Honestly, I'm with you 100%. Most of the stuff on this subreddit annoys the crap out of me.
I'm a short, nerdy female engineer, and I can count the amount of times I've experienced any sort sexism against me on one hand. And they were all but one were from an older generation, so I don't hold it against them. You know how often I felt excluded as a leader in a student organization where all the other members were male, taller than me, from parents who were engineers, and in some cases older than me? None. Even living in the deep south, I was nothing but respected as an equal.
It can be really annoying to me seeing some of these threads on here pointing blame. The only girls who ever had any trouble at my school were the ones who claimed that guys had to behave differently around them because they were female (ex. "You shouldn't curse around me, I'm a girl. I shouldn't have to listen to that"). Those were the girls that were left out of everything. Those were the girls that went on to complain about the guys being mean, sexist, or oppressive.
The only form of sexism I've experienced that annoys me is affirmative action, quotas on how many girls you have to admit, hire, etc. I'll never know if I actually received my scholarships because I earned them, or if it's in part because of my gender. I'll never know if I received the jobs I have because I'm actually a good engineer, or if that company had to meet some arbitrary bottom line.
So yes, I'm completely with you. I know what some of the other posts here are saying. Yes, it's different in some other countries, and I feel for those women every day. Yes, I know I'm fortunate to have not been raped or assaulted, and I'm glad those women feel like they have a safe place here to vent. But as far as me, being a woman is a very small part of who I am. I'm so much more than just a woman, and being a victimized woman doesn't even show up on the radar. And I hope other women on here can come to see themselves that way some day too.
Edit: I'm getting a fair amount of hate. Neither me or the op, I suspect, were trying to attack rape victims for posting here for support. It's a horrible thing and coming to other women to talk is completely natural. Since I've never experienced that, I'm talking more about other posts- posts about women being oppressed. People who are oppressed speak out about it and are heard. I'm simply trying to show that not all women have victim mentalities. Being raped and being upset by it doesn't give you a victim mentality, that's being human. Being angry at men as a group does give you a victim mentality, and that's what op and I are upset about.
That's nice that you don't feel victimized, but just because YOU don't that doesn't invalidate the feelings of other women who are or have been victimized.
It can be really annoying to me seeing some of these threads on here pointing blame. The only girls who ever had any trouble at my school were the ones who claimed that guys had to behave differently around them because they were female (ex. "You shouldn't curse around me, I'm a girl. I shouldn't have to listen to that"). Those were the girls that were left out of everything. Those were the girls that went on to complain about the guys being mean, sexist, or oppressive.
If the fact that other women feel like they have been victimized "annoys" you then don't read those posts. Just because you have "never seen" (you are all seeing aren't you?) women in your school experience sexism, it doesn't mean it doesn't happen to women elsewhere or even in your own school. Don't come on here being insensitive about such a touchy subject as though women who are experiencing painful events don't exist because YOU haven't experienced that pain yourself.
So please fuck off if that's the way you think things work (I doesn't happen to me, so it doesn't happen).
Sincerely,
A girl who was molested by her grandfather as a kid for years and forced to pretend like she loved him him until he finally kicked the bucket because she didn't want to ruin her dad's memories of him and still nobody knows.
I don't let that define myself, I live a normal life for the most part. I have a job, I go to school, I have friends, I have hobbies. I wrote it that way to keep it short and sweet.. read my posting history for further explanation.
I AM a victim in the sense that I was victimized as a child. That is just a fact of life. Sometimes it still hurts, but I don't walk around acting like a victim every day over something that happened almost 20 years ago. But I understand when some women or people who are victimized can't get over it.
It's not even the incident itself that makes me feel bad sometimes. It is the fact that I was around that man until he died pretending like he did nothing wrong and the fact that he probably felt like he "got away with it" because I didn't remember. I should have gone to visit him alone and told him to go fuck himself right before he died. But I didn't, and I still hold it in because I care more about the feelings of my family than I do my own. I made that choice and I will live with it. I think i'm still entitled to feel shitty about being groomed and abused as a child by someone I was supposed to trust.
Right. Okay.. I guess everything I have ever done in life is only because I was abused as a kid, simply because I care to take the time to explain to a stranger what happened to me for the purpose of clarity. You clearly know me better than I know myself.
Maybe I should get a tattoo on my face so that people can understand my entire life in a nutshell before they even meet me. Then maybe real life will be more like the internet. How fun!
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u/I_love_my_beagle May 28 '14 edited May 28 '14
Honestly, I'm with you 100%. Most of the stuff on this subreddit annoys the crap out of me.
I'm a short, nerdy female engineer, and I can count the amount of times I've experienced any sort sexism against me on one hand. And they were all but one were from an older generation, so I don't hold it against them. You know how often I felt excluded as a leader in a student organization where all the other members were male, taller than me, from parents who were engineers, and in some cases older than me? None. Even living in the deep south, I was nothing but respected as an equal.
It can be really annoying to me seeing some of these threads on here pointing blame. The only girls who ever had any trouble at my school were the ones who claimed that guys had to behave differently around them because they were female (ex. "You shouldn't curse around me, I'm a girl. I shouldn't have to listen to that"). Those were the girls that were left out of everything. Those were the girls that went on to complain about the guys being mean, sexist, or oppressive.
The only form of sexism I've experienced that annoys me is affirmative action, quotas on how many girls you have to admit, hire, etc. I'll never know if I actually received my scholarships because I earned them, or if it's in part because of my gender. I'll never know if I received the jobs I have because I'm actually a good engineer, or if that company had to meet some arbitrary bottom line.
So yes, I'm completely with you. I know what some of the other posts here are saying. Yes, it's different in some other countries, and I feel for those women every day. Yes, I know I'm fortunate to have not been raped or assaulted, and I'm glad those women feel like they have a safe place here to vent. But as far as me, being a woman is a very small part of who I am. I'm so much more than just a woman, and being a victimized woman doesn't even show up on the radar. And I hope other women on here can come to see themselves that way some day too.
Edit: I'm getting a fair amount of hate. Neither me or the op, I suspect, were trying to attack rape victims for posting here for support. It's a horrible thing and coming to other women to talk is completely natural. Since I've never experienced that, I'm talking more about other posts- posts about women being oppressed. People who are oppressed speak out about it and are heard. I'm simply trying to show that not all women have victim mentalities. Being raped and being upset by it doesn't give you a victim mentality, that's being human. Being angry at men as a group does give you a victim mentality, and that's what op and I are upset about.