I’ve been told a billion times that I embody feminism. And I get sort of angry when people say that, because it turns out I’m an anti-feminist.
Now, I’m a woman, and I know we used to not have equality and all that jazz, but we do now. Yeah, there are times when men are total dirt bags to us; but to be honest, I think most the time we bring it on ourselves.
I recently had to read part of an “anti-capitalism” textbook for some class, and it had the audacity to assert that men were objectifying women and that they were strictly victims, all the time. First of all, I don’t trust a book that says capitalism is a “social problem,” but I do know enough women that purposefully dress like street walkers. Turns out, classy men aren’t into that.
So ladies, we’ve been playing the woman card for far too long.
We are nagging the men to let us play the hero, but we expect them to still act like Prince Charming. It just doesn’t work like that. You can’t burn your bra and wear it, too.
We insisted on being allowed in the work place only to find out that now we are stuck there. Most families can’t survive on only one income in this two-income world. We did this to ourselves.
We try to have careers at the expense of our children, who then have to be watched by Amber, the 13-year-old down the street who feeds them candy for dinner and lets them watch “Teen Mom” before bed.
On the flip side, we are having careers at the cost of not having children (because obviously women weren’t born to be baby makers). Then we turn into Tina Fey in “Baby Mama,” hiring Amy Poehler to carry our child while chewing gum and almost exclusively disposing of it on the bottom of our coffee table.
And that is why I am an anti-feminist.
Men don’t know if we want them to hold the door or if we can hold it ourselves. Men don’t know if they can ask us to marry them or if we consider that some sort of sexist slavery. Men don’t know who pays when we go out (let me clear that up while we're here: they do).
The lines are blurred. The movement is over. We’ve taken it too far.
We got the right to vote and then we went buck wild.
And by “we went buck wild” I mean men. Feminism is obviously their secret plan to make women do more work. And ladies, we are falling for it. Us women are asking for better jobs, more responsibility, claiming we can do it all. Men are hanging out by the water cooler saying no, no, you can’t do it all. Prove it.
It’s not your fault — I didn’t see it at first either. I thought, “Oh this is so great — women are CEO’s, and women are garbage women, mail women, bat women, and women can even run for president.”
But then I realized, we are working, cooking, cleaning, bearing children, working some more and then packing our husband’s lunch as they run out the door.
Well, the joke's on us.
Reach the columnist at hkmills@asu.edu or follow her at @HaleyKMills
