Feminism provides a human cause for equality and justice to unite behind, because the personal is political, and because our lives should never be subject to debate.
I have always been the observer. I feel most comfortable watching the world unfold around me as I stay tucked away safe in my bubble, opinions coming out only when asked for advice or guidance — the pacifist, the therapist. Growing up as a girl in South Carolina, I was rarely asked for my thoughts on anything controversial anyway, especially politics. When I was asked, I would typically skirt around the question to avoid confrontation and continue to be the well-mannered, hospitable Southern girl I was raised to be. However, now in college and under the Trump administration, I have come to believe that some issues, such as feminism, demand both attention and decisiveness.
Up until a few years ago, I would not have called myself a feminist. I thought that word was reserved only for those who go out and do something, and that the word insinuated a level of anger that I did not possess. Riding in my dad’s truck, I would often listen along to conservative talk shows rant about the necessity of traditional American values and the chaos erupting due to radical policies and people. The term “feminazi”, which was coined by Rush Limbaugh in the 1990s but remains widely recognized today, was part of a distortion I would hear that attempted to dismiss feminism and discredit its sentiments, villainizing the movement.
My comfort in neutrality suddenly felt like complicity when Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022. I was 17 years old and seeing girls who were my age, looked like me, could have been me, being denied healthcare on the basis that they no longer had control over their bodily autonomy. For the first time in my life, I felt that the structures and systems I had been taught to trust would not defend me, and I began to question my lack of participation and understanding in politics.
In comparing feminism to Nazism, Limbaugh made it irrational and dangerous, and gave critics an effective tool to shut down conversations about pertinent topics like gender equality and justice through mockery and ridicule. To anyone ill-informed on the goals of feminism, like I was, these harmful projections about the dangers of feminism and other ‘radical’ ideas serve to create distance between potential allies and the movement itself.
For a long time, I absorbed the idea that challenging what I saw as the dominant viewpoint would invite more trouble than it was worth. None of the issues I was hearing on the radio seemed to affect me — why did it matter whether I defended a movement like feminism or not?
My comfort in neutrality suddenly felt like complicity when Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022. I was 17 years old and seeing girls who were my age, looked like me, could have been me, being denied healthcare on the basis that they no longer had control over their bodily autonomy. For the first time in my life, I felt that the structures and systems I had been taught to trust would not defend me, and I began to question my lack of participation and understanding in politics.
Today, a law proposed in South Carolina called the “Prenatal Equal Protection Act” would make an abortion equivalent to homicide under state homicide laws, subjecting women who already faced a tragic decision to trial and possibly murder charges. Although expected to fail, this proposal aims to instill fear in both women and healthcare providers under the guise of protecting American values and saving lives. This is a theme of intimidation emerging at the national level with rollbacks on LGBTQ+ rights, DEI policies, and education, and is a tactic for hopelessness that I refuse to be complicit in.
Everything is personal. We exist together, stuck whether we like it or not, and injustice to one person invites injustice to all. What used to feel like someone else’s battle has become undeniably mine, and feminism has been a tool to help me see why. While it is essential to acknowledge that the history of the movement is imperfect, today’s broad understanding of feminism is rooted in a collective purpose towards achieving many goals of equality and justice, an aspiration I think many of us can resonate with. The statement “the personal is political,” a core idea stemming from the second wave of feminism, is not meant to suggest that our individual experiences of discomfort always require legislation, but rather that the patterns of preventable discomfort many of us face reflect larger, systemic issues that can and should be addressed. It is up to us to identify these patterns, redefine how we want to live, and work together to advocate for solutions. The more voices involved in this effort, the better.
I am a feminist. I may not have always called myself that, but I have never doubted that I deserve equal opportunities, and that my neighbors do, too. The personal is political because our lives should never be up for debate. Efforts like feminism do nothing more than give a human cause for equality and justice to unite behind, yet we continuously villainize initiatives for growth because we fear change and crave comfort. But comfort is not guaranteed. No matter how small, silent, and sheltered we are, we still exist together.
I choose to hold the title of feminist for others as well as myself because I can no longer pretend that I stand outside of this fight. We must recognize that messages of hate and bigotry propagate through both active participation and abstention — speaking up against them is a responsibility we all share. At this critical moment, I urge you to refuse to be a stepping stone on the path to an unjust future and use your voice to advocate for what you believe. Pay attention, speak up, and risk being controversial for the sake of a better future.
Image Credit: Ella Harris Perin, August 2, 2021
