This offensive--and offensively stupid--question was trending on Twitter the other day along with #SusanSarandon & #JKRowling, two women who regularly get piled on for daring to speak out of turn against the two biggest cults in this nation: the DNC and the trans cult. Yes, "What is a Woman?" is a question we're seriously debating in 2022 as national abortion rights are on the line, mass shootings are rampant, monkeypox is spreading and hepatitis of unknown origin is killing & sickening kids all over the world. Funny how nobody ever asks 'What is a Man?' but then, why would they? It's not men's sports, prisons, bathrooms & changing rooms that are being colonized by the opposite sex in a manner that renders their sports records & training inadequate & puts their safety at risk. Men don't have any real skin in this game and it's not their identity that's being questioned.
Let me start by explaining what "woman" is not. It is not a costume, a fetish or a trendy label anyone can slap on & demand others refer to them as. Women aren't avatars in some imaginary video game or simulation. We're not shallow fashion icons whose lives revolve around looking sexy, playing dumb & seeking the affection of men. We're not catty gossips who backbite & act like the Real Housewives. We're not space cadets who think with our hearts instead of our brains & exist to serve as walking fuckholes for men to ogle & catcall. We're not defined by cosmetics, dresses, high heels & other hyper-feminine constructs forced onto us by the patriarchy. Many of us shun those things altogether & are no less female for it.
Most importantly, "woman" is not a category one can identify into or out of at will any more than are "Asian," "disabled," "little person" or "gay". These things are known as immutable traits--you don't choose them & can't change them. Being a woman comes with a whole host of health, safety & social consequences that I'll get into below. (And for those who want to to play semantics with the imaginary distinction-without-a-difference between 'sex' and 'gender': don't try it. What you call "gender" has been known as personality until the last 15 or so years. Of all the things "woman" is not, a FEELING tops that list).
(P.S. - I write this with the disclaimer of #notallmen, though if the shoe fits you can wear that bitch).
Women's Healthcare (or Lack Thereof)
Being a woman comes with so many unique health challenges I could write a book on the subject. These health problems are unique to women (with the exception of breast cancer & autoimmune disease, though these diseases affect women at such disproportional rates I've included them here for obvious reasons). Endometriosis, the
dangers of childbirth,
80% of autoimmune diseases, cancers of the breast, endometrium, ovary, uterus & cervix; PCOS, post-partum depression/psychosis; recurring urinary tract infections, osteoporosis, the misery of menopause & the
extreme changes the body goes through during pregnancy are just
some of the afflictions a woman may face during her life simply by virtue of being born female. For those unfamiliar with autoimmune diseases, they include over 80 fun chronic conditions like multiple sclerosis, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis & Guillain-Barre Syndrome, some of which can be fatal.
Doctors are less likely to take a woman's symptoms seriously than a man's and even if they do, there are no cures or suitable treatments for most of these conditions. The average time between first symptoms & diagnosis of endometriosis is 11 years. The
average time. Nobody knows what causes it & the treatments are often worse than the disease itself. It affects one in every 10 women. Imagine if a similar disease caused unbearable pain & infertility in men at that rate. The kicker is that
the vast majority of medical trials are conducted on men because women's menstrual cycles are considered an "unpredictability variable" which means most of the drugs in use today go to market with an unknown effect on half the human population. Us.
Social Inequality
In the United States, freest country on Earth,
women were not guaranteed equal rights to obtain a credit card, serve on a jury, get an Ivy League education at some colleges, decline sexual advances from their husband, take legal action against sexual harassment in the workplace or take birth control until the mid-1970s. And it wasn't until 2013 that we were allowed to serve on the front lines of the military and 2010 when we stopped paying more than men for health insurance. Women couldn't vote or take part in our democracy until the suffrage movement of the 1920's, and we still make 70-to-
83 cents to a man's dollar depending on where you live (in Boston it was 70 cents). We've been fighting for the fundamental right to control our reproductive organs & not be forced by the government to loan our wombs out to an unwanted fetus, risking our lives & ruining our bodies in the process, for the last century. Those of us who do have babies are guaranteed no maternity leave which means no time to breastfeed or form a bond with our babies. And good luck affording day care. Those who don't breed are forced to go to work & school while in agony every month during our periods.
In the 244 years this country has existed, we've never had a female president. On an individual level, the household labor is still divided unfairly for many heterosexual couples with the woman doing the bulk of the cooking, cleaning, organizing & caring for/disciplining the children while the man's work ends when he clocks out of his job. She remembers all the birthdays & holidays, preparing gifts & planning parties while he enjoys the Kodak moments & buys his free time with her labor. On a social level, women take on the bulk of the "helping" jobs such as teaching, nursing, daycare & social work which are among the most physically & emotionally taxing and get very little thanks or recognition (not to mention insulting pay & grueling hours--see the pay gap link above).
Of course none of that compares to how bad women in other parts of the world have it. In some African & Nepalese regions, women are shoved into menstrual huts and seen as "unclean" during their periods, banned from interacting with the outside world. They often succumb to the elements, snake bite, dehydration or other hideous causes of death. Female genital mutilation--the removal of the entire clitoris & external genitalia with an instrument like a razor or scissors, glass, sharpened rocks, or fingernails--is common in at least 30 countries affecting 200 million women & girls. In Afghanistan, the Taliban prevents women from mixing with men in public & forces them to cover their entire bodies from head to toe with hot Burqas in the desert. School & careers are pipe dreams for these girls. In Saudi Arabia, one of the wealthiest nations on Earth due to their vast oil supply, women were not allowed to drive cars until 2018 and must sit at the back of public transit when allowed to use it at all. In Saudi court, the testimony of one man equals that of two women. Not figuratively but literally. (At least they said the quiet part out loud).
They can't identify out of this oppression because their oppression is sex-based. Gender is a Western fantasy.
Violence Against Women
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| Domestic violence survivor Nurbanu who was forced to remarry the man who threw acid in her face |
In all parts of the world, women are the victims of horrific violence at the hands of men every single hour of every single day. The majority of this violence is committed by intimate partners or other men close to the woman (her father, brother, uncle, etc). But we also have to be on constant alert for strangers on the streets, in the bushes, in dark alleys & new neighborhoods. We can't leave drinks unattended & must always watch the ratio of men to women at parties & make sure we have a route of escape should one or all of them go feral on us.
Gang rape happens with regularity & is treated like a sport by males of the human species. When literally half the human population outmatches you in size & strength, you go through life in a state of hypervigilance. This is something men can only understand on an intellectual level at best. The old quote about what men and women fear most about going on a blind date with the opposite sex still rings true: For men, the biggest fear is "that she'll laugh at me." For women, it's "that he'll kill me."
And it's a valid fear. 1 in 3 women globally will experience domestic violence in her life. That means a person who's bigger and stronger than her is physically assaulting her. This is no better than an adult beating up a child or a fit 20-something assaulting an elderly person. Using your physical strength to impose your will on someone is repugnant no matter the circumstance. It makes you a bully and a coward. Using that energy to fight up the chain against your boss, the lying city mayor or whoever is actually making your life hell is what a real man would do. But punching down--literally--is what abusers do.
The very fact that we categorize "domestic abuse" as somehow different than any other type of assault is very telling. It implies that women are property of their partners, that it's a private "domestic" matter & that assaulting a stranger or another man in the street is somehow worse. This couldn't be further from the truth, especially since so-called domestic abuse often ends in the victim getting maimed or losing her life. It's no better in other parts of the world. Honor killings are tolerated in many Middle Eastern countries, though there's nothing honorable about them, and Russia recently decriminalized domestic violence.
Some men kill women out of a twisted sexual desire to watch their victims suffer. Sadistic sexual killers fall into this category (think Ed Gein, Ted Bundy & Ed Kemper). While their victims aren't always women, around 99% of these killers is male with the remainder being women recruited by male lovers with this fetish (Cindy Hendy, Rosemary West). Many non-murderous rapists get off on the power/dominance aspect of the act as well. The lack of consent or outright terror of their victims is the goal. Look at Bill Cosby's M.O: a wealthy, famous funny man who could've had any woman he wanted chose instead to drug 60+ women and rape their unconscious bodies violently, then throw them out of his room when they woke up. This is typical of rapists who view women as objects to be used & discarded.
Our justice system's punishment of all forms of violence against women & children is woefully, insultingly inadequate. Rapists like Brock Turner & the DuPont heir Robert Richards IV, who was convicted of raping his 3-year-old daughter & served 0 days in prison, routinely get a slap on the wrist while domestic abusers skip prison altogether in lieu of "anger management" classes. Women & children are viewed as property of men to be abused as men see fit and this is reflected in every single weak verdict against every violent male rapist, child molester, wife batterer, sexual harasser, pimp & killer who passes through our courts. It happens so often one has to wonder if the laws weren't written that way because the lawmakers themselves are violent misogynistic perverts & pedophile sympathizers.
Human Trafficking, aka "Sex Work"
No article on women would be complete without discussion of prostitution/sex trafficking, now cleverly rebranded as "sex work". This form of exploitation is as old as time but has seen a transformation in recent years with the advent of 3rd wave feminism. It's now painted as empowering and "real work" rather than the oppressive degradation it is. While a handful of cam models & work-from-home feet pic dealers may see no issue with the industry, they're a vocal minority & don't represent the vast majority of actual sex workers worldwide. The reality of the sex trade is very different to this rosy version.
Most "sex workers" get into the business at an average age of 12.5, were sexually abused as children, are runaways, have pimps & have been raped or beaten at least once (and usually many, many times) while in "the life". Drug addiction is a common theme for these women as a means of numbing themselves to the pain of their everyday surroundings. Families in countries like Cambodia, India & Pakistan openly sell their daughters to sex traffickers for a small fee never to see them again. Even if fully legalized and regulated, you can never completely eliminate the pimps from the equation as they can always lurk in the background of a woman's life, coercing or brutally forcing her to bring home money via prostitution. Contrary to pop culture's depiction of the pimp as a clownish Black dude with a pimp cup & feathers in his cap, the typical pimp looks more like a lazy boyfriend who "sweetly" nudges his girlfriend into selling her body so he can avoid actual employment. Meaning you wouldn't know him if you passed him in the street.
And why are women prone to become victims of sex traffickers? Simple: Because there's a demand for it. For women and girls specifically. A category you can't identify into or out of. Slapping a 'they/them' pronoun on a victim of a brutal pimp who has just been gang raped is not going to save her from further brutalization, nor is a man calling himself 'she/her' going to suddenly make him desirable to strip club owners, pimps & porn producers looking for actual women to sell to a salivating hoarde of heterosexual sex-buying men. Interestingly, men seem to have no problem identifying who's a woman when it comes to porn preferences. The only time Reddit allows "cis women only" specifications is in their porn subreddits; otherwise your forum will get shut down for attempting to limit admission to biological females. This happened to /r/TrueLesbians & others.
And that's how the world works, catering to the heterosexual male gaze while denying the humanity of actual women. "Woman" has become an abstract concept; "lesbian" a mere porn category. Lost in all this is the suffering & oppression of girls & women worldwide. 50% of the human population is being stomped on by narcissistic, perverse men who view us as private property (conservatives) or public property (liberals). But neither side views us as fully-autonomous humans with full & equal human rights, including the right to reject men completely if we so choose. They may pay lip service to our liberation but when we try to claim our god-given human rights, they threaten us with oppressive laws backed by the brute force of jack-booted police, militaries & their individual physical strength. We're physically outmatched & that's how they've kept us oppressed since the dawn of time.
Oppression By Any Other Name
One needn't belong to a minority group to be oppressed despite the mantra of the trans rights movement (a vocal minority within a minority). A man in a dress is still a man capable of overpowering, beating, raping, impregnating against her will & murdering a woman regardless of how he "feels" inside. Biology is where the rubber meets the road. If you haven't been socialized as a woman or been tethered to the biological weight of womanhood your entire life, faced the constant threat of violence from men or been treated as a lesser being with approximately half the rights & autonomy of a man, you have no right to claim womanhood or to even ask such a ridiculous question as "what is a woman?" (Obvious stupidity of the question itself aside).
Often this question is asked as a litmus test to separate the cool from the uncool... As in: "Only decrepit dinosaur BOOMERS think men have penises and women have vaginas!" That might win you imaginary internet points but won't help when your human rights are stripped & you find yourself living in a 1950s hellscape without the right to abortion but with the added burden of predatory men in your changing rooms, bathrooms, prisons, domestic violence shelters & women's sports. Among other things. Those were the fears that prevented the ERA from being passed in the 1970s, by the way. So now we have no Equal Rights Amendment AND males smashing in our skulls in the MMA ring. And a good chunk of the population is cheering it on.
If you read this article and came away with the opinion that "women in the West have it so good compared to other parts of the world," congrats on missing the point. The point being that women's oppression is universal and based in biology, not "gender identity". We didn't choose it and can't change it. Also: Any oppression or inequality is too much. Human rights are innate, not granted by government overlords. While men in America cry about their rights to their tools of rage--semi-automatic AR15's, AK-47's and other war weapons used in 50+ of the most deadly mass shootings this nation has ever seen--women fight just to maintain control over our own bodies & reproductive autonomy. And now we're fighting liberals on the transgender front just to maintain our few safe spaces in public, a reminder that neither party gives one iota of a damn about us.
Welcome to political homelessness, ladies.
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