Riding the Third Wave

I’m a member of a movement that barely exists. Logically, I would be labeled a “third wave feminist.” One of very few. There are like-minded women and men my age out there. There must be. I’ve met a few of them. With our level of education these days and our state of hyper-connectedness, you’d think we’d have figured it all out by now. I’d like to tell you that we’re working on it—on all of it, poverty, injustice, discrimination of all shapes and sizes—but it doesn’t really seem like we are. And here I am, the living, breathing, blogging proof of what I think is wrong.

It used to take work to make a public statement. And it used to take work to support that statement. Now, all I have to do is post my new blog entry on my facebook and I feel like I’ve contributed to my cause. And all you have to do is ‘like’ that post and you feel like you’ve supported. In the olden days there was no ‘like’ button, no blog, no twitter, no forum for ideas at our fingertips. People had to write letters to the editor, to their senators, they had to march and sit and organize to feel as if they’d done something to further the causes they cared about.

Trust me, I’m aware of the humor inherent in blogging about this issue.

A few weeks ago, HBO aired a piece about Gloria Steinem called Gloria: In Her Own Words. It featured clips and photos from throughout her life and was completely narrated by Gloria herself by way of archive interviews and such. I was green with envy throughout the film. March after press conference after article after protest. I want to do that! I want to carry a sign. I want to spend a day out on the street, miserably uncomfortable, surrounded by a bunch of people. I want to make the ignorant mad. I want to ruffle feathers, because the people who make change always do.

There are people that wonder what it is I’m so mad about, why I feel so full of fire sometimes and hopeless others. When we were sitting down to watch the Steinem documentary, my mom said: “See, Emma. Things have gotten much better since the sixties. We’ve come a long way.” How right she is! But there is still more to do. That’s why I love the term ‘wave.’ First-wave, second-wave, third-wave feminism. Waves rush in with collective fury, and once they reach their apex, they pull back, floating, content, and ultimately falling back into the next wave that surges onto the shore. And each wave wears down the rocks they roll over until those rocks become powder. What a boulder we began with. We had no rights. That first wave brought us the vote. The second wave eroded ignorance surrounding women’s intellectual and professional potential, sexual assault, societal expectations, and so much more. And that leaves me. A woman of the third wave who just registered to vote and is preparing to enter the work force for real. This third wave needs to wash away that whole 75 cents to the dollar thing and for GOD’S SAKE rid us all of the dehumanizing and pervasive sexualization of women and the crippling obsession with our bodies.

I want to do it like out mamas and grandmamas did it. I want there to be the kind of radical shift in thought that comes from real human-to-human, face-to-face discussion, no screens or keyboards or wi-fi involved. I want to know what it feels like to stand in a crowd of men and women that want the same kind of change that I do. After unsuccessfully clicking around the internet in search of any kind of demonstration or organization that would have me, I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m probably going to have to figure something out myself.

So once I find my outlet, you will be the first to know. And hopefully you will join me. I can’t make much of a wave all by myself.