"Freedom,
freedom, open your wings on us".
This is the chorus of an old samba, which title and performer I cannot
recall.
Before
shocking you all, I warn: yes, I know,
this phrase also belongs to the Republican Anthem's lyrics.*
Much have
been said about equality between men and women.
Nevertheless, women's right to freedom is seldom commented. Everybody repeats that equal rights have been
already achieved (!), there's a talk about "post-Feminism", but there
certainly are events in which inequality is evident, taking dramatic
proportions when woman wants to be as
free as men are.
We are not
yet.
Feminism has brought us suffrage,
equal rights (in most western countries) guaranteed by the constitution (in
countries with a codified constitution) and the law (civil and common law),
access to labour market and many achievements.
However, most of Feminism (at least Feminism in Brazil) has not yet
dared to break up with certain domineering concepts about women, that
constraint and restrain our freedom, like:
women's idealization, compulsory altruism, consecration of maternity and
the reproach of women's individualism, of sex and pleasure.
We have not
been raised for freedom. We are not
admited neither in collective, neither
in individual exercise of freedom. Our
mothers were against our freedom. Most
women are against their own freedom.
There has
been much ado about breastfeeding's nature - is it a right or a duty? Women have the right to choose whether to
breastfeed, whether not to. However,
there are women (many of which believe themselves feminists!) who do not agree
with this statement. Yes, women have the
right to put themselves first in their own lives, above motherhood
inclusive. Yes, they have the right to
be individualistic, and State, society, family and friends ought to respect
such choice.
Women
against freedom hate free women. The
she-wolves. The untaming. The wild and almighty hearted ones.
Our hearts
are our freest part. In it, we can be
and do everything!
Women who
are freedom's enemies are those who do not understand this. Their hearts cannot be or do everything. Maybe their hearts are capable of
nothing. Who are them?
Those who,
afraid of having homosexual sons, raise their boys as rude
"machos"; those women who say, "I'm not a feminist, I'm
feminine"; those who find
acceptable that women be discriminated on the grounds of their marital status, divided between “mrs” and “miss”; those who are against equal freedom to both
sexes; those who raise their sons and
daugthers differently, granting the former much more freedom; those who believe that mothers must put their
children first, above themselves, and that women cannot be as individualistic
as men; those who speak in such a
honeyed tune that sounds humiliating;
those who accept discriminatory and humiliating rules for women.
They are,
above all, those who don't want to change, paying freedom's price, which is to
take one's own history in the hand, to take care of themselves and not be
sustained by a man. This demands hard work,
study, courage, work, work, struggle, struggle.
How can a woman, for example, become a judge, if she doesn't work, but
depends on a man? How can a woman
complain about politicians, if she fulfills her mouth to say she hates politics
and snorts when her father, husband or companion watches a TV program on
politics? If she despises suffrage,
painstakingly obtained? There are lasses
who'd rather give their voters' id to their "lords" to vote for
them. If a woman believes herself as
superior by adopting dependant and alienated behaviors such as these, she's a
freedom's enemy.
The world
is full of women that feed sexism's fire, with attitudes compatible with
femininity's negative stereotype. And
how many reactionary women there are! They were the ones who took Brazilian streets,
in 1964, in “Family’s Parades With God For Freedom”. This helped the coup d’État that stablished a military dictatorship which would
last more than 20 years and make hundreds of fatal victims. Once a man phoned me to tell me he knew more
women “right to lifers” than men. If
this perception is real, I cannot say. Years
ago, when Ellen Gracie Northfleet was the only woman Justice at the Brazilian
Supreme Court, she voted against the possibility of interrupting pregnancies of
brainless fetuses. In April 2012, the
Brazilian Supreme Court (with 2 women Justices now) stated that such
interruptions did not violate the constitutional right to life, in an 8 to 2
judgment.
Very
well. We must take Feminism over, but to
make it into a movement effectively committed
with women’s liberation; also, with
men’s liberation. Our Feminism has not
gone beyond half freedom’s way: it ought
to break up with women’s and men’s idealization; it has to propose female’s condition overcome,
so we can reach human condition. How
come, Simone Andréa?
Women have
to stop wanting to idealize themselves, trying to prove men that they are
“superior” to them; that they are “more
sensitive”, “less selfish”, “more solidary”, “stronger”, because this only
brings us more burden and less actual freedom.
I’ve already given an example of this, “breastfeeding dictatorship”,
because women have not yet dared to break up with female’s condition mandatory altruism,
with motherhood’s consecration. Women
and men have equal right to enjoy life.
We ought to take a brave position on this, repelling any purity our
santity’s ideal, but admitting that we are human beings, sexual beings, and
that this is important for us.
More: we have the right to choose
whether we will do it, with whom, when and where. We have the right to live free from prejudice
and gender-based discrimination; the
right not to listen to sexist jokes or alike;
of being treated as adults, not as big children; of being competitive, ambitious,
aggressive; of daring to fight and win.
Ultimately,
we have the right of being regarded as human beings, not being dichotomized as
“saints” and “she-devils” as we’ve been so far:
on the one , the friendly freedom’s traitors; on the other, those who dare to be free.
*Anthem composed to celebrate the Proclamation of Brazil as a republic, which occurred on November 15, 1889, overthrowing the constitutional monarchy of the Empire of Brazil.
