The Women’s Corner: The word “feminist” is not an insult

If you have been reading my column long enough, you can probably tell that I associate myself as a feminist.

Now, my definition of a feminist is any person who is helping women be seen as equals in society. Where all women are treated fairly, and we get the same opportunities as men. And that’s what I thought was the known definition of feminism. But there are people in this world that took that and turned it into an insult.

I went to go look up the web’s definition, and came across a very different outcome. “Urban Dictionary” is a common source for today’s generation because any person can write their own definition based on their own experiences. These opinion based definitions show the most popular ways people think. And clearly, people have taken the word feminism and turned it into a vulgar word that now resembles an insult.

The second top definition is, “a sexist, male hating individual, solely concerned with female supremacy and the denigration of all males and boys . . . a male hater of the first degree.”

This just baffles me.

But what really got my anger stirred up was a comment saying, “the simple solution to stopping a feminist is to slap them stupid, order the bitch to get back to the kitchen and make you a … damn sandwich, followed by preventing her from leaving the kitchen, just as nature intended.”

This is not the 1940s, get your own dang sandwich you pig!

Feminism is not about male bashing at all. It is about women being seen as an equal to men in every form of life. I don’t hate men. I don’t think women are better than men. I believe, like any other feminist, that men and women are equal and should be treated as such. This is not a weighted scale, it is a level playing field.

I made this column to give a platform to women, because you don’t see those often. I write because there are topics that I want to discuss from a woman’s perspective. But never do I want readers to take my words and appoint that it is hateful towards men. That is not what this is for.

All of my columns this year are written because I felt a pull toward that topic, and I wanted to share it with my fellow peers. None of which are meant to degrade men or put women higher on the scale.

I don’t want people taking from my columns that I hate men or that all of them are terrible. Because they’re not. Like everything in this world, there is good and bad in all situations.

Feminism is a word that I proudly use to describe myself. It is not an insult, nor is it an adjective that says women are better than men. We are equals, and that’s what we want to be seen as. Someday, we will be equals in every aspect of our lives, and I hope that I have somehow contributed to that.

Tabitha Barr is a Nickerson freshman studying Media Communications and Production

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