Have you heard? Feminism is CRAP!

It’s totally true, ladies and gentlewomen, because some opinionated little snot on Facebook said so just yesterday.

Yep, right in time for International Women’s Day. Lovely!

Wasted a lot of good time and electricity saying so, too. But damn, she sure told us, didn’t she?

Yes, dear, I totally agree with you; feminism is crap. After all, what do you need the vote for? The Conservatives don’t respect it. You probably don’t use it. Or you use it against your own best interests and don’t even realize it.

You have the ability to read and write, and you waste it scolding people you don’t want to expend the least effort to understand, on the Internets. You have the right, as well, to wear pants, to drive a car, ride a bike, use birth control, have a career, etc.–and you take it all for granted.

If those things were taken away from you tomorrow, you’d probably miss them. Maybe you’d even protest.

And yet, you think that the social force that gave you all these things you take for granted is CRAP.

Maybe you don’t want those things so much, little sister? There are plenty of people who’d be more than happy to take them away from you if you allowed it. In fact, they are busy and working hard to do just that, even as I sit here wasting good electrons calling you out on your shit, girlfriend. They are counting on your smugness, your complacency and your stupidity to help them do exactly that. Whenever you or any other girl calls feminism crap, a devil rubs its hands and sets to work, chipping quietly away at your rights. It starts by driving a wedge between you and your feminist sisters. From there, it proceeds to rolling back hard-won gains; in the end, you will find yourself back in the kitchen and wondering how the hell you landed up there. Maybe it’s because you thought fighting for your rights was crap?

But then, I’m into crap. I like the things that crap gave me. I think we could get a lot more, too, if we were willing to fight for them. I don’t take them for granted, and I don’t think others should, either. If that makes me full of crap in your eyes, fine. You haven’t grown up and seen the real world yet. Don’t worry; you will. And you’re not gonna like it. And if you find misogyny punching you in the face, with lower wages and fewer rights than your brothers after all, and you get the urge to complain, just remember what you said: Feminism is CRAP! You opted out, and you can thank feminism for giving you that option, because life itself certainly hasn’t and won’t. So suck it up, cupcake; you’re on your own.

Unless, of course, you swallow hard and learn how to fight like a woman. That’s “crap”, sweetie? Tell it to a woman, to her face, no hiding behind the Internets. You’ll get set straight so fast you won’t know what hit you. Life itself will set you straight in due course.

This is a lot bigger than just a word or a phrase in the national anthem. We are not equal, even if you think you are. When half the population is excluded, even symbolically, it sets up a mindset: Half of us don’t really matter. Their rights don’t matter, because those rights were won by crap.

And the saddest thing is, some members of the half who don’t count vociferously defend the status quo, thinking they have everything they need already, including equality. To be told differently threatens their smug, complacent, “everything is already perfect” worldview; no wonder they jumped all over a modest, but sure-to-catch-on initiative for change. They don’t like being told the truth; they’d rather sing “la la la la la” with fingers in ears.

They want to believe we already have equality, but we don’t. The fact that we don’t is as obvious as our national anthem, and some people just don’t see it.

THAT is what’s really crap here, people.