Sexist Messages Evolving the Female Perspective

“Clearly we have sent these messages with such alarming regularity and consistency we have encouraged you to willingly run toward something violent and terrible with your eyes and arms wide open.”

I found this quote from “Dear Young Ladies Who Love Chris Brown So Much They Would Let Him Beat Them” by Gay to be heavy in meaning when taken out of the context of celebrity abuse and analyzed with a broader scope. Gay in writing this piece is making a clear stance regarding this specific topic under the umbrella of oppression that women endure in today’s society, although, this quote is applicable to the entire umbrella. There are a number of different messages that we send our young girls that lead to such a mentality regarding oneself- as a warped perspective on oneself and their gender as a whole is the only way in which a woman would happily run head-on into a danger zone that they are well-aware exists. At the root of these messages is an issue of trying to teach our girls how not to be prey and blaming them when they fail, rather than trying to teach our boys how not to be predators and holding them accountable for their actions.   

            Today, we have young girls being told that their shoulders are too distracting to their male counterparts in a school setting. So, rather than teach our generation of young men to abstain from sexualizing their female peers, we send our girls to the principal to be dealt with. In this same motion, we are telling these young women that their education is of less importance than that of the boys, as they are forced to miss class, waiting to be disciplined and brought something more modest to wear. We tell them that name-calling, touching, and stealing kisses is the way that boys flirt and imply that they ought to feel special, because the boy likes them. As these girls become women, the same messages are repeated: “don’t wear clothes that are asking for attention if you do not want the attention,” “harassment is a form of compliment that should be accepted with a smile and gratitude,” “your male colleague deserved the promotion more so than you, because he’s more equipped, etc.” 

Now we are faced with generations of women that possess this mentality to some degree. For example, women who do not believe in these messages are still capable of questioning whether or not they were to blame for their attack. If they are certain that they weren’t, they meet new doubts in their own perspective of what transpired when they’re labeled a liar or have their case meet no justice. In a society that insists that you’re being dramatic each time you speak out about a wrong that you’ve fallen victim to, it is no surprise the number of girls that reframe their perspective, accept blame, accept inferiority. It should not be a shock that these young girls grow into women that believe they are lucky if all their man does is “X” because it could be worse: being with their one predator in the safety of their own home, some feel that they are protected from the sea of predators that still remain beyond those walls, and so, they run straight ahead into their refuge that is not a refuge at all.