who actually stands on their own?
Lillian Scott
she/her
Cadigal based writer, studying at the University of Sydney. Lillian is involved in producing and presenting on FBI Radio as well as a reporter for the student run newspaper ‘Honi Soit.’“Please raise your hands,” the speaker says, “if you would trade five years of your life for the so-called perfect body.”
With a laugh I sat onlooking with my male friends at this hilarious and troubling question of what it means to be a feminist and a ‘good feminist’ posed by Phoebe Waller-Bridge in her hit T.V. show ‘Fleabag.’ After the episode concluded I looked around for the opinion of my male friends about the show and ‘Fleabag’ as it was my recommendation for us to watch it. One comment which resonated with me from one of the boys was that he didn’t enjoy the show as it was clearly targeted for a female audience due to the abrasive themes of feminism exemplified within it. Although there are many problematic concepts we can unpick from this statement, the first one that comes to mind is that this opinion is a reflection of the T.V.
Industry and the normalisation of male voices and protagonists which would make this appear not to be a universal show. But after further prying about this comment, it was made evident that they felt as if they weren’t apart of the feminist conversation through their experiences and didn’t feel like they could contribute anything to it. He felt an awkwardness to engage in the discussion. I believe this is truly a failure within our society to have men who identify as feminists to not feel comfortable in these spaces.
This is a trend that isn’t new and not limited to gender politics, but across a myriad of minority groups and inequalities. People or in this instance men do not feel comfortable being involved within the conversation and thus do not listen at all or do not get involved. This is frustrating for me, as everyday it becomes clearer in my isolation how absolutely dependent we are upon other people. This is quite a scary concept to grapple with, particularly when notions of success and maturity lie in the ability for one to be independent and to stand alone.
For example, when one imagines a Gold Medallist at the Olympics, the thought lies exclusively of them on the top step. I highly doubt the image that springs to mind would be the coaches, funding, familial love, doctors, history and many other support systems that placed them on that top podium. Nobody is truly a self-standing individual and this interdependency upon others is undervalued and an unrecognised strength. When examining this through a broader social lens and gender politics, this connectedness should serve as a foundation for our ethics and our ability to empathise and relate with others.
None of us can get anywhere on our own and with this foundation in mind, we should have the entirety of people involved and comfortable contributing in these conversations. I truly believe that this is a liberating concept, recognising this truth and rethinking ourselves as people who are fundamentally dependent upon one other without it being shameful and thus, actively caring and involved in making a society more equitable. Embracing this concept would allow for us to treat each other differently, because our conception of our identity would not be merely defined as self-serving and self-interested, instead it would be to further the causes of every member within our society.
Feminism isn’t limited to women, there are men who are feminists, non-binary and trans people who are feminists and they are part of the movement if they hold the basic propositions of freedom and equality that are part of any feminist political struggle. I don’t want men to be left out of the exploration of women’s voices, I want them to have an active role. To remove their voices in discussion merely cancels their ability to be involved in long-thought out debate and limits the amount of change in which we could see to bring us closer to equality.
I want men to be within these frameworks and feel comfortable to contemplate questions surrounding the objectification of women and their bodies. I want men to actively seek out these questions and not feel as if the space is limited to women or female identifying people. I want men to feel as if they have a voice within gender politics. At the crux of this lack of engagement, I believe lies this inability to see the ways in which we support each other and should be the foundations of our ethical beliefs to make a fairer society. I think both men and women should make these spaces available to both.
In saying this, obviously women’s voices, stories and histories are still prioritised within these discussions and it is important that women do have a safe platform to speak. However, discussions involving gender politics increasingly risk becoming an echo chamber in which female and female identifying people listen and share their thoughts with like-minded people. Although there is a sense of solidarity and community evoked from this, if we want real and permanent change to happen, we need everyone involved in an ongoing intellectual debate and to feel comfortable within these spaces.
“I sometimes worry that i wouldn’t be such a feminist if I had bigger tits” is another one of my favourite quotes from Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s show Fleabag and one that strikes a chord. It has crossed my mind that if I had larger tits, I would be less of a feminist and that frightens me. I want men to be exposed to this and consider their impact and gaze, would they treat me differently if I did have bigger tits? If so let’s work to understand why that is and that perhaps this would aid in my own answer to this question. I do not want men to think that feminism is exclusively a ‘Woman’s Issue’ and I don't want that to be the message that is portrayed in feminist debate.
After all, if we think upon the ethical foundations of who we are and our relationships with each other, we should all be striving to make it the most equitable and shared place for all both within gender politics and other issues in society.