Lesson #13

The truth about sexism is that it does exist. It may be diminishing with time, but it still finds ways to creep into our lives. Now I don't want to think of this as starting an argument, but as many problems as men may understand— this is not one of them. Even I cannot begin to understand what it must be like to have society waive my right to vote because they do not believe that I am equipped for such a task.

When this country was born, men were given the birthright to vote— this was something that women had to fight for. Women were rarely given the opportunity to work, until WWII when there were not enough men home to work. It is important to acknowledge that these rights are not something that were handed to a women, they were not something that she could call her own. This is why I believe that it is hard for men to understand. They were never given the oppressive message that they were undeserving to have such liberties. Men have never once had to give a reason as to why they would prefer to find a job rather than clean up after the children. I believe that instead of becoming defensive about such a topic, it is important to understand that the message behind it is not malevolent, but rather explanatory.

When reading "Letters" between John and Abigail Adams, it is sad to say that Abigail was forced to argue with her own husband that she should have rights. Women were not given the right to vote, as they preached for equality, and protested the hypocrisy. She requested that men "give up the harsh title of master" so that the minds of capable women could finally be heard. It was those who were born with their rights handed to them on a silver platter that were reluctant to extend the same liberties to others. Abigail was required to prove to her husband that she was deserving, because a women's wit and intelligence is something that society questions.

I personally can't think of many times where men had to prove to women that they were deserving of the rights we were deprived of. I think this is one of the instances where you really cannot understand unless you were to walk a mile in the shoes of a women.; because in that case, I would like to go back in time and ask a man why he would deserve the right to vote over his wife. I would like to ask the employers that pay women less why a males work is more valued than a females?

There are some choices that really baffle me, but the one that feels most present at this moment is why no man stood up for his wife. Why did no brother stand up for his sister? Why did no father stand up for his daughter? Was there some type of disease that made women look comparingly less worthy? I cannot seem to fathom why the role of a women was cast the way it was. I look around me today and I see a world of women who are doing amazing things, and women who are changing this planet for the better; and this just makes me ask: how much better would this world be if society had realized the importance of equality?

Lesson #13: The rights of one should be the rights of all.

Lesson #12

The date today is February 10th, 2019; I marked today with this date because it is different from any other day that will ever happen again. I think that is the part that we forget about labels, because we often tend to focus on only the negative ones— yet there are so many that can be positive. Our tendency to feel judged by people’s comments, doesn’t allow us to see the beauty that comes from these marks.

Now don’t get me wrong, I know what it feels like to be negatively judged. It is incredibly insulting for people to assume that I am in regular classes, or that I may not care about my grades. I once had a math teacher tell me that I should not be in honors math, before he had even seen me take a test. But as much as I wish that this judgement could be minimized, I don’t think I would choose to take away the labels that surround us. One of the comments Deborah Tannen makes in “There is No Unmarked Woman” is “there is no women’s hairstyle that can be called standard” (554). Take the word “standard”, how does being standard sound more desirable than being different? I believe that women are blessed with our inability to be like everyone else. Yet Tannen chooses to make standard sound like a wonderful thing. I label everybody around me, but those labels are not inherently negative. Take my best friend as an example, I would label her as incredibly smart, charismatic, and compassionate; this is what makes her who she is— yet because I am describing her, I am marking her. These are the marks that Tannen was forgetting. We are all characters, and our life is us writing our storybook; and in my story I am perfectly happy to be labeled, even if I don’t always appreciate the labels I receive. I personally don’t believe that being marked is a bad thing. My math teacher may not have been right to label me as incapable of taking an honors class, but he did make me want to work harder to prove him wrong. The people who assumed I don’t care about school may have underestimated me, but that didn’t suddenly make me deem myself to dim-witted. The beauty with labels is that they are not permanent nor are they limiting. I am marked differently by different people. I am marked as a daughter, a girlfriend, a best friend— which are markings I am blessed to carry. We can choose to look at these labels as scars or beauty marks. No two people carry the same markings, and for that I conclude by saying that I would rather carry marks for everything, rather than losing all of the meaning that they carry. So next time you wish you could rid yourself of marks, I urge you to think about who you would be without a single marking.

Lesson #12: Who would we be without the markings we have?