Tag: feminism

A Lock That Can Be Opened By Many Keys

I was thinking about the ol’ “A key that can open a lot of locks is a pretty good key, but a lock that can be opened by many keys is a shitty lock” analogy, which seems like a shitty analogy, but actually it’s just that the conclusion is wrong.

See, why might one want a lock that can be opened by many keys?  Perhaps because you’re generous and want the resource to be available to many people, like the “lock” on the cabin my dad built in our woods, anyone can open it, it doesn’t even need a key, you just have to turn the little piece of wood so that the door can swing open.  We want hikers and anyone else who happens to be taking a stroll to have access to the cabin so the lock isn’t supposed to keep people out.  Then why have a lock in the first place, you ask?  In this case to prevent bears from getting in and ransacking the store of snacks we keep up there.  You might also want such a lock to say… prevent children from falling into a pool, while allowing access anyone who can work the lock.  There are any number of things one wants to make accessible to the general public, but also keep animals and unattended children out of.

Now what kind of a person might want a key that can open any lock?  I can think of only one kind of person who would like such a key, and it’s a person who intends to go where they’re not wanted.

So a lock that can be opened by any key is a great lock for someone generous who wants to share something, but a key that can open any lock is a key that’s only desirable if you have bad intentions

I’d really like a character who looked like me but also got to be a three dimensional complex human being

Like in media, especially comics, my body type is not just represented but over represented but it almost exclusively appears in works written by douchey bros who hate women and can’t write for shit. I’d like a character who looks like me in an ensemble cast of women with diverse body types, and she’s dolled up and that’s part of who she is, but it’s not all and she’s not presented as better or worse than her friends, she just has a look she likes doing and does it, and even though she loves heels and leopard print miniskirts she’s not always sexy or sexual.

maatangi:

some girls are legitimately not nice u need to be careful dont let tumblr’s ‘all girls are beautiful and gifts to the world’ fool u because there are really horrible girls and women out there

and putting women on pedestals is just as misogynist as demonizing them.  It’s dehumanizing and negates our capacity for uniqueness… and well humanness.  Women are people capable of as much good or as much evil as men.  Women are as complex, as varied, and as human as men.

Okay, here’s the thing about misogyny, you grow up in a world being told that sexism is over, that you’re just as good as a boy… though of course boys and girls aren’t the same, lol what crazy radical feminist nonsense, you’re different, but you can do anything you want.

And you grow up and you notice little bit by little bit that the world doesn’t treat you equally, you’re more likely to be interrupted, shouted down when a man saying the same thing is applauded.  You realize that you’re not allowed to go out alone at night, or at the very least not allowed to feel safe if you do.  You realize that you aren’t allowed to just trust men, because if you expect them to be trustworthy, you will get hurt.  You realize that men can never see you as really just their friend.

You realize a million little awful things, and that disappointment aches, and what really sucks is entering a space that’s supposed to be fighting that, a space of radicals, of people fighting the system and having those million little wounds inflicted again, that not even here can you be anything, not even here can you feel safe.