A rant
So I was going to post about the past 36 hours. And then some comments about the Young Women's program on L's latest post pissed me off.
Slow-motion pillow fights? WHAT THE HELL?
I can't say I enjoyed everything about YW. However, I can say from experience that it is a good program that teaches young women to understand and value womanhood. If you haven't been through the program (read: if you are a man), don't tell me what the young women do. Don't tell me they spend all of their time having pillow fights and making lists of what they want their husbands to be like. Don't you DARE presume to tell me what the YW program entails. That program doesn't teach those stereotypes--it teaches us to be real women. Just because we aren't boy scouts doesn't mean we didn't do difficult things. I learned a lot of boy scout type skills through the YW program. I went on fat hikes and became CPR-certified and completed the 70 hours worth of projects and the other 42 required activities to complete the Personal Progress program. I was taught that I am a daughter of God.
Shame on you men out there that think the women of the Church sit around sewing or having slumber parties. Shame on you men that contribute to the demeaning female stereotypes of the world. We are your equals (if not your superiors) and we deserve your respect.
My intended post will come later. For now I must calm myself and go to sleep.
posted by Stephalumpagus @ 1:09 AM
5 Comments:
Can I still pretend there were slow-motion pillow fights? Pleeeease? I've been enjoying my delusions.
If you want I could have it be pillow fights interrupted with learning how to tie knots. That's pretty much what boy scouts was.
That's the other thing...what is it with men and daydreaming about us having pillow fights in our underwear? I've been asked several times if that's what we do at sleepovers. I don't know what gave them that idea...or maybe I just missed out on every typical girly sleepover there ever was. That's fine with me, really.
If it makes you feel any better, I never envisioned the YW having slow-motion pillow fights.
I must say though, it was a little insensitive. I was kind of disturbed as well. It's sad that people who demand respect because they area minority of sorts would stoop to this level of demeaning another class of people. I don't think they realized what they were doing. Personally, I didn't learn much in scouts - probably not as much as you learned in YW. And I'm an Eagle Scout.
Thanks for standing up for yourself though. You go girl! (That sounds sooo gay!)
Sounds like you learned at least as much in YW as I did in scouts. Probably more. But I'm no eagle scout. I scrapped scouting pretty early on for various reasons.
As for the pillow fights comment, I think it really was just meant in good fun, but believe me, I know how comments made in good fun can still aggravate and sting.
I do have to say that I have several female friends who have told me that though there were token life-skills activities, for the most part YW did over-emphasize the "girly" things like cooking, sewing, and focusing all your attention and identity on becoming a wife and mother. Now those are all very practical and noble for someone who is, actually, going to be a wife and mother, and I understand the indignation of certain female friends when people say "cooking and sewing" as if they're stupid skills. But many YW groups, from what I'm told by my girly friends, focus on the housewife identity to the extent that many of my female friends have felt aimless and confused when they reached 25 and were still single through no fault or shortcoming of their own.
It just really depends on the YW leaders. And probably where you live, especially rural vs. urban/suburban?
To be fair, we probably should also make some joke about scouts tying knots all day. Or mudwrestling naked. ...or thinking the highlight of a campfire is "putting it out the scout way".
Yeah it's true that YW's focuses on a lot of domestic/mom-type activities. I was just mad (because it wasn't just the pillow-fighting comment; there was more than one). I usually don't get all touchy about stuff like this (or anything at all--it takes a lot to make me mad). I was just venting. Thanks for your comments though!
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