instances that we see in other nations, viewed through our own lens of what is right and wrong, can make it seem like American women have it relatively good. So is gender inequality in the U.S. a “First-World Problem”? Let’s see.
First, I think it would be helpful for us to look at misguided notions of female subjugation. Americans (and Western culture in general) have historically had a tendency not only to be hypocritical when evaluating global gender inequality, but also to assume that certain customs oppress women because they are different from the “American way.”
Take Chinese footbinding for example. *Historically, a Chinese woman with bound feet was seen as beautiful and as a diligent, dedicated worker; the process to achieve this look was long, difficult and painful. When photography first reached China in the early 1900s, pictures spread across the globe and Western cultures immediately declared the practice backward and disgusting. This led to the abolition of footbinding in China.* Many Chinese women who had already irreversibly bound their feet — like Hsu Mei-Ling from Agnes Smedley’s “Portraits of Chinese Women in Revolution” (p. 34-39) — still valued the custom, but they were suddenly no longer desirable to their husbands. All of this was going on while women were still wearing corsets in the U.S.
We see this phenomenon of American hypocrisy today, as well. Muslim women are often thought to be oppressed by a patriarchal culture because of the hijabs and covering garments they are made to wear, but Americans fail to realize that many Muslim women would feel uncomfortable and objectified if they were exposed more sexually. A cartoon that Noelle sent me (Thanks, Noelle!) illustrates this idea really clearly. Basically, it shows that men in our culture play a large role in deciding what is beautiful and what isn’t, so women’s fashion in the U.S. is, in many ways, also dictated by men. This tendency to point fingers at cultural differences allows us to ignore the issues in our own country, making many people in the U.S. blind to the realities of gender inequality.
On a related note, Americans also tend to look down on other countries for their legal treatment of sexual crimes against females. This can be seen in a PBS article that explores the stigma of reporting rape in Pakistan. The author comments that women are often thought to be lying about being raped, and that a frequently proposed solution is for the woman to marry her rapist.
Articles like this are problematic because they highlight the extreme differences between gender inequality in other countries and the U.S. instead of addressing the similarities. In both Pakistan and America, many women who are raped face social stigma and feel ashamed. What’s more, a dateline article shows that some cases of rape in the U.S. are dismissed as “sexual imposition,” and the perpetrator can get off with a simple probation sentence. Oftentimes, authorities fail to take action for years after the initial incident. While these oppressive circumstances don’t exist to the same degree as in Pakistan, they’re still oppression, right?
Right. Just because American women may be in a relatively better situation than women in other countries, that doesn’t mean that less severe gender inequality should go unnoticed or be seen as a “First-World Problem.” We shouldn’t approach extreme cases of global female oppression from a pedestal; we should try make connections between these practices and our own society. I think this will help us better criticize gender issues in the U.S., and it could possibly move more people to take feminist action.
*-*I learned all of this information about China in Women's Studies 151: Women in Modern China (so I don't have a specific source for the info.)
I love that cartoon, it's an interesting (and funny) take on such a complex and difficult issue. What I think is important to consider is the line between male domination and the mutual posturing that characterizes all mating dances in the animal kingdom. I'd argue that the "nothing covered but her eyes" side of the argument can be characterized largely as a part of the latter rather than the former. The way American women dress is strange if you think about it objectively, but men dress equally strangely in an effort to court women. Trust me when I tell you, neckties are uncomfortable and serve no real purpose.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, I'm reading a story from the UK's Daily Mail, that I can't figure out how to link, detailing the actions of the Saudi Arabian "Moral Police". It explains that women will be punished for violating the national dress code, while men are permitted to walk around the streets in their underwear free of punishment. This dress code, when enforced unequally as the article claims, isn't a form of cultural expression at all, but a way to subjugate women. You did a great job of pointing out hypocrisy of American media, but, as you note in passing, there are very real differences in gender equality between America and the more fundamentally religious states in the world. Many double-standards in the US can be explained by "the mating game", while Saudi Arabia, for example, seems to have government sanctioned oppression of women.
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ReplyDeleteVery interesting article - I agree that our Western view does dictate our perception of gender dynamics in other cultures. At the same time, even though cultures vary considerably when it comes to tastes and preferences, we must always ask who has the authority to establish and promote these norms. Just because heteronormativity and “traditional” gender roles have been what’s expected in America for centuries doesn’t mean that men and women equally constructed them. While it’s true that [what appears to be] more overt examples of gender inequality in other countries divert people from acknowledging a gender gap here in America, I don’t think we can minimize or write-off sexist behavior abroad as well.
ReplyDeleteI do think you're absolutely on point in your discussion of sexual assaults in America. Before they graduate from college, 1 in 4 women and 1 in 10 men will have been sexually assaulted – an overwhelming majority of these cases occur between people who know one another...and most of these are never reported. Only the biggest news stories featuring the most dire circumstances make it into the national media, so we perceive assault as something foreign and rare when really it's prevalent and often local.
As an ally to many survivors, thanks for highlighting this points in your post!
I think this was a really interesting post. I agree that women in America are perceived to be equal to men, especially in comparison to other countries. I don't think that you are saying that we have it worse than other countries or even the same, rather, it looks like you want to acknowledge that there are parallels which serve to break down false cries of total equality.
ReplyDeleteI also think it would be interesting to compare American women to women in other developed democracies. For example, if you look at the Netherlands, social circumstances are exponentially better. They try to break down gender differences in a way that Americans do not. I think it is really important to think about the similarities among those who are different and the differences among those who are similar. Looking at both gives a clearer picture of how gender inequality lurks in the background of American culture. However, to compare all different types of countries and the experiences of people of all genders would be way beyond the scope of a blog post- but still, it is an interesting thought.