Response to Article, "After Class, Skimpy Equality," by Lisa Belkin

Last year, I took a class called “Leadership in a Diverse Society.”  In that class, we discussed many social divides, including those that exist between men and women.  I am not naïve about that topic.  I feel very strongly about female empowerment, especially because I want to be taken seriously both in an academic environment and in social settings.   This article was both appalling and fascinating to me.  I find it interesting that women have progressed so greatly in the past twenty years, in terms of overcoming obstacles in the academic realm, yet so many aspects have remained consistent in the dynamics of male-female relationships. 

            This article made me reflect on my own experiences with the concept of receiving respect in the academic realm.  I was in an advanced placement European history class last year, in which I was one of three girls in a class of thirty students.  The boys constantly challenged my contributions to class discussions, and I came to the conclusion that, for the most part, the boys in my class did this only to make themselves feel like they could match me (or beat me) intellectually.  So I started to wonder – why are boys so intimidated by intelligent women?  Is it because intelligent women make boys feel lesser?  Boys are generally physically stronger than women, so do boys assume that this physical quality automatically entitles them to the right to be “stronger” in an intellectual sense?

As this article also examined, women do tend to tear each other down just as much as they belittle themselves.  The subject is complicated – while I agree with the statement that women use their sexuality to their advantage, as Jared Griffin commented in his interview for this article, I also think that men present women with unfair social expectations.  These are standards that cause women to target other women with snide remarks and behind-the-back, hurtful comments.  From my perspective, many of these comments are fueled by jealousy.  Women tend to want to out-do other women so that they can be seen as more desirable to men, but in doing so, many women degrade themselves in the eyes of men.  So, evidently, a horrible cycle is exists in our society.  I hope, though I don’t know when this might come to fruition, that this cycle might someday be broken.