Dear Bad Woman,
Every so often, there is a new box created for women. Different shapes, sizes, specifics to distract from the fact that a cage — diamond-studded though it may be — is still a cage. One of the things, I have learned since reading feminist lore and literature is that true feminism does not leave anyone woman behind. So, though I do agree that some of you women (we hate the b word in this house), are in fact, dumb (we have all seen the tweet), I think that you are necessary representation. For women to be truly free, we must be allowed to exist freely along all points of the human spectrum. Women must be dumb, emotional, stoic, illogical, beautiful, smart, unintelligent, funny, wicked, filthy, evil, vulgar, without consequence. We must be allowed to exist beyond the boundaries of binaries.
Pause,
I am not entirely unreasonable (I am allowed to be though). This beautiful morning, I am making a somewhat insignificant contribution to feminism by reminding you, as you sip on your poison of choice — coffee,tea,alcohol — that we should punish women when they are deserving, not because they are women and as such inherently holy, but because they have erred.
And no, you do not get to punish them because you think they may have erred by your own moral standards. For instance, cheating in a romantic relationship is a breach of trust and hurts the parties involved. Yet, it is not a punishable offence and so you do not get to suggest domestic violence, r*pe or murder, or even jail time, as punishment. It is unreasonable to expect other people to live by your personal convictions, as morally sound as you may consider them. I should clarify at this point, that I am not fighting for your (or my) right to cheat or hurt people. This is only a figurative interrogation of the hoops people jump through to empathize with those who inflict violence on women who they think have erred. There are set laws — misogynist as a lot of them are — that govern individual behavior in society and we deserve fair trial, where necessary.
I am also advocating for safe spaces (and community) for bad women, even the ones we collectively dislike. Bad women, for centuries, have shifted the needle and ensured our survival, and it is time we return the favor. Yes, that sex-worker, poor trader, housewife, homemaker, woman with a million kids, “pick-me”, “male-centered”, hyper religious woman, regular woman, deserves protection and fairness because we are all bad women. A bad woman, is any woman that a man decides is bad. Such is the nature of our reality. No one is safe from bigotry. Though some of these women pose a threat to our collective safety — pick-mes to the front — . we need communal strategies to protect ourselves and liberate them. This is not a mutually exclusive struggle.
Women continually sustain themselves in friendship and community, regardless of their societal labels. We morph, stretch and shatter these inconvenient moulds, and bear the commentary of those who want to teach us to be feminist, to be women. So if you leave my morning musings with nothing today, I hope you make a personal commitment to define for yourself, what the best you looks like, and be that person.
I want women to like what they like, as individuals, and as a collective without being restricted. It is okay (and beautiful) to be girly. Pink is not a dirty color. Put down the drab nudes and pick up some color. Orange, if you’re nasty. You deserve attention, take some! It is okay, and beautiful to age, to have distinct identifiers, to dislike things, to be obsessed with others. Stop regulating yourselves by standards you did not set. You are not an object. There is no one way to be a woman. Choose to be robust, today, or don’t. You get to choose (no, this is not a nod to choice feminism because that shit is ass. See how I cursed because I wanted to? Exactly).
Wishing you orgasmic little joys and a happy pride!
— The worst woman
P.S.
Hello Babies,
If this piece sucks, it’s because I did not edit it (scandalous, right?). There’s more pictures of me in here and I hope you catch my drift. I did enjoy writing this as a break from more serious stuff. I hope you have the best day.
Ka o di,
-Chizobam
