What IS feminism?
I realise that simply by asking that question as a man, I will be instantly accused of ‘mansplaining’ by hordes of enraged women.
But just as I occasionally comment on the weather without ever having been to the Sun, I see no reason why I should not also be permitted to express an opinion about this subject given its relevance and prevalence in modern society.
My fresh interest was sparked by Emily Ratajkowski, the American model and actress.
The reason Emily Ratajkowski made the video had nothing to do with ‘feminist empowerment’ and everything to do with attention-seeking and marketing her naked beauty.
If you look up ‘feminism’ in the dictionary, it is defined: ‘the advocacy of women’s rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes.’ How exactly does writhing naked in spaghetti fit in with this ideal? What does it have to do with equality? A man would be mocked for a similar stunt
What man would not be instantly mocked and ridiculed if he pulled a similar stunt?
The answer to these questions is obviously ‘it doesn’t’, ‘nothing’ and ‘no man.’
Ms Ratajkowski has form for this kind of thing.
Her ruthlessly cynical modus operandi follows a rigidly familiar pattern:
She poses for deeply provocative semi-naked images, posts them on social media to tens of millions of people, says she’s doing it to promote feminist empowerment, and then screams ‘SEXIST!’ if men like me dare to suggest this is ludicrous.
The most infamous example of this came when Kim Kardashian posted a naked photo of herself two years ago and played the feminist empowerment card.
After I harangued her for it, Ratajkowski tweeted: ‘Love when a man comments on a decision to post a nude photo. Her body, her career. Sexist bullsh*t.’
She then posed together with Kardashian for a bird-flipping topless selfie – once again depicting it as a supposed show of feminist empowerment.
But to whom, exactly, was it empowering?
To my eyes, all it did was send a warped, dangerous message to millions of impressionable young girls that the only way to succeed in life is to strip off and shamelessly sell your naked body to the world.
That’s a word for that kind of behaviour and it’s not feminism.
The fight for gender equality, as with the fight for racial equality, has been a long and brutal one.
Emmeline Pankhurst and her suffragettes literally risked their lives and liberty to wage a relentless and often violent struggle for it.
In 1913, one of them, Emily Davison, was killed when she threw herself under the King’s horse at the Derby as a protest against the government’s continued failure to grant women voting rights.
Just before Pankhurst died in 1928, women were finally given the vote.
She won her fight, and by doing so, she landed a massively powerful blow for women’s equality.
I always think of her whenever I see the likes of Ratajkowski or Kardashian posting naked photos and claiming they are doing it for feminist empowerment, and I’m not the only one.
‘It is rather disingenuous of Kim Kardashian and Emily Ratajkowski to say they are doing this in the name of ‘liberation’, said Pankhurst’s great-granddaughter Helen Pankhurst in a newspaper column. ‘The fact is they are conventionally beautiful women who have created a sexy image of themselves as naked. Would they be sharing all in the name of liberation if they had average bodies and carried a little extra weight? It could be argued that they are contributing to sexual objectification – the very opposite of ‘liberation’. And this is a problem for the millions of women, especially teenage girls across the world who are routinely made to feel their worth measured in terms of their sexual attractiveness and more dangerous still, in direct proportion to how much they weigh. How many people are held back by low self-esteem, eating disorders, exercise and even self-harm as a result of worship of unobtainable standards of beauty? And the saddest thing is that they are unobtainable; in most cases, they are literally not real. Photoshop is a big part of the problem.’
Exactly.
We all saw – to her horror - what Kim Kardashian really looks like naked when those uncensored beach snaps emerged earlier this year.
Her brand, like Ratajkowski’s, is just a photo-shopped illusion.
And it’s such a dangerous distracting illusion at a time when the fight for women’s rights has never been more vital.
As Helen Pankhurst added: ‘Women represent two-thirds of those who cannot read and write; less than one in five landholders are women; one in three women worldwide are exposed to physical or sexual violence from a partner in their lifetime; globally, women earn 24% less than men and on average, women spend twice as much time on household chores than men and four times as much time on childcare.’
She concluded: ‘We still do not live in a world where women and men can have the same aspirations and the same opportunities. There are millions of feminists – women and men – for whom the term still has a meaning and purpose. Feminism is both alive and urgent.’
Yes, it is.
I consider myself a feminist and I passionately believe in the principle of gender equality.
If there’s a protest march for that, then count me in.
But I’m never going to march for Emily Ratajkowski’s right to strip naked in spaghetti – and nor should any genuine feminist
By Piers Morgan. This article has been amended from its original source.
