“We teach girls to shrink themselves, to make themselves
smaller. We say to girls ‘you can have ambition but not too much. You should
aim to be successful but not too successful, otherwise you will threaten the
man’.” These words from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie are a proven example from the
famous song “Flawless” by Beyoncé clearly reflecting that oppression is still
an extremely prevalent issue in Today’s society. Marilyn Frye expresses her
agreement with this issue in her article “Oppression” which our class read on
September 17th. In her
article, she discusses how the definition of oppression is recently being
stretched, therefore making it less meaningful. There is this common
misconception causing oppression to literally “press” human experience into
distinct men vs. women groups, however, this is completely unacceptable to me.
It’s believed that sensitivity is one of the characteristics assigned to the
women population as a whole and if we are, in fact, found to be insensitive,
then we may not be considered real women.
I personally do not agree with this at all and am appalled that this has
been such a widespread belief for such a long time. Through my experiences, I am in fact not
anything like the typical women. I do not share majority of these
characteristics that our population believes all females must posses and that
is why this generalized idea of the perfect women is so bizarre. No one should
be pressed into something they are not, which is why this belief can go on no
longer. I strongly and confidently agree with Beyoncé’s song lyrics and Frye’s
impression of today’s misunderstanding of what the world should be like in
relation to what we realistically are.
I believe Emma is correct in saying that the world has a skewed view on the characteristics that the different gender roles are expected to possess. The new age view and misunderstanding of the definition of "oppression" has caused a split in the population of today's society. For example, Marilyn Frye describes how fine the line between "slut" and "prude" has become in her article “Oppression”. She talks about how if a young female does not partake in sexual activities she can be ridiculed for being a prude, but if the same female were to "put out" she will be labeled as a "slut or a "whore". When referring to this issue it is a slippery slope to use the term “oppression” to describe it because it diminishes the scope of the problem. “Oppression” denotes a sense of form of extreme conditions which makes partakers in this discussion choose a side when there is are no sides in this situation. This is a serious matter and the term is almost creating an unintentional language barrier. I believe that the terms need to be explained when referring to this particular case so that people do not have a misunderstanding on the reason of the importance for this issue to be discussed. All young adults all impressionable and judgement passed on by the entire society can have a huge negative impact on the growth and development of these individuals and that is the real reason for this issue’s need to be brought to light.
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