POCKET-SIZED FEMINISMThe only other girl at the party is ranting about feminism. The audience:a sea of rape jokes and snapbacksand styrofoam cups and me. They gawkat her mouth like it is a drain clogged with too many opinions.I shoot her an empathetic glance and say nothing. This house is for wallpaper women. What good is wallpaper that speaks? I want to stand up, but if I do, whose coffee table silencewill these boys rest their feet on? I want to stand up, but if I do, what if someone takes my spot? I want to stand up, but if I do, what if everyone notices I’ve been sitting this whole time? I am guilty of keeping my feminism in my pocket until it is convenient not to, like at poetry slams or my women’s studies class. There are days I want people to like me more than I want to change the world. There are days I forget we had to inventnail polish to change color in druggeddrinks and apps to virtually walk us homeat night and mace disguised as lipstick. Once, I told a boy I was powerfuland he told me to mind my own business.Once, a boy accused me of practicing misandry. You think you can take over the world? And I said No, I just want to see it. I just need to know it is there for someone. Once, my dad informed me sexism is dead and reminded me to always carry pepper spray in the same breath. We accept this state of constant fear as just another part of being a girl. We text each other when we get home safe and it does not occur to us that our guy friends do not have to do the same.You could saw a woman in halfand it would be called a magic trick. That’s why you invited us here, isn’t it? Because there is no showwithout a beautiful assistant? We are surrounded by boys who hang upour naked posters and fantasize about choking us and watch movies we get murdered in. We are the daughters of men who warned us about the news and the missing girls on the milk carton and the sharp edge of the world. They begged us to be careful. To be safe.Then told our brothers to go out and play.
Blythe Baird
feminism