Well, now that we’ve all calmed down post-Hiddleswift (RIP) (IT WAS NEVER REAL), we can nestle down and enjoy a colourful discussion about feminism and the double standards women face as living breathing human beings. Courtesy of Emily Ratajkowski.
In an interview with Glamour, the model/actress dealt some real truths about the double standards women are (always) subjected to.
“Our society tells women we can’t be, say, sexy and confident and opinionated about politics,” she said. “This would allow too much power. Instead, our society asks us to declare and defend our motivations, which makes us second-guess them, all while men do what they please without question.”
Um, yep! Pretty much. And she continued.
“Mick Jagger is 73, and he still sometimes wears his shirt open and gyrates onstage. We understand that this is a part of his performance and artistic brand. Meanwhile, when Madonna, who is 58 and a revolutionary in that same kind of artistic sexuality, wears a sheer dress to the Met gala, critics call her a ‘hot mess’ who’s ‘desperate.'”
She then went on to defend Madonna who she felt was making “one of her signature political statements about female sexuality.” And then Ratajkowski called out society’s warped perception of women.
“The ideal feminist world shouldn’t be one where women suppress their human instincts for attention and desire,” she maintained. “We shouldn’t be weighed down with the responsibility of explaining our every move. We shouldn’t have to apologize for wanting attention, either. We don’t owe anyone an explanation. It’s not our responsibility to change the way we are seen — it’s society’s responsibility to change the way it sees us.”
Which, like, YES. I can’t count how many times I — or my friends or women I know even vaguely — have been conflicted about wanting attention or wanting to dress up or wanting to show off and then worrying that doing those things will negate our feminist agendas. Which is bananas. Like, what? In no way, shape or form does doing one’s self undermine one’s feminism. That’s not how feminism works. You can still be a badass bitch and wear crop tops and heels or nothing at all. Feminism doesn’t hinge on the clothes you wear or the selfies you take. Feminism is about:
1) Equality
And that’s it. That’s what it is. There are no footnotes. So if anyone gives you grief on not being a feminist because you’re wearing like, something sheer, you can print out this page and hand it to them and then scream “equality” until they are scared to the point of wanting to run away.
That, or you must insist that they approach Mick Jagger and every other man and insist they wear turtlenecks and long pants and take photos only in the Victorian fashion as well. Either/or. Because equality.
