“What It Really Means When You Say, ‘You’re So Pretty’” by Kelly Shepherd

I believe that women deserve to be treated equally to men and shouldn’t be held back by the unspoken “rules” of society. I recognize this because unknowingly, I am judging the girls around me in a way that I am truly ashamed of. I look around me and I see every single girl in this school trying to find her place, whether it is that she wants to be noticed or she wants to be in the background. Both are completely fine, and these girls that I pass in the halls every day are going through things very similar to what I am going through. They should be able to express themselves and figure out who they are without the opinions of those who aren’t entitled to ones affecting the way that they act, dress, or carry themselves. Every girl that I see has a different style and a different way that they carry themselves. While these things may seem completely opposite at times, we are all affected by the media. Every day we hear, “You need to be skinny, but still curvy. Tall but not too tall”, so every single day we look in the mirror and we compare ourselves to the celebrities that we see in the movies, on TV, or on the stage and we look at the body types that are the opposite of our own. What I see around me are girls that change themselves so that they will appear attractive, sexy, or even smart to people that do NOT matter. Our whole lives we grew up hearing “oh you’re so pretty”, which is a kind thing to say; however, this statement causes us girls to think about what makes us cute or pretty rather than things that are more important, like our intelligence.

Women’s bodies are sexualized and we are brought up thinking that we cannot show our skin because it might be taken the wrong way. At school, where we are supposed to be learning how to be accepting and treat others in a way that we want to be treated, there is a dress code that says you cannot show your shoulders. This is only true for women though, I look around and I see guys in muscle shirts, showing their shoulders. Why is it that when a girl shows her shoulders, it might be distracting to our male classmates? These guys that we grow up with only hear that women’s bodies are a distraction and it is our fault for deciding to show our skin. This belief that guys have that the way that we dress makes them irresponsible for their own actions is similar to the reasoning that some rapists have that the girl was “asking for it” because of the outfit that they wore. I am not saying that this is a direct cause and effect relationship because not every guy is a rapist; however, I am stating that men should be held just as accountable for their actions as women are.

Young women grow up seeing unrealistic ideas of beauty everywhere that they look. We try to stay positive and think, “We are perfect just the way we are”, however it is extremely difficult because all over the tabloids and the internet, we see headlines like “How to Lose That Belly Fat” and “Are you Beach Body Ready?”. Society is contradicting itself when they say love yourself then have headlines like this. At the end of the day, women need to be able to express themselves in a way that makes them happy, no matter how society sees them. I believe that if society lets up on the extreme body images portrayed and stops airbrushing models in the magazines, women will be able to feel comfortable in their own skin again.

"This I Believe: Feminism" by Sam

This December, Advanced Composition students studied, wrote, and recorded audio essays. Students wrote and recorded their own "This I Believe" essays inspired by the weekly This I Believe Podcast. While we're publishing the text of each essay below, we strongly encourage you to listen to each student's audio essay for a more intimate experience.

Middle School sucks. It’s a time of awkward social interactions, figuring out where you fit in, puberty, and mean kids so you shouldn’t be surprised that I don’t often find myself thinking about my middle school years. Yet here I was, sitting at my desk remembering my frustration in my sixth grade science class with the history of the DNA model. “Watson and Crick created the first DNA model with the help of research from scientist Rosalind Franklin” read the textbook in front of every one of the sixteen students in the class, but my teacher soon enlightened us that Franklin did more than just “help”. Watson and Crick used the information without her consent and took all the credit while she literally died for her work by contracting cancer through radiation poisoning. 

I remember bubbling with anger at how unfair it was that they went on to win a Nobel Prize for the discovery of DNA and other awards for research that they didn’t even do. Yet somehow, even with the public knowledge of their, essential thievery, these two men are still revered in the science community while Franklin is a name almost forgotten, an add-on to the story of Watson and Crick. She had done all the work and they took the credit by simply putting it into 3D form. I was so angry I couldn’t help but asking my teacher why she wasn’t the one getting the recognition, or why Watson and Crick didn’t get into trouble. He just shrugged it off like the rest of the world seemed to have as well, and we continued trudging through the rest of the content. Although I wasn’t thinking about it at the time, I believe this to be one of the first instances of me becoming a feminist.

This is world is unfair. It is unequal and unjust, especially when it comes to gender roles. I believe in “the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes” as Beyonce puts it in the interlude of her song “Flawless”. How is it fair that men get paid more than women? Why is that men can’t cry in public and women can’t be tough? People should be allowed to be who they want to be and do what they want to do… this is America for godsake! People don't fit into cookie cutter stereotypes. They are unique individuals who shouldn’t be bound by what society says. Unfortunately we’ve all contracted a disease, one that is embedded deep, even in the small things in our culture.  

In commercials or ads women are portrayed as frail, helpless beings with unattainable perfection. Damsels in Distress. The women in my life aren’t like that. My grandmother lived behind the Iron Curtain, endured years of oppression, managed to escape with her family of five, and not only survive but thrive in America. My mother is one of the strongest people I know. She came to this country not knowing a single word of English and in less than four years was studying in one a prestigious college, even earning one of the very few spots available to study abroad in her junior year.

It saddens me when my nine-year-old sister doesn’t think she can do something because it is too boyish, or that girls shouldn’t try that, and as much as we may try this problem goes too deep to be a simple fix. People need to open their eyes and culture needs to change its outlook because as I see it, things right now aren’t right. This movement is happening, and although we have a long way to go and it may take years upon years I believe, as a nation, we can achieve equality for all.