by anja eriud in Thinking Out Loud Tags: Self worth, Women

Women – not just feminists – though for the purposes of this essay we’ll get back to that “extra-special” category of women known as feminists a bit further down – where was I?

Ah yes, women, spend an awful lot of time thinking about, talking about, and writing about what they deserve. Great jobs or “careers” as we must now call them – job is just so pedestrian, great homes, great clothes, great bodies, and on and on and on – all these great things, that women believe, not feel, but believe they deserve.

There are some other things that an awful lot of women believe they deserve – great husbands or partners, and children, but not just any type of child or children, great children, whenever they decide to have them and at a time that suits them.

The last category of things that women believe they deserve, are respect, consideration, loyalty, and universal endorsement for anything they do.

Now if I was writing this for a woman’s magazine or website dedicated to all things females my readers would be nodding their heads, perhaps being overcome with a bit of emotion, or if there were more than two or three of them, the remarks would be something like this; –

“Oh, that is soooooooo true, every word of that just says perfectly what every woman deserves, she really really understands what women are about – we do, we really DO deserve all those things.”

There might even then ensue a discussion about how short-changed our putative reader and her gal pals are, how life is soooooooooooo unfair, how they weep into their pillows at night, about how the things that they deserve are just not manifesting themselves. On schedule.

Let’s just call our imaginary gal pals Susie, Megan and Lauren, shall we?

On one level, Susie, Megan and Lauren would be right, that women believe they deserve all of things I mentioned; they genuinely believe that they deserve EVERYTHING on the list.

But, they would be WRONG – they don’t – deserve ANYTHING on that list, they could work for them, strive for them, even in some instances make themselves worthy to have some of those things, but they absolutely do NOT deserve any of them.

Shocking isn’t it? Well Susie, Megan and Lauren are shocked now, aghast, maybe even getting a bit snarky, a tad grouchy – they are looking at one another, wide eyed, puzzled and getting ready to get the claws out and bitch slap me back into line. If I was standing in front of them they’d be scanning me for flaws, for weaknesses, for something that they could use as a weapon to hurt me with, undermine my sense of “self-worth” and shake my confidence in myself – AS A WOMAN!

Am I a bit overweight? Nope – not really, and anyway I don’t care. Am I, what my mother diplomatically used to call “a bit plain”? Apparently not, according to independent sources – and nope, again I don’t care. Am I childless? Nope. Unloved? Nope. Touchy about some aspect of my physical appearance at all? Nope.

You may have noticed that all of the examples I gave as potential weapons were based on some external factor, apart from the “childless” one, though unless I can claim several miraculous conceptions then I obviously didn’t achieve that on my own.

Susie, Megan and Lauren met in college, and became fast friends – of the “friends forever” type.

Susie eventually ended up as an administrative assistant to some higher level executive in some vast multinational company, one of many higher level executives in this monolithic company. She dated Brad in college and when they both graduated, they got married about 2 years after college, they both come from traditional families, and getting married has always been one of Susie’s life goals. No kids, yet, because they’re building their careers. They’re going to start trying next year, when Susie is 30 – it’s the last item on the Life Goals list. Susie’s. Life. Goals. List.

Megan, works for a Women’s Charity – that helps women start their own business, not married, not dating anyone, thinking about getting herself some of that donor sperm next year – when she’s 30, before it’s too late, and IVF is so expensive.

Lauren is the high achiever – works in a small but prestigious law firm, mostly real estate and wills, has her eye on a corner office, gives talks at her feminist group “Empowering Women with the Law” – belongs to another feminist group that does pro bono (she got that out of her law firm by threatening to sue them) for women accused of assaulting their husbands or partners, and women accused of neglecting or abusing their kids. Not interested in having kids – yet – plenty of time – anyway – she has her eye on the senior partner, wife passed away some years ago and….he has a house in Tuscany, Lauren loves all things Italian

They ALL believe that they deserve ALL of the things I mentioned in the first part, not want, not are prepared to work for, not even things they would be willing to sacrifice anything for – nope – they DESERVE them.

The reason they believe they DESERVE any and all these things?

Because they are WOMEN.

Time to mention the feminists. All of our gal pals took some women’s studies classes in college, and they were told that as women, they DESERVED anything and everything their little ole hearts desired, without working for it really, because as women, they join a long line of other women who have historically been deprived of all those things. They were also told that nothing they did was ever wrong, or their fault, because they live in a world where men dominate them, oppress them and stand in the way of their empowerment. That life was a constant struggle, as women, to be heard, to be taken seriously, to be allowed to reach their potential.

Oddly at the same time, they were told they could DO anything, BE anything, HAVE anything they wanted, in fact they DESERVED all this, as payback for the terrible things done to woman since Adam was a boy, the most important thing they took away with them into their “adult” lives was this, in direct opposition to the first part, that each and every one of them was a special and unique creature of incomparable beauty, ability, intelligence and accomplishment. In fact, that were awesome.

Because they were WOMEN.

Let’s catch up on our gal pals shall we?

Susie is unhappy, she doesn’t really know why, she knows that Megan and Lauren thought she was mad to get married straight out of college, and are always putting Brad down, she does too, Brad doesn’t seem to have any ambition, or not the kind Susie thinks he should have – he likes being outdoors, and has his own landscaping company, which he inherited from his father, and works with his two brothers. She hates her job, in her heart of hearts she knows she’s just a glorified secretary. She hates her house, it’s just an ordinary house, needs some work, and has been trying to get Brad to agree to move, get a huge mortgage to finance a bigger house in a more upscale neighbourhood.

She’s in a bit of a dilemma, she wants kids, but she wants that big house, first, even if she does have kids she’ll have to keep working. It’s all Brad’s fault for being so irritatingly easy going, and not giving her EVERYTHING she wants. His niceness really really irritates her. Why does she have to share the profits of the business with Brad’s brothers, and Brad’s annoying and boring stay at home mom, sisters – in law. God they’re so boring.

Megan is also in a dilemma, no matter what she does with her “Women in Business” groups, the vast majority of them fail, and the women keep coming back for more and more micro finance, with more (don’t let anyone hear me say this) daft ideas for businesses that just won’t work. The last relationship she had was a disaster, he didn’t want “to commit” and expected her to PAY HER WAY, on dates. He made fun of her job and the women she worked with – and then – Oh my God – try to “mansplain” to her the mechanics of business, so what if he was a business major in college – he just didn’t understand women. That only lasted 3 months. Good riddance.

No way was she going to tolerate some man “mansplaining” to HER. She’s going to check out this sperm donor thing over the next few weeks. What Megan doesn’t know is that that dose of Chlamydia she caught in college, what with all the – exploring her sexuality – she did in college, has damaged her fallopian tubes. Irreversibly.

She is worried about coming off the pill, on it since she was a teenager – acne – what if her acne comes back? Though it was cool being on the pill in college, never ever forgot to take it, so even on that one occasion, or was it two or three? when she got a bit drunk at that party and hopped into bed, condomless, with …………what was his name again? Anyway, it didn’t matter. Yep – come off the pill, wait 3 months, get some sperm, then aim to have this child around March next year, will give her time to get herself organised. Hope it’s a girl, boys are so noisy, and grubby and icky, hmmmm, can always terminate and try again if it’s a boy.

Lauren is oblivious to anything but her own ambitions – she has been working on her five year plan since leaving college – she does the pro bono work for her “Empowering Women With Law” group because of what happened in college. The incident. That party. That creep. The police didn’t believe HER! So what if she was drunk, so what, that everyone at the party saw her sticking her tongue down that creep’s throat and dragging him by his tie into the bedroom, heard her laughing and shouting “do it to me” do it to me” Bastards. They recorded it.

Time to make her move on Mark Darcy, the senior partner, she’s tired of living in her one bed apartment, she wants a house in upscale Poshville, and that villa in Tuscany, she heard he had. Of course it never occurred to her to find out anything at all about Mark Darcy. That he has been seeing a very nice widow from his bridge club, that he signed over the villa in Tuscany to his children, (less a villa and more his grandparents old family home) that he and the nice widow are planning a summer wedding, just a small family wedding, with all her extended family and his extended family.

That he is not renewing Laurens contract because he and the rest of the senior partners are sick to death of all the harassment accusations, the constant demands for special conditions, the way Lauren treats the juniors and paralegals. Nope. Everyone in the firm is sick of her. She has to go. Her contract is up for renewal in 3 months, and the firm DOES need to downsize.

What all three have in common is that they are completely oblivious to anyone else’s needs, anyone else’s interests, anyone else’s anything – they DESERVE whatever it is that they want, be it a job, a house, a man, respect, loyalty, career advancement, children – ANYTHING.

Because they are WOMEN.

© Anja Eriud 2014

NB. For the hard of thinking – I made these women up – they are fictional, a conglomeration of innumerable women I have known and observed over a long period of time. So, for any women who happen to be called Susie, Megan or Lauren and think this is about you – GROW UP! And grow a brain.