18 Weeks and Confused

I don’t label myself as a feminist, because I am not actively involved in any sort of activism pertaining to the movement, which has seen serious movements throughout the last century and especially during the post-war era. I like to call myself, however, a sort of feminist sympathizer. Indeed, the “feminist perspective” can be applied to anything, including academic disciplines in the social sciences such as sociology (where it is one of the more minor perspectives of research). Women are regarded as having more aesthetic talent and language ability (right-brained) of their left-brained, male counterparts; they are holders of “women’s intuition.” All jargon aside...

...There is an ongoing trend on Facebook that seeks to raise awareness for female-exclusive or female-predominant illnesses such as ovarian and breast cancer. With a feminist tinge, a woman is supposed to post a status update that corresponds to a set of esoteric instructions that in no way allude to any form of cancer, feminist ideology, or activist message – it’s simply fun and games, like most socialization on Facebook.

There is a sort of ulterior motive in the whole ordeal, which has included posting statuses about bra color, underwear color, fruits, purse placement, and most recently, length of faux pregnancy and craving corresponding to your birthday. To be objective, a status about the location of a women’s purse preceded by a provocative “I like it on the...” does nothing to raise awareness for any form of cancer or even gender equality itself. Instead, it drives men crazy and perpetuates sexism against men in a way – by making them clueless and uninformed about raising awareness for a serious problem and finding a solution to it. Women seem to find some sort of perverse satisfaction in leaving men in the dark, and it’s wrong, no matter which gender this is directed towards.

If women are going to eschew half the world’s population to raise awareness on a contemporary health issue, then there better be more masculinists in the world to defend the rights of men to be informed. Cures do not come from sensationalism on social networks, but from research funding. Why don’t we – as men and women – we fix our education system to create more competent scientists before we herald what we may crave on a given week of pregnancy? It doesn’t take women’s intuition to figure this one out.

SAT Vocabulary:

1. Aesthetic – adj. artistic, related to the appreciation of beauty
2. Intuition – n. Instinctive knowledge or feeling.
3. Jargon – n. Confused, unintelligible speech or highly technical speech
4. Esoteric –  (adj.) understood by only a select few
5. Allude – v. To refer incidentally, or by suggestion.
6. Ulterior – adj. Not so pertinent as something else to the matter spoken of
7. Faux – adj. fake
8. Perpetuate – v. To preserve from extinction or oblivion.
9. Perverse - adj. Unreasonable.
10. Eschew – v. to avoid
11. Competent – adj. qualified