Rhysand: I taught Tamlin the finer points of females and intricate flirting techniques.

Tamlin: YOUR HAIR IS CLEAN.

Rhysand: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Rhysand: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Rhysand: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Being uniquely privileged to be growing up in an urban, well-off, metropolitan area, every International Women’s Day I am forced to explain this over and over again.

The plight of feminism isn’t just the plight for equal opportunity vis-a-vis education or job opportunities, least of all in small, unrepresentative areas.

It’s turning down an offer to go out with friends because at the end of the night you’ll have to walk home alone.

It’s blasting music, TV and lights when ordering take-out so the delivery person doesn’t assume we’re home alone.

It’s being told we have it easy because in the end we have to do nothing more than marry rich to ‘make it’ in life.

It’s smiling too much and smiling too little and never wearing dresses and wearing dresses too much and being unfashionable and being so fashionable we’re a slave to the media.

It’s purchasing a magazine we don’t want in a store we never intended to enter, just to make sure the figure walking behind us for 3 blocks straight isn’t following us.

It’s seeing a sexual predator dominate every (inter)national headline daily.

It’s earning less than a male counterpart for twice the effort and 1,5 times the hours.

It’s the term feminazi.

It’s having to explain this at all.

It’s the fact that these circumstances still paint a picture of the height of privilege among young women worldwide.

It’s not having to struggle to come up with anecdotal instances to list - but having experienced or witnessed all of the above in the past week. 

Feel free to add your own. Feel free not to read it at all. Feel free to agree or disagree. But don’t feel free to suppose any mention of gender inequality is unfounded and inflammatory.

It’s been a long road, and there’s still a long road ahead.