Smashing, patriarchy!
Somewhere in our conversation about rights, especially intersectional feminism, we got cozy. We put the kettle on, sat down for a brew, and decided things were smashing. Patriarchy, however, continued at an untrammelled pace, the global rights of women restricted like a frog in ever hotter water. There are many who would disagree with this assessment, that the tea cups were most surely smashed on the pavement and turned into raging daggers. That each brew supped was in solidarity for the cause, and that their quiet work rewired the system to uplift the oppressed. That each woman does what she can in the face of oppression.
Yet, the patriarchal modes of operating are still a knee on the necks of all women. The quiet work is essential, necessary to help uplift the oppressed and vulnerable, for power must be shared; yet as Covid-19 ravages nations it is the poor, often people and women of colour, who die first. It is those at the margins of life that cannot shelter in place without starving, it is the women who clean houses, drive buses, make your clothes, do all the hidden jobs that make our lives comfortable. Their risks are ours mitigated.
Women, such a broad and diverse sisterhood, cut across all spectrums of life. Our lives lived experience the soaring hights and the most depraved lows. No one of us is the same, no one of us can speak for another. Yet, to break through the reinforced lead glass ceiling takes more than just cups of tea and howling into the wind. Rage. Rage at injustice, directed and focused. Rage at the needless sacrifice of women to the scourges of poverty, mis-education and wilful suppression of our rights. All the quiet work is solid foundation for this rage, for it allows us to raise up a towering inferno that should ignite the world.
From the queer woman supporting and counselling those too scared to step out of the closet, to trans women making strides in public officer, to first generation immigrant women bursting into parliaments and congresses; each in their own way does the quiet work. Each sets us all up to speak, not as lone wolves snarling at the predator, but as the pack. We are all unique, but together we must uplift and break down the oppression that stifles our voices. There are many that scoff, saying that we already have rights, that we should be grateful, that we will get there in the end. Of course we will get there in the end, but that end should not be in a hundred years time. Not fifty. Not twenty. It needs to happen in this time of flux when all things seem possible.
Smash the tea cups, use the net curtains as banners, turn floral patterns into camo. We are the generation of all ages that must unite to effect real, meaningful change. Brianna Taylor et al died because the system saw their lives as less. Migrants drown in the oceans because we see them as unter menschen. Care workers sicken and die from Covid-19 because we value handing PPE contracts to minster’s mates over effective protection. Our rage is redirected as the governments blame ‘others’ for our woes, pointing to the latest shiny issue as if we are magpies led by the nose. It is easy to sit and chat and sup our tea rather than rage. While our fellow women die, we are distracted.
This is not to lessen the plight of men trapped in similar circumstances, for their lives are just as dire. In raising up women through female empowerment we raise their lives up too. Intersectional feminism is never just about women’s lives, for equal rights for all is equal rights for men, women, and gender queer folk. Our equality and equity is not taking a slice of rights from anyone else; rather, we widen rights like a river runs into a lake. Dam the river and the lake shrinks. Open the flood gates and rights quench the parched land. Our rage, our female empowered rage, smashes through this dam holding back all rights to all folks. It uplifts and empowers the many, not the few.
Smashing, breaking, raging. Such unfeminine words, because people fear that when women rage our fury will burn down the world. Our place is where we choose; be it the kitchen, the classroom, the boardroom, the battlefield, the operating theatre. Our biology does not decide our fate. Our skin colour does not dictate our path in life. Who we love and fuck is no-bodies business but our own. Our lives are intersectional in ways that defy easy labels. Mine is as many verbs and nouns as you so wish, much as yours is; it is important to appreciate and understand that, yet the singular most important thing to remember is that we, women, must uplift all other women into power and dignity.
Tea is one of the marvels of British life; a calm aid to sooth the battered soul. Mugs, tea cups, ready-to-go; we sup and we digest the day. On reading this, think about what rights you have, what actions you take, what your approach to life is. Do the small things to life up others, do the quiet actions that make life equitable and joyous. You can only ever do so much, yet you need rage to fuel change. Your voice really does matter, both through the ballot box and what you say. Yours is the hope to bring about meaningful change, yours is the ability to be the pebble the brings about the avalanche. Patriarchy binds women and men into iniquity, holding us all down. By fuelling your small and quiet actions with rage we can affect real change that uplifts us all.
You may feel small and without anything meaningful to say, but a letter, a vote, a conversation, a protest can influence one person, and then the next. It is not on the shoulders of one person to make a movement, it is on us all to move forward into equity. Direct your rage, focus it, coral others with your embers. The first scratch of pen or message on social media is the hardest. Your stone will gather momentum, crashing through the barriers. And yes, a quiet cup of tea and conversation can set the world to rights, but smashing that tea cup and making your voice heard together with mine will move us closer to making society more equitable.
