Feminism vs Hypocrisy

Mark Ruffalo has recently come out swinging at the “I am not a feminist,” movement and until I read that, I had no idea that such a thing existed. In order to understand the situation a little better, I looked up the tumblr page dedicated to women against feminism. I sit here now reading posts by women everywhere listing reasons why they don’t need feminism. Overall I have found that these women have no idea feminism really is. 

I’ve had multiple conversations with other women who are afraid to call themselves feminist because of this stigma that it is a dirty word used by men-hating women. People seem to think that feminism now consists of women who want special treatment. 

I will admit that I’ve met people who claim to be feminist and use it as leverage to complain about their misfortunes and pull the gender card whenever possible. These women do not understand what feminism is. Feminism is about equality. It’s not about getting special treatment. It’s not about oppressing men. These women who claim they don’t need feminism are so caught up in this horrifyingly trendy fad that they don’t understand that without feminism their lives would be extraordinarily different. 

One woman wrote that she feels she doesn’t need equality because it already exists. I understand that not everyone in the world will feel the effects of inequality, but that doesn’t mean it’s made up. Personally, I am disgusted by this ignorant movement. Their ignorance is not an opinion, it is a fact. Inequality is not imaginary, it’s something that women deal with every single day, it’s something I’ve witnessed and experienced, and women who are actively fighting their pursuit of equality should be countered. Something I hope everyone who thinks that feminism is a dirty word takes away from this is that there is a difference between hypocrites and feminists. 

True feminism is about equality, and that is something that does not exist yet. Of course there are people who take it too far, but extremists exist everywhere and an entire movement towards better treatment of people should not be tarnished because of a few people who crossed a line. Sound familiar?