Feminism - K L Kaine

Feminism Resources

Welcome to the section of my website dedicated to feminism.

Some people’s writing goals are to hit the NYT bestseller list, or to win the Booker prize. Mine is to ignite a feminist revolution.

Failing that, it is to help girls and women awaken to how unfairly we are treated by society, and to inspire them (and boys and men) to fight for a fairer world.

Before we go any further, we need to define what we mean by feminism.

Because sadly, not everybody agrees that females should be treated as fully-fledged members of society, and so the word ‘feminism’ has been subject to repeated smear and misinformation campaigns.

So here’s what it means:

‘Feminism is the belief that women deserve equal rights to men.’

For further clarity, here are a few things that it doesn’t mean:

you mustn’t shave your armpits or wear make-up
you hate men
you don’t want to have children

I think that a lot of girls and women don’t realise quite how heavily society is stacked against them, or how invasive and pervasive the messages are that we receive.

Blood of Gods and Girls is, at heart, about rejecting the narratives we’ve been told about who we are, what we’re capable of, and how we should behave.

But how do we do that?

There’s no easy answer, and there’s no single way, but here is what I have to offer:

Educate Yourself

I used to think ‘educate yourself’ was a bit of a cop out when it comes to activism – as it wasn’t actually doing anything. But now I feel the complete opposite.

Educating yourself gives you a clearer view of reality, it shows you opportunities and it strengthens your revolve and motivation. It is the foundation of everything else, including wise choices.

If you only read one feminist book, read Invisible Women.

Invisible Women takes a data driven approach to exposing how women lose out again and again in a world designed by and for men. It covers every aspect from crash test dummies (dummies being designed to average men’s measurements means women are disproportionately harmed in car crashes) to toilets (women’s and men’s toilets are usually designed to the same size ‘footprint’ despite that fact that cubicles take up more space than urinals, meaning the same footprint results in less provision for women than men. Add to that the fact that women are far more likely to be helping children and elderly people and women’s provision reduces further. Add to that the fact that when men see the long ladies’ toilets queues they roll their eyes and berate us for spending so long on our lipstick, the insult added to the injury is remarkable) to medicine (since medical testing began, trials have deliberately and systematically only been done on male bodies (including mice), as women’s bodies have been deemed ‘too complicated’. This means that the vast majority of medicine and medical interventions are designed for male bodies, which causes actual harm to women. Not to mention that our symptoms are described as ‘atypical’ when they differ from the standard symptoms recorded in men.)

Here are some more of my favourite feminist books:

Nonfiction

Invisible Women, Caroline Criado Perez
How to be a Woman, Caitlin Moran
Mother of Invention, Katrine Marçal
Men Explain Things to Me, Rebecca Solnit
Caliban and the Witch, Silvia Federici

Fiction

The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood
The Power, Naomi Alderman
You Could be So Pretty, Holly Bourne
The Exact Opposite of Okay, Laura Steven

Pay Attention

Once you start reading up on this stuff, you might start to notice it in your every day life a bit more, as if you’ve suddenly been given x-ray glasses.

Here are a few of the key areas where I constantly notice sexism, that appear to go unnoticed by a lot of the population:

Default male animals

When people see a bird, or a spider or a squirrel, they almost invariably say ‘he’. This may seem like a minor thing, but it is a direct representation of how everything is assumed to be male unless deliberately specified otherwise. It creates a world where females don’t exist.

Male overrepresentation in fiction

Picture books, children’s books, TV shows and movies. If you actually start counting the number of female characters compared to male characters in stories which are not overtly aimed at women (and even many that are) you start to notice just what a small slice of fictional society women make up. I remember being shocked when I heard that someone had analysed Frozen and discovered that despite the fact the two leads were female, more than 50% of the dialogue was spoken by males (https://www.reddit.com/r/Infographics/comments/1ex60x1/disney_movies_dialogue_distribution_by_gender/).

Women’s semi-naked bodies everywhere

The display window of Anne Summers. Huge billboards. Even art galleries, album covers, adverts. We are constantly expected to be okay with seeing female bodies exposed and overly sexualised.

Of course, if you go looking for it, you’ll be able to find a male model in his boxers somewhere, but I’m talking about volume.

Next time you walk around a city – count how many times you see an image of a female in underwear. Also see how many males you see in the same state.

Speak Up and Act Up

Once you’ve learned more about the situation, and begun to see it with your own eyes, you may feel compelled to speak up, or take action.

This can be hard, because there is a lot of backlash against feminism, and we all have to value our own self-preservation.

So only do as much as you feel compelled to, you do not have to feel guilty for ‘not doing enough’. That’s just more of those same guilt messages.

If it’s right for you, here are some places where you can speak up, or take action.

Have discussions with trusted friends

Talk about the things that you’ve learned with trusted friends. Perhaps they are already feminists, perhaps they’ve never thought about it. Perhaps they have a negative view of feminism based on false beliefs, which you can question.

Try not to get into arguments about it, or get frustrated with people because you think they’re wrong, or not doing enough. It takes time for people to work through the realities we’ve built up over their whole lives.

So be patient. Minds don’t usually change on the spot, but if you speak to people about these issues, you will be planting seeds and shifting their paradigms bit by bit.

Society changes by one tiny mind shift at a time.

Call out sexism when you see it

When someone default males an animal, I tend to say – ‘Oh, do you think it’s a boy?’

I find this works better than darkly muttering ‘or she’, because people will meet spikiness with spikiness, and this behaviour is not malicious. But gently and lightly mentioning it makes people stop and realise what they’ve done, which is the first step.

If you’re walking around town and you notice a lot of images of women in their underwear, then point it out to whoever you’re with, and talk about how it makes you feel uncomfortable. Again, it’s not their fault, but if they’re so numb to seeing it, mentioning it helps them realise that it could be a problem.

If you’re writing a review of a book, movie or TV show, then include gender representation as one of your judging aspects. You might have enjoyed a show, but noticed that only a quarter of the characters were female. You can say that you might have liked it even better if women had been more equally represented.

Bring it into organisations

If you’re in a position to, then you can try to make change in institutions.

Schools and other Academic Institutions

If you notice uniform or dress code inconsistences, like girls being forced to wear skirts instead of trousers, or female staff members being required to wear heels, then you can bring it up with the relevant people.

You can view the curriculum and reading list and asses it for female representation. Are all the books on the reading list written by men? Request that more female writers are included. In fiction, what is the balance of characters within the books? Are females represented at all? If they are represented, are they shown as reductive female stereotypes, or real, nuanced characters with wants and needs that don’t revolve around men?

Workplaces

Notice if women are spoken over in meetings, or whether they are not given credit for their ideas. Speak up about it and make sure credit is given fairly.

It should go without saying that any harassment or inappropriate behaviour should be reported and punished.

Push for fair policies. Request your company have a fair pay and non-discrimination policy. Ask how these policies are being enforced.

Make sure internal documentation uses gender neutral language, not using ‘he’ to mean anyone, and not using words like ‘chairman’.

Contribute to Feminist Organisations

The two main things you can contribute are time and money.

Again, I can’t emphasise enough how you mustn’t feel guilty about only giving what you comfortably, confidently can.

One of the key messages that we get as women is that our role is to support others – often putting them before ourselves.

Putting other people first is often cited as a ‘moral’ way to live – not only for women. But people don’t expect men to do it – whereas when a women puts herself first, she’s selfish.

Sod that message, and remember that you are as important as anyone else, and you need to make sure your needs are met as much as anyone else’s.

So, only give money to charity if you know that you can afford it. Only give your time in the same way.

You can still be part of the tide of change in any of the ways I’ve mentioned above, and if your circumstances change in the future, you can consider contributing then.

If you do have capacity to contribute in this way, then here are some great charities that are fighting for equal rights for women:

Room to Read https://www.roomtoread.org/

Malala Fund https://malala.org/

Women Nepal https://www.womenepal.org/

Womankind https://www.womankind.org.uk/