I don't want to be sexist. But, according to understandingprejudice.org, I have a very high rating of something called, "benevolent sexism." What the? (You can find out more here)
I know. I'd never heard of that either. However, I'm now very disturbed and want to try hard not to be that.
From there, I learned some things that will forever change the way I perceive women.
Now, here's one reason why my friend (and understandingprejudice.org) think that I'm sexist: I've decided to only give money to homeless women and not homeless men. Something that I thought was pretty noble, maybe even a little endearing. But, sexist? Woah.
I feel like I've been taught to revere women and, often times, place them on a proverbial pedestal. However, apparently that's a very sexist thing. Not hostile sexism, which is what people traditionally think sexism is, we're talking about benevolent sexism.
"Benevolent sexism may seem harmless, noble, or even 'romantic, but its effects can be devastating. Benevolent sexism, like hostile sexism, is an ideology that supports gender inequality."At the end of the day, I don't want to be any sort of sexist. I'm against gender inequality and I would love to understand this more. In the meantime, I think I'm making progress by at least accepting and acknowledging this. That's the beginning, right?
4 comments:
If that is the worst thing you do, I think you are doing just FINE. :) It's waaay better than unrighteous domninion in a calling, wouldn't you say? ;)
P.s. Something that changed my mind forever in giving money to homeless people. I once said to my friend Weedus, "I never know if they are really going to spend it on food or whatnot." She said, "To me, it doesn't matter. If they spend it on food - fantastic! If not, I still did the Christ-like thing."
:) I'm glad home teaching was as good for you as it was for us! I think it was two hours well-spent, don't you? :)
And here, read this: http://sawasnow.blogspot.com/2011/10/call-me-feminist.html
I think those tests are kind of inaccurate, by the way. I just took both the race and gender tests, and I just thought they weren't the most credible. You may be benevolently sexist, but I think you need to use some other tools besides those tests to definitively say that. We could go into more depth on the topic of test validity later, but for what it's worth, I think the test has some serious problems. :)
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