Raise your hand if you’ve ever heard the word misogyny.
Keep your hand raised if you actually know what misogyny means.
Keep your hand raised if you know what internalized misogyny is.
Most hands are down
and unfortunately, that’s exactly what I expected.
Whenever I told someone
that I was doing a TEDx talk on internalized misogyny,
I usually got the same response:
a blank stare, a forced smile, an aggressive nodding,
which put together looked a little like this
(Laughter)
but simply meant that they were confused
and for my sake, they were going to pretend that they understood.
For me, this was quite troubling
because internalized misogyny
is a topic that definitely needs to be talked about more.
Most people know that misogyny is the dislike or the contempt of,
or any prejudice towards women,
but not many people know what internalized misogyny is.
When a boy says something misogynistic,
such as, “Well, shes strong for a girl!”,
or a man catcalls a woman,
feminists are quick to call him out on the injustice,
but when the insulting words are said by another woman,
the reaction is not reciprocated.
This is where internalized misogyny comes in.
Internalized misogyny is prejudice towards women by women
and the justification of misogynistic acts and ideas.
I’m almost sure that at least once in their lifetime,
women will experience internalized misogyny.
Although, I personally, seem to exude a lot of confidence,
I often wonder what do other girls think.
Do they like me?
Am I good enough?
I strongly believe that if women were kinder to each other,
girls would feel more confident in their own skin.
(Applause)
In 2012, 16-year-old Gabrielle Douglas
was lighting up the Olympic stage
as one of the best gymnasts in the world.
She won two gold medals, however, throughout the Olympics,
people weren’t talking about her amazing acrobatics,
but her hair.
People were very harsh, saying things
like, “So nobody wanted to go to London to do Gaby’s hair?”
and, “She shouldn’t be the stand down in all those commercials
until she learns to get her hair done.”
In 2016, the Olympics were held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Once again, Gaby Douglas attended,
and once again, she was met with loads of critiques on her hair.
Possibly the worst part wasn’t the criticism that she was getting,
but who her critics were.
Most of her critics were fellow women.
No woman should have this type of criticism,
let alone a woman competing at the highest stage of the Olympics.
Unfortunately, the media seems to boost internalized misogyny.
We often see, gorgeous women gracing covers of magazines.
However, the final photo is rarely the original.
Before being published,
there is often tons of retouching and photoshopping done to the picture.
This gives women an unrealistic and idealistic image
of what a woman should look like,
and in turn, they project this on to themselves and other women.
The active ingredient of what a woman should look like
starts at a young age.
Many television shows aimed at tweens and teens
have that one character
who’s less intelligent, overdramatic, and narcissistic.
More often than not, that character is also a woman.
On “The Suite Life of Zack and Cody,”
a show that I personally watched all the time – I was obsessed with it -,
they had a character named London Tipton.
She was very narcissistic, she was overdramatic,
and she really wasn’t very smart,
but she was portrayed as fun, popular; everybody loved her.
They also had a character named Bailey Pickett.
She was focused on her academics and later career,
yet, she was portrayed as a nerd, boring.
This gives young girls
who definitely take into account what television shows say
as if it’s their own life,
the impression this is what a woman should look like,
this is what a woman should act like.
In a classic movie, “Mean Girls,”
Regina George and her friends have an entire book known as the burn book
devoted to insulting other women.
Although we all laugh at the funny jokes kept inside the burn book,
it actually normalizes internalized misogyny.
We shouldn’t keep women’s identities inside a box,
we shouldn’t judge them based on their masculinity or femininity,
we should learn to embrace their unique qualities
and embrace our own unique qualities.
One of the worst parts about internalized misogyny
is that, because most women don’t know that they exist,
they also don’t realize that they are doing it themselves.
I’ve given several examples of what internalized misogyny looks like,
but there are less clear examples as well.
When we look at another girl’s Instagram photo
and immediately judge her based on what she looks like,
that’s internalized misogyny.
Although there is probably no way
we can ever completely eradicate internalized misogyny in our society,
there are several things we can do to move in that direction.
First, simply knowing that internalized misogyny exists
is the first step.
When women say phrases like, “I’m one of the guys,”
or “I don’t have any friends who are women because they are all overdramatic,”
that is misogynistic,
so we need to be more conscious
of what we are saying and the generalizations we are making.
Try to walk a mile in the other woman’s shoes,
whether she wears heels or snickers.
When you hear someone say something misogynistic,
call them out, use it as a teaching point.
For the men in the room, wondering what in the world this has to do with you,
it does.
You can help, too,
whether you are a father, brother, husband, or son,
you can help by empowering women
and helping break down stereotypes.
Most of us, myself included,
have experienced or contributed to internalized misogyny firsthand.
But my goal now is to empower women and build them up
rather than breaking them down.
At Ursuline, I’m a part of its sisterhood.
This sisterhood has inspired me
to want a sisterhood that reaches across the world.
Ladies, before asking men to treat us with more respect,
let’s start treating her with more respect,
and her with more respect,
and her with more respect.
(Applause)
Let’s start treating each other with more respect
and let start that right now.
Thank you.
(Applause)
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